Patterico's Pontifications

Q Scott, has anyone — has the President tried to find out who outed the CIA agent? And has he fired anyone in the White House yet?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, Helen, that’s assuming a lot of things. First of all, that is not the way this White House operates. The President expects everyone in his administration to adhere to the highest standards of conduct. No one would be authorized to do such a thing. Secondly, there — I’ve seen the anonymous media reports, and if I could find out who “anonymous” was, it would make my life a whole lot easier. But —

Q Does he think it didn’t come from here?

MR. McCLELLAN: But we’ve made it very clear that anyone — anyone — who has information relating to this should report that information to the Department of Justice.

Q Does he doubt it came from the White House?

MR. McCLELLAN: I’m sorry?

Q Does he doubt?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, there’s been no information that has been brought to our attention, beyond what we’ve seen in the media reports, to suggest White House involvement.

Q Will the President move aggressively to see if such a transgression has occurred in the White House? Will he ask top White House officials to sign statements saying that they did not give the information?

MR. McCLELLAN: Bill, if someone leaked classified information of this nature, the appropriate agency to look into it would be the Department of Justice. So the Department of Justice is the one that would look in matters like this.

Q You’re saying the White House won’t take a proactive role?

MR. McCLELLAN: Do you have any specific information to bring to my attention suggesting White House involvement?

Q If you would —

MR. McCLELLAN: I haven’t seen any.

Q Would you not want to know whether someone had leaked information of this kind?

MR. McCLELLAN: The President has been — I spoke for him earlier today — the President believes leaking classified information is a very serious matter. And it should be —

Q So why doesn’t he want —

MR. McCLELLAN: — pursued to the fullest extent —

Q Right, so why —

MR. McCLELLAN: — by the appropriate agency. And the appropriate agency is the Department of Justice.

Q Why wouldn’t he proactively do that, ask people on the staff to say that they had not leaked anything?

MR. McCLELLAN: Do you have specific information to suggest White House involvement? I saw a media report that said “senior administration officials.” That’s an anonymous source that could include a lot of people. I’ve seen a lot of “senior administration officials” in media stories.

Q Would they know — to the White House?

Q Scott, when you say that it should be pursued by the Justice Department — Justice has not said whether it actually is conducting an investigation. Does the President want the Justice Department to investigate this matter?

MR. McCLELLAN: If someone leaked classified information of the nature that has been reported, absolutely, the President would want it to be looked into. And the Justice Department would be the appropriate agency to do so.

Q And do you know that they are doing this?

MR. McCLELLAN: That’s a question you need to ask the Department of Justice. My understanding is that if something like this happened and it was referred to the Department of Justice, then the Department of Justice would look to see whether or not there is enough information to pursue it further. But those are questions you need to ask the Department of Justice.

Q But, Scott, something like this did happen, right? Bob Novak had information he should not have had, that he was not authorized to have. So something —

MR. McCLELLAN: Terry, all I can tell you is what I’ve seen in the media reports. And I’ve seen different statements in the media reports from, the CIA hasn’t confirmed or denied that this was a covert agent for the CIA; I’ve seen media reports to suggest that it was referred to the Department of Justice, and that — and comments the Department of Justice would look into it.

Q So the President of the United States doesn’t know whether or not this classified information was divulged, and he is only getting his information by reading the media?

MR. McCLELLAN: I’m sorry?

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/19/2007 @ 12:12 pm

Bummer. 🙁

Discovery and cross examination were going to be such fun!

Pablo (99243e) — 7/19/2007 @ 12:12 pm

Uh, it was Armitage, who doesn’t work in the White House. And who the left doesn’t seem to give a damn about. You been paying attention to this thing, AF?

Pablo (99243e) — 7/19/2007 @ 12:13 pm

Citing Helen Thomas? How’s that for brain dead. By the way the Seanate Intelligence subcommittee demonstrated exactly how much of a fraud both of these Phlame morons were. They should both be in prison for fraud.

Thomas Jackson (bf83e0) — 7/19/2007 @ 12:36 pm

A) Classifed information were its quite questionable whether it was classified and Fitzgerald made it a point to avoid arguing or making a legal case that it was classified.

B) So the WH takes an aggressive role, and then gets accused of being too involved and trying to cover up by taking control.

C) MAN, was the press core that bitchy back then too?

Schmoe (20ce31) — 7/19/2007 @ 12:37 pm

MR. McCLELLAN: If someone leaked classified information of the nature that has been reported, absolutely, the President would want it to be looked into.

With that statement, McClellan cleared the decks for the WH. Whether he knew at the time he had qualified his statement in a fashion that precisely removed the Bush Administration from responsibility, who knows?

AF, you seem a little uninformed here.

spongeworthy (45b30e) — 7/19/2007 @ 12:38 pm

Looks to me like Chemerinsky can’t write a complaint.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/19/2007 @ 1:50 pm

Q: Did there come a time following the publication of [Ambassador Joseph] Wilson’s op-ed [July 6, 2003] that you met with Mr. Libby again?
A: Yes.
Q: When was that?
A: July 8th.
[…]
Q: Was there discussion at any time about Mr. Wilson’s wife [Plame] on this occasion?
A: Yes.
Q: Can you tell us what you recall about that?
A: Yes. Mr. Libby was discussing what he called two streams of reporting on uranium and on efforts by Iraq to acquire sensitive materials and components. He said the first stream was reports like that of Joe Wilson. Then he said the second stream, and at that point he said, once again, as an aside, that Mr. Wilson’s wife worked at WINPAC.
Q: Can you tell us what WINPAC is?
A: Yes, WINPAC is, stands for Weapons Intelligence Non-Proliferation and Arms Control. It’s a part of the CIA which is specifically focused on weapons of mass destruction.
—
Here’s some more
Hey. Here’s Patrick Frey himself
She was covert. There was an organized attempt from the White House to discredit her husband. Data was cherry picked. We went to war. etc.etc.

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/19/2007 @ 2:04 pm

Yawn. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz………

I’m sure the Right will be jubilant. The
coalition of the prevaricators hung together so
that they would not hang separately, and without
corroboration, no crime was provable.

Absent any of conscience, absence of malice.

A day of reckoning? Perhaps in twenty or thirty years. That’s the price of our system of justice.
To protect thsse innocent, some guilty go unpunished.

BTW. has OJ paid anything to the
Goldmans yet?

Semanticleo (4741c2) — 7/19/2007 @ 2:10 pm

AF, now you are spamming the comments with nonsense.

Semanticleo, coalition of prevaricators? Once again, an accusation by you without any basis.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/19/2007 @ 2:30 pm

1. Armitage was one of the four defendants in the case
2. It was dismissed on jurisdictional grounds

The Liberal Avenger (b8c7e2) — 7/19/2007 @ 2:37 pm

She was covert. There was an organized attempt from the White House to discredit her husband.

Uh huh. So, if you’ve got all this evidence locked up, why wasn’t anyone charged, AF?

Pablo (99243e) — 7/19/2007 @ 3:05 pm

Oh, and her husband needed discrediting. But fortunately, he’s done plenty of that himself.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/19/2007 @ 3:05 pm

She was covert.

AF, if she was covert then why were no charges brought against Armitage?

Cue the chirping crickets!

H2U (81b7bd) — 7/19/2007 @ 3:26 pm

Val was so covert and so undercover that the CIA verified her employment and her identity over the phone to a journalist, Robert Novak.

Washington Post:

Novak said he called the CIA on July 10, 2003, to get the agency’s version. The then-CIA spokesman, Bill Harlow, told the columnist that the story he had gotten about Wilson’s wife’s role was not correct. Novak has written that Harlow said the CPD officials selected Wilson but that she “was delegated to request his help.”
Harlow has said that he told Novak that if he wrote about the trip, he should not mention Wilson’s wife’s name. Novak, who published her maiden name — Valerie Plame — has written that Harlow’s request was “meaningless” because “once it was determined that Wilson’s wife suggested the mission, she could be identified as ‘Valerie Plame’ by reading her husband’s entry in ‘Who’s Who in America.’ “

http://tinyurl.com/9jht8

Actual (81be4a) — 7/19/2007 @ 3:30 pm

So why isn’t Jesse Jackson in prison for outing a super-secret CIA program and super-covert CIA agents?

(This is just teasing the America-haters, AF and Semanticleo, BTW.)

nk (37689a) — 7/19/2007 @ 3:32 pm

There are three important facts in the case that people shouldn’t forget.

1) The judge is a Bush-appointee.

2) The judge used to work as a partisan hack in Ken Starr’s independent council office.

3) The judge already illegally denied the General Accounting Office access to Dick Cheney’s records about his illegal secret meetings with energy company campaign donors on energy policy.

libhomo (2ebaed) — 7/19/2007 @ 3:51 pm

libhomo,

And yet all those facts are entirely irrelevant when you look at the actual decision rendered by the judge.

Civil Action No. 06-1258 (JDB)

The proper inquiry in this Court’s view, then, is whether talking to the press in order to discredit a public critic of the Executive Branch and its policies is within the scope of defendants’ duties as federal employees.

The alleged means by which defendants chose to rebut Mr. Wilson’s comments and attack his credibility may have been highly unsavory. But there can be no serious dispute that the act of rebutting public criticism, such as that levied by Mr. Wilson against the Bush Administration’s handling of prewar foreign intelligence, by speaking with members of the press is within the scope of defendants’ duties as high-level Executive Branch officials. Thus, the alleged tortious conduct, namely the disclosure of Mrs. Wilson’s status as a covert operative, was incidental to the kind of conduct that defendants were employed to perform.

