It's been a really bad week for President Bush.
And it will get worse.
With further controversies involving Tom DeLay, Karl Rove and Bill Frist stretching to the upper echelons of the Republican Party, it's no wonder Bush's approval ratings are at a dismal 39 percent.
It's hardly surprising the president said he wants to restart his second term. Unfortunately for him, you don't get a do-over in the presidency.
The recent indictment of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, shows the spot on the outside of the apple that hints at a greater rot inside. As the GOP tries its best to salvage these recent disasters, it's important to understand how the president's second term has come to this point.
It started with the reason for war in Iraq.
On July 6, 2003, Joseph Wilson wrote a column in The New York Times criticizing the administration for using faulty intelligence to press the war with Iraq. Wilson traveled to Africa to investigate claims Iraqi officials attempted to obtain nuclear materials and found nothing to corroborate the administration's claims.
In apparent retaliation, Libby allegedly outed Wilson's wife, Valarie Plame, as a CIA operative about a week later to Robert Novak, a syndicated columnist.
Libby told the grand jury presiding over the Plame case in 2003 that he received his information from other journalists. But later, it was revealed he received the information from the CIA, U.S. Department of State and Cheney. Now, Libby is being indicted for perjury and obstruction of justice.
Many people in the GOP are trying to downplay the charges to protect their party. Democrats, however, are dragging their feet and not pushing for more inquiries.
Perjury is a serious charge, as seen with Clinton. In fact, it's even more serious in this situation and might implicate further moral problems in the White House.
The difference is Clinton lied about his personal life. Libby and others in the administration might have lied over the cause for the Iraq war.
This is comparable to another White House scandal: Watergate. That started as a simple burglary and escalated to officials.
Libby is an intelligent man — he's a top administration official. It's doubtful that he accidentally lied over where he got his information about Plame. In fact, it looks almost as though Libby might be taking the fall for a bigger plot.
It's unlikely that Bush would be implicated by a Republican Congress; it would take a major scandal for the GOP to disown its president.
However, this might turn into a major scandal.
Perhaps then, this past week won't seem so bad compared with what Bush and his administration will have to deal with later.
