Two Types of Americans: Dick and Fitz [Updated]
A guy innocently goes to a couple of meetings this afternoon and gets back home to find that in the meantime about eight million words have been spilled all over the Topic of the Day.
Culling what I can, here’s my decision: I’m going with Gergen and Sullivan in terms of cutting through to the central significance of Scooter Libby’s indictment:
Appearing on CNN’s Larry King show, David Gergen, simply said: "Because if there are indictments, it will not only be people close to the president, the vice president of the United States, but they will raise questions about whether criminal acts were perpetrated to help get the country into war."
Precisely. The essence of Plamegate can now be boiled down to two words: Dick Cheney. After the first whiff that Joe Wilson was going to somehow contradict the administration snow-job on Iraqi WMD, Dick got the ball rolling. Hoping to roll righ over Wilson. He shared his info on Wilson’s wife with his handmaiden Mr. Libby, and told him to scoot right to the task of discrediting the former Ambassador. It was not a crime for Cheney to know of Valerie Plame’s job, nor to pass that info along to Scooter. But it was a conspiracy to defraud the American people of the truth in a quest to stampede them into a war. A war that has become a fiasco. Says Andrew Sullivan:
“From the evidence we now have, it seems crystal clear to me that Libby knew he was out of line when he leaked the Plame name, and perjured himself to protect himself and the real source of the leak, Cheney. He gambled that the reporters wouldn’t squeal; and that he could cleverly spin his phone conversations so that the information seemed to come from reporters, not him. The question now is whether he will now turn against his colleagues and master to save his own skin. This story is just beginning. Ultimately, it’s about Cheney.”
I don’t foresee Libby turning on Cheney. There’s nothing in it for him. Fingering the Veep (excuse the imagery), won’t get him anywhere with Fitzpatrick because, as stated above, it broke no legal codes for Cheney to gin up the anti-Wilson counterspin. No, it just violated all sense of decency.
I watched Fitz this morning and had to wonder, as I’m sure many of you did, why don’t we have more guys like him as our elected leaders? Talk about a mensch. A serious, earnest, highly-principled man who clearly enshrines a sense of justice, fairness and rule of law as a sort of civic religion.
Compare the two men: Dick Cheney. Patrick Fitzgerald. No further comment.
Update: There seems to be some confusion about the gravity of the Libby indictment. You know, "it’s only perjury, obstruction of justice…and not the underlying charge."
Wrong. Let me translate into clear terms what Fitzgerald unintentionally wound up obfuscating with his overwrought baseball analogy on Friday.
To wit: Fitz’s narrative boldly underlined how, prescisely, Libby blew covert agent Valerie Plame’s cover by exposing her to reporters. He made that sharply evident in his hour long press conference. In order to convict Libby on the Intelligence Identities Act, Fitz would have to demonstrate, beyond a reasonable doubt, the INTENTIONALITY of Libby’s whisper campaign to reporters. What Fitz very clearly said, for those who wish to hear, is that Libby lied so much (the kicking the sand in the ump’s eye allegory) that it would be extremely difficult if not impossible for a jury to discern just exactly what Libby intended.
So instead of going out on a limb, Fitzgerald — as prosecutors routinely do– is seeking the sort of punishment he feels he can guarantee by taking the route of a secondary charge. This is common, common prosecutorial practice. The most-used and perhaps most instructive example is that of Al Capone. His indictment and conviction on tax evasion in no way absolved him of being a murderous gangster — it was merely the most expeditious route available for prosecutors.
This White House is now under fifty feet of water. If "Official A" i.e. Karl Rove gets nicked by Fitz in the next few weeks, you can double the depth. As dispassionately as possible, I can foresee only continuing turmoil and mounting erosion for the administration. Bush is nowhere near digging out of the hole he’s in. As long as the war in Iraq flounders, Libbygate will continue to percolate because the real underlying cause isn’t the outting of Plame, but rather the deception of the American people.
October 28th, 2005 at 8:39 pm
I couldn’t agree more.
