This is not a joke.  Karl Rove has announced that he will resign at the end of August.

What does this mean for the ongoing battle over executive privilege and congressional subpoena power?  Remember, Rove has defied a subpoena from the Senate Judiciary Committee, setting up a legal showdown that has yet to really get underway.  Likely, it won't make much of a difference.  The White House has claimed executive privilege for Harriet Miers and Sara Taylor, both of whom had already left the administration when they were served with the congressional order.

UPDATE: Sen. Pat Leahy (D-VT), the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has issued the following statement:

Far from backing down in the face of White House opposition, Senator Pat Leahy (D-VT) just announced on the floor of the Senate that he has issued subpoenas for Karl Rove and another White House aide, J. Scott Jennings.

UPDATE: Read the subpoenas and Leahy's statement here.

On Tuesday Attorney General Alberto Gonzales testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee that a March 2004 White House briefing for Members of Congress did not concern the NSA's warrantless wiretapping program.

Tuesday afternoon and all day yesterday saw a rash of briefing attendees from the Senate and House step forward to contradict this assertion; they say the meeting did focus on the NSA program, and a damning May 2006 letter to Congress from John Negroponte, then the Director of National Intelligence, backs this up.

Gonzales is standing by his testimony, says a spokesman.  And this has made Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT) angry enough to give Gonzales until late next week to correct the record. If he doesn't, Leahy will ask the Justice Department Inspector General to launch a perjury probe.

But Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is so angry that he would rather see the perjury investigation start right away. This video of Sen. Schumer's exchange with CNN this morning comes from TalkingPointsMemo.

UPDATE: Schumer, along with Judiciary Committee colleagues Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Russ Feingold (D-WI), and Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), have written a letter to the Solicitor General asking him to appoint a special prosecutor to immediately investigate whether or not Gonzales perjured himself.

UPDATE: Think Progress has video of the Senators' press conference about their letter to the Solicitor General.

I attended yesterday's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in hope of finally hearing a truthful explanation come out of the mouth of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

Yeah, I really do know better.  What the American public heard instead was vague denial, sorry excuses, and shoddy memory (though Mr. Gonzales was careful to avoid the phrase "I do not recall").

On the other hand, we did hear some sharp rebukes from the Senators asking the questions.

From Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT): "I just don't trust you."

From ranking member Arlen Specter (R-PA): "Your credibility has been breached to the point of being actionable" and "Is your department functioning?"

From Chuck Schumer (D-NY): "How can we trust your leadership?" and "You're not being straightforward with this committee...You're deceiving us."

From Russ Feingold (D-WI): "I believe your testimony is misleading at best."

Senator Pat Leahy (D-VT), the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has sent Attorney General Alberto Gonzales a set of written questions in advance of Gonzales' next appearance before the committee on July 24.

Specifically, Leahy is seeking clarification of Gonzales' previous testimony that he had had no conversations with anyone about the investigation into the US attorney firings.  Former aide Monica Goodling, however, testified that she felt "uncomfortable" during a conversation she had with him that he apparently did not remember.

Ha.

I'm a bit mixed up about the impending showdown over the US attorney firings.  On the one hand, as a student of American government it's fascinating to examine the constitutional elements of arguments over executive privilege and congressional subpoena power.

On the other hand, the politicking disgusts me.

The White House has stated that any and all communication by former WH political director Sara Taylor and former counsel Harriet Miers - both internal and external - falls under executive privilege.  This unprecedented broad application of privilege has undercut and delayed the investigation into what really happened with the firing of the US attorneys for political reasons.

Yesterday, Sara Taylor testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee (you can see video here).  She used her letter from White House counsel Fred Fielding directing her not to answer questions pertaining to allegedly privileged communication as an excuse not to answer the majority of questions from Committee chair Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and other tough Democratic questioners.

Given the "parade" of DoJ officials who have come before Congress and delivered weak testimony claiming to know nothing about how the US Attorney, the next step for congressional investigators is obvious, the New York Times says:

Especially after this week's laughable testimony from former Missouri US attorney Bradley Schlozman, it's become clear that answers are not going to be had from Department of Justice officials who appear to be suffering from a worrisome memory loss epidemic.