Scooter Skates
POSTED BY: deadlockvictim
UPDATED: Thursday, July 12, 2007 19:38
VIEWED: 10164
PAGE 1 of 2
"I respect the jury's verdict," Bush said in a statement. "But"....aw screw it......I ain't got no respect fer nobody....'sides I'm the friggin DECIDER....!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20070702/cia-leak-trial/
can these last 18 months not end soon enough?
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Bastard...
King of the Mythical Land that is Iowa
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http://www.speaker.gov/blog/?p=543
Quote:
The President’s commutation of Scooter Libby’s prison sentence does not serve justice, condones criminal conduct, and is a betrayal of trust of the American people.
The President said he would hold accountable anyone involved in the Valerie Plame leak case. By his action today, the President shows his word is not to be believed. He has abandoned all sense of fairness when it comes to justice, he has failed to uphold the rule of law, and he has failed to hold his Administration accountable - July 2nd, 2007 by Speaker Pelosi
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_Affair
Quote:
On September 30, 2003, President Bush said that if there had been "a leak" from his administration about Plame, "I want to know who it is ... and if the person has violated law, the person will be taken care of."
Bush added.... "we're gonna have a real texas barbecue...that'll take care of ole scooter....yeeeeha!"
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I'd like to hear now from the morons who still support this administration. Care to dance for us?
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Quote:
Originally posted by deadlockvictim:
"I respect the jury's verdict," Bush said in a statement. "But"....aw screw it......I ain't got no respect fer nobody....'sides I'm the friggin DECIDER....!
I'm numb...............catatonic.........................not surprised.........we're doomed anyway....if somebody shoots Bush soon, it wasn't me
If you're not on Malbadinlatin's side, you're with the terrorists.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
I'd like to hear now from the morons who still support this administration. Care to dance for us?
Her name is Ann Coulter, and trust me, you don't want to see her dance, or even talk, eeesh! all those lanky fingers and scrawny legs.
If you're not on Malbadinlatin's side, you're with the terrorists.
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i know this has been around before, but i think at times like these this message bears repeating......
http://filmstripinternational.com/
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Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
I'd like to hear now from the morons who still support this administration. Care to dance for us?
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
Those would be the people wearing the " I'm with stupid T-shirts right? "
Wouldn't that be ironic
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I think that about says it. They left one out though: the American Voter. We let him back in 2004 and blew it when we had a second chance to right things by not sending a veto proof majority in to congress.
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Good. I have to admit, for a short while I was starting to think that Bush wasn’t going to pardon Libby. (Although technically, he didn't.)
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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I don't usually comment on the RWED, but this was curious to me;
Quote:
"That's fantastic. It's a great relief," said former Ambassador Richard Carlson, who helped raise millions for Libby's defense fund. "Scooter Libby did not deserve to go to prison and I'm glad the president had the courage to do this."
Raised millions for one man's defence who was probably already priveledged and had the money to support himself (may be wrong, don't know too much about him) but isn't it strange these politico's are raising millions to defend another politico while people in the very same country are starving or going bankrupt just trying to stay healty. Thing's that make you go hmmmmmmm.
Oh, and this;
Quote:
Bush said Cheney's former aide was not getting off free.
"The reputation he gained through his years of public service and professional work in the legal community is forever damaged," Bush said. "His wife and young children have also suffered immensely. He will remain on probation. The significant fines imposed by the judge will remain in effect. The consequences of his felony conviction on his former life as a lawyer, public servant and private citizen will be long-lasting."
For a minute there, I thought he was talking about Paris Hilton, his sentence has the same sort of bs the Sherrif spewed off.
Ah to be rich, powerful, and be able to piss anyone off and never have to worry about culpability.
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~*Peter* Peter*; power *re-peater*~
`@/
/Y
/_)
*Petrelli for President. Together we can soar.*
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HEROE'S IS MY CRACK!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
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Quote:Yes. It's good to be da rich.
Originally posted by Misstressahara:
Ah to be rich, powerful, and be able to piss anyone off and never have to worry about culpability.
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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Veteran- Take this for what you will but the American voter did NOT vote Bush back in 2004. There were such serious discrepanices between the exit polls and the final vote tally... in six contentious states with electronic voting... that a group of high-powered statisticians who looked at the results said the only explanation that could NOT be ruled out was tampering. I find it disturbing ang frustrating that the Democratic Party does not make an issue of requiring tamper-proof voting methods.
And that doesn't even get into the registration and voter rolls. People think we live in a democracy because they can go to the polls. But the UN wasn't allowed to monitor our elections, and if they had been allowed to do so they wouldn't have even be able to certify them.
ETA: Oh yeah: F*ck Bush, Cheney and f*ck the whole damn lying, greedy, hypocritical buncha bastards. If people realized what these f*cking *ssholes have been doing for the past seven year AHWBL.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Signym,
You make a good point. The discrepancies and suppression not withstanding many Americans did vote for Bush. Even an extremely well coordinated rigging effort would not have been able to overcome a landslide. Face it a lot of our fellow citizens drank the cool aid.
Don't drink downstream of the herd.
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Some day I'll tell you how I REALLY feel about the Administration.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Via Newsbusters:
MSM Ignores Higher Placed Clinton Officials' Conviction to Tout Libby's
I keep seeing this talking point phrase in multiple MSM stories about the Libby conviction; "Libby was convicted in March, the highest-ranking White House official ordered to prison since the Iran-Contra affair roiled the Reagan administration in the 1980s."(emphasis, mine) This is a misleading statement that makes the reader imagine that no high-ranking Presidential appointee, adviser, or member of the White House has been convicted of anything since Reagan's era. But, at least one past official's name should be placed above that of Libby's. Henry Cisneros was the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, appointed to that position by President Bill Clinton. Cisneros, it should be remembered, was convicted in 1995 on 18 counts of conspiracy, false statements and obstruction of justice. And, I'd dare say that Libby, who only worked in the office of the Vice President, was a minnow in the pond in which Cisneros swam. Cisneros was the Secretary of HUD, after all, a presidential cabinet member!
Naturally, on his way out of the White House in 2001, Clinton pardoned Cisneros.
Yet, here we have the MSM constantly calling Libby the "highest White House official" convicted, completely ignoring the conviction of a much, much higher official with Cisneros. Of course, that this man was a member of Clinton's cabinet pretty much explains why the MSM is conveniently forgetting the fact that Libby is a small fish in this conviction game compared to Cisneros. And, Cisneros was certainly a member of the White House having been a Clinton appointee.
Still, this claim of Libby being "highest official" is everywhere. An MSM talking point, for sure. And a misleading one, at that.
Here are just a few quick examples:
The AP
"Libby was convicted in March, the highest-ranking White House official ordered to prison since the Iran-Contra affair roiled the Reagan administration in the 1980s."
Bloomberg News
"Libby, who had faced as many as 10 years in prison, was the highest-ranking former White House official sentenced to prison since 1990, when ex-National Security Adviser John Poindexter was ordered to serve six months for lying to Congress about the Iran- Contra affair. "
The Times On'Line
"He was the highest-ranking US official to be sentenced since the Iran Contra affair 20 years ago."
Even MTV got in the talking points game with their report today:
"Libby is the only person charged in the Plame investigation and is the highest ranking government official to be convicted in a government scandal in 20 years."
These several stories are just today's, but the use of this talking point goes back months. Whether new or old, though, this "highest official" talking point that is besmirching both Reagan and Bush is pervasive and it all conveniently forgets the conviction of Clinton's much higher placed White House Official, Cisneros.
And, let us not forget to mention that Clinton himself was a pretty high level White House Official to get in a tad of trouble. There WAS all that impeachment stuff a little while ago, you know?
