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Waxman Wants Former Rove Aide to Testify about Politicization
It's time for another round of "Which Office or Agency is the White House Politicizing Now?"
House oversight committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-CA), having recently brought to light the politicization of the surgeon general's office, is shining a light on the nation's drug czar. The czar, John Walters, and his deputies traveled on the taxpayers' dime to 20 events with vulnerable Republican members of Congress in the months prior to the 2006 elections, according to a committee press release. Not only that, but several of the trips were "combined with the announcement of federal grants or actions that benefited the districts of the Republican members." If government officials were using government funds to help elect Republicans, that would be a violation of the Hatch Act.
You can guess who was behind all that GOP-boosting travel: Karl Rove. Waxman says that Rove's former top aide Sara Taylor was the point person, and so he wants her to testify before his committee. He's requested that she appear for a deposition July 24th and raises the possibility of a hearing on July 30th. Taylor, you'll remember, just testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week about the U.S. attorney firings.
Taylor, like Rove and his other aides, gave briefings to a number of agencies throughout the government about which Republican candidates were in danger of losing reelection. When questioned about those briefings last week, she was evasive. The White House has claimed that the briefings were only "informational" and that agency employees were not directed to take actions to benefit GOP candidates.
Waxman has uncovered emails, however, that show the White House's enthusiasm for using agency heads as political props. Among them is an email (pdf) that describes a proud Karl Rove boasting after the 2006 election that the drug czar's office and officials from the departments of Commerce, Transportation, and Agriculture had gone "above and beyond the call of duty" in making "surrogate appearances."
Comments (20)
KestrelBrighteyes wrote on July 17, 2007 12:33 PM:Is that another "executive privilege" bell I hear ringing?
No way they're gonna let Sara Taylor out again, not after that last disastrous appearance.
P J Evans wrote on July 17, 2007 12:44 PM:“Every tree we look up has a cat in it!”
Still true.
At some point we should run out of either trees or cats, but clearly we haven't gotten there yet.
Anonymous wrote on July 17, 2007 12:52 PM:I hope Waxman persists in his efforts to dislodge Rove's many clandestine e-mail networks.
The ONDCP coordination e-mail that TPM sites talks about the 72 Hour Project, which was an RNC-run activity. And, of course, the 72 Hour Task Force had a website, co-located down in Chattanooga, TN with the Rove-mail system (gwb43.com) and all the other ones. The RNC owned the .com, .org and .net domains for 72 hour. They've since sold off the "com".
See how 72hour.org still fits in the RNC infrastructure:
www.robtex.com/dns/72hour.org.html
Pay a trip down memory lane when 72hour.com was still active:
Anonymous wrote on July 17, 2007 1:15 PM:web.archive.org/web/20040926230335/http://www.72hour.com/
Did the e-mail from DOI to WH Political Director Matt Schlapp get sent to Sclapp's EOP.GOV or gwb43.com address? The printed copy only shows Sclapp's name.
Steve5117 wrote on July 17, 2007 1:35 PM:I wonder how Sara, Karl and Fieldman feel about Waxman's references to various e-mails and letters that have probably been provided to the committee by insiders. Where's the Plummers Unit when you need them.
Keep all the political appointees busy trying to cover their asses so they can't screw-up anything else. Career service people can keep the system in idle while the hearings go on.
Impeach Bush / Cheney 07
ifthethunderdontgetya wrote on July 17, 2007 2:13 PM:=>Among them is an email (pdf) that describes a proud Karl Rove boasting after the 2006 election that the drug czar's office and officials from the departments of Commerce, Transportation, and Agriculture had gone "above and beyond the call of duty" in making "surrogate appearances."<=
Translation: Broke the law.
Cali4nian wrote on July 17, 2007 2:25 PM:I'd like to see someone connect the dots -- all these scandals coalesce into one large scheme -- keeping the repubs in power and running the governemnt for their cronies and cronies' cronies.
Anonymous wrote on July 17, 2007 2:37 PM:Also of interest on the House website is another internal e-mail from ONDCP political official James O'Gara to Doug Simon, ONDCP White House Liaison.
