Redstate

a little silly. Rampant speculation from both sides with a healthy serving of conspiracy theories, hold the facts.

FWIW, my take:

1. The evidence used to back up the "16 words" clearly wasn't sufficient at the time, and the WH admitted so. If in fact the yellowcake bit was "fake but accurate" that doesn't justify its use after the fact. This is the same logical error that so many liberals make with WMDs -- "we didn't find WMDs, so Bush lied!" You have to judge Bush on the WMD evidence available to him at the time; ditto for the uranium evidence.
   
   
2. You're in interesting company trying to parse Bush's statements, a bit of a dangerous game under the best of circumstances. Suffice it to say that Scott quite clearly stated that Rove was not involved, and that the WH at one time indicated it took the matter seriously.
   
   
3. Clearly his wife helped push the trip.
   
   
4. For heaven sakes, let's wait for further facts before going too crazy with the speculation.

President Bush on June 10, 2004, at news conference after G-8 Summit in Sea Island, Ga.

Q. Given recent developments in the C.I.A. leak case, particularly Vice President Cheney's discussions with the investigators, do you still stand by what you said several months ago, suggestion that it might difficult to identify anybody who leaked the agent's name? And ...

A. That's up ...

Q. And do you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found to have done so? And ...

A. Yes.

You assume that the one quote you have of the President is the only time he spoke on the matter.

Q: Given recent developments in the CIA leak case, particularly Vice President [Dick] Cheney's discussions with the investigators, do you still stand by what you said several months ago, a suggestion that it might be difficult to identify anybody who leaked the agent's name?

BUSH: That's up to --

Q: And, and, do you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found to have done so?

BUSH: Yes. And that's up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts.

I'd say that "Known Fact" hasn't been slayed.  

1. Wrong. The WH capitulated under media pressure, that was the mistake. The evidence for the statement "The British government has learned..." should be the British government telling you so. The statement was 100% factual. It's all the more offensive that the whole thing that got the WH to prematurely backpedal was the firestorm Wilson himself ignited with his lying.
   
2. You're right, Scott made the statement. Press secretaries make mistakes.

...but wasn't this a fun read! Puddin'head Joe is on his Sixteenth Minute, methinks.

And all because he wanted a job with a Kerry Administration....

Sheesh, the things liberals do.

Flyerhawk and Moderate Voice post the same talking point within minutes of each other. Hilarious.

By the way, his pledge was to fire anyone having committed a crime. Sure, that's not what I would have said, but the reporter restated his original statement.

Then the phrase "has learned" is different from the phrase "has claimed". We absolutely don't know if that is 100% factual.

Q: Given -- given recent developments in the CIA leak case, particularly Vice President Cheney's discussions with the investigators, do you still stand by what you said several months ago, a suggestion that it might be difficult to identify anybody who leaked the agent's name?

THE PRESIDENT: That's up to --

Q: And, and, do you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found to have done so?

THE PRESIDENT: Yes. And that's up to the U.S. Attorney to find the facts.

Hat tip goes to:  http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/004934.php

Comments made by Dafydd:

The first point that leaps out at me is that the last sentence indicates that Bush's "yes" was in fact answering the first question -- whether it would be difficult to find the source -- not the second about some "pledge" that in fact cannot seem to be located. The referrant of the word "that" in Bush's response cannot possibly be the pledge, unless Bush is suggesting that Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald should be trying to discover whether any such "firing promise" was made.

The second point is one that also went unnoticed by the commenter: the rather wide divergence between the "pledge" that Bush is said to have made, to "fire anyone found to have" "leaked the agent's name," and what Sen. Reid claimed yesterday that Bush had pledged: "The White House promised that if anyone was involved in the Valerie Plame affair, they would no longer be in this administration, his administration."

Even if such a pledge were made, Reid's statement was still a wild-eyed exaggeration of it.

So you have your standard your quote and other people have their's.  

I don't see how that means that one is a Known Fact.

If I say, "asscer has learned that Albert Gore got more votes in Florida than George W. Bush in 2000," and that turns out to be factually bogus, who is really culpable, here?

Now, in that case, you could actually make a much more reasonable case that I am to blame, since I'm relying on such a crappy source. However, citing the adamant conclusions of MI-6 is generally not considered reliance on crappy sources.

To see where this investigation leads...

Rove is in the clear, and Libby readily cooperated as well.  I wonder who might be the target?

That the source was either crappy or non-crappy. That isn't the issue. The issue your claim that is was 100% factual that "The British government has learned..." I don't believe we know that was 100% factual.

Do we know that to be 100% factual?

Again, I fully admit this is getting picky about words. But the whole point of this thread is word pickiness.

PS - Are you suggesting that the conclusions of MI-6 should be trusted on all matters? Cause we've heard some interesting thoughts from the head of MI-6 latetly :)

Well, here we go.

That the source was either crappy or non-crappy. That isn't the issue. The issue your claim that is was 100% factual that "The British government has learned..." I don't believe we know that was 100% factual.

Do we know that to be 100% factual?

If someone comes by some information that is false, and commits it to their memory, is it safe to say that, even though what they have learned is false, they have learned it?

Do we not say that people are capable of "learning" bad habits? A lot of people have "learned" plenty of things in U. S. History classes that are of dubious certainty (read any book on Joe McCarthy for example), but they've certainly learned them, whether they're true or not.

So, the issue of whether the claim itself was factual is irrelevant to whether the British government learned it. They claim, to this day, that the claim itself is true. I'd say it's something they've "learned." And when the Brits say, "we've learned that Iraq tried to purchase yellowcake from Niger", that is a definitely authoritative source for President Bush to say "The British government has learned that Iraq tried to purchase yellowcake from Niger."

PS - Are you suggesting that the conclusions of MI-6 should be trusted on all matters? Cause we've heard some interesting thoughts from the head of MI-6 latetly :)

Never think it, but he certainly is an authoritative source for what the British intelligence community has learned (whether they've learned true or false things).

Novak had a CIA contact that confirmed Plame's employment-they could be the target.

