From the Wall Street Journal:
Karl Rove, President Bush's longtime political adviser, is resigning as White House deputy chief of staff effective Aug. 31, and returning to Texas, he said in an interview with Paul Gigot, editor of The Wall Street Journal's editorial page...."I just think it's time," Mr. Rove said in the interview. "There's always something that can keep you here, and as much as I'd like to be here, I've got to do this for the sake of my family." Mr. Rove and his wife have a home in Ingram, Texas, and a son who attends college in nearby San Antonio.

The announcment that Karl Rove is going to resign -- precipitiously, in a matter of days, obviously in a great hurry to get the hell out of Dodge -- must mean there is one hell of an indictment coming down the pike (or else one hell of a backroom deal has been  cut to avoid an indictment. If that's the case, it probably involves the politicization of the Justice Department: an egregious thing to be sure, but more in the nature of a "technicality" when compared to Rove's roles in conspiring to launch a war of aggression, subvert the electoral process and install an unconstitutional authoritarian regime. Of course, prosecuting Rove for the Justice scandal (or even the Plamegate scandal, which is another possibility) would be akin to nailing Al Capone on tax evasion charges: not really the fullest measure of justice -- but at least he'd be behind bars for awhile.

Naturally, anything we say at this point would be pure speculation. But certainly there is much more to this sudden, panicky departure than Rove's desire to "spend more time with his family." (Uh, Karl -- when your son has already gone away to college, it's too late to spend more time with him, unless you're going to hang around his dorm or something, which would be pretty creepy. If "spending time with your family" was such a priority, perhaps you shouldn't have spent 24/7 servicing George W. Bush throughout the entirety of your son's childhood, eh?)

This hankering for the family hearth is of course a transparent lie, like most of the drivel that issues from Rove's mouth for public consumption. And he will surely continue to service George's needs 24/7, despite this "retirement." But again, such a headlong departure can only betoken a feverish desire by the White House to avoid some kind of major legal heat.

Or has Larry Flynt come up with the goods on some unseemly proclivities of the porcine counselor? Would it be irresponsible to speculate on such lurid matters? It would be irresponsible not to.

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