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Plame: The Dogs Start Biting Each Other

Over the last two days, we have been overwhelmed with rumors in what was once a tight-lipped affair. What that tells me is that people are beginning to talk to get their story out ahead, to make sure they distance themselves from the "wrong" people and try to point the finger elsewhere. And of course, these things tend to move along the chain of command.

But first the fear has to come up from the bottom. Assuming for the moment that the reports are accurate--and they are not at all unreasonable--in the last two days Raw Story has described testimony of two White House functionaries who are turning evidence on the VP's office. Once you get people inside the White House pointing fingers up the chain (apparently Fitzgerald has them nailed on participating in the links, according to RS), the people who gave the orders start working on their stories.

Thus, today in the Daily News we have the "protect Bush" leak: George was "furious" with Rove for his efforts in unmasking Plame--although apparently on grounds of incompetence, not ethics. I don't think the leakers on this one meant to suggest that Bush was lying when he said Rove told him he wasn't involved, but there it is, and the groundwork for later is laid: Bush was mad when he found out---implying that he had to be TOLD. Hint, hint. Josh Marshall digs in deep on the story today.

So now Rove's out in the cold, right? Heck no. He can just pass on the heat. Tomorrow's WaPo carries the story of Rove's recollection on who might have been that guy who told him about Plame, that he just couldn't remember before: Oh yeah, it was Scooter! I think, anyway. And besides, we just talked about what we heard the reporters tell us.

I suspect as the vulnerability of the White House Group spreads (they're even trying to rope Judy Miller in now, although she may have eagerly qualified on her own), you'll also see more of this from former administration personnel--the sudden freedom to speak your mind about all the dead bodies you saw during your time in the regime:

n a scathing attack on the record of President George W. Bush, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff to Mr Powell until last January, said: “What I saw was a cabal between the vice-president of the United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld, on critical issues that made decisions that the bureaucracy did not know were being made.

“Now it is paying the consequences of making those decisions in secret, but far more telling to me is America is paying the consequences.”
...

   Among his other charges:

■ The detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere was “a concrete example” of the decision-making problem, with the president and other top officials in effect giving the green light to soldiers to abuse detainees. “You don't have this kind of pervasive attitude out there unless you've condoned it.”

■ Condoleezza Rice, the former national security adviser and now secretary of state, was “part of the problem”. Instead of ensuring that Mr Bush received the best possible advice, “she would side with the president to build her intimacy with the president”.

■ The military, particularly the army and marine corps, is overstretched and demoralised. Officers, Mr Wilkerson claimed, “start voting with their feet, as they did in Vietnam. . . and all of a sudden your military begins to unravel”.

Note with interest the reference to fallout with Powell on his public comments; Wilkerson describes him as a good soldier to the end. Pathetic. And I'm glad he speaks up about Rice; the heinous rumor that Rice would get nominated to replace Cheney at VP has been making me ill with the number of people who seem to think that's a good idea. I think if this really blows up to the point where Cheney resigns, Condi is going to get some of the mud splatter on her own dress.

For so long, the Bush administration was a model of harsh enforcement of discipline. But once people's names started getting into the paper alongside the word "indictment," these cowards began bailing on each other. (To be fair, it would seem Wurmser and Hannah bailed some time earlier, once Fitzgerald showed them what he had). As I saw someone mention in a comment recently, you can bet there are no G Gordon Liddys in this sniveling group.

It's horrible for the country, but I have to admit that it's satisfying to see the rats scurry as the cellar door opens on them.

--TJ

He and He Said/She Said

Perhaps apropos for a woman of Harriet Miers' generation, the highly operative question of the week for her nomination prospects appears to be "Does she or doesn't she?"  This morning in the Wall Street Journal, the usually hacktastic John Fund dropped a strangely planted-feeling bomb on the start of the workweek: two of her best friends from Texas said in a Konservative Konference Kall that given the chance to overturn Roe, she would "absolutely" do it:

Mr. Dobson says he was surprised the next day to learn that Justice Hecht and Judge Kinkeade were joining the Arlington Group call. He was asked to introduce the two of them, which he considered awkward given that he had never spoken with Justice Hecht and only once to Judge Kinkeade. According to the notes of the call, Mr. Dobson introduced them by saying, "Karl Rove suggested that we talk with these gentlemen because they can confirm specific reasons why Harriet Miers might be a better candidate than some of us think."

