Friday, October 28, 2005

So This Is Fitzmas?

After two years of breathless hype and leaky speculation, marked by Randi Rhodes shrieking "TREASON!!!" and Al Franken predicting that Rove and Cheney will be executed, special prosector Patrick Fitzgerald has indicted Lewis "Retarded Nickname For A 55-Year-Old Man" Libby with five counts related to telling fibs. In an act that would've never happened during the Clinton Regime, Scooter has packed his bags and resigned his gig. Such as it is when you're charged with felonies and aren't a Democrat - you go and face the music.

Details are still sketchy and since I'm stuck at work, I haven't had a chance to check Rush's site or listen to Randi Rhodes or Michael Savage's opinions - like I need them to lay the smack down - and I've been piling up Firefox tabs with different interesting bits all day on this slightly moving target of a story, but here's a recap and thoughts about it. (For some reason, Hugh Hewitt has been silent on this, preferring to post more dribblings on the SCOTUS picks - that's so yesterday, Hugh, and you blew it with Miers. Michelle Malkin must be at Pilates class working her fine booty, but I digress...)

The Editors on National Review Online have their editorial about it and it sounds about right and cautions against some of what has been happening earlier and I'll quote in a second:

There has been much high-minded talk about how the Valerie Plame controversy is really about the case for the Iraq war. No. For liberals, it has always been about inflicting as much damage as possible to the Bush White House, especially by taking out through indictment its most central player in the person of Karl Rove. That has not happened. Nor has special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald alleged a conspiracy at the top levels of the Bush administration to out a CIA agent. What he instead charges in his five-count indictment is that Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, Lewis “Scooter” Libby, lied to investigators about conversations with three reporters. This long-hyped, two-year investigation appears to come down, in other words, to one man's alleged dishonesty when investigators came knocking. This is not Watergate or Iran-Contra, but neither is it a trifle.

Please spare us the excuses warmed over from Democratic talking points in the 1990s: the prosecutor is out-of-control, there was no underlying crime, etc., etc. It is the responsibility of anyone, especially a public official, to tell the truth to FBI agents and grand juries. If Libby didn't, he should face the consequences.

But conservatives would be well-advised not to start slamming Fitzgerald. We don't know all the facts and until we do, his acts are open to dueling interpretations. It seemed unfair for him to talk at his press conference of Libby damaging national security by revealing classified information, when Libby wasn't charged with that. But this was a departure for the otherwise restrained and responsible Fitzgerald. The Bush administration, for its part, has conducted itself with notable forbearance in this case, avoiding the sort of smears that the Clinton administration routinely resorted to whenever a prosecutor proved inconvenient.

Unfortunately, Republicans and Democrats engage in alternating opportunism over “the criminalization of politics,” and it is the Democrats’ turn to pin their political hopes on the work of a prosecutor.


What I and others find odd is the lack of specifics about things like was Plame really covert and who was Novak's source and if Darth Rove is in the clear or not. Talking Points Memo is going with the sinister moonbat view of things in thinking that a smoking gun exists. I dunno and considering the hallucinatory properties of BDS, I'm not gonna worry about it. (As if I was in the first place.)

Power Line thinks it's only bad for Libby and basically wonders WTF Scooter was thinking in lying so badly as does Just One Minute who says "Maybe Libby Can Try An Insanity Defense". Andrew Sullivan wonders why Scooter lied and suspects he's covering for Darth Cheney.

One fascinating aspect is how BOTH sides were planning on and/or are attacking Fitzgerald as a partisan hack depending on what had happened. The Dems were already whispering "whitewash" if he didn't go all Judge Dredd on Rove and the GOP peeps are now whining like Dems now that one of theirs got tagged. Michael Leeden thinks it "stinks" and Mark R. Levin is growling about the presser, but the worst example of trashing Fitz I've seen so far is this guy at Newsbusters who says "It was just like Captain Queeg. Fitzgerald had everything except the strawberries, and the ball bearings. By the end, I think many of the reporters had reached the same conclusion." Hyperbole much, pal?