But, who really could be surprised that Clinton gets a pass by the MSM... AGAIN?
http://newsbusters.org/node/13886
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Skywalken, you did not read the statements carefully. They did NOT say "highest White House official" convicted. What they said is "Libby was convicted in March, the highest-ranking White House official ordered to prison" Cisneros, because of a plea deal, never got jail time. Meanwhile "independent counsel" David Barrett continues to work--at taxpayer cost of $2 million a year--on footnote scandal of Clinton administration even thought the final report was submitted a year ago. The GAO is wondering whether he's doing anything beside sucking up a salary. Seems like you've got an axe to grind. And you don't know how to read.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Here's some more material of interest:
Pardons granted by President Clinton (1993-2001):
http://www.usdoj.gov/pardon/clintonpardon_grants.htm
Clinton: My Reasons for the Pardons...
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/18/opinion/18CLIN.html?pagewanted=all&e
i=5070&en=66ba82eaf117b24b&ex=1183521600
Hat tip to the Drudge Report.
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And let's no forget Watergate.
SW, what point are you trying to make? Is it really the old saw "Clinton did it too"?
As someone who holds equal contempt for Republicans and Democrats I can tell you - Bush's crimes, his pig-headed arrogance, his cynical attempts to evade the intent of the constitution at every turn, outclass Clinton's in every way. Maybe you can hang your hat on that, Bush is a lot better at it than Clinton, and has been able to a lot more lasting damage. Congrats!
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Mr. Libby did not deserve to go to jail. I just love how out of their minds the Dems are on this...just all verklempt and besides themselves..what a hoot! Funny how none of them had any problems with their love God Clinton when he pardoned embezzlers, drug dealers, rapists, and felons.....compared to those that dirty Bill set free, Libby was a Boy Scout.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Good. I have to admit, for a short while I was starting to think that Bush wasn’t going to pardon Libby. (Although technically, he didn't.)
What he did was really quite clever. By commuting some, but not all the sentence and leaving the verdict intact he allows Mr. Libby to continue the appeal process which many legal experts agree shows a great deal of promise.
If Libby wins then he does not need a pardon and thus is saved having to go to prison over a politically motivated conviction that failed to survive appeal and Bush is saved the hassle and scrutiny of issuing a pardon. Also accepting a pardon is by nature an addmission of guilt, something Mr. Libby has never done.
If Libby loses the appeal, Bush still has the option to issue the pardon up till January 20, 2009.
H
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Quote:
Originally posted by Jongsstraw:
Mr. Libby did not deserve to go to jail. I just love how out of their minds the Dems are on this...just all verklempt and besides themselves..what a hoot! Funny how none of them had any problems with their love God Clinton when he pardoned embezzlers, drug dealers, rapists, and felons.....compared to those that dirty Bill set free, Libby was a Boy Scout.
Lets not forget that Clinton directly accepted money for several of his pardons. Also he pardon several Jewish fellas in New York whose community had turned out to vote 97% for Hillary, despite never voting Demacrat before or since.
Not that Clinton broke any laws. The Supreme Court has said many times that the pardon power is unlimited and that the President can pardon a person for ANY reason, including political.
H
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Quote:
Originally posted by Hero:Quote:
Originally posted by Jongsstraw:
Mr. Libby did not deserve to go to jail. I just love how out of their minds the Dems are on this...just all verklempt and besides themselves..what a hoot! Funny how none of them had any problems with their love God Clinton when he pardoned embezzlers, drug dealers, rapists, and felons.....compared to those that dirty Bill set free, Libby was a Boy Scout.
Lets not forget that Clinton directly accepted money for several of his pardons. Also he pardon several Jewish fellas in New York whose community had turned out to vote 97% for Hillary, despite never voting Demacrat before or since.
Not that Clinton broke any laws. The Supreme Court has said many times that the pardon power is unlimited and that the President can pardon a person for ANY reason, including political.
H
Ya know...I had forgotten about that Jewish block vote in NY for HIllary....Nothing Wrong With This Picture...right? She also used her Senatorial leverage to allow an African women to stay in America because she claimed female mutilation in her home country...turned out the women was a wanted fugitive for credit card fraud, and is now one of our 12 million illegal aliens in America...and Hillary just said...oops!
And....talk about yo' National Security??...what about little bad bad Sandy Berger....man was caught red-handed stealing classified documents out of the National Archives, using Clinton as his "benfactor". No prosecution or jail for him, just some fines and a little disbarrment, but no jail. Only Republicans should go to jail I guess.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
I'd like to hear now from the morons who still support this administration. Care to dance for us?
I just love being the Devil's advocate, moron that I am. Libby, while spared jail time, must still pay a $250,000 fine, get 2 years probation, and have a criminal record. How can that be equated to skating?
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Hero- your replies helped me to understand why lawyers say "the law is a whore".
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Hero- your replies helped me to understand why lawyers say "the law is a whore".
Perhaps. But I was only pointing out the obvious. The pardon power is unlimited whether used by Republicans or Democrats.
Should Libby go to jail? If he misremembered something, I don't think so. If he deliberately obstructed the investigation, then yes he should. But I find the fact that there was no underlying offense compelling. How can one obstruct an investigation into nothing? I don't think it can be done. So my final conclusion is that Libby does not deserve jail.
Its not like he was knowingly lying under oath or going on national TV and lying directly to the American people or shoving classified documents down his pants or something like that.
I've always found pardons interesting. Lawschool requires us to write a research paper during our final year and we cannot graduate until its done. Mine was a paper on the Presidential pardon power that traced the evolution of the pardon power from its biblical origins up to the Clinton era. The question was whether Clinton broke the law if he sold pardon for money or political gain. He did not. It may not be ethical, moral, or smart...but its legal and constitutional and entirely consistant with the historical uses of the power both in American history and beyond.
In this particular case its also quite clever. I think those who consider this move stupid and unjust are a bit biased (Bush-haters...if Bush orders pancakes for breakfast they are ready to march, if he orders cereal they are ready to march, if he skips breakfast you could see a riot, they hate Bush, the topic is not relevent).
It may be unjust (all pardons are unjust, its their nature) but it was smarter then either an outright pardon or a complute commuting of the sentence. I'm not sure things have ever been done in quite this way and knowing something of the history, thats saying alot.
H
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Quote:
Originally posted by BigDamnNobody:
How can that be equated to skating?
Bigdamn, come on, you really think Libby will be out one red cent. His legal defense fund - http://www.scooterlibby.com/ - has raised millions – his good bud Dick has very deep pockets as well. The possibility of a full pardon before Bush leaves office is still very real and I certainly expect it will happen.
IMO, there was never a real chance that Libby would do any time, have to pay any cash – or live with an ankle bracelet for one single day – this administration is very adept at the old bait and switch style of politics, and they would not abandon one of their own.
One more thing – I don’t dislike Scooter Libby, he’s a stand-up guy – he took one for the team. I don’t necessarily dislike George Bush, he may be a decent dude, when he is in his element (which, it seems, is not leader of the free world…. etc), and even old Dead Eye Dick would be someone you might want watching your back, maybe not with a loaded shotgun, but I think it is evident that he rewards those loyal to his plan for world domination… But what really girds my loins is the way BushCo has a tendency to blow their respective noses on the constitution. For those of you who feel that some of the freedoms guaranteed by the constitution have not been blatantly eroded by this administration, I would ask you open your eyes a bit and look at the evidence of high crimes and misdemeanors committed by these wacky pranksters parading as the good guys.
a starting place or google your own...
http://www.commondreams.org/views06/1114-30.htm
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Quote:How did you conclude that? Patrick Fitzgerald said that he could not even investigate if there was any underlying crime due to Libby's interference and obstruction. Your logic is spectacularly faulty.
