Category: Politics

This revelation from today’s New York Times is utterly hilarious:

WASHINGTON, July 14 – Karl Rove, the White House senior adviser, spoke with the columnist Robert D. Novak as he was preparing an article in July 2003 that identified a C.I.A. officer who was undercover, someone who has been officially briefed on the matter said.

Mr. Rove has told investigators that he learned from the columnist the name of the C.I.A. officer, who was referred to by her maiden name, Valerie Plame, and the circumstances in which her husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, traveled to Africa to investigate possible uranium sales to Iraq, the person said.

After hearing Mr. Novak’s account, the person who has been briefed on the matter said, Mr. Rove told the columnist: “I heard that, too.”

Game, set, match, the White House wins.

Rove’s critics claim that Valerie Plame was a covert agent at the time he spoke to Matt Copper about her role in sending Wilson to Niger, citing a hastily-written article from Newsday in 2003 (link unknown) as the source:

A senior intelligence official confirmed that Plame was a Directorate of Operations undercover officer who worked “alongside” the operations officers who asked her husband to travel to Niger.

In fact, the situation is a bit more complicated. See Mark Levin in The Corner:

USA Today has it right. In the end, as a legal matter this won’t be about outting Plame. Among other things, the five year rule can’t be met. The paper reports, in part:

In The Politics of Truth, former ambassador Joseph Wilson writes that he and his future wife both returned from overseas assignments in June 1997. Neither spouse, a reading of the book indicates, was again stationed overseas. They appear to have remained in Washington, D.C., where they married and became parents of twins.

Six years later, in July 2003, the name of the CIA officer –Valerie Plame– was revealed by columnist Robert Novak.

The column’s date is important because the law against unmasking the identities of U.S. spies says a “covert agent” must have been on an overseas assignment “within the last five years.” The assignment also must be long-term, not a short trip or temporary post, two experts on the law say. Wilson’s book makes numerous references to the couple’s life in Washington over the six years up to July 2003. “Unless she was really stationed abroad sometime after their marriage,” she wasn’t a covert agent protected by the law, says Bruce Sanford, an attorney who helped write the 1982 act that protects covert agents’ identities.

A number of other links at Tom McGuire’s say the same thing. Plame wasn’t a covert agent in the meaning of the law, just a CIA employee with an ax to grind.

Excellent commentary on Rove’s whistle-blowing:

Democrats and most of the Beltway press corps are baying for Karl Rove’s head over his role in exposing a case of CIA nepotism involving Joe Wilson and his wife, Valerie Plame. On the contrary, we’d say the White House political guru deserves a prize–perhaps the next iteration of the “Truth-Telling” award that The Nation magazine bestowed upon Mr. Wilson before the Senate Intelligence Committee exposed him as a fraud.

For Mr. Rove is turning out to be the real “whistleblower” in this whole sorry pseudo-scandal. He’s the one who warned Time’s Matthew Cooper and other reporters to be wary of Mr. Wilson’s credibility. He’s the one who told the press the truth that Mr. Wilson had been recommended for the CIA consulting gig by his wife, not by Vice President Dick Cheney as Mr. Wilson was asserting on the airwaves. In short, Mr. Rove provided important background so Americans could understand that Mr. Wilson wasn’t a whistleblower but was a partisan trying to discredit the Iraq War in an election campaign. Thank you, Mr. Rove.

Media chants aside, there’s no evidence that Mr. Rove broke any laws in telling reporters that Ms. Plame may have played a role in her husband’s selection for a 2002 mission to investigate reports that Iraq was seeking uranium ore in Niger. To be prosecuted under the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act, Mr. Rove would had to have deliberately and maliciously exposed Ms. Plame knowing that she was an undercover agent and using information he’d obtained in an official capacity. But it appears Mr. Rove didn’t even know Ms. Plame’s name and had only heard about her work at Langley from other journalists.

Wilson was sent to Niger to see if Saddam had been trying to buy uranium, and found that he had indeed attempted to on several occasions. But Wilson lied, and people died so he could promote himself and sell books.

Wilson was unqualified to gather intel for the CIA and never should have been sent.

Here’s what Washingtong insiders are saying about the Rove smear:

If Joe diGenova is right, and I suspect he is, the federal investigation into the disclosure of the identity of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame should never have happened.

“My views are stronger than ever,” the former U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia said Monday when asked about the white-hot controversy that has sent a New York Times reporter to jail, changed the rules of investigative journalism and now threatens to envelop the White House in a major crisis. “This investigation never should have started because it’s apparent that no crime was ever committed.”

diGenova says the CIA took no steps to protect Plame’s identity because some inside the agency were playing politics. Wilson didn’t even sign a non-disclosure agreement before hiking off to Niger, for example. You can’t even interview for an engineering job without doing that, for godsakes.