What followed, according to the notes, was a free-wheeling discussion about many topics, including same-sex marriage. Justice Hecht said he had never discussed that issue with Ms. Miers. Then an unidentified voice asked the two men, "Based on your personal knowledge of her, if she had the opportunity, do you believe she would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade?"

"Absolutely," said Judge Kinkeade.

"I agree with that," said Justice Hecht. "I concur."

If you found yourself skipping through the excerpt without clicking the link, I hate to enable such perfidy by giving you the needed context---ah dammit, OK: Jittery Jim Dobson is doing his level best to help prop up the nominee, and helped organize a conference of faith in order to soothe rattled evangelicals.  According to Dobson, 'someone' virtually handed him Kinkeade and Hecht and let the call roll.

By mid-afternoon, word had already made it to Capitol Hill:

Her position on the contentious topic appeared to gain some clarity when Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., emerged from a nearly two-hour meeting with her, saying she'd affirmed a key underpinning of the Roe vs. Wade ruling that legalized abortion.

    

But a short time later, his spokesman issued a statement saying that the senator had misunderstood Ms. Miers and that the nominee had not taken a position on a constitutional right to privacy.

                             

       Hours earlier, Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said the nominee had        disputed a Wall Street Journal column that quoted two close judicial friends from Texas as telling leading conservative skeptics that she'd vote to reverse the landmark 1973 ruling.

    

"She said to me that she couldn't recall discussing the Roe vs. Wade case – and whether she would overturn it – with anybody," Mr. Schumer said.

To mix metaphors, this really is turning into kabuki of the absurd. Everyone's either asking about Roe, or pretending not to have asked but are handing out the answer with a wink and a nudge. And for one further interesting detail about who knows and who doesn't, we turn to the Knight-Ridder version of the story:

The [evangelical conference] call came one day after Rove spoke at length with Dobson about Miers, assuring the influential conservative that Miers was acceptable. Dobson has said that Rove made no promise about how Miers would vote if confirmed for the court.

The White House said Monday that it didn't set up the second call.

"That was not a call organized by the White House, and as far as I've been able to learn, no one at the White House was involved on that call," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.

Miers told Schumer that she'd never discussed Roe v. Wade with Kinkeade or Hecht, Schumer said, but she refused to say whether she had ever discussed the issue with Rove.

Kinkeade declined to comment. In a statement read by his assistant, the judge said he "does not feel it is appropriate to have further discussion about Ms. Miers' nomination in public."

Hecht didn't respond to calls for comment.

A little "I've said too much already" from Kinkeade; Hecht appears to have realized that one inopportune quote was enough. And how interesting that KR reports Miers to have specifically denied the comments from the two, rather than just saying "I didn't tell anybody"--although not near as interesting as her refusal to say whether she discussed it with Rove. Which means that pending doom or not, Karl is still running the show and doing whatever he can to keep the turds blossoming in the White House. The stress is showing.

--TJ

 

Harriet Miers: As the Story Develops

What a great story the Harriet Miers nomination has turned out to be, because it has generated all kinds of surprising feedback. The conservatives are howling, the Democrats are smiling broadly as they come to grips with the bullet they may have just dodged, and the radical liberals are some combination of bewildered and bemused as they stare blankly at a page of litmus tests ready to be checked off without any information to assist them.

Count firedoglake among the bemused.  Reddhedd the attorney takes much the same line of discontent as Jerry Seinfeld when he found out his newly converted dentist was already telling Jewish jokes; it didn't upset him as a Jew, but as a comedian. In other words, forget the ideology--this woman's a hack:

Here's the thing, the Supreme Court is the top of the heap for lawyers. To become a judge on the Court is to enter the highest position you could ever have hoped for as you slaved away in your law review cubicle. To reach this pinnacle of lawyerdom, most attorneys have spent time in the inner sanctums of power, serving as law clerks to federal judges or justices, working for public governmental institutions, and constantly challenging themselves by rigorous intellectual debates either in front of courts as an appellate attorney or via publication and debate in law reviews or other peer reviewed journals in the legal world, devoting the whole of their brains toward advancing our understanding of lofty constitutional principles and their intersection with our practical lives.

