No one (other than mad dog liberals) who really followed the situation thought Hatfill was guilty, so that's not a surprise. The surprise is how well Hatfill has come across, and how bad the FBI looks.
So now we have three possibilities:
1. Was he a willing and very convincing participant in a diversion?
2. Was the FBI simply looking for a temporary scapegoat, and willing to trample on this guy to get it?
3. Or was the FBI simply stupid, arrogant, and out of control?
Personally, I sure hope its #1.
1. Was he a willing and very convincing participant in a diversion?
2. Was the FBI simply looking for a temporary scapegoat, and willing to trample on this guy to get it?
3. Or was the FBI simply stupid, arrogant, and out of control?
I think the most plausible model is that Amerithrax was always conceived of as a vehicle for a PR stall while Bush figured out a response to the blackmail, but the FBI agents assigned to it aren't in the loop. They were probably told by Mueller, "Just between you and me, boys, we think this one's from one of our own people," and then set loose. Given the small size of the operation and the poor quality of the agents put on it, this was a nice safe way to put up a public front of an investigation that would never stray into any dangerous territory. Lots of people have reacted to the investigation with bafflement, but nobody's been smart enough to figure out that it is the way it is for a reason.
While I'm feeling a lot more comfortable that I understand how the Amerithrax part of this charade works, I still don't have a handle on how much Hatfill knows. I think that the goofballs at Amerithrax have been suckered by Nuthatch et al, and they really are under delusions that Hatfill is their man and, in consequence, they really have been Jewell-ing him, in their characteristically half-assed way.
But does Hatfill understand the bigger picture, and is his public indignation genuine? Of that, I'm not sure. It certainly looks like the crisis in the "lone nut" theory has been engineered to coincide nicely with the Iraq buzz, and I doubt that is a coincidence. But does that mean Hatfill is in on it? Not necessarily. I am confident that Bush would intervene if things started straying from his own timetable. Everything is being orchestrated -- it's too important not to be -- but that doesn't mean everything is being micromanaged, or that all the parties are in cahoots. Steering inputs are coming from the top as needed to bring this thing home. And home is probably not too far away now.