In sum, the Court finds that plaintiffs have not pled sufficient facts that, if true, would
rebut the Westfall certification filed in this action. Hence, neither further discovery nor an evidentiary hearing on the scope-of-employment issue is warranted, and the United States is substituted as the sole defendant for the claim of public disclosure of private facts. Furthermore, plaintiffs have not contested defendants’ assertions that they have not exhausted their
administrative remedies as required by the FTCA.

H2U (81b7bd) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:10 pm

Once again the righties are strangely forgiving of something the rest of the world rightly sees as shocking: people at the highest level of the White House vindictively outing an intelligent agent during wartime. Ironic that it was just a few years ago that Pablo, so casually accepting of treason now, questioned my patriotism based on some grade-school-level reasoning or other. How soon until we can banish you people to the garbage scow of history, 184 days? Please, let that day come quickly.

djangone (5b39d8) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:15 pm

libhomo,

And yet all those facts are entirely irrelevant when you look at the actual decision rendered by the judge.

Civil Action No. 06-1258 (JDB)

The proper inquiry in this Court’s view, then, is whether talking to the press in order to discredit a public critic of the Executive Branch and its policies is within the scope of defendants’ duties as federal employees.

The alleged means by which defendants chose to rebut Mr. Wilson’s comments and attack his credibility may have been highly unsavory. But there can be no serious dispute that the act of rebutting public criticism, such as that levied by Mr. Wilson against the Bush Administration’s handling of prewar foreign intelligence, by speaking with members of the press is within the scope of defendants’ duties as high-level Executive Branch officials. Thus, the alleged tortious conduct, namely the disclosure of Mrs. Wilson’s status as a covert operative, was incidental to the kind of conduct that defendants were employed to perform.

In sum, the Court finds that plaintiffs have not pled sufficient facts that, if true, would
rebut the Westfall certification filed in this action. Hence, neither further discovery nor an evidentiary hearing on the scope-of-employment issue is warranted, and the United States is substituted as the sole defendant for the claim of public disclosure of private facts. Furthermore, plaintiffs have not contested defendants’ assertions that they have not exhausted their administrative remedies as required by the FTCA.

And the conclusion the Judge reached?

For the reasons given above, plaintiffs have failed to state a claim upon which relief can be granted with respect to their four causes of action asserted directly under the Constitution. Furthermore, this Court lacks subject-matter jurisdiction over plaintiffs’ claim for public disclosure of private facts. Accordingly, defendants’ motions to dismiss are granted. A separate order accompanies this memorandum opinion.

While you may not like the Judge’s background, his decision is spot on. Plame has no ground to stand on and the jurisdiction is questionable. Judge Bates is right on the money despite your insinuation regarding possible conflicts of interest. Next time you may want to actually read the court’s decision before trying to smear the person who rendered it…

Just a little advice from me to you.

H2U (81b7bd) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:15 pm

Comment by Semanticleo — 7/19/2007 @ 2:10 pm

cleo, you post your brain-dead, idiotic meanderings over here, too?

N. O'Brain (9056e2) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:28 pm

1) The judge is a Bush-appointee.

OMG, you mean to say he might actually obey the law?

OHNOES!!!!!!

N. O'Brain (9056e2) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:30 pm

Ironic that it was just a few years ago that Pablo, so casually accepting of treason now, questioned my patriotism based on some grade-school-level reasoning or other.

Treason? Put down the crack pipe, Jingo. And note the absolute absence of prosecution for the “outing” of Plame, despite a special prosecutor. And if my guess is correct, I questioned your grade school reasoning. Close though!

Pablo (99243e) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:33 pm

Libby was charged with and convicted of lying, not outing Plame. Making the charge of outing Plame would have been difficult.
Plame was covert. The CIA asked for an investigation because it considered her status to be covert. Bush promised to fire whomever was responsible. Wilson did not lie. The documents were forgeries (and they had a complete transcript from the forgeries when Wilson went to Niger).
Lets see, What else is there… oh yes:
Bush’s policies have been an absolute failure and Al Qarda is as strong as it was before 2001.
Of course you don’t believe any of these things because you never accept the opinions of experts. “Opinions are like assholes, everybody has one” you say.

Let me then ask your next question: Well, why is this a leak investigation that doesn’t result in a charge? I’ve been trying to think about how to explain this, so let me try. I know baseball analogies are the fad these days. Let me try something.

If you saw a baseball game and you saw a pitcher wind up and throw a fastball and hit a batter right smack in the head, and it really, really hurt them, you’d want to know why the pitcher did that. And you’d wonder whether or not the person just reared back and decided, “I’ve got bad blood with this batter. He hit two home runs off me. I’m just going to hit him in the head as hard as I can.”

You also might wonder whether or not the pitcher just let go of the ball or his foot slipped, and he had no idea to throw the ball anywhere near the batter’s head. And there’s lots of shades of gray in between.

You might learn that you wanted to hit the batter in the back and it hit him in the head because he moved. You might want to throw it under his chin, but it ended up hitting him on the head.

FITZGERALD: And what you’d want to do is have as much information as you could. You’d want to know: What happened in the dugout? Was this guy complaining about the person he threw at? Did he talk to anyone else? What was he thinking? How does he react? All those things you’d want to know.

And then you’d make a decision as to whether this person should be banned from baseball, whether they should be suspended, whether you should do nothing at all and just say, “Hey, the person threw a bad pitch. Get over it.”

In this case, it’s a lot more serious than baseball. And the damage wasn’t to one person. It wasn’t just Valerie Wilson. It was done to all of us.

And as you sit back, you want to learn: Why was this information going out? Why were people taking this information about Valerie Wilson and giving it to reporters? Why did Mr. Libby say what he did? Why did he tell Judith Miller three times? Why did he tell the press secretary on Monday? Why did he tell Mr. Cooper? And was this something where he intended to cause whatever damage was caused?

FITZGERALD: Or did they intend to do something else and where are the shades of gray?

And what we have when someone charges obstruction of justice, the umpire gets sand thrown in his eyes. He’s trying to figure what happened and somebody blocked their view.

As you sit here now, if you’re asking me what his motives were, I can’t tell you; we haven’t charged it.

So what you were saying is the harm in an obstruction investigation is it prevents us from making the fine judgments we want to make.

I also want to take away from the notion that somehow we should take an obstruction charge less seriously than a leak charge.

This is a very serious matter and compromising national security information is a very serious matter. But the need to get to the bottom of what happened and whether national security was compromised by inadvertence, by recklessness, by maliciousness is extremely important. We need to know the truth. And anyone who would go into a grand jury and lie, obstruct and impede the investigation has committed a serious crime.

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:34 pm

Plame was covert. The CIA asked for an investigation because it considered her status to be covert.

Then why did Bill Harlow, head of the Public Affairs Office confirm her employment to Novak?

Not covert. No crime. No prosecution for “outing” her. You don’t have to like it, but you’re going to have to live with it. And you’ll learn to accept it, eventually.

Oh, and no Rove frogmarch either. Heh.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:38 pm

Val was so covert and so sooper-seekret undercover that the CIA verified her employment and her identity over the phone to a journalist, Robert Novak.

Washington Post:

Novak said he called the CIA on July 10, 2003, to get the agency’s version. The then-CIA spokesman, Bill Harlow, told the columnist that the story he had gotten about Wilson’s wife’s role was not correct. Novak has written that Harlow said the CPD officials selected Wilson but that she “was delegated to request his help.”
Harlow has said that he told Novak that if he wrote about the trip, he should not mention Wilson’s wife’s name. Novak, who published her maiden name — Valerie Plame — has written that Harlow’s request was “meaningless” because “once it was determined that Wilson’s wife suggested the mission, she could be identified as ‘Valerie Plame’ by reading her husband’s entry in ‘Who’s Who in America.’ “

http://tinyurl.com/9jht8

Actual (81be4a) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:40 pm

Sorry Pablo. I guess I’m as incompetent as Joe Wilson.

Actual (81be4a) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:41 pm

Libby was charged with and convicted of lying, not outing Plame.

Again, why was Armitage not charged with a crime? Answer the question — don’t obfuscate.

Making the charge of outing Plame would have been difficult.

Since when does difficulty excuse Fitzgerald from doing his job?

Plame was covert.

So pithy and yet so empty of fact. If Plame was covert as you claim, why was Armitage not charged with a crime? Perhaps because she wasn’t covert…

Wilson did not lie.

But Valerie Plame most certainly did:
Read Page 211

H2U (81b7bd) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:44 pm

AF, now in addition to spamming the thread with irrelevancies, you are again posting as facts things that simply are not. That the CIA made the referral does not establish that Plame was covert for the purposes of the statute. Its not proof. In fact, its never been proven, even though Fitz wanted to assert it w/o any proof. Wilson did lie about several things, including that he had anything to do with “proving” the Italian docs were forgeries and his assertion to Corn about how he was sent to Niger as well as misrepresenting his own report to the CIA about his trip.

Given Fitzgerald’s connivance at concealing Russert’s cooperation and his deliberately deceptive assertions in press conferences about the investigation, he’s not going to be considered a reliable “expert”.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/19/2007 @ 4:46 pm

I hardly ever comment anymore because I am convinced it is useless. It sure is depressing, watching Rome fall.

Those who support Plame and Wilson, and ignore the facts that Plame was not covert, that Plame and Wilson are megalomaniacs, that the leaker, Armitage, is an enemy of Bush, are simply insane.