I don't think so. If he deliberately obstructed the investigation, then yes he should. But I find the fact that there was no underlying offense compelling. How can one obstruct an investigation into nothing? I don't think it can be done. So my final conclusion is that Libby does not deserve jail.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
How did you conclude that? Patrick Fitzgerald said that he could not even investigate if there was any underlying crime due to Libby's interference and obstruction. Your logic is spectacularly faulty.
Your knowledge of the case is faulty.
On July 14, 2003 Robert Novak revealed Plame's identity in his column. There is a great deal of speculation about whether Plame was a covert operative as defined by the law at that time. If she was not, then no crime was committed by revealing her status. Also she herself revealed the information to friends, neighbors, and even the press who took little or no interest in her "former" job. These two questions and some others equally interesting made it impossible for Fitzgerald to establish the underlying offense.
Assuming for the sake of argument that she was an operative then the question revolves around who revealed the information to Novak. Novak testified that the information was revealed by ex-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and later confirmed by Carl Rove. They were not charged.
The Prosecutor was never able to establish that a crime had occurred and never made the argument that if there was such a crime, the Vice-President's office was involved, so Libby's connection was tenuous at best. Libby's mistake was not being clear about the details of his involvment with the discussions of the Plame matter that occurred AFTER the Novak column was published. He was prosecuted for not remembering things the same way others did. This is why many people have now refused to cooperate with Congressional investigations into matters such as the firing of the US Attorneys.
It is interesting to note the Mark Rich connection. Libby was Rich's attorney from 1987 until 2000 and Fitzgerald was the Prosecutor for most of that period as well. Perhaps there is lingering animosity here...although I doubt it. But it is an odd coincidence.
H
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Jewish trial lawyer Lewis "Scooter" Libby was Jewish Israeli spy and indicted felon Marc Rich's lawyer.
http://archives.cnn.com/2001/ALLPOLITICS/03/02/clinton.library/
Rich was pardoned by Jewish president Bill Clinton Blythe III (bastard Rockefeller).
www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/bc42.html
Homosexual Libby authored the novel THE APPRENTICE, with its hero participating in pedophilia and bestiality.
www.conspiracyplanet.com/channel.cfm?channelid=104&contentid=2934
www.amazon.com/Apprentice-Novel-Lewis-Libby/dp/0312284535
Similar to lesbian Lynn Cheney's homosexual novel SISTERS.
www.whitehouse.org/administration/sisters.asp
Quote:
"Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event––like a new Pearl Harbor."
-Lewis Libby, Jewish Israeli Bush Project for a New American Century, Rebuilding America's Defenses, 2000
www.newamericancentury.org/RebuildingAmericasDefenses.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_Century
Paris Hilton served more jailtime for lawfully driving on a license that was NOT suspended, than PNAC Israeli citizen Libby, effectively convicted of treason.
Quote:
LARRY KING: Why did you drive with a suspended license?
PARIS HILTON: I was told that I had my license. My lawyer told me the license is suspended for 30 days, no driving. Then 90 days then after that you could drive to and from work. So for 30 days, I never drove once. Then after that it was for work related purposes.
KING: Think you got a raw deal? Do you?
HILTON: Yes, I do.
KING: What's the terms of probation? What can you do and can't do?
HILTON: Now?
KING: Yes. You're on probation, right?
HILTON: I'm just going to follow all the laws.
KING: I mean, for how long? Do you have to report to a probation officer?
HILTON: No. It's not like that.
KING: Do you think the judge was unkind?
HILTON: You know, my lawyers even said that with this kind -- it wasn't for a DUI, it was for a suspended license -- that people only -- I was walking in there assuming I was just going to get community service. That's what my lawyer said at the time. So when he sentenced me to that much time in jail, it was shocking, because that doesn't happen, ever.
KING: Did you think, Paris, that you didn't deserve to be there?
HILTON: You know, I think the crime did not fit the, you know, fit the punishment. I did my time. And you know, it was really hard, but I don't feel like I deserved to go to jail for it.
KING: You never felt you were a criminal.
HILTON: No.
KING: Not now, not then?
HILTON: No.
KING: On January 15, you were pulled over by the California Highway Patrol and told your license had been suspended, and you said you thought it was OK.
HILTON: I told the officer because I called my lawyer at that point and they said you're allowed to drive for work related purposes and I was at a business meeting before that.
KING: So misconception.
HILTON: Yeah.
KING: And January 22 you plead "no contest" to a reduced charge of alcohol-related reckless driving, you were ordered to take alcohol education. Did you?
HILTON: Yes, I did. And actually when we went into court, they said that I hadn't but the lady was sitting right in the courtroom and she said, "I will testify and say that Paris finished the course" and they wouldn't let her do it.
KING: And the driving with a suspended license. That you thought it was not suspended, right?
HILTON: I never would have driven on a suspended license. I get followed by paparazzi all day. Why would I have the audacity to do that?
KING: What kind of license do you have now?
HILTON: Fully reinstated license.
Even before I went in jail my license was fully reinstated with no restrictions whatsoever.
KING: Were you -- oh, we have your mug shot. Want to find out what you were thinking, what it was like to go through this. We will show that. I've seen worse.
HILTON: Thank you.
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Quote:This is all bullcrap and you know it. I challenge you to post verification of any of this. You should stop shitting outta your mouth, it's unbecoming.
There is a great deal of speculation about whether Plame was a covert operative as defined by the law at that time. If she was not, then no crime was committed by revealing her status. Also she herself revealed the information to friends, neighbors, and even the press who took little or no interest in her "former" job. These two questions and some others equally interesting made it impossible for Fitzgerald to establish the underlying offense.
Quote:It appeared that there was more than one source. The Prosecutor was never able to establish IF the VPs office was involved bc of Libby's obstruction.
The Prosecutor was never able to establish that a crime had occurred and never made the argument that if there was such a crime, the Vice-President's office was involved, so Libby's connection was tenuous at best.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Quote:Ah, funny. The debate over whether Plame’s status with the CIA was actually protected under the law was a huge, huge debate – in the media, in the courtroom, even on this board, yet you feign this shock, like its first time you’ve ever heard of it. That’s hilarious.
Originally posted by SignyM:
This is all bullcrap and you know it. I challenge you to post verification of any of this. You should stop shitting outta your mouth, it's unbecoming.
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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It was an artifical debate- one which I knew at the time was half smokescreen and half flying bullshit. All the "speculation" and "controversy" was sheer butt-puckered ass-covering. Her neighbors and friends didn't have a friggin' clue as to what she did for a living. The CIA said she was a covert operative. End of story.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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YEAH... it was really a big fuss about nothing. its definitely not because the Bush administration has any skeletons in its closet, that this is how they operate, by lies and vagueness and secrecy and disinformation. no, thats not it. its the 'liberal media', being hypocritical again.. i mean its not like they dont do it TOO.
this is sickening 
my guess, the guys not innocent.. and if it were up to me, id take Bush and Cheney and Rice and Rumsfield and Gonzalez and anyone else who even had a meal with any of these people to court, and scrutinize them like they ought to be; they're all a bunch of criminals and traitors
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Depends on your point of view. By law convicted drug dealaers get a lot of time.... but traitors get shot. Libby gave up not just one spy but her hole cover operation, sounds more like a traitor than a Boy Scout to me.
