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Tonight I toast to Fitzgerald

JG

1 down many to go...

 
Oct 28, 05 1:00 pm
e

scooter has scooted.

Oct 28, 05 1:18 pm  · 
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"We are obviously watching and the press is beginning to document the implosion of a presidency," Bernstein said

Oct 28, 05 1:20 pm  · 
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norm

i guess it's better than nothing.
with only one busted it will be far too easy for the white house propoganda oulet (fox news) to spin it.
criminalization of conservative politics...what b.s. that is.

Oct 28, 05 1:23 pm  · 
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secretingredient

That only puts the Bush administration 59 behind the Clinton administration.

Oct 28, 05 1:23 pm  · 
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e

i think spin is difficult when you have the president says that fitz has been doing a good job and repubs and dems both say he is apolitical. much in the same ways dems would not have much to say if there were no indictments.

Oct 28, 05 1:30 pm  · 
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b3tadine[sutures]

yeah the Bush presidency may be behind Clinton in terms of "investigations" but they own the numbers when it comes to soldiers dying in an unjust war, and nations alienated for the sake of New World Order.

Oct 28, 05 1:33 pm  · 
 · 
.

let me get this straight - libby gave cheney a blow job while rummy had a cigar? am i missing something?

Oct 28, 05 1:39 pm  · 
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secretingredient

Javier, for the readers sake, please don't link to an editorial that blatantly omits the fact Joe Wilson, Plame's husband, lied when he said or implied that he had been sent to Niger by Vice-President Dick Cheney, and denied that his wife had sponsored his trip. The second was that Joe Wilson lied when he wrote, in the pages of the New York Times, that his own mission to Niger had demonstrated that the President misled the American people when he said that Saddam Hussein's regime had tried to buy uranium in Africa.

Understand, there is no doubt about the fact that Wilson's attack on Bush was a lie. The Senate intelligence committee's report is definitive. Wilson returned from Niger and reported to the CIA that that country's former head of state had told him that he received an overture from Iraq that he understood as an attempt to buy uranium. So Wilson's report supported the Africa claim, it didn't refute it. That's what the Intelligence Committee found, and Wilson's claim to the contrary was a lie and a vicious slander of President Bush.

Oct 28, 05 1:45 pm  · 
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The Senate intelligence committee is an oxymoron if I've ever heard one. The Senate is not incriminating anyone that they themselves tuned with in the drum up to the war.

Oct 28, 05 2:01 pm  · 
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norm

secret ingredient...
you are repeating fox news spin - uncritically.
show me one name of a clinton official who was indicted. (there was one - good luck)
show me where wilson said he was sent by cheney. he said cheney made inquiries to the cia, and he was sent in response to these inquiries.
have fun.
take the weekend if you have to.
i'll be at the bar celebrating fitz-mas.
(and stop watching fox)

Oct 28, 05 4:03 pm  · 
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norm

even if wilson lied thru his teeth...this isn't about wilson or clinton or anyone else that the extreme right wants to crucify. it's about a senior white house official - serving in the administration that campaigned on the promise to restore honor and dignity to the oval office - who is charged with perjury and lying and obstructing justice. so much for your moral f***ing superiority.

Oct 28, 05 4:06 pm  · 
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nicomachean

...and Rove lives on...hehehe

...by the way, 'classified' does not equal 'covert' - try again.

...is that you Cindy?

Oct 28, 05 4:18 pm  · 
 · 
e

rove does live on, but this is not good for someone who ran on the idea of bringing dignity to the white house. is this dignity? i think not.

on the flip side, how many ppl can name gore's chief of staff? or, heh, heh, heh, dan quayles's?

this will probably be old news by next week. the repubs just have to hope that scooter cuts a deal because they say this thing will go to trial right before the next election. and the repubs don't want the bush admin lies resurfacing at that time.

Oct 28, 05 4:28 pm  · 
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after seeing fitzgerald on tv, i doubt this will blow over by next week. now the press has tons of new leads and if fitzgerald doesnt produce anything on rove, the press seems to be willing to. besides, i think joe and valerie are going to and probably should sue rove and scooter.

Oct 28, 05 4:36 pm  · 
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e

blow over? no. old news? probably. the only thing bush needs to do is nominate a better person for the court and the media will be all over this. and yes, joe and valerie will be suing.

