1. Harriet Miers withdrew from consideration for a seat on the Supreme Court.
2. Scooter Libby, from Dick Cheney's office, was indicted on counts of Perjury and False Statements.
It's been a good week for the Bush Administration.
On the face of it, these both look like disasters. And they are. But the disaster happened a while ago. In the Miers situation, the disaster happened when she was nominated; in the Libby case, the disaster happened when Fitzgerald opened his investigation.
Once those things happened, the Bush administration was going to face some stuff. But this week both crisises have turned out to be bad, but not as bad as they could have been (for the Bushies). Rove wasn't indicted and may not be. Nobody was charged with actually outing Valerie Plame (or Valerie Wilson as she is named in the documents). Harriet Miers withdrew because the White House refused to turn over documents, and not because of a massive split between the White House and the Conservative Base (or at least that's the official story).
It's possible both of these stories could reverse themselves. Fitzgerald could hand down further indictments. Bush's next pick for the Supreme Court could be just as problematic (well from my perspective it almost certainly will be). But for today, things are going better than they might have for the Bush Administration.
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