October 28th, 2005 at 9:34 pm
You Californians always seem to be under the influence of some drug, spell, or, in this case, delusional liberal thinking. From the vantage point of my Brooklyn brownstone, I see the real villian as not Scooter Libby, Dick Cheney. Karl Rove or George Bush. They are simply living up to our low expectations. No, Amerca was most let down by you lapdogs in the media. America will not begin to recover from this 2000-plus-dead travesty until the resignation of the one of the most powerful media voices– Bill Keller, editor of the New York Times. And, while we’re at it, let’s indict as co-conspirators all in the media who gave their early support to the war in Iraq.
October 28th, 2005 at 10:15 pm
Well said, Clark.
Judith Miller is merely a symptom of what’s wrong with the NYT specifically, and the mass media in general.
If Americans were, in general, a little less naive and trustful they would read the NY Times with the same skeptical and discerning eye that Russians once read Pravda.
But I suppose that’s just too much to ask for. All the news that’s fit to print, indeed.
Good article here by Russ Baker on the anti-Fitz spin being put forth by Kay Hutchinson and the apologists and defenders of the administration — a category in which at least a couple of the posters here definitely belong.
October 28th, 2005 at 11:30 pm
“…it was a conspiracy to defraud the American people of the truth in a quest to stampede them into a war.”
A quibble: the American people had already been stampeded, at the point where Wilson went public. What we’re looking at here is blowback from ham-fisted damage control. Russ Baker gets this wrong as well. Kristof’s column citing Wilson unnamed was over 6 weeks after the invasion, and we didn’t see a Plame leak until a week after Wilson’s NYT op-ed in July 2003.
The double standards about honesty are hilarious. Joe Wilson “misspoke” (to the extent that he’d conveyed some impression that he’d personally seen documents that the IAEA had already determined to be forgeries with a quick Google session). So he’s a LIAR, LIAR, PANTS ON FIRE. But ScooterBoy may have just plumb fergot. An uncharacteristic lapse from his famed study-it-to-death work habits, perhaps, but it can happen to anyone! “Even monkeys can fall from trees”, goes the old Japanese saying. Well, one thing’s for sure: this monkey is now out of his tree.
It should be interesting to see how ScooterBoy responds to having to scramble on the ground. Some of the press are playing this like it’s Act 1 of unraveling the war cabal — ScooterBoy was, after all, pivotal in making the case for invasion. Much depends on whether he can get, and goes for, immunity from prosecution in exchange for testimony. I have to say that seems a stretch to me. The story may begin and end with “ScooterBoy Perjures Hisself!”, and have long term repercussions for BushCo no worse than the Jeff Gannon / Talon News / Military Stud Rentboy scandal, without being even half as interesting. More’s the pity, but that’s just how the monkey tumbles, sometimes.
October 29th, 2005 at 5:12 am
There may not be anything Scooter can give Fitzgerald on Cheney, but he will give up anything he can on anybody now. When a comfortable and powerful Columbia Law School grad starts staring at real Federal hard time he’ll do whtever he can to shorten his stay in Club Fed.
Conservatives especially, and people in general, like to talk about “four star hotels” for criminals but the real deal sobers them up pretty quickly.
You can bet Cheney gave the orders for the leak of the CIA agents’ name and, if that’s a crime, Fitzgerald will eventually find that out.
October 29th, 2005 at 6:28 am
At the risk of adding further verbiage to the current surfeit, I will indulge myself with two thoughts: what would be happening to Libby now if the Iraq war were not a fiasco? I believe nothing, which reminds me that it is not only easy to bamboozle people into going to war but also to get away with it if you win.
Secondly, I suggest that the Dems not gloat too much, given their pathetic record in standing up for the truth when it was difficult, i.e. in the pre-war period. It is most distasteful to see holier-than-thou stances from the likes of oily Chuck Schumer who rushed to vote in favor of Bush’s little adventure.
October 29th, 2005 at 7:40 am
Hey! What a lot of verbage. Stick to the matter at hand. Focus. These are the points – right here:
1. Compare the two men: Dick Cheney. Patrick Fitzgerald. No further comment.
2. There seems to be some confusion about the gravity of the Libby indictment. You know, “it’s only perjury, obstruction of justice…and not the underlying charge.”
3. Libbygate will continue to percolate because the real underlying cause isn’t the outting of Plame, but rather the deception of the American people.
Marc, Thanks so much for this post. Perfection!