“My fellow Romans, the Goths are invading.”

“Oh, piss off, they are not, and if they are, it’s the Emperor’s fault, it’s a fantasy, let’s talk about…”

I’m from Canada so don’t accuse me of being a Republican. Like it or not, we who live in the marches worry about our fate if the USA loses it. And you are most definitely losing it. Lefty dullards everywhere. What kind of a complete loser moron would ignore what Armitage did and who he is?

BlacquesJacquesShellacques (f81c65) — 7/19/2007 @ 5:07 pm

I agree with Pablo’s post at #2.
I am disappointed that the suit was dismissed. Testifying under oath by the Wilsons and other players could have been the best political turn of events this administration has had.

MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 7/19/2007 @ 5:19 pm

Page 211.
The claim that Plame convened the meeting? Was denied by her superiors at the CIA.
Here’s someone you should read

“his own report to the CIA about his trip.”
He didn’t write a report. And as I said, the CIA had a complete transcript of the forgeries at the time of Wilson’s trip. He knew the accusations. Everyone outside the White House discounted the Niger claims, before and after the trip.

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/19/2007 @ 5:20 pm

AF wrote (among other delusional things): Wilson did not lie.

Here’s a challenge for you, AF: Google the phrase “a little literary flair” and get back to us.

L.N. Smithee (7d35d5) — 7/19/2007 @ 5:22 pm

Like we said, AF, we wished he had the opportunity to be on the witness stand to clarify his record.
Otherwise, I think all has been said on previous threads.

MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 7/19/2007 @ 5:44 pm

Memories, light the corners of my mind….

Woodward: But it was Joe Wilson who was sent by the agency. I mean that’s just —
Armitage: His wife works in the agency.
Woodward: — Why doesn’t that come out? Why does —
Armitage: Everyone knows it.
Woodward: —that have to be a big secret? Everyone knows.
Armitage: Yeah. And I know [ ] Joe Wilson’s been calling everybody. He’s pissed off because he was designated as a low-level guy, went out to look at it. So, he’s all pissed off.
Woodward: But why would they send him?
Armitage: Because his wife’s a [ ] analyst at the agency.
Woodward: It’s still weird.
Armitage: It—It’s perfect. This is what she does, she is a WMD analyst out there.
Woodward: Oh she is.
Armitage: Yeah.
Woodward: Oh, I see.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/19/2007 @ 5:58 pm

AF, now you are creating strawmen while pretending to answer points. This is a good clue that you are not interested in the actual facts, just your spin talking point. Wilson reported a Niger gov’t official’s statement that they had been approached by Iraq. He did not establish that Iraq had not attempted to obtain uranium and he knows it and you know it.

Its really amazing to me that the theme of the Wilson oped was that the White House was dishonest and the methods that Wilson used to “prove” it were themselves dishonest misrepresentations of what he had done. That theme continues with everyone spinning on his behalf.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/19/2007 @ 6:09 pm

Cant we all stop with the “She was covert!”… “She was not covert!” gyrations and semantics….it is irrelevant. The core issue is whether revealing her name broke any laws. The answer to that is a emphatic NO. End of story. Cue the crying Demrats.

BP3 (6d35cb) — 7/19/2007 @ 6:35 pm

“Wilson reported a Niger gov’t official’s statement that they had been approached by Iraq.”

…to discuss trade, and the official said he thought that meant yellowcake. Everyone heard that and then read the reports that were written up after Wilson came back. Nobody was very worried about it, for a lot of reasons. First that one official made an assumption that may or may not have been correct, and second: well, maybe you should read up on who how the mines are operated in Niger.

Also the CIA directorate had a verbatim transcript of the forgeries [see here and here] which was the basis of the whole thing. I’ve mentioned that 2 or three times already but you seem to ignore it.
Remember this was the era of “Mushroom clouds!” etc.
Saddam was completely locked down. And you did know he had shitloads of yellowcake already right? The forgeries were the foundation of the case.
And they were forgeries. The rest is secondary.

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/19/2007 @ 7:01 pm

AF, the statement was made by the Niger official. It specifically rebuts any claim that Wilson “proved” that Iraq was not seeking uranium.

The forgeries do not by themselves rebut whether or not Iraq was seeking uranium no matter how often you repeat the same non sequitur logical fallacy. Your assertion that the forgeries were the “foundation” of the case is without basis as well.

As I said before, Wilson and his defenders use misrepresentation to “prove” the Bush administration’s misrepresentations.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/19/2007 @ 7:40 pm

The original claims in the forgeries that were the basis for this entire hullabaloo were of contracts, agreements and signatures on the dotted line. Etc. etc. The documents were fake.
Who made them, and why?

What was found by Wilson and others (the US Ambassador in Niger looked into this previously) was the possibility of a furtive attempt to have a conversation about something (we don’t know what but are free to guess) that if it were about yellowcake would lead nowhere because the government of Niger didn’t and doesn’t have control over the mines, which are operated by a consortium of governments, including Europeans, and were overseen and inspected constantly by the IAEA.
What we ended up with was huffing and puffing about mushroom clouds, with no basis whatsoever. We ended up with lies. We went to war, with no god damn plans for the aftermath.

We should have been worrying about Pakistan. But you weren’t and the administration wasn’t and they were wrong and so were you. And Bush just had a breakthrough dealing with North Korea so that now we’re almost back to where we were during the Clinton Administration before Bush decided Clinton was wrong and blew it, wasting 7 years.

I’m sick of arguing with uneducable idiots who run on ignorance and attitude. You blew it in Afghanistan. You blew it in Iraq. Thousands and thousands and thousands are dead, the troops still don’t have enough armor on their Humvees [who the fuck sent them those stupid things?] their medical care sucks, and Al Qaeda is as strong as ever. Don’t lecture me on a god damn thing. Don’t lecture me on intellectual seriousness and damn well don’t argue with me on morality.

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/19/2007 @ 9:40 pm

AF is pretty wound up tonight.

In the moonbat world, in the infamous 16 words, if you take the word sought (which Iraq had sought), and just morph that into bought (which the Left and their buddies in the media have done), then this all makes sense from their perspective.

However, Joe and Val are still lying hacks.

JD (a04d17) — 7/19/2007 @ 9:54 pm

BP, how could you say she was not covert when the CIA director said she was covert? How could there have even been a case in court about “outing a CIA agent” if she wasn’t covert? Many former CIA say she was covert.

About the Wilson/Plame case being dismissed, this from the “14 Characteristics of Fascism” comes to mind.: #13. “Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint eachother to government positions and use govermental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources for even treasures to be appropriated, or even outright stolen by government leaders.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/19/2007 @ 9:56 pm

Sooooooo Bush is the only president to appoint friends to Gov’t positions? What was Bobby Kennedy? A fluke?

Scott Jacobs (a1de9d) — 7/19/2007 @ 10:01 pm

AF, I applaude you. You are on target with the facts.

For some reason, what is literally defined as treason, outing a CIA agent is no big deal to some, which in all probablility, according to CIA folks, got people within the front organzation in which Valerie Plame worked ended up dead. It also destroyed Valerie Plame’s career. Others’ as well. Aint no big deal to the Right wing, apparently.

The job that Plame and her colleagues had were specifically seeing who had WMDs. Important, don’t you think?

Anyone that knows anything has seen the note from Cheney’s desk regarding his contempt for Wilson, for exposing the phony reasoning to start a war of aggression killing hundreds of thousands of innocent people, bringing terrorists into a country where none existed previously. Gee, some scoundrel Wilson was trying to prevent hundreds of thousands of innocent people dying. (????)

And regarding her status, this open letter to Congress from former CIA might prove interesting, for anyone that is actually interested in knowing the truth. Of course, many would rather parrot the pundit’s BS, but for those with a conscience, and a genuine quest for truth: http://www.fas.org/irp/news/2005/07/intlet.pdf

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/19/2007 @ 10:13 pm

Scott, the point was the dismissal of a case of genuine treason.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/19/2007 @ 10:14 pm

Blubonnet – Nice of you to stop by and squeeze out a few turds of opinion. That was a great letter by Scary Larry Johnson on behalf of the VIPs. Larry was in the CIA for what, four years in the late 1980s, then was a transpotation analyst in the State Department for a few years. He’s the one who wrote a New York Times op-ed six weeks before 9/11 saying terrorism was an overrated threat. He’s a continuously discredited hack that for some reason liberals love. Personally, I think he wants to be Valerie’s tampon, you know, sort of like the Prince Charles thing. Larry does have that Prince Valiant haircut going for him.

How many sides of their mouths do you think the VIPs can talk, Blubonnet? They are in high dudgeon over Joe outing his own wife, yet are actively encouraging insurance professionals to expose clandestine programs on the other hand. It seems sort of contradictory, but that is nothing new to the left.

daleyrocks (906622) — 7/19/2007 @ 10:50 pm

The original claims in the forgeries that were the basis for this entire hullabaloo were of contracts, agreements and signatures on the dotted line. Etc. etc. The documents were fake.
Who made them, and why?

Wrong. The basis was the 16 words in the State of the Union speech, which pertained to British intelligence….intelligence that the Brits stand behind to this day. Neither “Niger” or “douments” are contained in those 16 words.

Which, you’d never know if you listened to lefties. But if you were to wander over to someplace like FactCheck.org, you’d find, among other things, this.