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dare we speculate about Bush or Cheney meeting a firing squad? homeland security or the SS might construe this as a 'death threat'..
although, i wouldnt 'take it off the table', to use a commonly thrown around Bush term
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Libby was charged with perjury and obstruction of justice, not illegal exposure of a government covert agent. If such case could even be made, certainly it would have been made against the person who has confessed to the supposed crime. When a drug dealer is accused of a crime that another person later confesses, you don’t throw the innocent man in jail and ignore the confession, unless the “crime” was just a bunch bullshit to begin with. If Libby is truly guilty of what he has been convicted of, then I firmly believe he should be punished under the law. I do think that jail is excessive though. Most people who commit perjury are never even charged; those that are, rarely go to jail. I remember a certain Democratic President for which it was known with absolute certainty that he did perjure himself and obstruct justice, but he didn’t even lose his job. Libby did. Seems to me that based on the precedent that Democrats were perfectly happy setting a few years ago and the fact the perjury is not treason, Libby has been punished for his crimes when he lost his job.
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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W finally does something right. Good for him.
'Scooter' wasn't the one who leaked Val Plame's name to the press, so anyone trying to claim Bush went back on his word, is a moron.
Nancy Pelosi, is a moron. The 'crime' Scooter is guilty of is mis-remembering. Wow. Lock the kids up and hide the farm animals, Scooter is loose! Dear god,don't let him mis-remember again! Fact is, his actions harmed no one, nor did he hinder or deprive anyone of their rights through force or fraud. In no way,shape or form did Bush,..." abandoned all sense of fairness when it comes to justice, he has failed to uphold the rule of law, and he has failed to hold his Administration accountable. " . It's well with in the power of the President, check the US Constitution before ou utter something as stupid as that again.
I'm sure there was this amount of rightious indignation when Clinton PARDONED dozens of drug dealers and tax evaders, right ? Hell no there wasn't, so screw ANYONE of you who thinks Bush is skirting the law or playing the cronyism game , as Hitlery stated in her remarks. Damn hypocrites. 
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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How does pointing out what Clinton did excuse GWB? I didn't vote for Clinton and there were a lot of things he did that pissed me off. So before you start using Clinton-bashing as an excuse for Bush, you might notice that nobody here is defending the guy on moral grounds and nobody here is going to defend Bush either.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
How does pointing out what Clinton did excuse GWB? I didn't vote for Clinton and there were a lot of things he did that pissed me off. So before you start using Clinton-bashing as an excuse for Bush, you might notice that nobody here is defending the guy on moral grounds and nobody here is going to defend Bush either.
Clinton was President. Bush is President. Both have commuted/pardoned folks while in office. It's understood that a vast majority of those who don't like Bush simply adore Clinton. Not everyone, but most. Clinton pardoned drug dealers, terrorist, and tax evaders, and there wasn't 1/100th the outcry in the media / on the hill over his choices, and yet Bush makes one decision, and you'd have thought he was re-writing the Constitution. Reading Hillary or Pelosi's comments on the issue, is a lesson in pure hypocrisy.
And you might want to open your eyes, because there are folks who are 'defending' or approve of what Bush did, whether you want to acknowledge it or not.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:
Originally posted by Veteran:
Depends on your point of view. By law convicted drug dealaers get a lot of time.... but traitors get shot. Libby gave up not just one spy but her hole cover operation, sounds more like a traitor than a Boy Scout to me.
Libby gave up no one, not one spy, not any damn operation, but that's a fact that your simple mind just won't grasp. If he DID, then why the hell wasn't he charged w/ that act ? Because he DIDN'T. Richard Armitage did, with out malice or intent, it seems, but I don't see you calling the firing squad for him, do I ?
Val & Joe lied. Val lied when she said she had no role in Joe getting the job to Niger. Joe lied when said the office of the VP sent him over to Niger. The Wilson's were against this war all along, and wanted to do anything they could to stick it in the eye of the President and his administration. This entire mess is a game which so many of you were played by Joe and Val. Hope y'all enjoyed it.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Val and Joe were correct. There was no uranium yellow cake in Iraq. Hope y'all are enjoying the war though.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Quote:
Originally posted by piratenews:
Jewish trial lawyer Lewis "Scooter" Libby was Jewish Israeli spy
They have Jews in Isreal now?
Wow, they realy do get everywhere dont they?
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Can we be clear on a few things here… It has been noted on this board and elsewhere that Scooter Libby was not directly connected to the original offense of disclosing the identity of a CIA agent (yes, Valarie Plame was a covert agent working for the CIA -), an open act of treason. However, Libby was no less culpable than those who set him up as the fall guy.
I expect there will be repercussions in the weeks ahead.
Here is part of an op-ed piece by Sidney Blumenthal that appears on today’s Salon.com.
Bush and Cheney walk, too
Sidney Blumenthal
http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2007/07/03/libby/
Quote:
Cheney aroused President Bush to the danger from Wilson. A handwritten note by Libby that surfaced in his trial revealed that Bush raised his concern about the Kristof column in a subsequent June 9 meeting. The next day, the State Department memo "Niger/Iraq Uranium Story" began circulating within the administration. On June 12, Cheney identified Plame to Libby, and Libby went hard to work. Within three days, he discussed Plame with five officials. On July 6, after Wilson published a New York Times op-ed disclosing that the rationale the president gave for the war was premised on false information, an enraged Cheney ordered Libby into high gear. Cheney also secured Bush's concurrence for Libby to leak selected parts of the still-classified National Intelligence Estimate on Saddam's weapons of mass destruction to New York Times reporter Judith Miller on July 8. Bush, therefore, was deeply involved. But what did the president know, and when did he know it?
Bush's commutation of Libby's 30-month prison sentence for four counts of perjury and obstruction of justice was as politically necessary to hold his remaining hardcore base for the rest of his 18 months in office as it was politically damaging to his legacy and to the possibility of a Republican succession. It was also essential in order to sustain Libby's cover-up protecting Cheney and perhaps Bush himself.
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All roads lead to Cheney. I just read an article about Cheney's personal involvement in irrigating the Northwest using Klamath River water, and creating the largest fishkill in their history (he saved the farmers and ruined the fishermen)
http://humboldtherald.wordpress.com/2007/06/27/dick-cheney-ordered-kla
math-fish-kill/
and one of the lines that stuck out was Characteristically he left no tracks. If you read the article, you'll see that Cheney's MO includes appointing loyalists who know what Cheney wants (he doesn't have to give orders), reaching waaaay down the hierarchy with personal, frequent phone calls and visits which pressure low-level staff (sounds very much like his frequent personal visits to CIA HQ b4 the Iraq war), and blocking outside access to information (to the point of illegally erasing or shredding documents).
When I was looking into neocon involvement in setting up the Iraq war, it was pretty easy to trace. Rumsfeld, Feith, Wolfowitz, Abrams, Wurmser, Kristol, and a host of other Jewish activists both in and out of government left clear tracks in JINSA, AEI, memos etc. The anomaly was Cheney. There is almost no information about him on the web about his religion or political views: no statements of any kind for decades. The guy is a habitual mastermind of secrecy and autocracy. AND, he believes that's the way things should be done. Didn't he just say that the rules don't apply to him because he's not part of the Executive Branch? In his mind, he IS the government.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Val and Joe were correct. There was no uranium yellow cake in Iraq. Hope y'all are enjoying the war though.
No, they lied. I see how well you skirted the specifics I cited, and instead tossed out some irrelevant non sequitur about there not being any yellow cake in Iraq. That wasn't even Joe's mission, to see if any ( more ) was in Iraq. Joe had been sent to Niger (allegedly ) to see if Iraq had been looking to buy any MORE yellow cake uranium. Niger was where Iraq had obtained some yellow cake uranium back in 1980, for a nuclear power plant. The power plant which Israel destroyed before it could be completed. There was every reason to believe, as the British Intel still holds to, that Iraq was trying to obtain more yellow cake from Niger.
Continue your education. Please.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Just to clear up a few ambiguities.