Harriet Miers has the qualifications of someone who gets appointed to oversee the sale of assets for a local school board or a state agricultural department. She was a managing partner at a large-ish law firm in Dallas, requiring keen administrative and money-management skills, I'm sure, but not exactly a position of substantial Constitutional scholarship. She was appointed by Shrub to a 6-year term on the Texas Lottery Commission, so maybe she's good at picking numbered balls out of a spinning cage, if nothing else. Ms. Miers was a member-at-large of the Dallas City Council, requiring her to have inordinate amounts of patience for inanity, if my experience as a municipal attorney has any correlation, but again not exactly an intellectual challenge in terms of constitutional principles or anything, but more like a whole lot of people complaining about titty bar zoning ordinances and policing problems. And she was the first woman president of the Texas State Bar Association (okay, decent marks here, since she had to overcome the good-ole-boy network to get a leg up, but being able to position yourself politically has nothing to do with intellectual abilities in terms of legal scholarship and judicial temperament). Maybe she can organize a bingo night for the Justices if she gets confirmed.

Look, not to be intellectually snobbish about this (okay, I'm being intellectually snobbish, but for heaven's sakes, it is the Supreme Court!), but she simply does not look qualified for this job at first glance.

One of the more interestingly gleeful comments from the left was that (as firedog notes) as one of Bush's many fixers within the White House, she must have been hanging around the office for quite a few of the policy and strategy boondoggles were hatched, along with the shenanigans used to sell them. That ought to make for an embarrassing hearing...although not necessarily for Miers.

I do share fd's indignance that the President clearly has so little regard for venerated offices and appointments as to set up one of his buddies for the gig. But really, after all of the indignities the country has suffered under this guy's watch already, today I just have to laugh. Progressives, sit back and enjoy the proceedings. Moral crusaders of the right? You got served.

--TJ

OR Supremes: Live Sex Shows OK By Us

Given that the variously lovely ladies of Oregon have long enjoyed the legal ability to sate their cash-enamored dreams by pushing a little tail in one form or another, Thursday's doubly penetrating state Supreme rulings were no surprise, slamming home the message that Rose can continue to display her flower to Pearl while men watch through a plexiglass window. And that some 5-foot6-guy in a cigarette-stale office upstairs will get the labor for free. America! Or rather, Oregon!

Lest I confuse you by starkly representing the strip club industry in paragraph one, I heartily support both rulings on the premise that there appears to be no compelling state interest in banning the practices under discussion. But let's face it: even at their best, the purveyors of erotic dance are not generally running the classiest joints in any Oregonian burg.  And no matter how hot the girls are and how unbelievably good the steak is for just $4.00 with 51 taps to choose from to wash it down, look up and you're still in a dim bar where a nude woman is distractedly dancing with a pole while recorded music blares at variously annoying volumes.

So this is definitely one of those rulings that you can really only support in the name of good old American liberty, embracing chaos as the mysterious side dish for your all-you-can-eat combo plate of freedoms. Is the lack of a four foot buffer between dancer and patron, and the ability to watch two humans fulfill a design function, a signal of chaos? Well, no--but it certainly doesn't look good on a postcard, and thus you can understand why some folks might not wish to provide a broad outlet for these more base and fun concerns of the human spirit.

So if you're still reading this rather than going out to a club (or investigating a move to Portland), some helpful background to allow you to save face at parties where NOW may be waiting to pounce: in a tribute to our lost friend B!x, Portland Communique gave a nice update on the status of the cases when they were heard by the Court. I love the bar owner in the story he quotes, who worries that he might not be able to maintain four feet between dancers and patrons because of the size of the bar. What, does he show girls in a shoebox, like a sexy diorama? For a slightly more earnest treatment of the issues in both cases, ACLU Oregon immediately removes all traces of any lustful thoughts you may have encountered while reading this post. The Oregon State Bar is another, more even handed perspective, although it's just as much of a boner kill to read.

I thought when I read this at Oregon Commentator Online (an OR Blog I confess I had not yet seen), that might spur all kinds of local blog champagne corks. Read about the story Friday at work, go violate the 4 foot buffer on Buffy Friday night! But nothing. Speaking seriously, this is actually a fairly notable story. Live sex acts? You won't get away with that crap in most of the South, and places with lots of old people like Arizona. And if you're Outside the Beltway, this is just one more example of the coming Armageddon:

With courts approving this stuff it’s no wonder marriages fall apart, kids think oral sex is not sex, and what was once considered reserved for marriage and special is now officially open season for reducing people to their lowest common denominator. No wonder we are so willing to murder our own children and call it choice.

I'll let you draw the connection between shcool sex education and the four foot buffer, because I can't. Anyhow, let me join my brethren here in our great state, and as an official ambassador of good will urge you to Fuck On Ahead in Oregon! Hey, I gotta call Teddy the Bowler--he might could use that one.