It's an All Spin Zone, folks, but who REALLY knows what's up outside of the players on the field? That's right! No one!!! So rather than add to the speculation, let's notice the HYPOCRISY on display from the MSM, shall we?

The Big Three Networks broke into the soaps today to report that some guy with a dumb name got charged with fibbing, but as Newsbusters notes, when Clinton Regime crooks were charged, it barely rated a mention on the evening snooze.

[W]hen former Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy was indicted on 39 counts, the networks aired a single evening news story. Three of the four networks -- ABC, CNN, and NBC -- underlined that the Smaltz inquiry had so far cost $9 million. None of them noted civil penalties originating from targets of Smaltz's inquiry amounted to more than $3.5 million. The next morning, CBS's morning show, called CBS This Morning, didn't even mention Espy's indictment. Months later, I noted in a Media Reality Check that on December 11, former HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros was indicted on 18 counts for misleading the FBI about payoffs to a mistress, Linda Medlar. NBC Nightly News filed one story; ABC's World News Tonight gave it 18 seconds. CBS Evening News didn't arrive on the story until the next night, and gave it nine seconds, a fraction of the two minutes Dan Rather gave the nightly El Nino update, about the weather "giving a gentle lift to the monarch butterfly."

What liberal bias?!?

They also note that the AP reporting is using loaded language about Rove not being charged:

Here's how the AP reported today's developments in the Plame case:

"Karl Rove, President Bush's closest adviser, escaped indictment Friday but remained under investigation, his legal status a looming political problem for the White House." [emphasis added]

"Escaped"? Did he scale the wall at the Big House? Pull a Shawshank Redemption and slip out through the sewer system?

If during the Clinton administration, a top aide had not been indicted, would the AP have spoken of him having "escaped"?

Is the AP's disappointment showing?

Here's a link to the AP story:


Check out the comments below on that one.

Michael Kinsley has a funny piece about this:

Everyone assumed that Miller's source was Snapper. Him and/or Karl Rove (another great name, especially for the official bad guy). He said he didn't mind if she testified. She apparently didn't hear this, so a couple months later he said it louder and she said okay. Then she testified that she couldn't remember who told her that Valerie Plame was an undercover CIA agent, but it wasn't Skippy. And she conceded that much of what she reported in the run-up to the Iraq war, relying on administration leaks, was wrong. So she went to jail to protect a "source" who didn't give her the crucial fact at issue for a story she didn't write, but did give her inaccurate information for other stories. Huh?

He closes with a good note about how the sides have hypocritically flipped:

The Republicans have their own plotline they'd like to impose on this confusing blur of events. It's actually a dusted-off plotline from the Reagan Iran-contra scandal of the 1980s: all about an "overzealous prosecutor" and "bitter partisans" on the other side who want to "politicize policy differences." But two intervening developments have overroasted these chestnuts: Bill Clinton and Yahoo. When Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison preemptively mocked perjury as what prosecutors charge you with if they can't find a real crime, it was the work of minutes for bloggers to find and post her comments from the Clinton impeachment about the transcendent seriousness of a perjury rap.

And that's the irony of this thing: Democrats are suddenly certain that perjury is a serious crime and Stupid Partiers are trying to blow it off.

Um, it IS a serious crime and I'd like to know what was so GD important that a presumably intelligent bloke like Pooter (sp?) needed to lie like a moth-eaten rug as if no one would notice? Who'd he think he was? Bill Clinton?!?

The Volokh Conspiracy wonders "what's a Bush Administration official supposed to do?" when the Left slags them when they lie and slags them when they tell the truth:

Jeralyn Merritt of TalkLeft complains at the Huffington Post that Karl Rove might avoid serious punishment because he told the truth to the government. Merritt outlines a scenario (which as best I can tell has to be strictly theoretical at this point) in which Rove would "make a plea deal with Fitzgerald under which he agrees to plead guilty if Fitzgerald agrees to request a sentencing reduction to probation, because of his cooperation against others." She then concludes:

As a devout critic of the Bush Administration, I bring it up because I don't like rats. If Karl Rove isn't indicted, or gets a sweetheart deal, I can't conceive of any reason why other than he sang his heart out.

