"Chief, I think Karl Rove is in charge of Kaos."
Posted on 01/31/2007 10:03:14 PM PST by freespirited
ping
Yep. How many millions are being wasted on this politically driven circus sideshow?
I have to read these articles OVER and OVER to try to figure out WHAT is going on.
Now Matt Cooper "can't remember" either?
None of THEM can remember, but Libby's going to be convicted for something HE may have not rememebered?
The Headline Ends With a Question Mark
Wednesday was a good day for the Libby defense. Judy Miller, as the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and the AP’s Matt Apuzzo noted was not an all star witness for the prosecution. I don’t like ploughing a field that’s already been tilled and refer you again to my media bloggers association colleague, Rory O’Connor who has some good thumbnails on the last portion of her testimony (1, 2).
The most amusing witness of the trial was up today, the charming Matt Cooper who with his sloppy notes, shoddy journalism and wry humor brought the old play “Front Page” to life before our eyes. He is the sort of person it would be fun to have dinner with, not the sort of person whose news story should be taken as a bit of serious journalism
Cooper is one of the prosecution’s chief witnesses and surely by now even those who believed in the “Elliott Ness with a law degree” fluff about the prosecutor must be thinking more along the lines of “Get Smart”. In a brutally devastating but gentlemanly low key way the defense destroyed a key prosecution witness. The defense showed through an examination of the internal Time emails and documents that the story that brought Matt Cooper into this, “A War on Wilson?” was something concocted out of thin air.
Cooper’s notes showed he claimed as "confirmation" a minute’s long “off the record conversation”( something never to be considered confirmatory) in response to a question about Wilson’s wife playing a role in this Mission . Libby seems in fact—from Cooper’s own notes (haphazard and mistyped as they are) --to have said very much what he said he did: That he heard that too but didn’t even know if that was true.
The key story “A War on Wilson?” coauthored by Matt begins:
“Has the Bush Administration declared war on a former ambassador who conducted a fact-finding mission to probe possible Iraqi interest in African uranium? Perhaps.”
This war as it turns out existed only in in Matt’s mind. Unless you consider efforts to respond to inquiries about Wilson's claims with the truth to be war or to be as Cooper does “dissing” or “disparaging” Wilson. It seems Libby engaged in perfectly appropriate conduct such as noting all the elements of Wilson's claim were false (Something the bi-partisan Senate Select Intelligence Committee confirmed):Wilson was not sent at the “behest of the vice president; he did not refute, but rather supported, the existing intelligence that Iraq was seeking uranium in Niger; his report never made it to the vice president.
But beyond that, we saw how to meet a pressing deadline while on a summer weekend's jaunt at a country club, Matt took a noncommittal off the record response from Libby, pretended Rove’s statement about Plame had been confirmed by Libby and that he had a third confirmation from his colleague Dickerson who still claims that despite what Fleischer testified to the other day, Fleischer did not tell him about Plame but merely said that if he wanted to know who sent Wilson to Africa he should ask the CIA.
Even better, the quote in the article’s account of Libby’s response to Cooper is not in his notes, wasn’t even in his first draft of the story. It was a revision suggested by someone higher up the food chain at the magazine. It clearly fit better into an account which without factual basis claimed there was a “War on Wilson”.
Cooper, in defense of this shoddy journalism (the phrase “watching sausage being made” was muttered in the media room and not by the bloggers) reminded us that “The headline ends in a question mark."
Clarice Feldman.
http://justoneminute.typepad.com/main/2007/01/the_headline_en.html
Fitzy is about as credible and capable as Nifong.
This really is just nuts, isn't it?
Cooper is the one who told a heart wrenching tale about how he was tearfulling saying goodbye to his kids as he prepared to be jailed when, lo and behold, his source called at the last minute and released him from his vow of silence. Of course, it didn't really happen that way. The source had made a public release already. Cooper wanted a personal release or he claimed he wouldn't talk. When jail time loomed and he didn't get his personal release, he had his lawyers contact the source's attorneys. He talked, but he never got a personal release from the source- who I believe was either Karl Rove or Scooter.
Please, please tell me it ain't so... Has the AP's crack reporter Michael J. Sniffen (or one of AP's crack editors) actually confused Time Magazine with the New York Times in that statement? But... but... but... professional Journalists don't make rookie mistakes like that, do they???
Of course, with the disclaimer of Associated Press writer Matt Apuzzo contributed to this report. at the bottom, Sniffen can always blame it on Apuzzo...
As I said earlier: one man's perjury is another's poor memory.
I can't remember where, but there's talk of a "mystery" witness. Anyone heard anything?
"Missed it by...that much."
ROFLMAO!
"Chief, I think Karl Rove is in charge of Kaos."
True, but those of us who love the show, can hear it said, inside our heads. :-)
Libby Trial Exhibits
http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/iln/osc/index.html
The Jan. 30 - Cheney and Cheney/Libby notes. I'm not convinced Cheney's communicates the same spirit as the def. atty. is employing.
Anyone else see it that way? Wish I could make out Libby's writing for the June 12, 2003 note.
First Judith Miller, now Matt Cooper. Damn. The only crime committed is this circus is allowed to continue.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.