October 29th, 2005 at 8:16 am
Well Tim offhand I’d say you’re wrong. The Dems like the rest of the country were conned into going along with this debacle. That’s what the story is about. A con job.
October 29th, 2005 at 8:20 am
I’ve examined the Wilson “lie” charge with source documents at my site. It takes a hardy belief system to come up with that from the evidence, but hey, that’s what these folks do.
October 29th, 2005 at 10:02 am
What Tamar said…
October 29th, 2005 at 10:58 am
Incisive post, Marc. Sums it up quite nicely.
(I was surprised, BTW, at how smart and forthright Gergen was yesterday. By contrast, one of the legal analysts for NBC, whose name presently escapes me, was a moron. And I had an unusually strong urge to slap Jeffrey Toobin.)
October 29th, 2005 at 11:44 am
Oh, Christ.
This is kinda off topic. But in the past hour or so I’ve come to lose all respect for someone whose work (mainly editing and compiling fiction — and writing top-notch analysis of said fiction based on a thorough knowledge and understanding of virtually every religious tradition and myth cycle that there is or ever was) has meant a lot to me over the past decade.
Probably, DC Sniper is familiar with some of his work as well.
Man… man oh man, oh man.
Some people should just not engage in any form of political analysis.
I understand that one can be brilliant when it comes to one subject and a complete ‘tard when it comes to another.
It’s just, I dunno, disappointing that someone whom you had a lot of respect for turns out to be the kinda guy that makes Rockford look like a paragon of reason and intelligent discourse.
Damn, this sucks.
October 29th, 2005 at 11:48 am
To wit: Fitz’s narrative boldly underlined how, prescisely, Libby blew covert agent Valerie Plame’s cover by exposing her to reporters. He made that sharply evident in his hour long press conference. In order to convict Libby on the Intelligence Identities Act, Fitz would have to demonstrate, beyond a reasonable doubt, the INTENTIONALITY of Libby’s whisper campaign to reporters. What Fitz very clearly said, for those who wish to hear, is that Libby lied so much (the kicking the sand in the ump’s eye allegory) that it would be extremely difficult if not impossible for a jury to discern just exactly what Libby intended.
Precisely. Intent is often one of the hardest things to prove in a criminal case.
Libby’s deliberate disinformation, in addition to probably protecting Cheney was also done to impede the investigation, thereby obstructing justice. That’s the charge that would have gotten Nixon impeached if he hadn’t been pardoned.
October 29th, 2005 at 1:35 pm
> After the first whiff that Joe Wilson
> was going to somehow contradict the
> administration snow-job on Iraqi WMD
There’s the giant hole in your narrative, Marc– Wilson’s New York Times editorial was *itself* a snow job. There, Wilson claimed Iraq wasn’t trying to acquire WMD from Africa. That was exactly wrong:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39834-2004Jul9.html?referrer=emailarticle
“… Wilson’s assertions — both about what he found in Niger and what the Bush administration did with the information — were undermined yesterday in a bipartisan Senate intelligence committee report.
The panel found that Wilson’s report, rather than debunking intelligence about purported uranium sales to Iraq, as he has said, bolstered the case for most intelligence analysts. And contrary to Wilson’s assertions and even the government’s previous statements, the CIA did not tell the White House it had qualms about the reliability of the Africa intelligence that made its way into 16 fateful words in President Bush’s January 2003 State of the Union address.”
So what still doesn’t make sense to me– and surely you see the non sequiter here, Marc– why would Libby and Cheney try to debunk Wilson by going after his wife, when they could have easily debunked him on factual grounds?
October 29th, 2005 at 1:53 pm
I must say there is much to what Clark Kent wrote. Why would “Scooter” concoct such a stupid lie (he is a Columbia Law grad after all and a lawyer with clients like Marc Rich) if he did not have every confidencxe that his friends in the media would never squeal. And that is because of the symbiotic relationship in DC between Press and Official. There is no doubt that we, as a country, were ill-served by the media coverage in the run-up to war. And, as any number of media critics have pointed out, by the way the media covered the 2000 election and greased thne skids for this criminal bunch to seize power. Even now Chris Matthews can speak of the President’s “nobility” in reacting to the indictment. And there has never been any doubt as to his oppostion to the whole Iraq fiasco.
