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"We suffered a lot in prison but with God's help and that of the people of Fallujah (search) I gained my freedom," he said. "Thanks be to God for the victory of Fallujah."

ARGGGHHH!!!

This guy is the freaking top Imam in the city and basically a Sunni version of al Sadr. This is the prick who was stirring up the Fallujah insurgency in the FIRST PLACE!!

And now we are releasing him? Tell me that isn't a surrender!?! We are pulling out, handing over control of the city to the very Saddam loyalists we've been fighting, and releasing the terrorist in charge.

Oh yeah... this is a wonderful victory... great plan... absolutely. If you're with the TERRORISTS!

WTF? I mean... WTFF?

So let me get this straight. We've got one of Saddam Hussein's generals. He's got the trademark 'Saddam moustache'. He's wearing his Republican Guard uniform. He's flying the OLD Iraqi flag rather than the new one. He's a resident of Fallujah who has remained in the city during the resistance. The terrorists who have been killing our troops are celebrating in the streets and cheering their victory and this guy as their new leader.

How is this a good plan!?!!?

These f*cks killed over a hundred of our soldiers! We should be leveling the stinking rat-hole. One of the generals called the Golan district a cockroach nest and that's exactly what it is. Fumigate the place and wipe them out before they breed more little terrorists. Surrendering and handing things over to one of their leaders is a treasonous betrayal of our soldiers who fought and died there. It's just sick and I for one am completely pissed off.

Waitaminute!

Let's be clear here...

CNN >made up< a story about the White House calling them to say that this kid was edited into the scene?

That certainly seems to be the case. They even said later that the White House never called them. This can't just be a 'mistake'... either the White House called and told them that or it didn't. If the WH didn't call (and why would they?) then CNN made up a story... to make Bush look better? Which makes no f'in sense. Why would the Clinton News Network lie >FOR< Bush?

Whole story makes no sense. It seems obvious CNN outright lied, and so far as I am concerned that should cost them their broadcast license, but WHY did they lie?

Setting aside that Queery will never get elected, this plan would never pass Congress. The Dimocrats would revolt. They are long since bought and paid for by the international corporations that are getting those tax-free profits for work done overseas.

Stupid feminist dykes. 'Oh no an evil male might get us pregnant'. Duh, that's what God made you for. stupid baby killing bitch.

Kerry and Edwards?

I thought these guys both claimed they were AGAINST homo-marriage.

No way. Bush never said that sending jobs overseas was good for the economy. That's just BS put out by the Librul press. It was some flunky on an economic policy board or something and all he said was that the economy is strong enough that jobs going overseas isn't a concern.

>> It is my understanding that reporters are not covered by the leak law. Novak's not going to do any time. <<

Reporters are not subject to the law unless they engage in a 'pattern' of such behaviour designed to undermine national security. So Novak would have to out at least one more agent before it could even be stretched to charge him under that law.

That said, journalistic confidentiality does not extend to crimes. Technically, he could be ordered to disclose his source and held in contempt of court for refusing. Others have suggested that since Plame worked on WMD non-proliferation it could be considered 'harming efforts against terrorism' and he could be charged under the USA Patriot Act. However, I think both of those are EXTREMELY unlikely. Maybe under a Rat administration the Justice Department might try to pull one of those, but not Ashcroft.

>> I really don't understand why Bush 41 was so damn good with the CIA (Former CIA Chief) and Bush 43 has had so many problems. <<

Bush 41 was largely RESPONSIBLE for getting the law against revealing covert operatives passed in the first place. He was also on very good terms with Wilson if you can believe that. Bush 43 just doesn't have the same 'spook credentials' I guess.

I dunno. Apparently he is angry about it... and obviously the cat is now well and truly out of the bag.

Yes, Valerie Wilson was definitely under cover. It has been confirmed by half a dozen sources. Amongst others, a former CIA analyst who worked with her;

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/media/july-dec03/leaks_09-30.html

LARRY JOHNSON: Let's be very clear about what happened. This is not an alleged abuse. This is a confirmed abuse. I worked with this woman. She started training with me. She has been undercover for three decades, she is not as Bob Novak suggested a CIA analyst. But given that, I was a CIA analyst for four years. I was undercover. I could not divulge to my family outside of my wife that I worked for the Central Intelligence Agency until I left the agency on September 30, 1989. At that point I could admit it.