Who do these donkeys think they’re fooling?

Mickey Kaus notes the backpedaling of Mr. Sterling creator Lawrence O’Donnell on his non-scoop of the non-story on Karl Rove’s non-involvement in anything to do with Valerie Plame’s non-career at the Central non-Intelligence Agency:

David Corn usefully and calmly lays out what we know and don’t know about Rove and Plame. … Meanwhile, Lawrence O’Donnell is milking his scoop for all the HuffPo items it’s worth, though he’s now quietly downgraded Rove from “Matt Cooper’s source” and “the source Matt Cooper has been protecting” to “one of the secret sources Matt Cooper has been protecting.” [Italics added] … But the unsubstantiated–yet posssibly true!–O’Donnell headline “Rove Blew CIA Agent’s Cover” is still up. … 5:26 P.M.

Apparently this has all played out on cult member Arianna non-Huffington’s non-blog.

My choice for Sandy’s replacement is the estimable Tony LaRussa, law-degreed baseball manager:

LaRussa had managed less than two full seasons in the minors when he replaced Don Kessinger as the White Sox manager on August 2, 1979 at the age of thirty-four. LaRussa, who had graduated with a law degree from Florida State the previous year, became the fifth lawyer/manager in baseball history. The other four – Monte Ward, Hughie Jennings, Miller Huggins, and Branch Rickey — are all in the Hall of Fame. Extremely bright and articulate, LaRussa quickly established a reputation for being one of the best field tacticians in baseball.

Anyone of lesser stature would be an unacceptable compromise, but the Dems will filibuster whoever it is just because Chimpy McChimphitlerburton nominated him (or her) so he may as well throw some red meat to the base.

As a baseball man himself, Bushitler should appreciate LaRussa, who took his Cardinals to the World Series last year, and he has red state/blue state appeal, living in Danville, CA and working in St. Louis.

My god, Nancy Pelosi is a fucking moron. Check her sophisticated understanding of the Supreme Court and eminent domain law:

Q Later this morning, many Members of the House Republican leadership, along with John Cornyn from the Senate, are holding a news conference on eminent domain, the decision of the Supreme Court the other day, and they are going to offer legislation that would restrict it, prohibiting federal funds from being used in such a manner.

Two questions: What was your reaction to the Supreme Court decision on this topic, and what do you think about legislation to, in the minds of opponents at least, remedy or changing it?

Ms. Pelosi. As a Member of Congress, and actually all of us and anyone who holds a public office in our country, we take an oath of office to uphold the Constitution of the United States. Very central to that in that Constitution is the separation of powers. I believe that whatever you think about a particular decision of the Supreme Court, and I certainly have been in disagreement with them on many occasions, it is not appropriate for the Congress to say we’re going to withhold funds for the Court because we don’t like a decision.

Q Not on the Court, withhold funds from the eminent domain purchases that wouldn’t involve public use. I apologize if I framed the question poorly. It wouldn’t be withholding federal funds from the Court, but withhold Federal funds from eminent domain type purchases that are not just involved in public good.

Ms. Pelosi. Again, without focusing on the actual decision, just to say that when you withhold funds from enforcing a decision of the Supreme Court you are, in fact, nullifying a decision of the Supreme Court. This is in violation of the respect for separation of church — powers in our Constitution, church and state as well. Sometimes the Republicans have a problem with that as well. But forgive my digression.

So the answer to your question is, I would oppose any legislation that says we would withhold funds for the enforcement of any decision of the Supreme Court no matter how opposed I am to that decision. And I’m not saying that I’m opposed to this decision, I’m just saying in general.

Q Could you talk about this decision? What you think of it?

Ms. Pelosi. It is a decision of the Supreme Court. If Congress wants to change it, it will require legislation of a level of a constitutional amendment. So this is almost as if God has spoken. It’s an elementary discussion now. They have made the decision.

Q Do you think it is appropriate for municipalities to be able to use eminent domain to take land for economic development?

Ms. Pelosi. The Supreme Court has decided, knowing the particulars of this case, that that was appropriate, and so I would support that.

This is the House Minority Leader, and may she ever remain so.

Bloggers (and creationist radio hosts) speculate that Rehnquist has resigned, but it may actually be O’Connor. Based on this latter scenario, Bill Kristol thinks Alberto Gonzalez is destined to become the next Chief Justice:

(1) There will be a Supreme Court resignation within the next week. But it will be Justice O’Connor, not Chief Justice Rehnquist. There are several tea-leaf-like suggestions that O’Connor may be stepping down, including the fact that she has apparently arranged to spend much more time in Arizona beginning this fall. There are also recent intimations that Chief Justice Rehnquist may not resign. This would be consistent with Justice O’Connor having confided her plan to step down to the chief a while ago. Rehnquist probably believes that it wouldn’t be good for the Court to have two resignations at once, so he would presumably stay on for as long as his health permits, and/or until after Justice O’Connor’s replacement is confirmed.