Yes, it is a good thing that Fitz is the anti-Starr and is hard to attack. I note the GOP talking points exclude that alltogether. No the line is going to be that Libby is the “Lone Gunman”who went off on his own to, possibly, commit illegal acts even though Valerie was not covert and Wilson was a liar. Well I’ve got a bridge in Alaska to sell you.
As to the underlying crime, the Intellegence Agent’s Protection Act, I think another reason for not filing is the fact that Fitz would have to show that the CIA PROACTIVELY protected her cover. And would have to show the damage her outing caused. That would expose sources and methods and create more harm. This happens a lot in espionage cases and defense lawyers use it to “Blackmail” the Govt. into settling for a plea on lesser charges. This way the Special Prosecutor can throw the book at Libby without getting into that. I agree that it is unlikely that Libby will rat on Chaney but if he did you’ve got conspiracy – and welcome mr. Rove – but that is asking a lot.
Finally, it was never in the cards, I guess, that Fitz would drag in the lies about the war. So it will be up to the media to do it. Or are we going to allow the Italians to do it for us. Wouldn’t you like to be a fly on the wall when Berlesconi visits Bush this week? Cue the “Godfather” music!
October 29th, 2005 at 2:11 pm
Richard,
Berlusconi’salready jumping ship:
Granted, it is Berlusconi and he may well be burnishing his image in advance of a possible fraud and tax evasion trial, but so much for the solid coalition.
October 29th, 2005 at 2:12 pm
Well, I eventually closed that tag . . .
October 29th, 2005 at 2:13 pm
Well, Mr York, then the Dems are not only yellow-bellied but also dumb. I did not believe the sloppy and transparent ‘con job’ for one nanosecond, and our distinguished elected officials supposedly have access to a little more information than a lowly private citizen such as myself.
October 29th, 2005 at 2:18 pm
Tim is right that the fiasco in Iraq has brought out the daggers in the press and the public at large. Could this investigation have gone anywhere had the poll numbers been where they were 2 years ago or even last year? Maybe. But it’s more likely that the villain after yesterday would have been Fitzgerald instead of Libby.
We are indeed fickle, and our leaders make gambles every day about the direction and the degree of our fickleness… too bad for Libby, his gamble came a couple of years too late.
Sorry for your loss, Abbas-Ali. Reading the posts makes me think you’ll get over it quickly.
October 29th, 2005 at 2:23 pm
So what still doesn’t make sense to me– and surely you see the non sequiter here, Marc– why would Libby and Cheney try to debunk Wilson by going after his wife, when they could have easily debunked him on factual grounds?
WJA,
Probably because they didn’t know themselves. I also hardly think that the term “snow job” is an accurate term to describe Wilson’s op-ed. Here’s some of what he wrote:
This is not the writing of someone who is trying to deceive:
[my emphasis]
So in essence he is acknowledging the possibility that he could be wrong.
October 29th, 2005 at 2:25 pm
outstanding post, Marc.
I agree that Libby probably won’t roll Cheney, unfortunately. And he’ll probably plead guilty; a trial would rip this gang wide open, right in the middle of the Congressional campaign season.
Fitzgerald is the least self-involved prosecutor I’ve ever seen; very impressive.
October 29th, 2005 at 3:28 pm
Randy, that was my point. Berlesconi, facing serious charges and an opposition gaining on him in a forthcoming election wants out. Bush needs him. Those talks could get pretty heated. And those “Niger Documents” that were forgeries? They come from SISMI, the Italian Secret Service. Think Silvio knows something about them? Like I said, to be a fly on the wall . . .
October 29th, 2005 at 3:32 pm
And for you conspiracy buffs out there. It is all over the blogisphere that the info that Karl Rove’s attorney gave Fitzgerald that gave the special Prosecutor pause is the presence of Rove in meetings with Chaney and Libby where the leaks about Plame were discussed. In other words Rove will flip on the Veep. Probably not but boy is Fitzmas the gift that keeps on giving!
October 29th, 2005 at 3:44 pm
Let’s set the record straight on a couple of issues.
