[Mb-civic] A New Moment of Truth For a White House in Crisis - Washington Post

[William Swiggard]

A New Moment of Truth For a White House in Crisis

By Dan Balz and Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writers
Saturday, October 29, 2005; Page A01

With yesterday's indictment of Vice President Cheney's top aide, 
President Bush's administration has become a textbook example of what 
can go wrong in a second term. Along with ineffectiveness, overreaching, 
intraparty rebellion, plunging public confidence and plain bad luck, 
scandal has now touched the highest levels of the White House staff.

Not surprisingly, Democrats were quick to condemn the president and his 
administration over the perjury and obstruction indictments of I. Lewis 
"Scooter" Libby. But even some Republicans suggested that the president 
and his team will have taken away the wrong lesson if they conclude 
that, other than the personal tragedy of Libby's indictment, the long 
investigation changes nothing of significance.

House Government Reform Committee Chairman Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va.) 
was stinging, saying he was "very disappointed in Libby, and the White 
House, and the vice president and the president."

"They should have taken care of this a long time ago," Davis said in an 
interview. "They should have done their own investigation. They're going 
to get very little sympathy on Capitol Hill, at least from me. . . . 
They brought this on themselves."

The indictment of Libby, but no colleagues, was not the devastating blow 
that some in the administration had feared. But the action of Special 
Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald nonetheless added to the sense that this 
is now an administration staggering to regain its equilibrium. The 
question now facing the embattled president is whether he will use this 
moment of vulnerability to reflect on what has gone wrong this year and 
why, and then look for ways to regain his effectiveness.

Citing both the indictment and the withdrawal of Harriet Miers's 
nomination to the Supreme Court on Thursday, former GOP congressman 
Mickey Edwards of Oklahoma said: "The president got a pretty good 
wake-up call. He needs to stop thinking about his grand legacy and being 
the all-time hero of the Republicans and concentrate on doing the job he 
was elected to do. He really has to get a grip on his administration."

Some GOP loyalists dismissed yesterday's indictment as a blip that will 
quickly be forgotten. "If we are going to reach conclusions about stains 
on the presidency, let's wait until he's [Libby] convicted," said 
veteran GOP strategist Charles R. Black. Calling Bush's administration 
"remarkably clean," he added: "The amazing thing is that they went 
almost five years without having any kind of scandal."

...continued at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/28/AR2005102802150.html?referrer=email
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