There is also Miller's contact.  There is absolutely no sane reason for Miller to go to jail, if Rove was her leak and he has freed her from having to keep it a secret.

There is also the possibility of other charges such as perjury, ostruction of justice, etc.

I think this case has taken far longer than a simple investigation into the charge of revealing a covert agent-considering Rove and Libbey have admitted their involvement, if that is all this was, it would have already been over a year ago.  

And if there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. And if the person has violated law, the person will be taken care of.

It seems to me that he didn't pledge to "fire" anybody. That's the reporter putting words in his mouth and the President (as he often does) engaging his mouth a microsecond before his brain.

He did promise to "take care of", i.e. in this context, it clearly means "punish" whoever made the leak ... if the person broke the law.

So, no ... I think the Known Fact is still pretty much dead.

This is almost too tedious to even mention, but there is a sense in which learning implies acquiring of knowledge rather than memorization of propositions.  The most standard prerequisites for knowledge include the proposition being believed by the agent, the agent's ability to offer an explanation for that belief, and the belief actually being true for the reasons expressed.

In this sense you couldn't acquire knowledge that the Earth is the fifth planet from the Sun-- since it's not true.  Similarly,  British intelligence can't gain knowledge of Iraqi ambitions in Africa when it admits that it doesn't know whether or not it's true.  You can't learn something you don't know.  British intelligence certainly coudl have believed it though, which would have been a better choice of words.

However, even if we want to take an RBC leap and assume that he meant the person would be fired after they got thrown in jail (as if that wasn't painfully obvious), we are still left with the rather obvious problem that Bush prefaced his statement with a rather important qualifier, "If they broke the law."

President Bush on June 10, 2004:

QUESTION: Given recent developments in the CIA leak case, particularly Vice President Cheney's discussions with the investigators, do you still stand by what you said several months ago, suggesting that it might be difficult to identify anybody who leak the agent's name? And do you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found to have done so?

BUSH: Yes. And that's up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts.

(Emphasis added.)

Now, we can pick this apart in Clintonian "meaning of 'is'" fashion all day, but my reading is that Bush promised to fire whoever leaked and left it to the investigation to figure out who it was.

It amazes me how often you guess attack the poster here.  What is my M.O. this time?

flyerhawk and Moderate voice already posted this talking point.

this is the 3rd time this same quote has been posted, but this time it has a different format.  The formatting of the quote seems to make a great deal of difference.  I wonder which is the correct format?

first two times.

Also, considering the rest of Bush's answer referenced the fact that Fitzgerald finds you can infer that he means "where a crime has been committed" not the reporter's less specific paraphrase.

What is equally clear, however, is that Wilson's claim that Cheney authorized the trip is also false

For what it's worth TPM disagrees with the claim that Wilson claimed Cheney authorized his trip, and reprints the part of the interview where JW specifically says Cheney didn't send him.

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_07_10.php#006082

I jumped to reply before reading the existing discussion.  Mea culpa.

In any case, I think the "only if a crime" reading is kind of a stretch.

Tangentially, I could gripe here about how politicians are generally difficult to parse in a way that everyone can agree on, but that's kind of like griping that water is wet.

Anyway, sorry again about the duplication.

if he had done something illegal.  Which I'm not sure he did.

But I wish I had that same criteria for evaluation at my job :)

t.h.

Whether or not what Rove did was illegal is kind of beside the point. What he did was unethical. This kind of behavior wasn't tolerated by his father, but apparently it doesn't bother W.

Sounds like we're debating what the meaning of the word "is" is.

Because the quote was pretty readily at hand.

The update clears it up.  It's always better when slaying a known fact to have the most direct quote possible.  I'm only happy to provide the direct quote.

I do agree that it seems that the "earlier pledge" is in regards to having broken the law.

There is also this quote where McClellan is saying outright that nobody at the White House had anything to do with this:

 MR. McCLELLAN: -- that suggests White House involvement. There are anonymous reports all the time in the media. The President has set high standards, the highest of standards for people in his administration. He's made it very clear to people in his administration that he expects them to adhere to the highest standards of conduct. If anyone in this administration was involved in it, they would no longer be in this administration.

So, he may be speaking out of turn here.  He should have made it clearer that this would be at the end of a criminal prosecution, not at the admission of "involvement".

We're a long way from where I'd ask for Rove's resignation.  But we ARE in the area where McClellan went way, way out on a limb to defend Rove.  

unethicalness of it.

Had Rove called Cooper and offered the information, I might feel differently, but from what I know at this point, it sounds more like Rove responding with information that impeaches the veracity of a source (Wilson) to a reporter, telling said reporter not to put too much stock in the source (Wilson) and lising a couple of reasons why (Wilson lied about who sent him to Niger, and that there was other information coming out that would disagree with Wilson's assertions).

I am willing to go with unwise, and I think that I will go with unethical if Rove had McClellan go out and lie for him (either McClellan was told to lie, or McClellan was lying to protect Rove-we may or may not find out that answer).  But I am not sure if that deserves firing-I figure Bush is best suited to decide whether or not Rove should go at this point.  When there is more information I may feel differently.

The criteria for firing Rove is and always has not been "involvement" or "guilt".

The criteria is "too much of a political liability."

If Rove gets too hot to handle, the President may decide that dropping him is better than sticking with him.

It's sad, because it's not the way the American system is supposed to work.

Most likely he will take a "sabbatical" until he's exonerated.

I agree that McClellan has contributed to a lot of the controversy with those ill-chosen comments, there - but then, I'm willing to cut the guy some slack. Being the WH press secretary is one of the most difficult jobs on planet earth, especially for a President as despised by the Media as this one is. It's natural to expect that under the constant onslaught that McClellan takes sometimes, he would make some mistakes.

is one of the most difficult jobs ever, and your words always come back to bite you.

Either McClellan was told to lie, or the truth was kept from him, and he lied without knowing, or he was speaking out his rear end at times, and didn't have the facts.

I am going with a or b on this one, only because you only speak out your rear for so long without knowing the facts, and at some point McClellan would have gotten some.

But overall this is where what went down is bad.  It makes the administration look bad, and it makes McClellen either look bad or like a patsy.

