Wilson and Plame: Victims or Traitors?

[banned]

...myself at the moment, and I have to tell you that there are many magnitudes of difference between what I am actually working on/with and what I can tell a lay person without legal training.<br><br>The law is insanely complex and technical, which is something that Americans raised on melodramas like "Perry Mason" and "LA Law" and "Boston Legal" just do not grasp. Not because they're stupid but because they've never researched even a seemingly simple issue through legislation and legislative notes and case law and dicta and shepherdizing and Law Review articles and finally had a frickin' MASTERPIECE only to have a case come down on all fours the day before you file it that blows it all out of the water.<br><br>And, of course, you can have all the aces legally and the other guy's witness perjures himself, or the judge's balls are in someone's pocket (as in NOT YOURS) and it's all for nothing. <br><br>Prosecutors like Patrick Fitzgerald and Ronnie Earle are piloting a military fighter jet while playing three dimensional chess and creating a nanomosaic on a microchip--oh, and whistling "Dixie".<br><br>Fun as it is to try to second guess them, and believe me, I'm not trying to stop anyone from doing it, it's hard to know what the outcome will be when you don't know what they know--or what shadowy power has decreed what they know.<br><br><br><br><br> <p></p><i></i>

[sunny]

anti, brilliant analysis as always. <br>The timing of the new Fitz website is telling; I think he is putting himself out there in preparation for the dung about to hit the fan. <br>John Dean's article is also sharp, but like most mainstream sources, he's missing the salient point, namely, the CONTROLLING LAW in this case. Surely, he is not unaware of it? Or are we being prepared to accept much lesser charges? I certainly hope not.<br>anti, I know you are no mind reader, but what is your <!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>gut feeling</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--> about what kind of charges we are likely to see? Will he be riding a White Charger next week, or a jack-ass that's been ridden hard and put up wet? <p></p><i></i>

[dbeach]

Listening to Webster tarpley who says cheney and sharon will try to ignite a Israel/US invasion..<br><br>Sauron knows how to scare the sheeple so get ready for some more hostile rhetoric as the unltra topice changer.. <p></p><i></i>

[dbeach]

sorry ultra topic changer is another WAR<br><br>SYRIA and IRAN <p></p><i></i>

[chiggerbit]

Don't forget what Clinton, if I remember right, was actually impeached for ---lying under oath. Technically, it wasn't what was on the blue dress. <p></p><i>Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=chiggerbit@rigorousintuition>chiggerbit</A> at: 10/23/05 5:35 pm<br></i>

[antiaristo]

sunny,<br>EXPECTATIONS minus OUTCOME equals SATISFACTION.<br><br>Be careful about expectations.<br>We have had SO MUCH SUCCESS this last month.<br>The political atmosphere is unrecognisable from five months ago.<br>The VERY FIRST mention of the Espionage Act in the MSM was the David Johnstone "rebellion" article on 1 October. Just three weeks ago.<br>We can have no doubt that Fitz is moving towards more serious charges. He has watched the political scene (there is a difference between disinterest, which fits Pat, and uninterest) and he can smell the fear.<br>I'll accept his judgement on the matter. We've got our best team on the field (DC Grand Jury of ordinary citizens, a courageous prosecutor, and the strongest fortification that Comey could provide) and we've got the net to stay involved.<br><br>Personally, I think Dean has been nobbled. He wrote something on 18 US 793/4 for Findlaw some months back. So his position now is curious.<br><br>dbeach,<br>I think Cheney is finished, a broken man.<br><br>chig,<br>I can't think of a more applicable precedent than the previous incumbent, can you?<br>Remember the movie Wag the dog?<br>Maybe it's due some airtime? <p></p><i></i>

[chiggerbit]

<!--EZCODE ITALIC START--><em>And if Plame is such a goody-goody why did she allow Khan so much leeway?</em><!--EZCODE ITALIC END--><br><br>Shoot, that one is easy--to gather more information. The police undercover operations do it all the time, and I doubt that it is any different for Brewster Jennings. "She" giving orders? Who knows who was giving the operation its orders? But there comes a point when simply gathering information cannot be justified. At what point did it become clear that Saddam no longer had WMD? Had anything else happened in this timeline up to early 2003 that might have brought this to a head? (Not being a brainiac, I love timelines.) What was in that shipment that was intercepted as it arrived in the Mideast by sea? Can't remember the details. Did that end the operation? Too many loose ends yet for me to jump on Plame. <p></p><i></i>

[antiaristo]

<!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>Shoot, that one is easy--to gather more information.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--> <br><br>Agreed. Just like WTC I?<br>They blew up the World Trade Center in 1993, for just this "reason". What did you get in return?<br><br>If you give these people the benefit of the doubt, they use their power to create more doubt. Isn't it obvious?<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>At what point did it become clear that Saddam no longer had WMD?<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--> <br><br>Now there's a question. Clear to whom? So far as I am aware Cheney still holds to his position.<br>We could have known the answer had Hans Blix been allowed the few more weeks that he asked for. But he was ordered out by the Americans so they could begin bombing according to their election timetable. That created the uncertainty they wanted, and from which <!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>they can plead for understanding to this day.</strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--><br><br>Honestly, chig, it's January 2003.<br><br>The president stood up and told a lie in the State of the Union address.<br><br>The whole world watched him.<br><br>The people at B-J had been trailing uranium. They had risked their lives to get the truth. And they watched that abomination.<br><br>They knew how much AQ Khan had been allowed to get away with on the grounds of "gaining more information". And they saw the president say that information was a crock of shit. <p></p><i></i>