--TJ

*I linked to the KGW version of the AP story because it's the more complete version than the standard Google copy, but you may find yourself against KGW's content barrier. You should be OK for the first page visit.

Wyden to Vote Yea on Roberts as Chief

Yesterday I got a missive from somewhere (MoveOnPAC, maybe?) urging me to call Senator Wyden and counsel him to vote No on confirming John Roberts for Chief Justice. Before I did that, I figured I should ask if he'd made a decision yet. He had:

Judge Roberts’ combination of temperament and intelligence  give him the potential to be a conciliatory voice at a divisive  time. He has the skills to reach across the divisions in America to show that justice can be a healing force for the wounds that cut our society so deeply these days. He can help to unify the country by building a record of well-reasoned opinions, grounded in the rule of law, not ideology. He will receive my vote tomorrow to be the next Chief Justice of the United States.

I'm sort of down with that perspective; it reflects a view that seeks to broaden the scope of discussion beyond individual issues and toward a long-term vision of political amity, one that in our current times surely does seem visionary--at best.

Wyden buries the lede here--it's the 3rd to last paragraph in a fairly long statement, one that seems to confirm the speculation that he was seriously on the fence before today. He leads up to his conclusion by discussing his private talk with Roberts, the public testimony, the available record, and various media and advocacy group analyses. He makes good surface points, suggesting that he feels comfortable with a Yea vote because Roberts said he believes in privacy, believes in Griswold, and starts from a position of liberty and state control when it comes to life-end issues. He also takes a bit of a shot at the issue-advocates, saying that their belief that he's "not our choice" is irrelevant to his decision; by definition he's not Wyden's choice, he's the President's. (Wyden does indicate that he wouldn't personally choose Roberts for the job, either. How this virtual shrug on the devils of process  is supposed to salve the wounded base he's addressing here, I'm not entirely sure.)

What concerns me is not what he said, but what he didn't say. By deflecting the base advocates as simply being unrealistic to oppose for opposition's sake, he ignores the reasons WHY they urged him to oppose: the book on Roberts is mighty thin, the White House is holding back many chapters, and what's in the book doesn't match the cover Roberts drew in the Senate hearings this month. Where is the recognition that we don't have much to go on as far as rulings? Where is the outrage that the Bush administration prevented the Senate from making a fully informed judgement? Where is the analysis of why his writings as a scheisster for Reagan don't match what he's saying now?

It's not in there, and as I say that concerns me. The picture that develops of Wyden here is that like many other Democrats, he was disarmed by Roberts' personal style and comfortably couched statements under oath. As Wyden rattles off the reasons he is not worried by Roberts' views because of what Roberts told him, the question arises: why does he believe him? Which is not to suggest that Roberts is clearly a liar, but you at least gotta ask.

Two other things niggle at me about this 'concession' speech. All of the rationale building he puts together is potentially undermined, in my view, by his strong warning that the next nominee may not be so lucky. It suggests that Wyden himself knows he is punting on Roberts, or in the parlance of weak-kneed Senators, "keeping his powder dry." The implication is that his review of Roberts' nomination was not done in a vacuum, but looking ahead to the next battle. Politically I understand the nuance, but ideologically it's suspect: either Roberts is a qualified nominee, or he's not. Saying "I wouldn't choose this guy, but I'll give him a pass and I promise to spend more opposition capital on the next one" suggests that Wyden doesn't even buy his own lengthy rationale.

The reason I bring this up is that I'm suspicious about his motives in conjunction with Oregon's Right to Die statute. Let me be upfront and state that I fully support our death with dignity law, I definitely want both Senators to do their best to protect it from federal intrusion, and I appreciate Wyden's past positions on the issue. But while I applaud his concern for state legislation approved by his constituents, this isn't the first time he's sublimated a national duty for a state one. Wyden mentions the Schiavo affair in his statement; he declares that he believed it was unwarranted to federally intrude on the case with a bill in Congress. What he doesn't tell you directly, is that he went ahead and allowed unanimous consent on the final version of the bill, once assisted suicide in Oregon had been protected from its effects.

And here again, part of Wyden's statement is to reassure voters that he believes Roberts will not futz with Oregon's right to die law--a case among the first he will hear as Chief.  Beyond his suspension of disbelief that Roberts wasn't playing him like a National guitar, one might get the feeling that once his fears were assuaged on assisted suicide, he rolled over on the bigger question. As I said, I'm torn between approving of his strong concern for the vitality of Oregon law, and being dismayed at his "what's in it for me" approach to decisionmaking.

