Indicted? For What?

National Review Online ^ | 10/19/05 | Byron York

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Of course not. Selective lying is right out the Clinton playbook. It allows Wilson to "haunted" by something he made damn sure everyone understood, but allows him and his liberal running dogs convenient deniyability.
Now that I think about it, I would redraft "parsing" in favor of "WILSONTHINK"
To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which canceled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them. To use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe democracy was impossible and that the party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed and then promptly to forget it again; and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself. That was the ultimate subtlety; consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word Wilsonthink, involved the use of Wilsonthink.

[Steve_Seattle]

Regardless of what Wilson actually said, here is how the media spun it: (1) Cheney sent Wilson to Niger; (2)Wilson reported back to Cheney that the yellow cake story was false; (3) Cheney, eager for war in Iraq, suppressed Wilson's report because it wasn't what he wanted to hear; (4) Wilson went public, accusing the administration of falsifying the case for war; (5) The White House retaliated by trying to "discredit" Wilson by "outing" Plame.

As far as I can tell, based on the public evidence, ONLY #4 is true.

[Steve_Seattle]

To finish my thought: Lugsoul is preoccupied with the secondary issue of who actually arranged for Wilson to go to Niger, and whether Wilson himself claimed that it was Cheney. This is a distraction. More important is the scenario I laid out in my previous post, a scenario that Wilson repeatedly defended in its most essential and damning form, i.e., that Cheney deliberately ignored Wilson's report and tried to punish him for going public.

[frankjr]

Who said Rove or Libby provided "code books"?

[Hound of the Baskervilles]

Why would anyone NEED to lie to the Grand Jury if there was no crime?

[lugsoul]

Every single time he has been asked about it in the past two years, yes.

[Steve_Seattle]

"Why would anyone NEED to lie to the Grand Jury if there was no crime?"

If one of the reporters - say Matt Cooper - had previously been misrepresenting statements from his sources (Rove?), and was caught in the act, he might try to lie his way out of an admission that would be professional suicide.

[Vonnegut]

Read the article that you posted. No one is saying that anyone provided "code books." Quite the contrary, in fact. The article takes the position that, if you don't provide "code books" or one of the other specifically-mentioned items in the Espionage Act, there's no crime.

What I've highlighted is the other language of the Espionage Act (which is quoted in the article ). It prohibits providing "documents," "notes," and any other "information" related to national defense. I still believe that if someone provides any "information" related to national defense, they can be prosecuted under the Espionage Act -- not just those who provide the "code books" or other specific documents that no one claims changed hands here.

And, as stated before, I believe that's the way it should be. I don't want anyone who shares secret national defense-related "information" to get away with it on a technicality. The Espionage Act says that any secret national defense "information" is protected -- that's a better approach than trying to divine an "intent" of the law that would let those who share protected "information" to claim that the law doesn't really apply. One might be happy with the result of that approach in this case, but it's short-sighted as well as questionable legal analysis.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Wilson crowded the edge of the lie, danced around it, never denied, then did the Cheney setup that has set this entire bamboozle on its way. Its beyond Clintonoid...maybe its from the mind of Hillary ?

[pepperhead]

Every single time he has been asked about it in the past two years, yes.

Where did he say Andrea Mitchell is wrong?

[lugsoul]

Well, if she says he said Cheney sent him, and he denies having made that claim, every time he denies it he is saying she is wrong.

[pepperhead]

Where did he say Andrea Mitchell isn't telling the truth?

[arasina]

Don't get your hackles up trying to argue with a contrarian atheist anal retentive perfectionist, Eric. In its mind, it always wins simply because it has been around giving off the same foul odor since 1999.

[okie01]

Of course, the media looks pretty foolish anyway.

Contrast how they've already indicted, tried and found guilty up to "twenty-two members of the administration" -- including Rove, Libby and the Vice President -- with the "unseemly rush to judgment" and their "deep concern for due process" in the case of Saddam Hussein.

The MSM won't be happy unless Dick Cheney goes to jail...and Saddam Hussein goes free.

[lugsoul]

Well, you got one right. Missed on all the rest. And the atheist bit is far off the mark. But you do have the snotty tone down just right, so the judges will give you good scores on artistic merit. So there.

[arasina]

Yes, I'm quite the snot, indeed.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

I'm keeping my hackles right where they belong.