Ambassador Wilson was told by the CIA, prior to his trip to Niger, that the interest in the Niger claim that prompted his trip came from the Office of the Vice President.
Valerie Plame was covert at the time of her outing. (the relevant quote from a declassified CIA document entered into evidence during the sentencing phase of Libby's trial is, "Ms. Wilson was a covert CIA employee for who the CIA was taking affirmative measures to conceal her intelligence relationship to the United States." http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18924679/ )
I. Lewis Libby was in charge of digging up dirt on Ambassador Wilson to use in push back. This was prompted by a 6 May 2003 Nicholas Kristof article that used Wilson as an anonymous source (well before Wilson wrote his own op-ed). If Libby doesn't do that digging it is unlikely that Karl Rove and Ari Fleischer and Cathie Martin and Richard Armitage et al. know that Wilson's wife works for the CIA.
Libby leaked the information to Judith Miller prior to the publishing of Robert Novak's column on 14 July 2003. He was one of a number of administration people to leak the information.
Patrick Fitzgerald's pattern as a prosector is to convict underlings, turn them using the carrot of reduced sentences, and then go after the next person in the food chain. By commuting Libby's sentence, President Bush effectively kneecapped Fitzgerald. The investigation was temporarily stonewalled by Libby's obstruction of justice, his making of false statements to investigators and his perjury. With the commutation, that temporary stonewalling has now become permanent. In other words, President Bush has stepped into the middle of an ongoing investigation and effectively ended it. He is completely within his rights as President to commute this sentence. And he is morally wrong to do so.
The smokescreens that you read are all after the fact. The administration clearly set out to punish Ambassador Wilson for daring to weaken the pre-war claims about Saddam Husseins ability to provide al Qaeda with a nuclear weapon that they would then use against an American city. The administration outted his wife Valerie Plame, who was working covertly in an area that is vital to national security, because it was the most powerful weapon they were able to unearth against Wilson. Whether or not this was a legal thing to do or whether or not this damaged our national security did not enter into their decision making process. This administration realizes that they can do whatever they want and their enablers will work out the excuses after the fact.
When the administration was unable to stop an investigation before it started, Libby fell on his sword and obstructed justice to protect those who gave him his orders. And he was rewarded, even before the appeal process has run its course, by the President making sure that he will not serve a day in jail for his obstruction. The message is clear: if you subvert justice to protect the President and Vice President from being held accountable for their transgressions you will not be punished.
Bringing integrity back to the oval office? Methinks that word doesn't mean what they think it means.
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Thanks Soup, for the clarification. The evidence is available for all to see, if they want to do just a little searching.
On this Independence Day, as I think back to all of the incredible blunders made by this administration, all I can do is shake my head and wonder what the future holds for this nation. I just feel that we have lost so much in the last six and a half years, and yet this president still has more than a year to cause more harm than he already has. If Bush/Cheney go into full batshit crazy cowboy mode, we could all be in for a long, dark eighteen months ahead.
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Sorry Soup, but your info is in error. Wilson claimed he was sent to Niger via orders of the V.P. He wasn't. That's lie one. Also, it makes zero rational sense for Libby to 'dig up dirt' on Wilson in the manner you suggest, simply because it doesn't achieve the ends which Cheney allegedly is looking for, to hurt Wilson. Seems he made him more a celeb of the Left than he could have dreamed.
Val Plame was NOT actively covert at the time of Wilson's trip to Niger. This entire case was about the Wilsons, being against the war and hating Bush , setting up the administration with a bogus claim of having been 'outed'.
The investigation WAS over before it started, as Fitzgerald had his leaker, in Richard Armitage, but he still needed to convict someone. Libby was the best he could come up with, who gave testimony which was no less spotty than Tim Russert. And yet Libby gets charged , and Armitage skates ? Please.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:NO, he didn't. And I dare you to find the quote where he did.
Wilson claimed he was sent to Niger via orders of the V.P.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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So, bottom line. We don't really need silly things like courts and due process. We just ask the decider. Should save some money anyway.
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Quote:Bottom line is that the power to prosecute is the President’s power. The Presidential pardon is needed to protect from prosecutorial excess, like this case. When a prosecutor, knowing full well, that another party had confessed to the supposed crime, begins conducting an investigation to create a crime, he is abusing his power. When no crime is found, because there was no crime to begin with, he then takes inconsistencies in his investigation and prosecutes for catch-all “crimes” like perjury and obstruction. But if there was no underlying crime to begin this is abuse of power not justice. Any prosecutor in the country could go around investigating anyone until he found some sort of inconsistency and then prosecute that person and send that person to jail. That’s abuse, which some people are perfect happy allowing because it suits their particularly hatreds and political alignments, but that’s not the way this country is supposed to operate.
Originally posted by SergeantX:
So, bottom line. We don't really need silly things like courts and due process. We just ask the decider. Should save some money anyway.
Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.
Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.
-- Cicero
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Indeed!
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Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
So, bottom line. We don't really need silly things like courts and due process. We just ask the decider. Should save some money anyway.
Quick question Sarge, are you against the presidents power to pardon or just Bush's?
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Clinton pardoned 140 convicted criminals including drug dealers, big-time embezzlers, and all sorts of low-life felons....I don't remember ANY Dems. having ANY problems with any of those going away presents to America from bad-boy Billy....AND then he and thunder-thighs STEAL everything that isnt' nailed down in the White House...and are humiliatingly forced to return almost all of it to its' rightful owners, the people of America. Selective outrage to the point of insane fucking absurdity I say!
AND...let's look at the real issue of quid pro quo....can you (clear-minded citizen) even possibly fathom the "payment" for just one of these 140 felons...let's say Marc Rich? ...Now that's Marc Rich, the Clinton pal who stole the life savings from tens of thousands of hard-working Americans, and then FLED to Europe, too much of a scumbag coward to go to court. I would bet my Firefly DVD set that Mrs. Rich has a lifetime of impromptu, grubby little sex hook-ups at the Motel 6 in store for her...that plus a few million donated to the Clinton "library". And what about the Hill?...Her cocaine-cowboy brother was also pardoned by Mr. Wonderful...I'll bet he got it in writing from her that if she ever became President, he would get to screw (or assault) everything that walks thru the WH doors in a skirt. Can you even imagine the lining-up, camping out on the lawn in advance "event" for all the little Clinton cultists...a dream of an opportunity to suck the great big Bill?...sort of like the sweet cult girls that Thulsa Doom could make commit suicide with just a mere gesture in Conan....what a team!
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Quote:
Originally posted by BigDamnNobody:
Quick question Sarge, are you against the presidents power to pardon or just Bush's?
I'm against the abuse of presidential powers, or government power in general for that matter. This president has show a callous disregard for the spirit and intent of the constitution, pushing every possible legal loophole he can find to subvert it (gitmo?). As an isolated incident, this example would be less troubling. But it's not isolated and this president has proven he has no respect for the principle of limited government or the rule of law.
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Quote:
SergeantX wrote:
Thursday, July 05, 2007 02:00
So, bottom line. We don't really need silly things like courts and due process. We just ask the decider. Should save some money anyway.
Tell that to the former President.
I submit to you Bill Clinton's commutatinos and pardons.
Commutations
Benjamin Berger
Ronald Henderson Blackley
Bert Wayne Bolan
Gloria Libia Camargo
Charles F. Campbell
David Ronald Chandler
Lau Ching Chin
Donald R. Clark
Loreta De-Ann Coffman
Derrick Curry
Velinda Desalus
Jacob Elbaum
Linda Sue Evans
Loretta Sharon Fish
Antoinette M. Frink
David Goldstein
Gerard A. Greenfield
Jodie E. Israel
Kimberly Johnson
Billy Thornton Langston Jr.
