(National) Guarding Bush: Did Karl Rove Leak Forged Documents to 60 Minutes?
nyc.indymedia.org
by Mike Burke
10 Sep 2004
The big buzz on the Internet and in the papers over the past 24 hours has been the fallout from the "60 Minutes" story this week on President Bush's service (or lack thereof) in the Texas National Guard. In particular, scores of blogs and Matt Drudge have honed in on accusations that documents obtained by "60 Minutes" bolstering the case that Bush did not fulfill his duties were faked.
The dominant thinking seems to be that if the documents were forged, they were leaked in an effort to harm Bush. But it is worth considering another possibility: the Bush team itself may have "leaked" the forged documents. The whole affair seems to bear what is known as "The Mark of Rove," as in Karl Rove, senior advisor to President Bush; Karl Rove the grand wizard of dirty tricks.
The big buzz on the Internet and in the papers over the past 24 hours has been the fallout from the "60 Minutes" story this week on President Bush's service (or lack thereof) in the Texas National Guard. In particular, scores of blogs and Matt Drudge have honed in on accusations that documents obtained by "60 Minutes" bolstering the case that Bush did not fulfill his duties were faked. The right wing FreeRepublic website posted this theory:
"Every single one of the memos to file regarding Bush's failure to attend a physical and meet other requirements is in a proportionally spaced font, probably Palatine or Times New Roman. In 1972 people used typewriters for this sort of thing (especially in the military), and typewriters used mono-spaced fonts."
The post went on to say, "[T]hese documents are forgeries, run through a copier for 15 generations to make them look old. This should be pursued aggressively."
It should.
The dominant thinking seems to be that if the documents were forged, they were leaked in an effort to harm Bush. But it is worth considering another possibility: the Bush team itself may have "leaked" the forged documents. The whole affair seems to bear what is known as "The Mark of Rove," as in Karl Rove, senior advisor to President Bush; Karl Rove the grand wizard of dirty tricks.
It is commonly known that one of Bush's greatest weaknesses in the presidential campaign is Vietnam. While John Kerry fought in the war and earned (deservedly or not) three Purple Hearts, a young George W. Bush enlisted in the Texas National Guard with help, it turns out, from then-Texas Speaker of the House Ben Barnes. Barnes, of course, was a central figure in the "60 Minutes" story, as he admitted for the first time to the media to intervening to get Bush into the Guard and keep him out of Vietnam.
As investigations by the Boston Globe and others have uncovered, Bush's military record was shoddy at best, criminal at worst. He may be the first president who could have been tried for going AWOL. To counter Kerry's "war hero" image, Bush supporters have launched an attack campaign on Kerry's record in Vietnam, questioning his account of his service. They have also portrayed him as having betrayed veterans when he spoke out against the war in 1971 in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
If Rove is behind the leaking of the "forged" documents shown on "60 Minutes", it could well be phase two of a strategy to kill all criticism of President Bush for his record during the Vietnam War era. If the documents turn out to be fakes, the story will no longer be about Bush's military record but about who forged the documents. In fact that is essentially what is happening already. It won't be long before fingers start pointing toward the Kerry camp.
If you think this sounds like a nutty conspiracy theory, you probably haven't been following Karl Rove's career; a career replete with dirty tricks and sophisticated, preemptive political strikes.
Remember the allegations that Bush was arrested in 1972 on drug possession charges, specifically cocaine? Today it is basically a non-story. But it is worth looking back at why.
In 1999, St. Martin's Press published a critical biography of Bush titled "Fortunate Son". The book quoted an unnamed "high-ranking advisor to Bush," who revealed Bush's 1972 drug bust. The source told author J.H. Hatfield, Bush "was ordered by a Texas judge to perform community service in exchange for expunging his record showing illicit drug use."
Hatfield later revealed that his source was none other than Karl Rove. That might seem ridiculous, considering Rove's lifelong loyalty to the Bushes and the fact that he now has an office adjacent to Bush's in the White House. But leaking the story to Hatfield essentially discredited the story and sent it into the annals of conspiracy theory. Soon after the book was published and just as St. Martin's was preparing a high profile launching of the book, the Dallas Morning News ran a story revealing that Hatfield was a felon who had served time in jail. In response, St. Martin's pulled the book.
"When the media stumbled upon a story regarding George W. Bush's 1972 cocaine possession arrest, Rove had to find a way to kill the story. He did so by destroying the messenger," says Sander Hicks, the former publisher of Soft Skull, which re-published "Fortunate Son."
"They knew the stories of Dubya's cocaine and drink busts would come out, so they made certain that it would come out of the mouth of a guy they could smear," said journalist Greg Palast, who wrote the forward to the final edition of the book.
If Rove was Hatfield's source, he certainly wasn't trying to expose Bush's drug use. Instead he was trying to discredit and ultimately kill the story. And it worked. Few reporters since have dared to touch the story.
Consider also the history of Rove's dirty tricks, chronicled by James Moore and Wayne Slater in their book "Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W. Bush Presidential."
In 1986, according to the book, Rove told reporters that someone had bugged his office where he was campaign manager for Texas gubernatorial candidate Bill Clements. On the morning of a major debate Rove called a press conference. He said, "Obviously I don't know who did this. But there is no doubt in my mind that the only ones who would benefit from this detailed, sensitive information would be the political opposition." The press quickly assumed the bugging was done by Clements' opponent, Mark White, who was leading in the polls. By election day, Rove's candidate won and the source of the bug was never found -- but many reporters later concluded that Rove himself had placed it.
Four years ago during the Bush-Gore race, the Gore camp mysteriously obtained sensitive campaign materials from the Bush campaign including a video of the Texas governor prepping for a debate and detailed campaign strategy notes. Rove soon accused the Gore campaign of secretly taping Bush. Later a former employee of a Bush campaign adviser admitted supplying the information to Gore.
In trademark fashion, Rove's role in the case was never clear. He never leaves fingerprints behind. It is known as the "Mark of Rove."
It may well have returned in the form of Times New Roman font on some forged documents.
Mike Burke is a producer for the national radio and TV show Democracy Now! He can be reached at mike@democracynow.org |
