Who gives a flying flag? The smearing of Joe Wilson, the excuses for Karl Rove: for the pundits of the right, national security is just a bumper sticker.(MEDIA)

LOOKING AT THE REACTIONS OF THE right-wingers to l'affaire Novak-Rove-Wilson-Plame, you'd have to conclude that, for them, national security is a sometime thing--a talking point or a symbolic flourish, but not a real-world imperative involving actual lives, dangers, and government workings.

The smears and (to be generous) fat, sloppy errors directed against former Ambassador Joseph Wilson pour forth as thick and fast as finger paint. The anticipatory excuses for Karl Rove--who, if he did not commit actual crimes, may have at the least leaked classified information about Wilson's ...

Read the rest of this article with a Free Trial at HighBeam Research.