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Thursday, July 5. 2007
Taking Care
Remember back in 2003 when the president said anyone found to be leaking information from the White House, like the identity of a covert agent, would be taken care of? Well, the president stuck by his word: he took care of his buddy Scooter and commuted Scooter's jail sentence!The others involved in outing Valerie Plame haven't faced justice and it looks like they won't; that would be Karl Rove, Richard Armitage and Dick Cheney. The hypocrites on the right are, of course, spinning it as a non-crime, like they did when the Congress impeached Clinton ... on wait, the hypocrites on the right said Clinton's lie about getting a blow job in the White House was such an injurious breach of right and wrong, Clinton had to be removed from office lest the republic fall apart.
-- This is one of the funniest things I've heard on TV in a long time: a dimwit on Hardball Tuesday said the difference between Clinton being impeached and Libby getting convicted and sentenced; and then having his prison time commuted, was that Clinton admitted he lied about getting a blow job in the White House. Libby didn't admit to lying to a grand jury so therefore was entitled to a commutation and/or pardon. The inference being of course that being convicted of a crime by a jury of your peers doesn’t really count for anything anymore. Unfortunately, MSNBC hasn't put up the transcript from that program yet.
So, as most of the righties claim, Scooter's was a victimless crime; they also claim it's been proven that A) Valerie Plame-Wilson was not a covert agent and B) no crime was committed by the leaking of Valerie Plame's name.
I had written a long part here, but when I tried to save it, …. Sigh … I wish I had my Mac …
Well, there was a victim: Valerie Wilson lost her job at the C.I.A. as a result of her identity being divulged by the White House staff; The U.S. was also a victim because the outing of the covert agent was a part of a smear campaign by the White House to discredit the agent’s husband so the president could use the lie – that Saddam Hussein was about to make nuclear weapons – as a reason to start the war. U.S. citizens were also harmed because the spy network set up around Plame-Wilson's cover identity as an employee of Brewster-Jennings was blown, thereby putting in jeopardy the lives of all the men and women Plame-Wilson had been in contact with while she was gathering information on nuclear proliferation in the Middle East ... so we lost a lot of assets right in the region where we need them most.
As far as Valerie Plame-Wilson’s status as a cover agent, the special prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, who was a Bush-appointed federal prosecutor, indeed verified at the beginning of his investigation Valerie Wilson was a covert spy, a NOC, no less, which means when Plame-Wilson went abroad she didn’t have the cover of diplomatic immunity, so if she had been discovered and imprisoned in a place like Libya or Iraq, countries Valerie Wilson had done business in while a covert agent, she most likely would have died a horrible death without anyone, especially her family, knowing about it.
The other tune people like to sing is that since Valerie Wilson wasn’t a covert agent, no crime was committed when revealing her name. In other words, the underlying crime – of revealing a covert agent’s identity – couldn’t have occurred so Scooter Libby’s lies to the grand jury are then acceptable.
The little piece of fact the Bush apologists forget to mention when spinning that argument is that the special prosecutor said the underlying crime couldn't be proven because Scooter Libby had"thrown sand" in his eyes; Libby lied. And why don't the Democrats go after Richard Armitage, the man who leaked Plame-Wilson's name to Bob Novak? Well, because Armitage first got the information from the Vice President's office before giving it to Novak.
The tortured logic the Bush-Cheney-Libby apologists use to invalidate the jury’s conviction and the judge’s sentence is mind-blowing. It was okay for Scooter to commit perjury, but not okay for Clinton to commit perjury.
This wasn’t even gonna be about the president taking care of his buddy – although that is a pretty good story – no, the real target was Joe Scarborough, MSNBC’s perpetually happy conservative. I like Joe, especially his Morning Joe spot, begun after Don Imus was kicked off the air. Joe isn’t the target per se, but his sidekick. I don’t recall the guy’s name – it appears he is so lame the MSNBC web site has absolutely no reference to the guy – but he went off on an anti-Al Gore rant worthy of the venom-filled spew the righties shot at Bill Clinton 10 years ago.
Unfortunately, we don’t have the transcript for that either.
The gist of it was: if Al Gore goes to any of the Earth Concerts he helped organize and promote, instead of spending some alone time with his son, Al III, then Al Gore doesn't have his priorities right. SHUT UP! Who is this melonhead!
John Ridley, a screenwriter who is, occasionally, a panelist on NPR and the Jim Lehrer News Hour on PBS. I’m thinking, Ridley saw how popular Mika … with the really long Polish name … how popular Mika got when she refused to read the Paris Hilton “news,” tearing up the copy and at one point, looking as if she were about to cry – neither Scarborough or Willie Geist were taking her seriously – and another point she was ready to rip Joe’s head off and shit down his neck! That was cool, Mika (Brzezinski). Joe and Willie were being a-holes.
Back to Ridley …
Your rant this morning was … stupid! No other word for it! Why Joe let it go on … and on, and on, and on, who knows, but it didn’t make any sense. Al Gore’s son got popped for driving under the influence and for possession of pot and pharmaceuticals. And you’re saying Al Gore doesn’t have his priorities straight unless skips these big plans he’s been involved with for … a long, long time and spend time with his 25 year old son.
Oh, Al Gore, III – this is his second offense and if you haven’t noticed Ridley, Al III is a legal adult! Responsible for his own actions; and were I his old man, I’m not too sure Al III would have posted bail, let alone take me away from the important issues in my life – possible the most important issue of my life – the climate.
The absolute wrong thing to do, Ridley, is spin the life of the family around that of the addict; the last thing a family wants to do is enable the addict by validating the addict's sense of being the center of the Universe, which is what happens when everyone goes, "OMIGOSH! AL IS HIGH AGAIN! WE BETTER STOP EVERYTHING AND GET INTO ORBIT AROUND AL!"
The two Als have had plenty of quality “one-on-one” time through the years and Dad has done his best. Now, John Ridley, as an adult, it’s time for Al III to be a man, take responsibility for his actions and stop relying on, and blaming, daddy.
That’s how it works in the real world Ridley. Even Paris Hilton got a taste of reality … man, which makes me think: I’d sure like a taste of Paris … as we share a double-double from In-n-Out … Hmmmm ...
“Paris, you have some mustard … right there! I’ll take care of it!”
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