The LA Times is breathlessly reporting that the “obscure” Office of Special Counsel is looking into the activity of Karl Rove in the AG story.

“Most of the time, an obscure federal investigative unit known as the Office of Special Counsel confines itself to monitoring the activities of relatively low-level government employees, stepping in with reprimands and other routine administrative actions for such offenses as discriminating against military personnel or engaging in prohibited political activities.

But the Office of Special Counsel is preparing to jump into one of the most sensitive and potentially explosive issues in Washington, launching a broad investigation into key elements of the White House political operations that for more than six years have been headed by chief strategist Karl Rove.

The new investigation, which will examine the firing of at least one U.S. attorney, missing White House e-mails, and White House efforts to keep presidential appointees attuned to Republican political priorities, could create a substantial new problem for the Bush White House.

First, the inquiry comes from inside the administration, not from Democrats in Congress. Second, unlike the splintered inquiries being pressed on Capitol Hill, it is expected to be a unified investigation covering many facets of the political operation in which Rove played a leading part.

“We will take the evidence where it leads us,” Scott J. Bloch, head of the Office of Special Counsel and a presidential appointee, said in an interview Monday. “We will not leave any stone unturned.”

This would be earth shattering news except that the call for the probe came from within the administration. As the story fades from view – as all made up scandals should – this is the the administration’s call to put the matter to rest completely.

It also has a lot to say to those critics that continue to call the legal and right move of replacing prosecutors as an effort to stall investigations of Republicans. Bloch is a presidential appointee as well.

Of course this isn’t stopping all the fishing expeditions Waxman and his crew are creating.