In the e-mail, O'Gara lauds Simon for:
"...making yourself so available (after hours and offsite, naturally) to help plug people in to the relevant machinery..."
http://oversight.house.gov/documents/20070717104252.pdf
After hours. Offsite. Yeah, right.
illlich wrote on July 17, 2007 2:47 PM:When I first heard Rove had talked about a "permanent Republican majority", I laughed. But now I see-- he had a plan all along to ensure that majority: politicize departments, find sneaky ways to side-step the Hatch Act, "voter fraud", and probably more ideas that haven't seen the light of day.
Anonymous wrote on July 17, 2007 2:55 PM:ONDCP White House Liaison, appears to have been well picked and well placed guy to violate the Hatch Act.
According to this older bio:
http://www.cosn.org/resources/international/2002_trip/delegation.cfm
"...As Vice-President of Hockaday Donatelli, a political consulting firm in Alexandria, VA, Doug brought to his clients an expertise in utilizing the Internet to raise money and communicate a message. As an Internet professional, he understands the need for creative application and ongoing technological innovations to maximize the Internet's potential.
Prior to joining Hockaday Donatelli, Doug was Sales Director at eContributor.com. He was responsible for designing successful Internet fundraising campaigns. His clientele consisted of universities, non-profit organizations, political campaigns and political action committees. Before eContributor.com, Doug worked under Ohio Secretary of State and Chairman J. Kenneth Blackwell at the United States Census Monitoring Board..."
Former Ohio SecState Kenneth Blackwell was of course the villain in the 2004 election, disenfranchising voters and curiously routing Ohio's election results through SmarTech Corp in Chattanooga - the backbone of Rove's clandestine e-mail network.
Simon's connections to Blackwell need to be considered here.
illlich wrote on July 17, 2007 2:57 PM:It also occurred to me recently that there are only two things missing here that would make this blow up like Watergate: hard evidence (like a tape recording) that can't be "spun" by Bush/Cheney, and someone within the Bush administration with an actual conscience (like John Dean), who would actually tell the truth if asked under oath.
Of course I'm sure there IS hard evidence, but Bush/Cheney have managed to keep it under wraps, and as John Dean himself has noted, these are "conservatives without conscience."
Anonymous wrote on July 17, 2007 3:01 PM:And no surprise, but Doug Simon's old political firm, Hockaday Donatelli (now known as Campaign Solutions) hosts their system with SmarTech Corp of Chattanooga, TN.
http://www.robtex.com/dns/campaignsolutions.com.html
SmarTech Corp also hosts:
-- all RNC tech enterprise infrastructure
-- Rove's clandestine gwb43.com e-mail domain
-- Holtzman-Vogel law firm's activities (they ran the fraudulent American Center For Voting Rights)
Anyone sensing a pattern here?
JNagarya wrote on July 17, 2007 4:54 PM:Is that another "executive privilege" bell I hear ringing?
No way they're gonna let Sara Taylor out again, not after that last disastrous appearance.
Posted by: KestrelBrighteyes
Date: July 17, 2007 12:33 PM
"They" actually have no control over whether she appears, as we've already seen: she was "directed" by Bushit not to testify, and she testified. The precedent having been set, that "directed" business is out the window, at least for Taylor.
As I've said here many times, Congress has much more hard evidence than it is revealing. And it isn't complicated as to why: the gov't is a seive. Throughout the Federal bureaucrazy -- the Executive brnach and administrative agencies -- are individuals who "whistleblow" as a matter of routine. Anonymous calls are made to Congress, anonymous passings of internal documents, etc.
One of Richard Clarke's "rules": gov't can't keep a secret. From whom, as example, did Congress get its copy of Rove's power point presentation?
So, as ever, those who demand action from Congress on this or that, and whine and bash Democrats becauethey don't see anything, haven't a clue as to how the gov't, and Congress, function.
blackpropaganda wrote on July 17, 2007 4:55 PM:Is Waxman wise to proceed so carefully? If he were a (cough) U.S. Attorney building a case against the Mafia, this would be the way to go. But, here, in a race against time, I wonder.
It reminds me of a chess game, in which a positional player faces a gambiteer. Waxman is playing perfect positional chess, but Rove can sacrifice pieces, and hope to win on time. And as anyone who has studied chess knows, the way to refute a gambit is to accept it; and the way to punish a poor move is with a poorer one. There is no reason to maintain a perfect pawn structure when you have the king on the run. Now is the time to sacrifice, and to attack!
