Has Bush EVER kept a promise to the American people? Just like his forgotten promise to catch bin Laden dead or alive, this promise will also be shoved to the sidelines in the interest of protecting his little troglodyte pointman.

Where are the Republican insurgents, I mean trolls, who keep invading our Kick Ass blog? I was kinda hoping they'd join our Rove roast and give us some Texas bbq sauce from W's ranch. BBQ Rove, what a pleasant summertime meal.

Karl Rove you committed treason, Karl Rove you are a traitor. Until now all traitors are promptly arrested and spend the next several years bargaining for their lives.

What is the definition of "too foul" - disgusting - perverted - irony? Karl Rove sitting in the White House surrounded by fine men and women that would take a bullet to protect him.

Karl Rove all your political life you attacked the spouse of "the person" - candidate, judge, ambassador - whomever. I have always felt that was a cowardly way to conduct a campaign and now we know it is also treasonous. Mr. Rove you had some very basic disagreements with Mr. Williams, and when nothing worked you, Mr. Rove, went after his wife. Basically your threw a 2 year old - treasonous - temper fit.

Mr. Rove how many of our children are you responsible for killing. When you outed a CIA operative you jeopardized our ability to gain intelligence. We then send our children to Iraq and Afghanistan and many of them die. How many of these deaths are directly related to your act of treason.

Mr. Rove I do not support the death penalty - even for traitors - what a shame. You are a traitor and you have committed treason. I believe you should be reclassified as an enemy combatant and shiped off to GITMO. There you could remain without attorney, without family, without end.....AMEN.

The Bush Administration has done nothing but lie to the American people. For all their talk of ethics and morals they have none. They continue to protect the man who committed a federal crime by leaked classified information and endangered the life of one of our brave CIA operatives all for dirty politics. Come on Bush. For once in your life do what you said you'd do.

Here's my one comment on Karl Rove...sometimes the intellect outfoxes the heart and soul, but not for long!!!

Where the Hell are the trolls? Remember the "Swiftboat Veterans for Truth"? Can we expect them to weigh in on this, since they were indirectly supported by Rove? I saw the list of RNC talking points published on Raw Story.com. Take a look at those talking points. Just for fun, I sent an email to the communication officer listed on the memo asking her just how stupid they think the media and the public are? I saw Ken Mehlman spouting so much spin he was making me dizzy. They are trying to divert, distract, misdirect and distort all attention away from the fact that Rove lied. After all, once the public sees that Rove lied, is it much of a stretch to think that many other prominent players within this pyramid of deceit may have also lied?

Please email the writer of today's talking points at the RNC-- Write to Cweyforth@rnchq.org

I bet she'd love to hear from every one of you. After all, those talking points may be of interest to those of you who love good fiction.

I am sorry to see such a muted response from the DNC as regards to Ken Mehlman's comments about the Democrats following the MoveOn.org lead. Where are the the leaders of this party? Why haven't you responded to the RNC's diversionary tactics? When the issue is one that effects our government officials, they decide to change the subject. I participated in a survey after the November, 2004 election. I am sure that many did as well. Speak to the issues, and slam back harder than we have been getting from the RNC. It is preposterous to me that Mehlman gets away with saying that MoveOn.org sets the policy for the DNC. The RNC has gotten burned by being closely associated with the Christian Right. They seem to believe that associating the DNC with MoveOn.org (about 3% of registered Democrats are members) will create doubt in American's perceptions about the DNC's goals. We have to respond, but I don't see it. If you want my contribution, ( I have donated generously in the past) get out there and ask Mehlman who sets his policy.

As to Rove, we all know he is a slime ball and that he is perfect compliment to the Admistration.

From his official biography:

Born on Christmas Day 1950 in Denver, Colorado, as one of five siblings, Karl C. Rove grew up in both Colorado and Utah, where his father was employed as a geologist. On his 19th birthday, his father abandoned the family and soon afterwards, Rove found out that this man was not his biological father. He was informed of this by his family. His mother committed suicide in Reno, Nevada in 1980.

While in a Utah high school, Rove was seen as an intelligent but loud-mouthed, highly opinionated eccentric and was not popular with his peers. School records indicate that Rove was highly argumentative with both his teachers and his peers and was known to use “vulgar and suggestive” language to female students. He had no girlfriends but spent all of his time in obsessive pursuit of various political offices in the school . It was remarked by students and faculty sponsors alike that Rove was intensely fixated on political activities “to the point of obsession” and that his methods of seeking school offices were highlighted by “unprincipled campaigns, noteworthy by their viciousness” towards any rival. Rove always wore jackets and ties in school and displayed an attitude of pompous self-importance that made him even more unpopular with staff and students alike. He had no interest in women, student social or sporting events but dedicated all of his school time in political activity. It was noted that when he obtained a position, he apparently lost all interest in it and merely applied himself to gaining the next higher position.

Rove had very little pocket money and was accused several times of stealing money from student’s personal lockers. His family had no strong political affiliations but Karl became fixated on Richard Nixon before he was ten and was a very loud and persistent supporter of him.

Like George W. Bush Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, Rove managed to avoid the Vietnam draft with a college deferment, but dropped out of the University of Utah in 1971, never obtaining a degree. While at the University of Utah, Rove began his real-life political career as the executive director of the College Republican National Committee. He held this position until 1972 when he became the National Chairman of the College Republicans (1973-1974). As chairman, Rove had access to many powerful politicians and government officials during the Watergate scandal, including then CIA director George H. W. Bush. For the next few years, he worked in various Republican circles and assisted George H. W. Bush's 1980 presidential campaign. Rove's greatest claim to fame at the time was that he had introduced Bush to Lee Atwater. A signature tactic of Rove was to attack an opponent on the opponent's strongest issue. Another tactic used since high school, was to launch smear campaigns against any political rival no matter how insignificant. Rove early on was a master at slander, usually imputing sexual deviations to his opponents but always being careful to divorce himself from the resulting reactions. Reports in his school files indicate that he was repeatedly warned by school authorities about these allegations of sexual deviancy but Rove always very smugly denied being their author. A school district psychiatrist wrote that Rove was sexually inadequate and had developed an “almost pathological hatred” of so-called “normal” students. The general consensus of Karl Rove in high school is that he was very bright but obsessive about gaining some kind of control over his fellow students and doing so by publicly humiliating them. Rove was termed “arrogant, untruthful and very destructive” in his interpersonal reactions while in school.

When Rove went on to college, he only increased his intense focus on almost any kind of politics but now manifested an intense attraction to ultra-conservative politics while studying at the University of Utah, where he described himself as a "diehard Nixonite" often expressing violent hatred for what he termed "all those Commies" in Vietnam. He also expressed fury and contempt for fellow students who did not support the war and began circulating forged newspaper articles claiming criminal arrests for sexual deviancy on the part of campus liberals. Rove was a "Young Republican" back when being a Young Republican wasn't cool (a historical era ranging from 1959 through the present). As a student at the prestigious University of Utah, Rove teamed up with a young Lee Atwater to seize control of the College Republicans political club in the early 1970s.

Lee Atwater was later to become notorious as the man who sealed Michael Dukakis's defeat in the 1988 presidential election with a blatantly racist television advert demonising the Democratic candidate for offering a weekend prison release to a violent black prisoner in Massachusetts. Atwater and Rove became lifelong friends as well as colleagues, sharing a very similar outlook including a passion for Machiavelli's The Prince, the ultimate political document about the ends justifying the means. In his campaign to seize the nationwide College Republicans by running for the chairmanship in 1973, Rove quickly reverted to type and left a mass of destruction behind him as he elbowed, kicked, bit and otherwise damaged any person standing in his way. His hallmark then, as now, was the launching of vicious and almost always invented, slander against his perceived enemies. Prime among these accusations were allegation of sexual aberrations, a subject that Rove has always been obsessed with. In the College Republican race, Rove challenged the legitimacy of every delegate who voted for his opponent, and came up with an entirely bogus alternate slate of delegates he claimed had greater standing. The matter was ultimately decided in Rove's favor by the then head of the Republican National Committee, George H. W. Bush. Both men have remained unwaveringly loyal to each other since although the senior Bush has been careful not to identify himself with Rove’s savage malice.

His highly aggressive and completely unprincipled ad homonym attacks on anyone in his way won the 22-year-old Rove a walk-on role in the Watergate saga that was consuming the nation. A report was published in the Washington Post on August 10, 1973, titled "[Republican party] Probes Official as Teacher of Tricks", gave an account, based on tape recordings, of how Rove and a colleague had been touring the country giving young Republicans political combat training, in which they recalled their feats of Republic partisanship , such as Rove's Chicago theft at the Dixon headquarters. In the autumn election season of 1970, a chubby, simpering and bespectacled teenager turned up at the Chicago campaign headquarters of Alan Dixon, a Democrat running for state treasurer in Illinois. No one paid the newcomer much attention when he arrived, or when he left soon afterwards. Nor did anyone in the office make the connection between the mystery volunteer and 1,000 invitations on campaign stationery that began circulating in Chicago's red-light district and soup kitchens, promising "free beer, free food, girls and a good time for nothing" for all-comers at Dixon's headquarters.

The incident marked the genesis of the Rove-Bush axis and it was in Washington that Rove met the younger Bush. He literally fell in love with the future President’s son. "Huge amounts of charisma, swagger, cowboy boots, flight jacket, wonderful smile, just charisma - you know, wow," Rove recalled years later. In 1977, Rove was sent to Texas, in theory to run a political action committee, but according to one Texan political consultant who knew him at the time, "It was really to baby-sit Bush back when Bush was drinking". The younger Bush, as is well known, was a heavy binge drinker and while intoxicated, was known to be completely self-destructive, cursing family friends, urinating in public, once, even in the White House during the Reagan administration. Bush’s college records, as well as law enforcement reports, indicate that Bush’s drinking caused several minor accidents and that when apprehended he cursed and threatened police officers, claiming that his father would “get them” if they didn’t let him go. There was also the question of sexual orientation. Bush was known to associate with openly gay students and is known to have developed an “especially intimate” relationship with one student while at the Harvard Business School.

While trying to keep George W. Bush out of trouble, Rove set up a direct mail political operation, calling it Rove & Company. Its purpose was to identify potential Republican voters and target them with pro-Republican campaign literature and voter registration forms.

Rove’s direct-mail political consulting business and worked on Republican campaigns in Texas. He tapped into oil money and other corporate interests and helped a succession of candidates to clean out the old Democratic order in the South. One campaign, for a spot on the Alabama state supreme court, was so nasty it led to a year-long court battle in which Rove accused his opponent - who had led in the initial vote tally - of systematic vote fraud and thereby prevented a batch of all-important absentee ballots from being counted at all. This same underhanded tactic was repeated again in Florida in the 200 presidential election, an election controlled with an iron hand by Karl Rove and run according to his dictum of always attacking the other side by every means available including slander, fraud , intimidation and outright blackmail

They talked about a run for Texas governor in 1990, but decided to wait until the senior Bush was no longer President. .In 1994, Rove persuaded Bush to run for Governor of Texas. They waited until George H./W. Bush was not longer in office because the senior Bush disliked and disapproved of Rove’s vicious personal attacks on his opponents. It was Rove who decided to oppose a very popular incumbent, Ann Richards, and Rove developed a political strategy based on appalling venom, often accusing Richards of being a practicing Lesbian, which she was not.

Every day for two years, the Bush campaign put out negative stories about Governor Richards, hinting she was soft on crime and overly fond of homosexuals, culminating in a devastating revelation that a prominent Richards appointee had lied about her college education. From the start, Rove kept Bush away from unscripted situations, offering him just three or four key talking points which the candidate repeated ad nauseam until the electorate not only memorized them but also started to believe them. Rove also became adept at handling the media, rigorously controlling their access and never shying away from calling a dissenting reporter at home and screaming.

Although Rove is conventionally religious, he does not share Bush's religiosity, but the two men have a similar antipathy to East Coast intellectual types and a preference for political discourse that is simple, forceful and appealing to the gut more than the head. One of Rove's favorite books is The Dream and the Nightmare, an excoriation of the progressive values of the 1960s by a neoconservative thinker called Myron Magnet. Magnet blames poverty on liberal permissiveness and suggests the problem is best left to Christian charities - an embryonic form of what Rove and Bush would come to call "compassionate conservatism". Rove is a master coiner of such political labels. "Compassionate conservatism" manages to appeal both to the religious right and also to some moderates.

In March 2001, Rove met with executives from Intel, successfully advocating a merger between a Dutch company and an Intel company supplier. Rove owned $100,000 in Intel Co. stock at the time. In June 2001, Rove met with two pharmaceutical industry lobbyists. At the time, Rove held almost $250,000 in drug industry stocks. On 30 June 2001, Rove divested his stocks in 23 companies, which included more than $100,000 in each Enron, Boeing, General Electric, and Pfizer. Rove was one of the biggest holders of Enron stock among White House staffers, with between $100,000 and $250,000 worth of shares when he was appointed. He was required to sell them when the Bush administration took office On 30 June 2001, the White House admitted that Rove was involved in administration energy policy meetings, while at the same time holding stock in energy companies including Enron. Rove also recommended the Republican strategist Ralph Reed (former executive director of the Christian Coalition) to Enron for a consulting contract as Bush was considering whether to run for president.

Although it has become a common belief that the U.S. attack on Iraq was instigated by the extreme right of the Republican party or the macninations of the very pro-Israeli neo-cons, the actual movitating force behind what has deveoped into a terrible debacle was Karl Rove. He believes, and has stated, that a wartime president is impossible to attack and that if Bush were seen as a wartime president, he would be guaranateed two full terms. In spite of many negative reports on the feasibility of such an attack by US intelligence agencies, to include the CIA and the Pentagon, Rove easily persuaded Bush to abandon his military activities in Afghanistan for a much more dramatic pounce on oil-rich Iraq.

A former U.S. Ambassador , Joseph Wilson was one of the biggest political liabilities the White House faced in 2003. Wilson had been dispatched to Niger early in 2002 to investigate whether Iraq was trying to buy uranium there. Turns out, they weren't. He reported this information to the White House, which promptly ignored it. Bush cited the uranium story in his 2003 State of the Union address, Cheney cited it repeatedly, and the State Department cited it in several of its endless justifications for why the U.S. just had to invade Iraq. When Wilson wrote an op-ed piece for the New York Times, he incurred the spiteful fury of Karl Rove and shortly after this article was publish, with attendant negativity for the President, a leak to a right wing White House friendly reporter disclosed that Wilson’s wife was a serving CIA agent. As this is a clear violation of federal law, a desultory investigation was launched but without result. Many individuals attached to the White House have put the blame for this squarely on Rove, who denies it. It is a hallmark of his destructive activities that he always hides behind others and piously claims to be the injured party.

Then, just a few short weeks after the fall of Baghdad, Rove had the President dress up in a flight suit and land on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln beneath the slogan "Mission Accomplished", in what appeared to be a brazen photo op for the presidential re-election campaign. Hindsight and the mounting body count have taught us that this was a rare Rove play gone wrong. But it also speaks volumes about the cynicism of an operation willing to create political sales pitches out of the very gravest issues of war and peace, life and death.

By his own account, Rove's sights are set even further into the future than Bush's re-election. He has spoken about strategic shifts of power that happen every so often in American history. The precedent he often refers to was set over a century ago by William McKinley, another Republican with brilliant advisers, who narrowly defeated a populist Democrat (William Jennings Bryan) in 1896 and established a Republican hegemony that lasted more than three decades.

Rove has stated in closed Republican circles that it is his aim to reduce the Democratic Party to a virtual cipher and that he intends to oversee a Republican lock on all three branches of government.

The Republicans now control the Presidency, the Senate, and the House of Representatives. Rove's task now is to consolidate that dominance of the White House and Capitol Hill and then use it to recast the Washington's third source of power, the Supreme Court, from its current cautious conservatism to a more activist and strongly right wing Republicanism. As the Republican party has virtually been preempted by both the radical political and even more radical Christian, right, Rove caters heavily to these groups. Their ferocity appeals to his own and their tight organization make it far easier for Rove to control and direct.
http://tbrnews.org/Archives/a1160.htm

Courtesy News Watcher

From DemocracyCellProject.net

Frameshop: Fancy Talk

As the scandal unfolds around the crimes committed by President Bush's closest advisers, it is important to remember three key points.

1 George W. Bush will never, never, never fire someone in his inner circle, let alone his closest advisers.

2 When the Bush White House is in trouble they are very, very, very good at leading the media off the real story with fancy talk.

3 Democrats always forget about point number one, which makes them easy prey for point number two.

Case and point: just a short while ago, a statement that was obviously written by the White House was issued through Ken Mehlman, the Chairman of the Republican National Committee. Here is what that statement says:

"It's disappointing that once again, so many Democrat leaders are taking their political cues from the far-left, MoveOn wing of the party. The bottom line is Karl Rove was discouraging a reporter from writing a false story based on a false premise and the Democrats are engaging in blatant partisan political attacks." (Go here to see the full statement)

What follows in "Mehlman's" statement (which was clearly given to him by the White House), is not a litany of angry comments about MoveOn.org, but a character assassination of Joe Wilson.

Now...why does this statement present such a problem for the Democrats?

Well, now that this statement has been issued by the White House, the media will start launching stories about the credibility of Joe Wilson. As I write this essay (4:00pm EST, July 12), the scandal of Karl Rove committing a crime is the top story in the news media. It took one week for it to get to the top of the pile. By this time next week, the media will have two stories: one about Karl Rove committing a crime, and the other about Joe Wilson trying to bring down the President. This will be a huge, huge distraction if it happens. Suddenly, the story about President Bush's White House breaking the law to prevent someone from speaking the truth about Iraq not being an immediate danger to the United States will be off the front pages. The story will give way to a standard "he-said-she-said" round of political bickering.

Democrats must not follow the media into this blind alley.

How to avoid this trap?

Here are six suggestions:

1. Argue Politics, Not Law: So far the GOP has thrown up a series of smokescreens to protect the Bush White House. All this fancy lawyer talk is designed to lure the media into the minutiae of legal discussion or into discussions about what the meaning of "is" is. This is a waste of time for everyone in America. The real issues here are political. Certainly we must be concerned about President Bush's advisers having committed a crime. But even if they did not technically do so, there is still a big, big problem.

2. Always Put the President at the Center of this Scandal: Ultimately, this scandal is not about one adviser to the President. The scandal is about President George W. Bush and how he misled the public into a brutal and useless war that has stolen the lives of good citizens, wasted billions of dollars, and made the world a more dangerous place. Always put the President at the center of the scandal. I would say it is no longer even useful to talk about Karl Rove. Instead, talk about "the President's closest adviser, the architect of every one of George W. Bush's political campaigns, and the person who got George W. Bush elected twice to the White House." It's about Bush. Make it that way by talking about the President.

3. Talk About Why This Scandal Is a Scandal: The larger issue in this debate is the War in Iraq. Because Joe Wilson spoke out against the War in Iraq, the President's closest adviser tried to destroy Wilson's and his wife's lives. It's that simple: you opposed us, now we will use the power of the Presidency to destroy you. Americans want to know if their President is using his power for personal gain or revenge, and that is what has been discovered here.

4. Keep The Story Moving Forward: Many Democrats get caught up in one aspect of the story. This is understandable since it is quite a scandal. Yesterday, the mainstream press caught the White House Press Secretary off guard as he repeated denial after denial. Today, Democrats should be moving it forward to a new topic. Ask a a few new questions: "What did the President know? What did the Vice President know? Why have we not heard from Vice President Dick Cheney since this story began? If the Vice President was so concerned that Joe Wilson was lying, why hasn't Dick Cheney filed a civil suit in court against Joe Wilson." If we follow this tack, then suddenly the media will be talking about it.

5. Keep Talking to and for the American People: This is not a scandal about who will be the first reporter to catch the Bush White House with its pants down. The real issue is helping the American people to understand how little President Bush respects them. The fact that President Bush has gone silent as a potential act of treason has been discovered in the Oval Office--this demonstrates how little the President cares about the American people. Remind them of this: "The American people want to know what is happening in our name? Americans everywhere want to know if the President tried to destroy the lives of anyone who opposed the invasion of Iraq? The American people want to know if their sons and daughters were sent to die in Iraq on the backs of lies?"

6. Connect the Dots: It is really important not to get lost in just one story. Remind people that there are dozens of stories of the Bush White House lying to the American people on the issue of Iraq. Connect the dots. It's not necessary to have a long theory about how these things all fit together. Just keep reminding the American people of all the instances where it has been discovered that the Bush White House was not being truthful.

Keep the story out there! Don't let the White House lead media--and the American people--off the real story with a bunch of fancy talk.

The American people deserve better.

© 2005 Jeffrey Feldman http://www.frameshopisopen.com/

What is the story? He never mentioned her name and prior to this "blockbuster" story Joe Wilson said his wife worked in the CIA on many different occasions. Maybe, just maybe if you guys stopped trying to find the "Next Watergate" and spent more time coming up with better ideas, your party would actually be successful without relying on Republican failure. Obviously you want Karl Rove out, he has been whooping your appeasement party's rearend for years.

When we have the Supreme Court, all your Liberal Federal Judges are not going to be able to Legislate from the bench any longer.....I can feel your pain

Oh and before I leave, If you guys really want to be credible, you may want to check into the allegations about Robert Byrd. I hear he may have been in the KKK. Now as the party that is for the little guy, I know Howard Dean would not allow that to happen.

Does Jesse Jackson know about this?

Please keep digging

The Big Lie About Valerie Plame
By Larry Johnson (Formerly of the CIA)

The misinformation being spread in the media about the Plame affair is alarming and damaging to the longterm security interests of the United States. Republicans' talking points are trying to savage Joe Wilson and, by implication, his wife, Valerie Plame as liars. That is the truly big lie.

For starters, Valerie Plame was an undercover operations officer until outed in the press by Robert Novak. Novak's column was not an isolated attack. It was in fact part of a coordinated, orchestrated smear that we now know includes at least Karl Rove.

Valerie Plame was a classmate of mine from the day she started with the CIA. I entered on duty at the CIA in September 1985. All of my classmates were undercover--in other words, we told our family and friends that we were working for other overt U.S. Government agencies. We had official cover. That means we had a black passport--i.e., a diplomatic passport. If we were caught overseas engaged in espionage activity the black passport was a get out of jail free card.

