- Top Features:
- War Room
- Glenn Greenwald
- Broadsheet
- Joan Walsh
- Camille Paglia
- Since You Asked
- Follow Salon:
Read other letters about this article
Probably the most telling feature of this scandal is the comparison to Watergate. Perhaps everyone is right. The cover-up that is worse than the crime leads, in both cases, to much larger issues, among them the expose of an administration obsessed with only one thing: remaining in power. There is one parallel, however, that is the most worrisome: the aftermath. Watergate left the nation confused and divided, disenchanted with the office of the President that has gone too far. And though it may be argued that we were pretty well divided even before the Valerie Wilson issue broke, it's clear that the main aftermath of this scandal will also be confusion, division, disenchantment and dismay.
This is the first irrefutable proof of something that 50% of the nation suspected all along: that this administration played us for fools ever since the Towers fell. The phony "intelligence" that sold us on the Iraq war is just part of the brazen boo-politics used by our leaders to line their pockets and set up their cronies with cushy jobs in the government. It is one thing to suspect one's administration of fraud, it is a whole another thing to see proof of it.
For the people who voted against Bush in 2004, the Plame affair confirms their worst fears. For the people who voted for Bush in 2004, it is a nasty wake-up call. The President who rode to victory as the champion of "moral values" presides over a cabal of liars, cheats and thieves. The administration which was elected because people trusted them on national security spent innumerable man-hours dismantling our national security network. The people who are supposed to be competent at their job turned out to be nothing but a gaggle of petty criminals.
And that is probably the most damaging legacy of the Plame affair: our relization that for the last five years we've been ruled by a gang of thugs. It sucks to be us.