Both the US and British investigations make clear that some forged Italian documents, exposed as fakes soon after Bush spoke, were not the basis for the British intelligence Bush cited, or the CIA’s conclusion that Iraq was trying to get uranium.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/20/2007 @ 2:55 am

How could there have even been a case in court about “outing a CIA agent” if she wasn’t covert?

There couldn’t have been one, which is why there wasn’t. The Left: Making shit up since the day they were born.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/20/2007 @ 2:58 am

bluebonnet

BP, how could you say she was not covert when the CIA director said she was covert? How could there have even been a case in court about “outing a CIA agent” if she wasn’t covert? Many former CIA say she was covert.

First, the CIA director does not get to make that determination. The law outlines the requirements for covert status. There was never any case in court about outing a covert agent. Many former CIA, Larry Johnson, speak out their rectum.

JD (a04d17) — 7/20/2007 @ 5:11 am

“Both the US and British investigations make clear that some forged Italian documents, exposed as fakes soon after Bush spoke, were not the basis for the British intelligence Bush cited, or the CIA’s conclusion that Iraq was trying to get uranium.”

The US report refuses to acknowledge the complete verbatim transcripts of the forgeries that were in the hands of the CIA. The Butler report says that the British had independent intel but the Brits did not and have not said what it was or where it originated.
here’s some fun for you And some more from a British MP. The Poodles can’t make up their mind if Iraq “bought” or “sought” yellowcake, and they can’t even make up their mind who gave them the intel.
It all goes back to Italy.

“The president’s statement in the State of the Union was incorrect because it was based on forged documents from the African nation of Niger, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said Monday.

“The president’s statement was based on the predicate of the yellow cake” uranium “from Niger,” Fleischer told reporters. “So given the fact that the report on the yellow cake did not turn out to be accurate, that is reflective of the president’s broader statement.”
Fleischer’s remarks follow assertions by an envoy sent by the CIA to Africa to investigate allegations about Iraq’s nuclear weapons program. The envoy, Joseph Wilson, said Sunday that the Bush administration manipulated his findings, possibly to strengthen the rationale for war. “

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/20/2007 @ 5:44 pm

The US report refuses to acknowledge the complete verbatim transcripts of the forgeries that were in the hands of the CIA.

Transcripts of forgeries? That’s interesting.

The Poodles can’t make up their mind if Iraq “bought” or “sought” yellowcake, and they can’t even make up their mind who gave them the intel.

The quote, in the 16 words which Wilson took issue with, was “sought”. And it was not based on the forgeries. If the intelligence said “bought”, why did Bush say “sought”? And why do the Brits and the CIA stand by the intelligence? And where did Saddam get the yellowcake we’ve found? And are you really going to rely on Ari Fleischer as a definitive intelligence source?

You’re chasing your tail, AF. And all the Joshtalkingpointsleftcoaster evaluations of intelligence they don’t have aren’t going to change that.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/20/2007 @ 6:04 pm

AF- This thread started with the news that Plame’s lawsuit was dismissed. In case it was over looked, many of us “uneducable idiots who run on ignorance and attitude” were disappointed, we wanted to see the case go to trial. We wanted the opportunity to have them cross-examined, as well as the defense get to call witnesses in the broader context of events, not the circumscribed part having to do with Libby’s testimony.

“Thousands and thousands and thousands are dead, the troops still don’t have enough armor on their Humvees [who the ____ sent them those stupid things?] their medical care sucks, and Al Qaeda is as strong as ever. Don’t lecture me on … and … don’t argue with me on morality.”

Yes, thousands x 3 = three thousand plus have died. People die in combat and in wars. The best reason to fight a war is when postponing it will lead to a worse war. In this calculation many see Iraq as unnecessary, others think confronting Saddam after 10 years of “hide-go-seek” was appropriate.

If you visit Blackfive, you’ll get to see how amazing the “Stryker” vehicles can be in action, as well as the great medical being done by US troops on Afghan civilians as well. As far as Al Qaeda getting stronger, I’m not sure what you expected they would do if we didn’t engage them on their turf. Besides, the Iraqi’s are fed up with them, best thing that could happen.

I don’t plan on lecturing or arguing with you on anything. I wanted to point out that we are disappointed Plame and Wilson didn’t get their day in court.

blubonnet- There has already been a discussion on this blog on the thread “Why did Fitzgerald continue the investigation…”. There is ample reason to doubt Plame was “covert”, if that means a person under cover with no visible ties to US government intelligence agencies. As far as danger goes, 1/3 of Presidents since 1960 have been shot at while in office. Since 1960 the number of CIA people who drive in and out of Langley each day who have been shot at is nowhere near that high. The media and the Left usually doesn’t mind CIA and NSA activities being exposed, heck, that’s how to win a Pulitzer prize. If people have died because of Plame’s “outing” I want to see the details.

MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 7/20/2007 @ 7:45 pm

Dear Dr, I said people. That includes Iraqis.
Pablo, do a little research.
“Transcripts of forgeries? That’s interesting.”
Yes: government transcripts of the documents later proven to be forgeries.
The war itself?
Again go read a book, or a newspaper.
What’s Bush’s popularity at these days?

enough. I’m out.

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/20/2007 @ 7:54 pm

AF, we’ve done the research. You want to ignore that research and put the emphasis on what Wilson says to the exclusion of the bipartisan select intel committee reports, and the British report regardless of the fact that Wilson’s statements are not consistent in themselves nor with the documentary evidence.

blubonnet writes: “For some reason, what is literally defined as treason, outing a CIA agent is no big deal to some, which in all probablility, according to CIA folks, got people within the front organzation in which Valerie Plame worked ended up dead. It also destroyed Valerie Plame’s career. Others’ as well. Aint no big deal to the Right wing, apparently.”

No, the outing of a CIA agent is not literally defined as treason. It is – in certain very narrow circumstances that Fitzgerald could not prove here – defined as a separate crime. If you can’t even get something so elementary to the case as this right, it is not a surprise that the rest of your “points” are false as well.

As for the “letter” you cite, that is written by Larry Johnson. Johnson is literally ( to use your word ) a joke. Not to mention a cheap thug who has made implied threats to people who disagree with him. Johnson has no credibility here.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/20/2007 @ 8:13 pm

Hey, daley, seems you can read, why didn’t your read the entire open letter (#44) to the Congress that NUMEROUS former CIA stated regarding her being covert. Also from those NUMEROUS former agents is the statement that those like Medved, and other highly paid, pin-head pundits had MISREPRESENTED the story, and the disgust among those CIA professionals that spent their lives in that occupation, risking risking their well being for their country.

And despite the fact that the CIA DIRECTOR STATED when asked, “YES, PLAME WAS COVERT” all of you Rightie tighties still keep regurgitating the lies. And like all vomit, it stinks.

Apparently the Republican party is now the procriminality, anti-American party, because something that would hurt this country, and hurt one of its own CIA, is just a-okay with you. It’s a sporting event to you- the Ds vs the Rs, not peoples lives, or human beings dying from the kind of dishonest, corporate sponsored, crap being done. I’m quite sure that if murder of D’s for political gain was openly proposed by someone from your party, you’d oblige, because you don’t care when people die for childish vendettas that administration officials instigate. It’s a game to you. Only rules don’t even apply. It’s like biting and scratching in a wrestling match. It’s all dirty, and you’re all for it, even if people have to die.

And yes, other former CIA that had worked with Plame having stated her covert status, said that in all liklihood, people died in Brewster Jennings, the cover operation, in which she worked, after Bush and Cheney’s sick little game of “gothcha back nah”. Gargantuan egos, with the emotional maturity of a 6 year old child, yet with unspeakable power. What a nightmare!

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/20/2007 @ 10:23 pm

The only reason Fitzgerald couldn’t prove anything, is because of the OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE. If the trial could have been carried out, which would require COMPLIANCE WITH JUSTICE, then he could have proven it. So, lying was all that came about from it, because the criminal cabal kept successfully throwing out roadblocks, OBSTRUCTING JUSTICE, LYING, “NOT REMEMBERING”. Laws are not something respected by these thugs, and not something that they feel a need to follow.

AND OUTING A CIA AGENT IS TREASON.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/20/2007 @ 10:30 pm

blubonnet – You need to check the timeline of your narrative. The D’s started the D’s against the R’s in this case. In fact it’s pretty funny that Broadway Joe Wilson was pretty sure Saddam had WMDs in early 2003 and said so during his media appearances. His stance only started to change once he started working with the Kerry campaign. Ray McGovern, a former high level CIA employee and one the the signatories of the letter you included, even wrote Bush just before the Iraq invasion to warn him of the dangers to our troops of Saddam using his poison gas, which the left now claims he never had, against our troops. The only thing noteworthy about this collection of morons is how consistently wrong they have been.

If it helps you to make it through the day, keep believing your fantasies. The relentless us versus them has been a lefty creation. Read the Woodward/Armitage conversation excerpted above, which makes it pretty clear that Joe outed his wife. The CIA General Counsel also wrote a letter during the course of Waxman’s hearings this spring saying that they had not yet determined whether Valerie’s status was covert under IIPA because the question was complex. It’s tough to see how other agents, the director, Larry Johnson and all these other nonexpert partisans can make their claims if after four years the CIA still hasn’t figured it out. Perhaps you are using the term covert in a more pedestrian sense as opposed to a legal sense.

