Yes, I know, I haven’t been blogging about politics as much lately. I’m in one of those periodic burn-out modes. I have maybe a half-dozen half-finished posts that I can get back to at some point, and a few topics–like a look at Roe v. Wade, or what “strict constructionism” is supposed to be–that I plan to get to soon. But when I ask myself, what should I blog on, the idea of delving into any of the current stories seems less than appealing to me at the moment.

But how about a quick rundown of the top two stories?

Roberts is looking a little bit less confirmable with new information that both is and isn’t coming out. After raging at the Clinton White House for not releasing every last document about everything, the Republicans are being even skimpier with their own sharing of paper. Specifically, what Roberts did in his job as the Justice Department’s deputy solicitor general under Bush 41. The reason? Violation of privileged information. One problem: Roberts was representing the people of the United States. Or at least he was supposed to be. Otherwise, all documents released from that time and from his time working as counsel under Reagan will be released after a strict screening process–which, of course, means that they’ll withhold anything that could hurt his nomination. Josh Marshall points out quite aptly the right wing’s indefensible argument that the White House should have access to more information about Roberts than Congress will get. Otherwise, what we learn of Roberts is yet more and more that he has been an extreme partisan, including his figuring prominently in shutting down the vote count in Florida in 2000. Well, Katherine Harris got her payola. Why shouldn’t Roberts get his, eh?

Rove & Plame: in a nutshell, everyone knows that Rove & Libby were spreading the story about Plame being a CIA operative. It now appears that the source of the information was very clear that she was undercover and that the information must not be shared. Now there are so many versions of what happened from Rove and Libby and McClellan and Novak and others that contradictions abound.

In a nutshell: the White House doesn’t give a rat’s ass about intelligence when there’s a political point to be won. Case in point: in August 2004, the Bush White House ordered a fake terror alert, one of a series of many timed to take attention away from John Kerry whenever the news started going his way. The August leak, timed just a few days before the Democratic convention, was based on the claim that evidence found on one Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan’s laptop computer indicated a plan to attack financial buildings in New York, New Jersey and Washington D.C. These claims were false, the “solid intelligence” trumped up. But in an effort to bolster claims of the legitimacy of the terror alert, the Bush administration leaked Khan’s name to the press.

Now, why is that a big deal? Because Khan was a computer expert working for al Qaeda. He had many connections within that organization, and could potentially have access to information of priceless value. When he was arrested in July 2004, his arrest was kept a secret and Khan worked secretly as a double-agent–our greatest known source within al Qaeda. Under cover, Khan’s value to anti-terror intelligence was immense. But then the Bush administration, in order to defend a political lie, blabbed the name of the covert operative to the press. Sound familiar?

So Khan’s cover was blown. The intelligence agencies handling him scrambled to arrest his associates, the al Qaeda people they might have used to find the leaders of the organization and further terrorist plans, but many got away. The ones who were captured escaped full prosecution because not enough evidence had been collected to fully convict them of their crimes.

What’s worse, the data on Khan’s disks in fact did not point to American targets–the data did point to British targets, and the Pakistan ring’s cover being blown by Bush has been connected with the recent subway bombings in London. In other words, had Bush not leaked Khan’s name, the attacks in London could have been found out and stopped before they happened. This blog does an excellent job of explaining the whole issue. And not that this is anything new for Bush, he’s got experience allowing terrorists to succeed because he’s trying to play politics.

But maybe Bush and Co. feel vindicated: after all, the real enemy, John Kerry, was defeated. And if all they had to do to secure that victory was to let go their intelligence on capturing and stopping al Qaeda, and putting civilians’ lives at stake, then maybe they feel that it was worth the price paid. Outing secret agents to secure the political agenda certainly seems to work as far as the White House in concerned.

Which vital national security source will the Bush White House expose to win their next political victory?

Stay tuned!