Veep under the microscope

In one of those reports seemingly designed to put progressives' hearts all a flutter, Raw Story is reporting that Cheney is being investigated for his possible involvement in Plamegate:

Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is trying to determine whether Vice President Dick Cheney had a role in the outing of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame-Wilson, individuals close to Fitzgerald say. Plame’s husband was a vocal critic of prewar intelligence used by President George W. Bush to build support for the Iraq war.

The investigation into who leaked the officer's name to reporters has now turned toward a little known cabal of administration hawks known as the White House Iraq Group (WHIG), which came together in August 2002 to publicize the threat posed by Saddam Hussein. WHIG was founded by Bush chief of staff Andrew Card and operated out of the Vice President’s office.

Fitzgerald’s examination centers on a group of players charged with not only selling the war, but according to sources familiar with the case, to discredit anyone who openly “disagreed with the official Iraq war” story.

The group’s members included Deputy White House chief of staff Karl Rove, Bush advisor Karen Hughes, Senior Advisor to the Vice President Mary Matalin, Deputy Director of Communications James Wilkinson, Assistant to the President and Legislative Liaison Nicholas Calio, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley and I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby - Chief of Staff to the Vice President and co-author of the Administration's pre-emptive strike policy.

Now I'm aware that any hope that Darth Cheney will be forced to resign may be just so much wishful thinking, but it is certainly not unheard of for VPs to be forced out of office in disgrace a lá Spiro Agnew.

And since I'm in a wishful thinking sort of mode, I've always considered one drawback to the "Impeach Bush" movement the fact that its result might be, eek, President Cheney!

But if Cheney goes, gosh, it's a progressive's pipe dream come true.