Bush White

Critics of the Iraq war often lament that the Bush White House has never been called to account for exaggerating - at best - evidence that Saddam Hussein had nuclear weapons in order to justify a pre-emptive attack against him. Yet thanks to a kind of cosmic justice, a severe penalty for that offense is now being exacted upon President Bush and his team. The indictment Friday of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's top aide, stemmed from charges that he lied to a federal grand jury about conversations with reporters concerning the identity of a covert CIA operative.

Washington -- It's not often that President Bush, who casts himself as decisive and bold, is cut off from decisions of grave importance to his presidency. But as he and his team brace for the results of a lengthy CIA leak investigation that has reached inside his famously cloistered White House, threatening to topple his senior aides and tarnish his image, Bush is watching, powerless, from the sidelines. The immediate risks for the president are clear: the possible indictment of Karl Rove, one of his closest and most influential advisers; I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's powerful chief of staff; or others in his administration.

Washington -- President Bush named his trusted White House counsel Harriet E. Miers, a Texas native with no experience as a judge, to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, sparking an outcry among conservative activists who had hoped for a hard-line jurist with clear ideological positions. Bush called Miers, a prominent commercial litigator in Dallas before she followed him to Washington, a legal "pioneer" who has worked to topple gender barriers. He said she would be an "outstanding addition" to the court.

WASHINGTON - Presidential and constitutional scholars took issue yesterday with Condoleezza Rice's reasons for refusing to testify under oath, saying she has undercut her argument by speaking extensively in private and on television and is resting on a narrow legal point. The refusal by President Bush's national security adviser marks the latest struggle between the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks and the White House, which at first resisted the creation of the panel and has tried to restrict its access to the president and key documents.

WASHINGTON -- Up to now, the most distinguishing aspect of the George W. Bush administration has been how ideological it has been in both domestic and foreign policy. At home, it has adhered to the conservative orthodoxy that the best friend of an American -- especially a wealthy American -- is a tax cut. And abroad, it has been guided by a sense of superpower superiority that dictates that it's best to go it alone -- unless setbacks dictate asking for help from others. The first ideological path requires deep tax cuts even in the face of -- indeed, while contributing to -- a mushrooming federal deficit.

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration pursued a two-track political strategy yesterday to minimize the damage from the criminal investigation into the disclosure of a CIA officer's identity. The White House encouraged Republicans to portray the former diplomat at the center of the case, Joseph C. Wilson IV, as a partisan Democrat with an agenda and the Democratic Party as scandal-mongering. At the same time, the administration and Republican leadership on Capitol Hill worked to ensure that no Republicans in Congress will break ranks and call for an independent inquiry outside direct Justice Department control.

WASHINGTON -- While the world continues to parse President Bush's 16 little words in his State of the Union message on Iraq's alleged try to buy nuclear fuel in Africa, it seems to have ignored his latest contribution to, as he likes to say, "revisionist history." In an exchange with reporters the other day after the White House visit of U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the president offered this to explain why he invaded Iraq: "The fundamental question is, did Saddam Hussein have a weapons program?

WASHINGTON - Ari Fleischer, the public face of the Bush White House during two tumultuous years that included the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and two wars, said yesterday that he would resign as President Bush's press secretary this summer to seek a job in the private sector. Fleischer's departure will clear the way for the White House to solidify its team for Bush's 2004 re-election campaign without unexpected changes as the election draws near. Aides said the president, who spoke with Fleischer about his departure Friday, has not settled on a replacement.

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration, which has developed an array of communications strategies that bypass the traditional White House press corps, has a new Internet feature that allows anyone with a computer and a modem to put a question directly to an administration official. Inaugurated last week, "Ask the White House" enables the administration to deliver its message directly to the people, free of media filtering or analysis. Still, based on the first two online sessions, e-mail questioners are likely to get the same prepackaged answers as any reporter asking a question at a White House briefing.

The Right Man: The Surprise Presidency of George W. Bush, by David Frum. Random House. 384 pages. $25.95. Loyalty means everything to George W. Bush. He made his national political debut as the family's loyalty enforcer during his father's '88 run. When he launched his own candidacy, he forced his chief strategist, Karl Rove, to sell his political consulting business. That way, Rove could give Bush all his time (and couldn't cash in on his Bush connection). In the Bush White House, taking credit away from the president is considered disloyal.