Better luck next time.

daleyrocks (906622) — 7/20/2007 @ 10:56 pm

The only reason Fitzgerald couldn’t prove anything, is because of the OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE. If the trial could have been carried out, which would require COMPLIANCE WITH JUSTICE, then he could have proven it. So, lying was all that came about from it, because the criminal cabal kept successfully throwing out roadblocks, OBSTRUCTING JUSTICE, LYING, “NOT REMEMBERING”. Laws are not something respected by these thugs, and not something that they feel a need to follow.

If you replace the word “Fitzgerald” with “Starr,” the above paragraph might have been similar to something I would have posted eight years ago, with one big difference — it would have been true.

L.N. Smithee (83f42c) — 7/20/2007 @ 11:41 pm

enough. I’m out.

A.F.T. Take Joe and Val with you.

L.N. Smithee (83f42c) — 7/20/2007 @ 11:42 pm

The only reason Fitzgerald couldn’t prove anything, is because of the OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE. If the trial could have been carried out, which would require COMPLIANCE WITH JUSTICE, then he could have proven it.

For that trial to have been carried out, Fitz would have to have brought charges. He didn’t. He didn’t try. No covert agent, no outing, no crime, no charges. Deal with it.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/21/2007 @ 2:42 am

blubonnet, bold font does not improve your argument. Certainly, you don’t understand what is, and what is not, proof the elements of the crime you allege.

But probably the silliest portion is your claim that Libby’s obstruction of justice prevented prosecution. It simply makes no sense, since Fitzgerald knew who actually “outed” Plame within days of being appointed. Basically, the less one knows about this case, the more emphatic the comments. Bold and all.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/21/2007 @ 8:18 am

If she was not covert, why would Libby have to lie as to whether or not he outed her? It is such obvious common sense, I’m baffled as to why you even try to say otherwise. When CIA director, numerous collegues of Plame stated her covert status, even Bush when he was (as usual blowing smoke) saying that “we were going to get to the bottom of this, whoever did this, and they will be fired if it was someone in our administration”

What research could any of you possibly have that would out wiegh the above evidence?

And as far as the Ds vs the Rs, that is where you are hanging your hat in the priority department of debate. This is about treason vs not. That is the side we on Wilson’s side were for. Incidentally, Wilson used to be a Republican, voted for Bush in 2000, and like all intelligent ones, saw what scoundrels the president and his cohorts have shown themselves to be.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/21/2007 @ 10:24 am

All of your “research” could only be coming from the documented liar pundits like Hannity, Savage, Limbaugh, and the like.

You accuse Joe Wilson of going front and center into the media, proclaiming his case. That shows guts, not ego. Of course the Republican, criminal apologists are going to speak scathingly about him, accuse him of self aggrandizing. That is because they know that discussing the SCRUTINIZED facts, will not work, so throwing out opinion, which cannot be proven wrong or right, is all they got. You keep buying it, because it’s a big football game to you all, not the devastating impact of self-serving corporatist administration officials.

MD, if you look at the research preceding the illegal, dishonest, resulting catastrophe of the invasion of the innocent country of Iraq, you will find, that most of the world knew, as did our inspectors (who were ignored, then disparaged, for speaking up, as was Wilson and Plame) they stated of the impotence of Hussein’s weapons capacity.

The only reason you did not know of the impoverished military capacity of Sadaam Hussein, is because our MSM is united with our government, in the sense that both have mutual interest in the war, both in defense industry profits and the PNAC (Project for the New American Century) aspiration of owning the middle east and its resources.

Jim Hightower said: “The corporations don’t have to lobby the government anymore, they are the government.” Check out the shareholding of each and every administration official.

Dwight Eisenhower said: “Beware the influence of the military industrial complex.”

Well, the MIC invested deeply into the influence-the media. We are where we were ominously warned of being, from Dwight Eisenhower. That is why you keep bypassing the facts, you listen to those pundits, who are a device of the defense industry/media/government, yes all one interdependent entity.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/21/2007 @ 10:54 am

Blubonnet, you completely discredited your arguments when you penned this sentence:

The only reason you did not know of the impoverished military capacity of Sadaam Hussein, is because our MSM is united with our government, in the sense that both have mutual interest in the war, both in defense industry profits and the PNAC (Project for the New American Century) aspiration of owning the middle east and its resources.

Who are you trying to kid?

Paul (0544fc) — 7/21/2007 @ 11:57 am

blubonnet – He did not lie about whether or not he outed her. Armitage outed her. If you have no desire to actually deal in the known facts, why bother discussing it?

Numerous former CIA now get to determine the covert status of an agent? Fuck the statute, huh?

I am quite certain that if people were dying as a result of this non-outing, then Armitage would have been charged with a crime, and evidence would have been presented showing that people were dying as a result of this non-outing. Since it was not, I call BS on your speculation.

out wiegh the above evidence

That one was particularly rich, as when you look above, you find a series of opinions, assertions without foundation, and basic moonbat talking points.

JD (a04d17) — 7/21/2007 @ 12:31 pm

This is about treason vs not.

Thanks for the giggle, blubonnet.

nk (37689a) — 7/21/2007 @ 1:18 pm

Blubonnet – I particularly enjoted the following paragraph of yours:

“The only reason you did not know of the impoverished military capacity of Sadaam Hussein, is because our MSM is united with our government, in the sense that both have mutual interest in the war, both in defense industry profits and the PNAC (Project for the New American Century) aspiration of owning the middle east and its resources.”

Actually, the real reason we didn’t have a firmer grip on the situation was because the intelligence gathering assets of the CIA, particularly HUMINT, and other agencies were decimated by design during Clinton’s administration. Don’t let that spoil a good narrative, though, or the fact that most of the senior Democrat leadership thought Saddam had WMDs in during both the Clinton and Bush administrations. They’re just all trying to look like hindsight heroes now, but you can look up the quotes. We also weren’t alone in our evaluation of Saddam’s capabilities, but others didn’t want to buy into our solution because they were making too much money off the oil for food program and other scams.

You are a lightweight on this topic blubonnet and it shows.

daleyrocks (906622) — 7/21/2007 @ 2:40 pm

blubonnet, you are looking sillier with each comment. Certainly you don’t know what evidence is. As for research, the bipartisan intelligence committee report is what I started with. You seem unaware that it even exists.

But most amusing of your recent is this comment by you: “If she was not covert, why would Libby have to lie as to whether or not he outed her? ” This comment confirms my impression that it is you that you have not followed the case at all. Fitzgerald himself claimed that the reason Libby lied about his conversations with reporters was to avoid embarrassment. So even the prosecutor does not agree with you.

Wilson has been donating money to Democrats for a long time, his nonsense about being Republican is just another example of how dishonest he is. Basically, blubonnet, you are repeating talking points that were debunked literally years ago.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/21/2007 @ 2:53 pm

Libby was part of the whole dirty deal, and you all continuously show your OBLIVION. Logic is wasted on you. So is sharing knowledge that could prevent you from sounding like such primitive morons, but you insist on sounding off the BS, the corporate media spouts.

It would be funny if it weren’t so tragic that you people might be voting.

blubonnet (768c29) — 7/21/2007 @ 4:54 pm

blubonnet, you aren’t “sharing” knowledge. You are repeating talking points we heard years ago. And you are not showing any “logic” here, rather you are wasting our time because you are actually behind the curve. The tragedy is that so many BDS sufferers use superficial talking points like yours to feel on top of events that they do not actually have any command of.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/21/2007 @ 5:23 pm

“And despite the fact that the CIA DIRECTOR STATED when asked, “YES, PLAME WAS COVERT” all of you Rightie tighties still keep regurgitating the lies.”
blubonnet- did you take the time to read the actual memo that hayden sent and the discussion of it, as I mentined above? Let me summarize: Hayden’s memo basically said-
We’re making public her file as of Jan 1, 2002
On that date she had been “covert” and had multiple trips overseas.
[Editorial comment, he did not say exactly when she had been covert or when those trips overseas had been taken, i.e., whether she fit the description defining a criminal act to “expose” her.]

David Kay, in his address to the Senate on the interim report of the survey group, said that Saddam “was even more dangerous than we thought” because of the multitude of violations including missile system development that were long range. And there was the interesting habit of keeping lethal organisms, such as the virus that causes Crimean-Congo Hemorrhagic Fever (CCHF)*, buried in the backyard of one of the top government biologists. (CCHF- read Ebola Virus, but only kills about 50% of the time, not 90%).

Outing a CIA agent is treason? Then what is outing three CIA agnets and the small airline operating covertly? Apparently no longer treason, as nobody at the LAT was indicted.
http://newsbusters.org/node/10974

AF- don’t know if you’re still reading, I understand the desire to say “enough already”.
I appreciate the clarification about the deaths including Iraqi civilians. Deaths of Iraqi civilians, as well as Kuwaiti previously, were well underway before we got there, which is part of the reason we did go there.

MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 7/21/2007 @ 7:51 pm

blubonnet, Armitage leaked Plame’s name to Novak before Libby spoke about Plame, right?

Makes every bit of all your arguments moot, doesn’t it?

And, AF, Armitage leaked the information to Novak and then participated in a COVER-UP WITH FITZGERALD, RIGHT?

Why would Fitzgerald feel the need to cover up his knowledge of the case, as opposed to simply prosecuting Armitage?

blubonnet won’t answer that one either….

reff (f3109d) — 7/21/2007 @ 8:07 pm

It all very simple actually. Chomsky made the WMDs which everyone agreed were in Iraq during the Clinton administration (Google it!!!) magically disappear once George Bush was innaugurated. Linguistics. Catch the fever!

daleyrocks (906622) — 7/21/2007 @ 8:36 pm

Your “News Busters” really should be called the “New BSers”.