So what's a Bush Administration official supposed to do? I would have thought that telling the truth to investigators about criminal misconduct, including your colleagues' misconduct, is generally part of a government official's job. It's also sometimes the self-interested thing to do, but while that might mean you deserve less credit for it, it doesn't mean you should be condemned for it.

Merritt's view, though, seems to be that Rove would be a "rat," whom she "do[es]n't like," for "s[i]ng[ing] his heart out." Should he compound his initial offense (if he had committed an offense) by failing to do his duty? I've heard people condemn the Bush Administration for placing too much premium on loyalty over other virtues -- but surely few (on the Left or on the Right) would think that Administration officials should place such a premium on loyalty that they refuse to testify about others' criminal conduct? Or is it damned if you do (covering up your colleagues' crimes; shameful!), damned if you don't ("singing" about your colleagues' crimes; shameful!)?


Uh, Eugene....you're asking a liberal to be consistent? Dude...

So the spin will go on and on with both sides trying to paint the other side as good or bad as possible. Maybe one day, we'll find out what REALLY happened, but until then, I'm sure we'll get more fun hypocrisies like this one from the lying liar who started this all, Joe "Hey, did I tell you what my wife does?" Wilson:

"While I may engage in public discourse, my wife and my family are private people. They did not choose to be brought into the public square, and they do not wish to be under the glare of camera. They are entitled to their privacy."

Yeah, right.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Big Three Networks broke into the soaps today to report that some guy with a dumb name got charged with fibbing, but as Newsbusters notes, when Clinton Regime crooks were charged, it barely rated a mention on the evening snooze.

It may be because there is a slight difference between a SITTING high-level Cabinet member being indicted and FORMER low-level administration members being indicted after they have left office.

"Escaped"? Did he scale the wall at the Big House?

Yes, escaped. It's not loaded language. Everyone expected him to be indicted and he wasn't. Even the White House was bracing for that scenario. Why is that? Because they knew what Rove had done. He hasn't been charged yet because Fitzgerald isn't yet convinced he can prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, thanks to Libby's obstruction.

Joe "Hey, did I tell you what my wife does?" Wilson

Can we put a stake in the heart of this vampire, please?

I quote from PF's press conference from yesterday:

"Valerie Wilson was a CIA officer. In July 2003, the fact that Valerie Wilson was a CIA officer was classified. Not only was it classified, but it was not widely known outside the intelligence community.

Valerie Wilson's friends, neighbors, college classmates had no idea she had another life.

The fact that she was a CIA officer was not well- known, for her protection or for the benefit of all us. It's important that a CIA officer's identity be protected, that it be protected not just for the officer, but for the nation's security.

Valerie Wilson's cover was blown in July 2003. The first sign of that cover being blown was when Mr. Novak published a column on July 14th, 2003."

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/28/politics/28text-fitz.html?pagewanted=all

Dirk Belligerent said...

Wow. This is going to be sooooooooooo easy. (Did you even try?)

It may be because there is a slight difference between a SITTING high-level Cabinet member being indicted and FORMER low-level administration members being indicted after they have left office.

You have it backwards: Libby is a high-ranking lackey, but NOT a Cabinet official. Mike "I'm going to the game!" Espy WAS a Cabinet official who resigned when he knew the jig was up. Cisneros was also a Secretary and Ron Brown was under investigation when he mysteriously died while shepparding Bosnian war profiteers. (Gee, if Halliburton was only Friends of Bill.)

