All About Iraq (WSJ Editorial Calling on Fitzgeral to Close Shop)

WSJ ^

[magua]

President Bush has to realize that he is in a battle with the clintons period.Being mr. nice guy hasn't worked.Its time to start releasing any info his team maybe holding back. This is a blood sport, bury them.

[lugsoul]

"It has been established she was never a covert operative and her ties to Langley have been an open secret in Washington."

Strange. It used to be that in order for something to be "established" required actual evidence of the fact, as opposed to some talking head blather on TV.

[livius]

President Bush has to realize that he is in a battle with the clintons period.

This is very true. Billy is still in denial over his failures, and much of the attempt to smear Bush for having taken action to deal with the accumulated bungling proceeds directly from Clinton central.

[Watery Tart]

= ???

Oh, I hope this prosecutor isn't so special that all he can do is indict a ham sandwich?

---

If so, then I see it this way:

+ =

+

[an amused spectator]

Let's stipulate that the law is the law, and if Bush administration officials lied to a grand jury in the clear and obvious way that Bill Clinton did, they should be prosecuted.

The way Bill Clinton was prosecuted...

I think we should start indicting Hillary! early and often.

[The Spirit Of Allegiance]

"if Bush administration officials lied to a grand jury in the clear and obvious way that Bill Clinton did, they should be prosecuted. If Mr. Fitzgerald has evidence of a malicious attempt to expose a CIA undercover agent, as defined by the relevant statute, the same applies. But the fact that the prosecutor has waited as long as he has -- until the last days of his grand jury -- suggests that he considers this a less than obvious case."


BUMP and ping to WSJ story link in post 5

[Cindy_Cin]

Don't hold your breath. Bush has broken my heart for the last time.
All I can do now is look to 2006 and hope Bush doesn't roll over and play dead until we are. Dead that is.

[nopardons]

Thanks for the ping.

[bitt]

holding my breath bump

[FairOpinion]

It's definitely a "less than an obvious case".

Case against aides doesn't have leg to stand on. (Valerie Plame case) (MUST READ: NO CRIME)

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1509324/posts

"Consider the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. To violate it, you must disclose the name of a covert agent who has served abroad within the last five years, while knowing that that person was a covert agent. It does not appear that Plame was a covert agent who had served abroad within five years of the disclosure of her name to reporters. She was a desk officer at CIA headquarters at Langley at that time. This law was narrowly drafted and intended only to apply to people who purposefully endangered covert agents abroad. That is clearly not the case here. "

[hoyaloya]

Bush needs to pardon anyone who is indicted . . . before the sun goes down the day of the indictment.

[Steve_Seattle]

"Strange. It used to be that in order for something to be "established" required actual evidence of the fact, as opposed to some talking head blather on TV."

Talking heads and editorialists have also repeatedly asserted - without a shred of proof - that Plame was "outed" to "punish" or "muzzle" Wilson. They have also repeated - with no proof - that Bush "lied" about WMD's. I wish you would save some of your ire for those people. (An example of which is Howard Kurtz, whose latest column appears in another post.)

[Steve_Seattle]

Victoria Toensing, who helped write the statute, has been saying for months that the law does not apply to this case, and was not intended to apply to this kind of situation.

[popdonnelly]

"Only Democrats can get away with rampant corruption."

Your completely correct with that observation. They also get away with blatant lying.

[lugsoul]

Neither of those things bear on whether anyone has criminal culpability in this matter, or are served as a substitute for evidence of criminal culpability (except, perhaps, that the use of the word "outed" implies proof that she was, in fact, covert.)

The side show stories aren't of that much interest to me. On either side. So I don't really care if Joe likes mint tea, or if libs think this is all a substitute for debating the reasons to going to war. The issue at hand is whether or not the law was broken.

[lugsoul]

Victoria may have helped write the statute, but that doesn't give her any special insight into what Valerie Peel's status at the CIA was in 2003, or from 1998-2003. If she has some proof that her status wasn't covert for purposes of the statute at any time after July 1998, let her bring it. She hasn't done it yet.

