Insulating Bush: 2004, Plame, Rove, Hadley, & a potentially damaging memo

[johnfunk]

Once again, Murray Waas uncovers another piece of the story surrounding the outing of counterproliferation NOC Valerie Plame:

PREWAR INTELLIGENCE
Insulating Bush
By Murray Waas, National Journal
© National Journal Group Inc.
Thursday, March 30, 2006

Karl Rove, President Bush's chief political adviser, cautioned other White House aides in the summer of 2003 that Bush's 2004 re-election prospects would be severely damaged if it was publicly disclosed that he had been personally warned that a key rationale for going to war had been challenged within the administration. Rove expressed his concerns shortly after an informal review of classified government records by then-Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen J. Hadley determined that Bush had been specifically advised that claims he later made in his 2003 State of the Union address -- that Iraq was procuring high-strength aluminum tubes to build a nuclear weapon -- might not be true, according to government records and interviews.

So, it was about keeping the public from knowing that there were serious doubts about aluminum tube intel, among other things!

And how? Rove got between a highly classified paper warning Bush that Iraq intelligence was phonier than Anna Nicole Smith's hooters -- so the boss wouldn't know the truth!

The plan was simple: discredit Wilson by destroying his wife's cover in a cheap attempt to claim nepotistic collusion, blame the CIA, and coopt the press.

Heckuva job there, Hadley and Rove!

Read it all here.