The point is that the media doesn't report liberal malfeasance - don't EVEN try to bring up Monica, for they hid Clinton's PERJURY (you know, that thing that's now bad) and TREASON (You got the check, Chang? Here are the plans for the rockets.) by making it a tabloid affair about an affair - but if a high-ranking flunky gets in trouble, it LIVE TIME!!!! Please.

STRIKE ONE!!!

"Valerie Wilson was a CIA officer. In July 2003, the fact that Valerie Wilson was a CIA officer was classified. Not only was it classified, but it was not widely known outside the intelligence community."

You need to learn to read what's there and not what your fantasize about. There is a difference between being "classified" and being "covert" and a difference between a fact "not widely known" and "not known at all". Translation for BDS-sufferers: The reason Scooter isn't facing a firing squad is because he DID NOT OUT A COVERT AGENT. A reporter axed Fitzgerald whether she was covert and he said that she wasn't.

Also, when Joe Wilson decided to editorialize his partisan lies, what was to prevent anyone from looking up this: http://wizbangblog.com/images/2005/josephwilson_whoswho.jpg

Don't forget that David Corn of The Nation was the first to reveal her formerly covert status in print, not Novak. (IIRC)

STRIKE TWO!!!

Fitzgerald was weirdly intense about harping on the need to protect CIA agents identities and there's nothing wrong with that, but wouldn't charging someone with outing an agent really make an example of the point?

There are a lot of unanswered questions still, like who was Novak's source, but until the facts come out, you and your fellow travellers will spin madly to make reality bend to your conspiracy theories. I was disgusted to see this Freep story this morning that analyzed these charges as proof that Team Dubya was trying to crush dissent. Totally left out was the fact that a bi-partisan committee had debunked Wilson's lies.

This leaves Truth in a bad spot: If someone can lie and can't be refuted without a criminal investigation and a media smear campaign, what protection does the Truth have? The double-dealing of the media is unmistakable:

* Linda Tripp tapes Monica's blather about the Big He's cigar techniques and it leads to the revelation that Clinton was a conspiring perjurer. Who's the wrong-doer? LINDA TRIPP!!!!

* Joe Wilson, a partisan enemy of Team Dubya is sent by his wife to discredit the war and then writes a lie-filled editorial. Team Dubya points out that Wilson's a liar and he was sent by his NON-COVERT wife, not the Veep as Wilson lied about. Who's the bad guy? TEAM DUBYA!!!!

When liberals lie, the Truth is not allowed to speak and anyone who dares try will be destroyed. However, when liberals commit crimes, the media will excuse, ignore or attack those who dare question our fascist masters and the government will bring false charges (Billy Dale ring a bell?) and audit those who dare speak REAL Truth to corrupt power.

STRIKE THREE!!! YER OUTTA HERE!!!!

Bub, the issue isn't Libby, it's liberal and media hypocrisy. Wake the f*ck up and look in a mirror.

Anonymous said...

You have it backwards: Libby is a high-ranking lackey

You are correct, and I was mistaken, but you're focusing on the wrong part of what I said: He's a SITTING member. There's a reason that the media has been mentioning that this is the first time in 130 years that a SITTING official has been indicted.

The reason Scooter isn't facing a firing squad is because he DID NOT OUT A COVERT AGENT.

Oh, little monkey, if only it was so:

"FITZGERALD: Let me say two things. Number one, I am not speaking to whether or not Valerie Wilson was covert. And anything I say is not intended to say anything beyond this: that she was a CIA officer from January 1st, 2002, forward."

Do you know why he is not saying if she was a covert agent?

From the IIPA:
"Whoever, having or having had authorized access to classified information that identifies a covert agent, intentionally discloses any information identifying such covert agent to any individual not authorized to receive classified information, knowing that the information disclosed so identifies such covert agent and that the United States is taking affirmative measures to conceal such covert agent's intelligence relationship to the United States, shall be fined under title 18 or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both."

BECAUSE IT IS ILLEGAL FOR HIM TO DO SO.