[dbeach]

<!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.firedoglake.blogspot.com/">www.firedoglake.blogspot.com/</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br><br>reters is a saying looks like lessserious charges on mon or tues..BUT its spin more serious will come IF he only lays down a lil fire this wk <br><br> ANTI may have the best insight..<br><br>a good card sharp keeps em close and he ain't gonna fold with a winnning hand<br><br>cheny can twist and shout BUT is the US military gonna let him do another 9/11??..Remember how blog land beat the drums about the possible nuke attacks in AUG in South Carolina..and it was a training exercise..<br><br>ONE MORE terrisit attack on the USA and many more will pt at the busheviks..MAYBE the criminals will get sloppy <p></p><i></i>

[banned]

....to the best of my memory he said exactly what he said in this article, that it would be virtually impossible to get anyone on the charge of outing an agent.<br><br>I'd be happy to go back and search for the article I read, though it may not be the one you're referring to, so if you have a link for yours I'd be interested.<br><br>sunny, there is no such animal as 'controlling law.' Not as an absolute. Courts ignore precedent and reinterpret statutes all the time. And it's all subject to the vicissitudes of politics, which was Dean's point about the national security aspect.<br><br>If you were special counsel and a sitting President tells you "There are national security considerations you are not privy to because you don't have that high a clearance, and as your President I am telling you what you are doing is compromising national security", what would YOU do? <p></p><i></i>

[banned]

<br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20050715.html">writ.news.findlaw.com/dean/20050715.html</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>It Appears That Karl Rove Is In Serious Trouble<br>By JOHN W. DEAN <br><br><snip><br><br>...it basically said that it would be pretty difficult to get Rove (or, presumably, anyone else--Libby wasn't a focus when he wrote that article) on outing Plame.<br><br>I searched Findlaw for 18 USC 793 and found an article from 8/15/05 by Louis Klarevas citing the Dean article.<br><br>Is this the Dean article you meant:<br><br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://writ.corporate.findlaw.com/dean/20030926.html">writ.corporate.findlaw.co...30926.html</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>Bush's Unofficial Official Secrets Act:<br>How the Justice Department Has Pushed to Criminalize The Disclosure of Non-Security Related Government Information<br>By JOHN W. DEAN<br>----<br>Friday, Sep. 26, 2003 <p></p><i></i>

[chiggerbit]

So, did Plame, Wilson and Brewster Jennings give the people of this administration enough rope with which to hang themselves? <p></p><i></i>

[banned]

...to God's ears <!--EZCODE EMOTICON START :D --><img src=http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/happy.gif ALT=":D"><!--EZCODE EMOTICON END--> . <p></p><i></i>

[antiaristo]

banned,<br>Maybe it's the world that has shifted and not Dean.<br>The thing that stuck in my mind was that Dean mentioned the unmentionable when everybody else with ANY profile was pushing the IIPA.<br>He seemed ahead of the field. Now he seems behind.<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>If you were special counsel and a sitting President tells you "There are national security considerations you are not privy to because you don't have that high a clearance, and as your President I am telling you what you are doing is compromising national security", what would YOU do?<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--> <br><br>Seems to me you have a national security prosecutor, like Fitzgerald. If you allow THAT dodge then it becomes inevitable that stains on a blue dress will be investigated, but not treason. Treason serves at the suffrance of the president alone.<br><br>Outing a NOC is by definition treason.<br>That's why the perpetrators went about it the way they did.<br><br>EVEN WILSON PARTICIPATED.<br>Wilson told us his wife is NOC on 16 July 2003. He stressed the danger to the surveillance network. If you want to minimise damage, you don't get into a public argument.<br><br>He did it AGAIN with that photograph.<br><br>I cannot see how Valerie was harmed by this. She was back in the States with her two newborns. It's the people in the field who trusted her.<br>What did she lose? She's fortyish, with a husband in his early sixties (my guess) and two toddlers at home.<br><br>What did SHE lose? <p></p><i></i>

[antiaristo]

Then there is this<br><br><!--EZCODE QUOTE START--><blockquote><strong><em>Quote:</em></strong><hr>Leak of Agent's Name Causes Exposure of CIA Front Firm<br><br>By Walter Pincus and Mike Allen<br>Washington Post Staff Writers<br>Saturday, October 4, 2003; Page A03 <br><br>The leak of a CIA operative's name has also exposed the identity of a CIA front company, potentially expanding the damage caused by the original disclosure, Bush administration officials said yesterday. <br><br><!--EZCODE BOLD START--><strong>The company's identity, Brewster-Jennings & Associates, became public because it appeared in Federal Election Commission records on a form filled out in 1999 by Valerie Plame, the case officer at the center of the controversy, when she contributed $1,000 to Al Gore's presidential primary campaign. <br></strong><!--EZCODE BOLD END--> <br>After the name of the company was broadcast yesterday, administration officials confirmed that it was a CIA front. They said the obscure and possibly defunct firm was listed as Plame's employer on her W-2 tax forms in 1999 when she was working undercover for the CIA.<hr></blockquote><!--EZCODE QUOTE END--> <br><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK START--><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A40012-2003Oct3?language=printer">www.washingtonpost.com/ac...ge=printer</a><!--EZCODE AUTOLINK END--><br><br>I would LOVE a hero to come out of all this. America NEEDS heroes at this juncture. I just don't see Wilson/Plame in that light.<br> <p></p><i></i>