Our unsettled issues

When I wrote my first column a year ago, I explored one of those unsettled issues that keeps coming back to haunt American politics: Vietnam. We as a nation are still dealing with the cultural chasm caused by that tumultuous period — we still fight those battles over and over again. Controversies over gay marriage, sex education and intelligent design all have their roots in the discord of the 1960s. Today, we see another one of those issues coming to the surface: the intelligence failures before Operation Iraqi Freedom. Although smaller and more recent, the divide over whether "Bush lied" is one of those issues that just refuses to die (a full two years on), far after it has any tangible impact on current policy.

As Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald unsealed his indictment against Scooter Libby, many on the left began to salivate. Although the big target, Karl Rove, remains uncharged, blood ran into the water. Could this be the opportunity to stick it to the Vulcans for their royal screwup in the Middle East? Could the cunning mastermind behind two divisive Republican victories finally get his due? Karma for people in Rove's position is rarely fun, and it seemed that the man thought to be responsible for smear campaigns across the nation could be getting what he deserved in a way the left couldn't manage to pull off in two separate elections.

Pull off the rose-colored glasses, as this story has nothing to do with the war. Ambassador Joe Wilson (of yellowcake notoriety) has been making the rounds on the Sunday morning talk shows, but his 15 minutes of fame are up. This story is about perjury, obstruction of justice, lying to a grand jury and the naming of a covert operative — nothing more.

These are serious allegations, especially coming from an individual as highly placed and respected as I. Lewis Libby, who has served his country on-and-off for years. Many Republicans, however, do not seem to understand the severity of the problem. Conversations with conservatives on and off campus show just how little they're bothered by the whole affair. One told me Libby got busted simply because Fitzgerald had to indict someone on something. The person then went on to blame the entire situation on how much bureaucrats at the CIA and State Department hate the President. When told that Robert Novak revealed the name of a CIA front company that covered other agents working the Middle East, another shrugged and said that if there had been any real ramifications, we would have heard about them by now.

But Republicans should be more concerned about this than anyone else. Weren't they the ones who, a short 10 years ago, tried to expel Clinton from office for "just sex"? Now that the tables have turned, it is somewhat ironic how many people who supported impeachment back then are brushing this off now, and yet none of the people I talked to could justify the differences of opinion between 1996 and today. Truth is, it wasn't just sex then, and it isn't just amnesia now.

To add insult to injury, it was Bush who tapped the typical outsider's mantra in his 2000 campaign — let's clean up Washington. Pledging to use morality AND legality in making decisions, Bush picked up voters sick of both Clinton's subjective definition of sex and politics as usual inside the Beltway. This is the morality that the President invoked in the campaign? The party of accountability? The party that supports our intelligence community? This White House is long overdue for a housecleaning, and the bigger the better. Harry Truman had it right — the buck stops at Oval Office.

That said, none of this should play any role in Democratic strategy. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) was just hurting herself and her party when she went on TV to note that this White House is getting its due for bringing the country into Iraq on apparent false pretenses. As much as it would feed Howard Dean's ravenous desire for red-state blood, the Democratic Party should never re-fight WMD-gate. The Democratic Party must realize that if the "Bush Lied" argument hasn't resonated with the American people yet, it probably never will. Democrats should instead zealously strive to keep the independent counsel process nonpartisan (and as such, Fitzgerald appears to have been a wonderful choice) and focused on the actual issue at hand, while desperately trying to refine a clear, coherent and positive message for America's future. After all, from Congressman DeLay to Senator Frist to Harriet Miers, Republicans seem to be losing enough battles on their own these days. Matthew Gold is a politics major from New York, N.Y. He can be reached at mggold@princeton.edu.