WASH POST: It's unfortunate so many people took Joe Wilson seriously...(Drudge headline)

Washington Post ^ | Sept. 1, 2006

[johnny7]

“WE'RE RELUCTANT to return to the subject of former CIA employee Valerie Plame because of our oft-stated belief that far too much attention and debate in Washington has been devoted to her story and that of her husband, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, over the past three years.”

Hunh...? Paging Walter Pincus... Mr. Walter Pincus... is Mr. Pincus in the room?

[gaspar]

Will Senator McCain now drop Armitage (and Powell who knew and also kept quiet) from his foreign policy team? Will some enterprising journalist (oxymoron) please ask.

[Eagles Talon IV]

BINGO!!!!

[DustyMoment]

Unaware that Ms. Plame's identity was classified information, Mr. Armitage reportedly passed it along to columnist Robert D. Novak "in an offhand manner, virtually as gossip," according to a story this week by the Post's R. Jeffrey

I almost bought it.

[Pharmboy]

April, 2006 Editorial from WAPO on leak...

[beaversmom]

Frickin' jerks. You know, even if some person in the Bush administration did "reveal" her name, I never understood the big scandal anyway. Wasn't she just a glorified secretary?

[johnny7]

Nice job George... it works well... kind'a film-noir

[beaversmom]

That's really good.

[jrooney]

WAPO - How aboout having the guts to publicly apologize to Bush, Cheny, Rove and Libby for your part in tarnishing their reputations for three years? A high school student could see Joe Wilson was lying all along and things did not add up, but you guys played this game too. Screw you. Nice apology! You are only writing this editorial TO DISTANCE YOURSELF FROM THE HOUSE OF FALLING CARDS.I for one will not forget or forgive you. I will never buy your newspaper, take its contents seriously or trust you. You have an agenda and from where I sit, it is not good.

[Darkwolf377]

Portrait of a man caught in a sticky web of lies he spun himself. Submitted for your approval, the story of Joe Wilson, a doughy nobody who wants to be SOMEbody, ANYbody. Unable to get back in the game, he uses a blond spy so far undercover her husband's been talking about her spying activities for nearly a decade. In the shadowy world of international intrigue, he has an in most chubby losers don't--his wife. And he will use her to open a doorway for him, a doorway to secrets and lies, a doorway to being The Big Man his ego tells him he is. A doorway to a place we call...THE BULLSHIT ZONE.

music: DA-DAH-DAAAAAAAAAHHHH!

[no dems]

It's unfortunate he's not in prison being horsewhipped on a daily basis.

That would be cruel and unusual punishment. I say we treat him humanely. Put him in a cell with Big Bubba who hasn't been with a woman in 10 years and let the good times roll mama.

[Sooth2222]

"Mr. Libby and his boss, Mr. Cheney, were trying to discredit Mr. Wilson" = "WHAT jerk at CIA sent THAT idiot..."

"Discredit"= "explain" in newspeak.

The Post's second stage of the recovery process would be learning how to write in English. But they seem to have made the first step towards recovery. ("I am the Washingron Post and I am a Bushaholic".)

I am amazed.

[jazusamo]

Now where are the front page stories asking why Powell and Armitage didn't come forward and stop this fiasco when it started, it seems both of them knew the truth.

[Dinah Lord]

I have been steadily cooling on McCain and this involvement with Powell and Armitage has been the nail in the coffin for him as far as I'm concerned.

And I said as much in response to an email solicitation I rec'd last night from the StraightTalk Express.

It would sure be nice to get some Straight Talk out of Colin Powell and Richard Armitage as to why they kept silent for so long.

Regarding their departure from the administration:

Did they walk the plank or were they pushed?

[Boston Tea Party]

Priceless! THAT is the picture that should be front and center on Drudge.

[Tennessean4Bush]

I just looked out my window and could have sworn I saw a bovine looking creature flapping wings about 30 yards in the air. Hmmm.

[beaversmom]

How much stuff has gone on just recently or fairly recently? From Dan Rather to doctoring photos to sucking up to the stinkin' Iranian jerk to a million other tricks they play on a daily basis. They are all beyond pathetic.

[Bahbah]

Could Armitage have sold his soul for a potential Cabinet position?

There was quite a bit of that going on.

[shrinkermd]

Freepers shouldn't worry. Gramsci is alive and well at the Minneapolis Star and Tribune. Here is their take on the same subject. They only think like those on the "back ward," they aren't really instutionalized--yet.

Editorial: Armitage's error doesn't excuse others He made a mistake, but Cheney, Rove, Libby have no excuse.

To hear Bush administration defenders tell it, news that Richard Armitage was the original source of the leak of Valerie Plame's CIA work means the entire Plamegate tempest was a whole lot of nothing. That spin should be a tough sell, if folks pay attention to the facts. Armitage is a former Navy officer who served with distinction in various high-ranking defense and diplomatic posts under Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush. In chitchat at the end of a conversation with newspaper columnist Robert Novak in 2003, while deputy secretary of state, Armitage let slip that Valerie Plame, wife of Iraq war critic Joseph Wilson, worked at the CIA. Armitage apparently did not know Plame's CIA work was undercover and classified.

So there you go, administration supporters say: There was no conspiracy to "out" Plame as part of a plan to "get" Wilson. So far as Armitage goes, that makes sense. He appears to have made a foolish, forgivable mistake, though why he remained silent about it is mystifying.

But Armitage's error does not lift the thick layer of Plame-related gunk from the reputations of White House adviser Karl Rove, Vice President Dick Cheney and his ex-chief of staff, Lewis Libby. While Armitage had no anti-Wilson ax to grind, they did. In fact, Armitage learned about Plame's CIA association from a memo written in response to a request from Cheney's office for information about Wilson. The White House's "get Wilson" effort was already underway. Armitage's slip offered them an opportunity of which they made maximum use.

Novak needed confirmation of Armitage's information. He got it from Rove. Between them, Rove and Libby peddled the story to various Washington reporters, insinuating that Wilson's CIA-sponsored trip to Niger to investigate possible Iraq purchases of uranium was a junket arranged by his wife -- and that Wilson was a has-been showboat who just wanted a free trip to Africa, where he had worked as a U.S. diplomat.

Wilson may be a showboat, but he is also an experienced African hand who was sent on a legitimate mission by the CIA (not by his wife), and convincingly disproved the Niger-Iraq uranium stories central to the Bush case for war -- stories Bush used long after he had reason to know they were false. For that, the White House tried to smear him, and it used liberally the opening provided inadvertently by Armitage. Libby apparently lied about the effort and got caught. The others may not have broken federal law, but they certainly showed, if anyone needed further proof, how low they will stoop to smear a critic rather than argue an issue on its merits.

[Wristpin]

They are trying to run from the real story here. The media being a de facto arm of the DNC and spreading false anti Bush myths.

Lies...all Lies!!!!!!