Either way this case throws a lot of mud on the administratoin.

Was supposed to work in a manner that people were sacked the moment they were accused of any wrongdoing, regardless of the veracity of those accusations?

You and I had some very different U. S. Civics teachers.

At worst, Rove stands accused of calling a reporter and saying, "This source you're using? You might not want to go to the mattresses for him. He's a liar."

This is unethical in what universe?

Many states allow people to be "sacked" for absolutely no reason at all. Just like you can quit for any reason.

Certainly, you can be sacked for any number of reasons, none of which have to do with lawbreaking. Even arch-demon Karl Rove is subject to this.

However, the point of the original poster was that in the "American System", Bush would somehow have been required to fire Rove by now.

This wasn't an isolated comment - there are (at least) two sources and six reporters involved.  What we now know is just that Rove was one of those sources, not the full extent of who talked to whom.

As for who the liar is, I guess we don't know.  Either: Rove lied to Bush and McClellan; Rove and Bush lied to McClellan; Rove and McClellan lied to Bush and the press; or Rove, Bush, and McClellan lied to the press.  It seems like if Rove lied to Bush, Bush ought to fire him for lying to him.  It's pretty much a no-brainer that you need to be able to trust someone in Rove's position.

at best Rove is accused of calling a reporter and saying Wilson a liar. At worst he's accused of breaking the law.

it would be at best Rove was called by a reporter and answered his questions regarding Wilson with the comment about Plame.  At . . .

What is equally clear, however, is that Wilson's claim that Cheney authorized the trip is also false...

Actually, the falsehood is that Wilson ever claimed that Cheney explicitly authorized his trip.  Wilson has claimed -- and no one has disputed -- that Cheney's office had questions about the authenticity of the report and requested the CIA to obtain further information.

Self-righteous arguments based on narrow technicalities were a staple of partisan debate long before Bill Clinton quibbled about the definition of "is," so I certainly don't want to begrudge you your fun.  Still, unless you are attempting deliberate self-satire, you should probably make sure that smug, condescending criticisms of your opponent's strict factual accuracy, are themselves factually accurate.

-- Winston

I meant what I said.

Rove's conduct, in the worst possible light, amounts to contacting a reporter and warning said reporter not to over-invest himself in a particular source, given concerns about that source's credibility.

That may be shown to amount to a crime, but it's hardly ipso facto unethical, any more than violating any other arbitrary bureaucratic edict handed down by the legislature is ipso facto unethical.

...but as a former member of the "intelligence community" (TM), and one who had trusted the White House's protestations of non-involvement, I'm not happy about the way this is moving at all.

A poorly-advised and politically-motivated leak is bad enough, but to pretend for so long that you had absolutely nothing to do with it is reprehensible.

The American System I'm referring to is "innocent until proven guilty."  When I said I was sad above, it was because I fear that Rove will be let go before a jury makes that decision, if it comes at all.

Right now, Rove is facing heat more from innuendo than facts, and that's nonsense.

Of course, that's about par in American politics.

Sincerest apologies.

I realize I'm new here.  I want folks to understand where I'm coming from.

Huh, I just found this (quote below):

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/10/20031006-5.html

Doesn't this count as words from the WH? It kinda says that the President will fire a leaker of classified information.

I think this might have been tied to previous issues with leaked classified information, and that Bush was mad that Congress might have leaked some stuff that was classified. I can certainly understand why that would piss him off, he mentioned that we were at war and this kind of stuff was not good - and I agree.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/10/20011010-9.html#Intelligenc
e

But I could be wrong, I'm kinda catching up on this.

-G

Q Scott, the President just expressed his desire to get to the bottom of this CIA leak issue. And he said he wanted to hold accountable whoever was responsible --

MR. McCLELLAN: Absolutely.

Q -- responsible for this. But can you confirm that the President would fire anyone on his staff found to have leaked classified information?

MR. McCLELLAN: I think I made that very clear last week. The topic came up, and I said that if anyone in this administration was responsible for the leaking of classified information, they would no longer work in this administration. This is a very serious matter. The President made it very clear just a short time ago in the East Room, and he has always said that leaking of classified information is a serious matter. And that's why he wants to get to the bottom of this. And the sooner we get to the bottom of it, the better.

I have to agree here, McClellan's job is very tough, and certainly he will make mistakes.

It's weird that given the situation, and the current situation, that no one in the WH has cleared this up yet.

But, I can also understand them keeping quiet until the investigation comes out - I wouldn't want to step into any legal issues either. In fact I would have commented even less than they have already.

The reporter called Rove about another subject. At the end of the conversation Cooper threw into the mix the question about Wilson. Rove didn't have a list of reporters to call and burn Wilson. He was trying to rebut a story that he was being asked about, and never mentioned THAT WOMAN by name.

Certainly telling someone that a story might not be a good story is not in itself unethical, but you seem to be missing something:  dropping the identity of an undercover CIA operative during a conversation with a reporter IS at best unethical.

The reporter didn't have clearance for such information and it looks like Rove gave it to him.

she was undercover at the CIA.  It is yet to be known whether or not Rove was aware that she was more than just a day jobber at the CIA.  

There isn't anything unethical about saying somebody works at the CIA, the issue is whether or not he knew she was/had been a covert operative, and how he came by that information.

If he thought she was just another government beaurocrat at the CIA and had pushed her husband for the job, I don't see an ethical violation here.  If he was aware of her covert past, then we can talk ethics.

I'm trying to find the quote that this matches

What is equally clear, however, is that Wilson's claim that Cheney authorized the trip is also false

I found a quote that claims differently:

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0308/03/le.00.html

BLITZER: I know you were sent to go on this mission long before the State of the Union Address. When Condoleezza Rice, the president's national security adviser, was on this program a few weeks ago, on July 13th, I asked her about your mission. Listen to this exchange I had with her.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. CONDOLEEZZA RICE, NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISER: I didn't know Joe Wilson was going to Niger. And if you look in Director Tenet's statement, it says that counter-proliferation experts, on their own initiative, sent Joe Wilson. So, I don't know...