Oct 28, 05 4:41 pm  · 
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yeah, but bush has huge problems naming another judge. he has less clout now than before the meiers fiasco. he can't appoint alberto gonzalez because they will grill him on plamegate. he's in a catch 22.

Oct 28, 05 5:10 pm  · 
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Dazed and Confused

Dr Kelly: "I accept the process that is happening."

- Tuesday 15 July 2003

Someone is cooking the books alright - the question is who.

"According to some anecdotal accounts, journalists' failure to fully protect their sources in the Plame case has already chilled official leaks to reporters. Should Fitzgerald win convictions under the espionage law or Section 641, any conversations between officials and journalists touching on classified information could come become prosecutable offenses. That would turn the current chill into permafrost."

"Judith Miller indicates (in the Times) that Libby's motive in talking to her about Wilson and his wife was the fight between the White House and CIA over whose fault it was that Bush had included faulty intelligence about Saddam's pursuit of African uranium in his 2003 State of the Union address.

What I want to know is - did David Kelly slit his own wrists while he was "going for a walk" If so, why?

And why did the CIA send an idiot like Joe Wilson to Niger if they cared about real (uncooked) intel.?

Where did this trumped up crap come from? "Bush" is the easy answer who you can say you voted or didn't vote for - - - but I think that is waaaay too easy an answer.

Oct 28, 05 5:11 pm  · 
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e

indeed javier. he does have some major problems that are still on the horizon. time will tell.

Oct 28, 05 5:18 pm  · 
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secretingredient

"The impression one gets from reading the indictment is that there was massive cooperation on the part of administration employees and officials. This looks like the anti-Watergate -- a president ordering everyone to cooperate and the absence of any organized cover-up.

Unless Karl Rove is indicted later on, the political fall-out is likely to be almost non-existent."

Moral indeed...norm go smoke another you broken record...=)

Oct 28, 05 5:37 pm  · 
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totally counter to what i've read, secretingredient. where's that quote from?

bernstein, in the article posted by javier, noted that "in the nixon administration, courageous republicans decided it was important that the president's actions be scrutinized and that hasn't occurred in large measure (in the plame case). but the implosion that seems to be occurring would indicate that that kind of scrutiny might be on the way."

Oct 28, 05 5:45 pm  · 
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Dazed and Confused

- be careful what you wish for. Is the weakening of a president you don't like worth the weakening of the institution?

Oct 28, 05 5:48 pm  · 
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secretingredient

What implosion? This seems right to me...

"Lying to a grand jury is serious, if true. The rest is Martha Stewart stuff. But this isn't the Libby-Rove-Cheney takedown that the lefties have been hoping for -- there's not even a charge of "outing" a covert agent -- and the very extravagance of their hopes will make this seem much less significant. If there's no more, this will probably do Bush little harm."

Oct 28, 05 6:18 pm  · 
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e

and this is not the dignity that bush said he would bring to the white house. obstruction of justice and perjury are very serious charges.

Oct 28, 05 6:29 pm  · 
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Urbanist

I think it is a fairly good guess that this is only Act I of a very long process... as was watergate. The press doesn't seem to understand that one does not need to empanel a new Grand Jury for this to continue... there are always a few around to be used when required. Also, there is always the possibility that the grand jury whose term ended today has already issued further indictments that are sealed contingent on this or that negotiations or discussions. And then there are any trials which may happen and the discovery process that proceeds them... lots of subpeonas and deal-making. If Bush pardons prematurely, there will be blood in the streets (politically speaking). The guessing, rumors, innuendo, scandal and ultimately legal process that this first indictment has started have just begun. I really do believe that this ends with an impeachment.

Oct 28, 05 9:21 pm  · 
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nicomachean

merry fitzmas norm!

here's my gift for you from an upcoming NYT piece by David Brooks:

"...Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald did not find evidence to prove that there was a "broad conspiracy to out a covert agent for political gain. He did not find evidence of wide-ranging criminal behavior. He did not even indict the media's ordained villain, Karl Rove...

...Leading Democratic politicians filled the air with grand conspiracy theories that would be at home in the John Birch Society...

...Why are these people so compulsively overheated?.. Why do they have to slather on wild, unsupported charges that do little more than make them look unhinged?..."

Brooks quotes from an essay written 40 years ago by Richard Hofstadter called "The Paranoid Style in American Politics."