Her exact status in July 2003 isn't even the issue. A simple read of the statute, even by those who didn't help write it, shows that having covert status as defined by the statute at any time after July 1998 raises the possibility of a violation of the statute.

To believe, based on what talking heads say, that it is 'clear-cut' that she wasn't covert is to believe that the CIA made a criminal referral for the disclosure of someone who wasn't covert, the DOJ opened an investigation of that disclosure, referred it out to a special prosecutor, who presented evidence to an appellate panel that found indications of a serious crime, but that no one throughout this process ever said - "Wait, she was a desk jockey without any covert status and everyone knew who she was, so why go any further?"

That's what a lot of folks seem to believe. But I think it defies logic.

[FlipWilson]

I find it troubling that the dems can't accept defeat and move along. The entire 2004 election was about the War in Iraq and the rationale for going to war. It was THE issue fo the election. The dems made the election a referendum on that issue and they lost. Unable to accept that loss they hammer away again and again and again at it as if to say to the American People "Didn't we explain it well enough to you stupid idiots!!!"

I have a feeling that this latest dem tactic, to criminalize their opposition, is going to alarm the voters more than it will win the dems any points. In the meantime, I only see the dems heading right back to their post-Vietnam antiwar platform that was a disaster for them. But hey, what do I know when compared to the all knowing elites in the MSM.

[lugsoul]

Troubling? Sure. But it has no bearing on whether anyone under investigation broke the law. And it does not serve as a substitute for actual evidence of wrongdoing. Nor does it serve as a legal excuse for wrongdoing.

[FlipWilson]

Hold on, I am referring to the attempt by the dems to turn this investigation about a leak into yet another "Bush lied about WMD's and people died" debate. That debate was front and center before the American people during the 2004 election and they decided upon it. The dems are trying to use this investigation to establish that Bush lied (as if Clinton and the gang never said boo about Saddam having WMD's) to fool the U.S. into War in Iraq.

So yes, it is troubling and it does have some bearing on this if Fitzgerald (under pressure or a secret deal with the dems) has gone down this road using some peripheral statute or charge (not related to the original investigation) as a rationale for doing so. Oh, then next of course will come calls for impeachment.

Maybe I need to take off the tin foil hat, but I could see a dem operative influencing Fitzgerald to expand the investigation to include finding grounds for impeachment. I can also see dem operatives influencing members of the SEC, local prosecutors, etc.

Afterall, there is a fairly large bureaucracy in D.C. that thinks it runs the show. These are lifetime government employees that have the attitude that they are forever, elected officials only temporary. Looking at recent history, the dems have certainly taking advantage of those bureaucrats, i.e. the State Deparment and CIA, in the past and used them as operatives to stand DIRECTLY in the way of administration policy. Now, they are taking it to new levels.

I just hope the administration is prepared to fight back and hit hard because if what I said is true, it is just short of, if not all the way to being, a coup d'etat. I say, its time to investigate the investigators. Shine some light on these guys and find out if they have been influenced by the dems. If so, then drop the hammer on the dems because they most certainly are dropping the hammer on the Republicans.

[Steve_Seattle]

"To believe, based on what talking heads say, that it is 'clear-cut' that she wasn't covert is to believe that the CIA made a criminal referral for the disclosure of someone who wasn't covert, the DOJ opened an investigation of that disclosure, referred it out to a special prosecutor, who presented evidence to an appellate panel that found indications of a serious crime . . . "

It's been reported that the CIA makes referrals regarding leaks of classified information to the DOJ on a regular basis, so the existence of a referral does not necessarily imply any great crime. It has also been reported that someone in the CIA then leaked news of this referral to the media, which then - along with the Dems - clamored for a special prosecutor. It just annoys me that you seem willfully blind to the blatant politics behind all this. Why, of all the leaks of classified info reported to the DOJ, did this one - alone of all of them - become such a big deal? Because of politics.

And if the three-judge panel thought this was such a HUGE threat to national security - and if all this really was was the inadvertent leak of an agent's identity as the administration tried to counter false news stories - then I think the judges are sorely lacking in judgment and perspective. In my opinion, there are a lot of judges - even entire courts full of judges - who are full of crap. Someone's putting on a black robe doesn't guaranty my respect.