BLITZER: Who sent him?

RICE: Well, it was certainly not at a level that had anything to do with the White House.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Is that true?

WILSON: Well, look, it's absolutely true that neither the vice president nor Dr. Rice nor even George Tenet knew that I was traveling to Niger.

What they did, what the office of the vice president did, and, in fact, I believe now from Mr. Libby's statement, it was probably the vice president himself...

BLITZER: Scooter Libby is the chief of staff for the vice president.

WILSON: Scooter Libby.

They asked essentially that we follow up on this report -- that the agency follow up on the report. So it was a question that went to the CIA briefer from the Office of the Vice President. The CIA, at the operational level, made a determination that the best way to answer this serious question was to send somebody out there who knew something about both the uranium business and those Niger officials that were in office at the time these reported documents were executed.

I also find it interesting that earlier in that transcript Wilson says he believes Iraq has WMD. But, his argument was with "the threshold test of imminent threat to our own national security or even the test of grave and gathering danger. "  

You're making three rather enormous predicate assumptions, here:

(1) That Plame was, in fact, an undercover CIA operative.

(2) That Rove knew that she was an undercover CIA operative.

(3) That Rove went ahead and blew her cover anyway.

If all three of these conditions were demonstrably true, then what Rove did was arguably unethical. It'd go a ways towards a showing of bad faith -- though I'm sure that the liberals who consider Deep Throat a hero would admit evidence of Karl's higher motives on the ethics question, yes?

But you have a problem, because these things are merely Known Facts -- which is to say that they are articles of faith on your side of the partisan divide, and not actual facts. In reality, the idea that Valerie Plame was "covert" in any meaningful sense doesn't even pass the laugh test, and if you can't get over that elemental hump, the rest doesn't matter.

some time ago?

I get what you are saying now. What the President actually said....

Sorry! I guess McClellan screwed up in his response.

Instead of fired he should have said, "that person will be dealt with" so the reporters could have asked "what does that mean" if it confused them. Come to think of it, I guess if they were confused they should have asked then. I wonder how many thought "oh, that means fired" and how many thought "oh that means put in jail, 'cause he broke the law".

You're making three rather enormous predicate assumptions, here:

(1) That Plame was, in fact, an undercover CIA operative.

(2) That Rove knew that she was an undercover CIA operative.

(3) That Rove went ahead and blew her cover anyway.

Ah. You are right; although there is some evidence that she was a spy, false addresses that seem to be used by the CIA, ex-cia people saying she was, etc., perhaps I should not jump too far ahead, eh?

So what you're saying is that it is OK to have a guy at the top of our government who blurts out the country's secrets when a reporter calls him - identifying covert operatives who are tracking down who is trying to sell WMD to terrorists, thereby destroying the entire operation as well as the identity of her CIA cover company thereby exposing all the other agents working there.  (Was she in the country at the time, or was her life put at risk, too?)  AND we do not know how many informants were killed, but they certainly are "rolled up" now and ineffective.

And, by the way, Rove did not have "need to know" that Wilson's wife was CIA.  Who told him?  Who TOLD a guy like that - a guy capable at the very least of blurting such a thing out to a reporter?

This is serious stuff and people risk their lives.  They were trying to track down loose nukes, nerve agents, things like that.  Rove (and others?) BLEW HER COVER!

In 1991, the acting U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Joe Wilson, sheltered 800 Americans at the embassy in Baghdad during Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait.  (Click for the link.)

THAT is who you are smearing here.

His wife was a CIA operative who was trying to track down terrorist attempts to acquire WMD.  THAT is who you are smearing here.

Rove's leak - deliberate or not - blew her operation, exposed here, burned her network of informants, and exposed her over company.

THAT is what we are talking about here.

You really ought to think about this.

We've discussed all this ad nauseam over the last three days, and while many of our contentions are disputed, you are wandering past the disputed area of our contentions, past the areas on which there is general consensus, and into Democrat talking points.

I've read through your comment history here, and you get consistently troll-rated for good reason, and that is that you are contributing nothing to the substantive discussion at hand. No more Known Facts, capiche?

Before this one was posted, I won't eject you for this. But neither will I let this idiocy stand.

Do you know what the purpose of a flippin' embassy is? When we go to war against a country (or just in everyday ordinary run of life), kind of the whole point of having an embassy in that country is to provide a safe haven for our citizens there during times of peril. The fact that Wilson did his job as an Ambassador and allowed AMericans to stay in the American Embassy is not exactly the same as saying that he's Daniel Boone.

It would be worth your time to remember that Wilson has been discredited as a lying partisan hack about virtually everything he said after returning from his trip.

So it's OK to say Wilson's wife was CIA, as long as the reporter called him and not the other way around?  That's OK for someone at the top of our government?

These people put their lives at risk and count on our leaders to put people in place who can keep a secret.  And to put other people in place hat won't tell people like Rove that someone is CIA or not.  He had no need to know.

Novak's column blew a CIA operation to track down weapons of mass destruction that might get into the hands of terrorists.  It blew her network of informants and we do not know how many of them have been kiled because of that.  But it certainly harmed the CIA's efforts to track down WMD.

so far with what is known, those elements haven't been met.

You threaten to eject people for pointing out a man's honorable service to the country?  The guy was Ambassador to Iraq under Reagan!  Saying THAt is grounds for rejection?

Pointing out that his wife was serving in the CIA, tracking down terrorist efforts to obtain WMD is grounds for REJECTION?

Posting Democrat talking points is grounds for ejection.

Saying that we are all "smearing" this incredible saint Wilson, when in fact we are pointing out that the man is a pathological liar and partisan hack besides, is rank trollery, and thusly also grounds for rejection.

Excessive usage of all caps is highly irritating to me, and might possibly be grounds for ejection if I'm awake too much longer.

talking point that is the problem.

Since you are all concerned about the outing of Plame, just curious but were you equally incensed at the outing of Aero another front company for the CIA that was given up by confidential sources to the NYTimes?  This front company among others was working hard in the War on Terror, but the NYTimes felt it was justified and ethical in printin a story on it.