Jul 13, 2005 -- 12:47:20 AM EST

A few of my classmates, and Valerie was one of these, became a non-official cover officer. That meant she agreed to operate overseas without the protection of a diplomatic passport. If caught in that status she would have been executed.

The lies by people like Victoria Toensing, Representative Peter King, and P. J. O'Rourke insist that Valerie was nothing, just a desk jockey. Yet, until Robert Novak betrayed her she was still undercover and the company that was her front was still a secret to the world. When Novak outed Valerie he also compromised her company and every individual overseas who had been in contact with that company and with her.

The Republicans now want to hide behind the legalism that "no laws were broken". I don't know if a man made law was broken but an ethical and moral code was breached. For the first time a group of partisan political operatives publically identified a CIA NOC. They have set a precendent that the next group of political hacks may feel free to violate.

They try to hide behind the specious claim that Joe Wilson "lied". Although Joe did not lie let's follow that reasoning to the logical conclusion. Let's use the same standard for the Bush Administration. Here are the facts. Bush's lies have resulted in the deaths of almost 1800 American soldiers and the mutilation of 12,000. Joe Wilson has not killed anyone. He tried to prevent the needless death of Americans and the loss of American prestige in the world.

But don't take my word for it, read the biased Senate intelligence committee report. Even though it was slanted to try to portray Joe in the worst possible light this fact emerges on page 52 of the report: According to the US Ambassador to Niger (who was commenting on Joe's visit in February 2002), "Ambassador Wilson reached the same conclusion that the Embassy has reached that it was highly unlikely that anything between Iraq and Niger was going on." Joe's findings were consistent with those of the Deputy Commander of the European Command, Major General Fulford.

The Republicans insist on the lie that Val got her husband the job. She did not. She was not a division director, instead she was the equivalent of an Army major. Yes it is true she recommended her husband to do the job that needed to be done but the decision to send Joe Wilson on this mission was made by her bosses.

At the end of the day, Joe Wilson was right. There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. It was the Bush Administration that pushed that lie and because of that lie Americans are dying. Shame on those who continue to slander Joe Wilson while giving Bush and his pack of liars a pass. That's the true outrage.

Source:

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/7/13/04720/9340

Joe Wilson is a liar, his wife threw him a bone.

If the heat gets too hot for Rove, I hear Duke Cunningham knows where he can get a boat to hide out for awhile.

Stop organized crime! Vote a Republican out of office.

Ok you go vote Rove out.......I wont stop you.....promise

Are these trolls, kool aid and bluestate, kidding? Joe Wilson is a liar? He was right about WMD's. And Rove is admitting he did it.

And I especially hate that "appeasement party" crap. Very Rovian. All the major wars of the past century except Iraq and Afghanistan have been fought under Democratic leaders. Everyone wanted retaliation against Al Quaeda and the Taliban in 2001. But it's becoming more and more evident that the Bush administration duped this country into the Iraq war in 2003. And the Democrats appeased him. There's the appeasement.

If someone like Karl Rove needs other people to die on a battlefield to make him feel like a tough guy then he is a douche bag. National defense shouldn't be a political issue. The unity after the 9/11 attacks proved that. Bush and Rove exploited it. Between that and Plame and Social Security and Terri Schiavo this country is finally losing it's patience with Bush and Co.

What the democrats need is a catchy phrase like bush uses.

May I suggest the following:

rewarding failure
america public deserves an explaintion
"look us in the eye"
time for a progress report
do the right thing (and resign)
time to clean house

At least Kool-Aid chose an appropriate name for a troll. After all, it's a requirement in his party that you drink it.

In response to the republican noise machine stating over and over again that Rove did not mention this woman by name could the democrats please respond with something, anything!

Like this for example:
Is it not extremely obvious that Rove singled this woman out? Mr. Wilson is married to one woman!!! Pointing the blame at his wife by name or title is the exact same thing!!! Valerie Plame and Joseph C. Wilson IV's wife is the same person!!! Rove did state her name, any person in the world with Google can find out who his wife is. Try it, her name is in the very first article that comes up.

Rove did say her name because he singled out one person and the law is not as blind nor is as stupid and the republican as are hoping the American public is.

ZDUX,

The world America needs to start using is:

IMPEACHMENT.

Granted, with this Republican congress it's a very hard sell, but why not start it now, paint all who are defending this as weak ideologues rather than statesmen, and let's get on with it!?!

Proof is there:

UN Security Council Findings

Wilson's investigation of Bush's 16-word lie to the nation

America is well-ready for this, far more costly error than a stained blue dress.

"BUSH COMPROMISES NATION'S SECURITY"

By continuing to allow Karl Rove access to the White House, President Bush has put our country's security at risk.

This is your headline and story. Wake up!
If you all let this traitor get away, then there is no hope for the Democratic Party. They are kicking your azzes! It's frickin humiliating to watch.

One last item:

Please stop asking for our help.

If you cannot lead, get the f**k out of the way.

It may be time for you to consider retirement. You no longer have any fight left in you.

The Republicans are kicking your azzes. Every time!

And, forget about the Supreme Court. That was last year's fight -when it mattered. Where were you then? Idiots.

Zombie, there is a far bigger picture than Karl Rove here.

There is Iraq and the $300 billion wasted on this treasonous venture.

There are the tens of thousands killed and maimed over lies spoken by this president and willingly covered up by this administration (that lead to Rove's action)

and yes, ultimately, there is the compromise to our national security since Iraq has led to a significant weakening of the all-volunteer military, has led to a decline in our military readiness as a whole, and led to an overall decline in our country's stature in the world in terms of economic might, credibility and power in general

I did it! I bought into themonthly democracy bond campaign! Over at DailyKos, a link reports that the democrats are raising more money hand over fist than the repugnicans. It wasn't the best article so I don't know where we are making such headway, but any news is good news. I encourage everyone to buy. Think of it as a form of tithing if one must.

If the President does not dismiss Rove, we will know that he is a "hat and no cattle" man.

Miller may be protecting Rove, but I have a hunch that Rove is protecting Cheney and that is why their President is fighting so hard. Rove, much as it would hurt to let him go [and I am sure he would still be working off-camera]is expendable, but Cheney exposed and gone would be the real crisis event. Can't wait to see what Fitzgerald is digging away at. Miller might wait out the first 4 months, but maybe not the second when she is asked again, unless she is enjoying prison and doesn't miss her life outside. Someone should be worrying very hard at this point.

Hello, Dr. Dean? Get your shit working right now, dude. I want to hear you on every newscast, in a continuous loop, saying Rove should be fired, then prosecuted. Revealing the name of a CIA agent, explicitly or implicitly, is illegal, right? Start saying it, again and again and again until every Republican in Congress looks like a criminal by association. I want a list of every Republican in Congress, every Republican governor, for whom Rove worked put out there, and his actions on their campaigns investigated as well. Do NOT listen to the people right now who are trying to make us the don't-offend party again. Get in peoples' faces. Rove is the biggest threat to a Democrat in the White House, period. Rove and Bush have put themselves in this political position. So bite down and don't let go.
FIGHT, DAMMIT
Man, I'm exhausted now. Thanks

I wish one of those reporters grilling McClellan would ask : Scott, do you think it's fair that while the White House remains silent on the ongoing investigation, that Judith Miller will sit in jail until that investigation is over?

Kleenex anyone?

Wow, we are open to debate. The "trolls" are allowed to speak their mind. However, that doesn't shield them from people calling them trolls. At least we can debate here, even if it's a little heated. On the RNC blog, the moderators remove posts that contradict the RNC point of view and then prevent the user from making further posts.

Wow, If the USA went into any country that had a dictator and removed them, wouldn't that make the USA the global dictactor? One country that decides the fate of all other countries that oppose us?

Wow, how much of your payroll taxes went into paying for the war? How much of your taxes went into Halliburton pockets? How much of your taxes will continue to go into the war?

How can you claim to support the war and then complain about your tax dollars at the same time? What do you think is paying for the war?

And if you think the cost of war is insignificant, go to www.costofwar.com and compare what we spent on Iraq to what we could have spent the money on. We could have ended world hunger for 7 years, or fully treat every AIDS patient in the world for 18 years. Any idea how many fewer terrorist there would be if instead of killing Iraqis, we fed the hungry and ended AIDS instead?

Wow, many republicans want to trivialize the import of the Karl Rove situation, however the former RNC chair himself said that this may be worse than Watergate. Watergate, you know, the scandal that led to President Nixon resigning.

Wow, you obviously believe the war in Iraq is justified. I'm sure you have some basic set of reasons that upholds this belief. How would you justify the war if it turned out that most, if not all, of those reasons were untrue?

WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE! SPEAK UP!

I have been a lifelong democrat and my frustration is reaching a breaking point. You can tell me over and over again that you've been addressing the hypocracy and criminal acts of this administration BUT IT'S NOT BREAKING THROUGH. NO ONE IS HEARING YOU!

If you don't learn PR and marketing and find a way to let people know IN SIMPLE TERMS how this man and his administration have been playing with them, cheating them, stealing from them and lying to them, you will forever be the minority party and lose even more support.

I'm being harsh because you people need to hear it. Good does not always win out. You've got to be aggressive and on point to be heard - and you have to get ahead of this story as OnCall told you in an earlier posting.

I don't care what the politics are in Washington. I don't care if one of you will be shunned in the beltway by saying something that needs to be said. I will judge you on your words and actions and if you remain sheep you will lose me and others forever.

I am not an ultra-liberal, by the way. I'm pretty conservative and I just want to see someone step up and do what has to be done.

One last comment: I think if you follow the advice of Jeffrey Feldman on July 12 at 11:40 as I mentioned, you will have a good start at finding a way to beat the republicans at a game they are very good at and you folks are not.

By the way, don't put John Kerry out there as your spokesman in taking Rove to task. Kerry has proven himself, to most people, to be a politician above all else - and his words will always ring hollow. You may not want to believe it, but it's true.

And, much as I feel Bill Clinton has been the finest president of my lifetime, I also feel pushing Hillary in the forefront of the next presidential election is the death knell for your party. I think she's a good woman, an accomplished woman - but most of the country WILL NOT ELECT HER. It's just the plain truth and, therefore, she can't be the nominee.

When did the Democratic Party become so infatuated with hate? I dont want to seem like a troll, I am honestly hoping for real debate here but it just seems like today's Dems as led by Howard Dean are simply a party consumed by hatred, vitriol and have no direction, no real desire to achieve anything other than hurt Republicans.

Here is what Ann Coulter said about the Rove questions this week. I think she makes some good points.

MISSION IMPLAUSIBLE
by Ann Coulter
July 13, 2005

Karl Rove was right. The real story about Joseph C. Wilson IV was not that Bush lied about Saddam seeking uranium in Africa; the story was Clown Wilson and his paper-pusher wife, Valerie Plame. By foisting their fantasies of themselves on the country, these two have instigated a massive criminal investigation, the result of which is: The only person who has demonstrably lied and possibly broken the law is Joseph Wilson.

So the obvious solution is to fire Karl Rove.

Clown Wilson thrust himself on the nation in July 2003 when he wrote an op-ed for The New York Times claiming Bush had lied in his State of the Union address. He said Bush was referring to Wilson's own "report" when Bush said: "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."

But that is not what Wilson says he found! Thus, his column had the laughably hubristic title, "What I Didn't Find in Africa." (Once I couldn't find my car for hours after a Dead show. I call the experience: "What I Didn't Find in San Francisco.")

Driven by that weird obsession liberals have of pretending they are Republicans in order to attack Republicans, Wilson implied he had been sent to Niger by Vice President Dick Cheney. Among copious other references to Cheney in the op-ed, Wilson said that CIA "officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story" that Saddam Hussein had attempted to buy uranium from Niger, "so they could provide a response to the vice president's office."

Soon Clown Wilson was going around claiming: "The office of the vice president, I am absolutely convinced, received a very specific response to the question it asked, and that response was based upon my trip out there."

Dick Cheney responded by saying: "I don't know Joe Wilson. I've never met Joe Wilson. I don't know who sent Joe Wilson. He never submitted a report that I ever saw when he came back." Clown Wilson's allegation that Cheney had received his (unwritten) "report" was widely repeated as fact by, among others, The New York Times.

In a huffy editorial, the Times suggested there had been a "willful effort" by the Bush administration to slander the great and honorable statesman Saddam Hussein. As evidence, the Times cited Bush's claims about Saddam seeking uranium from Niger, which, the Times said, had been "pretty well discredited" — which, according to my copy of The New York Times Stylebook means "unequivocally corroborated" — "by Joseph Wilson 4th, a former American diplomat, after he was dispatched to Niger by the CIA to look into the issue."

So liberals were allowed to puff up Wilson's "report" by claiming Wilson was sent "by the CIA." But — in the traditional liberal definition of "criminal" — Republicans were not allowed to respond by pointing out Wilson was sent to Niger by his wife, not by the CIA and certainly not by Dick Cheney.

So important was Wilson's fact-finding mission to Niger that he wasn't paid and he produced no written report. It actually buttressed the case that Saddam had tried to buy uranium from Niger, though Wilson was too stupid to realize it. His conclusion is contradicted by the extensive findings of the British government. (I'm not sure, but I think that's what Bush may have been referring to when he said, "the British government.") One could write a book about what Joe Wilson doesn't know about Africa. In fact, I'm pretty sure someone did: Joe Wilson.

About a year later, a bipartisan Senate committee heard testimony from a CIA official that it was Wilson's wife who had "offered up" Wilson for the Niger trip. The committee also discovered a Feb. 12, 2002, memo from Wilson's wife gushing that her husband "has good relations with both the PM (prime minister) and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity."

Wilson's response to the production of his wife's memo was: "I don't see it as a recommendation to send me."

Wilson's report was a hoax. His government bureaucrat wife wanted to get him out of the house, so she sent him on a taxpayer-funded government boondoggle.

That was the information Karl Rove was trying to convey to the media by telling them, as described in the notes of Time reporter Matt Cooper: "big warning"! Don't "get too far out on Wilson."

Democrats believe that because Wilson's wife worked at the CIA, the White House should not have been allowed to mention that it was she who sent him to Niger. But meanwhile, Clown Wilson was free to puff up his apocryphal credentials by implying he had been sent to Niger on an important mission for the vice president by the CIA.

Despite the colloquialism being used on TV to describe the relevant criminal offense, the law does not criminalize "revealing the name" of a covert operative. If it did, every introduction of an operative at a cocktail party or a neighborhood picnic would constitute a felony. "Revealing the name of" is shorthand to describe what the law does criminalize: Intentionally revealing a covert operative as a covert operative, knowing it will blow the operative's cover.

Rove had simply said Wilson went to Niger because of his wife, not his skill, expertise or common sense. It was the clown himself who outed his wife as an alleged "covert" agent by saying he was not recommended by his wife, and thus the White House must have been retaliating against him by mentioning his wife.

Wilson intentionally blew his wife's "cover" in order to lie about how he ended up going to Niger. Far from a serious fact-finding mission, it was a "Take Your Daughters to Work Day" gone bad. Maybe liberals shouldn't have been so insistent about that special prosecutor.

You people seem to forget that so far, and according to one of the writers of the law in question, nothing has been brought forward to show that Rove broke any law. It may be in the technicalities, but that is what law is, technical. Get it? Oh I guess not.HAHAHAH!

Whah, whah, whah.

The Dems need to quit their whining and focus on something a little more important than a presidential advisor. How about the business of the country? Social Security Reform? War on Terror? To date, you've offered nothing! No wonder you keep winning elections! Oh wait, you aren't winning elections and your ideas (or lack thereof) are soundly rejected by the American public. Enjoy your ride to Insignificantville.

Where's the outrage over Sandy Berger STEALING classified documents?!?

Sandy Berger STEALING classified documents

Well technically he wasn't stealing classified documents. He simply repeatedly stuffed highly classified (only the high classification ones get numbered and counted) documents into his sock (which was on his foot at the time) and "forgot" they were there.... repeatedly.

The Dims want Rove because he continues to make them look like fools. The man is in another league toying with them like the Harlem Globetrotters toy with the Washington Capitols. :-) My guess is this is another of Rove's sucker punches on them... just give it a couple more weeks before he pulls the carpet out from underneath them.

After looking over the Senate Select Committee's work it appears that Joseph Wilson is not very credible and that his wife did "throw him a bone". Once again the party is WASTING TIME! The war has already started! George Bush cannot run again! Let's move FORWARD!

I have to agree w Coulterite on this. When we see the prosecutor's report, maybe some action should be taken againt Rove if he is indicted. Until then it seems to me that what from the limited amount of facts available that what Rove did was more focused on countering the statements made by Mr Wilson than any attempt to intimidate or retaliate against him.

Mr Wilson's were clearly being used against the president as part of the presidential campaign, and it seems that this was Mr Wilson's intent, which is fine with me.

However, you cannot expect the White House not to respond to political statements which was clearly Mr Rove's intent. The fact that he seems to have been responding to a reporter's question on the matter and correcting the reporter's apparently mistaken information on deep background seems to indicate that it was not his intent to out a CIA agent but rather to see that the story was reported accurately.

Perhaps he should have been more circumspect in mentioning that it was his wife who recomended him but this just isn't a case of gross misconduct or malicious intent. I would think appropriate action would be some additional training to WH staff that identification of operatives, even indrirectly should be actively avoided but I think Rove gets this by now.

Not sure why some much time is being wasted on the silly game of gotcha. There is serious work to be done by the party and the White House and this is just a distraction.

I don't see the problem. Rove hasn't been shown to have done anything unethical or illegal.

It has finally come out that Rove informed at least one member of the press that Joe Wilson lied in his editorial. One of the lies was who had sent him on the trip to Niger. Rove at minimum said that Wilson's wife suggested that he go (an not VP Cheney). THIS IS NOT OUTING V. PFLAME!!!

It has also been proven that Wilson did in fact lie about many things (including why he went on the trip). It may come out that Rove gave reporters Pflames name and/or CIA status, but there has not been any first-hand source or direct evidence that happened. If so, Bush might have a problem. It wouldn't be too surprising if even Joe Wilson himself outed his wife inadvertantly after being questioned how his wife would have been able to sent him on the trip. In fact, the NY Times report (Miller I believe) can't be protecting Rove as a source since he has multiple times waved all reporters from any confidentiality on this story. She must be protecting someone else. Could it be Joe Wilson?

On top of that, even the NY Times has stated that they don't think this was a violation of the law because Pflame wasn't a covert operative. Joe Wilson has been shown to have been incorrect, misleading, and lying on several other points of this matter. I think it is time we did something about him.

seems more likely that someone

Karl Rove apparently did not break any laws. The law that is purported to be broken specifically states several criteria. The law says that the agent has to have been working covertly outside the US during the last 5 years. This is not the case. NO LAW WAS BROKEN.

Some recent reading I did on Whitley Strieber's website filled in the blanks on what may really be going on with this administration, including Karl Rove. Whatever you may think of Mr. Strieber (IMO a very honest and direct researcher of the paranormal sciences, etc.), he nevertheless hails from Texas and has many well-connected friends there (by his own admission). He has confronted govt secrecy before and has the scars to prove it. What he has shared opened my eyes a little wider.

From: http://www.unknowncountry.com/journal/
Whitley's Journal: A Nation in Peril
by Whitley Strieber
Tuesday July 12th, 2005

There is a significant likelihood that the United States is going to experience a nuclear attack. This attack will probably take the form of the destruction of more than one American city, and will be designed to cause maximum casualties.

This seems inevitable because the steps necessary to prevent it have not been taken, and perhaps cannot be taken. While some efforts have been made by Homeland Security to secure our borders and ports against the importation of illegal nuclear materials, the reality is that a determined enemy will eventually get such things through.

But who has both the motive and the means? Certainly, al Quaeda would appear to have the motive, as would any number of other terrorist groups, Islamic and otherwise. There is more to it than that, though.

While I cannot prove it with documentary evidence, I can speculate that there is a hidden group, not really organized in any overt way, that, taken together, possesses both the motive and the will to engage in this horrific act.

I am not so sure that it is as simple as an Islamic Terrorist group. That's part of it, but the waters run even deeper.

The reasons for this are many, chief among them the fact that there are elements within the United States government who are deeply committed to destroying this free society, and rendering it powerless to prevent their larger aims in the world, which are to fulfill a modified version the racial and social objectives that were formed in Germany during the twenties and thirties of the last century.

The power centers of this group are three: Saudi Arabia, Munich, and Texas. Elements of these three communities are connected by a secret bond of loyalty that was forged during and after World War II, in the German prisoner of war camps in South Texas, in the Islamic Center of Munich, and among Texas oil men and the Saudi kingdom.

Beginning in 1942, the British began to be unable to house all the German prisoners they were taking in North Africa, then, as the war wound down, in Europe. By late 1944, the western Allies were refusing the surrender of German soldiers, and simply disarming them and sending them home. The Russians were briefly interning them and then killing them like cattle.

Prior to this 650,000 German prisoners were sent to internment camps in the United States. A number of these camps were located in Texas, in Hearne, in San Antonio and other places, mostly in South Texas, because the soldiers had been captured in North Africa and the Geneva Convention required that they be interned in areas similar to those in which they had been captured.

Soldiers in these camps were governed by their own officers, which meant that a powerful Nazi presence existed in the camps. In fact, they were run by Nazis, with the full co-operation of the US government. Again, it was required under the Geneva Convention that officers of captured troops be allowed to remain responsible for the welfare of their prisoner-soldiers.

Also in South Texas was a substantial settlement of Germans who had come as a result of the urging of an early colonist of German extraction, Fredrick Diercks. At present, there are about 2.5 million Texas Germans, located mostly in the hill country north of San Antonio, San Antonio itself, and throughout south Texas.

I am, myself, a Texas German, and I do not mean to imply by anything that follows that I think that the majority of Texas Germans are in any way disloyal Americans, or even that people of German descent in Texas form the core of the present post-Nazi group I am discussing here.

However, Naziism was brought to Texas by Germans, and it has taken root there.

Prior to World War II, there was a significant Nazi movement in the United States. The FDNA, the American Nazi Party, was run from Germany until 1936, when it became the German-American Bund, an American-run replacement that was designed to be less unpopular with the American people.