And Libby hasn't been charged with outing a covert agent because Fitzgerald couldn't prove it because... Libby OBSTRUCTED HIM.

but until the facts come out, you and your fellow travellers will spin madly to make reality bend to your conspiracy theories.

Once again, you argue your fantasies and not the reality: I'm not bending anything. I think this outcome was the perfect balance. In any business deal, you know the deal is right when both sides feel like they're getting fucked. The right thinks it's prosocutorial overreaching and the left thinks he didn't go far enough.

Sure, I'd have liked to see Rove indicted, but if this guy says he can't prove it, I'd rather he not bother.

Joe Wilson, a partisan enemy of Team Dubya is sent by his wife to discredit the war and then writes a lie-filled editorial. Team Dubya points out that Wilson's a liar and he was sent by his NON-COVERT wife, not the Veep as Wilson lied about.

I would like you to post, with attributions, these lies.

You won't, because you're pulling the Rush Limbaugh style of arguing... slightly devaitions from the truth, but not outrageous lies.

Here, I'll help you start it off:

You: Wilson was not sent by the Veep as Wilson lied about.

Wilson: "In February 2002, I was informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency that Vice President Dick Cheney's office had questions about a particular intelligence report. [...] The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president's office."

Truth: Wilson never claimed the VP sent him.

Go ahead, post some more...

Dirk Belligerent said...

Gotta make this fast cuz I've got stuff to do.

You are correct, and I was mistaken, but you're focusing on the wrong part of what I said: He's a SITTING member. There's a reason that the media has been mentioning that this is the first time in 130 years that a SITTING official has been indicted.

And what was Spiro Agnew? The issue isn't that Scooter is a sitting official, it's that he's a REPUBLICAN official. Period. The double-standard is there for all to see, so quit pretending it's not there. It only makes you look dumber. I'm not saying that the media shouldn't break into the soaps to bring the news, just that they didn't do much (even on the evening news) in the past.

Do you know why he is not saying if she was a covert agent? BECAUSE IT IS ILLEGAL FOR HIM TO DO SO. And Libby hasn't been charged with outing a covert agent because Fitzgerald couldn't prove it because... Libby OBSTRUCTED HIM

1. Posing in Vanity Fair means you ain't covert anymore, so Fitzgerald can say it all he wants. Under your delusional argument, Randi Rhodes should be up on about 187,249 counts of revealing a covert agent.

B. I'm hearing this a lot from you guys, "The reason Scooter wasn't charged was because he was too good a liar." Uh, right. If you charge him with lying, then there's gotta be something he's lying about, right? You can't bring criminal charges against someone without some specifics. (Well, you can in the communist systems you're trying to implement here, but that's not the way the game is played. Yet.) That would be like charging someone with murder, but not stating who is dead because the accused was too good at hiding the body, so they don't know.

Joe Wilson, a partisan enemy of Team Dubya is sent by his wife to discredit the war and then writes a lie-filled editorial. Team Dubya points out that Wilson's a liar and he was sent by his NON-COVERT wife, not the Veep as Wilson lied about.

I would like you to post, with attributions, these lies.


Start reading, Bub. Try here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Wilson lied about his own report. Wilson lied about his wife sending him. Wilson has been peddling his lies everywhere an open microphone is, so while I'm sure you could cherry-pick an exculpatory version, the bottom line remains: Joe Wilson is a liar and his wife wasn't a covert agent anymore.

The Left and MSM have been peddling this Big Lie for 2 years, yet they still don't seem interested in the UN Oil-For-Food scandal; the bribing of 2000 companies, France, Russia and George Galloway; the fact that Iraq keeps moving forward toward democracy. Why is that? And why do you so-called freedom-loving people oppose democracy so much, whether in the Middle East or Washington state?

Comments will be turned off for the weekend. This will give you three days to concoct some more fairy tales for us or maybe Tim Russert will explain how Scooter thinks he told him about Plame. See ya Tuesday morning, chump.