Posted on 09/30/2003 11:04:56 AM PDT by hsmomx3
Robert Novak is a coward.
Let's not say there's a lot at stake over Novak's refusal to name his alleged White House source(s) who leaked upon him the name of Valerie Plame; too much has already been impaled upon that stake. Plame, as Novak told us all, is a CIA employee, and the wife of the former U.S. Ambassador, Joseph Wilson, who called into question Bush's forthrightness in the January 2003 State of the Union Address. Novak included this highly sensitive (and classified) information in a column a couple of months ago, and he now stands as an obdurate obstacle between the truth and the lies that resulted in thousands of deaths and mutilations.
The story really didn't make much of a splash back then (Bob Novak's columns seldom do). In the hot and lazy summer, power outages in the Northeast and the corpses of Saddam's kids sucked up all the newsprint. But this looks like something that could swamp Bush's boat now. The papers are soggy with ink about this morning's official White House denials that top political strategist Karl Rove was the source of that leak. Bush spokesman Scott McLellan looks like he needs a hug from Arie Fleischer as he issues the obligatory gray-faced denials up there.
Let's get through this quickly: Leaking the classified identities of CIA operatives is a felony that can result in a ten year prison sentence, not to mention a $50,000 fine (that ought to buy a couple of pairs of sneakers for some Iraqi children - oh, wait... they only need one shoe each). The reasons for such a law being on the books, and for carrying such a stiff penalty, ought to be clear to any creature with a working frontal lobe. When names get named, people get killed. Such a heinous crime is, to quote Senator Charles Schumer, "despicable".
Politics is not much different from football, which is probably why it interests me in the first place. One of the rules is that if a player from either team drops the ball, the other team gets to pick it up and run with it in the opposite direction. Every realistic Democratic candidate called for an independent investigation of the leak. Senator Jay Inslee, the Democrat from Washington, said he intended to see "whether or not we can get Karl Rove frog-marched out of the White House in handcuffs."
The Bush camp says that's "ridiculous" - such colorful language from our statesmen these days - but what else are they going to say? Always well above the din of reality, the White House says that John Ashcroft's Department of Justice is capable of handling the problem. That's unacceptable, of course, after the treatment given to Bill Clinton at the taxpayers' expense. This is a bit more serious than a complimentary executive blowjob or a shady real estate deal in Arkansas, and anyone who might have suggested back then that Janet Reno should have been the one investigating Whitewater would have been shouted out of the room.
That's why it is important that Novak come clean, instead of protecting what many perceive to be the president himself. The talking head is - that's Novak, by the way - the real leaker, but the same law that's likely to land some poor underling in the slammer protects the "journalists" who expose classified information, unless it becomes a pattern of behavior. Novak can clam up, finally, with impunity, and chances are the investigation will end with him, gravestoning what may be one of the most egregious acts of malfeasance ever committed by any administration. If it were otherwise, the CIA (which works for the executive branch) would not have filed a crime report with the Department of Justice in the first place.
Novak should be thrown in jail, perhaps even a military brig, immediately. Those provisions in the law that protect the Fourth Estate should not be extended to him, for he is no objective reporter. He's a columnist, and if you've ever read one of his pieces, or suffered through insomnia while watching Crossfire, you know that Novak is no more a journalist than is Rush Limbaugh.
Walter Cronkite, okay, is a journalist. Robert Novak is a conservative shill, which is why he leaked Wilson's wife's name and relationship to the U.S. intelligence apparatus, in order to help the Bush administration quell criticism of their dastardly "sixteen words". It's the same reason he will refuse to name the source he says came from the White House; he's protecting his boy, because he knows he doesn't have to go to jail, like real reporters do.
Even if Novak is held harmless, just the appearance of the impropriety that led this country into war, among other things, merits Congressional exploration of impeachment. Conservatives will wear a brave mask, but they must be aghast at Bush's drop in the polls, and now even the most supportive pundits are assailing the spending on reconstruction in Iraq; today it was Cal Thomas, as far to the right of the planet Earth as any star out there.
At this point, the Republican Party would do well to start looking for another qualified candidate. They don't have much time.
Just wanted to be sure I have it right.
That one statement is what this entire mess is about. The Dems figure they've found a piece of something that they can use to beat up Rove.
Rove has been at the core of the White House and it's positive efforts for this entire administration at the expense of the Dems.
They hate this Administration and this President and anyone connected with him so much that they will resort to nothing - including trotting out lies as truth - to get to their ultimate goal.
If someone from the Bush Whitehouse did leak this I feel certain Bush will want that person found and fired. Bush is not Clinton! I would be more apt to believe Wilson leaked it himself.
I could have sworn that Joseph Wilson said this.
Granted. Now... is the name of Wilson's wife one of those that is classified? If not, then... will you appologize to George Bush for your irrational accusations, and foolish jumping of the gun? Also, are you so stupid to swallow this obvious "McDermott-Newt-Cell Phone taping" like gambit, and not see through it? I thought so. Clearly, we have no dearth of willing idiots in the press.
Huh? Where? When? How? No need to read further!
These guys have to be smoking something intense if they think Novak will ever give up his sources. And Walter Cronkite is about as much a journalist as Saddam's information minister "Baghdad Bob" was.
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