Send Karl Rove to Jail

Posted by Liliana Segura, AlterNet at 12:24 PM on July 18, 2008.

Earlier this afternoon, on the premiere episode of Brave New Films' new show, Meet the Bloggers, I joined Firedoglake's resident Karl Rove expert Marcy Wheeler, along with Baratunde Thurston of Jack and Jill Politics to discuss a question most of us can probably agree on: Should Karl Rove Go to Jail? For so many reasons, I said "yes." But ultimately, the real issue up for discussion was not whether he should be held accountable, it is whether there is any chance on earth he will.

Many others have written intelligently and at length about Karl Rove's recent no-show before the House Judiciary Committee -- most notably Marcy, who has blogged exhaustively on the whole thing. But the short of it is this: The HJC issued a subpoena for Rove back in May. He had until July 10 to appear, to discuss, broadly speaking, his role in the vast politicization of the Department of Justice (which includes the U.S. attorney firings, the illegal hiring practices at the DoJ, and the prosecution of Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman.) Instead, Rove had his lawyer send the committee a letter, dated July 1, in which he "respectfully" refused to appear, claiming immunity -- a sort of "executive privilege on steroids" according to one highly reliable source -- and, just to be especially villainous and brazen, skipped town.

Watch this short video for a crash course. The main point? Karl Rove broke the law.

"By ignoring the Judiciary Committee subpoena," House Judiciary Chair John Conyers wrote on Huffington Post, "Karl Rove and the White House once again showed their utter disregard for our system of checks and balances, for Congress as a co-equal branch of government, and ultimately for the American people."

The question that now confronts the Judiciary Committee and, ultimately, the full House of Representatives, is what action to take in the face of such blatant defiance of the rule of law. As Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, I am considering all options.

This would be interesting -- tantalizing, even -- if it were to come true. After all, in theory "all options" would ultimately include leaving Karl Rove at the mercy of Congress's in-house security guard, the legendary "sergeant at arms", who would then drag the dastardly Turdblossom bodily to the Congressional jail.

But, as Arianna Huffington recently opined, that's probably not going to happen.

Odds are the Committee will move to hold Rove in contempt. The matter will then be turned over to the Justice Department -- the same Justice Department Rove is accused of politicizing -- which will likely do the same thing it has done with Harriet Miers and Josh Bolton, i.e. nothing. The matter will then be tossed to the courts… and Rove will go on pontificating on Fox and advising John McCain. Pretty sweet set up."

In the closing moments of the show, Baratunde brought up Rove's disgusting hypocrisy when it comes to the rule of law, as a hatchet man for an administration that supports a criminal justice system that warehouses more and more Americans each year. "Most of the growth in U.S. prison population has come from non-violent drug offenses," he writes. "… Rove must be held in contempt and must go to prison, preferably an overcrowded, unhygienic, violent outpost where he can experience a small taste of the horror that he's helped inflict on others."

Amen.

So, what can be done? Rather than leave it to Congress to truly hold Rove accountable, sign this petition to pressure members of the House Judiciary Committee to hold Rove in contempt and send him to jail. As Meet the Bloggers producer Robert Greenwald writes: "We've never had such a direct opportunity to hold Rove accountable."

Watch the premiere episode of Meet the Bloggers here.

Liliana Segura is a writer and activist and on the cast of Meet the Bloggers.