First, the Democrats: They knew quite well, as any rational person did, that Iraq in 2002 posed no significant threat to the United States. They knew, if Saddam even had a nukes program he was years away from completion, and that there was plenty of time for other options other than immediate war. None of this stopped them from rubber stamping Bush’s war drive; they were just friggin’ political opportunists shitting in their diapies, worried that Bush would ride the post 9/11 wave of patriotism and leave them behind. The Democratic leadership is every bit as responsible for this war as is the White House. This is the Bush-Gephardt-Kerry-Clinton war in Iraq and don’t ever forget it.
Second, as to Joe Wilson: Wilson is quite an imperfect hero. It seems evident to me that he orginally embellished the role the VP’s office played in sending him to Iraq; I also find him to be a rather blatant self-promoter. His book, which I read two summers ago was a crass, self-glorifying attempt to cash in on his sudden notoriety. That said, the gist of what he reported was accurate i.e. the Niger yellowcake story told by the administration and used by the administration to help sell the war lacked serious foundation.
Also.. anyone who knows something about Wilson’s role as the last American envoy in Baghdad prior to Gulf War One knows that he has no record, desire or tendency to be soft on Saddam Hussein. Wilson was, conversely, quite bold in his conffrontation of same. I saw it firsthand having spent some time in Wilson’s Baghdad residence immediately prior to the outbreak of war.
October 29th, 2005 at 3:49 pm
Richard, oh I agree with you. I just want to point out that he’s already put some distance between himself and Bush.
October 29th, 2005 at 4:49 pm
“This is the Bush-Gephardt-Kerry-Clinton war in Iraq”
The Democrats deserve major calumny in regard to their role in the Iraq war run-up.
But I think you’ve got to distinguish between the tail and the dog. Do you think that Al Gore, Kerry or either Clinton would have pursued this Iraq policy if they’d been in charge ? The Senate Dems were cowards in dealing with Bush, but I can’t imagine a Democratic administration taking a totally lame tack in Afghanistan after 9/11 and then opting to invade Iraq. Truth is, had Gore been President and Richard Clarke still in charge of the bin Laden detail there’s even a (slight) chance that 9/11 – or the worst of it – might have been avoided. The warnings of August, 2001 couldn’t have possibly been taken less seriously by a Democratic President than they were by Bush and the execrable Condaleeza Rice.
October 29th, 2005 at 5:01 pm
I think your assessment is spot-on marc. Here is what said in response to John Fund.
Wilson
October 29th, 2005 at 5:09 pm
What reg said about dogs and tails.
Marc, glad you added the part about Wilson in Baghdad. He’s a bit grating, and prone to self promotion and his own form of self-serving spinning, but his credentials and his reporting in the issue at hand, appear to be solid, which in the end, is the point. He doesn’t have to be our new best friend. And, hey, his wife’s kind of a babe.
So, Mr. Clark Kent. … Can we wild and crazy Calif. liberals come over and hang out at your Brownstone until we detox from the drugs, or what? Also, for the record, I don’t consider myself a media lapdog at all, but rather a neurotic, yappy terrier, if it’s all the same to you.
October 29th, 2005 at 5:12 pm
I meant “about the issue at hand…”
(need preview)
October 29th, 2005 at 6:52 pm
I agree with Reg on the ridiculous overstatement concerning the ‘Bush-Gephardt-Kerry-Clinton war’. Gephardt-Kerry-Clinton and others Dems were in some cases gutless and in some simply misguided ( just as some liberal Hawk intellectuals supported the war for reasons not ignoble). Kerry obviously would not have chosen to go to war in Iraq, despite his moronic claim to the contrary when pressed by a reporter a few months before the election. It’s also hard to see any Dem duplicating Bush’s incompetence in prosecuting the war. That took special talent, rare in any generation.
October 29th, 2005 at 7:23 pm
> That said, the gist of what [Wilson] reported
> was accurate i.e. the Niger yellowcake story
> told by the administration and used by the
> administration to help sell the war lacked
> serious foundation.
Again, Marc, that assessment is just wrong:
http://www.factcheck.org/article337.html
“June 1999 – Niger ’s former prime minister Ibrahim Mayaki meets with an Iraqi delegation wanting to discuss ‘expanding commercial relations.’ Mayaki interprets this as an interest in uranium, Niger ’s main export, and later tells Wilson that he did not discuss it because Iraq remained under UN trade sanctions. (Senate Intelligence Cmte., Iraq 43-44, July 2004).”