In South Texas, there were about 2,000 registered Bund members when war broke out between Germany and the US. Most of them were in south Texas, specifically in San Antonio and the counties to the south and east of that city. They were interned in camps in Crystal City and Kenedy, Texas, along with German aliens who had been in the United States at the time war was declared.

This was done to prevent them from sending money to Germany via Mexico. Like the more public Union Bank, which had been created by Prescott Bush with the support of influential Germans, the purpose of this was to enable Germany to replenish its gold reserves, which had been severely depleted after World War I. After WWII began, Germany’s need for gold became more urgent, because of the demands of the war.

There was much communication between German nationals and US Bund members interned in Kenedy and Crystal City, and Nazi officers interned at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio. This was accomplished by US Army intelligence officers who moved between the three groups trying to find out how US dollars were moving from South Texas to Mexico, where they were being used to buy gold to send to Germany.

Profoundly loyal relationships were developed between some Texans, Germans and others, and members of the Nazi party interned in the various camps. These relationships survived the war, and after it was over, the overseers of Project Paperclip, which was a program that brought German scientists of use to the United States into this country, determined that Air Force installations near San Antonio would be a good place to base such scientists, who would find a relatively more receptive community in which to live.

At the same time in Germany, an event was taking place that would form the basis for the connection between Saudi Arabia and the Nazis and, ultimately, oilmen among the Texas Germans, who have brought their loyalties forward, at this point, two generations.

During the war, large numbers of Red Army soldiers deserted to the Wehrmacht, and many of these soldiers ended up in West Germany after the war. As they learned more about Nazi ideology, they discovered in its occult roots a connection to Islam that drew them toward that religion, but not entirely because they believe in the words of the Prophet in the same sense that an ordinary Muslim does.

By 1958, ex-Nazis had founded a mosque in Munich, which, on the surface, was a place of Moslem worship, but which was also a center for Nazi recruitment and maintenance of the Nazi organization throughout the world. There was a need for funding, and this was found by following the traces of the old gold path back through Mexico to the Texas Germans. The movement took on its Moslem appearance and character when it became clear that existing Arab ad-hoc financial systems, which primarily involved cash transfers based on coded telegrams, would be an ideal means of funding substantial activities, which included, by that time, very extensive political operations throughout Latin America, as well as a slow process of infiltration of the American political system.

Information about how to access these Arab financial systems, and how to gain the confidence of the Saudis was provided by representatives of ARAMCO, the Arab-American Oil Company, Texas Germans who were sympathetic to the larger aims of the Munich group.

The infiltration of the American political system was accomplished by reconstructing the links that had existed before the war between the German-American Bund and the followers of Father Charles Coughlin, an influential Nazi sympathizer of the thirties.

Originally a supporter of the New Deal, by the late thirties Father Coughlin had abandoned his National Union of Social Justice and created the Christian Front, which is the foundation, in one way or another, of many modern extremist political organizations that characterize themselves as Christian.

Increasingly, in the late thirties and early forties, Father Coughlin became more pro-Nazi and anti-Semitic. An FBI raid on Coughlin’s headquarters in 1940 revealed evidence that the group planned the murder of many Jews and other political leaders, and Father Coughlin faded from the national scene.

After the war, many of Father Coughlin’s followers sought other means of expressing their anti-Communism and anti-Semitism, and their relationships with members of the German-American Bund.

There is no structured organizational link between the old Bund, Father Coughlin, and modern extremists on the left and the right in the United States who, mostly without realizing it, are members of groups that support the larger objectives of Naziism, which is a vitally alive and active, if concealed, political presence in the modern world.

However, when you see members of the left claiming that they are “anti-Zionist,” not anti-Semitic, and sometimes defending blood-soaked forgeries such as the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” a fabrication created in the late nineteenth century by elements of the Okrana, the Czarist secret service, to justify economic expropriation of Jewish assets by cash-strapped Imperial Russia, you are seeing unconscious Nazis doing the work of the larger organization, which remains to eliminate democracy as a form of government, and to eradicate the Jewish race.

Similarly, when you see radical Christian groups claiming that the Nazi stronghold Colonia Dignidad in Chile had innocuous aims, and calling for the replacement of the American republic with a “Bible republic,” you are seeing groups carrying out, for the most part unconsciously, the objectives of world Naziism.

Modern Nazis do not express their sympathies openly. The American Nazi Party, for example, has no more to do with them than do publicly visible racist organizations in Germany and Russia. Rather, they are Nazi by their sympathies and their beliefs, not in name or by virtue of membership in political organizations.

There is one world shrine, however, that many of them visit from time to time. This is a grove of trees in Berchtesgaden, near the site of Hitler’s mountain chalet, which was destroyed after the war and is now occupied by a hotel. The postwar West German state forbade the placement of votives or memorials on the site of the chalet itself, but it still drew silent visitors from around the world. The grove is its replacement.

Whether worshipers at the grove or not, these people, with their shared beliefs and loyalties, and their successful avoidance of discovery by the press, have come very close to Hitler’s objective, which is world domination by a central authoritarian government that would function as an umbrella over all other governments. However, there is a difference now. In order for such a profoundly inhuman, not to say inhumane, organization to control the life of man, it would need to be a deep secret. In fact, it would need almost to be tacit, an organization of shared beliefs and agreements, rather than anything on paper.

This is what it is, in fact. Its members, at this point, are bound more by family ties and a belief that they have a superior ability to govern, than by any sentimental connection to Adolf Hitler. For the most part, they would never dream of visiting Berchtesgaden, nor do they feel any connection with Nazism. They are Nazis, however, in that their personal ideology is authoritarian and racist in the same ways, and for the same reason, that Nazism is authoritarian and racist, and arises from the same deep currents of fear, personal arrogance and tribalism that gave rise to the Nazi movement.

The link with Saudi Arabia has three roots: money, Islam and anti-Semitism. The mosque in Munich appears now to be a thriving center of radical Islam and anti-Semitism, carefully concealed to avoid violating German law. Money travels freely around the world, borne on the tide of an ancient system of finance that is cash based and, at this point, completely untraceable. It gets its cash from the Saudis and from counterfeiting operations located throughout the world, most notably in Syria, Iran and Myanmar. Indeed, counterfeit dollars are at this point so perfect that they cannot be distinguished from real currency at all. Nobody knows how much American cash is fake, but billions of dollars a year are poured into the world economy in the form of artificial American cash.

Returning to the roots of Nazi influence in modern America, and why this is leading to a nuclear attack on the United States, it is necessary to explore the current situation, so that we can understand why the Nazis, as close as they are to goals they have been pursuing for two generations, would suddenly feel so threatened.

It is first necessary to understand that they began the process of gaining control of the United States back in the fifties, when they began to act, behind the cover of an extensive and cancerous system of “classification,” through which all important information was routinely withheld from the public, to consolidate their power within the military, the cutting edge of space science, and the human behavioral arm of the intelligence community.

Dwight Eisenhower was well aware of this problem, and in his last speech as president of the United States warned against the growth of the very “military-industrial complex” that has come to dominate American society, and has preserved itself past the cold war by manufacturing an artificial atmosphere of crisis, without regard for the welfare of the nation or the lives of its citizens, or those of any other nation.

After John F. Kennedy was elected to office, Eisenhower warned him that these people had taken over a small piece of American soil called No-Name Key, where the International Penetration Force was being trained. Kennedy accordingly put a stop to activities on No-Name Key and aborted the planned invasion of Cuba.

This outraged a group of right-wing Texas oilmen, among them H. L. Hunt and others, who began to seek the assassination of Kennedy. Whether they succeeded or not remains a source of controversy, but certainly they wanted Kennedy dead.

During the fifties, also, various CIA-sponsored mind control experiments, among them Operation Bluebird, MK-ULTRA and others, sought to create, and did create, assassins, of whom Robert Kennedy’s murderer, Sirhan Sirhan, was almost certainly one.

The Kennedys were killed not only because of Cuba, but because they did not intend to extend American operations in Vietnam, and, above all, were aware of the fact that Nazis and Nazi sympathizers were getting involved in the American political process, most particularly in Texas.

It was also at this time that George H.W. Bush, with his knowledge of the old gold path gained from his father and his father’s Union Bank records, moved from Connecticut to Houston. He brought with him a hidden connection both to German Nazis and to Saudi anti-Semites, and effectively consolidated the movement in Texas, removing the last traces of it from the hostile northeastern United States, and placing it firmly among the more congenial Texas German community.

Whether he did this consciously or not I do not know. But I do know that he moved to Texas because there were like minded people there, who were not disturbed by his father's wartime miscalculation and, indeed, may even have found it laudable.

There are deep sympathies among some Texas, especially connected to the oil industry, that coincide with the interests of the Munich mosque, the Saudis, and American authoritarians who seek to establish a world government that controls local puppet states across the planet, without regard to how they function locally, as long as they act toward the great corporations that are the real seat of elite power, as they are bidden to act.

Over time, the objective of this elite is to establish itself as a kind of international royalty that will rule a planet of what will essentially be pacified slaves. In general, human beings will no longer be able to move between countries freely, will no longer have access to a free exchange of ideas, and will be caught in an economic trap from which, without any meaningful organizations among the general population to balance the power of this authority, there will be no escape.

As was true when the Roman republic collapsed, the appearance of free government will be maintained. The Roman senate continued to sit, and apparently to govern a republic, for hundreds of years after all power had, in fact, passed to the emperors. City officials continued to be elected as before, throughout the empire. But, in fact, it was not a free society, and eventually succumbed, as this new one will, too, to the cumbersome inefficiencies of authoritarianism.

Sadly, we will face, on a larger scale, the same fate that befell the Romans, who celebrated in the streets when the brutal imperial tax collectors came no more. Within two generations, most of the western Roman empire had degenerated into starved and miserable communities isolated from each other by a lack of roads, by the decline of Latin into a polyglot of slangs, by the isolation of government to the point that the only real order any leader could impose, for example, in Gaul, extended only as far as a soldier could march in a day. Money was forgotten to the point that, when it began to be reintroduced a few hundred years later, it was regarded as a form of magic. Literature, the arts and science declined into a confusion of superstitions that led to the dictatorship of the church, a malign barbarism that lasted a thousand years.

It is impossible to estimate just how much mankind lost of hope and freedom when the Roman republic collapsed, or how much more with the collapse of the empire, but certainly we are as we are today, mired in this strange and malignant state of wars, alarms, disasters, and concealed leaderships because we have never managed to truly democratize, to finally establish an economic and governmental system that flows from the individual and not the various institutional forms that have arisen, in endless variety, over the millennias-long struggle of this species to free itself from those who would impose the will of the few on the many.

It may seem a long leap from there to the Kennedy assassinations, the shoot-down of TWA Flight 800, 911, the London bombings and the threat to Carl Rove that has emerged in recent months, but it is not.

It is difficult not to think that this silent, almost ad-hoc movement of authoritarians is not deeply invested in the United States military and in the government, and acting to further its objectives from positions of power, that are protected by the political leadership because it is no longer powerful enough to dislodge them, or does not care to do so, or cannot find them.

Despite the absurd explanation for the presence of a missile track in a video of the Flight 800 disaster offered by the CIA after the event, it still remains true that the plane was shot down. The one vessel known to be in the area at the moment the plane exploded that was probably involved—a small boat that headed out to sea at high speed immediately after the incident—was the only craft not investigated by the FBI. The CIA’s explanation of the missile track is childish propaganda, as silly as the explanation for why the 757 that struck the Pentagon on 911 mysteriously vaporized.

It is my belief that Flight 800 was shot down by elements operating within the United States government, and using its facilities and resources, in order to prevent documents that had been placed aboard the plane from reaching Kennedy associate Pierre Salinger in France. I fear that these documents would have proven connections between people like Roy Hargraves of No-Name Key fame, H. L. Hunt, and a number of other Texas millionaires who have been heavy political contributors over the years to both US political parties, both of which have accepted this tainted money and become its victims.

Judging from his statements at the time, Mr. Salinger was well aware of what was coming his way, which was why he so vociferously maintained that the plane had been shot down. He knew it, I suspect, certainly, but was led, through a lack of sophistication, into making a fool of himself over the matter.

What happened on 911 is that a consortium involving the Bin Laden family and their friends in Texas engaged in an operation that was, to an extent, co-opted by the errant Bin Laden brother into a much more extensive attack than the rest of the conspirators had expected. They did not count on suicide bombers, nor on the fact that the World Trade Center could be entirely destroyed. They sought a spectacular and terrifying event, not a catastrophe on the scale that actually unfolded. However, they did receive the benefit of the event, which was exactly the same benefit that Adolf Hitler received after the burning of the Reichstag in 1933: a transformation in popularity inspired by public fear.

They are in an even worse position now than they were then. George W. Bush is one of the least popular presidents in American history. Through greed and a lack of expertise, his administration has gotten itself into a quagmire in Iraq which the public will not tolerate much longer, but which cannot be ended “with honor” for the foreseeable future.

Now the whole administration is threatened with being unraveled over the Valerie Plame affair. If any serious attention is paid to Carl Rove and his background by the press, a great deal of information could become public, information that would inevitably lead to the discovery and subsequent destruction of the entire secret infrastructure that I am discussing here.

I do not know if the president--or any president, for that matter--has been consciously aware of the existence of this malign structure. I'm not suggesting that the Bush administration would engage in an act of terrorism to boost its popularity.

What I am suggesting is that there are elements who operate within the government, and have access to its resources, who might well do that, and who have been doing it for many years.

However, if Mr. Rove's associations in Texas are scrutinized carefully, some of these people are going to be exposed for what they are, probably to the shock and surprise of most of the administration, Rove included.

This could have happened during any previous administration from Eisenhower's on, and would have been done BY the Kennedy Administration, had he lived, or his brother.

If the public wakes up, a vast historical change could then begin to unfold. As ordinary people across the world realize that the whole system of beliefs, dogmas, ideologies, hostilities, battles and rivalries by which we live are an illusion created by a cynical leadership, and do not emerge out of the hearts of the people, it could be that mankind will refocus on the only thing that has ever mattered, from the beginning of history: that each individual obtain sufficient prosperity and happiness, in a peaceful context, to express all of his potential into the world, and taste of this life to the fullest.

This desire is the great current of human life, the vast, unstoppable river, as it were, of souls seeking to ascend into a new realm of freedom. Standing against it, and thinking of themselves as carrying the banner of a desperate elite against the torrent of a despised horde, are the inheritors of the traditions of race and entitlement that go as deep, and were briefly given voice by Adolf Hitler.

If these people do not get what they need, and fast, they are going to falter. The US midterm elections will be a catastrophe for the Christian right, and thus also for them, for they hide themselves among the many good and sincere people who give that movement its importance by their loyalty to it.

This will result in a new congress, one that is about evenly divided between moderate Republicans and Democrats, that will be willing to pursue investigations that must not be pursued, if the elite is to continue to hold sway. It will lead to a revitalization of the press, which has been in thrall to the power of government since 9/11.

It will lead, in short, to the destruction of a system that has, from the assassination of Kennedy to 911 and beyond, come within inches of the goal it has held for generations, which is domination of this planet.

Another small terrorist attack in the US will not be sufficient to stop the unraveling that is threatened. In fact, that will only weaken an administration whose one area of popularity remains its effectiveness against terrorism. No, something much larger is needed now, and the sudden expansion of discussion about the possibility of nuclear terrorism should be taken as a sign and a warning. There is great peril now. If the administration begins to collapse, and that does not seem far off, given Mr. Rove’s troubles, a gigantic terror attack on American soil would seem to be one way this malign presence might choose to shore it up.

The president will act as he did last time, doing everything he can by his own lights to help the people, and, I would hope, never imagining for a moment that elements within the government were involved in the catastrophe, any more than Bill Clinton knew that Flight 800 was an act of terrorism, or that this fact was protected by a skillfully disempowered FBI investigation.

We can only hope that they will hesitate to pull the trigger until it is too late for them to do so, in the event, by the grace of God, that time might come.

idiots

Does Karl Rove a citizen of the United States have less rights than Bin Laden, who is not?
The reason I ask is the Chairman of the Democratic party Howard Dean,
thinks and I quote a CNN Dec 26,2003 article:
"I've resisted pronouncing a sentence before guilt is found," Dean said in the interview. "I will have this old-fashioned notion that even with people like Osama, who is very likely to be found guilty, we should do our best not to, in positions of executive power, not to prejudge jury trials."

Posted by JohnSmith on July 14, 2005 at 11:33 AM

Get out much? Moldy basements even if they are your mom's are bad for your long term health as evidenced by your selection of sources. The guy cant even spell Rove's name right...

What a bunch of whiners. You idiots might actually win an election if you proposed some new ideas instead of complaining about everything. You should be looking at what you are doing wrong instead of blaming everyone else. The only thing more annoying than a Democrat in Congress is a White House reporter.

"Just like his forgotten promise to catch bin Laden dead or alive..."

You do realize we're still looking for him, right?

BTW, you dems can demand Rove gets fired as soon as somebody tells us who hired Craig Livingstone.

Left vs. Right, I am tired of this nonsense! We need to elect some Libertarians! Being socially liberal and fiscally conservative is the only way to get out of this mess. The Federal Government has grown too big, and our tax dollars continue to be misappropriated by fools like Karl Rove and Joe Wilson.

Left vs. Right, I am tired of this nonsense! We need to elect some Libertarians! Being socially liberal and fiscally conservative is the only way to get out of this mess. The Federal Government has grown too big, and our tax dollars continue to be misappropriated by fools like Karl Rove and Joe Wilson.

Well, while I agree partially with the sentiment you do know that Rove and Wilson dont appropriate tax dollars.... right? The beef I have with libertarians is that they are 1 step from Conservatives and 2 steps away from anarchists. There IS a role for the Federal Government and legalizing drugs is a bad... BAD idea.

I just do not get it. What a waste of time. Why not go for something the average guy is interested in. This inside the Beltway BS is a waste of time.

Okay, like it or not I'm going to put some things out there to keep the discussion moving forward.
1) If Rove is the single "leak" of this information, why is Judith still sitting in jail? Who is she protecting?
2) Several previous posts have been correct, Joe Wilson had mentioned his wife as being an employee of the CIA on several previous occasions. Besides, she was not a covert operative so no law was broken.
3) I won't go so far as to say that Joe Wilson is a liar, but I don't think he's that smart. Just for kicks, check out the GOP web-site for the 10 biggest Wilson lies. Some are BS, but some are very interesting. Why not, you're intelligent enought to not be trapped by the 'Republican Ferry Dust', right?
4) Honestly, this is not a big story. Nobody cares. I know it's an opportunity to take a shot at the president, but there are much better opportunities than this (Terry Schivo, etc..)
5) Don't let yourselves get too excited thinking that this will drive the president out of office an into shame. As soon as he nominates a Justice and your leaders start their assault on whoever it is, this will be wiped off the headlines. Rove will probably never be punished, just as Sandy Berger hasn't been for stealing those documents.

Just my thoughts.

From your own blog..... "President Bush: "if there's a leak out of the administration, I want to know who it is. And if a person has violated law, the person will be taken care of...And so I welcome the investigation...I have told our administration people in my administration to be fully cooperative. I want to know the truth.""

SO....

1)"The Washington Post and New York Times joined in briefs, court papers, arguing that there is no underlying crime here. If that's their position, how can they then say that Rove can be said to have committed any offense as a matter of law?" (rushlimbaugh.com)

2)"So do me a favor and listen to this, because this is the aspect of all this that needs to be pointed out. I'm not even talking about Clinton. To compare this to what happened to Clinton is irrelevant and not the point. This all goes back to Bush's State of the Union speech and what he said about Iraq seeking nuclear material in Africa, Niger. Remember this. It was true, the White House later apologized for saying it, and I do not to this day understand why, but it was true, the Brits confirmed it, they have never denied it, and that fact is all you need to know to illustrate the wanton lies told by Joseph Wilson.

The British stood behind their intel, and even later the Senate intelligence committee report concluded there was good reason to credit the Brits for the intel that Iraq had attempted to purchase yellow cake uranium from Niger. But the administration panicked in the face of outright left-wing criticism and apologized for it. I guess it was still part of the new tone back then. I do not understand it. The guy who was in the middle of all of this, a guy named Steve Hadley, ended up getting promoted after he took the bullet for something that nobody should have taken a bullet over. I mean, the simple fact of the matter is that it was true, and yet the administration apologized for it, and that gave every enemy of the administration free rein to go out and say that the administration was wrong about it, and they lied about it, when in fact to this day it remains true. And this was back in the days when the administration was not fighting back on this kind of thing, they just said, "Okay, okay, okay, if you don't like that we'll take it out." I don't know whether you call it surrender or whatever. The Wilson trip debacle -- and this, Jeff, is -- you know, you talked about how eager the White House was to sell this war in Iraq. I want you to listen carefully here. Because Joe Wilson ending up getting the assignment to go to Niger to figure all this out, and then coming back and lying in an op-ed to the New York Times and anybody else he was speaking to about what he found over there, is one of the central problems this administration has.

