Hit in the gut? The GOP-owned press responds to Valerie. Can you smell it?

[stevedeshazer]

Buzzwords and spin highlighted by OP.

Plame remarks sparks Capitol Hill stir

By JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS Associated Press Writer
© 2007 The Associated Press

WASHINGTON — Valerie Plame put a glamorous face and a personal story to Democrats' criticism of the Bush administration Friday, telling a House committee that White House and State Department officials "carelessly and recklessly" blew her CIA cover in a politically motivated smear of her husband.

Plame, the operative at the center of the leak scandal that resulted in last week's criminal conviction of a former top White House official, created more of a stir by her presence on Capitol Hill than by her testimony.

She revealed little new information about the case, which sparked a federal investigation and brought perjury and obstruction of justice convictions of Vice President Dick Cheney's former top aide, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby. No one has been charged with leaking her identity.

Still, Plame's appearance before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee was a moment of political theater that dramatized Democrats' drive to use their control of Congress to expose what they see as White House efforts to intimidate dissenters.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/politics/4637958.html

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So that's all they've got? Okay. We knew that.

I smell blood.

[ender]

1. yellow journalism

WShat a corrupt shill of a reporter.

[Demeter]

2. Political Theater? More Like a Call in Poker

and Valerie and the Democrats are holding a royal flush.

[bluerum]

3. Hey. She is blond and good looking. This should play for weeks.

On a positive note, this is positive exposure for her. Rove is cowering deeper in a hole somewhere. And the stump has had that deer in the headlights look for two weeks solid now.

[stevedeshazer]

6. If she had disappeared in Aruba?

24-7 coverage.

[woodsprite]

7. I bet today the Pubs wish she fit into that category. n/t

[Matariki]

4. gotta love the press's "use" of "quotes"

I mean what possible grammatical purpose do quotes around the words "carelessly and recklessly" serve in this sentence: 'White House and State Department officials "carelessly and recklessly" blew her CIA cover in a politically motivated smear of her husband.'?

[shrdlu]

5. Fools...

She explained how it came about that she was asked to sound out Joe Wilson on whether he would undertake the mission to Niger. And that she was not to keen on the idea at first...

[dogday]

8. AP Hit piece for sure

Still, Plame's appearance before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee was a moment of political theater that dramatized Democrats' drive to use their control of Congress to expose what they see as White House efforts to intimidate dissenters.

:wtf:

[AX10]

9. You see why the right wing wants to censor the Internet?

It's the only way they can stop the truth from getting out. No Internet = MSM hit jobs against Democrats.

[11 Bravo]

10. Sniff ... sniff ... smells like desperation.

[stevedeshazer]

11. Yes, desperate, but they obviously still have big media on a short leash

That's a problem.

[Sydnie]

12. I think Tucker and his guests today had the corner on that market

What a pukefest his show is today (yes, even more than usual).

[librechik]

13. hm--I smell republican talking points. That's the 3rd time I heard "reveal little"

they should cover their trails better.

[leveymg]

14. No real coverage here, but AP hit all the RW talking points.

Here's more:


Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia, the committee's senior Republican, called the session a partisan hearing that would do little to illuminate how Plame's identity came to be exposed or how such disclosures could be prevented.

"It's a terrible thing that any CIA operative would be outed," Davis said. But "there's no evidence here that the people that were outing this and pursuing this had knowledge of the covert status."

Plame repeatedly described herself as a covert operative, a term that has multiple meanings. Plame said she worked undercover and traveled abroad on secret missions for the CIA.

But the word "covert" also has a legal definition requiring recent foreign service by the person and active efforts to keep his or her identity secret. Critics of special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation said Plame did not meet that definition for several reasons and that was why nobody was charged with the leak.

"No process can be adopted to protect classified information that no one knows is classified. This looks to me more like a CIA problem than a White House problem," Davis said.

Plame said she wasn't a lawyer and didn't know her legal status, but said it shouldn't have mattered to the officials who learned her identity.

"They all knew that I worked with the CIA," Plame said. "They might not have known what my status was but that alone — the fact that I worked for the CIA — should have put up a red flag."

Plame said she did not select her husband for a CIA fact-finding trip to Niger. Wilson later wrote in a newspaper column that his trip debunked the administration's prewar intelligence that Iraq was seeking to buy uranium from Africa.

"I did not recommend him. I did not suggest him. There was no nepotism involved. I did not have the authority," she said.

That conflicts with senior officials at the CIA and State Department, who testified during Libby's trial and told Congress that Plame recommended Wilson for the trip.

[Sparkly]

15. "little new information"

She explained how the idea of Wilson going to Niger occurred, and exactly how she came to write the infamous "recommendation" email.

She explained the memo, correcting the spin against her and asking for a chance to speak -- a memo never acted upon.

She explained that she was covert, that she had been overseas, and confirmed the dangers posed by the leak.

She confirmed that the CIA did indeed urge Novak not to publish his article naming her as CIA, and that the government did organize to out her because of her husband's position on their phony claims.

The AP has PLENTY to write about here!!!

[Disturbed]

16. Waxman neds to put Tenet under oath.

Brewster Jennings was a Covert Operation that was exposed by Rove, Libby and Cheney. Is that not Treason?

[stevedeshazer]

18. No kiddin'

Nothing new here.

:crazy:

[peacetalksforall]

17. They HAVE TO SAY REVEAL LITTLE because A LOT WAS REVEALED

TODay - by the representative from the OFFICE OF SECURITY - they revealed that Bush did not ask for, order, or demand the investigations he promised.

It's ingeniuous that they got the press to say Plame Wilson 'revealed little; because they HAVE TO KEEP THE PRESS away from talking about the ABSENCE OF AN INVESTIGATION INTO THE LEAK which was an enormous revelation.

It was a surprise to the Congresspeople - at least the Dems.