I wonder how many covert operatives had their lives put at risk.

Plame is hardly in the closet. She's out there and people know it. Plame is behind trying to get her husband a job with the CIA. She's using nepotism to get him some work. Plame blew her own cover when she agitated for a job for her honey. Then her honey, who so likes being the center of attention starts screeching about GWB and Niger and the same old. But the deal is: he's lying. So Wilson is lying and saying Cheney wanted him. And Cooper asked Rove what was up with that? And Rove says, bad story, Dick Chaney no tell Wilson to go. Wilson's wife with CIA, she say go. Wilson story no true.

So the story is, No implication here that she's covert CIA. She's hardly acting in a covert way when she's pushing her hubbie for a little jobbie. Been slim picken's since the Clintons left town. Rove gives no indication that he knew Plame was covert. Knew she worked for the CIA. She was not the focus of the story. Didn't mention her by name. The focus of the story was, Cooper Story Bad--Joe Lied, Don't run with it if you don't want to be embarrassed. Wilson is a political hack that is trying to bet back into the circles that might actually get him a Vanity Fair cover.

Much ado about nothing. And still we turn our heads to the oil for food scandal and the corrupt governments that wouldn't approve a war with Iraq after 17 resolutions.

This is what happens when you let the nasty little bureaucrats run amock!

Just Me, if I'd been involved in this conversation from the start, I'd have ejected him several posts ago.

"Saying that we are all "smearing" this incredible saint Wilson, when in fact we are pointing out that the man is a pathological liar and partisan hack besides"

heh

"Excessive usage of all caps is highly irritating to me, and might possibly be grounds for ejection if I'm awake too much longer."

Agreed.

To be clear, it is not a "talking point."  I really am incensed that people would try to rationalize this.  I think people who try to excuse leaking something as important as this - intentionally or not - should think about their motivations.  These people put their lives at risk and deserve better.

"the corrupt governments that wouldn't approve a war with Iraq"

Yeah, they're looking real dumb about now, aren't they?

Q. Do you think that the Justice Department can conduct an impartial investigation, considering the political ramifications of the CIA leak, and why wouldn't a special counsel be better?

The President. Yes. Let me just say something about leaks in Washington. There are too many leaks of classified information in Washington. There's leaks at the executive branch; there's leaks in the legislative branch. There's just too many leaks, And if there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. And if the person has violated law, the person will be taken care of.

And so I welcome the investigation. I'm absolutely confident that the Justice Department will do a very good job. There's a special division of career Justice Department officials who are tasked with doing this kind of work. They have done this kind of work before in Washington this year. I have told our administration--people in my administration to be fully cooperative.

I want to know the truth. If anybody has got any information, inside our administration or outside our administration, it would be helpful if they came forward with the information so we can find out whether or not these allegations are true and get on about the business.

Yes, let's see, Kemper [Bob Kemper, Chicago Tribune]. He's from Chicago. Where are you? Are you a Cubs or White Sox fan? [Laughter] Wait a minute. That doesn't seem fair, does it? [Laughter]

Q. Yesterday we were told that Karl Rove had no role in it.

The President. Yes.

Q. Have you talked to Karl, and do you have confidence in him--

The President, Listen, I know of nobody--I don't know of anybody in my administration who leaked classified information. If somebody did leak classified information, I'd like to know it, and we'll take the appropriate action. And this investigation is a good thing.

And again I repeat, you know, Washington is a town where there's all kinds of allegations. You've heard much of the allegations. And if people have got solid information, please come forward with it. And that would be people inside the information who are the so-called anonymous sources, or people outside the information--outside the administration. And we can clarify this thing very quickly if people who have got solid evidence would come forward and speak out. And I would hope they would. And then we'll get to the bottom of this and move on.

But I want to tell you something, leaks of classified information are a bad thing. And we've had them--there's too much leaking in Washington. That's just the way it is. And we've had leaks out of the administrative branch, had leaks out of the legislative branch, and out of the executive branch and the legislative branch, and I've spoken out consistently against them, and I want to know who the leakers are.

Thank you.

Link

Now, perhaps the appropriate action for one who leaked classified information is no action at all.  But I don't think thats an impartial assessment.

I hope there's a gap between the two.

As to the first point, that is what I thought when I first read that quotes.  That he was responding to the first question.

But then I noticed that he was picking up where he left off.

Q: Given -- given recent developments in the CIA leak case, particularly Vice President Cheney's discussions with the investigators, do you still stand by what you said several months ago, a suggestion that it might be difficult to identify anybody who leaked the agent's name?

THE PRESIDENT: That's up to --

Q: And, and, do you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found to have done so?

THE PRESIDENT: Yes. And that's up to the U.S. Attorney to find the facts.

So, FWIW, it is my opinion that the "Yes" is in response to the additional question, and the rest is the response to the first question.  I could be wrong, but I think that it is a reasonable assertion.  Maybe watching the clip would tell you for sure.  If they are talking over one another, then it becomes less reasonable.

As for your second point, unfortunately you are wrong there, because the WH did say exaclty that through McClellan (last line of the article:

McClellan took exception to suggestions that the leak was intended to punish Wilson for speaking out.

"If someone in this administration leaked classified information, they will no longer be a part of this administration, because that's not the way this White House operates," he said.

sorry

That may be the case, but the public can be a funny thing.  They might not see the distinction.  It might just look weasely.

I'm just saying that it is defensable, but politics isn't always about being right.

Ultimately, it doesn't matter until the Grand Jury is done.  Maybe by then it won't seem like such a hot issue.

WILSON: Well, look, it's absolutely true that neither the vice president nor Dr. Rice nor even George Tenet knew that I was traveling to Niger.

If Cheney didn't know that he was going to Niger, how could he have had anything to do with authorizing it?  So, I guess that would be the quote.  If Wilson thought that, he can't have claimed that Cheney authorized it.

Somebody educate me.  Why is this important?  I missed this arc.  What is at issue here?

Which statement is being argued?

