Cliff May offers up what he calls a few talking points in the Plame/Rove "scandal:"

On Fox a moment ago, liberal radio talk show host Nancy Skinner said that Karl Rove "is endangering our national security" - her short-hand reference to the Wilson/Plame brouhaha.

So the left, which is always shouting: "How dare you question my patriotism!" to people who are not questioning their patriotism is now questioning the patriotism of Karl Rove and President Bush. Nice twist.

That this is consuming as much time and discussion as it has is mind-boggling, considering everything that this story lacks.

Including:

1) An insider/witness - any insider - who has obviously turned allegiance on the Bush Administration and is working hand-in-glove with prosecutors. Where's the John Dean? The Linda Tripp? The Monica Lewinsky? The Robert MacFarlane? Heck - where's the Fawn Hall in this scandal? Nobody, not a single person, has bucked the Bush Administration and turned state's witness in a manner that threatens any high-ranking officials;

2) Executive privilege claims. President Bush isn't using executive privilege to keep evidence from prosecutors, like Nixon did with the tapes. He's not exerting any privilege to prevent witnesses from testifying, like Clinton did with Secret Service agents. Not only that, but Bush Administration officials have done nothing but run around waiving privileges, including their source-reporter promises of confidentiality that, in the past, have been left alone under U.S. Justice Department rules.

3) Sacrificial lambs. G. Gordon Liddy did hard time to protect Nixon, as did many other members of the Watergate crowd. All Susan McDougal had to do is answer a couple of questions in front of the Whitewater Grand Jury, but she decided she would rather stay in the slammer than turn on President Clinton. The closest thing to a sacrificial lamb in the Plame kerfuffle is Judith Miller; and since Karl Rove and Scooter Libby have both signed statements releasing any journalist from promises of confidentiality, we know who she's not protecting. (Maybe Ahmed Chalabi was her source on Plame, too. Who knows?)

4) Complaints about a special prosecutor's overreach. Nixon fired Archibald Cox. The entire political left of America worked 24X7 to tar Kenneth Starr as the bad guy in the Whitewater/Lewinsky scandals. Up until now, it's been difficult to find even off-the-record criticism of Patrick Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor in this case, floated by Bush loyalists.

So where does this leave things? With a presidential administration that is answering every question for prosecutors, providing every piece of evidence for prosecutors, doing no complaining and getting on with the business of government. This doesn't mean nobody's guilty of anything. But nobody is acting guilty.

So many of President Bush's opponents have tried to wedge so many administration actions into templates of the worst in American history, but the Plame case is template-free. That's not stopping them, but it does give one pause to think.