Belinda Lynn Lumpkin
Peter MacDonald - President of the Navajo Nation
Kellie Ann Mann
Peter Ninemire
Hugh Ricardo Padmore
Arnold Paul Prosperi
Melvin J. Reynolds - Democratic Congressman from Illinois - bank fraud and obstruction of justice
Pedro Miguel Riveiro
Dorothy Rivers - lead official in Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, plead guilty to theft of 1.2 million dollars in federal grant money
Susan Rosenberg
Kalmen Stern
Cory Stringfellow
Carlos Anibal Vignali - convicted of cocaine trafficking
Thomas Wilson Waddell III
Harvey Weinig
Kim Allen Willis
Kimba Smith
Antonio Camacho Negron - FALN militant
Pardons
Verla Jean Allen (1990 false statements to an agency of the United States)
Nicholas M. Altiere (1983 importation of cocaine)
Bernice Ruth Altschul (1992 money laundering conspiracy)
Joe Anderson Jr. (1988 income tax evasion)
William Sterling Anderson (1987 defraudment of a financial institution, false statements to a financial institution, wire fraud)
Mansour Azizkhani (1984 false statements in bank loan applications)
Cleveland Victor Babin Jr. (1987 using the U.S. mail service to defraud)
Chris Harmon Bagley (1989 conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine)
Scott Lynn Bane (Unlawful distribution of marijuana)
Thomas Cleveland Barber (Issuing worthless checks)
Peggy Ann Bargon (Violation of the Lacey Act, violation of the Bald Eagle Protection Act)
David Roscoe Blampied (possess with intent to distribute cocaine)
William Arthur Borders Jr. (Conspiracy to corruptly solicit and accept money in return for influencing the official acts of a federal district court judge (Alcee L. Hastings), and to defraud the United States in connection with the performance of lawful government functions; corruptly influencing, obstructing, impeding and endeavoring to influence, obstruct and impede the due administration of justice, and aiding and abetting therein; traveling interstate with intent to commit bribery)
Arthur David Borel (Odometer Rollback)
Douglas Charles Borel (Odometer Rollback)
George Thomas Brabham (Making a false statement or report to a federally insured bank)
Almon Glenn Braswell (1983 mail fraud and perjury)
Leonard Browder (Illegal dispensing of controlled substance and Medicaid fraud)
David Steven Brown (Securities fraud and mail fraud)
Delores Caroylene Burleson, aka Delores Cox Burleson (Possession of Marijuana)
John H. Bustamante (wire fraud)
Mary Louise Campbell
Eloida Candelaria
Dennis Sobrevinas Capili
Donna Denise Chambers
Douglas Eugene Chapman
Ronald Keith Chapman
Francisco Larois Chavez
Henry Cisneros (former HUD Secretary)
Roger Clinton, Jr. (half-brother of President Bill Clinton)
Stuart Harris Cohn
David Marc Cooper
Ernest Harley Cox Jr.
John F. Cross Jr.
Reickey Lee Cunningham
Richard Anthony De Labio
John Deutch (former Director of Central Intelligence Agency)
Richard Douglas
Edward Reynolds Downe
Marvin Dean Dudley
Larry Lee Duncan
Robert Clinton Fain
Marcos Arcenio Fernandez
Alvarez Ferrouillet
William Dennis Fugazy
Lloyd Reid George
Louis Goldstein
Rubye Lee Gordon
Pincus Green
Robert Ivey Hamner
Samuel Price Handley
Woodie Randolph Handley
Jay Houston Harmon
Rick Hendrick
John Hummingson
Dav
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:Quote:NO, he didn't. And I dare you to find the quote where he did.
Wilson claimed he was sent to Niger via orders of the V.P.
Dare accepted.
“In February 2002, I was informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency that Vice President Dick Cheney’s office had questions about a particular intelligence report. … The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president’s office.” (Joseph C. Wilson, Op-Ed, “What I Didn’t Find In Africa,” The New York Times, 7/6/03)
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/07/06/opinion/06WILS.html?ex=1372824000&en
=6c6aeb1ce960dec0&ei=5007
Read officials at the Central Intelligence Agency as " my wife ", and that Vice President Dick Cheney’s office had questions as "our cover story we'll use for attempting to discredit the Bush administration per the Iraq war. "
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Sorry, AURaptor, no dice. If you think Cheney's strategy to discredit Ambassador Wilson failed because it made him a cause celebre of the left then you haven't been paying attention. What does Cheney care about them for? The far left didn't support the Iraq war to begin with. Who Cheney cared about was the majority of Americans who initially supported this war because they thought Saddam Hussein represented an offensive threat to our country.
The administration had just fast tracked the Iraq war into existence by conning a majority of the American public into believing that Saddam Hussein was going to give nukes to al Qaeda. The other claims - about the chemical and biological weapons - only really resonated with those who are on the lookout for the black helicopters. The nuclear claim, however, resonated quite well with the general public. And all of a sudden, just a few months into this war, the tissue of lies surrounding that nuclear claim is being tugged at.
Discredit the messenger to discredit the message. How many times have we seen that strategy used by this administration? If you read the transcripts of the Libby trial and the testimony of the witnesses (for both sides) you see how the push back against Wilson develops. For $13 you can own a complete transcript. I can provide the ISBN number if you're interested.
From the testimony at the trial, it is clear that Libby was asking questions about Wilson as early as May of 2003 (almost two months before Wilson wrote his op-ed), that he learned about Valerie Plame's CIA status in early June (from both the Vice President and his own CIA contacts), that his information digging was necessary in the creation of the talking point that Wilson's trip was a boondoggle organized by his wife (a boondoggle to Niger? Nice boondoggle. Also conveniently forgetting that Wilson had undertaken a similar trip to Niger in 1999) that he leaked the information on Valerie Plame's CIA status to Judith Miller before that information became public knowledge, that he lied to investigators and pretended he had no knowledge of the people he had been investigating for over a month and that the first he heard about Plame's status was from a reporter, that he perjured himself in front of a grand jury and that he obstructed justice and effectively halted the investigation into the outting of an American spy. (I'm guessing that sentence could've used some shortening).
Saddam Hussein's regime did not pose a nuclear threat to the United States. This administration claimed they did. Wilson was publically repudiating those claims. In the process of attempting to discredit his message this administration sacrificed Valerie Plame. And they didn't lose a wink of sleep over it. When one of their own was found guilty of obstructing justice and temporarily halting the investigation the President doubled down and engaged in some obstruction of justice of his own.
Bringing integrity back to the oval office my ass.
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Soup, you should post more.
Not much I can add to that, except maybe this. The obvious reason why everyone is so upset about this is that Libby was nothing more than a fall guy for the administration. He did what he did at their bidding. This administration has played dirty from day one and people have died for their duplicity. Bush and Cheney are the ones who should be facing jail time.
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Auraptor- It is one thing to say "the VP ordered me", it is another thing to say "I was told that the VP's office had question". I know how you like to slide one thing into another but really they're different, and they require your "interpretation" to make them conform. I will read statements as I read them, not as YOU think I should read them seeing as your judgement so far has been abysmal.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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You err on your very first sentence. There was no strategy by Cheney to discredit Joe Wilson. That's where this fairy tale about Cheney falls apart, from the very start. It was the WILSONS who were engaged in a strategy, not Cheney. Hell, Cheney was the victim here, having been dragged into this ruse of Joe and Val when he had no idea who Joe Wilson was nor did he even SEND Joe, as Joe claims. And that majority of Americans who thought Saddam was a threat? The list included, among others, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, Madaline Albright, Al Gore, etc....
Quote:
The other claims - about the chemical and biological weapons - only really resonated with those who are on the lookout for the black helicopters
Guess that includes the list of folks from above, huh?
