Dotty Lynch CBS News

But Rove's dominance of White House and Republican politics, Gannon's aggressively partisan work and the ease with which he got day passes for the White House press room the past two years make it hard to believe that he wasn't at least implicitly sanctioned by the "boy genius." Rove, who rarely gave on-the-record interviews to the MSM (mainstream media), had time to talk to GOPUSA, which owns Talon.

One of Gannon's first projects was an attempt to discredit the South Dakota Argus Leader, South Dakota's major paper, and its longtime political writer, David Kranz. According to the National Journal, which reported on this last November, Gannon wrote a series of articles in the summer of 2003 alleging that Kranz, who went to college with Democratic Sen. Tom Daschle, was not only sympathetic to him but was an actual part of the Daschle campaign. These articles then got a huge amount of play on the blogs of John Lauck and Jason Van Beek, and were picked up by other conservative sites and talk radio. The paper was bombarded with messages about its bias and acknowledges that these had an impact on its coverage.

Daschle opponent John Thune's campaign manager was Dick Wadham, an old political crony of Karl Rove's; the kind of pal Rove could ask to hire his first cousin, John Wood, a few years back. Wadham put the bloggers on the campaign payroll and the symbiotic relationship between the campaign, the bloggers and "reporter" Gannon” continued. On September 29, Gannon broke the story that Daschle had claimed a special tax exemption for a house in Washington and the bloggers jumped all over it. According to a November 17 posting on South Dakota Politics – a site that Van Beek, who has become a staffer for now-Sen. Thune, has bequeathed to Lauck – "Jeff Gannon, whose reportage had a dramatic impact on the Daschle v. Thune race (his story about Sen. Daschle signing a legal document claiming to be a D.C. resident was published nearly the same day Thune began to run an ad showing Daschle saying, "I'm a D.C. resident) has written an analysis of the debacle."

Oliver Willis has more: Will Thune Get A Pass On His Gannon Connection?

The bloggers in South Dakota want to know what relation, if any, the junior Senator had with the fraudulent journalism of Jeff Gannon. Thunewatch

Inside Politics:

Woodruff: As we reported a little while ago in our blog segment, the Internet is abuzz with reaction to comments by New York Democratic Congressman Maurice Hinchey. The congressman over the weekend shared his views about the now disputed CBS News report about President Bush's Air National Guard service. Representative Maurice Hinchey is with me now, he joins us from Albany, New York.

Video

REP. MAURICE HINCHEY (D), NEW YORK: And then the issue of the CBS Dan Rather event came up, and I said that there were false documents or documents which were falsified and presented as being accurate and there was a question as to where those documents came from. And in the context of the discussion I suggested that -- my theory was that I wouldn't be surprised if it came from the White House political operation, headed up by Karl Rove.

More from Digby: It's Irresponsible Not To As Peggy Noonan so memorably wrote about the "little Elian" drama:

Was Mr. Clinton being blackmailed? The Starr report tells us of what the president said to Monica Lewinsky about their telephone sex: that there was reason to believe that they were monitored by a foreign intelligence service. Naturally the service would have taped the calls, to use in the blackmail of the president. Maybe it was Mr. Castro’s intelligence service, or that of a Castro friend.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Michele Malkin on Hinchey here. LGF here

We lost all of yesterday's posts for a while. Now the pictures have disapeared.

We think it's Karl Rove.

Talking Points Memo

The key passage in the Wehner Memo (the leaked memo written by Karl Rove's deputy, Peter H. Wehner and reported this evening in various news outlets).

Let me tell you first what our plans are in terms of sequencing and political strategy. We will focus on Social Security immediately in this new year. Our strategy will probably include speeches early this month to establish an important premise: the current system is heading for an iceberg. The notion that younger workers will receive anything like the benefits they have been promised is fiction, unless significant reforms are undertaken. We need to establish in the public mind a key fiscal fact: right now we are on an unsustainable course. That reality needs to be seared into the public consciousness; it is the pre-condition to authentic reform.

Remind you of anything?

Also included is a nice encapsulated history lesson: "For the first time in six decades, the Social Security   battle is one we can win -- and in doing so, we can help transform the political and philosophical landscape of the country."

In other words, this isn't about the fiscal soundness of Social Security or the babyboomers moving toward retirement or anything else. As Wehner himself says, this is the best chance the opponents of Social Security have had in six decades of trying to phase-out the program.

And this allows us to see the whole matter clearly. Social Security has been around for seventy years. How many people do you know who really don't like Social Security? Back when I was younger I'd go spend part of my summer at the subsidized retirement community where my grandparents lived. And I don't remember many people who lived there bad-mouthing Social Security. And those folks had lived under the program for pretty much all of their adults lives.