As we told you yesterday, Joe Wilson got this gig via his wife. George Tenet, who ran the CIA, didn't even know. You have a rogue CIA here, and make no mistake about this, during this period of time, the CIA is out to get Bush every bit as much as the state department had people there out to get Bush. I'm not saying Tenet, I'm saying career lifers in the CIA, and one of the reasons they were out to get Bush is there was a bunch of libs in there. The CIA never allows former agents to write books. This CIA did, allow some guy, what's his name? He's been all over television, Matthews show, writing books about how we're screwing up the war on terror, how we don't have a chance to win it. With his wife's recommendation, Wilson gets sent the over to Niger to come back and write a false description of what he learned and then continue to lie about it and become a hero of the American left. The CIA is summarily embarrassed because -- and they don't want there to be any connection between Al-Qaeda and Iraq, because they missed it. They don't want to look bad. So you've got a rogue CIA who is out to screw the sitting president -- I'm not saying the whole organization. You've got members in it and Wilson and his wife are part of this cabal, and the administration doesn't fight back against any of this. The administration goes ahead. Cheney didn't know that Wilson was part of this mission or that was authorized to go. Leave aside for a moment, folks, the fact that there was a connection between Al-Qaeda and Iraq and a connection between Iraq trying to get yellow cake uranium, leave aside the fact that it's legitimate, even necessary for the public to be informed about all this and that Wilson got the job because of his wife, not because he had any special expertise, the more important thing here is there's a pattern that the administration still does nothing about and namely that is the CIA between 2000 and 2004 was an out-of-control, politicized agency actively campaigning to defeat a sitting US president in the 2004 elections. And Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson are just a couple of members of it. And the administration sat back and didn't fight back because Bush is loyal to the government. (rushlimbaugh.com)

3)FROM GOP.COM:

1.) Wilson Insisted That The Vice President’s Office Sent Him To Niger:

Wilson Said He Traveled To Niger At CIA Request To Help Provide Response To Vice President’s Office. “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.” (Joseph C. Wilson, Op-Ed, “What I Didn’t Find In Africa,” The New York Times, 7/6/03)

Joe Wilson: “[W]hat They Did, What The Office Of The Vice President Did, And, In Fact, I Believe Now From Mr. Libby’s Statement, It Was Probably The Vice President Himself ...” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 8/3/03)
Vice President Cheney: “I Don’t Know Joe Wilson. I’ve Never Met Joe Wilson. … And Joe Wilson - I Don’t [Know] Who Sent Joe Wilson. He Never Submitted A Report That I Ever Saw When He Came Back.” (NBC’s “Meet The Press,” 9/14/03)

CIA Director George Tenet: “In An Effort To Inquire About Certain Reports Involving Niger, CIA’s Counter-Proliferation Experts, On Their Own Initiative, Asked An Individual With Ties To The Region To Make A Visit To See What He Could Learn.” (Central Intelligence Agency, “Statement By George J. Tenet, Director Of Central Intelligence,” Press Release, 7/11/03)

2.) Wilson Claimed The Vice President And Other Senior White House Officials Were Briefed On His Niger Report:

“[Wilson] Believed That [His Report] Would Have Been Distributed To The White House And That The Vice President Received A Direct Response To His Question About The Possible Uranium Deal.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)

The Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Reported That The Vice President Was Not Briefed On Wilson’s Report. “Conclusion 14. The Central Intelligence Agency should have told the Vice President and other senior policymakers that it had sent someone to Niger to look into the alleged Iraq-Niger uranium deal and it should have briefed the Vice President on the former ambassador’s findings.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)

CIA Director George Tenet: “Because This Report, In Our View, Did Not Resolve Whether Iraq Was Or Was Not Seeking Uranium From Abroad, It Was Given A Normal And Wide Distribution, But We Did Not Brief It To The President, Vice-President Or Other Senior Administration Officials.” (Central Intelligence Agency, “Statement By George J. Tenet, Director Of Central Intelligence,” Press Release, 7/11/03)

3.) Wilson Has Claimed His Niger Report Was Conclusive And Significant

Wilson Claims His Trip Proved There Was Nothing To The Uranium “Allegations.” “I knew that [Dr. Rice] had fundamentally misstated the facts. In fact, she had lied about it. I had gone out and I had undertaken this study. I had come back and said that this was not feasible. … This government knew that there was nothing to these allegations.” (NBC’s, “Meet The Press,” 5/2/04)

Officials Said Evidence In Wilson’s Niger Report Was “Thin” And His “Homework Was Shoddy.” (Michael Duffy, “Leaking With A Vengeance,” Time, 10/13/03)

Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Unanimous Report: “Conclusion 13. The Report On The Former Ambassador’s Trip To Niger, Disseminated In March 2002, Did Not Change Any Analysts’ Assessments Of The Iraq-Niger Uranium Deal.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
“For Most Analysts, The Information In The Report Lent More Credibility To The Original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Report On The Uranium Deal, But State Department Bureau Of Intelligence And Research (INR) Analysts Believed That The Report Supported Their Assessments That Niger Was Unlikely To Be Willing Or Able To Sell Uranium.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
CIA Said Wilson’s Findings Did Not Resolve The Issue. “Because [Wilson’s] report, in our view, did not resolve whether Iraq was or was not seeking uranium from abroad, it was given a normal and wide distribution, but we did not brief it to the president, vice president or other senior administration officials. We also had to consider that the former Nigerien officials knew that what they were saying would reach the U.S. government and that this might have influenced what they said.” (Central Intelligence Agency, “Statement By George J. Tenet, Director Of Central Intelligence,” Press Release 7/11/03)

The Butler Report Claimed That The President’s State Of the Union Statement On Uranium From Africa, “Was Well-Founded.” “We conclude that, on the basis of the intelligence assessments at the time, covering both Niger and the Democratic Republic of Congo, the statements on Iraqi attempts to buy uranium from Africa in the Government’s dossier, and by the Prime Minister in the House of Commons, were well-founded. By extension, we conclude also that the statement in President Bush’s State of the Union Address of 28 January 2003 that: ‘The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.’ was well-founded.” (The Rt. Hon. The Lord Butler Of Brockwell, “Review Of Intelligence, On Weapons Of Mass Destruction,” 7/14/04)

4.) Wilson Denied His Wife Suggested He Travel To Niger In 2002:

Wilson Claimed His Wife Did Not Suggest He Travel To Niger To Investigate Reports Of Uranium Deal; Instead, Wilson Claims It Came Out Of Meeting With CIA. CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “Among other things, you had always said, always maintained, still maintain your wife, Valerie Plame, a CIA officer, had nothing to do with the decision to send to you Niger to inspect reports that uranium might be sold from Niger to Iraq. … Did Valerie Plame, your wife, come up with the idea to send you to Niger?” Joe Wilson: “No. My wife served as a conduit, as I put in my book. When her supervisors asked her to contact me for the purposes of coming into the CIA to discuss all the issues surrounding this allegation of Niger selling uranium to Iraq.” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 7/18/04)

But Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Received Not Only Testimony But Actual Documentation Indicating Wilson’s Wife Proposed Him For Trip. “Some CPD, [CIA Counterproliferation Division] officials could not recall how the office decided to contact the former ambassador, however, interviews and documents provided to the Committee indicate that his wife, a CPD employee, suggested his name for the trip. The CPD reports officer told Committee staff that the former ambassador’s wife ‘offered up his name’ and a memorandum to the Deputy Chief of the CPD on February 12, 2002, from the former ambassador’s wife says, ‘my husband has good relations with both the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity.’” (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)
5.) Wilson Has Claimed His 1999 Trip To Niger Was Not Suggested By His Wife:

Wilson Claims CIA Thought To Ask Him To Make Trip Because He Had Previously Made Trip For Them In 1999, Not Because Of His Wife’s Suggestion. CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “Who first raised your name, then, based on what you know? Who came up with the idea to send you there?” Joe Wilson: “The CIA knew my name from a trip, and it’s in the report, that I had taken in 1999 related to uranium activities but not related to Iraq. I had served for 23 years in government including as Bill Clinton’s Senior Director for African Affairs at the National Security Council. I had done a lot of work with the Niger government during a period punctuated by a military coup and a subsequent assassination of a president. So I knew all the people there.” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 7/18/04)

In Fact, His Wife Suggested Him For 1999 Trip, As Well. “The former ambassador had traveled previously to Niger on the CIA’s behalf … The former ambassador was selected for the 1999 trip after his wife mentioned to her supervisors that her husband was planning a business trip to Niger in the near future and might be willing to use his contacts in the region …” (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

6.) Wilson Claimed He Was A Victim Of A Partisan Smear Campaign

Joe Wilson: “Well, I Don’t Know. Obviously, There’s Been This Orchestrated Campaign, This Smear Campaign. I Happen To Think That It’s Because The RNC, The Republican National Committee’s Been Involved In This In A Big Way …” CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “But They Weren’t Involved In The Senate Intelligence Committee Report.” Wilson: “No, They Weren’t.” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 7/18/04)

Senate Intelligence Committee Unanimously Concluded That Wilson’s Report “Lent More Credibility” For Most Analysts “To The Original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Reports.” “Conclusion 13. The report on the former ambassador’s trip to Niger, disseminated in March 2002, did not change any analysts’ assessments of the Iraq-Niger uranium deal. For most analysts, the information in the report lent more credibility to the original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reports on the uranium deal, but the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) analysts believed that the report supported their assessment that Niger was unlikely to be willing or able to sell uranium to Iraq.” (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

Members Of The Senate Select Committee On Intelligence That Wrote The Unanimous “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq”:

Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV)

Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI)

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR)

Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL)

Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN)

Sen. John Edwards (D-NC)

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)

Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS)

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT)

Sen. Mike DeWine (R-OH)

Sen. Christopher Bond (R-MO)

Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS)

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME)

Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE)

Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA)

Sen. John Warner (R-VA)

(Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

7.) A Month Before The Bob Novak And Matthew Cooper Articles Ever Came Out, Wilson Told The Washington Post That Previous Intelligence Reports About Niger Were Based On Forged Documents:

In June Of 2003, Wilson Told The Washington Post “The Niger Intelligence Was Based On Documents That Had Clearly Been Forged Because ‘The Dates Were Wrong And The Names Were Wrong.’” (Susan Schmidt, “Plame’s Input Is Cited On Niger Mission,” The Washington Post, 7/10/04)

However, “The [Senate Select Committee On Intelligence] Report … Said Wilson Provided Misleading Information To The Washington Post Last June [12th, 2003].” (Susan Schmidt, “Plame’s Input Is Cited On Niger Mission,” The Washington Post, 7/10/04)

Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Unanimous Report: “The Former Ambassador Said That He May Have ‘Misspoken’ To The Reporter When He Said He Concluded The Documents Were ‘Forged.’” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
8.) Wilson Claimed His Book Would Enrich Debate:

NBC’s Katie Couric: “What Do You Hope The Whole Point Of This Book Will Be? Joe Wilson: “Well, I - I Hope, One, It Will Tell - It Tries To Tell An Interesting Story. Two, I Hope That It Enriches The Debate In A Year In Which We Are All Called Upon As Americans To Elect Our Leaders. And Three, … That [It] Says That This Is A Great Democracy That Is Worthy Of Our Taking Our Responsibilities As Stewards Seriously.” (NBC’s “Today Show,” 5/3/04)

Wilson Admits In His Book That He Had Been Involved In “A Little Literary Flair” When Talking To Reporters. “[Wilson] wrote in his book, he told Committee staff that his assertion may have involved ‘a little literary flair.’” (Matthew Continetti, “‘A Little Literary Flair’” The Weekly Standard, 7/26/04)

Wilson’s Book The Politics Of Truth: Inside The Lies That Put The White House On Trial And Betrayed My Wife’s CIA Identity Has Been Panned In Numerous Reviews For Its Inaccuracies:

“On Page One Of Chapter One, He Quotes NBC Talk Show Host Chris Matthews, Who Told Him That, After Mr. Wilson Chose To Go Public: ‘Wilson’s Wife Is Fair Game.’ Later, He Bases His List Of Suspect Leakers On Conversations With Members Of The News Media And A ‘Source Close To The House Judiciary Committee.’” (Eli Lake, Op-Ed, “Don’t Quit Your Day Job, Mr. Wilson,” New York Post, 5/4/04)

“For Example, When Asked How He ‘Knew’ That The Intelligence Community Had Rejected The Possibility Of A Niger-Iraq Uranium Deal, As He Wrote In His Book, He Told [Senate Intelligence] Committee Staff That His Assertion May Have Involved ‘A Little Literary Flair.’” (Matthew Continetti, “‘A Little Literary Flair,’” The Weekly Standard, 7/26/04)

The Boston Globe: “In Essence, Much Of Wilson’s Book Is An Attempt To Portray The Bush Administration As A Ministry Of Fear Whose Mission In Pursuing War In Iraq Required It To Proclaim A Lie As Truth.” (Michael D. Langan, Op-Ed, “‘Truth’ Makes Much Of Bush Controversy,” The Boston Globe, 5/4/04)

Newsweek’s Evan Thomas Wrote In The Washington Post: “[W]ilson’s Claims And Conclusions Are Either Long Hashed Over Or Based On What The Intelligence Business Describes As ‘Rumint,’ Or Rumor Intelligence.” (Evan Thomas, Op-Ed, “Indecent Exposure,” The Washington Post, 5/16/04)
9.) Wilson Claimed The CIA Provided Him With Information Related To The Iraq-Niger Uranium Transaction:

“The Former Ambassador Noted That His CIA Contacts Told Him There Were Documents Pertaining To The Alleged Iraq-Niger Uranium Transaction And That The Source Of The Information Was The [Redacted] Intelligence Service.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)

However, “The DO [Director Of Operations At The CIA] Reports Officer Told Committee Staff That He Did Not Provide The Former Ambassador With Any Information About The Source Or Details …” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
10.) Wilson Claimed He Is A Non-Partisan “Centrist”:
Recently, Joe Wilson Refused To Admit He Is A Registered Democrat. NBC’s Jamie Gangel: “You are a Democrat?” Joe Wilson: “I exercise my rights as a citizen of this country to participate in the selection of my leaders and I am proud to do so. I did so in the election in 2000 by contributing not just to Al Gore's campaign, but also to the Bush-Cheney campaign.” (NBC’s “Today Show,” 7/14/05)

“[Wilson] Insist[s] He Remained A Centrist At Heart.” (Scott Shane, “Private Spy And Public Spouse Live At Center Of Leak Case,” The New York Times, 7/5/05)

Joe Wilson Is A Registered Democrat. (District Of Columbia Voter Registrations, Accessed 7/14/05)

Joseph Wilson Has Donated Over $8,000 To Democrats Including $2,000 To John Kerry For President In 2003, $1,000 To Hillary Clinton’s (D-NY) HILLPAC In 2002 And $3,000 To Al Gore In 1999. (The Center For Responsive Politics Website, www.opensecrets.org, Accessed 7/12/05)

Wilson Endorsed John Kerry For President In October 2003 And Advised The Kerry Campaign. (David Tirrell-Wysocki, “Former Ambassador Wilson Endorses Kerry In Presidential Race,” The Associated Press, 10/23/03)

“[Wilson] Admits ‘It Will Be A Cold Day In Hell Before I Vote For A Republican, Even For Dog Catcher.’” (Scott Shane, “Private Spy And Public Spouse Live At Center Of Leak Case,” The New York Times, 7/5/05)

I just love the Dean machine quote about sticking up for Bin Laden. Out of the other side of his big mouth he said, "Tom Delay should go back to Texas and serve his jail sentence..." Hey, he's your mouthpiece right Dem's? And you wonder why we think you're a bunch of nutty America hating socialists still whining because your precious Soviet Union fell.

I am trying to understand your thinking here so let's work backwards. 1. You condemn Karl Rove before the facts of the case have been thoroughly weighed by a still pending investigation. Is that how it works in your America? 2. Ask yourself an honest question: Do you think that a man like that of Karl Rove, who is much more intelligent than all of you, would actually do something so stupid as to divulge secret information to a left wing biased press? Not. 3. Now really think hard. I know Clinton was attacked with accusations and had numerous flops during his administration, but he really did perjure himself, was found guilty, had impeachment proceedings, and lost his law license, and just recently paid off the millions he owed in legal fees. That all really happened! It does not mean that Karl Rove did anything wrong. I know in your liberal utopian world things seem to be tit for tat, now back to reality... After all, isn't all this speculation really just retribution for Rove's comments a couple of weeks ago about the lefty's being soft on terror? Isn't this just a feeble attempt bring the Republican administration down to the white trash level in which the Clinton administration operated on? Meager, and transparent. 4. The press is 0-2 this term already. 1st there was Rathergate A.K.A. memogate, 2nd there were the fictitious Downing Street memos and John Conyers along with a hundred other fools outside the White House making asses out of themselves. Does the left wing media really want to go down this road? Or, do they want to continue to report, and re-type, then shred the originals? I mean they're are going to be 0-3 on this Karl Rove thing. The credibility of the biased left press has gone way down hill. Let's face it their credibility is shot. The Times, the Globe, The L.A. times circulations are way down, companies are pulling adds, ETC. People just aren't wasting their money on this crap and furthermore; they don't buy into it head over heels like you all do. Anyway, I am just wasting my time here. Good luck to you in the next election. Tell me, what does New York, Boston, and L.A. plan to do about picking up some democratic senate seats, house seats, the white house...the Supreme Court? Stay loud, proud, and liberal! Stay on message, red America can hear you!

There is no crime - Valerie Plame was NOT an undercover CIA operative for nine years prior to the so called leak by ROVE. Give it up and move on...

Why is the DNC wasting time on this smoke-filled accusation? Because they have no ideas, no principles, and no common sense.

Please get your whiny obstructionist butts in gear and get engaged on the major problems confronting us: terrorist Muslims, high taxes, too many laws, SS reform, term limits, tort reform, too much government, too much gov't spending, healthcare reform.

I know there's more, but wouldn't that keep you busy for a year or two, huh?

Rove told the truth - tried to warn Cooper off - Wilson's an ineffective political hack, doing a BS backstabbing job for John Kerry - his wife helped put him up to it - and nobody has ever said she was covert to begin with. Non-story, pure Democrat smoke.

Coulterite:

1.) Perhaps you should look up the meaning of "misappropriate."

2.) Libertarians never said there wasn't a role for the federal government. The problem is that the feds continue to expand beyond their proper role. For example, spending $300 billion to go kill some people in Iraq. The reality is that if I want to spend money to help people, I would be better off not sending it to Washington, DC. It's all getting funneled out to special interest- and that's NOT the role of government!

Don't ever forget Bill Clinton The real american lair. Proved in a court of law. Hillary the thief. This was proved and then thrown out by an AK. judge appointed by Clinton.Or Ted Kennedy the murdurer. What really happened to Mary Jo. This party is full of criminals.

>>Are these trolls, kool aid and bluestate, kidding? Joe Wilson is a liar? He was right about WMD's. And Rove is admitting he did it."<<

This is a great summary of the ignorance of the typical Democrat. Joe Wilson didn’t even say anything about WMDs. He claimed (in a report that no one took seriously) that Iraq didn’t attempt to purchase yellowcake uranium from Nigeria – and how was he so sure of this? He asked! “Hey, Mr. Nigerian diplomat – did Saddam try to but yellowcake from ya?” “Nope.” “OK, I’ll run back and tell GWB that, so he won’t invade Iraq.” Nevermind that the entire British intelligence community still, to this day, claims that they know that Iraq tried to buy yellowcake. And nevermind that Wilson’s version of the events is full of lies, distortions, and self-aggrandizing half-truths. The press loves Wilson. You Democrats love Wilson. And your hatred of Bush has blinded you to the truth. So when Karl Rove says to Matt Cooper (of Time Magazine) that he shouldn’t count on Wilson beaing very credible, he mentions that the only reason Wilson (who falsely claimed to be personally dispatched to Nigeria by Dick Cheney) was pegged for the trip in the first place is because of his wife’s recommendation, as an employee of the CIA. Not an “undercover operative” of any sort – that is pure fantasy. Because why would Cheney or anybody with the Bush administration choose an avowed anti-war, anti-Bush Democrat (I know, one time long before GWB’s time he contributed to the Republicans, but only to Democrats in later years) to take a trip like that? And one other thing… Rove told Cooper what he did on “double super secret background” (a direct quote from Cooper’s own email) – in other words, “don’t use this info in your story, but here’s some background that will help you determine whether you should trust Joe Wilson’s story or not.”

There is no chance whatever that your dreams will come true and Karl Rove will be indicted, much less convicted of any crime in this. This will not turn into a Watergate. President Bush will not fire Rove, and Rove will not resign. These are the facts. Please, please, puh-leeeze choose to ignore them, and continue to froth and foam at the mouth about this story, while we Republicans go about the work of continuing to get this economy back on track, reducing the deficit, winning the war on terror, etc. You know, real issues.

And kill some people in Afghanistan!

The whole problem with the Democrats on this issue is:

1. It's NOT an issue!! Nothing important happened!!

2. Why are the Democrates afraid of Private Accounts for Social Security? Now THA'S an issue!!

Ann Coulter,

I know you're having trouble finding work these days, but surely you don't have the time to hover over you computer monitor (on your broom, I suspect) waiting for a post you disapprove of on this particular website.

Or do you?

What about Judith Miller. Why is she not coming forth, now that we all know the source. WHY? Is there another source? I bet there is another source. Remember Karl Rove gave Matt Copper permission to tell. Why did he not tell Judith the same. Because he is not her source. The NY Times might be covering something up. I want to know.

Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha you guys keep trying, you make yourself look worse Ha Ha Ha Ha

Realamerican, because Judith Miller is covering up for a democrat, either Wilson himself or hillary, the truth rules

aflyonthewall,
Don't understand your comment or who it was directed to. Can you clarify?

How funny. Poor lemmings didn't know what to do or say on the 12th...when the story broke...but as soon as those rnc "weasel points" came out, you all are out in full force!!! roflmao

God forbid you have an original thought on your own.....don't do it, okay? Your heads might explode, and the "machine" needs you....for now....but remember, you ARE expendable!!!

I like the idea of you Dems going out in style. Have you asked Tom Daschle lately what brazen partisanship did to him? How about Dan Rather? Eason Jordan?

Keep goin' gang. Keep up the shrill monkey screaming over Rove, and y'all can hang out with Tom and Dan and Eason.

The way you're treating Rove brings to mind images of Nazis, Gulag's and Pol Pot.

Bushrocks

Shaking,
Those are all very good insults, now how about you exercise that exceptional brain of yours and refute our points?

I personally think the times is covering for somebody who is going to completely take the focus off of Rove. Somebody on the left maybe....

This is why I am now a registered independent and no longer contribute to the democratic party.

There are terrorist attacks all over (since the mid 90's); local state and federal gov'ts are taking 50% of my income, and thus turning me into a wage slave, and I cannot figure out what either party really stands for anymore.

On Wilson, Kerry dropped him like a hot rock during his campaign when he found out how untrue his statements were. I think the NY Times source is the real story (and it's not Rove).

But of course, nobody cares about that because this is a witch-hunt now with no end in sight.

anybody can "win" if they break the rules to do so. You are "proud" of such repukes? then that meakes you just as sorry as they are.

I'll bet you like it when you see a boxer "win" a fight by hitting his opponent in the nuts all through the bout too....

I just hope that you soul-less freakshows don't have children...the lessons you'd teach them would be the biggest, saddest, most tragic state of all...

Note to the pathetic left (see Democrats). YOU LOST! Suck it up and deal with it. You should concentrate on 2008 before you become extinct (God willing).

