The Biggest Fish of All

The Office of Special Counsel is a tiny section of the executive branch tasked with protecting civil service workers from their bosses. Basically they protect whistleblowers, sift through sexual harassment and discrimination claims, and investigate violations of the Hatch Act. It is this last duty that brings the Office of Special Counsel to Karl Rove, chief republican strategist. It seems the pudgy master-mind made a series of politically charged power point presentations to top bureaucrats around the executive branch. The leaders of these federal bureaucracies are all appointed by the President. The presentations gave polling updates in key races around the country, and officials were reminded that actions they took have electoral consequences. Rove was pressuring the federal bureaucracy to take political action in favor of Republicans in “key states”. Those bureaucracies are paid for by ALL OF US, not just republicans. This is another case of the Bush administration politicizing bureaucracies to ensure their grip on power. This attempt feels like something Darth Vader or Adolph Hitler would do, not something that happens in America. Some officials brought this all to light by complaining to the Office of Special Counsel. The department announced today that it would begin an investigation into Rove regarding these presentations and his role in the firing of U.S. Attorney David Iglesias.

When I first heard this, I was a little giddy. I’ve been frustrated as recent investigations have pointed to Rove as playing some part, but each time he has managed to escape serious scrutiny. In the Plame investigation, Libby’s defense was that he was the fall guy for Rove, but the case offered little in specific actions by Rove. Additionally, this latest U.S. Attorney scandal has been dotted by appearances of Roves name in the media. While he has been rumored to have been the origin of the idea to fire the attorneys, he hasn’t been linked with any evidence. Partly because of the millions of e-mails he deleted that now escape federal investigators. This latest investigation is the first one to target Rove specifically. So perhaps it will be the most successful in uncovering evidence of his roles in these scandals.

I thought all this, before I researched what the Office of Special Counsel (OSC) was, and more importantly, who heads the department. To begin with, this is an office within the executive branch. So it’s not congressional in nature, and can’t be seen as coming from “outside” the administration. Bush’s own branch of government is investigating Rove. That has some minor perks; Rove/Bush can’t claim this is a politically motivated investigation. But it also has a massive downside, since the OSC is under Bush’s authority; he appointed its department head.

His name is Scott J. Bloch. Before being head of the OSC he was a lawyer in Kansas and he served on the Justice Department’s Task Force for Faith-based and Community Initiatives. His record at the OSC has been marred by a series of scandals.

- He failed to enforce Executive Order 13087 issued by Bill Clinton. The order adds sexual orientation to the list of protected classes in discrimination rules. As a result federal employees cannot be discriminated against based on their sexual orientation. Bloch stopped enforcing the rule. Homosexual whistleblowers were not protected and Bloch removed every appearance of “sexual orientation” from complaint forms and the department’s website. Bush claims to support the executive order, but has failed to take any action against Bloch. If he were under Clinton he would have been fired and his position filled by a more cooperative person. Bush stated publicly that he supported the executive order but did nothing to remove Bloch or ensure enforcement of the order. Why wouldn’t Bush punish Bloch? The only reason I can imagine is that he privately supported removing protections for Gay federal employees, but did not want the political firestorm of explaining that position. Enter Bushy Scott Bloch. He gets to have his cake and eat it too. All the bigotry of exclusionist institutions none of the accountability.

- He retaliated against people in his office who “disagreed with his politics”. This lead to an investigation of him and his department by The Office of Personnel Management. In that investigation, he has been accused of intimidating underlings and avoiding scrutiny. This investigation is still on going. That’s right, the person who is charged with getting to the bottom of Karl Rove’s political malfeasance is in fact just another Republican minion who has been doing their dirty work since he was appointed in 2003

So what is going on here? Why would a political hack start an investigation against the biggest fish of all in the Republican Party? It seems he was compelled to, David Iglesias has already said that he filed a complaint which he believes was partially responsible for starting the Rove investigation. So Bloch was forced to start the investigation, his office has been under scrutiny for years for the parade of scandals he has been involved in, and he knew that at this point in Washington there are serious repercussions of failing in one’s duty. If that’s the case what kind of investigation are we going to see here? Will it exonerate Rove of wrongdoing preemptively casting a vote in his favor as he is undoubtedly investigated in larger scandals? Another possibility is that he will doggedly pursue Rove until his office finds evidence of wrongdoing? Even if they do, the most severe punishment the OSC can hand out is recommending that Rove be terminated. RECOMMEND, is the key word, Bush doesn’t have to replace him, and he’s already failed to replace Rove after it was shown that he had some part in the Plame leak. So pretty much this investigation doesn’t matter. It either won’t be able to do anything, or it won’t be a real investigation. The only possible positive outcome is that the investigation, while trying to appear legitimate, uncovers real evidence that can be used in larger investigations. But with Bush loyalist Scott Bloch at the helm, the chances of that are pretty slim.