Let me tell you first what our plans are in terms of sequencing and political strategy. We will focus on Social Security immediately in this new year. Our strategy will probably include speeches early this month to establish an important premise: the current system is heading for an iceberg. The notion that younger workers will receive anything like the benefits they have been promised is fiction, unless significant reforms are undertaken. We need to establish in the public mind a key fiscal fact: right now we are on an unsustainable course. That reality needs to be seared into the public consciousness; it is the pre-condition to authentic reform.

Remind you of anything?

Also included is a nice encapsulated history lesson: "For the first time in six decades, the Social Security battle is one we can win -- and in doing so, we can help transform the political and philosophical landscape of the country."

In other words, this isn't about the fiscal soundness of Social Security or the babyboomers moving toward retirement or anything else. As Wehner himself says, this is the best chance the opponents of Social Security have had in six decades of trying to phase-out the program.

No doubt by now you've at least heard about Eminem's anti-Bush anthem "Mosh," but, damn, no one prepared any of us for the video. Wow. Karl Rove, meet another totally unexpected nightmare.

Direct quicktime links: Broadband and dial-up. [It looks like their servers are getting hammered now. Alternate locations: Launch, onegoodmove, archive.org and freshstation.org.

From Salon's review:

Kerry Enlisting Clinton Aides in Effort to Refocus Campaign.

Former President Bill Clinton offered John Kerry advice on how to reinvigorate his candidacy, and Mr. Kerry enlisted more Clinton advisers for his campaign. By By ADAM NAGOURNEY and DAVID M. HALBFINGER.

The conversation and the recruitment of old Clinton hands came amid rising concern among Democrats about the state of Mr. Kerry's campaign and criticism that he had been too slow to respond to attacks on his military record or to engage Mr. Bush on domestic policy. Among the better-known former Clinton aides who are expected to play an increasingly prominent role are James Carville, Paul Begala and Stanley Greenberg, campaign aides said.

"It's very simple," Mr. Johnson said in an interview yesterday, describing what he said would be the template for Mr. Kerry's speeches and advertisements in the weeks ahead. "It's: 'Bush has taken us in the wrong direction. If you want more of the same for the next four years, vote for President Bush. If you want a new direction, John Kerry and John Edwards.' It's not complicated. Failed policies, jobs and the economy, health care."

Mr. Begala, who said he would remain a CNN commentator, said he was delighted with the changes. He added that Mr. Bush had succeeded over the past month in transforming the race from a referendum on an incumbent president to a referendum on Mr. Kerry.

"It was an enormous shift," Mr. Begala said last night. Then, referring to Karl Rove, a top Bush strategist, he added: "And it required the cooperation of the candidate. And you know what? The Kerry campaign is no longer cooperating. Sorry, Karl."

As James Dobson told us in his big, revealing moment the other day:

"Well, what Karl told me is that some of those individuals took themselves off that list and they would not allow their names to be considered, because the process has become so vicious and so vitriolic and so bitter, that they didn't want to subject themselves or the members of their families..

Dobson continued today with the same talking point:

"The judicial-confirmation system has become a political gantlet that more and more candidates are unwilling to run through."

More and more this talking point will filter down to try and rally the conservative base. The evil liberals headed by Ted Kennedy have corrupted the process so none of the great candidates Bush had promised conservatives during his re-election campaign would take a chance to be on the Supreme Court because of all the vitriol. Funny how it didn't seem to bother Judge Robert.

NBC Today: Joe Wilson says Rove "should be fired"

Wilson went on the offensive this morning on the "Today Show" and asked that the President stick to his word.

Download | play -WMP

Download | play -QT

Raw Story has the GOP attack talking points as the smear campaign goes on to discredit Joesph in an effort to protect Rove. The RWNM has been on high alert and is actually trying to make Karl Rove the victim in all of this. How did Rove even know that Valeri was a NOC?

AmericaBlog has the transcripts and some more on Wilson.

BuzzFlash has an interview with James Moore, author of Bush's Brain.

Josh Marshall asks a legal question.

The CarpetBagger Report: Playing to the base:One interesting part of the Rove defense strategy is its similarity to the approach Rove used during the presidential election: Play to the base. When it was Bush on the campaign trail, that meant ignoring outreach to anyone who wasn't a Republican, creating a partisan bubble around the president, and rallying the hard-core sycophants. The past couple of days, I think we're seeing something similar in defending Rove in the Plame scandal.

Talk Left wants to know: Where Does Ari Fleischer Fit In? Jeralyn does extensive research as she tries to connect the dots.

World O' Crap delves into the Wingnut universe in the Ultimate Wing Nut Challenge As always there really isn't anyone quite like her. She takes apart Ann Coulter! Rush Limbaugh! Bill O'Reilly! Michelle Malkin! G. Gordon Liddy! And last and least, Sean Hannity!