The people cooperating with Bush, be it Hayden or anyone in Bush’s favor is going along with all their lawlessness. Many Republicans have either been smeared, or left the party since the outlaws started running the show. Those whose moral compass was tossed into the fire with their position are in the George W. Bush administration. Most of you don’t even have the capacity to fathom the shit they’ve pulled.

Wilson USED TI BE a Republican. Bush changed all that. In all Rove and company’s sneaky, slimy little maneuvers to put all yes-men Republicans into their government, and turn the public into all Republicnas, achieved the exact opposite. The more aware public, who are paying attention (not just watching the common MSM), those of us that have not abandoned all objectivity, and analytical thought, see the demise of all checks and balances, our democracy is being slowly dismantled, monarchy (yes, really) taking hold, and you guys are cheering it on. But, my point is, there are plenty of us, that are taking note, and the Left leaning have since been given much greater numbers, compliments of GWB. I’ll thank the GWB administration for that. Only if they don’t thieve themselves into power. Oh, you can deny it as you generally do, by merely ignoring the sources showing it to be true, which is what you always do, the Republican way.

Incidentally Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame are going to appeal.

And, yes, Armitage, one of the PNAC cabal, was the one to put her outing into motion. It was obviously a group operation. Cheney was the one that initiated it, but all those big kids on the block, are sending in the littler ones, to take the heat, up until Bush declared himself, and everyone he ever talked to exempt, due to his “executive priviledge”. Astonishing power abuse! But that is about yet another scandal of George Boy King and his scary men (and women).

But, as Joe Wilson stated so eloquently, the real tragedy, in his mind, and those of us on the Left’s real concern is that men, women, children, elderly are over in Iraq dying for corporate acquisition, as the more aware, among us already realize it, but the blinded by devotion to party ones, like yourselves continue to deny it, led by corporate propaganda, and let the blood keep soaking the earth, and death, and horror continues. The fools keep allowing hell on earth, and ignore what this brilliant Republican said decades ago, only the full magnitude of which the problem has become, probaly seemed inconcievable to him, how that industy has become our government, and our media. That is where all the money is in this industry. This is the Republican I’m talking about http://www.warisaracket.com

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/21/2007 @ 10:42 pm

Here’s the IAEA’s report on WMDs prior to our invasion, and follow to bottom where pertinent knowledge is. We all know that in the 80’s he was procuring yellowcake and such, in fact our country was selling him the shit!!!

But pre Iraq invasion 2003:
http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Programmes/ActionTeam/mwp2.html#indigi

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/21/2007 @ 10:59 pm

MD,
OOOPS. The correct URL article for the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Association) is:
http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Programmes/ActionTeam/nwp2.html

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/21/2007 @ 11:08 pm

bb – Does that link cover the chemical and biological weapons by chance, or are you purely focused on the nukes?

daleyrocks (906622) — 7/22/2007 @ 12:15 am

“blubonnet, Armitage leaked Plame’s name to Novak before Libby spoke about Plame, right?”

No. July 8th same day. Miller didn’t publish

“Deaths of Iraqi civilians, as well as Kuwaiti previously, were well underway before we got there, which is part of the reason we did go there.”

The right keeps chainging their minds about this. What were our reasons exactly? And how many died before we got there and for what reason? You’re a doctor, look up the numbers. They’re easy to find. If you want to be conservative: The sanctions were responsible for about 225,000 deaths (children). People stopped disputing that a long time ago.

The Armitage leak was not directly a part of the White House’s fierce anti-Wilson crusade. But as Hubris notes, it was, in a way, linked to the White House effort, for Armitage had been sent a key memo about Wilson’s trip that referred to his wife and her CIA connection, and this memo had been written, according to special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, at the request of I. Lewis Scooter Libby, the vice president’s chief of staff. Libby had asked for the memo because he was looking to protect his boss from the mounting criticism that Bush and Cheney had misrepresented the WMD intelligence to garner public support for the invasion of Iraq.

The memo included information on Valerie Wilson’s role in a meeting at the CIA that led to her husband’s trip. This critical memo was — as Hubris discloses — based on notes that were not accurate. (You’re going to have to read the book for more on this.) But because of Libby’s request, a memo did circulate among State Department officials, including Armitage, that briefly mentioned Wilson’s wife.

Armitage’s role aside, the public record is without question: senior White House aides wanted to use Valerie Wilson’s CIA employment against her husband. Rove leaked the information to Cooper, and Libby confirmed Rove’s leak to Cooper. Libby also disclosed information on Wilson’s wife to New York Times reporter Judith Miller.

…Fitzgerald, as Hubris notes, investigated Armitage twice–once for the Novak leak; then again for not initially telling investigators about his conversation with Woodward. Each time, Fitzgerald decided not to prosecute Armitage. Abiding by the rules governing grand jury investigations, Fitzgerald said nothing publicly about Armitage’s role in the leak.

The outing of Armitage does change the contours of the leak case. The initial leaker was not plotting vengeance. [again the actual conversations ocured on the same day July 8th, but Miller did not publish:AF] He and Powell had not been gung-ho supporters of the war. Yet Bush backers cannot claim the leak was merely an innocent slip. Rove confirmed the classified information to Novak and then leaked it himself as part of an effort to undermine a White House critic. Afterward, the White House falsely insisted that neither Rove nor Libby had been involved in the leak and vowed that anyone who had participated in it would be bounced from the administration. Yet when Isikoff and Newsweek in July 2005 revealed a Matt Cooper email showing that Rove had leaked to Cooper, the White House refused to acknowledge this damning evidence, declined to comment on the case, and did not dismiss Rove. To date, the president has not addressed Rove’s role in the leak. It remains a story of ugly and unethical politics, stonewalling, and lies.

“bb – Does that link cover the chemical and biological weapons by chance, or are you purely focused on the nukes?”

this is getting really funny

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/22/2007 @ 6:15 am

What is the “fierce White House crusade” crap, and where does it come from other than the fevered minds of partisan hacks?

Wilson lied and got debunked. His wife was not outed because she was not covert. No outing, no crime, no charges, no frogmarch, no story. Period, game over. The only “fierce crusade” in this charade has come from the left against the administration. And it failed. You lost. Deal with it.

No. July 8th same day. Miller didn’t publish

The Armitage-Woodward conversation linked in my #35 took place in mid-June 2003. You know, the one where they’re talking about Plame being CIA and that everyone knows it.

The right keeps chainging their minds about this. What were our reasons exactly?

They’re laid out the AUMF, quite explicitly. Try reading it, and then look up the vote on it. Or perhaps I should just say “Stop ignoring reality and asking question you already know the answers to.”

Pablo (99243e) — 7/22/2007 @ 7:07 am

If you want to be conservative: The sanctions were responsible for about 225,000 deaths (children). People stopped disputing that a long time ago.

Not.

The issue of child mortality has long had a political element to it in Iraq, especially under the rule of Saddam Hussein during the period of UN sanctions on the country.

An August report by the Ministry of Health says that Saddam Hussein over-reported the number of children who died from 1992-2003 for political ends.

According to al-Dulaimi of the Health Ministry, the real figure for child mortality during the sanctions era was 870,240, rather than the 3 million reported by Hussein.

But that’s just some dumb Iraqi, and we all know that they don’t know anything about what goes on in their country, right?

In response to Saddam’s statistics, the World Health Organization (WHO) printed a report in 1995, showing an average of 4,500 deaths among children in the country every month.

But according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), reports during the last eight years of the sanctions showed that half million children in that age group were registered dead, due to poor nutrition and bad health conditions.

Many children died from diarrhoea and cholera, caused by unsafe drinking water along with other deadly diseases such as diphtheria and measles.

AF, you’re just too easy. It would be funny if it weren’t so pathetic.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/22/2007 @ 7:14 am

What are you talking about. I gave what’s now the conservative estimate of 225,000 from the sanctions. People no longer argue that it might be less. They used to, but they stopped. You want to up it? Next you’ll bring up the Lancet studies which is fine by me. That would make it a million+ in total using UNICEF numbers for the sanctions and low-balling the effects of the invasion.
One MIllion Dead, no WMD and all of us less safe. Al Qaeda as strong as ever.
Thanks George. Thanks Pablo. Thanks Pat.

“Wilson lied and got debunked. His wife was not outed because she was not covert.”

Wilson did not lie. You keep repeating the same things over and over again, and I keep knocking them down.

AF (4a3fa6) — 7/22/2007 @ 7:48 am

You keep repeating the same things over and over again, and I keep knocking them down.

No, you keep denying the truth, like Baghdad Bob.

Paul (0544fc) — 7/22/2007 @ 7:52 am

Knocking them down, AF? I think that phrase doesn’t mean what you think it means.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/22/2007 @ 7:55 am

“There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never!”

/My impression of John Edwards channeling AF.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/22/2007 @ 8:03 am

Mainstream media = corporate representatives = defense industry = misrepresentation = Conservatives sounding stupid = ignoring the horrors,
the blown apart bodies,

the resulting mental and emotional instability of soldiers,

the blindness,

the lost testicles,

the faces blown off,

the burns over large portions of bodies,

the children’s lives lost,

and the limbs lost,

and their families care for them forever,

and their vision,

and their sanity,

and the families devastation of having lost their dear father,

or son,

or daughter,

or mother,

the depleted uranium resulting in deformities of newborns,

or our soldiers’ families,

and Iraqi families,

the recently displaced homeless Iraqis wandering dangerously, in a war zone, possibly starving,

the newly orphaned Iraqis,

the lack of medical care due to the hospitals bombed, and ambulances also (see Fallujah reports),

the lack of electricity,

the lack of clean water,

the lack of sufficient medical care for our soldiers when they return,

the lack of Veterans care–long after they’ve come home,

the alcoholism that becomes a part of too many Veterans’s lives, and their families due to their recollection of the unjustified horrors they were forced into doing, and I could probably go on, but I won’t.