How funny. Poor lemmings didn't know what to do or say on the 12th...when the story broke...but as soon as those rnc "weasel points" came out, you all are out in full force!!! roflmao

God forbid you have an original thought on your own.....don't do it, okay? Your heads might explode, and the "machine" needs you....for now....but remember, you ARE expendable!!!

Another waste of time, but here goes...

THE STORY IS OVER TWO YEARS OLD!!!!!

Here's some original thought, and I am thinking really hard...how is the democratic party going to win an election in the house, the senate, the white house, & the supreme court? Wait a minute, who cares? Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. I am a Republican, at work, and am listening to Rush Limbaugh. by the by, this is now my favorite blog. Thanks lefty's!

Jeffro
Phoenix, AZ
Home of Prop. 200

Shaking,
I wonder if you teach your kids to dodge the issue and try to pull people off point with insults when they feel threatened. Again, I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you can attack the positions and refute our points (or, okay, just my points) without resulting to inflammatory rhetoric. Are you capable of that (if not, then perhaps it is you who should not have children).

It's not proven Rove obtained information regarding Wilson's wife using his security clearance.

It's not proven he knew she was undercover.

It's not proven she IS undercover - CIA's not saying.

Rove's not being prosecuted for anything, let alone actually being proven guilty of anything.

Rove has cooperated with the independent prosecutor for the last 18 months, signing a waiver allowing ANYONE to speak to the prosecutor about communications they've had with Rove about Wilson's wife (that waiver includes Judith Miller and Cooper. Cooper didn't require any 'last minute communication' to reveal Rove - Rove has allowed that revelation for the past 18 months. Miller wouldn't need special permission either because she is covered by the same waiver).

Sorry to tell you guys but this is petty partisan politics. Maybe if Democrats in general hadn't ardently opposed the law under which they wish Rove to be prosecuted, people would take this seriously? I certainly can't take it seriously yet.

I love it that Bush supporters spend their time posting playground insults on the DNC website! It really sums up your party and your mentality as a whole...

I love it that Bush supporters spend their time posting playground insults on the DNC website! It really sums up your party and your mentality as a whole...

This bit of wisdom from....

Posted by republicansaremorons on July 14, 2005 at 01:10 PM

Republicansaremorons,
Read this blog and categorize all the insults into either targeted at republicans or targeted at democrats. You'll see that the majority of insults are being launched at, not from, republicans. The republicans are, in large part, arguing facts. Look, see for yourself.

Judith Miller is just a pawn of New York Times. She knows nothing and the Times are just trying to pretend she has something to hide so they can look like they aren't revealing their sources.

It's funny that once the Repubs started posting the actual facts most of the Dims shut up.

Karl Rove did nothing wrong and you guys are going to continue to look like morons if you keep trying to come up with "the next watergate".

I love it that Bush supporters spend their time posting playground insults on the DNC website!

============================================

Reply:

And Democrats can't get a message out because all of the special interests won't work together, and spend all of their time fighting about stuff or wasting their breath on things like mock impeachments (which make them look about 3 years old) and the Rove thing.

See this is why I can't stand either party at this point (and I don't particularly like the Libertarians either).

Fix Social Security for the next 300 years, improve the way of life for people in this country, do something about the borders and everything that is being smuggled across; or get out of Washington. I don't think I could be more frustrated at this point if I tried.

...but I don't love it that you are spending your time on this website at all when you should really be spending your time here: http://mediamatters.org/

Also, and I can't speak for everyone making posts, but the goal here is to argue the facts and eventually either a) learn something new that might change our mind or b) convince someone that you are right. My goal here is to convince many of you that you are wrong (which can only be done if you approach information with an open and objective point of view), which will hopefully result in your applying pressure to your leadership to quit treating you like idiots, accept that you an intelligent group of people capable of independent and well-studied opinions and that you are requiring them to get back into the business of making this country better. This will help all of us (regardless of our political affiliation).

Republicansaremorons...
"love it that Bush supporters spend their time posting playground insults on the DNC website! It really sums up your party and your mentality as a whole..."
Right on! Just goes to show you DNC chairman right, Republicans have all this time cause they don't work and can spend time making insults to the Dems!.
Sad Republicansaremorons, even your log on name is an insult and you have the lack of facts on your side that you resort to name calling. For shame.
Think, then respond with facts as moderate1234 responded.

um, moderate, I don't recall addressing you in particular. hahaha

you certainly are a neurotic one...or perhaps you simply feel as though every post here is directed at you? typical...

last I checked, this is a DEMOCRAT forum that you and your ilk are contaminating with nothing but regurgitated republican spin. You all are like wind up toys....you just need to be given your "lines" and pointed in a certain direction and you're off!!! how sad....I pity you all...

no matter. I'm entitled to express my opinion, and at least I don't have to hear or read anyone's "weasel points" in order to do so! lol There's such liberty in having a mind that is truly my OWN. You should try it some time...! Oh...wait...don't...

you, my dear misguided friend, are pathetic.

In the words of Barbara Bush, "I'm through with you." (another "mother" of the year....cough cough)

Shaking,
I wonder if you teach your kids to dodge the issue and try to pull people off point with insults when they feel threatened. Again, I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you can attack the positions and refute our points (or, okay, just my points) without resulting to inflammatory rhetoric. Are you capable of that (if not, then perhaps it is you who should not have children).

Posted by moderate1234 on July 14, 2005 at 01:08 PM

Sure, another waste of time, but this is fun.

1. You did not make any points.
2. If you were referring to the Karl Rove thing, you are reaching. I say you because you are obviously making this an issue, and concerned about the Karl Rove issue, therefore you & your party have become part of the issue. At a minimun your liberal thinking has become part of the issue. Whew. Did you get all that?
3. There was link to this site from Drudge, so by chance all of us Republicans arrived here.
4. We breed because we are not a culture of death such as the new, progressive, left wing democratic party...see Deficit of Decency by Zell Miller. Besides what does procreation have to do with the Karl Rove story? Stay on point!@#$%
5. There is no Karl Rove leak story, so there is no issue to discuss, there is no evidence that he did anything wrong, he has not been chrged with anything, it is all really just a media driven fairy tale. So can you possibly think we on the right could take you people seriously?

There are five points to ponder.

I have to get back to my real job. Oh, if you want to take it to the playground, put down the marijuana joint, climb out of your basement and I'll be outside waiting for you. Until then...

This is all stupid. The whole Rove thing is obviously a smokescreen.

This is one of the reasons I vote libertarian rather than democrat- the party gets too caught up on stupid crap.

Wow, Ann, that's a TERRIFIC comeback.

Not.

I'd expect more from you, really.

No, no. wait a second ... I forgot. YOU are the one who referred to Mr. Wilson as "Clown Wilson" in your column on this Rove matter. So I guess the vapid, insipidness of your comment is exactly what I'd expect from you.

You're pretty, just not very smart, I guess. Shame, really, but not surprising.

I think we all need to take a step back. Ambassador Wilson divulged on his own website that his wife was a CIA agent BEFORE Rove ever discussed it with a reporter. This "outrage" looks rather redicules in light of this fact. Our Party is beginning to act like a fringe group. We elected Howard "Mean" to be our chairman and he is running around saying Rove is a criminal. But he gave Osama Bin Laden the benefit of the doubt when he said he was innocent until proven guilty. For God's sake, what is wrong with our leadership? What have we come to as a Party when we waste time attacking Rove for something Wilson did?

Thursday, July 14, 2005
Joe Wilson's Top Ten Worst Inaccuracies And Misstatements

1.) Wilson Insisted That The Vice President’s Office Sent Him To Niger:

Wilson Said He Traveled To Niger At CIA Request To Help Provide Response To Vice President’s Office. “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.” (Joseph C. Wilson, Op-Ed, “What I Didn’t Find In Africa,” The New York Times, 7/6/03)

Joe Wilson: “[W]hat They Did, What The Office Of The Vice President Did, And, In Fact, I Believe Now From Mr. Libby’s Statement, It Was Probably The Vice President Himself ...” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 8/3/03)
Vice President Cheney: “I Don’t Know Joe Wilson. I’ve Never Met Joe Wilson. … And Joe Wilson - I Don’t [Know] Who Sent Joe Wilson. He Never Submitted A Report That I Ever Saw When He Came Back.” (NBC’s “Meet The Press,” 9/14/03)

CIA Director George Tenet: “In An Effort To Inquire About Certain Reports Involving Niger, CIA’s Counter-Proliferation Experts, On Their Own Initiative, Asked An Individual With Ties To The Region To Make A Visit To See What He Could Learn.” (Central Intelligence Agency, “Statement By George J. Tenet, Director Of Central Intelligence,” Press Release, 7/11/03)

2.) Wilson Claimed The Vice President And Other Senior White House Officials Were Briefed On His Niger Report:

“[Wilson] Believed That [His Report] Would Have Been Distributed To The White House And That The Vice President Received A Direct Response To His Question About The Possible Uranium Deal.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)

The Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Reported That The Vice President Was Not Briefed On Wilson’s Report. “Conclusion 14. The Central Intelligence Agency should have told the Vice President and other senior policymakers that it had sent someone to Niger to look into the alleged Iraq-Niger uranium deal and it should have briefed the Vice President on the former ambassador’s findings.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)

CIA Director George Tenet: “Because This Report, In Our View, Did Not Resolve Whether Iraq Was Or Was Not Seeking Uranium From Abroad, It Was Given A Normal And Wide Distribution, But We Did Not Brief It To The President, Vice-President Or Other Senior Administration Officials.” (Central Intelligence Agency, “Statement By George J. Tenet, Director Of Central Intelligence,” Press Release, 7/11/03)

3.) Wilson Has Claimed His Niger Report Was Conclusive And Significant

Wilson Claims His Trip Proved There Was Nothing To The Uranium “Allegations.” “I knew that [Dr. Rice] had fundamentally misstated the facts. In fact, she had lied about it. I had gone out and I had undertaken this study. I had come back and said that this was not feasible. … This government knew that there was nothing to these allegations.” (NBC’s, “Meet The Press,” 5/2/04)

Officials Said Evidence In Wilson’s Niger Report Was “Thin” And His “Homework Was Shoddy.” (Michael Duffy, “Leaking With A Vengeance,” Time, 10/13/03)

Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Unanimous Report: “Conclusion 13. The Report On The Former Ambassador’s Trip To Niger, Disseminated In March 2002, Did Not Change Any Analysts’ Assessments Of The Iraq-Niger Uranium Deal.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
“For Most Analysts, The Information In The Report Lent More Credibility To The Original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Report On The Uranium Deal, But State Department Bureau Of Intelligence And Research (INR) Analysts Believed That The Report Supported Their Assessments That Niger Was Unlikely To Be Willing Or Able To Sell Uranium.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
CIA Said Wilson’s Findings Did Not Resolve The Issue. “Because [Wilson’s] report, in our view, did not resolve whether Iraq was or was not seeking uranium from abroad, it was given a normal and wide distribution, but we did not brief it to the president, vice president or other senior administration officials. We also had to consider that the former Nigerien officials knew that what they were saying would reach the U.S. government and that this might have influenced what they said.” (Central Intelligence Agency, “Statement By George J. Tenet, Director Of Central Intelligence,” Press Release 7/11/03)

The Butler Report Claimed That The President’s State Of the Union Statement On Uranium From Africa, “Was Well-Founded.” “We conclude that, on the basis of the intelligence assessments at the time, covering both Niger and the Democratic Republic of Congo, the statements on Iraqi attempts to buy uranium from Africa in the Government’s dossier, and by the Prime Minister in the House of Commons, were well-founded. By extension, we conclude also that the statement in President Bush’s State of the Union Address of 28 January 2003 that: ‘The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.’ was well-founded.” (The Rt. Hon. The Lord Butler Of Brockwell, “Review Of Intelligence, On Weapons Of Mass Destruction,” 7/14/04)

4.) Wilson Denied His Wife Suggested He Travel To Niger In 2002:

Wilson Claimed His Wife Did Not Suggest He Travel To Niger To Investigate Reports Of Uranium Deal; Instead, Wilson Claims It Came Out Of Meeting With CIA. CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “Among other things, you had always said, always maintained, still maintain your wife, Valerie Plame, a CIA officer, had nothing to do with the decision to send to you Niger to inspect reports that uranium might be sold from Niger to Iraq. … Did Valerie Plame, your wife, come up with the idea to send you to Niger?” Joe Wilson: “No. My wife served as a conduit, as I put in my book. When her supervisors asked her to contact me for the purposes of coming into the CIA to discuss all the issues surrounding this allegation of Niger selling uranium to Iraq.” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 7/18/04)

But Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Received Not Only Testimony But Actual Documentation Indicating Wilson’s Wife Proposed Him For Trip. “Some CPD, [CIA Counterproliferation Division] officials could not recall how the office decided to contact the former ambassador, however, interviews and documents provided to the Committee indicate that his wife, a CPD employee, suggested his name for the trip. The CPD reports officer told Committee staff that the former ambassador’s wife ‘offered up his name’ and a memorandum to the Deputy Chief of the CPD on February 12, 2002, from the former ambassador’s wife says, ‘my husband has good relations with both the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity.’” (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)
5.) Wilson Has Claimed His 1999 Trip To Niger Was Not Suggested By His Wife:

Wilson Claims CIA Thought To Ask Him To Make Trip Because He Had Previously Made Trip For Them In 1999, Not Because Of His Wife’s Suggestion. CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “Who first raised your name, then, based on what you know? Who came up with the idea to send you there?” Joe Wilson: “The CIA knew my name from a trip, and it’s in the report, that I had taken in 1999 related to uranium activities but not related to Iraq. I had served for 23 years in government including as Bill Clinton’s Senior Director for African Affairs at the National Security Council. I had done a lot of work with the Niger government during a period punctuated by a military coup and a subsequent assassination of a president. So I knew all the people there.” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 7/18/04)

In Fact, His Wife Suggested Him For 1999 Trip, As Well. “The former ambassador had traveled previously to Niger on the CIA’s behalf … The former ambassador was selected for the 1999 trip after his wife mentioned to her supervisors that her husband was planning a business trip to Niger in the near future and might be willing to use his contacts in the region …” (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

6.) Wilson Claimed He Was A Victim Of A Partisan Smear Campaign

Joe Wilson: “Well, I Don’t Know. Obviously, There’s Been This Orchestrated Campaign, This Smear Campaign. I Happen To Think That It’s Because The RNC, The Republican National Committee’s Been Involved In This In A Big Way …” CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “But They Weren’t Involved In The Senate Intelligence Committee Report.” Wilson: “No, They Weren’t.” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 7/18/04)

Senate Intelligence Committee Unanimously Concluded That Wilson’s Report “Lent More Credibility” For Most Analysts “To The Original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Reports.” “Conclusion 13. The report on the former ambassador’s trip to Niger, disseminated in March 2002, did not change any analysts’ assessments of the Iraq-Niger uranium deal. For most analysts, the information in the report lent more credibility to the original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reports on the uranium deal, but the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) analysts believed that the report supported their assessment that Niger was unlikely to be willing or able to sell uranium to Iraq.” (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

Members Of The Senate Select Committee On Intelligence That Wrote The Unanimous “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq”:

Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV)

Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI)

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR)

Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL)

Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN)

Sen. John Edwards (D-NC)

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)

Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS)

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT)

Sen. Mike DeWine (R-OH)

Sen. Christopher Bond (R-MO)

Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS)

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME)

Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE)

Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA)

Sen. John Warner (R-VA)

(Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

7.) A Month Before The Bob Novak And Matthew Cooper Articles Ever Came Out, Wilson Told The Washington Post That Previous Intelligence Reports About Niger Were Based On Forged Documents:

In June Of 2003, Wilson Told The Washington Post “The Niger Intelligence Was Based On Documents That Had Clearly Been Forged Because ‘The Dates Were Wrong And The Names Were Wrong.’” (Susan Schmidt, “Plame’s Input Is Cited On Niger Mission,” The Washington Post, 7/10/04)

However, “The [Senate Select Committee On Intelligence] Report … Said Wilson Provided Misleading Information To The Washington Post Last June [12th, 2003].” (Susan Schmidt, “Plame’s Input Is Cited On Niger Mission,” The Washington Post, 7/10/04)

Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Unanimous Report: “The Former Ambassador Said That He May Have ‘Misspoken’ To The Reporter When He Said He Concluded The Documents Were ‘Forged.’” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
8.) Wilson Claimed His Book Would Enrich Debate:

NBC’s Katie Couric: “What Do You Hope The Whole Point Of This Book Will Be? Joe Wilson: “Well, I - I Hope, One, It Will Tell - It Tries To Tell An Interesting Story. Two, I Hope That It Enriches The Debate In A Year In Which We Are All Called Upon As Americans To Elect Our Leaders. And Three, … That [It] Says That This Is A Great Democracy That Is Worthy Of Our Taking Our Responsibilities As Stewards Seriously.” (NBC’s “Today Show,” 5/3/04)

Wilson Admits In His Book That He Had Been Involved In “A Little Literary Flair” When Talking To Reporters. “[Wilson] wrote in his book, he told Committee staff that his assertion may have involved ‘a little literary flair.’” (Matthew Continetti, “‘A Little Literary Flair’” The Weekly Standard, 7/26/04)

Wilson’s Book The Politics Of Truth: Inside The Lies That Put The White House On Trial And Betrayed My Wife’s CIA Identity Has Been Panned In Numerous Reviews For Its Inaccuracies:

“On Page One Of Chapter One, He Quotes NBC Talk Show Host Chris Matthews, Who Told Him That, After Mr. Wilson Chose To Go Public: ‘Wilson’s Wife Is Fair Game.’ Later, He Bases His List Of Suspect Leakers On Conversations With Members Of The News Media And A ‘Source Close To The House Judiciary Committee.’” (Eli Lake, Op-Ed, “Don’t Quit Your Day Job, Mr. Wilson,” New York Post, 5/4/04)

“For Example, When Asked How He ‘Knew’ That The Intelligence Community Had Rejected The Possibility Of A Niger-Iraq Uranium Deal, As He Wrote In His Book, He Told [Senate Intelligence] Committee Staff That His Assertion May Have Involved ‘A Little Literary Flair.’” (Matthew Continetti, “‘A Little Literary Flair,’” The Weekly Standard, 7/26/04)

The Boston Globe: “In Essence, Much Of Wilson’s Book Is An Attempt To Portray The Bush Administration As A Ministry Of Fear Whose Mission In Pursuing War In Iraq Required It To Proclaim A Lie As Truth.” (Michael D. Langan, Op-Ed, “‘Truth’ Makes Much Of Bush Controversy,” The Boston Globe, 5/4/04)

Newsweek’s Evan Thomas Wrote In The Washington Post: “[W]ilson’s Claims And Conclusions Are Either Long Hashed Over Or Based On What The Intelligence Business Describes As ‘Rumint,’ Or Rumor Intelligence.” (Evan Thomas, Op-Ed, “Indecent Exposure,” The Washington Post, 5/16/04)
9.) Wilson Claimed The CIA Provided Him With Information Related To The Iraq-Niger Uranium Transaction:

“The Former Ambassador Noted That His CIA Contacts Told Him There Were Documents Pertaining To The Alleged Iraq-Niger Uranium Transaction And That The Source Of The Information Was The [Redacted] Intelligence Service.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)

However, “The DO [Director Of Operations At The CIA] Reports Officer Told Committee Staff That He Did Not Provide The Former Ambassador With Any Information About The Source Or Details …” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
10.) Wilson Claimed He Is A Non-Partisan “Centrist”:
Recently, Joe Wilson Refused To Admit He Is A Registered Democrat. NBC’s Jamie Gangel: “You are a Democrat?” Joe Wilson: “I exercise my rights as a citizen of this country to participate in the selection of my leaders and I am proud to do so. I did so in the election in 2000 by contributing not just to Al Gore's campaign, but also to the Bush-Cheney campaign.” (NBC’s “Today Show,” 7/14/05)

“[Wilson] Insist[s] He Remained A Centrist At Heart.” (Scott Shane, “Private Spy And Public Spouse Live At Center Of Leak Case,” The New York Times, 7/5/05)

Joe Wilson Is A Registered Democrat. (District Of Columbia Voter Registrations, Accessed 7/14/05)

Joseph Wilson Has Donated Over $8,000 To Democrats Including $2,000 To John Kerry For President In 2003, $1,000 To Hillary Clinton’s (D-NY) HILLPAC In 2002 And $3,000 To Al Gore In 1999. (The Center For Responsive Politics Website, www.opensecrets.org, Accessed 7/12/05)

Wilson Endorsed John Kerry For President In October 2003 And Advised The Kerry Campaign. (David Tirrell-Wysocki, “Former Ambassador Wilson Endorses Kerry In Presidential Race,” The Associated Press, 10/23/03)

“[Wilson] Admits ‘It Will Be A Cold Day In Hell Before I Vote For A Republican, Even For Dog Catcher.’” (Scott Shane, “Private Spy And Public Spouse Live At Center Of Leak Case,” The New York Times, 7/5/05)

If you think for a second Ms Coulter would waste a nanosecond on any of you assclowns you are sadly mistaken. The Dims have been on the run for so long they no longer know how to do anything but make asses out of themselves. Ms Coulter is a symptom of this and an expert at making the rediculous SOUND rediculous.

This comment:

"I love it that Bush supporters spend their time posting playground insults on the DNC website! It really sums up your party and your mentality as a whole..."

was posted by someone who has the screen name of:

republicansaremorons

Something about "playground insults".... I think I just read that somewhere....

I think the Republicans are somewhere between "denial" and "anger" right now. When the courts start to validate this, it'll tone down into "bargaining".

Ah, schadenfreude.

Let me ask you GOP folks something... why the flip-flop on whether this is a serious crime or not?

Why are we so overlwhelmed with concern over this when it is still under investigation? There are TERRRORIST'S blowing themselves up around innocent people in Great Britton and around innocent children looking for candy from our brave soldiers in Iraq. These people believe in killing anyone that does not believe in what they believe in (INFIDEL'S). How many of their prisoners of war are still alive? DECAPITATION (the cutting off of ones head while one is still alive) is much more serious of an infraction of the Geneva Convention Rules than is humiliation and sleep deprivation. We need someone to file an international law suite on behalf of all of those prisoners of war that have been killed by their captors by decapitation. Let's get our priorities right and stop being afraid of offending anyone. Where has our Party of true caring gone?

