On the salivation scale, this past week has been a veritable
drool-fest for those who inhabit the newsrooms, editorial desks,
and websites making up the liberal media world. The Sunday talk
shows were awash in liberal glee; a level of happiness not seen
since before a certain blue dress avoided a trip to the
cleaners.
With perennial whipping boy Tom DeLay possibly on his way to the
woodshed, Dr. Bill Frist’s finances under examination, and good
soldier Harriet Miers taking friendly fire, liberal hopes are at a
new high. But the real cause for jubilation is the anticipation
that special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald’s probe into the Valerie
Plame affair will lead right up to the doorsteps of Bush
puppet-masters Karl Rove and Dick Cheney.
This tantalizing sugarplum dancing in liberal heads naturally
brings back memories of that ravishing glory known as Watergate. To
liberals of all ages — particularly those in the media — the
golden age of America was bookended by their twin triumphs:
campaigning to end the Vietnam War and bringing down the man who
ended it.
Not even the sainted FDR’s New Deal-brand of quasi-Socialism can
light up the eyes of the left as can recollections of the days of
Fonda and Hayden or Woodward and Bernstein. Their vanity is such
that all subsequent events — chiefly those that involve
Republicans — be viewed through the narrow lenses of Watergate and
Vietnam.
And that is why, excepting the eight years of the Clinton
administration, any U.S. military action is instantly dubbed
“another Vietnam” and thus doomed from the start. After this
pronouncement is made, the usual media suspects kick in with the
prescribed propaganda campaign while the movement’s foot soldiers
take to the streets.
Clinging to their decades-old playbook, they provide a steady
stream of depressing stories and unfounded theories while
constantly playing up our casualties. Hence, preparations by the
“peace movement” are underway to conduct “events”
across America to commemorate the death of the 2,000th American
soldier killed in Iraq.
News of that milestone will be trumpeted loud enough to drown
out the fact that the sacrifice of our troops has allowed the Iraqi
people to approve a new constitution; an opportunity to live in
freedom and peace. Thanks to an earlier intervention by the peace
movement, millions in Southeast Asia never got that chance.
Meanwhile, the Fitzgerald investigation has conjured up what the
left sees as its perfect storm: another Watergate and Vietnam, this
time for the Bushies. At least that’s what veteran Watergate
reporter Lesley
Stahl thinks. Others have also hoped against hope for this
since the Plame story broke two years ago.
While some may link what they believe is the Bush
Administration’s use of executive power to silence or discredit its
enemies to Richard Nixon’s, it is odd that this comparison was
almost never applied to Bill Clinton during his constitutional
unpleasantness. Indeed, it seemed the only mention of Watergate by
the liberal media during the Clinton Impeachment was to suggest
that the motive of congressional Republicans was payback for
Nixon.
And so this week, with the imminent death of the 2,000th
American soldier in Iraq and the hoped-for indictments from
Fitzgerald, the left-wing glee club is singing from the rafters.
Even though the Iraqi people have proved that the sacrifices of our
troops have not been in vain and that there might be no action at
all from Mr. Fitzgerald. But don’t take my word for it. Take it
from Watergate poster-boy, John Dean, who said last week that, excluding
perjurious acts,
I cannot imagine any of them being indicted, unless
they were acting for reasons other than national security. Because
national security is such a gray area of the law, come next week, I
can see this entire investigation coming to a remarkable
anti-climax, as Fitzgerald closes down his Washington Office and
returns to Chicago. In short, I think the frenzy is about to end —
and it will not go any further.
Lisa Fabrizio is a columnist who hails from
Connecticut. You may write her here.