The fact that Wilson claimed that Cheney authorized the trip is false

or

That Wilson made a false claim that Cheney authorized the trip

I don't see where Wilson makes that claim.  I see the opposite.  He said that Cheney didn't know.  So I agree with the first statement.  I just don't see why it matters.

Help me.

I am afraid it will sound like a talking point.  To be honest, up front, I don't know the chronology (and don't feel like digging it up right now, sorry), so you are welcome to correct me, but...

About the 16 words, and Wilson's report, or whatever intelligence we had.  It may be correct to say that "The British learned..." but if we had other information at the time that discredited or contradicted that assertion, then it cannot be defended, just because it was phrased in a way that happened to contain no open falsehoods.  That is misleading and deceitful.  No matter what.

Of course, I made some assumptions about what we knew at the time.  But if it is true, it was willful.  I am kind of afraid to take it to the next step from there.  I want to give you a chance to prove me wrong first.

comment.

Also there is that big "if" there.

Once again we are back to just how Rove et al got their information.

Wilson's trip obviously wasn't classified, or he coulnd't have been writing about it.

Plame's employment is said to have been wellknown in Beltway circles.  If that is the source, then it is hard to say it was classified information that was leaked.  Especially since not all CIA employees are classified and apparantly the CIA contact was more than happy to confirm employment to a reporter.

... that it's only illegal or unethical if Plame had been undercover less than five years before her supposed "outing."

Considering that it seems that the fact that she worked at Langley was rather well-known in the DC Cocktail circuit, her subsequent posing for pictures in magazines, and her husband publishing her name and employer on his website prior to all this, I am not so convinced that she was actually outed by anybody except herself.

Why don't we just wait for the Grand Jury to be done with this and then we can choose to take off Rove's head ... or give him a medal?

that Cheney ordered the trip before the whole Plame issue came out, part of impeaching Wilson was letting the reporters know that Wilson wasn't sent by Cheney, and Cheney wasn't even aware of the trip, and the report Cheney got didn't have Wilson's name attached to it at all.

That interview is from August 8 after the Plame story broke-at that point Wilson was arguing that his wife had absolutely nothing at all to do with him being sent to Niger (which we now know was a lie) but he backed off his Cheney claim to what in reality is probably the truth.

I think his earlier claims/impressions were more an attempt to make the trip look more important than it was-saying "CHeney wanted somebody to go investigate" sounds more "sexy" than "Cheney had a question about a report, so the guys at the CIA thought sending me to look into it would be the best way to find his answers."

What I can't find is his original Meet the Press interview.  All I get are later dates.

For some reason your second point that included Reid's comment is missing.  But I remember it sounding verbatim from McClellan's quote.

It makes me cringe to put so much emphasis on the "if."  I don't know what you mean.  He either did or he didn't.  He was Cooper's source, so that means he did.

Maybe you are trying to parse what the meaning of "leak" is?  I can see your point then.  Was it technically a leak, if everyone knew it?  Good point.

Unfortunately, I don't think that the public is going to make that distiction.  That puts Bush and Rove in a tight spot.  Bush because of what McClellan said, and Rove because he was so adamant that he had nothing to do with it.  I can see how (in his mind) he may not have.  But that isn't how it looks at the moment to the public in general.

I think the bottom line is that, given the facts, it is easier to understand the leak argument than it is all the explaination and word parsing that is involved to say that Rove did not really leak it, and Bush doesn't have to take action.  Besides.  People love a scandal.

for explaining that.

Isn't it, Leon H.?  I mean it's your site, but this "I'm going to take my ball and go home!" business is pretty pathetic on a site that, for a while at least, actually hosted some pretty vigorous debate.

Rather than continuing this campaign to tarnish the very words "known" and "fact", attempting to reduce all knowledge to a hierarchy of opinions based on their partisan genesis, and doing your best to intimidate or silence those who dare challenge your own assumptions, why don't you actually, you know, make a case that can stand on its own two feet?

Even if we accept all your allegations about Wilson and Plame, that they were despicable liars with a political agenda to undermine the effort to invade Iraq (a tough sell in itself, given the nonexistance of an active nuclear weapons program in Iraq, the forged documents, etc.) and even if we assume that what Karl Rove admits he did was not technically illegal (which has the added virtue of possibly being true), can you not see that this sort of thing is very damaging to our covert intelligence services?  Would you want to risk your life doing undercover intelligence work, knowing that at any moment an administration official could drop your identity to a newspaper columnist on double-super-secret background to score a political point, and that the President would tolerate this action?

Even leaving the national security questions aside, if Wilson was so very wrong, why didn't the administration just pony up some evidence to prove it in the marketplace of ideas?  Why did they go after his wife?  Doesn't this violate pretty much every grown-up moral code in the book?  Do you think there is anything honorable about calling someone's wife "fair game" in a public political dispute with the husband?  If someone did this to your wife, how would you respond?

And this is not even to address the fact that either Rove lied to the administration, or the administration lied to us.  "Ridiculous" is the word Scott McClellan used to describe the suggestion that Rove was involved in the leak, and he explicitly said he'd spoken to Rove about it.  He was unambiguous.  If the administration is to regain a shred of credibility, someone has to go, and Bush doesn't need to wait for the results of the investigation to know who did the lying.  Yet they are all still drawing salaries paid for with my tax dollars and yours.  What conclusions can we draw from this?  (Hint:  it doesn't have anything to do with Wilson's credibility, or Plame's covert status, or the technical truth of the 16 Words.)

continuously post talking points. Leon asked you to behave. Take it or leave it, your commentary isn't as highly valued as you would seem to think.

In case you haven't noticed, I've spent copious amounts of time on this site over the last few days refuting his (and your) drivel. Because I put my stuff on the front page, it attracts your fellow Kossacks like flies.

Now let me tell you about a not-so-clever trick they have learned, and you can tell me whether you're involved in it. Whenever I (or any other editor) posts something factual that the Kossacks disagree with, about thirty of them come over here screaming the exact same talking points over and over. I, and others (like Just Me) try to respond as best we can to the first five or six, but after a while, you realize that it's a waste of time to respond to the same talking point from 30 different people. So, in keeping with the purpose of this site (that is, NOT being a place for Democrat talking points), you tell person number 30, "Tell me something new, or get lost."