You are all funny...I don't see anything in what you (Socialist Liberal Democrats)are saying that even shows me that you know the facts based on the TRUTH about anyone that you either hate or agree with. Be honest with yourselves and stop relying so much on what you think you know or better yet what you WANT to know. I've never seen a bunch of posts that try to post things as "fact" like saying that this is "From an Official Biography"...one question -- BY WHO? The next thing you're going to try to tell people is that Bill Clinton never lied to a grand jury based on an official document written by WILLIAM JEFFERSON CLINTON. Or that Joe Wilson told the TRUTH about his findings on Uranium based on a book by JOE WILSON and that he (Joe Wilson) was directed by the Vice President himself as told by JOE WILSON. Why don't you be TRUTHful about this Karl Rove thing or better yet, be honest with yourselves and who this JOE WILSON guy really is and who he represents. Think outside of your socialist liberal idealistic boxes and come to grips with what the TRUTH really is...you can do it I know you can. Open your minds it really is refreshing. AMERICA IS A GREAT COUNTRY where you have a majority of honest people who live their lives with dignity, class, and honesty and the minority is what it is. One day you will become the majority but only when you're honest with who you are, and what you say, and start making sense. None of these post are any of these things. All I see is putting people down who you don't agree with based on the little YOU WANT TO KNOW about them or raising people up who sees things how you WANT see them again based on the little YOU WANT TO KNOW about them.

President Bush's reaction & response to the bombardment of queries re: Mr. Rove are fairly consistent with his actions on most issues. He sets back, listens to the drivel, and likely conducts his own internal (covert) investigations. I'm certain most past U.S. Presidents did the same. HOWEVER, because of the "apparent appearance" of impropriety, Mr. Rove should be considered a candidate for administrative (non-chief of staff duties) leave, akin to a law enforcement officer "suspected" of exercising excessive force on a citizen. The individual is not accused, indicted, or charged. He/she is only placed in a somewhat protective status so as not to further "compromise" the issue.

Joe,
I disagree with your first statement (obviously, it's an opinion rather than a question or statement of fact). However, your second question is a good one. GOPers, do you agree that GW has flipped flopped on the importance of this issue and if so, why?

URFUNNY, try to stay on topic. Since JOE WILSON is kind of on topic, what does he actually have to do with the story other than supplying the motive for the alleged crime? Not much. Doesn't really matter who he is or what he did.

See, one can post without ranting like a psychopath. Try it.

Joe Wilson has been shown to not represent the truth. I know this doesn't matter to some of you out there (as evidenced by your reaction to Bill Clintons numerous lies). As for Rove being a traitor, the Democratic party is full of Traitors. Our Intel Dept stopped giving Patric Leahy updates because he leaked all the information. And who could forget that Bill Clinton sold our Weapons technology (MRV Technology) to the Chineese for campaign contributions...

There was no crime. Cooper has admitted that Rove was mearly trying to give him a "heads up not to get too far out on the Joe Wilson is working for the Vice-president" story. This is true, Wilson was NOT working for anyone in the administration on his trip to Niger. He was sent there by the chief of the CIA's directorate responsible for tracking WMD proliferation on the recommendation of Wilson's wife. When Cooper asked Rove who sent Wilson, Rove told him that was probably Wilson's wife, who works at the CIA. That was all that was said. There is absolutely NO crime based on this information.

How do the dems ever hope of winning the white house, or any chamber of congress with no message other then hate speech. Now the right wingers are about to take over the courts and there goes the last bastion of temperment. Way to go DNC, Dean, move on and Shumer. You've given away the keys to the city and now the moderates are paying the price. At least I know that the right will cut my taxes and keep the pressure on the terrorists. Why the hell should this moderate ever vote for a democrat when you pander to the nutty left wing as much as the Bushies pander to the nutty right? Once again, you have missed the chance to actually move the debate on national policy forward by getting bogged down in this ridiculous Rove mess. Just watch Bush sneak in the supreme nominee right past your noses while you're focusing on the wrong thing - AGAIN! Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

moderate,

I was just kind of poking fun with the pop psychology anyway - who knows where their heads are at? It all seems like ad hoc damage control. I really don't get the Joe and Valerie Wilson character assasination. Or why they are even such a prominent part of the discussion.

I'm afraid that a previous poster may be right . . .Rove & Co. are sitting back laughing, waiting to pull the rug out when the time is right. It seems they toss out the hook and the Democrats lunge at it eagerly, every time.

This is a non-story. And, there are too many mis-statements made by Wilson to make him look credible. (Like Cheny personally sending him to Niger.)

Please, Democrats, do yourselves a collective favor and focus on the concerns of the American people . . .health insurance, social security, the war on terror, high taxes.

As a group, you're beginning to look desperately foolish. Howard Dean's absurd comments about Republicans aren't helping your cause, either.

This is one of the most talked about non-stories I've ever heard of.

First published: 23 Oct 2003, 15:48

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Labour forges ties with US' Democrats
Norway's Labour Party is joining other European social democrats in linking up with the Democrats in the US. The goal is to be prepared with common strategies if a majority of them on both sides of the Atlantic come back to power.
A group of European social democrats, led by former British Foreign Minister Robin Cook, met last week with several top Democratic politicians and party officials. They included US senators Hilary Clinton and Joseph Biden.

They also had meetings with Ron Klain of presidential candidate Wesley Clark's campaign, and Stan Greenberg, former US President Bill Clinton's campaign strategist in 1992.

On the agenda was European concern over current US foreign policy and the effects of globalization.

Espen Barth Eide, who led the Norwegian delegation, said the group met "understanding" that "economic globalization must be accompanied by political globalization."

There remain wide differences between the European social democrats and their counterparts in the US, who tend to be far more conservative.

Barth Eide called it "natural" however, "to begin with those (in the US) who are closest to us (in ideology), even though the Democrats of course aren't social democrats."

Aftenposten English Web Desk
Nina Berglund/NTB

Is this truely where we Democrats are seeking to go? If so, let's just come right out and say it in truthful terms that everyone in our party, and others, can and will understand. Let's not hide it in a Norwegion News Paper article! Let's get this NEWS out to our people here in the United States of America.

I think the Republicans are somewhere between "denial" and "anger" right now. When the courts start to validate this, it'll tone down into "bargaining".

Ah, schadenfreude.

POS website logs me out every other post so I lost the response to this and have zero desire to type it again. Safe to say the words "assclown" and "delusional" were used.

Let me ask you GOP folks something... why the flip-flop on whether this is a serious crime or not?

There is NO flip flop folks. Releasing the name of a covert agent during a covert operation on for the purpose of unveilging that agent is a crime. THe guy who made the law even said this is NO CRIME. What happend here was some self aggrandizing assclown decided to take a shot at the White House during an election... he fumbled and outed his own wife on national tv. Now since some lib reporter was going to implicate Rove as his source the comlibs have their panties all in a bunch. All Rove said was in response to a question posed to him... no the Veep didnt have anything to do with this faux agents trip to Niger, no the Veep didnt send him, no the Veep never saw any reports, I believe the assclowns wife sent him. (paraphrased to be sure).

Pretty sad state of your party when this comes as big news.

i can't seem to find a place where joe & josephine citizen can voice their opinion at the GOP website. hmmm.

JOHN KERRY 4 PRES!

Remember that the truth shall set you free. The GOP would love to have democrats leave their party and join ours. So Dems keep it up on your talking points about Rove, The facts are out there and the general public will finally see it is another example of you not having a clear, concise plan for the success of our country but only anger and slander. By the way I am a hardworking republican.

Coulterite:

If there was no crime, then why the investigation? I don't know if your analysis holds up to Ockham's razor. It sounds like disparate facts being desperately pulled together.

Our only platform of any real concern is "I HATE G.W. BUSH" and we will block anything that his administration puts forth. We do not need to have any real ideas for keeping our country strong and safe because our base is only interested in having issues to protest. We shall do our very best to never really fix anything, because if we do there will be no more issues to protest anymore. Let's keep up our collective good struggles against our true enemy...CAPITALISM!!!!!!

i can't seem to find a place where joe & josephine citizen can voice their opinion at the GOP website. hmmm.

You didnt look too hard then (rolls eyes) http://www.gop.com/Blog/

If there was no crime, then why the investigation? I don't know if your analysis holds up to Ockham's razor. It sounds like disparate facts being desperately pulled together.

So the presence of an investigation equals a crime? Since when? Certainly you must have held this same belief with Ken Star circa Bill Clinton blowjob. Clinton must have lied... since Ken Star was on the case... right? Ill let all my cop friends know that there is always a crime if there is an investigation as well. Cheers!

Hillary in '08

Hillary in '08

Please please please please make this happen!!! I thought getting Scream Dean was a blessing for conservatives....

Coulterite:

This has been a two year investigation. It would have been dropped if there was no meat to it, because to continue it would be a waste.

If your boys are clean, your party should come out of this thing smelling like roses.

Good luck ;)

And btw, Clinton did lie. About the sex act that everybody so desperately wanted to know about. It was wrong to lie. But it was also wrong to ask.

I'm not blindly loyal.

I try to pick and choose my battles.

Presumably, when you ask a question you want an answer, so here it is. Mr. Rove has not committed any crime. Valerie Plame was not a "covert operative," nor an "undercover agent," rather she was an analyst, a desk-bound bureaucrat. President Bush is "protecting" Mr. Rove from the scurrilous attacks by Democ rat politicians, and their equally reprehensible toadies in the self-styled "major" media, because President Bush is a decent man, a quality utterly lacking in the hate-driven attackers. Next question?

This has been a two year investigation. It would have been dropped if there was no meat to it, because to continue it would be a waste.

If your boys are clean, your party should come out of this thing smelling like roses.

Good luck ;)

Whitewater started in 94 ended in 98
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/whitewater/whitewater.htm

Good overview from the Post, nobody in your party seemed to think anything was wrong then despite a dreaded investigation going on.

Pot meet Kettle.

Coulterite:

Look, I don't care about Clinton. He was a sleazebag, which most politicians who work their way to the top are. I wouldn't want to do business with someone who I know cheats on their wife. How can you trust them?

There's no point in avoiding the matter at hand by exhuming that corpse, though.

It's important that these folks are held accountable. Power corrupts, pretty regularly.

Not to crash your party, but I don't think I'd want to hang my hat on Joe Wilson, or for that matter HRC or Kerry. As a general rule, demagogues are a bad thing.

It's been said already repeatedly, but the evidence is pretty strong that Joe Wilson lied repeatedly on national TV and in print quotes with respect to the level and extent of involvment of his wife in making his trip happen. Rove had a right and indeed an obligation to warn reporters that Wilson had a political agenda when making his allegations and warranted some critical thinking in assessing his motives and "facts."

As a general rule, as the WSJ recently editorialized, nepotism is a bad thing. But you don't need the WSJ to know intrinisically that nepostism is bad in both the private sector and the public sector. Is it any surprise Wilson lied? Not if he wanted to have any credibility. I think as the facts come out, this really will be a tempest in a teapot. It was not unlawful to identify Wilson's wife as the proximal reason for Wilson's trip when he was telling all it was the DCIA and/or VP. Again: bold-faced liar and or spinmeister.

Consequently, not only was Wilson the wrong man for the job in the event the CIA lacked ANY qualified assets in the Africa region to keep track of yellowcake sales -- but as a political hack and a liar he probably is not quite as effective w Bush credibility as, say, the Vietnam Veterans for Truth in torpoedoing Kerry's credibility. In fact, this operation by the DNC is so hilarious and such a comedy of errors, in this viewers opinion (and I speak on background regularly with reporters)

Following the now-maligned CBS story, former DNC Chairman had this to say: "For years, Bush has been claiming he met his obligations [to the Guard]," McAuliffe said. "George W. Bush has either lied or he has severe memory loss."

The lying allegations seem to be a common theme. But that quote was from early September 2004. The rest, as they say is history: the November election and the Dems had their ass handed to them in a sling. To wit: Daschle et al - gone!

Now I think the Dems are looking to have a comeback (honestly, things go in cycles). They may even have some novel policy ideas (other than "just say, "No."). But on Africa-gate (unlike Travelgate, Monicagate, Fostergate and all the rest of the backwater Arkansas bulls---) maybe you all should stew a little bit and await the Special Prosecutor's findings and the Grand Jury.

Lying isn't a crime (unless under oath, Mr. Clinton) so Wilson may be home free but for all we know it was common knowledge among the press that Plame was CIA -- and they may not have even known that she was a protected operative. Indeed, it is not yet clear to me that disclosing Plame's name -- if anyone actually did disclose -- was actually a violation of applicable law.

But to Mr. Carey's point, any such disclosure was not a "matter of national security." Give me a break. It was a matter in objective terms of political hacks engaged in nepotism to discredit the President. It was another low-end DNC operation fielded by so-called "professionals" that don't really seem to have their act together.

Cheers

My original point joe was that simply because there is an investigation doesn't mean there is a crime... it certainly doesn't mean there has been a crime you can nail the "other side" for.

Perhaps I should start a moveon website?

I guess I should have been clearer ... all I was trying to say was that some possible evidence of wrongdoing would have prompted the investigation. It would not have been opened otherwise. That does not necessarily mean a crime has been committed.

That's what we're going to have to wait for and see, because the pundits, they don't really know.

Cheers "teachersunions". Well said.

On another side note, how about that NEA convention? 80-some resolutions from the teachers union.... 79 of which had to do with bashing Walmart, solidarity with proletariat revolution in underdeveloped nations, the proper uses of KY jelly, if Gays should or should not be referred to as "other", etc etc etc. Gotta hand it to the teachers union... they have their priorities in line eh?

That's what we're going to have to wait for and see, because the pundits, they don't really know.

Standard tit for tat going on right now, I expect Dean et al to come out calling for his head just as much as I expect to get eaten by a lion if I jump in its den.

It is astonishing how the far left and far right gain so much excitement from smacking back and forth with these hollow, emotional, acusations. All I see are various memes being flung back and forth from the information sources of each. Is it possible to have a neutral analysis? Probably not for the average human mind. THese systems of information are simply far too complex. SO what to do?

Moderates... as useful as tits on a bull. Life without conviction, without passion.

There's plenty of facts, whether you chose to pay attention to them or not is immaterial.

Joe Wilson's Top Ten Worst Inaccuracies And Misstatements

1.) Wilson Insisted That The Vice President’s Office Sent Him To Niger:

Wilson Said He Traveled To Niger At CIA Request To Help Provide Response To Vice President’s Office. “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.” (Joseph C. Wilson, Op-Ed, “What I Didn’t Find In Africa,” The New York Times, 7/6/03)

Joe Wilson: “[W]hat They Did, What The Office Of The Vice President Did, And, In Fact, I Believe Now From Mr. Libby’s Statement, It Was Probably The Vice President Himself ...” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 8/3/03)
Vice President Cheney: “I Don’t Know Joe Wilson. I’ve Never Met Joe Wilson. … And Joe Wilson - I Don’t [Know] Who Sent Joe Wilson. He Never Submitted A Report That I Ever Saw When He Came Back.” (NBC’s “Meet The Press,” 9/14/03)

CIA Director George Tenet: “In An Effort To Inquire About Certain Reports Involving Niger, CIA’s Counter-Proliferation Experts, On Their Own Initiative, Asked An Individual With Ties To The Region To Make A Visit To See What He Could Learn.” (Central Intelligence Agency, “Statement By George J. Tenet, Director Of Central Intelligence,” Press Release, 7/11/03)

2.) Wilson Claimed The Vice President And Other Senior White House Officials Were Briefed On His Niger Report:

“[Wilson] Believed That [His Report] Would Have Been Distributed To The White House And That The Vice President Received A Direct Response To His Question About The Possible Uranium Deal.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)

The Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Reported That The Vice President Was Not Briefed On Wilson’s Report. “Conclusion 14. The Central Intelligence Agency should have told the Vice President and other senior policymakers that it had sent someone to Niger to look into the alleged Iraq-Niger uranium deal and it should have briefed the Vice President on the former ambassador’s findings.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)

CIA Director George Tenet: “Because This Report, In Our View, Did Not Resolve Whether Iraq Was Or Was Not Seeking Uranium From Abroad, It Was Given A Normal And Wide Distribution, But We Did Not Brief It To The President, Vice-President Or Other Senior Administration Officials.” (Central Intelligence Agency, “Statement By George J. Tenet, Director Of Central Intelligence,” Press Release, 7/11/03)

3.) Wilson Has Claimed His Niger Report Was Conclusive And Significant

Wilson Claims His Trip Proved There Was Nothing To The Uranium “Allegations.” “I knew that [Dr. Rice] had fundamentally misstated the facts. In fact, she had lied about it. I had gone out and I had undertaken this study. I had come back and said that this was not feasible. … This government knew that there was nothing to these allegations.” (NBC’s, “Meet The Press,” 5/2/04)

Officials Said Evidence In Wilson’s Niger Report Was “Thin” And His “Homework Was Shoddy.” (Michael Duffy, “Leaking With A Vengeance,” Time, 10/13/03)

Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Unanimous Report: “Conclusion 13. The Report On The Former Ambassador’s Trip To Niger, Disseminated In March 2002, Did Not Change Any Analysts’ Assessments Of The Iraq-Niger Uranium Deal.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
“For Most Analysts, The Information In The Report Lent More Credibility To The Original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Report On The Uranium Deal, But State Department Bureau Of Intelligence And Research (INR) Analysts Believed That The Report Supported Their Assessments That Niger Was Unlikely To Be Willing Or Able To Sell Uranium.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
CIA Said Wilson’s Findings Did Not Resolve The Issue. “Because [Wilson’s] report, in our view, did not resolve whether Iraq was or was not seeking uranium from abroad, it was given a normal and wide distribution, but we did not brief it to the president, vice president or other senior administration officials. We also had to consider that the former Nigerien officials knew that what they were saying would reach the U.S. government and that this might have influenced what they said.” (Central Intelligence Agency, “Statement By George J. Tenet, Director Of Central Intelligence,” Press Release 7/11/03)

The Butler Report Claimed That The President’s State Of the Union Statement On Uranium From Africa, “Was Well-Founded.” “We conclude that, on the basis of the intelligence assessments at the time, covering both Niger and the Democratic Republic of Congo, the statements on Iraqi attempts to buy uranium from Africa in the Government’s dossier, and by the Prime Minister in the House of Commons, were well-founded. By extension, we conclude also that the statement in President Bush’s State of the Union Address of 28 January 2003 that: ‘The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.’ was well-founded.” (The Rt. Hon. The Lord Butler Of Brockwell, “Review Of Intelligence, On Weapons Of Mass Destruction,” 7/14/04)

4.) Wilson Denied His Wife Suggested He Travel To Niger In 2002:

Wilson Claimed His Wife Did Not Suggest He Travel To Niger To Investigate Reports Of Uranium Deal; Instead, Wilson Claims It Came Out Of Meeting With CIA. CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “Among other things, you had always said, always maintained, still maintain your wife, Valerie Plame, a CIA officer, had nothing to do with the decision to send to you Niger to inspect reports that uranium might be sold from Niger to Iraq. … Did Valerie Plame, your wife, come up with the idea to send you to Niger?” Joe Wilson: “No. My wife served as a conduit, as I put in my book. When her supervisors asked her to contact me for the purposes of coming into the CIA to discuss all the issues surrounding this allegation of Niger selling uranium to Iraq.” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 7/18/04)

But Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Received Not Only Testimony But Actual Documentation Indicating Wilson’s Wife Proposed Him For Trip. “Some CPD, [CIA Counterproliferation Division] officials could not recall how the office decided to contact the former ambassador, however, interviews and documents provided to the Committee indicate that his wife, a CPD employee, suggested his name for the trip. The CPD reports officer told Committee staff that the former ambassador’s wife ‘offered up his name’ and a memorandum to the Deputy Chief of the CPD on February 12, 2002, from the former ambassador’s wife says, ‘my husband has good relations with both the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity.’” (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)
5.) Wilson Has Claimed His 1999 Trip To Niger Was Not Suggested By His Wife:

Wilson Claims CIA Thought To Ask Him To Make Trip Because He Had Previously Made Trip For Them In 1999, Not Because Of His Wife’s Suggestion. CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “Who first raised your name, then, based on what you know? Who came up with the idea to send you there?” Joe Wilson: “The CIA knew my name from a trip, and it’s in the report, that I had taken in 1999 related to uranium activities but not related to Iraq. I had served for 23 years in government including as Bill Clinton’s Senior Director for African Affairs at the National Security Council. I had done a lot of work with the Niger government during a period punctuated by a military coup and a subsequent assassination of a president. So I knew all the people there.” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 7/18/04)

In Fact, His Wife Suggested Him For 1999 Trip, As Well. “The former ambassador had traveled previously to Niger on the CIA’s behalf … The former ambassador was selected for the 1999 trip after his wife mentioned to her supervisors that her husband was planning a business trip to Niger in the near future and might be willing to use his contacts in the region …” (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

6.) Wilson Claimed He Was A Victim Of A Partisan Smear Campaign

Joe Wilson: “Well, I Don’t Know. Obviously, There’s Been This Orchestrated Campaign, This Smear Campaign. I Happen To Think That It’s Because The RNC, The Republican National Committee’s Been Involved In This In A Big Way …” CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “But They Weren’t Involved In The Senate Intelligence Committee Report.” Wilson: “No, They Weren’t.” (CNN’s “Late Edition,” 7/18/04)

Senate Intelligence Committee Unanimously Concluded That Wilson’s Report “Lent More Credibility” For Most Analysts “To The Original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Reports.” “Conclusion 13. The report on the former ambassador’s trip to Niger, disseminated in March 2002, did not change any analysts’ assessments of the Iraq-Niger uranium deal. For most analysts, the information in the report lent more credibility to the original Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reports on the uranium deal, but the State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) analysts believed that the report supported their assessment that Niger was unlikely to be willing or able to sell uranium to Iraq.” (Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

Members Of The Senate Select Committee On Intelligence That Wrote The Unanimous “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq”:

Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV)

Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI)

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR)

Sen. Richard Durbin (D-IL)

Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN)

Sen. John Edwards (D-NC)

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)

Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS)

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT)

Sen. Mike DeWine (R-OH)

Sen. Christopher Bond (R-MO)

Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS)

Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME)

Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE)

Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA)

Sen. John Warner (R-VA)

(Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04)

7.) A Month Before The Bob Novak And Matthew Cooper Articles Ever Came Out, Wilson Told The Washington Post That Previous Intelligence Reports About Niger Were Based On Forged Documents:

In June Of 2003, Wilson Told The Washington Post “The Niger Intelligence Was Based On Documents That Had Clearly Been Forged Because ‘The Dates Were Wrong And The Names Were Wrong.’” (Susan Schmidt, “Plame’s Input Is Cited On Niger Mission,” The Washington Post, 7/10/04)

However, “The [Senate Select Committee On Intelligence] Report … Said Wilson Provided Misleading Information To The Washington Post Last June [12th, 2003].” (Susan Schmidt, “Plame’s Input Is Cited On Niger Mission,” The Washington Post, 7/10/04)

Senate Select Committee On Intelligence Unanimous Report: “The Former Ambassador Said That He May Have ‘Misspoken’ To The Reporter When He Said He Concluded The Documents Were ‘Forged.’” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
8.) Wilson Claimed His Book Would Enrich Debate:

NBC’s Katie Couric: “What Do You Hope The Whole Point Of This Book Will Be? Joe Wilson: “Well, I - I Hope, One, It Will Tell - It Tries To Tell An Interesting Story. Two, I Hope That It Enriches The Debate In A Year In Which We Are All Called Upon As Americans To Elect Our Leaders. And Three, … That [It] Says That This Is A Great Democracy That Is Worthy Of Our Taking Our Responsibilities As Stewards Seriously.” (NBC’s “Today Show,” 5/3/04)

Wilson Admits In His Book That He Had Been Involved In “A Little Literary Flair” When Talking To Reporters. “[Wilson] wrote in his book, he told Committee staff that his assertion may have involved ‘a little literary flair.’” (Matthew Continetti, “‘A Little Literary Flair’” The Weekly Standard, 7/26/04)

Wilson’s Book The Politics Of Truth: Inside The Lies That Put The White House On Trial And Betrayed My Wife’s CIA Identity Has Been Panned In Numerous Reviews For Its Inaccuracies:

“On Page One Of Chapter One, He Quotes NBC Talk Show Host Chris Matthews, Who Told Him That, After Mr. Wilson Chose To Go Public: ‘Wilson’s Wife Is Fair Game.’ Later, He Bases His List Of Suspect Leakers On Conversations With Members Of The News Media And A ‘Source Close To The House Judiciary Committee.’” (Eli Lake, Op-Ed, “Don’t Quit Your Day Job, Mr. Wilson,” New York Post, 5/4/04)

“For Example, When Asked How He ‘Knew’ That The Intelligence Community Had Rejected The Possibility Of A Niger-Iraq Uranium Deal, As He Wrote In His Book, He Told [Senate Intelligence] Committee Staff That His Assertion May Have Involved ‘A Little Literary Flair.’” (Matthew Continetti, “‘A Little Literary Flair,’” The Weekly Standard, 7/26/04)

The Boston Globe: “In Essence, Much Of Wilson’s Book Is An Attempt To Portray The Bush Administration As A Ministry Of Fear Whose Mission In Pursuing War In Iraq Required It To Proclaim A Lie As Truth.” (Michael D. Langan, Op-Ed, “‘Truth’ Makes Much Of Bush Controversy,” The Boston Globe, 5/4/04)

Newsweek’s Evan Thomas Wrote In The Washington Post: “[W]ilson’s Claims And Conclusions Are Either Long Hashed Over Or Based On What The Intelligence Business Describes As ‘Rumint,’ Or Rumor Intelligence.” (Evan Thomas, Op-Ed, “Indecent Exposure,” The Washington Post, 5/16/04)
9.) Wilson Claimed The CIA Provided Him With Information Related To The Iraq-Niger Uranium Transaction:

“The Former Ambassador Noted That His CIA Contacts Told Him There Were Documents Pertaining To The Alleged Iraq-Niger Uranium Transaction And That The Source Of The Information Was The [Redacted] Intelligence Service.” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)

However, “The DO [Director Of Operations At The CIA] Reports Officer Told Committee Staff That He Did Not Provide The Former Ambassador With Any Information About The Source Or Details …” (Senate Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Assessments On Iraq,” 7/7/04)
10.) Wilson Claimed He Is A Non-Partisan “Centrist”:
Recently, Joe Wilson Refused To Admit He Is A Registered Democrat. NBC’s Jamie Gangel: “You are a Democrat?” Joe Wilson: “I exercise my rights as a citizen of this country to participate in the selection of my leaders and I am proud to do so. I did so in the election in 2000 by contributing not just to Al Gore's campaign, but also to the Bush-Cheney campaign.” (NBC’s “Today Show,” 7/14/05)

“[Wilson] Insist[s] He Remained A Centrist At Heart.” (Scott Shane, “Private Spy And Public Spouse Live At Center Of Leak Case,” The New York Times, 7/5/05)

Think about this people, Joe Wilson is the one that needs to be indicted for his lies that "CIA officials" sent him to Niger, and for HIS revelation that is wife is a CIA operative. Karl Rove never said that Wilson's wife was a covert operative; and that would only be a crime if she was conducting a covert operation and he blew her cover. Mr. Rove only clarified to a journalist that it was not the CIA who sent Mr. Wilson to Niger, it was his wife, who works for the CIA. Mr. Wilson's response, "my wife's a covert operative, you can't leak that information!" is what blew her cover. Nice job Mr. Ambassador...

Bush shouldn't fire Karl Rove
The “gotcha” game is in full swing in Washington as the vultures circle slowly over the White House, hoping for Karl Rove’s scalp.

The ritualized homicide/suicide is well-programmed. A White House insider is accused of doing something, the news media hype the story and, finally, without proof or presumption of innocence, the staffer resigns so as not to become a “distraction” from the president’s agenda.

But maybe this time the cycle can be stopped before it runs its bloody course.

Karl Rove did nothing wrong. The statute he allegedly violated has a number of very specific triggers. The person who reveals the identity of a covert CIA operative has to intend to uncover her identity, know she is a covert operative and know that he is blowing her cover.

The law is designed to stop the likes of Philip Agee, whose 1975 book Inside the Company revealed secret CIA information to sell books. Rove’s actions are a far stretch from those the statute was designed to cover.

Rove did not call Time magazine’s Matt Cooper. Cooper called him. He did not mention Valerie Plame’s name. He may not have even known it. He had no intent to reveal her identity. The context of the conversation was that Rove was trying to disabuse Cooper of the impression that CIA Director George Tenet had been the moving force in choosing former Ambassador Joe Wilson to investigate the nuclear dealings reported to be going on in Niger.

Rove said that it was not Tenet who pushed the appointment but that it likely stemmed from the fact that Wilson’s wife “apparently works” at the CIA.

To call that conversation a deliberate revelation of an agent’s identity designed to blow her cover is a far, far stretch of the statute’s wording and intent.

But just as Rove did not intend to blow Plame’s cover, so the Democrats demanding his head are not very interested in upholding the statute in question. Their motives are totally political. They want revenge against Rove for his successful role in piloting the Bush election and reelection campaigns, and they want to be sure that Bush does not have access to Karl’s advice in the remaining years of his second term.

Washington is a mean town where human sacrifice has been raised to an art form. But Karl Rove does not deserve this fate. He has served loyally and well, resisting enormous opportunities to leave midway and reap a bonanza of income in the private sector. He has shown himself to be a man of uncommon integrity and selflessness in serving this administration and this country. He should not be tossed to the partisan wolves.

Bush, having appointed a special prosecutor and pledged to fire anyone who was responsible for revealing Plame’s identity, cannot just sweep the matter under the rug. But he should allow Rove to clear his name through the normal process of investigation and testimony.

He should keep Karl onboard, stipulating only that he fully answer all questions from a grand jury — as he has done already? — should the prosecutor need him to appear again.

If Rove is indicted or even named as a target, Bush will have to let him go. But that’s not going to happen based on the current fact pattern, and Bush should not let himself be pushed ahead of the process by firing Rove.

Indeed, there is some question that the reporters who took Rove’s lead, looked up Plame’s name and published it may themselves be more likely to have violated the statute than is Rove himself. Whoever took the information Rove provided and outed Plame was, in fact, deliberately outing a CIA operative and may be a better fit for the statute’s intent than Karl Rove.

Bush should not fire Rove. He should stick by him until or unless the criminal investigation makes it evident that he may have violated the statute. Otherwise, he should stay on the job.

===========

Some of you Dems should wake up and stop drinking the Kool-Aid.

The stuff that I am reading on this blog is horrible. That the DNC would permit the slander being posted is shocking. I have been a democrat all my life, but this demonizing must stop. To allow the crap being posted here is awful. The "official biography" of Rove is a scandelmongering at the worst. This is from some wack-job named walter storch(not his real name) who tells lies and anti-semite crap.

The Previous post was written by Dick Morris on his site:

http://www.hillnews.com/thehill/export/TheHill/Comment/DickMorris/071405.html

"The party of tolerance and diversity keyed my car"

Help I am in a democrat website and can't get out.

www.ytedk.com

Find out How Senator Kennedy really did that late night so many years ago.
www.ytedk.com

Hey DNC stop censoring this website this is free speech remember just because you don't agree with this admin doesnot make unpatriotic. That goes both ways.

Boo hoo hoo! Republicans can't handle it when one of theirs gets caught.

You people defend this scumbag Rove as if he's your daddy and your daddy can do no wrong. The fact is HE OUTED A CIA AGENT. It doesn't matter if she's a desk jockey or not (which she really wasn't at the time he did this, but that's besides the point). I'm not even in government and I was brought up to know you don't identify someone in that kind of position.

It doesn't really matter. You people are lemmings. You'll follow this sorry excuse of a president and his minions over a cliff because you can't possibly admit they could be wrong. Your entire world would collapse.

And stop blaming Clinton, morons. He's been out of office for years. You people are just embarrassments.

What has happened to the Democratic Party? Remember when there were real Democratic statesmen like Scoop Jackson, Sam Nunn, Hubert Humphrey and Eugene McCarthy in the party? One might have disagreed with them, but at least they commanded respect. The Democrats haven't had a decent leader since Dukakis. You gave us Clinton the Perjurer, Hillary the Commodity Trader, Carter the Appeaser, Dean the Nut and a list of vapid self-promoting whiners like Daschle, Reid, Pelosi and dozens of others. What is wrong with you guys? Do you like losing elections? Well, get used to it because as long as you remain so completely out of touch with most of the voters you will continue to lose. Here are a few hints: The American people want a strong leader in the war on terror. (Yes, it is a real war folks, and Democrats are perceived as being on the wrong side.) The American people do not want a socialist welfare state. "We Hate Bush" is not a slogan that garners much traction with American voters because most voters think Bush is a decent guy--which he is. Demonizing the rich is a bad idea because most Americans aspire to be rich someday. Demonizing religious people is also a bad idea because most Americans are religious. I really feel for most Democrats, because the party is led by idiots and a Republican majority is virtually guaranteed for the forseeable future. Hillary in '08? I don't think so. Name one "red state" that she has a prayer of winning--oops sorry I know the DNC doesn't believe in prayer. As the first step to rebuilding the party, Democrats should boot this gang of looney tunes.

Hey Lifelong, you need to put the bong down and clear your head.

Rove did not 'out' V.P., if anyone did it was the reporter. But that of course won't satisfy your blood lust. So go ahead and keep going with your rantings and ravings so the rest of us can be amused.

Can anyone tell me how anyone was compromised by what C. Rove said? Explain how our national security was compromised? How was any CIA agent's life put at risk? This is all just a little circus side show for a political party that hasn't had a good idea for about 30 years now. You are so busy having your little "watergate" circle jerk you are missing the big picture. Rove didn't hurt anything. Everyone knows it. This will all blow over in about 5 days. Keep wasting your time.

RationalThinker,

Rove leaking that information to anyone in the press is a security breach. Rove telling that information to anyone, for that matter, when that information is considered classified, is a security breach. The fact that he did it with political motives is even more reprehensible (and he DID do it with that in mind. If you think otherwise, you're fooling yourself).

There's no blood lust here, fool. Most situations in life fall into a grey area anyway. I don't think this man is evil. He is a political animal and, when speaking to a reporter, he's surely going to assess all opportunities at hand to forward his agenda. Whether he knew that what he was doing was wrong or not is besides the point. It doesn't condone the act.

The sad part of this is that you've been lied to and you're so caught up in your own aggrandized opinion of yourself and your party's distorted set of beliefs you'll never even come close to the truth of this until years from now, maybe.

This government has the country scared. They're scared something else is going to threaten them and they want the government to coddle them.

I was in the battery during 9/11. If anyone has the right to be scared it's me and the thousands of others who actually saw first hand, in live 3D, what we're up against. The difference is, like most New Yorkers, we're not as afraid as some of the rest of the country - and we're not so easily duped. The GOP decided to use this fear as a way to forward their own agenda and people like you are their ass monkeys.

As long as Democrats keep wasting their time with nonissues like this, they will never win an election. Because instead of actually coming up with ways to win the War on Terror they focus on Abu Ghraib, fillabustering judicial nominees, and how America is the problem...not terrorism. As the President said, "Lead or get out of the way". The Democrats are getting out of the way because they continue to portray a doom and gloom image of America which is why they loose elections. Keep it up!!

I agree. The democrats need to find a message that not only resonates, but is consistent and befitting their platform. But the same manner of complaint you accuse the democrats of between fillabusters and lack of ideas is exactly where the republican were under Clinton.

Besides, fillibustering was the republican's favorite tool during Clinton and it's only become a bad word because, once again, they have lemmings like you spouting out their talking points as if they were gospel. By the way, "War on Terror" is mindless label created to be general and all-encompassing. Do you always mimic what's told to you from the TV? Try thinking on your own, pal.

WOW, I will re-direct those that are not in the know to this site so they they can see firsthand why 1. the democratic party in no longer in power and 2. how the inane/insane extreme elements have hijacked a once great party.
Seems facts are a pure luxury on this site.

tboater:

The pundits who tell you what to think have no shame. Here's the Late Edition transcript of your first point about Joe Wilson in it's actual context. The very first one. It didn't take me long to discredit the whole post... didn't have to go very far =D

----------------------

BLITZER: Is that true?

WILSON: Well, look, it's absolutely true that neither the vice president nor Dr. Rice nor even George Tenet knew that I was traveling to Niger.

What they did, what the office of the vice president did, and, in fact, I believe now from Mr. Libby's statement, it was probably the vice president himself...

BLITZER: Scooter Libby is the chief of staff for the vice president.

WILSON: Scooter Libby.

They asked essentially that we follow up on this report -- that the agency follow up on the report. So it was a question that went to the CIA briefer from the Office of the Vice President. The CIA, at the operational level, made a determination that the best way to answer this serious question was to send somebody out there who knew something about both the uranium business and those Niger officials that were in office at the time these reported documents were executed.

--------------------------------

As you can see, Wolf Blitzer cut him off in mid-sentence. The people who come up with your ideas for you only used the first part ;)

Tboater, did you author all that nonsense or just cut and paste it from the GOP website?

Surely it's just the bloggers who are so extreme. Surely the rank and file guy doesn't actually believe this stuff. There is absolutely no evidence that Bush lied about anything. He may have been wrong about WMD, but so was the rest of the world. Even those who voted against the authorization did so for reasons other than a belief that Iraq did not possess WMD.
Joe Wilson did not say Iraq did not have WMD. He did say he was sent by Chenney (which was either a lie or he was simply mistaken). He did not say that Iraq was not trying to buy uranium. He said that it was unlikely that Niger would supply it and that he was unable to find evidence proving the British claim. In fact, most security analysts who read Wilson's report felt like it supported the claim more than it debunked it.

Some state that the Administration was trying to destroy Wilson and his wife. Destroy? Sounds more like what Hillary tried to have done to each of the women who came forward with stories of Bill including Monica. Remember Linda Tripp? Several of Clinton's people went overboard trying to destroy her.

With respect to Bush cleaning up the White House: Note that Bush required his staff to waive the confidentiality that journalists are bound by---and they did. When the reporter was preparing to go to jail because he thought the waiver was obtained under duress, Rove approved another, more specific waiver. Do you really think that would have happened in the Clinton White House?

Let's see where the investigation leads. I don't know if Karl Rove committed a crime or not. And neither does anyone else on this blog. If he did, I will be very dissappointed if Bush does not fire him. But the point here is, all evidence indicates that the Bush White House has in fact cooperated with the investigation. No billing records have been misplaced in the Residence only to magiaclly appear a couple of years after they should have been produced.

It was common knowledge in Washington that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA, at least that is what Novak has said. I don't know if it was common knowledge that she was undercover. Perhaps if Rove had illegally gone through all of the FBI files (like the Clintons had done) he may have learned that, but we have seen no evidence that he knew that.

All I am saying is, don't let your hatred for the Republicans distort your view of the truth. Hannity and Combs is a TV show. It is supposed to be entertaining. It is not how life is to be conducted among a civil society. And don't speak in superlatives, it undermines your credibility.

Lifelong,

Wow, for you to discern “my own aggrandized opinion of myself” from my posting, you obviously must possess superior intellect and clairvoyance. As expected, I am amused.

Even according to the wonderful MSM, and the Select Committee On Intelligence, “Report On The U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments On Iraq,” U.S. Senate, 7/7/04, V.P. was given up. So I doubt that information on her was considered "classified".

Also, Rove is such a fantastic schemer he worked it out so Cooper would ‘call’ him. I guess it doesn’t matter to you that Wilson lied and it was proven that he lied. What would you have said if the tables were turned and it was a Republican that lied the same way Wilson did?

Your statement “Whether he knew that what he was doing was wrong or not is besides the point. It doesn't condone the act.”, is exactly the point. According to the statute, this is what would determine guilt; “Intent”, and “Knowing” that V.P. was ‘undercover’ and that he would be outing her. You need to do a little more studying my friend.

Don’t worry, as soon as Bush nominates someone for the Supreme Court everyone will be saying, “Wilson, Wilson who?”. You will then have your fun tearing into new meat and I once again will be amused.

A little advice: do come up for air once in a while.

Anyone here old enough to remember Watergate? Is this deja vu or what!? Right down to the predictable GOP spin. The only thing missing is Congress, but that could change in 18 months.

These things are certain right now:

The MSM, a sleeping giant since 9/11, has woke up, and Rove has lost one of his best assets for his boss, his ability to manipulate and use them - ever again.

Rove lied when he flatly denied his involvement in the leak. The White House's credibility has sunk to an all-time low.

This IS a big deal. Otherwise, all these fine points being raised by our friendly trolls today about how it's NOT a big deal would have been openly disseminated two years ago. Instead the WH at that time sought to distance itself from any culpability for the leak, and Bush promised to boot anyone found culpable. (Now he is copping out of that pledge and is further eroding public confidence).

Ordinary Americans like unsung heroes. They will view Plame and even Wilson sympathetically, and both are quite photogenic. Compare to Rove - ordinary Americans dislike sneaky fat-faced know-it-alls. In the age of television-dominated news, you couldn't ask for a better made-for-TV contrast between the good guys and bad guys.

That much cannot be disputed so far. Let's see what develops.

The mentally-disordered thinking of the Democrats is nothing, if not entertaining. The current hubbub surrounding Karl Rove is only the latest case in point.

My first instinct about this “controversy” was to chalk it all up to just one more partisan attack by the GET BUSH cabal. Yawn. But that was before tuning into a notably hysterical (even for them) press conference wherein Scott McClellan was pummeled with 41 questions in 35 minutes on the subject.

Once I was able to get by the revolting image of Helen Thomas and her ever-present hair barrette, I was mesmerized by the rabid ferocity of the aforementioned spectacle. Something big must surely have taken place to warrant all this! Why, at any moment I expected to see the news crawl stating the investigation was concluded and that Karl Rove had indeed been arrested and taken away in shackles!

I should have known better. I keep forgetting due process only applies to terrorists.

It matters not one iota to John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, et al, that there is a federal investigation pending and that, so far, Rove has been found guilty of nothing.

It simply does not matter to these people that Rove never uttered Valerie Plame’s name to Matt Cooper. And even if he had, he would still not be guilty of any wrongdoing as specified in the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, since Plame was not a covert operative acting outside the country at the time, and hadn’t been for over five years!

I remain convinced my first instinct is the correct one.

Jesse:

You have cited evidence or previous statements to prove all of your assertions in your intitial question on the blog. But you forgot one:

"Karl Rove, one of Bush's closest friends and Senior Advisor potentially violated the law when he disclosed the identity of an undercover CIA agent."

Please cite the proof of this statement.

Rove is guilty! Guilty as charged! Halliburton put him up to this! He was on Enron's payroll too. We democrats have never cared much for the CIA, but we will defend them from Karl Rove. He wants terrorists rounded up with the Patriot Act to be guilty until proven innocent. We democrats must protect the terrorists' rights from Republican attacks. Down with Karl Rove! Down with Big Oil! Down with those who want to use military force to avenge the deaths of Americans! Peace will only prevail when we Democrats return to our Marxist roots. Down with big tobacco!

I really don't understand why anyone is shocked whatsoever that Mr. Bush would be protecting Mr. Rove. Since his blatant theft of the 2000 election, George Bush has done nothing that was not to serve himself, his own inner circle and the shadow businessman that stand behind him.

Everyone hails George Bush for his "commanding" performance after the 9/11 atrocity-- but for what reason?
He's the PRESIDENT of the United States! That's his JOB!! That's like me getting praise from my boss and co-workers just because I came into work with a smile on my face and actually sat and performed work!

Now that his senior strategic advisor has blown his own cover I'm sure Mr. Bush cannot afford to lose him and so he will hold off as long as he can to deal with the issue, and maybe have the National Threat Alerts raised a few times to once again DISTRACT Americans from the REAL issues!

The blame unfortunately does not fall on our "leaders", but on the American people themselves.
Americans are too busy with their SUVs, two-car garage homes, and just getting by to notice or even fight for what is right.
If Americans were truly moralistic, the Iraq War wouldn't even be happening. Osama BinLaden would be getting the death penalty by now, and we would have a President that TRULY cares about the people and not his bottom line.

We deserve all the angst we get. Like idiots, we allowed him to obtain another FOUR year term.