Perhaps taking a cue from Wyden himself, my final inclination is to take what he says as being in earnest, and move on. But in my own example of burying the lede, I'm not real happy with Ron today.

--TJ

WA Gov-- Independent Investigation Confirms: NO Fraud

Is this a classic case of 'burying the lede' from the Post-Intelligencer's Gregory Roberts, or is it now simply common knowledge that King County's handling of the election was merely sloppy instead of fraudulent? Their headline, "Elections supervisor may be fired," is obviously true enough, but given the hue and cry and continued whining from folks like Stefan Sharkansky, I'd think this would be given a bit more play by the MSM:

The investigation, by the local law firm of Williams, Kastner & Gibbs, found no evidence of fraud or intentional misconduct, but did disclose neglect of elections procedures, resistance to changes in the agency, communication breakdowns and poor management. [emph mine]

Maybe the heavy club of rationality has finally beaten down the rabble rousers and Ukranian flag fliers, so that this is no longer news, but I'm taking no chances-- let's repeat: An independent investigation by a Seattle law firm found no evidence of fraud or intentional misconduct.

They did find a lot of sloppy work at the middle management level, which is where people like Nicole Way resided, and a culture of putting off problems until "things slowed down," a moment which in the record turnout of 2004 came far too late to address them. Way is the supervisor who "may be fired," although once you get your name in the paper for possibly being fired it's definitely time to move on regardless. Way's assistant Garth Fell is now on Double Secret Probation, and he'll need to score a couple touchdowns or intercept a couple of passes in the April election cycle to avoid  receiving a 2-week suspension without pay. Three lower ranking employees also received letters of reprimand. Bad plebe, bad!

As the P-I indicates, SuperNintendo of Elections Bill Huennekens is already gone--although curiously he comes out sounding like an undeserving fall guy:

Before 2004, investigators said, elections workers simply counted all properly completed absentee ballots they received, even if they could not find a matching signature. Because of past technological problems, 40,000 voter signatures were not registered in the computer program used for verification.

When Huennekens learned of that custom in early 2004, he ordered that ballots should not be counted without a signature match, as called for under state law -- a directive that rankled the work force, the report said. That summer, workers scanned most of the unregistered signatures into the computer system.

But in November, 735 absentee ballots came in for which no signature could be found on file. Workers set those aside and, again, did not follow up.

When the neglect came to light during the hand recount, Way went to retrieve those ballots -- but missed 175 of them, the report said. Ultimately, only 566 of the ballots were included in the final count, as time ran out.

So they were doing it wrong before, until Huennekens made them do it the right way. The rank and file balked, and the section head gave a vocal vote of 'no confidence' to inspire her team, before submitting guesstimate paperwork to Huennekens. Sorta takes the starch out of the GOP's attempt at trial to make Huennekens look like an evil schemer hellbent on giving Gregoire the election, doesn't it?

I'd be curious to see the whole report; I'll try and track it down if it's available. But for about the 100th time this year, let me offer Sharkansky and the rest of the electorially jilted some helpful advice: You lost; get over it.

--TJ

Rove's Omissions and the Missing Source

The floodgates seem to have opened at WaPo, as multiple sources are beginning to paint much more complete pictures of the Fitzgerald prosecution over the last couple years, particularly the evolution of its direction. The best reporting and worst paper readership of the week tend to collide with a giant 'meh' each Saturday.

I came at this a in a circuitous sort of way, first reading the diarist's synopsis of it at Kos, but only reading the quoted section. I then moved on to Horse's Ass, which has the story today's WaPo effort builds on--the Bloomberg article indicating contradictory testimony between Rove, Libby, Cooper and Russert. Within the comments was another link, this time to the Seattle Weekly and a column by Geov Parrish.

The gist from Parrish was  that because Democrats are so gleeful at the thought of taking Rove down, that's a form of tribute. And because it was tribute to his skill at being ruthless but successful, they're saying he's smart. And, in a leap farther than aides take when the President mounts some kind of personal transport, if he's smart--he must be innocent! Why? Because nobody so smart would be so sloppy as to lie to the Grand Jury!

