Is anyone watching Hardball?! The WH defense is going to be

[Coexist]

that REPORTERS TOLD THEM.

WTF?! Is that not the most embarrassing defense.

"Oh, gee, Mr. Fitzgerald, them there reporters told me about the NOC agent's name. I wouldn't have access to such privileged information".

ARGH!!!

[autorank]

1. Fitzgerals is a professional prosecutor,not a hack.

I doubt that he wants to be the laughing stock of American jurisprudence(after the five SCOTUS members who voted with Bush in 2000).

Just a thought.

[Coexist]

3. Oh, I know...

I just can't believe that they are actually going to ask people to believe that classified information was "given" to them by the press, that they didn't get it on Air Force One from people who had requested it.

[emulatorloo]

7. Plausible I guess if Judy Miller is working for the CIA

Is she?

[Coexist]

8. Nope - her employer is the New York Times.

for now.

[emulatorloo]

9. LOL - n/t

[FreedomAngel82]

21. It's all for the public

They care about their images and having their base and not having people snope around. I thought they already tried this though?

[stopbush]

2. And WHO in the government leaked the info to the reporters?

Surely their defense is not going to be that reporters had security clearance to classified information...or is it?

[AlCzervik]

4. Thats right---someone with a very high security clearance showed

or told them what was in that classified memo when they weere on airforce one.

[DLnyc]

10. Well, actually, I think they called six reporters from AF1

Presumably, they called all six reporters to talk about welfare reform, but, whadya know!, all six REPORTERS ended up ASKING the AF1 callers "did you know Valerie Plame is a NOC agent for WMDs?" What an AMAZING COINCIDENCE!!

[AlCzervik]

I think the reporters were actually on board that day with Powell and Rove

and whoever else from the admin.

[DLnyc]

14. I get the picture they were called, from this Sept. 2003 WP article

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A11208-2003Sep27?language=printer

(snip)

Yesterday, a senior administration official said that before Novak's column ran, two top White House officials called at least six Washington journalists and disclosed the identity and occupation of Wilson's wife. Wilson had just revealed that the CIA had sent him to Niger last year to look into the uranium claim and that he had found no evidence to back up the charge. Wilson's account touched off a political fracas over Bush's use of intelligence as he made the case for attacking Iraq.




"Clearly, it was meant purely and simply for revenge," the senior official said of the alleged leak.

(snip)

(Also, one of the first things Fitz did was subpeona AF1 phone records)

[autorank]

19. Wow, great archive piece--the start of it all.

"Clearly it was meant purely for revenge," the senior official(Powell) said of the alleged leak.

I think Powell had realized his reputation was forever tarnished and his standing in the international community was dead in the water forever as a result of touting this idiotic war. It then became time for revenge on his part. Remember how he was greeted at the UN when he did his presentation, like a hero returning. He was very well regarded, he was a symbol of sanity in an insane clown posse. Then he began the distortions and outright lies. He thought, well, whatever, we'll win the war and that will be that. Sorry, just like Panama when you forgot to have a police function following the trashing and Panama City was trashed. So he gets mad then starts getting even. He may roll out of this yet with something of a career but he'll always be known as the big liar for the really big liar.

[DLnyc]

20. Yeah, I agree. Only partially makes up for what he did.

But, for partial amends, it looks like a class act.

[FreedomAngel82]

22. Yep

But don't forget Mai Lai as well. He was involved with that. I used to think Powell had crediability too until I learned the truth about everything with Iraq and Mai Lai. He knew damn well what he was doing. I don't buy any of his guilty act or whatever. It's all for his image just like the rest of them. He's nothing but a hack whore too.

[autorank]

23. Agreed. He's a reasonable "hack whore" - which means he wouldn't

cage and beat us immediately, only if they told him it had to be so;).

What was that Great Al Pacino line from Dog Day Afternoon...better not mention it. Now he is one guy I wouldn't mind having a beer with, not two beers but one would be OK. The rest of them are off limits.

[Coexist]

5. that is goofy, isn't it!!

maybe they are going to say that the Wilson's made it so public, that even Chris Mattews knew it.

[Roland99]

6. Yeah, reporters knew about Valerie Plame before Wilson wrote his article.

:eyes:

[NashVegas]

11. Personally, I Wonder if Miller is CIA

And one of the cowboys - or cowgirls - at that.

It was all over the place that CNN and other media outlets were stuffed with spooks. So why not the Times? It would explain a lot.

[bee]

12. theyve been saying that for a while now...

hasnt that already been proven to be wrong?

[alcibiades_mystery]

17. Proven? It's ridiculous on its face

It relies on the assumption that Ms. Plame's identity was common knowledge in the press pool, a laughable assertion given the evidence. Nobody takes this line of argument seriously, primarily because it is utter, impossible, bullshit.

[MidnightWind]

13. Doesn't surprise me.

Attach the press and blame it all on them for you know, reporting the TRUTH has been their SOP for sometime now. Hell, they even came up with their own cable network so they could spin the news they wanted to spin it and it's popularity (I'm convinced that the GOP owns Nielsen too by the way) made both MSNBC and CNN take a hard-core turn to the right to try and become Faux-lite. Anyway, the GOP has made it its mission over the last 30 years to destroy the media and blame them for everything. And it's worked. And we are all the poorer for it.

[toska]

15. Still a crime

Doesn't make a difference if the journalists already knew. Confirming that she was an agent was still a violation of the espionage act. They will have to come up with something better than that.

[peacetalksforall]

16. That's what Toensig and her hubby said months ago. Accooooording

to their gospel...

- the WH is sparkling clean.... saintly, holy, gilded and their not so pretty right wing faces will be there on the screen to testify to Dick and George's purity.

So WHO did tell the reporters?

Did they become incensed at Wilson on their own? Did they decide to take out Brewster-Jennings on their own?

Oh, that's right, we know ... it was Tenet and Clinton!

None of it erases Cheney's motives which many people have enlightened us on - wmd nuclear equipment trafficking Khan Pakistan, etc.

Muck it up Dick and George. Go for it. Victoria and Joe and Sean and Jack Welsh's replacement and Murdoch will all be there for you.

It all brings up the question - what is the law in this country - the media with their right wing lawyer propagandists or the laws on the books upheld by some good citizen lawyers?

[Straight Shooter]

18. Well, what kind of message does this send to journalists, then?

bush, et al., have had a very pleasant massaging from the press up until now. If they start pointing fingers at journalists, and the journalists end up falling on their swords, up to the point of going to prison for a very long time, what can of worms do you think that would open up?

All the journalists know exactly what kind of dirty dealings have been going on from the Monkey Palace. If this so-called liberal media, which is very bush-friendly, turns on its master, then bush has lost the best protection he ever had. Dana Milbank wrote the "twitchy blinky shifty" story on him, and that is just the beginning. Could that have been a "shot across the bow," a way of saying, "don't mess with the press"?