And so, if my analogy bears out, then Waxman is not wise. He is a pawn-pusher, a patzer, content to count the pieces and afraid to win the game.
JNagarya wrote on July 17, 2007 5:04 PM:"If government officials were using government funds to help elect Republicans, that would be a violation of the Hatch Act."
It would also be a breach of faith -- and an obvious misuse of taxpayer monies outside the Hatch Act violations.
We need to add to separation of church and state, separation of taxx monies and /unelected public officials.
As for Taylor being evasive. Yes -- but: under close questioning by Whitehouse (D-RI), she not only appeared bored with the issue, as if it was so common and routine it was no big deal. And, as he allowed her to ramble in answering one question, she stepped into it by designating the practice "political," then quickly backtracked in effort to get back onto the line she'd been talking on and all around to being with: that it was "only informational".
Of course, even if it were "only informational," it would be prohibited -- and unnecessary: voters can determine for themselves who they're going to vote for, even if they work in the Federal bureaucrazy.
JNagarya wrote on July 17, 2007 5:09 PM:When I first heard Rove had talked about a "permanent Republican majority", I laughed. But now I see-- he had a plan all along to ensure that majority: politicize departments, find sneaky ways to side-step the Hatch Act, "voter fraud", and probably more ideas that haven't seen the light of day.
Posted by: illlich
Date: July 17, 2007 2:47 PM
See the Siegelman case for another method -- this one entirely outside Bushit's inflated ego/"Executive Privilege" claim.
SC = wound. As in, Exposure of the explosive fraudulant prosecution, conviction, and imprisonment of Siegelman should be a mortal Wound to the Bushit criminal enterprise.
TomPaine wrote on July 18, 2007 12:11 AM:Jill Holtzman Vogel is running for a state Senate seat as a Republican in the coming 2007 elections. Send any information you have about her to Steve Pazmino at the state Democratic Senate caucus.
TomPaine wrote on July 18, 2007 12:20 AM:Holtzman Vogel is running in Virginia; send information to:
Citizen 92 wrote on July 18, 2007 12:45 AM:http://vadems.bluestatedigital.com/pages/senate_democratic_caucus
One of Waxman's documents is an e-mail from a Bill Kloiber to White House Political Director Matt Schlapp.
http://oversight.house.gov/documents/200707171041
Kloiber, at the time at Interior, praises Sclapp for a White House political presentation at Interior and goes on to say that "these people sometimes need to be reminded who they work for."
Showing his true stripes, Kloiber resurfaces in April 2006 as GOP Congressman Mark Green is facing a heated race for Governor of Wisconsin against incumbent Democrat Jim Doyle.
Not surprisingly, Kloiber shows up with a Veterans' Administration check and poses with Green and a few locals.
http://dva.state.wi.us/Courier/2006/2006APRILcourier.pdf
There he is, on the right. Another Rove strategy? Sure smells like it.
JNagarya wrote on July 18, 2007 7:53 AM:Is Waxman wise to proceed so carefully? If he were a (cough) U.S. Attorney building a case against the Mafia, this would be the way to go. But, here, in a race against time, I wonder."
1. There is plenty of time to impeach.
2. Is the Bushit criminal enterprise not comparable to the Mafia?
3. Yes, Wiseman, being a lawyer, and a junkyard dog at investigation, is building a case, connecting the dots, so he can lay out for We the people the nature of the case, as fully as possible, in part on circumstantial evidence, in a way that reveals most or all of the picture so it is easily comprehended.
"It reminds me of a chess game, in which a positional player faces a gambiteer. Waxman is playing perfect positional chess, but Rove can sacrifice pieces, and hope to win on time. And as anyone who has studied chess knows, the way to refute a gambit is to accept it; and the way to punish a poor move is with a poorer one. There is no reason to maintain a perfect pawn structure when you have the king on the run. Now is the time to sacrifice, and to attack!
"And so, if my analogy bears out, then Waxman is not wise. He is a pawn-pusher, a patzer, content to count the pieces and afraid to win the game."
One thing Waxman isn't is afraid to win. This isn't a chess game; it is democratic due process of law.
Posted by: blackpropaganda
Date: July 17, 2007 4:55 PM