Quote:
Saddam Hussein's regime did not pose a nuclear threat to the United States. This administration claimed they did. Wilson was publically repudiating those claims. In the process of attempting to discredit his message this administration sacrificed Valerie Plame. And they didn't lose a wink of sleep over it. When one of their own was found guilty of obstructing justice and temporarily halting the investigation the President doubled down and engaged in some obstruction of justice of his own.
The U.S. intel wasn't the only source that had Saddam sniffing around for nuclear material. The famous 16 words of Bush's SOTUA basically said that British intel independently agreed that Saddam was looking for yellow cake. They still hold to that view today. If you're the leader of a country which had just been struck by the worst terrorist attack in history, you'd damn well make sure something bigger doesn't come down the pike. Wilson was politicallly motivated to discredit this administration, and that's exactly what he and his wife set out to do. There was no 'sacraficing' of Val by this administration and the Fitzgerald inquisition proved it. It was Richard Armatige who outed Val Plame, and no one else. Talk about ' the black helicopter crowd', its the folks who see a sinister V.P. conspiracy when no such plot exists. The claim that Bush some how 'shut down' this investigation is nothing more than pure myth. The investigation is done and over with, hell...it was over before it started. Fitz had his 'leaker' before the trial began, and yet he carried on w/ ruse and got a guy for mis-remembering facts from years ago. BFD.
You want the REAL story here ? It's the fact that the CIA, which is given billions of $$ to do its job, let this country down more times than anyone is willing to admit. It let us down when the Berlin wall fell, it let us down when Iraq invaded Kuwait, and it definatly let us down per 9/11. A President needs RELIABLE info when he/she has to make a major decission on whether to go to war or not. Bush was getting mixed signals from the CIA, and their primary goal was to cover their collective asses first, and then worry about the details of doing their job. This whole thing is a struggle from the life time bureaucrats at the CIA vs the Bush admininstration. Why do you think there are so many leaks to the press about top secret projects ? It's nothing more than the CIA trying to make the Bush admininstration look bad, while trying to divert attention away from the fact that the CIA, as a whole, has been shown up by a bunch of cave dwelling weird beards, time and time again.
I'm sorry, but you've got it 180 degrees backwards. Bush and Cheney aren't the bad guys. They're far from perfect, but history will prove they were trying to do the right thing. It was a corrupt inside the beltway enviroment which is causing so much trouble.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Auraptor- It is one thing to say "the VP ordered me", it is another thing to say "I was told that the VP's office had question". I know how you like to slide one thing into another but really they're different, and they require your "interpretation" to make them conform. I will read statements as I read them, not as YOU think I should read them seeing as your judgement so far has been abysmal.
SignyM, here's how it is. Joe's story simply doesn't hold water because we KNOW Val Plame was the one who had a hand in sending her husband over to Niger. There was no request by the V.P.s office to send anyone over there, so OF COURSE they're gonna want to know just who the hell was sent in their name, who ever it was. Then add to the fact that Joe Wilson tries to finger the V.P.'s office while giving a phony report about how nothing had gone on over there, and it's only natural that some alarms would go off.
You not agreeing w/ me does not make my judgement to be abysmal. Point of fact, it might show the exact opposite.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:Wilson was ordered to go to Niger by the CIA Directorate of Operations. The Directorate got its marching orders from someone other than Valerie. I don't know where you get this junk from. Why don't you take Soup up on his offer and read the transcript?
It was the WILSONS who were engaged in a strategy, not Cheney.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Wilson was ordered to go to Niger by the CIA Directorate of Operations. The Directorate got its marching orders from someone other than Valerie. I don't know where you get this junk from. Why don't you take Soup up on his offer and read the transcript?
He got it from Fox News Sig. At least I heard some of that there. This "Scooter campaign" is actually one of Fox/RNC's more thought out pieces of work. But he also coulda got it from Rush, and others. They all sing the Tony Snow approved song, to the note, in perfect chorus.
You know Rapter...it can't hurt to read the transcript, what's the worst that could happen?
If you're not on Malbadinlatin's side, you're with the terrorists.
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this issue about Scooter Libby really underscores the problem with America currently. a lot of people adamantly believe that the Bush administration is relatively benevolent('especially compared to Clinton'), and that theyre really just getting a bad rap from liberals in the media et al. those people are going to realize, i pray sometime in the near future, that they were outright fooled, that they aided in the destruction of our country, and that all those Bushs supporters, with their 'Bush/Cheney' stickers... amounted to nothing less than apologists to a bunch of globalist traitors. i personally dont care what the semantics of the case are, i would have to be blind and retarded to discredit or brush aside the hundreds of examples of blatant criminal activity and abuses, that have been issued by the white house over the last 7 years. but thats me... others are less discerning, and apparently more supportive of the ideology of authoritarianism and fascism
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:Quote:Wilson was ordered to go to Niger by the CIA Directorate of Operations. The Directorate got its marching orders from someone other than Valerie. I don't know where you get this junk from. Why don't you take Soup up on his offer and read the transcript?
It was the WILSONS who were engaged in a strategy, not Cheney.
The 'Directorate of Operations' for this case was none other than Val Plame herself. How you can't see that is beyond belief. The 'transcripts ' are nothing mnore than the ad hoc attempt by the CIA and the Wilsons to play C-Y-A. Only in this scenario, it didn't work. There was too much external intel that showed Iraq was indeed looking to buy yellow cake iranium.
Case closed.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Just ANOTHER gigantic blunder made by the Blunder King himself Bush....keeping that Clinton loyalist piece of shit Joe Wiilson on the WH payroll....why? Bush took office and wanted to be Mr. Nice Guy, so he kept lots of Clintonistas on the job in an ill-concieved effort to be bi-partisan, but one by one, all the Clinton vipers turned and betrayed their new boss...almost like planted sleeper cells for the Dems...set to go off once every three months to wreak havoc for Bush. Valerie Plame was a frustrated, conniving ex-secretary who wouldn't know Niger from nigger....or Yellowcake from Johnnycake. All she ever wanted was to get her smarmy mug on TV in hopes of landing a talk show or reality show. Bob Novak put her name in print first as a possible source of who sent crazy Joe on his little junket to Africa...Novak knew Plame, everybody within a 25 mile radius of D.C. knew Plame...they all went to the same cocktail parties together for years...matter of fact Novak said that Plame used to wear a name necklace that said CIA Agent Wannabee, so he gave it not a thought to print her name. The real villian in all this is Joe himself...what exactly are/were his credentials and track record concerning being a "terrorism expert"? Seems obvious to any clear-thinking person that little hippy-hairdo Wilson fucked-up America's preparedness and responses to terrorism under Clinton and Bush...a double-dose of failure for the ambitious self-absorbed traitor.
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Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
I submit to you Bill Clinton's commutations and pardons.
COMMUTATIONS :
Benjamin Berger
Ronald Henderson Blackley
Bert Wayne Bolan
Gloria Libia Camargo
Charles F. Campbell
David Ronald Chandler
Lau Ching Chin
Donald R. Clark
Loreta De-Ann Coffman
Derrick Curry
Velinda Desalus
Jacob Elbaum
Linda Sue Evans
Loretta Sharon Fish
Antoinette M. Frink
David Goldstein
Gerard A. Greenfield
Jodie E. Israel
Kimberly Johnson
Billy Thornton Langston Jr.
