Offering constructive criticism to the social cripples in our midst since early 2005.

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Mmmm, Burger (C.J.)
BTW, where are Bilmore and Slave?

Plame's name marked secret (b/c she's covert) in WH memo

(yes, it's not breaking news, except to some).

Fun, fun. So in addition to Plame being undercover, we now have a message from 11 former CIA agents to the Republican Machine: F. U., and the horse you came in on.

• Eleven former intelligence officers are speaking up on behalf of CIA officer Valerie Plame, saying leaking her identity may have damaged national security and threatens the ability of U.S. intelligence gathering.
  
  In a statement to congressional leaders, the former officers said the Republican National Committee has circulated talking points focusing on the idea that Plame was not working undercover and deserved no protection.

The open letter is here.

• We, the undersigned former U.S. intelligence officers are concerned with the tone and substance of the public debate over the ongoing Department of Justice investigation into who leaked the name of Valerie Plame, wife of former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV, to syndicated columnist Robert
  Novak and other members of the media, which exposed her status as an undercover CIA officer. The disclosure of Ms. Plame’s name was a shameful event in American history and, in our professional judgment, may have damaged U.S. national security and poses a threat to the ability of U.S. intelligence gathering using human sources. Any breach of the code of confidentiality and cover weakens the overall fabric of intelligence, and,
  directly or indirectly, jeopardizes the work and safety of intelligence workers and their sources.
  
  The Republican National Committee has circulated talking points to
  supporters to use as part of a coordinated strategy to discredit Ambassador Joseph Wilson and his wife. As part of this campaign a common theme is the idea that Ambassador Wilson’s wife, Valerie Plame was not undercover and deserved no protection. The following are four recent examples of this “talking point”:
  
  Michael Medved stated on Larry King Live on July 12, 2005, “And let's be honest about this. Mrs. Plame, Mrs. Wilson, had a desk job
  at Langley. She went back and forth every single day.”
  
  Victoria Toensing stated on a Fox News program with John Gibson on July 12, 2005 that, “Well, they weren't taking affirmative measures to protect that identity. They gave her a desk job in Langley. You don't really have somebody deep undercover going back and forth to Langley, where people can see them.”
  
  Ed Rodgers, Washington Lobbyist and former Republican official, said on July 13, 2005 on the Newshour with Jim Lehrer, “And also I think it is now a matter of established fact that Mrs. Plame was not a protected covert agent, and I don't think there's any
  meaningful investigation about that.”
  
  House majority whip Roy Blunt (R, Mo), on Face the Nation, July 17, 2005, “It certainly wouldn't be the first time that the CIA might
  have been overzealous in sort of maintaining the kind of topsecret
  definition on things longer than they needed to. You know, this was a job that the ambassador's wife had that she went to every day. It was a desk job. I think many people in Washington understood that her employment was at the CIA, and she went to that office every day.”
  
  These comments reveal an astonishing ignorance of the intelligence community and the role of cover. The fact is that there are thousands of U.S. intelligence officers who “work at a desk” in the Washington, D.C. area every day who are undercover. Some have official cover, and some have non-official cover. Both classes of cover must and should be protected.
  
  While we are pleased that the U.S. Department of Justice is conducting an investigation and that the U.S. Attorney General has recused himself, we believe that the partisan attacks against Valerie Plame are sending a deeply discouraging message to the men and women who have agreed to work undercover for their nation’s security.
  
  We are not lawyers and are not qualified to determine whether the leakers technically violated the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act. However, we are confident that Valerie Plame was working in a cover status and that our nation’s leaders, regardless of political party, have a duty to protect all intelligence officers. We believe it is appropriate for the President to move proactively to dismiss from office or administratively punish any official who participated in any way in revealing Valerie Plame's status. Such an act by the President would send an unambiguous message that leaks of this nature will not be tolerated and would be consistent with his duties as the
  Commander-in-Chief.

I wait with anticipation for the GOP Machine's response to be that these are clearly liberal CIA pansies, and that the CIA is filled with a bunch of sissified Democratic UN-lovers who want to take down The Great Man, and there's no big deal in blowing cover anyway.

They will lose.

The American public has sucked at the teat of too many James Bond and Jack Ryan novels to think that it doesn't matter. Roy Blount, Norm Coleman, and all other Rove jackass apologists will remember one step too late that in those books, it was the then-current Administration that was filled with the malcontents, the incompetents, and the malicious. Undercover agents are the good guys, fellas, and if it becomes clear that Plame was deserving of cover, and Rove/Libby/et al blew it in order to score some political points, I don't give a damn what the Intelligence Identities Protection Act says. It will get ugly.

Gattigap

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Undercover agents are the good guys, fellas, and if it becomes clear that Plame was deserving of cover, and Rove/Libby/et al blew it in order to score some political points, I don't give a damn what the Intelligence Identities Protection Act says. It will get ugly.

