Jonah, my two cents: It could have been worse, to be sure, but I think it’s still bad.
There is no closure on anything.
No, there was no conspiracy. But Wilson et al will continue to charge that there was.
There are no traitors in the White House. But the move.org types will continue to say this show there were and are.
There was never any smear campaign – just an attempt to correct the record and counter Joe Wilson’s untruths (as documented by the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report). But even Wolf Blitzer today was asking Gary Bauer if he thought it OK to “drag someone’s wife” into a policy dispute like this.
The fact of the indictment provides the Left and the MSM more fodder for their false but easily accessible narrative. It puts Bush and his defenders in the position of having to explain. And in politics, I’d argue, whoever is explaining is losing.
That said, I think it’s certainly possible this is the bottom and that if Bush & Co. are smart and a little lucky they can be in a much better place a few months from now.