I learned the difference between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law when I was five years old.

I wasn't allowed to cross the street. The other side of Lukens Street was teeming with ominous dangers and irresistible temptations.

A devilishly attractive cornfield, patrolled by Farmer Orr, shotgun slung over his shoulder. The rushing waters of Poquessing Creek meandering through the woods, crawling with small animals with sharp teeth. And, on the far side of the woods, Byberry, the Pennsylvania state mental institution. All of us kids knew that there was an escaped patient, the "Byberry Man," crouched in the bushes, lying in wait for innocent children, on whom he would perform vaguely described nasty acts.

My mother's specific directive was "You are not allowed to cross Lukens Street by yourself." This was the law.

I pondered this for weeks, and eventually hit upon a devious crack in Mom's logic. If I walked to the end of our street, where it made a T with Trevose Road, I could cross Trevose Road, cut through the sawmill lot at the junction, cross Trevose road again and end up on the exciting side of Lukens Street without ever actually crossing it. And that's exactly what I did.

I got caught, of course.

My convoluted explanation didn't butter any parsnips. I was five, old enough to know right from wrong. Was what I did right or wrong?

Wrong, I was wrong. I was soooo wrong. I knew darn well that "don't cross Lukens Street" really meant "don't go into the woods, or the creek, or the cornfield."

My parents later told me that on that day they decided that they had better start saving up law school tuition for their budding F. Lee Bailey. But that afternoon they hid their amusement. I was sent to bed without any supper.

I guess Karl Rove's parent's never held him accountable. Never walked him through the moral decision making process. Never developed his conscience. Never explained the difference between the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. Never sent him to bed without any supper.

If they did, Karl would know the difference between right and wrong. He doesn't.

Two years ago, Joe Wilson was sent to Niger to investigate a claim, made by the President in the State of the Union Address, that Iraq was obtaining nuclear materials there. They weren't, and Wilson made his findings public in a blunt op-ed column in the New York Times.

In a blatant ploy to get back at Wilson, someone leaked a snide story to six journalists that Wilson's wife, an undercover CIA agent, pulled strings to get him this "plum" assignment.

We now know that "someone" was Karl Rove. A special counsel has been investigating these leaks for a year and a half. One of the journalists - Judith Miller of the New York Times, who never even wrote anything about Wilson's wife's identity - is sitting in a jail cell for refusing to turn over her notes about Rove's leak to a grand jury.

The 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act targets people who "having or having had authorized access to classified information that identifies a covert agent, intentionally discloses any information identifying such covert agent." It's a Federal crime.

Whether Rove violated this law is unclear. His lawyer claims he never used Wilson's wife's name - Valerie Plame - as if that alone absolves him from guilt. Everyone knew exactly who he meant. He may not have known that she was covert. All that's for a court to decide.

But what is clear is that he used his position to spread mean-spirited gossip. That he put one of the nation's intelligence operatives in potential danger to get political revenge. That he lied to the President, or at least mislead him about his involvement. That he let a grand jury drag on for 18 months, when he could have answered their inquiry on the first day. That he let Judith Miller go to jail to protect him. That, even now, he is refusing to take responsibility for his action.

When Ronald Regan signed the Intelligence Identities Protection Act he remarked, "The Congress has carefully drafted this bill so that it focuses only on those who would transgress the bounds of decency."

Rove's acts transgress the bounds of decency. He was wrong. He was soooo wrong. It's not enough to send him to bed without his supper. I say: fire him.

Susan Ives can be reached at suives@texas.net.