Froomkin and Fitzmas

The Cheney Factor [WPOST]

Fitzgerald is expected to wrap up this week, possibly tomorrow. Libby and Bush senior adviser Karl Rove are widely seen as most likely to be indicted.

This may all be a bit of inside the beltway baseball. I've been around the blog world long enough to know that many people who are staunchly Republican have no idea who Karl Rove is. And as a VA resident, currently embroiled in a tight gubernatorial race, I know of red patriots who are hot on the death penalty issue and Tim Kaine's catholicity, but probably have not connected any faith based analysis to Mr. Bush's nomination of Harriet Miers.

So it seems entirely appropriate that while the clock ticks away on Plamegate an entirely new season of politicking called Fitzmas should ensue.

The ground has already been softened and expectations lowered so that the American public can grasp that our public servants, leaders, and administration aren't necessarily criminal in their actions. But they certainly are incompetent (think FEMA's Micheal Brown), dishonest and callously misleading (think WMDs), and ethically questionable (think Tom DeLay, Bill Frist).

So if Mr. Bush or his crony matrix end up on the news with eerily familiar sound bites of "I am not a crook" and you're thinking this is deja vu all over again...believe it.