So in 1999, the Niger’s former PM tells Wilson that Saddam’s government has– just like Bush said in his 2003 SOTU address– “recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.” Wilson doesn’t mention this trip, doesn’t mention what he learned from it, doesn’t say anything about it *at all* in his Times pieced (called, ironically, “What I Didn’t Find in Africa”.)
Given that, Marc, isn’t it fair to call Wilson’s Times editorial– the one that launched this whole sorry affair– a snow job?
October 29th, 2005 at 8:06 pm
Scooter Libby is a Ham Sandwich. Has there ever been a special prosecutor who did not find someone to hit with perjury charges? Either Libby, a sharp lawyer, was temporarily hit with a case of the stupids (possible – Clinton was a smart lawyer too), or he forgot who said what when (his current defense, which is plausible). In any case, it is sad that this whole thing revolves around a really minor issue in the WMD controversy.
NOBODY thought Iraq was close to having nuclear weapons, because the facilities needed to do that are much harder to conceal than those for making chemical or biological weapons. But Iraq had retained it’s scientists (one of whom was ordered, just pre-war, to bury a centrifuge in his rose garden), and Saddam no doubt had the intent for the future, when the sanctions were inevitably removed.
On a related subject, is part of the “progressive” cognitive disorder a failure of memory? Pretty much everyone believed, for very good reason, that Saddam had WMD’s (but not nuclear ones) before the war. Even his generals thought so. But since only a few WMDs were found (at least 16 chemical weapons rounds, including a binary Sarin round when Iraq was never known by any inspector to have binary technology), the narrative has shifted as if there never was any evidence of WMDs in Iraq or reason to believe there wouldn’t soon be in the future. This was not some deception by Bush – he too was deceived as were most others with access to high level intelligence.
So the Bush-haters with their Bushhitler thoughts conveniently forget the state of information about Iraq prior to the war, just like they forget Daniel Kay’s statement after his exhaustive search post-war, where he said the situation, with regards to terrorist acquisition of WMDs, was worse than he thought going in.
The “African Uranium” thing is especially silly, since Iraq did indeed try (and fail) to get uranium from Niger. Joe Wilson, who poses as a great savior of the truth, has a history of changing his story on this issue.
Finally, if you work in a big office building in Manhattan, or live in a big condo, you should hope that Al Qaeda did not get hold of any of the (unmarked) binary Sarin rounds. One was used in an IED against American troops last year, but not used correctly. A knowledgable terrorist with one round, an electric drill and a bug sprayer could easily kill everyone in a modern high-rise – again, with just one of the rounds found in Iraq. This is the sort of terrorist-Iraq WMD that represented the immediate threat – not massive quantities of any WMD (which a terrorist would have trouble transporting to a target).
So, Joe Wilson lied. Furthermore, Iraq had terrorist quantities of chemical WMD, some of which may right now be in the hands of Al Qaeda.
At least one member of the administration, apparently stuck on stupid, outed a previously covert CIA officer to fight this one little charge of Wilson’s – one which the MSM had inflated into a giant issue. The act of outing was itself not a crime, but the ham sandwich has had his life ruined.
October 29th, 2005 at 8:18 pm
Wow John!
“The “African Uranium†thing is especially silly, since Iraq did indeed try (and fail) to get uranium from Niger.”
Really? According to the CIA? Who?
That whole business about the “proof being in the form of a mushroom cloud†was not indented to lead people to believe that Iraq was “close to having nuclear weapons.†So Bush was lying or just being irresponsible? After a statement like that from the President of the United States, many people did think that Iraq was close to having real nuclear weapons.
John, you sound like Clintonoid’s did back during the Lewinski scandal. It is great! I really love to hear the elaborate rationalizations of lies and sleaze. Keep it up!
You whole “Bush-haters” and why not throw in “liberal media” for good measure sounds just like the whole “right wing conspiracy” rap.
October 29th, 2005 at 8:19 pm
intended
October 29th, 2005 at 8:58 pm
Josh,
Iraq trying to get uranium from Niger? According to, among others, Joe Wilson. Also, see WJA above.