Hofstadter argued that sometimes people who are dispossessed, who feel their country has been taken away from them and their kind, develop an angry, suspicious and conspiratorial frame of mind. It is never enough to believe their opponents have committed honest mistakes or have legitimate purposes; they insist on believing in malicious conspiracies.

"The paranoid spokesman," Hofstadter wrote, "sees the fate of conspiracy in apocalyptic terms -- he traffics in the birth and death of whole worlds, whole political orders, whole systems of human values. He is always manning the barricades of civilization." Because his opponents are so evil, the conspiracy monger is never content with anything but their total destruction."

Brooks summarizes: "So some Democrats were not content with Libby's indictment, but had to stretch, distort and exaggerate. The tragic thing is that at the exact moment when the Republican Party is staggering under the weight of its own mistakes, the Democratic Party's loudest voices are in the grip of passions that render them untrustworthy."

Oct 29, 05 6:57 pm  · 
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nicomachean

[with emphasis]
It is never enough to believe their opponents have committed honest mistakes or have legitimate purposes; they insist on believing in malicious conspiracies.

Oct 29, 05 7:02 pm  · 
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e

that last statement is so true. we always tend to think the worst of people who have an opposing affiliation/belief. sad.

Oct 29, 05 7:05 pm  · 
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b3tadine[sutures]

perhaps if those in the seats of the industries of power were not mostly supportive of republicans perhaps my opinion of republicans and conspiracies would be different, but when you turn on the news and find that exxon-mobil raked in $10,000,000,000 in profits over the last quarter - during the wicked hurricanes - and all of the puffing about refinery capacity, low supplies and every other excuse my faith of those in control setting things right and doing the right thing is shaken.

Oct 29, 05 7:32 pm  · 
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Janosh

The Democrats could learn much from the charitable and understanding behavior of the Republicans during Clinton's second term.

Oct 29, 05 8:06 pm  · 
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b3tadine[sutures]

oh man is that funny!

Oct 29, 05 10:14 pm  · 
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liberty bell

You said it Janosh. Conspiracy theories work in both directions.

Oct 29, 05 10:42 pm  · 
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nicomachean

childish.

'they did it too!'

of course they did.

so why do you do it?

Oct 30, 05 12:16 am  · 
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Janosh

What is it that we are doing? Seems to me that the Republican party is getting a taste of its own medicine. Right or wrong, these are the rules that govern the two party system, and I have little sympathy for anyone who delighted in the sticky filth that Clinton was dragged through but now claims that Scooter Libby is a victim of politics. Tough shit.

Oct 30, 05 1:06 am  · 
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b3tadine[sutures]

you know what else is funny? why is that republicans are still running against Bill Clinton? he can't be re-elected, he has been out of office since Jan 21 2001 and he has pretty much kept out of the press - with the exception of a few jabs at bush2. so why? my thinking seems to lead me to this; by running a constant campaign against Clinton the repubs manage to shore up their base and limit the numbers of defections when things go bad - Libby, War, Lies, Economy, Environment, Oil, Big Business, Terror - and by doing this perpetual campaign the name Clinton is stuck in the collective consciousness and GOP can associate bad=Clinton, so that when Hill makes the run they can use the same old arguments against a Clinton white house.

I think that Hill may have to go back to her maiden name in order to run.

I also think that if you can't run on the good you did or are doing then you have nothing to say, like the republicans are doing now.

Oct 30, 05 8:40 am  · 
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spaceman

Isn't Judith Miller's moniker for Libby funny now: "A former White House staffer"

What I find appalling is that Bush and Cheney still praise Libbey. A guilty plea and a pardon are in the works.

Who says there is a conspiracy? It is just a bunch of ideologues living in a bubble of their own invention, making regrettable decisions.

Oct 31, 05 4:52 am  · 
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norm

secret ingredient...
"...Moral indeed...norm go smoke another you broken record...=)"
that's a fairly typical tactic for someone with no facts to support their argument - and oh-by-the-way exactly how libby got indicted. don't argue on the merits - make personal attacks. of course when you have no facts on your side your tactics are severly limited.

Oct 31, 05 7:34 am  · 
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nicomachean

not that i ever cared about this that much, beyond having suspicions of the seedy character of Joe Wilson and finding amusement that so many would blindly assign heroic status to such a slick salesman - but as it turns out...

"It's unfortunate that so many people took him seriously."

End of an Affair

Sep 1, 06 10:18 am  · 
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