Which, tortured as it is, makes a decent surface point. Sloppiness through complacency and arrogrance only takes you so far; at a certain point you're not sloppy if you're too complacent to create a workable alibi for your testimony. You're stupid. But that misses an equally likely scenario: that the alibi gets used and works for a while, but something you missed fills in the puzzle for them and now you've got trouble. And this is where WaPo and the Kos diarist swopa come back into the picture:

Fitzgerald has long been interested in a Time magazine article co-written by Cooper shortly after Novak's column was published on July 14, 2003. In the article, Cooper and two colleagues wrote about the administration's efforts to discredit Wilson and noted that some government sources had revealed that Plame worked for the CIA.

Lawyers involved in the case said there are now indications that Fitzgerald did not initially know or suspect that Rove was Cooper's primary source for the reporter's information about Plame. That raises questions about how much Rove disclosed when first questioned in the inquiry or how closely he was initially queried about his contacts with reporters. Rove has testified before a grand jury and been questioned by FBI agents on at least five occasions over the past two years.

Two lawyers involved in the case say that although Fitzgerald used phone logs to determine some contacts between officials and reporters, they believe there is no phone record of Cooper's now-famous call to Rove in the days before Novak's column appeared. That is because Cooper called the White House switchboard and was reconnected to Rove's office, sources said.

Also, when first questioned in the days after Plame's name appeared in the press, Rove left the impression with top White House aides that he had talked about her only with Novak, according to a source familiar with information provided to investigators.
...

The sources said Fitzgerald looked surprised in the August 2004 deposition when Cooper said it was he who brought up Wilson's wife with Libby, and that Libby responded, "Yeah, I heard that, too."

The prosecutor pressed Cooper to then explain how he knew about Wilson's wife in the first place, and Cooper said he would not answer the question because it did not involve Libby, the sources said.

That testimony contributed to a lengthy legal battle, as Fitzgerald sought to compel Cooper to testify before a grand jury about his conversation with the source.

That battle culminated in this series of events, from Needlenose. So here we might be seeing Rove's alibi. Because there is no direct phone record of the call, turning phone records over wouldn't pick it up. It's not clear to me whether the Novak call is or not, but since he published the conversation Fitz already knew they had called each other. Not so Cooper. And Rove knew that, and so said nothing. The alibi had worked.

But this is where sloppy and complacent may have come in: because Rove didn't do any blabbing via email, perhaps turning over email records wasn't perceived as a big deal. And since the phone records wouldn't show Cooper's call, he could play it like it never happened. But there was a record of that call, in the email he sent to Hadley, Rove reassuring him that he didn't "spill the beans to Cooper." He remembered the phone call, and that he did good--but maybe he didn't remember the crowing email to Hadley.

And this email sparked the call for Cooper. As Needlenose points out, it was only when Fitzgerald discovered that Cooper had heard it from someone in government and wouldn't say who it was, that the legal conflict began. All of a sudden, as the Judge noted, it would be highly relevant to know where Cooper had heard it if not from Libby. And he was willing to send people to jail to find out.

And so Rove and Co. skated all this time until Cooper was finally made to testify--or actually when Time outed his stuff on the company's kind behalf, and sort of forced the issue. Sure enough, it was Rove. As the Post says, either he artfully dodged the questions or simply wasn't asked the right ones. With Cooper's information, the fact that Rove was silent about it at first and then contradicted Cooper in several places, caused Fitzgerald to move from "who leaked" to "who told the truth or not."

Which brings me finally back to Horse's Ass, with a comment I must immodestly reproduce:

That’s why they’re so smart they couldn’t have done it–they thought they had plausible deniability. Turns out they’re not, they did, and they didn’t.

But there are still so many questions. Why is Judith Miller not talking? Is it none of the previously named players? Is he (or she!) the "some other government official" Luskin is now hedging about as a source for Rove? Is it Ari Fleischer, who may be in his own soup of hot water for some contradictory statements about whether he'd seen the infamous Memo on Air Force One enroute to Nigeria? Is it Colin Powell, who's now blowing the whistle on everybody? Was it Condi who played Haldeman and meted out the dirty jobs? Or was it Miller herself, fed by somebody like Chalabi or another entirely trusted and entirely untrustworthy Iraqi expat feeding Rumsfeld and Cheney poor intel?

Keep watching.

--TJ

Pushing SB1000 For a Vote

#58#

While Plamegate is certainly the most interesting issue of the day on a few fronts, it's a well-covered national story and certainly in the way of journalism I have nothing to add to the discussion. Closer to (my) home, there is an inverted Washington power play going on in Oregon during this legislative session, and things are perhaps coming to a head. After passage of the state Senate Bill 1000--which both outlaws discrimination by orientation and passes civil unions for same sex couples--the focus turned to the Republican-controlled House, which has behaved this session as if it ran Congress and the Executive, instead of being the minority institution in an otherwise Democratic landscape. House Leader Karen Minnis has refused to schedule the bill on what appears to be grounds that it would run afoul of the recently-passed Measure 36 (bumper title: One Man One Woman).