(2) President Bush will appoint Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to replace O’Connor. Bush certainly wants to put Gonzales on the Supreme Court. Presidents usually find a way to do what they want to do.

And his aides will have an argument to make to conservatives (like me) who would be unhappy with a Gonzales pick: Bush would not, after all, be replacing a conservative stalwart like Rehnquist with Gonzales. Gonzales would be taking O’Connor’s seat, and Gonzales is likely to be as conservative as, or even more conservative than, O’Connor. Indeed, Karl Rove will continue, Gonzales is as conservative a nominee to replace O’Connor as one could find who could overcome a threatened Democratic filibuster. Bush aides will also assure us privately that when Rehnquist does step down, Bush will nominate a strong conservative as his replacement. They might not tell us that nominee would be as an associate justice, for Bush would plan to then promote Gonzales to chief justice–thus creating a “Gonzales Court,” a truly distinctive Bush legacy.

…and he ain’t too happy about it because Gonzalez is somewhere to the left of Atila the Hun.

Utah Sen. Bob Bennett is going to introduce some sort of a social security bill without private accounts:

Mr. Bennett said that during a luncheon with other Republican senators at the White House, he told the president of his plans to introduce the bill as early as next week.

“He indicated that I should go forward and do that,” Mr. Bennett said. “And I’m grateful to have him do that even though his own preference would be to have personal accounts included.”

Since the beginning of his second term, Mr. Bush has been pushing to allow younger workers to create voluntary personal accounts funded out of their Social Security payroll taxes. Democrats accuse the White House of seeking to privatize the Depression-era program and have been unified in opposition to the idea.

“I’ve decided that the Democrats have made it clear that they will not back personal accounts,” Mr. Bennett said outside the White House. “And in response to the president’s position that let’s try to get something done, I will be proposing a bill that does not include personal accounts.”

This compromise is necessary because the Democrats are not a serious political party, even if they do throw a great pretend tea party in the basement of the House.

This account of John Conyers’ make-believe impeachment hearing is pretty funny:

In the Capitol basement yesterday, long-suffering House Democrats took a trip to the land of make-believe.

They pretended a small conference room was the Judiciary Committee hearing room, draping white linens over folding tables to make them look like witness tables and bringing in cardboard name tags and extra flags to make the whole thing look official.

Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) banged a large wooden gavel and got the other lawmakers to call him “Mr. Chairman.” He liked that so much that he started calling himself “the chairman” and spouted other chairmanly phrases, such as “unanimous consent” and “without objection so ordered.” The dress-up game looked realistic enough on C-SPAN, so two dozen more Democrats came downstairs to play along…

The session took an awkward turn when witness Ray McGovern, a former intelligence analyst, declared that the United States went to war in Iraq for oil, Israel and military bases craved by administration “neocons” so “the United States and Israel could dominate that part of the world.” He said that Israel should not be considered an ally and that Bush was doing the bidding of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

…but Conyers’ complaints about it are even funnier:

The article begins with an especially mean and nasty tone, claiming that House Democrats “pretended” a small conference was the Judiciary Committee hearing room and deriding the decor of the room. Milbank fails to share with his readers one essential fact: the reason the hearing was held in that room, an important piece of context. Despite the fact that a number of other suitable rooms were available in the Capitol and House office buildings, Republicans declined my request for each and every one of them. Milbank could have written about the perseverance of many of my colleagues in the face of such adverse circumstances, but declined to do so. Milbank also ignores the critical fact picked up by the AP, CNN and other newsletters that at the very moment the hearing was scheduled to begin, the Republican Leadership scheduled an almost unprecedented number of 11 consecutive floor votes, making it next to impossible for most Members to participate in the first hour and one half of the hearing.

In what can only be described as a deliberate effort to discredit the entire hearing, Milbank quotes one of the witnesses as making an anti-semitic assertion and further describes anti-semitic literature that was being handed out in the overflow room for the event. First, let me be clear: I consider myself to be friend and supporter of Israel and there were a number of other staunchly pro-Israel members who were in attendance at the hearing. I do not agree with, support, or condone any comments asserting Israeli control over U.S. policy, and I find any allegation that Israel is trying to dominate the world or had anything to do with the September 11 tragedy disgusting and offensive.

He huffs and puffs like he was a real chairman and not just a Huffington Poster, sad bastard. His fake hearing was held in the basement because he’s not the chairman of a real committee. If his party could win an election, that might change but that hasn’t happened for ten years now. Holding tea parties in the basement isn’t going to change anything.