Gattigap

This is the crux of the matter, and why their actions are immoral, if not illegal.

[Sexual Harassment Panda]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
This is the crux of the matter, and why their actions are immoral, if not illegal.

But you are forgetting the Spanky rule - if a Republican does it, and it's not illegal, it's per se not immoral.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by Gattigap

I wait with anticipation for the GOP Machine's response to be that these are clearly liberal CIA pansies, and that the CIA is filled with a bunch of sissified Democratic UN-lovers who want to take down The Great Man, and there's no big deal in blowing cover anyway.

They will lose.

The American public has sucked at the teat of too many James Bond and Jack Ryan novels to think that it doesn't matter. Roy Blount, Norm Coleman, and all other Rove jackass apologists will remember one step too late that in those books, it was the then-current Administration that was filled with the malcontents, the incompetents, and the malicious. Undercover agents are the good guys, fellas, and if it becomes clear that Plame was deserving of cover, and Rove/Libby/et al blew it in order to score some political points, I don't give a damn what the Intelligence Identities Protection Act says. It will get ugly.

Gattigap

The Rude Pundit agrees with you:

• What's happening here, with polls showing that very few Americans believe the Bush administration on the whole issue, is the American public, having been fed years of propagandistic books, films, and television shows, since the Cold War, about how magnificent the CIA is in protecting our freedom (despite, you know, having often done quite the opposite), feels as if it's looking out for Jack Ryan. You know Jack Ryan, Tom Clancy's CIA agent, played by AlecBaldwinHarrisonFordBenAffleck in the movies. By this point in a Clancy novel or film, Jack Ryan (or someone) would have grabbed the tweedy, bespectacled, fat, balding asshole politico, who thought a CIA agent's identity was just more political capital to be spent when expedient, and beaten the shit out of him, leaving him bleeding, glasses broken, pissing himself on the floor of the Oval Office. Hell, where do you wanna go with this? Jason Bourne? Sydney Bristow? Bill Cosby on I Spy? George Smiley? James fuckin' Bond? All of the spy glorification in pop culture has made it a cardinal rule: you don't blow someone's cover.
  
  The Rove story has legs because the corporate media that lionizes spies over and over as a way of justifying secret operations against Americans, as well as bullshit like the Contras and more, has taught the public to love them some CIA agents. In a Clancy novel, we know who the villains are: they are just as likely to be the bureaucrats in DC as they are the arms dealers. And both should be dealt with as criminals.
  
  So all Democrats really have to do is stand back and let these fuckers twist in the wind. When we hear Rove told Matt Cooper, "I've said too much already," we know that that's the line of scoundrels and weasels trying to cover their own asses. When we hear the President lower the ethical standards bar by which one can work for the White House all the way to the floor, we know that he's covering for his friend. It's all SOP for those who, it seems more and more each day, are SOL.

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Replaced_Texan
The Rude Pundit agrees with you:

And put it more colorfully, too.

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Gattigap
And put it more colorfully, too.

If he puts on a few pounds and some glasses, Will Patton could play Rove and essentially reprise his role from No Way Out in the movie version of this mess.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Gattigap
Fun, fun. So in addition to Plame being undercover, we now have a message from 11 former CIA agents to the Republican Machine: F. U., and the horse you came in on.

• Eleven former intelligence officers are speaking up on behalf of CIA officer Valerie Plame, saying leaking her identity may have damaged national security and threatens the ability of U.S. intelligence gathering.
  
  In a statement to congressional leaders, the former officers said the Republican National Committee has circulated talking points focusing on the idea that Plame was not working undercover and deserved no protection.

The open letter is here.

• We, the undersigned former U.S. intelligence officers are concerned with the tone and substance of the public debate over the ongoing Department of Justice investigation into who leaked the name of Valerie Plame, wife of former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV, to syndicated columnist Robert
  Novak and other members of the media, which exposed her status as an undercover CIA officer. The disclosure of Ms. Plame’s name was a shameful event in American history and, in our professional judgment, may have damaged U.S. national security and poses a threat to the ability of U.S. intelligence gathering using human sources. Any breach of the code of confidentiality and cover weakens the overall fabric of intelligence, and,
  directly or indirectly, jeopardizes the work and safety of intelligence workers and their sources.
  
  The Republican National Committee has circulated talking points to
  supporters to use as part of a coordinated strategy to discredit Ambassador Joseph Wilson and his wife. As part of this campaign a common theme is the idea that Ambassador Wilson’s wife, Valerie Plame was not undercover and deserved no protection. The following are four recent examples of this “talking point”:
  
  Michael Medved stated on Larry King Live on July 12, 2005, “And let's be honest about this. Mrs. Plame, Mrs. Wilson, had a desk job
  at Langley. She went back and forth every single day.”
  