The news--simultaneously that the bill passed the Senate and would likely die there--made some national ripples. The National Gay/Lesbian Task Force gave solid props to Basic Rights Oregon (BRO), who spearheaded the legislative challenge of getting the Senate to pass the measure. Gays from Pittsburgh to St. Louis caught the word, and I link to the St. Louis one because it indicates congratulations from Log Cabin Republicans as well. Even Southern Voice covered it, in a more triumphalist "Thank Goodness Minnis Will Stop It" sort of tone, if I don't mistake the placement of a large picture of her to accompany the Buck Stops Here story. The Statesman-Journal takes a better hack at it. 

This type of maneuver is generally accorded to majority leadership in legislature, it seems, although most of the time it's done because the measure wouldn't pass anyway. According to Bryan at GayRightsWatch, however, Minnis may actually be holding out because it would pass--but would represent a defeat for "her people." And that's where I think this is more than run of the mill obstructionism.

First of all, it's a shameless reversal of all the mouthings from the right on Measure 36--it wouldn't affect civil unions, that's what the legislature is for, etc. Now all of a sudden the thing that people in support of 36 said was definitely NOT applicable, is now a subversion of 36's core purpose. There is a BRO offshoot site called subtly enough Track the Lies, which has a nice little flash movie to demonstrate this particular hypocrisy. (Hat tip to B!x on that one.)

Second, to say it thwarts the will of the people as expressed by 36 is absurd, since while Oregonians do indeed not favor the pure right of marriage, larger majorities tend to favor the establishment of civil unions. Besides the Senate, Governor Ted is on board, and can't figure out why nothing is moving (on anything) over at the Capitol.  Nike is taking the fairly courageous stand in favor of the bill.  So given that support, to refuse a vote is really what would be thwarting the will of the people.

As Track the Lies indicates at their page, a rally is scheduled for Wednesday the 20th in Salem at 6pm, with a hoped-for surprise guest. Until then, you can register your support for SB1000, focusing on the need to get the thing onto the floor at least on principle. You can contact the various media with a letter to the editor; they get printed more often than you think if they're cogent, brief, and timely. You can bug Air America to stay on this story, particularly Thom Hartmann,  who does a show out of Portland during morning drive.

More to come on this.

--TJ

Waxman: Rove, White House Broke Nondisclosure Laws

Today Rep. Waxman as Ranking Member of the House Reform Committee, published a "fact sheet" on potentially applicable laws regarding nondisclosure, particularly as it relates to maintaining a security clearance. Another phrase for "fact sheet" is "talking points," so treat accordingly--although almost all the facts Waxman refers to are either admitted or well implied by Rove's lawyer. Such is the one that when Novak told Rove about it, he said, "yeah, that's what we've heard too." And then did not back off or later repudiate the story that clearly used him as one of the two sources.

So here's what Waxman turned up. I notice there is little if any attention paid to the question of whether Rove had security clearance, what level it was, and whether he had it at the time of the leaks. I hope the Ranking Member wouldn't be wasting his time reading the government forms if he didn't already know Rove was signed up. The man was Bush's right, er, lobe from the get-go---how does he not get top security clearance in George's world? But it's not proven in this document.

That's about where the good news stops for Rove and the White House [all emph me]:

Mr. Rove, through his attorney, has raised the implication that there is a distinction between releasing classified information to someone not authorized to receive it and confirming classified information from someone not authorized to have it. In fact, there is no such distinction under the nondisclosure agreement Mr .Rove signed.

One of the most basic rules of safeguarding classified information is that an official who has signed a nondisclosure agreement cannot confirm classified information obtained by a reporter. In fact, this obligation is highlighted in the "briefing booklet" that new security clearance recipients receive when they sign their nondisclosure agreements: 'Before. ..confirming the accuracy of what appears in the public source, the signer of the SF 312 must confirm through an authorized official that the information has, in fact, been declassified. If it has not, ...confirmation of its accuracy is also an unauthorized disclosure.'

...