What business about proof in the form of a mushroom cloud? Iraq was close to having nukes under the circumstances of sanctions ending – they could have gotten them through the Libya/Malaysia/Khan operation. I certainly expect the administration to make statements that taken out of context can be challenged. And I expect under some circumstances they would exaggerate.
But the idea that Bush led the country to war on a pack of lies, the standard leftist and MSM narrative, is such vile nonsense that it needs to be contradicted whenever related topics come up. It is as dumb as the assertion, made to me by a Hollywood type, that we went into Afghanistan so Bush’s “rich oil friends” could profit by building a pipeline through it.
However, the narrative of the MSM, which indeed is “liberal” in the new meaning of the word (which means leftist/progressive/multiculturalist/one-worldist), is that Bush led us into the war through a bunch of lies. So I don’t mind characterizing the MSM as biased. Heck, last year I had my fill of dealing with those bastards when I was working as an anti-Kerry partisan, and watching the negative information about him being ignored or whitewashed, while every little negative thing that could possibly be tied to Bush was inflated to gigantic proportions. I could give examples but it would lead this discussion off into the weeds.
As far as the Lewinski affair, it is indeed a good check on rationality to see whether having the shoe on the other food leads to similar behavior. I have watched the right during the Bush administration occasionally act like the Democrats under Clinton. I have looked at my own beliefs in the Clinton era in that light.
So far, I don’t think this issue resemble the Lewinski affair (which is really the Paula Jones investigation). If Scooter Libby actually perjured himself, he should be held accountable, the same thing we said about Clinton. Hardly inconsistent. My problem is not the crime of perjury, if it happened, but the sadness that it was about something trivial. The same can be said about Clinton, except the left claimed that it since it was about sex (actually, sexual harrassment, but they let that slide), the crime should be ignored.
The right is not saying that, but rather that we don’t yet know if a crime was committed. Very different. The fact that nobody was indicted for revealing classified information or for outing a CIA operative is itself significant, since that is what the investigation was supposed to be about.
So what am I rationalizing? I hold that the idea that Bush led us to war based on lies is nonsense. This is a position I have held since the silly idea became the standard MSM narrative. I hold that the Niger uranium affair is minor in the overall issue, and that it is a shame that Scooter Libby was caught up in it, and maybe he was stupid and maybe criminal in his involvement. I hold that the MSM bias is what made the Niger uranium issue into a big flap (just like they did Abu Ghraib) when it was not a significant issue. I hold that Joe Wilson has told different stories at different times on that issue (contrast his initial statements to what he says in his book, for example).
October 29th, 2005 at 9:05 pm
foot
October 30th, 2005 at 1:12 am
To Reg et al:
Why the moral dodge on the Democrats and the war? I find it HILARIOUS and only slightly nauseating to hear Kerry and his pals now whimpering that they were “misled.” Give me a fucking break. Those who knew better and went ahead on the war are arguably worse than the right wing zealots who might have actually believed their own propaganda. If the Democrats had provided a united front of opposition in the fall of 2002 and said there was NO compelling to reason to rush to any war and had not voted the authorization for war — as they did lead by Mr Gephardt– we would have had a completely different political atmosphere in this country. And what would it have cost the miserable Democrats? The 2004 eletcion? LOL! I believed they windsurfed that one away in any case if I remember correctly. Anyway, Reg, it’s unbecoming to see someone as smart as you acting as shill for these gross opporuntists. We can do better
Or is it: America, We Can Do Better!
October 30th, 2005 at 5:46 am
How funny that WJA cites a Susan Schmidt “report” that the WaPo had to retract, especially for its claim that Iraq had sought 400 tons of yellowcake when the Senate report said that it was Iran, not Iraq. I still see people linking to that botched story. That one just won’t die.
Also, the Senate report relies on the Butler report for its substantiation that Iraq was shopping for uranium, which in turn relies on Butler, an unimpeachable peer of the realm, certainly, who said only “I’ve seen the intel and the intel is good.” But we can’t see it, can we? Perhaps because it was some of that primo Italian *designer* intel, the best stuff on the market. You gotta watch out for the cut-rate knockoffs, though, they can get you in trouble.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/06/25/iraq/main560449.shtml
“The Senate Intelligence Committee report — which said most of the pre-war claims were not supported — cited various reports that Iraq had sought uranium in Africa. Thus, although Mr. Bush cited only British evidence that was determined to have been inconclusive, other intelligence files clearly contained other inconclusive evidence of the truth of the claim.”