That person goes screaming back to dKos about how the RedStaters can't handle debate. Color me thoroughly unimpressed.

whole affair is that it never ever came across to me as an attempt to go after his wife.

It always seemed like it was what it appears to be, an attempt to impeach the varacity of Wilson, and in the end their impeachment was correct and the criticism deserved.  I am especially bothered by the fact that Wilson overblew his role in the whole thing-in reality his name was never even attached to a report and the CIA interpreted his findings as something other than he said they were, and Wilson did it as a hit piece on the president.

If the liberals had their way, the WH wouldn't and shouldn't have impeached Wilson at all, and they should have let him continue to do the talk show circuit spreading basically what amounted to half truths and outright lies.

He continued to deny his wife had any involvement up until the senate produced the information that he had been lying.  Now you can excuse the lie in the begining-it is always possible that Wilson wasn't aware of his wifes involvement, but considering they were married you would think at some point she could have said "well actually honey, I did verbally recommend you to my fellow agents, and wrote a memo reccommending you to my superiors" but that didn't happen.

I am not sure it was wise to mention Wilson's wife, and the extent of the damage isn't fully known (the one non partisan article I found on Brewster Jennings indicated that it was not meant to be used as a cover for foreign agents, and that Plame would have been given a stronger cover, if/when travelling overseas), but is it any less damaging than CIA employees leaking to the press the names of other CIA cover businesses that are operating in the WOT?

Here is the link:

http://powerlineblog.com/archives/011019.php

If you think they are different ethically explain why?  And if they aren't, then write your senator and ask why they haven't been investigating this?

why don't you actually, you know, make a case that can stand on its own two feet?

The term Known Fact refers to something that is widely quoted by persons of the Kossack persuasion. The significance of a Known Fact is that every Kossack in the forest feels that it is his or her duty to come over here and let us know what the latest talking point is.

OK, we'll put up with that... a few times. But after the eighth or tenth time some Kossack wants us to "refute" the Same Old Song or admit that we're afraid of your talking point and want to censor you, we've had it.

Kos is these days a veritable fountain of wonderful talking points about this Wilson/Plame business. How many times do you expect us to listen to the same rant? How many times are we supposed to "refute" or "debate" the same list of claims?

Whatever number it is, once we're sick of it, any more of the same ones are going to get tossed in The Pile. And if you don't like it, too bad. Kossacks are not going to take over our site with endless repetitions of the same thing.

linking back to the original refutation.

I've missed it.  Mind linking to refresh my memory?

you'd had a discussion. You haven't. You've posted talking points until we're tired.

that some of those "talking points" are actually logical questions about perceived holes in your argument.  I've been reading your posts over the past few days, particularly on this issue, and you've been using this "one bite at the apple" thing as a crutch to threaten and even ban some folks who have asked quite reasonable questions.  If you can't handle people questioning your ideas and opinions, maybe this isn't the appropriate pastime for you (and this is not a suggestion that you stop blogging, but rather that you lighten up).

And if this really is about weeding out trolls, I can say that from here it looks like you are doing an atrocious job of separating the wheat from the chaff.

Of course, the usual disclaimer:  this is your site to drag down if that is really what you want.

Also, as I told Streiff, I'm unable to recall where we tangled before.  What "drivel" are you referring to?

Leon gave me a banning warning in comment #87.  Yours is #86.  Are we dealing with some sort of relativistic space-time distortion here, or are you referring to a different warning?  Or are you mistaking me for another commenter?

have equal holes, but I haven't seen too many caveats on those.

Those holes have been addressed as well-maybe you should actually read some of the responses.

There are certainly some things in this case that nobody knows the answers to, and some answers can't be given until those are actual real facts.

use the word "drivel" I haven't the vaguest idea where you got it.

And having the arrogance to think that giving you the heave-ho would do anything but raise the level of discourse simply beggars the imagination.

But you are Leon's problem not mine.

Check #58. And yes there is a space time distortion as I am dealing with you. We're done.

he got it from Leon (#87):

I've spent copious amounts of time on this site over the last few days refuting his (and your) drivel

and was replying to Leon when he asked #93):

What "drivel" are you referring to?

Leon H. wrote in the post to which I was responding:  "In case you haven't noticed, I've spent copious amounts of time on this site over the last few days refuting his (and your) drivel."

And having the arrogance to think that giving you the heave-ho would do anything but raise the level of discourse simply beggars the imagination.

It is astounding how personal attacks, explicitly forbidden in the posting rules, are so selectively enforced at this site.  Yours isn't even close to the worst, of course, because there is always the third or fourth round in any discussion with Thomas (even I've admittedly been known to respond in kind to some of his more egregious slurs, but I guess the rank hypocrisy of only banning me under those circumstances would have been too obvious).  You'd almost think the posting rules are just a fig leaf.  In any case, good job bringing that extra touch of class to the site.

opinion.

I'm sure it's worth something to someone somewhere.

Don't post a factually incorrect claim and then slink away.  I was nice, and gave you an out on this, twice.  Now read the name on the parent comment of #58 the comment that earned that warning and admit you were wrong.

Or is very arrangement of the characters on this site now a "Known Fact" to be dismissed as biased?

we're done.

opportunity to stop by and poke you in the eye. You're oh, so entertaining - especially the whining - and only remain here thanks to a tangential relationship to an editor. It certainly isn't for your reasoned debate skills.

Ok, look, I'm a fellow lefty. I post horrible and conniving things about the president at Daily Kos. I agree with you that what Rove did -- even just the part that's generally agreed upon -- was rather low.

But for the most part you're just saying, "my speculation on the unknown is better than yours!" Which is, of course ridiculous.

Even if it wasn't ridiculous, even if you were well-founded in your arguments, they aren't getting anywhere because they're overly broad and overly antagonistic. Clogging up this thread with acrimonious complaints that they don't want their assumptions challenged isn't going to win them over you know.

Anyway, enough is enough.

And clarity, at least, is something.