This misery was not necessary. It is from the corporate agenda of obtaining resources, and the defense industry invested media which works in conjunction with the people who give them money, their sponsors, the oil giants for one.

An excellent book, which you need to read to start wising up is” “Confessions of an Economic Hitman”.

For anyone that wants to know about weapons capacity, of any country, past and present, wander around the IAEA site. Take note also, the BS about Iran being a threat, is just that-BS.

If you want more of the above list of horrors delivered to humanity, just oblige the Propagander-n-Thief, and his fellow war profiteers in the WH, and cheer on another illegal, dishonest invasion of an innocent country. Their sites are set on Iran, and what is preventing the invasion presently is the Generals most all threatening to quit if Bush and gang choose to invade yet another country, a non-threat, at that.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 9:54 am

Hey, let’s listen to what the Iraq Veterans have to say:

http://www.thenation.com/docs20070730/hedges

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:02 am

GRRR. The correct URL:

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070730/hedges

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:03 am

Mainstream media = corporate representatives = defense industry = misrepresentation = Conservatives sounding stupid = ignoring the horrors

I’ll bet you believe in chemtrails, too.

Paul (0544fc) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:09 am

Hey, let’s listen to what the Iraq Veterans have to say

So how much cherrypicking the the Nation have to do to find those 50 vets?

Paul (0544fc) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:11 am

Also, nobodfy would deny that Hussein was a moster, but as we speak scathingly of the deaths and torture he brought about, we overlook the deaths WE BROUGHT ABOUT IN IRAQ B4 OUR INVASION, and it is appreciated that AF brought up the sanctions that killed so many children thanks to the USA. I’d thought it was more like 500,000, but, I’ll take your word for it, AF.

Another thing, that the “liberal media” never told most people about is that we have been periodically bombing them even through the last decade prior to the war, just as a reminder of our power.

Another thing, when the first Gulf war happened, in 91, we suggested the Kurds and others take down Sadaam Hussein by any means possible, so as the conspiring to put an operation into place, the Kurds got the chemical weapons we sold Hussein, bringing their deaths.

And also, since WE encouraged an uprising against their leader-Hussein, determined to find out who, and end it, SH did his torture thing (you know, like WE do), and killed people that threatened him.

Besides that, WE told the Kurds and ones that dared rise up against Hussein, we’d back them if they did rise up, and we did not.

So, we can rattle on about the many deaths Hussein brought about in Iraq, (one million in his twenty year reign) due to his evil ways, but we took part in most of it.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:22 am

Poor Paul, so uninformed. The polls taken, show that the majority of soldiers in Iraq, 73%, last I’d heard many months ago, say we should not be there.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:24 am

Poor blubonnet , so delusional.

The polls taken, show that the majority of soldiers in Iraq, 73%, last I’d heard many months ago, say we should not be there.

Care to name and link those polls? Or are they part of your delusion also?

Paul (0544fc) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:27 am

The polls taken, show that the majority of soldiers in Iraq, 73%, last I’d heard many months ago, say we should not be there.

Where is the poll? And where are the bloggers among them? I can find you a bunch of milbloggers who believe in what they’re doing. Where are the ones who don’t?

Pablo (99243e) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:27 am

I can find you a bunch of milbloggers who believe in what they’re doing. Where are the ones who don’t?

blubonnet can’t find them Pablo, because they always turn out to be fakes and liars. You know, like Scott Thomas is on the road to being.

Paul (0544fc) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:35 am

Well, it was 72%, not 73%, so you get to laugh at my error. Don’t you see how worthless your war profiteerining MSM sources are though?

http://rawstory.com/news/2006/Poll_72_percent_of_troops_want_0028.html

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:58 am

I’d better start doing better previewingof URL links. The correct URL is:

http://rawstory.com/news/2006/Poll_72_percent_of_troops_want_0228.html

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:02 am

The link doesn’t work, buddy boy.

Paul (0544fc) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:02 am

Hah! A Zogby International poll…bought and paid for by the Far Left.

Paul (0544fc) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:03 am

Don’t you see how worthless your war profiteering MSM sources are though?

Do you ever read the New York Times? The AP? Reuters? Or for that matter, the Dog Trainer? Ever see their GRIM MILESTONE announcements? No?

That’s why you’re delusional.

Paul (0544fc) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:10 am

Paul, although I respect the poll done, telling the truth about how the troops feel, Zogby, the person, I am disgusted by, because I found out he is supporting the scoundrel Gulliani. Wrong again on Zogby. Yep, just keep sticking with the MSM and you’ll continue to humiliate yourself.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:19 am

I occasionally read articles from the NYT, and Reuters articles are in some of the Liberal sites, and the AP is the news source used by Air America, when I listen to that news, after the shows, but I read from a majority of sources.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:23 am

The poll, conducted in conjunction with Le Moyne College’s Center for Peace and Global Studies, showed that 29% of the respondents, serving in various branches of the armed forces, said the U.S. should leave Iraq “immediately,” while another 22% said they should leave in the next six months. Another 21% said troops should be out between six and 12 months, while 23% said they should stay “as long as they are needed.”

That seems to indicate an evenly distributed variety of opinion as to when and if we should leave and yet blubonnet said:

The polls taken, show that the majority of soldiers in Iraq, 73%, last I’d heard many months ago, say we should not be there.

This certainly does not say that. It also doesn’t say that the respondents are in Iraq.

All lies and jest, still a man hears what he wants to hear and he disregards the rest…

Pablo (99243e) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:35 am

Pablo, if you clicked onto the actual Zogby article from within the link I left, you will read that the poll was of the soldiers serving in Iraq.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:56 am

blubonnet, now that you’ve given us the entire litany of nonsense, between the long-discredited depleted uranium junk to the dangerously-wrong “news” that Iran is not a threat, one wonders just how much mythology it takes to sustain your worldview.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:56 am

I”m afraid that the clever saying regarding that man only hears what he wants to hear, applies to you.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 11:57 am

Robin, conversing with you is worthless, you cannot learn. You have that severe learning disorder, known as “already knowing everything”, leaving you hopelessly ignorant. You are a product, a well sculpted Robotican, with the MSM being your daddy/creator.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 12:01 pm

No, blubonnet, I’m someone whose already heard every loony conspiracy theory that inhabits your mind years ago, and spent the time to debunk them. Now that you’ve even linked to 9/11 conspiracy websites on another thread, I think we’ve fully explored your species.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/22/2007 @ 12:04 pm

My point is made. Your learning disorder is evident. You “already know everything.” You’re bypassing the dozens of government intelligence officials, and various other professionals pertinent to the event of 911. In case you didn’t know it, the officials story has been disproven.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 5:41 pm

Also, the 911 truth movement has only grown into an enormous body of evidence. The government story really doesn’t add up. Here is one of hundreds of web sites exposing the facts. This particular one pertains to the science. http://www.physics911.net

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 5:44 pm

No, blubonnet, the official story has not been disproven. And more amusing, the “truthers” don’t have a real alternative hypothesis to suggest because that isn’t how these looney conspiracy movements work.

Some serious advice, blubonnet, besides the fact that Patterico does not need his website infested with “truther” fantasies, you need to straighten yourself out and get back into reality. You are doing yourself no good.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/22/2007 @ 6:02 pm

http://www.patriotsquestion911.com

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 6:07 pm

So, Robin, are you smarter than the 100+ Senior Military, Intelligence Service, Law Enforcement and Government Officials in above post?

What about the 50+ Pilots and Aviation Professionals at: http://www.patriotsquestion911.com/pilots.html ?

What about the 170+ Engineers and Architects? Many structural engineers as well. http://www.patriotsquestion911.com/engineers.html

How about the 140+ Professors? Many physicists.
http://www.patriotsquestion911.com/professors.html

You are a one that is out of touch, if you still are in the category of believing this government, that they had nothing to do with it. Do some research. There is plenty out there to discover, with ample research suppproting the positions taken. Of course, if you are frightened by it, don’t.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 6:25 pm

“Incidentally Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame are going to appeal.”
– Good. I hope they win the appeal and it goes to trial.

Of course war is terrible and people die and families are devastated. There are few who disagree with that. One question is whether you believe that war is always so bad you should never fight one, that anything else is better, even life under a genocidal tyrant.

AF and blubonnet, do you believe there was misuse of funds in the “Oil for Food Program” that was monitored by the UN, or that the claim is just a red heering from the Right-wingers? If one believes everything the UN officially says, including that the Oil for Food Program worked well, there isn’t much point for further discussion.

The Lancet articles, as you probably know, have been sharply criticized over their methodology, results, and conclusions. If one critically examined the article (which is what the Lancet editors were supposed to do), one finds that their calculation of infant mortality rate prior to the US invasion was significantly better than that of the US. One has to believe that the claims of death because of the sanctions were greatly exaggerated, or that the calculations of excess death after the invasion is significantly overestimated (or some of both). If indeed many died under the sanctions, and the humanitarian relief that was supposed to happen under UN auspices was corrupted and diverted to weapons, etc., instead, it sounds to me like the UN and Saddam are more directly responsible.

MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 7/22/2007 @ 7:31 pm

It saddens me that a man of science, whom I respect can be so manipulated by the defense industry networks.

Sir, I greatly respect your education, that you do a fine service with your life, and your manner is kind and life supporting, but sadly, you’ve been manipulated. There is a documentary on line you should see called “Orwell Rolls in His Grave”. I could bring the link here, but I bet you won’t bother watching it.

There is a grave situation now in this country, of conglomerate, defense industry/media ownership that distorts perspective. Sometimes, it is done simply in a way, that uses a kind of belittlement, of those that oppose the corporate agenda, the war.

Belittling Wilson, when everything he has done has been honorable, and despite the fact that he tried to save hundreds of thousands of innocent lives, by exposing the Bush administration lies preceding the war, he is spoken disparagingly of, not those who literally outed a covert CIA agent, despite the numerous CIA that acknowledge it, the lies keep being pumped out. It is amazing. Treason-fine. (?) Going public challenging treason, Wilson tried to prevent an unnecessary war, considered-bad-self aggrandizing. (?) Lying to start a war, killing thousands of innocent people considered–good (?) Being upset about being lied to (now proven by dozens of reports of officials who would know) and speaking up against those lies that make our soldiers die (as well as thousands of innocent Iraqis) considered—bad-anti-American. (?)

What in the world has happened? Seems someone has sucked the Conservatives’ conscience and brains right out of their heads. The autonomous capacity for analytical thought is GONE.

The oil for food program, is also a scam, lies perpetuated by those that exploited it, the oil companies. I’ll bring you a link. Again, you’ve been lied to.

More corporate run netorks pumping their BS. Our democracy is seriously in a crisis of completely falling apart. The multiple ownership of media, much in print also, who are merely an appendage of the defense industry, are destructive beyond my capacity to express it.

When, Eisenhower said to beware the influence of the military industrial complex, I think he realized how much THAT power could compromise our country, and that owning media, would be especially devastating. MD, please consider this Republicans’ understanding of what we are up against http://www.warisaracket.com

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 9:51 pm

MD, here is a link to an article, of Chevron’s culpability. http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/08/business/08/chevron.php

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/22/2007 @ 10:14 pm

blubonnet,
Thank you for the civility of your post.

“The oil for food program, is also a scam, lies perpetuated by those that exploited it, the oil companies. I’ll bring you a link. Again, you’ve been lied to.”
– I’m not sure what your point is here, blubonnet. Are you saying that big oil companies, including those based in the US, bear primary responsibility for any wrongdoing in the mess, and that Saddam and the UN bear no responsibility?

You have not responded to my main point/question in my last post. Do you believe that the world would be at peace if only the “neocons and the military-industrial complex” would stop their behavior? We would not have to worry about the Hitlers, Stalins, Maos, Pol Pots, Husseins, Arafats, Bin Ladens, and Nasrallahs, etc. of the world?

MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 7/23/2007 @ 3:29 am

Belittling Wilson, when everything he has done has been honorable, and despite the fact that he tried to save hundreds of thousands of innocent lives, by exposing the Bush administration lies preceding the war, he is spoken disparagingly of, not those who literally outed a covert CIA agent, despite the numerous CIA that acknowledge it, the lies keep being pumped out.

blubonnet, leaving aside the notion that everything Wilson has done was honorable, the Saddam regime had already been deposed by the time Wilson wrote his piece in the NYT in June ’03.

How do you feel about Bill Harlow, the CIA Public Affairs officer who told Novak that Plame was an employee? If your thesis were correct, there is no other option than to assume that he outed Plame. Should he be prosecuted?

Pablo (99243e) — 7/23/2007 @ 3:57 am

MD, I’m a believer in having a good military force, both in weapons and well trained soldiers, however, the abuse of them, the lies and corporate exploitation of them, I find egregious. Not to mention that the lobbyist that represent them, causing far too much of our treasury going their way, grossly overcharging, and far more weapons than we need. I find it especially troubling that our president’s family and vice president, is invested into the defense and oil business, (extreme conflict of interest).

As, I’ve previously shared, this link, http://www.warisaracket.com ,this fellow, has exposed, how the corporate powers are linked with the government, all in interdependent support, and the cry of patriotism is a ploy, but now, with the ownership of the media as well, it is especially horrid, with the ignorant public accomodating them, but that was planned as well.

The many lies that preceded this fiasco in Iraq, and its resulting bloody catastrophe, is one of the worst examples ever of what General Smedley Butler, from above link, speaks of.

Our part in Sadaam’s wretched operations is overlooked, our sanctions causing deaths, our selling him chemical weapons.

Another thing, the assumption that we are there saving the Iraqis from a brutal dictator, is so bogus, because, at this moment, our country is doing business with equally as bad and worse dictatorial powers. Saudi Arabia, for one. One of the “stan” nations in the area, we’ve recently used as a location to operate interrogations, they do horrific things in punishment, but hell, here we are, as a country that practices torture now. We only get sketchy comments on what our interrogations are. Many countries around the world refuse to allow our CIA planes and our wretched operations on their air landing strips.

Also, if we are supposed to be preventing dictators from corrrupting this planet, we had better get every single breathing human from this US on it, because they are all over the place.

I have a quote by Abraham Lincoln I will bring, when I find it, that will state my feelings of how “threatened” I feel from Al Queda. I do beleive that if the neo-cons were not in power, this war would not be going on. If you study the massive body of evidence regarding 911, and recognize the hundreds and hundreds of professionals that have analyzed it, you’ll understand. Open your mind for what might seem unfathomable, and acknowledge the factual accounts, wander around this link. Be SURE to go to the MANY different categories of professionals that give their accounts of the facts. http://www.patriotsquestion911.com

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/23/2007 @ 11:13 am

Now you are spamming two different threads with your truther baloney, blubonnet. I’m going to urge Patterico to reign you in for spamming.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/23/2007 @ 11:25 am

MD, as promised, I am bringing the quotations.

Abraham Lincoln: “America will never be destroyed form the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed outselves.”

James Madison: “If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.”

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/23/2007 @ 11:46 am

Hey Blubonnet: remember this story?

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070730/hedges

Get a load who wrote it:

Chris Hedges, author of the discredited anti-Israel article “The Gaza Diaries,” and … none other than the daughter of Islamic Jihad kingpin Sami Al-Arian, Laila Al-Arian. Nice company they’re keeping at The Nation.

Ha!

Paul (0544fc) — 7/23/2007 @ 2:25 pm

Paul, I’m only interested in the testimonies of the troops, which is what the article you mentioned was of.

blubonnet (8d9f79) — 7/23/2007 @ 5:01 pm

blubonnet-

Unless I have the wrong website, your link, http://www.warisaracket.com, is written by someone after “The World War”, as “Germany and Japan were ascending in power…”.

Lincoln and Madison may end up being correct, but not in the manner you think of. It is easy for people to criticize the “GWOT” when they do not feel threatened. For many people in the US, NYC and DC are so many hundreds of miles away it didn’t have the emotional impact, just like earthquakes in California don’t have much of an emotional impact on me (I remember feeling a tremor once, as a child in Ohio, maybe 30 years ago). But you better believe I as nervous when flights resumed and I saw planes heading towards the Philly skyline.
But if we do not adequately protect ourselves from the current threats, what will happen if a few major attacks happen on US soil again, affecting other regions? Then you get the irrational response of a desperate mob, and that will be trouble.

I have always been troubled with the idea of cooperating with tyrants because they “are on our side”. In fact, that is the main reason I voted for Jimmy Carter at the time. But in hindsight, Carter has acted naively and played the fool. After 911 the “Buch Doctrine” was to go after terrorists wherever they were. First Afghanistan and Al Queda, then Saddam because he had consistently refused to honor terms of peace/cease-fire agreed upon after his aggression. The “Bush Doctrine” didn’t stand much of a chance once the efforts in Iraq and elsewhere became politicized as “Bush’s war” instead of the war against the United States that we are engaged in.

MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 7/23/2007 @ 6:51 pm

Indeed, MD, now we see Jimmy Carter beyond naivete and now cooperating with terrorists who are not even nominally “on our side”.

Robin Roberts (6c18fd) — 7/23/2007 @ 7:01 pm

Once Sadat was assassinated and no serious effort was made to bring his murderers to justice, it should have been clear there was no real commitment to peace with Israel except for scattered individuals, like Sadat, who didn’t have the influence and power to make it happen. It should also have become clear (to Carter) that the world has plenty of tyrants eager to take out the Sadats of the world, if we don’t deal with them with strength.

Diplomacy, by all means. Isn’t war simply a form of diplomacy when other forms have failed, and the valid threat of war a powerful incentive to negotiate? Some don’t take money from banks, even though it is there, because it is wrong to do so. Others don’t do it because they don’t want to end up in jail.

MD in Philly (3d3f72) — 7/24/2007 @ 5:11 am

Paul, I’m only interested in the testimonies of the troops, which is what the article you mentioned was of.

Ah, liberal journalism.

Here’s my advice: If you do an interview with a journalist, don’t expect the journalist to be there to tell your story. The journalist gets paid to tell her own stories which you might or might not be a part of.

Pablo (99243e) — 7/24/2007 @ 5:15 am

7/19/2007

Plame Suit Dismissed

126 Responses to “Plame Suit Dismissed”

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