And that’s where the matter still stands, as far as I know.
October 30th, 2005 at 9:54 am
I thought the Dem line in Congress was to give Bush the nod in Iraq “should he need to use it.” All ultimately felt he shouldn’t have, so this isn’t quite the same as signing on lock stock and banana peel.
Moore’s screed belongs in the new weasel post since that’s what it is. Nothing new there.
Address my analysis here if you dare: Wilson said what he said and it stands up, still. Just click my name.
October 30th, 2005 at 11:30 am
“MSM bias is what made the Niger uranium issue into a big flap (just like they did Abu Ghraib) when it was not a significant issue.”
Everything one needs to know about John Moore is contained between that pair of parentheses.
October 30th, 2005 at 2:03 pm
Rosen calls that the Great Explainer. Every crazy notion they have fits nicely in there.
October 30th, 2005 at 4:27 pm
Though it’s unlikley, if anyone is disposed to take J Moore’s “analysis” seriously, check this out… just for starters.
http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/10/30/18754/437
October 30th, 2005 at 5:37 pm
“Man… man oh man, oh man.”
I think the inmates at Abu Ghraib should be sacrificed to Cthulhu.
Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu Abu’ghraib wgah’nagl fhtagn!
October 30th, 2005 at 6:49 pm
Also, Marc…I don’t think that asserting that the Dems deserve calumny for their support of the war and then making a distinction between what I’m 95% certain would be the anti-al Qaeda strategy of a Democratic administration and Bush’s “War on Terror” – a distinction that you fail to claim is false, incidentally – is acting like a “shill”.
October 30th, 2005 at 7:18 pm
“On a related subject, is part of the ‘progressive’ cognitive disorder a failure of memory? Pretty much everyone believed, for very good reason, that Saddam had WMD’s (but not nuclear ones) before the war.
So the Bush-haters with their Bushhitler thoughts conveniently forget the state of information about Iraq prior to the war”
Is part of the “conservative” cognitive disorder a failure in the language centers of the brain that control reading comprehension, John? The number of people who believed the case for WMDs that the Bush administration presented before Book of Shadows: Gulf War II is a bit smaller than “pretty much everyone” as you can discern if you merely read this thread. We are right fucking here, John, if you just read.
On the flipside, the cognitive disorder that involves selective memory failure, is quite a bit more common than you suppose and it correlates as strongly with conservatism as it does with progressivism. There are no known cases of immunity to this disease (though some foolishly believe themselves immune) and individual cases only differ in their degree of severity. IQ seems to have no effect on this psychological condition as it presents just as frequently among MENSA members as among the general population. Further, there is no known cure and the condition is often fatal.
But by all means cling to your oversimplified respresentation of the world, John. Maybe it’ll help you feel superior.
October 30th, 2005 at 7:30 pm
DC sniper – since these clowns couldn’t rationally engage their critics prior to the war – essentially making a case to the American people for speculative pre-emption that nobody who was minimally knowledgable, not even most of their liberal “hawk” allies like Thomas Friedman, believed was fully credible – there’s no reason to believe that they should be able to untangle themselves now.
October 30th, 2005 at 11:28 pm
DC Sniper: “Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu Abu’ghraib wgah’nagl fhtagn!”
Hey, pick this one up if you haven’t already.
You won’t be disappointed.
October 31st, 2005 at 5:19 am
???
October 31st, 2005 at 7:38 pm
They’re related? An Authorhouse book and gibberish?
October 31st, 2005 at 7:45 pm
Moore and his Swiftnut bunch are particularly vehement Viet Nam vets, and trend towards the apocalyptic whether it actually is or not. The sad case for the Iraq edition of the war is a case in point. They blame media for everything they refuse to see, even when the media errs on their side as they did in the run up to war. Cronkite and Kerry lost Nam and so on. They really are hopeless.
October 31st, 2005 at 10:32 pm
“They’re related? An Authorhouse book and gibberish?”
Via the Cthulhu Mythos, yes.
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