So the fact that she's been undercover for three decades and that has been divulged is outrageous because she was put undercover for certain reasons. One, she works in an area where people she meets with overseas could be compromised. When you start tracing back who she met with, even people who innocently met with her, who are not involved in CIA operations, could be compromised. For these journalists to argue that this is no big deal and if I hear another Republican operative suggesting that well, this was just an analyst fine, let them go undercover. Let's put them overseas and let's out them and then see how they like it. They won't be able to stand the heat.

I say this as a registered Republican. I'm on record giving contributions to the George Bush campaign. This is not about partisan politics. This is about a betrayal, a political smear of an individual with no relevance to the story. Publishing her name in that story added nothing to it.

What is clear in this case is that there were other reporters who had the integrity and good judgment to recognize that this was a political hatchet job that this was not about real news. I like Bob Novak and I have been on his other show but in this case he got it wrong. And to hide behind the parsing of words that she was an analyst so therefore it's okay. No, it's not okay.

The principle's established: do not divulge the names of these people. In my own career trainee class I did not know Joe's wife last name; we went by our first initials.

I was in the same class with her. I was Larry J. In fact, when I first saw her last name I didn't recognize her until one of other my classmates who's out now called me up and said, hey. To realize this is a terrific woman, she's a woman of great integrity and other people that don't know her were trying to suggest that she is the one that initiated that. That is such nonsense. This is a woman who is very solid, very low key and not about show boating.

Oh sure... Wilson has been whining about every angle under the sun, but the 'revelation' of his wife's maiden name has GOT to be the least significant aspect of this whole thing. Makes sense to point out that he was whining about it unreasonably, but not to suggest that makes the whole issue shrivel up and blow away. Its a largely irrelevant side point.

I don't know that Novak HAS said it didn't come from the White House. He said the White House didn't call him up to leak it... but that isn't the same thing. He has also said several times that it came from 'senior administration officials'... so if not the White House then what? The CIA? Pentagon? It doesn't much matter really. Novak says it was people high up in Bush's administration... do you think people will really care where they work?

Well... the claim is that when a covert operative's cover is blown they are in danger of being killed. They certainly cannot continue to work in that capacity. There is also the potential of compromising their contacts.

If she really was as 'deep cover' as the CIA is claiming then it is a valid objection. If she was working for the CIA while her husband was acting ambassador to Iraq prior to the first Gulf War... and in the field of WMD. Then yeah... that is a big deal.

Come on. Her maiden name could hardly be a 'secret'.

The stink has been over revealing that she was a covert CIA operative... not the fact that they used her maiden name when they did it. This isn't like a 'code name' or something... her maiden name would be a matter of public record. She apparently used it alot... liberal femi-nazi most likely.

I don't know if Rove can sue or not. Wilson never actually said, 'It was Karl Rove'. He just implied it. Something like; 'We are definitely not going to just give up on this. I want to see whether or not it is possible to get Karl Rove frog-walked out of the White House in handcuffs'.

Obviously he was implying that Rove was behind the leaks, but I dunno if you can sue over an implication. At that... suing would allow Wilson to subpoena documents to try to prove Rove WAS involved (in which case it could not be defamation of character)... and I don't think we want to give the Democrats an opportunity like that.

Oi!

News just breaking... the Justice Department has upgraded this to a full criminal probe and directed the FBI to investigate the source of the leaks. They are contacting the CIA to find out who had access to the info.

The fact that 'Plame' was NOT a covert operative is much stronger grounds to dispute this nonsense IMO. Even the CIA says that she was no longer doing any covert/foreign operative work and was just doing research now.

I'm telling you, the 'Novak says it was not the White House that leaked it' thing is NOT going to hold up. We don't want to base our resistance to this on something which is already proven false. Novak has said that it WAS the Bush administration several times and there are now several other reporters making that claim too. The one time Novak seemed to say otherwise it was in reference to reports that the White House was calling people up to spread this... he says that he contacted them and they mentioned it during an interview. NOT that it didn't come from them at all.

Unfortunately, while Novak said that 'Nobody in the Bush administration called me to leak this' what he MEANT was that they leaked it after HE called THEM. He definitely did implicate two officials in the Bush administration. Later in the same article it says;

"Novak said Monday that he was working on the column when a senior administration official told him the CIA asked Wilson to go to Niger in early 2002 at the suggestion of his wife, whom the source described as 'a CIA employee working on weapons of mass destruction.'

Another senior administration official gave him the same information, Novak said, and the CIA confirmed her involvement in her husband's mission."


As for Wilson... there is absolutely no question that he is out to get the Bush administration and spinning like mad to do it. Unfortunately he can >claim< some degree of impartiality because he was heavily praised by George H.W. Bush for his work as acting ambassador to Iraq in the time leading up to the Gulf War.