You are right about one thing, Daranhatu...but only one thing. You ARE an idiot.

Well the right-wingers were right about one thing....

It's not only the "liberal" blogs saying it, because now its hit the fan for real.

Rove's stupid paid pundits can't keep his ass out of the fire.

http://washingtontimes.com/upi/20050714-104442-6075r.htm

The Washington Times owned by Syung Moon has indicated the fears of the White House, now reiterated in the NY Post.

The CIA is deservedly pissed. Not only did Rove take part in conspiracy, he revealed information that Plame was working in a WMD investigative unit!

This allowed Matt Cooper to discover directly, that she was working at Brewster Jennings&Associates which blew the cover of over 100 HIGH PROFILE OPERATIVES. All of who protect the country from WMD.

In addition, Wilson's testimony has NEVER been refuted! There's nothing but plausible deniability left for Bush on downing street, because the WMD was NEVER there and evidence WAS manufactured!

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=a8dab8rni_Do&refer=us
Party over country, assholes?

Someone's committed treason on multiple counts, and fed the country into TWO illegal wars now with Iraq & Iran, and all you can think of is your PARTY!

Sit down and shutup, or get something that makes any difference.

get rid of him and bush both!!!!!!!!!!!!!1

You moron!!!!

http://washingtontimes.com/upi/20050714-104442-6075r.htm

The Washington Times owned by Syung Moon has

In addition, Wilson's testimony has NEVER been refuted! There's nothing but plausible deniability left for Bush on downing street, because the WMD was NEVER there and evidence WAS manufactured!

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=a8dab8rni_Do&refer=us
Party over country, assholes?

The CIA went to langley probably TWICE, in the runup to flying to Niger!!!! They were NOT common knowledge, not everyone knew a thing about them, that is total bullshit!

The CIA officers were all NOCs, being that even if they were in plain sight you wouldn't know they were CIA. That is how undercover they were, you freeper morons!

Do you have the first clue about what happened in the movie the Bourne Identity? That is exactly what we're talking about! Nobody would know who the hell Jason Bourne was just by looking at him, would you? No you wouldn't. NOBODY would know who Plame and the others were by looking at them.

This is the purpose of NOC, my god....

What's this, everyone?

More proof that the republicans put party over country!!!!!!!

http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=109&session=1&vote=00188

Senate votes on ammendment, votes against revoking the security clearance of anyone who reveals classified information to outside parties.

SOFT ON TREASON: THE REPUBLICAN PARTY!

Get the message out there and blast it, Howard!!!

Nick

All those in support of Karl Rove are just tools of the mighty Neo-con propoganda machine. You sure can parrot the Republican talking points though, heard on Fox News. I wish I could be there when the coin drops and your world comes crashing down.

IDENTIFYING a CIA operative is a crime. You don't have to say their name to out them. If that's Rove's defense (and it is), he's in big trouble. Now if I made reference to Bill Clinton's wife, who do you think that could be?

And if Tird-Blossum's [Bush's pet name for Karl Rove] defense is his attempt to prevent a false story from being published (and it is), somebody should clue him on on the difference between the truth and lies. Yellow cake uranium was NEVER sold to Saddam in Niger and Everything that Wilson said in is op-ed piece was true.

Wilson is a hero. He was the last diplomat in Iraq before Saddam's invasion in Kuwait and was responsible for getting every American in the Embassy out safely. He stood up to Saddam face to face, what did Tird-Blossum do, gossip like a little school girl?

But Karl Rove isn't the story people. It's the cover up that's obstructed the investigation for the past two years that's going to be big news, not to mention the mounting evidence that we're fighting an illegal war in Iraq. I mean, why jeapordize national security to discredit an opposing view point, if it weren't true. Now, I admit, the Bush administration won't go down because of another lie piled on top of other dozens of lies he's told about Iraq and their connection to 9/11. But when the Feds couldn't prosecute Al Capone for his mob activities, they got him on tax evasion.

Indictments will be handed down and the second source will be revealed as a high ranking member of the administration -- probably, Dick Cheney - the house of cards will finally come crashing down, proving what goes around comes around.

JUST BREAKING:

Rove spoke to Novak before his article even came out, over 6 days before!

"
The article further revealed that Rove has told investigators that he learned from the columnist the name of Plame, not the other way around. After hearing from Novak about Plame, according to this source, Rove told the columnist: "I heard that, too." The Novak column appeared six days later.

The conversation with Novak took place three days before Rove chatted with Time magazine’s Matthew Cooper about the wife of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson.

Actually, as the Times noted, this account squares up pretty well with Novak’s own description, contained in a column of Oct. 1, 2003. Novak wrote then that a first inside official gave him the tip on Plame and a second source confirmed that. That second source was Rove, the Times says.

Asked by investigators how he knew enough to confirm Novak 's information was accurate, write Johnston and Stevenson, Rove said he had heard portions of the story about Plame helping to arrange her husband's trip to Africa from other journalists, but had not heard her name.

Rove has said he did not know the C.I.A. officer's name and did not leak it. The Times' source holds that Rove did not know that Plame was a covert officer.

Robert D. Luskin, Rove's lawyer, said Thursday, "Any pertinent information has been provided to the prosecutor." The Times said Novak declined to discuss the matter.

The Times added this description of its source: “The person who provided the information about Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Novak declined to be identified, citing requests by Mr. Fitzgerald that no one discuss the case. The person discussed the matter in the belief that Mr. Rove was truthful in saying he did not disclose Ms. Wilson's identity.”

The Times reporters observe: “The revelation of Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Novak raises a question the White House has never addressed: whether Mr. Rove ever described that conversation, or his conversation with Mr. Cooper, with the president.”"

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000979690

Rove openly lied and tried to spin the NY Times to print it! The lie is he got the name from Novak, when it shows him contradict the original writing....He confirmed for Novak that it was PLAME!

He knew her name, and flatout leaked the information to Matt Cooper and also confirmed it for Novak.....

So who was the other leaker, and how'd he tell Rove?

According to Jason Leopold and an official in the FBI, that source may be Lewis Libby who first started leaking the information everywhere.

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0507/S00227.htm

"In an exclusive interview Lewis Libby, the Vice President's Chief of Staff, told TIME: "The Vice President heard about the possibility of Iraq trying to acquire uranium from Niger in February 2002. As part of his regular intelligence briefing, the Vice President asked a question about the implication of the report. During the course of a year, the Vice President asked many such questions and the agency responded within a day or two saying that they had reporting suggesting the possibility of such a transaction. But the agency noted that the reporting lacked detail. The agency pointed out that Iraq already had 500 tons of uranium, portions of which came from Niger, according to the International Atomic Energy Administration (IAEA). The Vice President was unaware of the trip by Ambassador Wilson and didn't know about it until this year when it became public in the last month or so. ""
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,465270,00.html

"Two days later, two top White House officials disclosed Plame's identity to at least six Washington journalists, an administration official told The Post in an article published Sept. 28, 2003.

Those two officials were Karl Rove and Lewis Libby. "

If I were in that Jury hall, I'd be slapping down indictments on Rove and Libby for obstruction of justice and conspiracy! This meme needs to be repeated everywhere, ROVE KNEW HER NAME! So did the White House! LIES UPON LIES: HER NAME WAS KNOWN, AND THEY WERE LEAKING IT.

All of the CIA agents were NOCs, the crime is clear! Report it over and over again, Rove knew her name! He knew everything about the NOC operation Brewster Jennings, and openly lied about it!!!

The Democrats lost the election so you would think they would be trying chance the minds of those who voted for Bush. However, how are they going to change minds by calling those who disagree with them "idiots", "morons", and saying that they should return to Marx ideas and protect "terrorists rights". Does this talk resonate with the moderates you are trying to appeal too?

I think you'll find that not alll democrats are interested in appealing to moderates, (fortunately).

I find it fascinating that the Dims called for a special prosecutor for this ridiculous witch hunt, and the only person in jail is one of their OWN.

I find it even more fascinating that they don't seem to be the least bit curious about Judith Miller's source. She was given a waiver to identify her source, yet she chooses to sit in jail. I wonder why.

It can't be anything to do with principle or integrity...this is the NYT we're talking about. Could it be that she is protecting her ass AND the NYT's because, if known, her "source" would embarrass them both? It's probably Jayson Blair.

It is fascinating indeed, scorched earth (?) - they should have saved themselves the trouble and just asked you instead. You have some truly insightful theories...

July 15, 2005, 8:27 a.m.
Who Exposed Secret Agent Plame?
How about the least likely suspect?

This just in: Bob Novak did not reveal that Valerie Plame was an undercover agent for the CIA.

Read — or reread — his column from July 14, 2003. All Novak reports is that the wife of former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson is “an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction.”

Novak has said repeatedly that he was not told, and that he did not know, that Plame was — or had ever been — a NOC, an agent with Non-Official Cover. He has emphatically said that had he understood that she was any sort of secret agent, he would never have named her.

As for Novak’s use of the word “operative,” he might as easily have called her an “official,” an “analyst, or an “employee.” But, as a longtime newsman, he instinctively chose the sexiest term (one he routinely applies to political figures, too, i.e. “a party operative”).

Reread Novak’s article, and you’ll also see that Novak in no way denigrates Wilson. On the contrary, he talks of Wilson’s “heroism” in Iraq in 1991. And nowhere in his column does he say — or even imply — that Wilson was unqualified to conduct the Niger investigation or that Plame was responsible for getting him the assignment — merely that she “suggested sending him.”

Even so, it is unclear whether Novak’s sources may have committed a crime by talking to Novak about Plame. That would depend on a number of variables involving what they knew about Plame and how they came to know it. A prosecutor would have the power to compel Novak to testify regarding what was said to him and by whom.

Is this splitting hairs? Not at all. In Washington, plenty of people are acquainted with CIA operatives who are not working undercover. For example, when a CIA analyst wrote a book under the pseudonym “Anonymous,” it was widely known that Anonymous was the Agency’s Michael Scheuer. Before long, someone revealed that in print. No crime was committed or alleged — no classified information had been disclosed, no NOC had been exposed.

So if Novak did not reveal that Valerie Plame was a secret agent, who did? The evidence strongly suggests it was none other than Joe Wilson himself. Let me walk you through the steps that lead to this conclusion.

The first reference to Plame being a secret agent appears in The Nation, in an article by David Corn published July 16, 2003, just two days after Novak’s column appeared. It carried this lead: “Did Bush officials blow the cover of a U.S. intelligence officer working covertly in a field of vital importance to national security — and break the law — in order to strike at a Bush administration critic and intimidate others?”

Since Novak did not report that Plame was “working covertly” how did Corn know that’s what she had been doing?

Corn does not tell his readers and he has responded to a query from me only by pointing out that he was asking a question, not making a “statement of fact.” But in the article, he asserts that Novak “outed” Plame “as an undercover CIA officer.” Again, Novak did not do that. Rather, it is Corn who is, apparently for the first time, “outing” Plame’s “undercover” status.

Corn follows that assertion with a quote from Wilson saying, “I will not answer questions about my wife.” Any reporter worth his salt would immediately wonder: Did Wilson indeed answer Corn’s questions about his wife — after Corn agreed not to quote his answers but to use them only on background? Read the rest of Corn’s piece and it’s difficult to believe anything else. Corn names no other sources for the information he provides — and he provides much more information than Novak revealed.

Corn also claims that Wilson “will not confirm nor deny that his wife …works for the CIA.” Corn adds: “But let’s assume she does. That would seem to mean that the Bush administration has screwed one of its own top-secret operatives in order to punish Wilson …”

On what basis could Corn “assume” that Plame was not only working covertly but was actually a “top-secret” operative? And where did Corn get the idea that Plame had been “outed” in order to punish Wilson? That is not suggested by anything in the Novak column which, as I noted, is sympathetic to Wilson and Plame.

The likely answer: The allegation that someone in the administration leaked to Novak as a way to punish Wilson was made by Wilson — to Corn. But Corn, rather than quote Wilson, puts the idea forward as his own.

Keep in mind that from early on there were two possible but contradictory scenarios:

1) Members of the Bush administration intentionally exposed a covert CIA agent as a way to take revenge against her husband who had written a critical op-ed.

2) Members of the Bush administration were attempting to set the record straight by telling reporters that it was not Vice President Cheney who sent Wilson on the Africa assignment as Wilson claimed; rather Wilson’s wife, a CIA employee, helped get him the assignment. (And that is indeed the conclusion of the bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee.)

Corn’s article then goes on to provide specific details about Plame’s undercover work, her “dicey and difficult mission of tracking parties trying to buy or sell weapons of mass destruction or WMD material.” But how does Corn know about that? From what source could he have learned it?

Corn concludes that Plame’s career “has been destroyed by the Bush administration.” And here he does, finally, quote Wilson directly. Wilson says: “Naming her this way would have compromised every operation, every relationship, every network with which she had been associated in her entire career. This is the stuff of Kim Philby and Aldrich Ames.”

Corn has assured us several times that Wilson refused to answer questions about his wife, refused to confirm or deny that she worked for the CIA, refused to “acknowledge whether she is a deep-cover CIA employee.” But he is willing to say on the record that “naming her this way” was an act of treachery? That’s not talking about his wife? That’s not providing confirmation? There is only one way to interpret this: Wilson did indeed talk about his wife, her work as a secret agent, and other matters to Corn (and perhaps others?) on a confidential basis.

If Wilson did tell Corn that his wife was an undercover agent, did he commit a crime? I don’t claim to know. But the charge that someone committed a crime by naming Plame as a covert agent was also made by Corn, apparently for the first time, in this same article. No doubt, the independent prosecutor and the grand jury will sort it out.

Criminality aside, if Wilson revealed to Corn that Plame worked as a CIA “deep-cover” operative “tracking parties trying to buy or sell” WMDs, surely that’s news.

And it is consequential: On the basis of Novak’s story alone, it is highly unlikely that anyone would have had a clue that Plame — presumably under a different name and while living in a foreign country — had been a NOC. At most, her friends in Washington would have been surprised to learn that she didn’t work where she said she worked.

But once Corn published the fact that Plame had been a “top-secret operative,” and once he quoted Wilson saying what exposing his wife would mean — and once Plame posed for Vanity Fair photographers — anyone who had ever known her in a different context and with a different identity would have been tipped off.

But they would not have been tipped by Novak — nor, based on what we know so far, by Karl Rove. Rather, it appears they would have been tipped off by Joe Wilson who, the publicly available evidence strongly suggests, leaked like a sieve to The Nation’s David Corn.

— Clifford D. May, a former New York Times foreign correspondent, is president of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a policy institute focusing on terrorism.

Quote from Joseph Wilson on CNN “My wife was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity”

End of story

I'm just trying to confuse you with the facts, republicansaremorons. Never forget...it's all a "vast, right-wing conspiracy."

Quote from Joseph Wilson on CNN “My wife was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity”

Okay, follow me here,,, if Bob Novak outed her as a CIA analyst (shes an ANALYST folks, not an AGENT) earlier in the year and someone says later "this guys wife sent him" ostensibly outing her does it really matter that in fact she had "inned" herself after Novak's comment? EVERYONE including her neighbors already knew she was a CIA analyst... Is this REALLY worth arguing?

What the Dims consider worthy of debate has really become quite humorous.

Oh, let them have their fun, Coulterite. They are a Party without substance...what else are they going to do?

They're just trying to DISTRACT us from the fact that they have nothing to offer. It won't work though...we're onto them!

Reilley. You are correct, it will change in 18 mos. We may have a super majority. nick t - do another bong and don't hold this one in so long. Tiredblossumpicker. If you are in your twentys today you will probably die of old age before the coin drops. Drink some more kool aid.

Liberals jumping the gun yet again. Like a pack of sharks, you smell blood and start the feeding frenzy. Too bad. Seems recent developments show that Bob Novak knew about Plame before Rove did. Dont understand why Novak wasnt treated like Rove. He wrote the damn thing, afterall. All the dems see is that the architect of Bush's victory is vulnerable. Good thing Rove didnt buckle. Remember in the mid term elections why you lose even more representation in congress. Its because you jumped on this story before we knew the facts. Thats why the white house isnt commenting. They knew it would blow over. And it will.

It certainly has not been made absolutely clear if any laws were broken. That doesn't mean there were not a lot of instances of extremely poor judgement by everyone involved in this fiasco starting with the creative, questionable choice of words by Novak. He didn't have to use the word operative. If no actual law was broken this whole thing about the 'outing' of an agent is all relative. To the entire world beyond our borders, any affiliation with the three letters 'CIA' means you are a spy. Since it is, in fact, someone out there in the world, a Non-American, who would most likely have a grudge of some kind against the woman, splitting hairs about our laws and who is responsible doesn't really matter. Even if she was not an active spy, this fiasco has outed her to the world as a former spy. You tell me; has it made it a more dangerous world for the woman to live in? Is there possibly someone in the world she has messed over for the sake of spydom who had never put their finger on who they should blame, until now? Law be damned, the woman has been wronged by everyone who was involved in the proliferation of her career story, even the press and Novak. People today seem to have no sense of when to keep their mouth shut because they want to be in their self made limelight. People like Novak should be drummed out of the press core.

Considering the real scandal is Bill Clinton's legalcy of 9/11, it's kind of silly to describe the Plame affair as a scandal. She wasn't a NOC, her neighbors knew she was in the CIA, and it is clear Joe Wilson lied on numerous occasions concerning how he came to be sent to Niger.

http://www.retraoctiveimpeachment.com

I'm curious about something and maybe some of you can help me. You guys spend a lot of time talking bad about the opposing party, who likewise spends a lot of time talking bad about you. You guys talk about one party or the other being "in power". Could any of you clarify something for me? Do you not understand that both parties are in power? Democrats and Republicans control the country. All of the rest of us have little or no influence.

One party talks about how bad the other is, and frankly, I just don't get it. No party that I am aware of is not rife with hypocrisy. In fact, the very word "politics" suggests coruption, power, and greed in the minds of many many people. You're all bad. Your ideals are wrong and certainly the ways you try to achieve them are wrong, Democrats and Republicans alike.

There is a reason most people in this country don't vote. Did you guys know that was true? Check the numbers. On a federal level and often times on a state level, most people don't vote. Do know what that means? It means that no matter who wins an election, most people didn't vote for them. Do you know why that is? It's not because they are lazy, and it's not because they are apathetic. At least, not the majority of them. I understand that most of you will deny that, but how could you not? To admit that there is something fundamentally wrong with our system would put you guys out of influence. Most poeple, more often than not, who don't vote straight up refuse to. The reason? Because they have no faith in any of you, Republicans or Democrats. They do not trust you to have their best intrests in mind. They refuse to choose the lesser of two evils. In fact often times, there isn't a lesser evil. You are all awful.

So next time to you start spouting all of your "this is what's best for the country" catch phrases, keep in mind that you don't represent the country. Any of you. You only represent a small percentage of it, and it's getting smaller all the time.

I mean, why would anybody who has any real knowledge of how nations are born and die join a political party? What is wrong with you people?

I mean, why would anybody who has any real knowledge of how nations are born and die join a political party? What is wrong with you people?

Posted by dan-tet on July 17, 2005 at 06:34 PM
************************

http://www.bergonia.org

dan-tet(et al) - (maybe this is a country that you all could identify with!) It has all of the principles that you all seem to want here in our country. There is even a travel link to it... It's LINKS page is the best part though!

Please give it a look and then share your opinions of it with that new RNC blog that I have heard about and here.

Long live the revolution!

All Labor Unions Must Unite With All Democrat's For A True Socialist Nation To Emerge From The Ashes! Capitalism is for greedy people, and Right-Wing Republican's, only! Laborer's are not greedy people and we are all Democrat's and Left-Wing Socialist/Communist true believers!

Hear ye, Hear ye, read all about it...!

http://www.socialistaction.org/labor.htm

We must not hide behind the weak willed Progressive name anymore. We must show our true SOCIALIST / COMMUNIST colors on all fronts to change the hearts and minds of all of our current Capitalist Republican Right-Wing oppressors everywhere!

Long live the working peoples "true" revolution!

http://www.anu.edu.au/polsci/marx/classics/manifesto.html

This web site will "truely" explain everything that you need to know about our true cause. This is our true guide for Social Justice to all. We are not the Progressive Parties...we are the True Party. We must unite in TRUTH to beat back the evils of Capitalism and declare loudly our true colors throughout the entire world.

Long live the working peoples "true" revolution!

I think there is more than enough info available on Karl Rove, his history and motivations, to link him and his cronies among the neo-cons to more mechanations than Machievelli ever dreamed of. The real effort needed in my estimation is to exposed as much info as possible to support these accusations and analysis and then to hammer it home as publicly as possible.

If our good pal Karl can manuever the "swamp boat veterans" to damage the credibility of Sen. Kerry, then I think we as Demos OUGHT to be submerging Mr. Rove under the sheer weight of the evidence and history of his life's work and the nature of his ethical choices. Such things should not only be the grist of Blogs, but on the small screen and posing the questions needed to make the Repubicans realize that the "loyal opposition" is competent at presenting the evidence not in a shrill voice but one measured by fact and an unrelenting repetition of the truth.

Civility does not, to my mind, mean acquiesence, but rather dealing fairly and honestly but not stridently with the truth, and having the commitment to keep it before the electorate until they understand what it means, not just as politics, but what it means in their own lives. Too much today is accepted because it is quick and easily consumed, not necessarily because the truth of it matters.

http://www.philosophypages.com/ph/macv.htm

Go here and read all about Machiavelli and his thoughts on good and bad politics and strong and weak militias in the 1400's. Make your own judgements about it applies to the current state of politics and military posturing throughout the world. Is it truely a guide that all current world leaders are following to the letter? Is it only a small part of the grand equation that we are all searching for? Is it only a grand illusion? You decide!

I will reread Machiavelli, and see if he has strayed far in my memory from where he was before. In the meantime, don't believe everything you think is true either. A healthy skepticism is worth more in the long run than the euphoria of being top hog at Animal Farm.

I agree with the sentiments of posters who refer to White House operatives and others of that ilk as trolls, but I believe the term you're really looking for is troglodyte.

My dictionary defines troglodyte 1: a member of a primitive people dwelling in caves 2: a person resembling a troglodyte (as in reclusive habits or outmoded reactionary political attitudes).