Leave him out of it.  I'll be pulling no strings.  I've requested no bans, and I'll accept no immunity.  Your posting rules explicitly give you the option of banning me, since dissent is considered "disruptive behavior" (but you don't ban on ideology, of course).  If you want to "purge" me and keep those of your ideological brethren who tell obvious falsehoods and make personal attacks whenever argument fails them, it's your sewer to swim in, krempasky.

And I'm genuinely pleased to know that you were anxious to ban me back then, too.  Oh, right.  You personally attacked me in that incident.  That explains a lot about your standards for RedState.

Frankly, I stand by that other comment - the pile of clay is WAY more clever, and you prove your unpleasantness rather regularly. If that's a personal attack, I suggest Kleenex. The one's with lotion.

I think you'll have to do something really outrageous to outweigh the value of having you embarass yourself here on such a regular basis.

Exactly one person for rolling out talking points last night, and he was given three separate warnings.

Now, I've been willing to admit throughout this ordeal that I'm capable of making mistakes, and have frankly admitted the making of actual mistakes as well.

davej, on the other hand was just wandering into moonbattery and wouldn't stop, so I squelched him. Whenever someone has something worthwhile to contribute to a discussion, I'll listen. When they mistakenly assume that they've arrived at dKos, I help them find their way back home.

But I believe in minimal standards of polite discourse.  I think they make for better discussion.  Do you disagree?

And dishonesty is best met with scorn.

to jump in here. Streiff made an error of fact and was none too polite about doing so. Tag team much?

That we only keep you around for the amusement factor. From your Quixote-like charges to your contentless posts to your ability to regurgitate silliness at will, you're a non-stop laugh riot.

I see your ability to read clear English remains razor-sharp.

As to the rest: Golly, it's like life ain't fair or something. Go figure.

And pull them out at random, regardless of the comment to which you are responding?  You'd better start mixing it up, or folks are going to begin to suspect you are not actually a real person at all, but rather a badly-written Perl script on the RedState webserver, spouting "Straw Man!", "Quixote!", and "Reading Comprehension!" at random intervals regardless of context.

And yes, that life isn't fair justifies treating people unfairly.  Jesus said something along those lines, I think:  "Do unto others as they would do unto you if they thought they could get away with it."

Largely, I repeat these things because you've shown no indication that you've understood anything I, or indeed, anyone else, has written. I figure that perhaps the characters will burn themselves into your brain, so that when you finally pass third grade, they might float through the miasma of your mind, and begin the slow process of making it into your understanding.

I'll go pray a rosary for you tonight.

Jesus taught forgiveness. He also taught that there is an unforgiveable sin. Let us pray for your sake that it is not stupidity.

Do you have a link to that web page, or a copy of it? Who did he say, the CIA? Wow!

That Wilson made a false claim that Cheney authorized the trip.

I could only find the quote I posted.

-G

However, we need law, ethics, and morality for this society to work well. I get concerned with people who violate any of the three.

Look..

NO sane moderate dem (like myself) would say the Wilson is a saint. You could certainly make a case that he has an agenda, and a knack for self promotion. He knows how to twist a phrase to imply that the VP himself sent him to Niger, when in fact it seems that the VP's office decided to send someone, and the underlings beneath him (the VP) eventually settled on Wilson. I can certainly believe that Wilson's wife was influential in that decision.  I also think that the way the self promotional Wilson openly defied and embarrassed the Bush administration by being so public about the lack of substance regarding yellowcake from Niger also led Karl Rove and company to want to put this loudmouth in his place.

So....Joe Wilson has flaws. He is also a man who served his country bravely and capably as Reagan's ambassador to Iraq. Now, however, that Wilson's public statements are fueling the publics increasing distrust about the way our nation was led to war has the administration scared. They want to muddy the waters of the whole Rove/Plame affair by throwing as much crap as possible at Joe Wilson. Some of it is true, some of it isn't-but in the end it doesn't really matter. What matters is that Karl Rove wanted to discredit the story Wilson was writing, and he disclosed the identity of Valerie Plame while doing so. Even IF Wilson's story was completely false, Rove chose a poor way to discredit it. Rove the and the White House then compounded their error by denying any part of it. I think that the denial is the thing that is going to come back to bite the WH in the butt. They may be aple to parse their language and beat the legal rap about disclosing the identity of an agent, but they cannot undo their own denial of any participation in doing so.

I have yet to see any quote other than ones that said that Cheney told the CIA to look into it, and the CIA sent Wilson.  Someone please show us this, because so far it seems like this is a Mehlman talking point distortion rather than what Wilson actually said.

Fitzgerald has been notably silent on all of this.  It's nice to have a professional working this case instead of a hack like Starr leaking things to the press constantly.  Let the man marshall all the evidence, and we'll find out the truth.  Right now, we all know jack.  All we're hearing is the spin from both sides.  On the other hand, Fitzgerald has sworn grand jury testimony in addition to the documents we now are aware of, and may well have more documents we are not aware of.  If Rove is indicted, he's gone.  If he's not indicted, there's no way Bush fires him.  And until Fitzgerald is done, this is all a bunch of sound and fury signifying nothing, because it's now clear that Bush isn't doing anything until Fitzgerald is done, even if one or more of Bush, Rove and McClellan has been lying to us and/or to each other.

Leon H gracefully takes back this statement:

"Did Wilson claim that Dick Cheney sent him on the trip to Niger? ... No."

http://www.redstate.org/story/2005/7/14/134416/939

I have to agree with Leon again, this is a pretty messed up series of events, digesting it all will take some time. Mistakes happen more in these situations.

-G

If all you're gonna do is ban people who don't agree with you, why not have all posts emailed to you and you can then choose which ones to post?  That way you censor out any and all dissenting or disagreeable posts.  You could just make a blog where consisting of your opion and those who agree with you.  Also, every dissenting opinion is NOT a talking point.  You use that term ad nauseam.

Additionally, I think Rove knew at the very least that he was doing something WRONG.  You just don't mention top secret information to a reporter.  And he surely lied since he told Scott McClellan that he wasn't involved, whatsoever.  So much for his character.