Mr. Rove's attorney has implied that ifMr. Rove learned Ms. Wilson's identity and occupation from a reporter, this somehow makes a difference in what he can say about the information. This is inaccurate. The executive order states: 'Classified information shall not be declassified automatically as a result of any unauthorized disclosure of identical or similar information.' Mr. Rove was not at liberty to repeat classified information he may have learned from a reporter. Instead, he had an affIrmative obligation to determine whether the information had been declassified before repeating it. The briefing booklet is explicit on this point: 'before disseminating the information elsewhere. ..the signer of the SF 312 must confirm through an authorized official that the information has, in fact, been declassified.'

So that covers Rove, pretty much. Is there anything the White House might be guilty of, in general?

The executive order specifically provides that when a breach occurs, each agency must 'take appropriate and prompt corrective action.' This includes a determination of whether individual employees improperly disseminated or obtained access to classified information. The executive order further provides that sanctions for violations are not optional. The executive order expressly provides: 'Officers and employees of the United States Government. ..shall be subject to appropriate sanctions if they knowingly, willfully, or negligently. ..disclose to unauthorized persons information properly classified.'
There is no evidence that the White House complied with these requirements.

This is not partisan sniping, this is a clear-minded reading of the statutes, and a non-recommending brief. It reaches no conclusions in the paper, and uses information generally stipulated by Rove's spokesperson. Given a fair reading of this law, I think calling for a review of Rove's security clearance is the absolute least that should be demanded as a result of this. And based on the growing trickle of background assertions by sources "close to the investigation," it seems like that may be the best Rove wants to hope for right now. Of course, it's a Saturday which means this particular set of leads will likely die until picked up again by someone reading the NYT archives.

--TJ

MSNBC's O'Donnell: Rove was Plame Source for Cooper

How interesting that this story would begin breaking on the heels of the huge O'Connor story, and over the 4th of July weekend to boot...the result is that as of noon today, nothing was showing up in Google News. However, the blogosphere is definitely buzzing about it.

What is "it?" Last night, MSNBC senior political analyst Lawrence O'Donnell had this to say on the McLaughlin Group:

"I know I'm going to get pulled into the grand jury for saying this but the source of...for Matt Cooper was Karl Rove, and that will be revealed in this document dump that Time magazine's going to do with the grand jury."

That comes from Editor and Publisher, who is apparently leading on this story, given the lack of Google stories. Today a 2nd article appeared, linking to O'Donnell's blog entry this morning at Huffington Post:

I revealed in yesterday's taping of the McLaughlin Group that Time magazine's emails will reveal that Karl Rove was Matt Cooper's source. I have known this for months but didn't want to say it at a time that would risk me getting dragged into the grand jury.

McLaughlin is seen in some markets on Friday night, so some websites have picked it up, including Drudge, but I don't expect it to have much impact because McLaughlin is not considered a news show and it will be pre-empted in the big markets on Sunday because of tennis.

Since I revealed the big scoop, I have had it reconfirmed by yet another highly authoritative source. Too many people know this. It should break wide open this week. I know Newsweek is working on an 'It's Rove!' story and will probably break it tomorrow.

Well. The first thing this reminded me of was the bookkeeper's comments in All the President's Men: "If you guys could get John Mitchell, that would be BEAUTIFUL." We'll see what happens to Rove. There are some complications involved here however, that keep me from predicting any kind of colossal bringdown for the White House inner circle. First, O'Donnell says Rove was Cooper's source. Was he Miller's as well? Also, when did Cooper get his info from Rove--before or after Novak's article? How did Rove know, if in fact it was beforehand, that Plame was a covert agent? Obviously he could find out, but in order for a felony charge on outing an agent to stick, the outer has to know the outee was an agent. Finally, just because he was Cooper's source, does not mean he was specifically "the leaker." Did he learn it from someone else, like Scooter Libby? That could leave Rove vulnerable to the outing charge, but not perjury--since Rove apparently claimed to the grand jury he was not "the leaker," but could admit subsequently that he merely passed on what he heard.

One way or the other however, this story will be news next week, and everyone is going to become familiar with who Karl Rove is. I've been burned too many times believing that the outrage on a story of White House perfidy would be sufficient to cause real trouble, to make any predictions of a frogmarch for the Big K at this time. We'll have to see if the media reaction helps drive the Special Prosecutor's next moves. Fitzgerald may not need any media attention to make this a big story, but it would certainly help.

Update 1pm--
For implications, recollections of prior evidence, and good histories of a story many A2 readers might not be fully familiar with, I recommend TalkLeft and Josh Marshall.

Stay tuned as your burgers grill,
--TJ