Karl Rove’s attorney, Robert Luskin, has been one of the more entertaining elements of the seriously entertaining Rove-Plame saga to this point, grabbing the lead from White House spokesman Scott McClellan, whose struggles with the White House press corps have degenerated into poorly wrought Kabuki.
Luskin, on the other hand, brings a delightful sense of spontaneity to the affair.
On July 6, Time Magazine reporter Matt Cooper was preparing himself to be sent to jail for refusing to reveal his source for a July, 2003 story in which he said administration officials had noted that Valerie Plame, former ambassador Joe Wilson’s wife, ” is a C.I.A. official.”
A few days earlier, Newsweek’s Mike Isikoff followed up on an assertion by MSNBC commentator Larry O’Donnell that Rove was Cooper’s source. Luskin, said Isikoff, had confirmed that Rove spoke to Cooper a few days before columnist Bob Novak outed Plame, but said Rove “never knowingly disclosed classified information” and “he did not tell any reporter that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA.”
As soon became clear, Luskin’s words were carefully chosen. But the morning Cooper was saying goodbye to his family, Luskin was quoted in the Wall Street Journal as making a much more broad disclaimer: “Karl didn’t disclose Valerie Plame’s identification to anyone. That’s not a technical statement. That’s as practical and direct as I can make it. So if Matt Cooper is going to jail to protect a source, it’s not Karl he’s protecting.”
Rove was, of course, the source Cooper was protecting, and he and his lawyer took Luskin’s comments as an invitation for Cooper to abandon the confidentiality pledge. And within a few days, a Newsweek report made clear that Rove had in fact identified Plame to Cooper: Someone at Time had given Isikoff a Cooper email in which Cooper told his editor, “it was, KR said, wilson’s wife, who apparently works at the agency on wmd issues who authorized the trip.”
Those words were like Viagra to a White House press corps that has been flaccid since Bill and Hillary Clinton moved out of the White House. McClellan had told them it was “ridiculous” to think that Rove had anything to do with the leak, that if anyone in the administration did have anything to do with the leak they would “no longer be in this administration,” and that Rove, Elliott Abrams and Lewis Libby had personally assured him they had nothing to do with the leak (as indeed they may have done).
The press took the revelations as a personal insult. One of their own, Judith Miller, was in jail, another had barely escaped, their friend, benefactor and ritual tormentor, Scott McClellan, had betrayed them, and it was Karl’s fault. So they went nuts, and they’ve stayed that way ever since, and it’s all thanks to Robert Luskin and his expansive ways.
Since then, Luskin has been a staple of the press diet. Sometimes under his own name, sometimes anonymously, he continues to parry every attack on Rove with either an exculpatory interpretation of emerging details — Rove wasn’t trying to trash Wilson or his wife but rather to save Cooper from pursuing a bad story, and an ungrateful Cooper “burned” Rove in return — or by tossing out other names for the press to chase after, as happened to National Security Council deputy (now chief) Stephen Hadley.
Luskin is if not the Forrest Gump of this tale, at least the box of chocolates.
The unbearable lightness of Luskin
A fine thing, you might say:…
Mr. Luskin may not be a dumb as you think. I used to laugh at stupid legal defenses like Mr. Rove did not break the law because he disclosed Ms. Plame not by her maiden name, but by her married name, or President Clinton did not commit perjury because that depends on what the meaning of the word “is” is. But the older I get, the less I laugh. In fact, I have come up with a saying for just this sort of occasion:
What strikes me as incompetent is that he managed to precipitate the press storm. If he hadn’t opened his mouth, Cooper would have gone to jail and there wouldn’t be any official confirmation that Rove was Cooper’s source. Instead, he’s had to walk back his previous statements, subjected McClellan to probably months of abuse and sparked a leaking war between him and other Rove defenders on the one hand, and counter-leakers on the other, that has kept the thing on or near the front pages for weeks. If Rove does get indicted for something, it’ll probably be at least in part on the strength of information provided by one of the people Luskin is attempting to toss to the wolves.
Apparently, Mr. Rove has decided not to invoke his 5th amendment privilege. As a result, he has testified or will testify that he “leaked” the name of “Joe Wilson’s wife” to Mr. Cooper and possibly to other reporters. Bearing that in mind, nothing has been revealed that would not otherwise be revealed. Perhaps Mr. Luskin misspoke or spoke too soon, or perhaps Mr. Rove lied to Mr. Luskin. (I doubt the latter since no one could be that stupid, and certainly Mr. Luskin has unequivocally advised against lying under oath.)
I suspect, therefore, that Messrs. Luskin and Rove are relying on a “lack of intent” defense or some other legal maneuver to avoid Mr. Rove’s indictment. That’s why I dusted off my saying about Justice and the Law. If, however, you prefer a more recognizable quote, try this one:
I don’t know whether that particular quote truly applies here, but I like it anyway.