Reuters AlertNet - W.House rejects apology for Rove's Sept 11 remarks: "W.House rejects apology for Rove's Sept 11 remarks"W.House rejects apology for Rove's Sept 11 remarks
WASHINGTON, June 23 (Reuters) - Democrats demanded an apology from top White House adviser Karl Rove on Thursday for saying liberals responded weakly to the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, a request quickly rejected by the White House.
The complaints were the latest aftershocks in a bitter partisan battle in Washington over U.S. foreign and domestic policy and followed a Republican-led uproar over remarks by Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin comparing U.S. treatment of detainees at Guantanamo Bay to that meted out by the Nazis, at Soviet gulags or by Cambodia's Pol Pot.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada issued a statement saying, "It is time to stop using Sept. 11 as a political wedge issue."
"Karl Rove should immediately and fully apologize for his remarks or he should resign," Reid said. "The lesson of Sept. 11 is not different for conservatives, liberals or moderates."
Speaking to the Conservative Party of New York state on Wednesday night, Rove said, "Conservatives saw the savagery of 9/11 in the attacks and prepared for war; liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers."
Rove cited a petition the liberal organization moveon.org circulated after 9/11 urging moderation and restraint in responding to the attacks, and Durbin's comment about the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
"Let me put this in fairly simple terms: Al Jazeera now broadcasts to the region the words of Senator Durbin, certainly putting America's men and women in uniform in greater danger. No more needs to be said about the motives of liberals," Rove said.
Rove was the architect of President George W. Bush's 2004 re-election campaign and is now a deputy White House chief of staff.
Massachusetts Democratic Sen. John Kerry, last year's Democratic presidential nominee, said, "Karl Rove doesn't owe me an apology ... he doesn't owe Democrats an apology, he owes the country an apology."
White House spokesman Scott McClellan defended Rove's remarks and rebuffed suggestions he apologize. "Of course not," McClellan said.
He said Rove was "talking about the different philosophies and different approaches when it comes to winning the war on terrorism."
"I would think that they would want to be able to defend their philosophy and their approach. I know that the Democratic leadership at this point is offering no ideas and no vision for the American people," McClellan said.
'FAUX OUTRAGE'
Ken Mehlman, chairman of the Republican National Committee, said, "It's outrageous that the same Democrats who stood by Dick Durbin's libeling of our military are now expressing faux outrage over Karl Rove's statement of historical fact."
Rove's remarks were reminiscent of some of Bush's speeches from his re-election campaign last year but seemed to go further in saying liberals had offered therapy for the attackers.
Congressional Democrats criticized Rove in press releases, at news conferences and in comments on the Senate floor. Some echoed Reid's comments Rove should retract the comments or resign.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, a New York Democrat, said it was time for all to "just take a breath and calm down and eliminate the divisive rhetoric on all sides."
In New York, Republican Mayor Michael Bloomberg, citing the families and survivors of those killed in the hijacked airliner attacks, said, "We owe it to those we lost to keep partisan politics out of the discussion."
Democrats' demands for an apology from Rove came two days after Durbin yielded to criticism and apologized for his remarks about U.S. interrogation methods at Guantanamo.
