Some of us spend New Years nursing a hangover. Some spend it
getting a hangover (otherwise known as watching the Michigan Wolverines get spanked in the Rose Bowl). Bush, however,
spent the day quail hunting. Also in attendence: Bush Sr. and family hit man James Baker.
That's what makes me wonder whether hunting Cheney, rather than hunting defenseless game birds, wasn't actually on the agenda.
I speculated in the Plame Affair threads that the Administration might be allowing the investigation to go forward, with a tenacious prosecutor at the helm and Ashcroft no longer stewarding it, because they actually
want it to nab the culprit. I further speculated that such an investigation might be the easiest way to rid the Administration of some of its members that are no longer useful. Obviously, Scooter Libby (or Liddy, as Kos slipped) and his boss Cheney are two of the prime cultprits for the Plame leak. So I was basically speculating that maybe the recent movement in the Plame affair was an attempt to get rid of Cheney.
I floated this yesterday as pure speculation. But I'm beginning to convince myself it's not a bad speculation.
There have been rumors about a lot of people being gone in the event of a second Bush Administration: Wolfowitz and Powell most notably. But if you want to get rid of the people who are really f*cking up Iraq, you need to get rid of Rummy and Cheney. I think it'd be doable to get rid of Rummy (indeed, it seems that efforts to rearrange the reporting structure in Iraq have effectively neutralized Rummy). But getting rid of Cheney seems to present a whole lot of problems. (I made the analogy to a man giving himself a lobotomy--but I really think it has more to do with some dirt Cheney has on Bush.)
But it seems like the powers that be are making efforts to do just that. This Jim Lobe article goes into detailed speculation about whether or not Cheney is on his way out. It notes specifically that Baker and Brent Scowcroft are in on the discussions.
Anyway, if I'm right (and if they succeed at using the Plame affair to get rid of Cheney), then it will have several ramifications. First, the Bush Administration may get less incompetent. But probably not in a qualitative way before the election. Second, Bush can run with someone who could do more for the Republican side of the ticket (such as Rudy Giuliani). Third, Bush will turn what could have been a career-ending scandal into an opportunity to grab the moral high road (well, only kind of, but that's closer he's been to that road than ever before in his administration.)