  Victoria Toensing stated on a Fox News program with John Gibson on July 12, 2005 that, “Well, they weren't taking affirmative measures to protect that identity. They gave her a desk job in Langley. You don't really have somebody deep undercover going back and forth to Langley, where people can see them.”
  
  Ed Rodgers, Washington Lobbyist and former Republican official, said on July 13, 2005 on the Newshour with Jim Lehrer, “And also I think it is now a matter of established fact that Mrs. Plame was not a protected covert agent, and I don't think there's any
  meaningful investigation about that.”
  
  House majority whip Roy Blunt (R, Mo), on Face the Nation, July 17, 2005, “It certainly wouldn't be the first time that the CIA might
  have been overzealous in sort of maintaining the kind of topsecret
  definition on things longer than they needed to. You know, this was a job that the ambassador's wife had that she went to every day. It was a desk job. I think many people in Washington understood that her employment was at the CIA, and she went to that office every day.”
  
  These comments reveal an astonishing ignorance of the intelligence community and the role of cover. The fact is that there are thousands of U.S. intelligence officers who “work at a desk” in the Washington, D.C. area every day who are undercover. Some have official cover, and some have non-official cover. Both classes of cover must and should be protected.
  
  While we are pleased that the U.S. Department of Justice is conducting an investigation and that the U.S. Attorney General has recused himself, we believe that the partisan attacks against Valerie Plame are sending a deeply discouraging message to the men and women who have agreed to work undercover for their nation’s security.
  
  We are not lawyers and are not qualified to determine whether the leakers technically violated the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act. However, we are confident that Valerie Plame was working in a cover status and that our nation’s leaders, regardless of political party, have a duty to protect all intelligence officers. We believe it is appropriate for the President to move proactively to dismiss from office or administratively punish any official who participated in any way in revealing Valerie Plame's status. Such an act by the President would send an unambiguous message that leaks of this nature will not be tolerated and would be consistent with his duties as the
  Commander-in-Chief.

I wait with anticipation for the GOP Machine's response to be that these are clearly liberal CIA pansies, and that the CIA is filled with a bunch of sissified Democratic UN-lovers who want to take down The Great Man, and there's no big deal in blowing cover anyway.

They will lose.

The American public has sucked at the teat of too many James Bond and Jack Ryan novels to think that it doesn't matter. Roy Blount, Norm Coleman, and all other Rove jackass apologists will remember one step too late that in those books, it was the then-current Administration that was filled with the malcontents, the incompetents, and the malicious. Undercover agents are the good guys, fellas, and if it becomes clear that Plame was deserving of cover, and Rove/Libby/et al blew it in order to score some political points, I don't give a damn what the Intelligence Identities Protection Act says. It will get ugly.

Gattigap

Gatti -

Bush fucked up by choosing a fair haired boy like Roberts. He needed a blistering SCOTUS confirmation fight to galvanize his base and cover up the Rove Scandal. He should have picked a crazy right wing Jesus Nut to get such a battle. This Roberts fellow is a non story, and the Dems have wisely backed off, to let the Rove Mess reclaim center stage.

If you read Matt Cooper's piece about his grand jury testimony, you get the sense Fitz is aiming at the cover up, not the underlying act. There's also a line of questioning posed to Cooper which suggests a perjury charge against Rove. But we'll see. This could all be nothing in the end.

Or it could be the last bit of rudder damage that sends this Presidency's second term adrift like Reagan's and Clinton's. Funny. There are more creative checks and balances to stop ideologues in the system than the Founding Fathers everv could have contemplated. Or maybe they did contemplate these...

Enjoying it,
SD

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by sebastian_dangerfield
Gatti -

Bush fucked up by choosing a fair haired boy like Roberts. He needed a blistering SCOTUS confirmation fight to galvanize his base and cover up the Rove Scandal. He should have picked a crazy right wing Jesus Nut to get such a battle. This Roberts fellow is a non story, and the Dems have wisely backed off, to let the Rove Mess reclaim center stage.

If you read Matt Cooper's piece about his grand jury testimony, you get the sense Fitz is aiming at the cover up, not the underlying act. There's also a line of questioning posed to Cooper which suggests a perjury charge against Rove. But we'll see. This could all be nothing in the end.

Or it could be the last bit of rudder damage that sends this Presidency's second term adrift like Reagan's and Clinton's. Funny. There are more creative checks and balances to stop ideologues in the system than the Founding Fathers everv could have contemplated. Or maybe they did contemplate these...

Enjoying it,
SD

I think Fitzgerald needs to bring charges on both the leak and the cover-up. If he just brings them just on the cover-up, he'll get creamed in the press and shift public opinion in favor of Rove, a la Martha Stewart. The public doesn't really understand how there can be obstruction of justice without and underlying offense.

