Posted on 09/30/2003 6:02:01 PM PDT by Lance Romance
My Email to Aaron Brown:
Another poor job of reporting last night regarding the supposed leaking of a CIA "operative" and Joe Wilson's wife. First, you barely covered the fact that Joe's wife is really an "analyst" and not undercover, Robert Novak's admission that the Admin. official didn't call him, Joe's wife's name is on his bio website and the fact that Wilson blamed Karl Rove and then had to retract it. In fact, you seemed more than delighted to perpetuate the scandal than actually cover the facts. Once again, Fox news kicks your ass.
Aaron's Response
Gee, I had no idea. I thought we reported all this stuff( except for the bio which makes no sense at all since the question isn't her name but her job) I guess what this really must be is that the Director of the CIA who asked for the investigation is out to get the President.
I have no idea what Fox did or didn't do. I don't even care. I know what we did and we did just fine. Nice to hear from you.
A
Didn't diagram a whole lot of sentences in elementary school, did you?
When the sarcastic is the plausible, you gotta double check.
EAGLES UP!
"Hast thou not known? Hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the LORD, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? There is no searching of his understanding. He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."
» Isaiah 40:28-31
cnn is a natural for this anti-American pile of sh*t.
As far as the troll thing, we will see. I am, for now, willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. Understand our skepticism, as there are tons of people who are DU'ers that are here to do nothing else but disrupt.
(Note: See his comments just this morning on Meet the Press, where he commented that this was well orchestrated. He even went through a seemingly logical sequence so he could imply Rove again, even after he spouted off out in Seattle and retracted his statements: "It was a political act. There is a political office in the White House. And, Karl Rove is the head of the policitical office"...or something to that effect).
A leak implies intention. I am still not so sure that intent was there on the part of the administration officials cited.
As well, I still have a specific problem with the word "administration". Everyone on the left implies that this means, explicitly, the White House. It simply doesn't. In fact, most journalists that have stories where a White House source would is included would prefer to include "a senior White House official" or "a top White House official", rather than the more generic "administration official". The fact that the probe is also going outside of the White House, I believe, reinforces that the "leak", at least in the context of the original Novak story didn't come from someone in the White House.
That a CIA official even confirmed her identity and didn't specifically request the name to be withheld, even though Mr. Novak has explained that he would have withheld if explained that there was a danger --a contention that seems to be at the heart of the real "concern" that so many demos supposedly have--, isn't not only curious, it is telling.
Let's suppose it was someone in the White House that "leaked" the information to Novak, why isn't the press playing up the CIA's tacit admission? Why isn't the CIA making as much a stink about that?
Because the focus of their story is on the White House. They want to somehow pin this to the President, or Karl Rove. They want Bush out of the White House. They want a demo in there, because over 90% are demos and vote for demos.
The reporting comes down to the love for scandal, especially (maybe even particularly) when the scent of scandal surrounds a Republican.
Your assertions towards the end of your post are not fully substantiated, as of yet. It was obviously revealed. It was revealed by an administration, though not necessarily a White House, official. It appears that she may have done, in the past, some undercover work (though that is still a little murky), but it seems that she may have been doing desk work at the time of this revelation.
As far as the front company business, I have heard reports of this, but I haven't seen a source identifying an official source (such as the CIA or DOJ) stating this is the case. (If you have an actual source, please cite it and link to it. I would like to read up on that, if, indeed, that is the case).
Even if all of this were true, it doesn't mean any laws were broken because the person revealing the identity must have 1) known the person was undercover and 2) that the CIA was actively trying to maintain that undercover status.
It doesn' appear to be the case here. And, if it is, the official at the CIA is just as culpable as the "administration" official. In fact, one might argue that the CIA official is even more cupable because 1) they specifically know the sensitivity of cover and 2) they could have done something about the publishing of that name if they had expressed the potential danger to Mrs. Wilson and/or any other CIA employees (as Mr. Novak indicated in a follow-up column and this morning on Meet the Press).
So, coming back to your original statement, this situation is the farthest thing from a conspiracy as some conservatives and nearly all liberals want to contend.
Was it a screw up by the administration official? Yes.
Could it have been on purpose by the administration officail? Possibly.
Is the whole situation a mess? Yes.
But, is there some organized effort going on inside the Bush White House with either the President or Karl Rove specifically seeking to damage the lives of those who disagree with them? Not at all.
Ironically, we had 8 years of an administration that openly was hostile to any opponent. Heck, even totally innocent people like Billy Dale who never did anything more than being in the way, had their lives ruined because of the ambitions of that White House.
As far as the misguided conservatives who are trying to contend that this situation is a massive conspiracy, they need to take a reality check and remember 1992-2000.
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