[Sidd Finch]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
I think Fitzgerald needs to bring charges on both the leak and the cover-up. If he just brings them just on the cover-up, he'll get creamed in the press and shift public opinion in favor of Rove, a la Martha Stewart. The public doesn't really understand how there can be obstruction of justice without and underlying offense.

This is a little different than Stewart. The investigation into the leak here was not limited to whether someone had committed a crime, but included whether someone had leaked a CIA agent's name in order to punish her husband for political gain. Once upon a time, Bush pretended to care about the latter, too.

[Replaced_Texan]

Originally posted by Sidd Finch
This is a little different than Stewart. The investigation into the leak here was not limited to whether someone had committed a crime, but included whether someone had leaked a CIA agent's name in order to punish her husband for political gain. Once upon a time, Bush pretended to care about the latter, too.

Heh. The Rude Pundit (in the same post cited above) said something similar:

• One of the things that has failed liberals at every step of the way on stories as seemingly cut and dried as, say, Dick Cheney's relationship with Halliburton is that we've been on the wrong side of the simple vs. complex storyline. See, in order to understand how diabolical the Cheney/Halliburton nexus is, one has to immerse oneself into laws and rules regarding the finances of government officials, the various schemes created for assuring Halliburton would become bloated like dead hippo corpse, and more. Shit, it's just easier to ignore it.
  
  But this time we're finally on the easy-to-understand, anger-inducing side: Karl Rove outed a CIA agent for petty vengeance against her husband. That's all the narrative that's necessary. To counter that, the opposing side needs to entangle itself in legalistic arguments and semantical stunts, the kinds of arguments that always seem to be what liberals are making. Look at the stunning recitation of alleged history, law, and "media bias," all wadded into a huge ball of semen-stained Kleenex for your disposal by Andrew McCarthy (not the one who made a corpse seem alive in Weekend at Bernie's, but, as a writer for the National Review, achieves the same effect). Watch any of your loyal right-wing pundits act like they know the minutiae of rules and legalities. It's positively, breathtakingly, as they would have once said, "Clintonesque."

[Shape Shifter]

Originally posted by Sidd Finch
This is a little different than Stewart. The investigation into the leak here was not limited to whether someone had committed a crime, but included whether someone had leaked a CIA agent's name in order to punish her husband for political gain. Once upon a time, Bush pretended to care about the latter, too.

If the prosecutor charges Rove (and/or others) with obstruction and not for the leak, the great echo chamber of penske socks will resound with the legally ridiculous but rhetorically effective question: "How could he have obstructed justice when no other crime has been committed?"

[notcasesensitive]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
If the prosecutor charges Rove (and/or others) with obstruction and not for the leak, the great echo chamber of penske socks will resound with the legally ridiculous but rhetorically effective question: "How could he have obstructed justice when no other crime has been committed?"

But R's understand what perjury is and the seriousness of the offense, right? They weren't only pretending to be outraged that Clinton lied UNDER OATH were they?

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
I think Fitzgerald needs to bring charges on both the leak and the cover-up. If he just brings them just on the cover-up, he'll get creamed in the press and shift public opinion in favor of Rove, a la Martha Stewart. The public doesn't really understand how there can be obstruction of justice without and underlying offense.

Fitz gets creamed worst if he brings nothing. He's made to look impotent or bought, or both.

You're right to make the Stewart analogy, but I think you misead the public's reaction to her case. They viewed her as an unfairly attacked trophy defendant. BUT, they also viewed her as guilty. AND, they viewed her as deserving some penalty for her sheer arrogance to think that she couldd work a cover up. People might lament that politics is at the core of the Rove investigation, but they're already beginning to say "Why didn't he just fucking fess up?" Rove ends up looking like Clinton.

Bush is safe. His people kept him from any real knowledge. They're students of Watergate. Now Cheney... he might just be arrogant enough to have demanded to be "in the know" on the cover up. Spiro Agnewing him would be better, IMO, than nailing the chief.

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by Shape Shifter
If the prosecutor charges Rove (and/or others) with obstruction and not for the leak, the great echo chamber of penske socks will resound with the legally ridiculous but rhetorically effective question: "How could he have obstructed justice when no other crime has been committed?"

You flip that back on them by saying "The cover up cost tax payers __ million dollars in investigation costs. The federal sentencing guidleines base sentences on how much you steal. Karl Rove sat there and lied to us for a year and cost the taxpayers ____. Thats a serious crime in my book."

[sebastian_dangerfield]

Originally posted by notcasesensitive
But R's understand what perjury is and the seriousness of the offense, right? They weren't only pretending to be outraged that Clinton lied UNDER OATH were they?

Emerson... hobgoblins, etc...

You know the Party's bad when I can't handle its inconsistency.