Belinda Lynn Lumpkin
Peter MacDonald - President of the Navajo Nation
Kellie Ann Mann
Peter Ninemire
Hugh Ricardo Padmore
Arnold Paul Prosperi
Melvin J. Reynolds - Democratic Congressman from Illinois - bank fraud and obstruction of justice
Pedro Miguel Riveiro
Dorothy Rivers - lead official in Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, plead guilty to theft of 1.2 million dollars in federal grant money
Susan Rosenberg
Kalmen Stern
Cory Stringfellow
Carlos Anibal Vignali - convicted of cocaine trafficking
Thomas Wilson Waddell III
Harvey Weinig
Kim Allen Willis
Kimba Smith
Antonio Camacho Negron - FALN militant
PARDONS :
Verla Jean Allen (1990 false statements to an agency of the United States)
Nicholas M. Altiere (1983 importation of cocaine)
Bernice Ruth Altschul (1992 money laundering conspiracy)
Joe Anderson Jr. (1988 income tax evasion)
William Sterling Anderson (1987 defraudment of a financial institution, false statements to a financial institution, wire fraud)
Mansour Azizkhani (1984 false statements in bank loan applications)
Cleveland Victor Babin Jr. (1987 using the U.S. mail service to defraud)
Chris Harmon Bagley (1989 conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine)
Scott Lynn Bane (Unlawful distribution of marijuana)
Thomas Cleveland Barber (Issuing worthless checks)
Peggy Ann Bargon (Violation of the Lacey Act, violation of the Bald Eagle Protection Act)
David Roscoe Blampied (possess with intent to distribute cocaine)
William Arthur Borders Jr. (Conspiracy to corruptly solicit and accept money in return for influencing the official acts of a federal district court judge (Alcee L. Hastings), and to defraud the United States in connection with the performance of lawful government functions; corruptly influencing, obstructing, impeding and endeavoring to influence, obstruct and impede the due administration of justice, and aiding and abetting therein; traveling interstate with intent to commit bribery)
Arthur David Borel (Odometer Rollback)
Douglas Charles Borel (Odometer Rollback)
George Thomas Brabham (Making a false statement or report to a federally insured bank)
Almon Glenn Braswell (1983 mail fraud and perjury)
Leonard Browder (Illegal dispensing of controlled substance and Medicaid fraud)
David Steven Brown (Securities fraud and mail fraud)
Delores Caroylene Burleson, aka Delores Cox Burleson (Possession of Marijuana)
John H. Bustamante (wire fraud)
Mary Louise Campbell
Eloida Candelaria
Dennis Sobrevinas Capili
Donna Denise Chambers
Douglas Eugene Chapman
Ronald Keith Chapman
Francisco Larois Chavez
Henry Cisneros (former HUD Secretary)
Roger Clinton, Jr. (half-brother of President Bill Clinton)
Stuart Harris Cohn
David Marc Cooper
Ernest Harley Cox Jr.
John F. Cross Jr.
Reickey Lee Cunningham
Richard Anthony De Labio
John Deutch (former Director of Central Intelligence Agency)
Richard Douglas
Edward Reynolds Downe
Marvin Dean Dudley
Larry Lee Duncan
Robert Clinton Fain
Marcos Arcenio Fernandez
Alvarez Ferrouillet
William Dennis Fugazy
Lloyd Reid George
Louis Goldstein
Rubye Lee Gordon
Pincus Green
Robert Ivey Hamner
Samuel Price Handley
Woodie Randolph Handley
Jay Houston Harmon
Rick Hendrick
John Hummingson
David S. Herdlinger
Debi Rae Huckleberry
Warren C. Hultgren Jr.
Donald Ray James
Stanley Pruet Jobe
Ruben H. Johnson
Linda Jones
James Howard Lake
June Louise Lewis
Salim Bonnor Lewis
John Leighton LodwiNOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Auraptor, first, some background: The CIA is divided up into four directorates (the agency's fancy word for "branches"): * The Directorate of Operations (referred to as the "DO"), which is responsible for collecting HUMINT (human intelligence). In other words, this is the part of the CIA that you go to when you want to be (or catch) spies. However, the DO contains only 1000-2000 of the CIA's 16,000-20,000 employees. The DO is the part involved in clandestine operations.
So, first you say: There is a great deal of speculation about whether Plame was a covert operative as defined by the law at that time. If she was not, then no crime was committed by revealing her status.
Then you say The 'Directorate of Operations' for this case was none other than Val Plame herself.
Valerie Plame can't be so high up in the DO that she can "order" someone to go to NIger AND at the same time a lowly non-covert officer of the CIA. You can't have both. So one part of your story butts heads with another part. Figure out which one you want to say and get back to me on that.
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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SergeantX, for the most part, someone makes the post I would try to make. And, by the time I get through reading all the new posts, it's usually time to get back to whatever I was procrastinating on in the first place 
.
What is compelling to me about this story is how it exemplifies so many of the shortcomings of the present administration and how unserious they actually are about protecting this country.
AURaptor, I'd like to thank you for a good belly laugh. The idea of Cheney, who is probably the most powerful man in the world, as a victim is quite funny.
The reason why it was so important to Cheney to discredit Ambassador Wilson was because the evidence for Saddam Hussein having a nuclear weapon that he would provide to al Qaeda so they could blow up an American city was crap. Wilson pointed out the problems with the yellowcake claim - the same claim that the President was forbidden from saying at a speech a year earlier. It was only through a tortured parsing and shifting that they snuck it into the State of the Union. Everyone on our side of the pond knew the claim was false, and probably based on forged documents. But it was an important piece in the administration's plans to convince the American public that it was necessary to invade Iraq right now rather than wait for a mushroom cloud on our soil.
If you look at the timeline that was established from multiple people testifying at Libby's trial you see that Libby's requests for information from the State Department and the CIA were the only reason that Armitage (and the others) knew that Plame was CIA. You would know that Libby learned of her identity from Cheney (who had learned of it from high level CIA contacts) and from others. You would also learn that Libby was ordered by Cheney and, presumably Bush, to leak her status to reporters in an effort to paint the Niger trip as a boondoggle instead of a fact finding mission.
The reason why Libby was convicted of lying to FBI investigators, and of perjuring himself to a grand jury and of obstruction of justice was because all of the evidence pointed at him as being in on the investigation into Wilson from day one not, as he testified, of finding out about Plame third hand from a reporter. Fitzgerald can't find out who was ultimately responsible for destroying Plame's cover because of Libby's obstruction of justice. And now, thanks to the President's obstruction of justice in commuting the sentence, he never will.
You can continue to defend the casual outting of a CIA operative who was working to protect our country from WMD proliferation. You can continue to defend what should be considered treason. But the people you are defending haven't earned your support. Far from it. They don't deserve the effort you are investing on their behalf. Loyalty has to go down as well as up and there's no loyalty to you from them.
This administration came into office promising to bring integrity back to the oval office. Instead, they have done everything that the Republicans accused the Clinton administration of doing, and done it to an even worse extent.
It would be laughable if all they were doing was shitting on the carpet. But they're actually tearing down walls and ripping up floorboards and we may never get our system back in the shape it was before they came in through the side door.
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Quote:You're putting words on screen for me, words I never said. Simply put, she's the reason her husband went to Niger, not anyone from the V.P.s office. There's no ' butting of heads' anywhere on this. That's just your weak attempt to deflect the issue.
Then you say The 'Directorate of Operations' for this case was none other than Val Plame herself.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:How is he 'the most powerful man in the world ' ?? There's your good belly laugh! I swear , the obsession some have over Cheney is cultish in nature.
The idea of Cheney, who is probably the most powerful man in the world, as a victim is quite funny.
Quote:No, it wasn't crap, and Wilson himself said so. Wilson admitted that it wasn't inconcievable that such a transfer of material from Niger to Iraq was possible, though unlikely. Add to the fact that the British intel did and still does give credence to the notion that Iraq was still seeking to obtain Yellow Cake iranium wasn't going to be dismissed by ANYONE whose job it was to protect U.S. interest. Nor SHOULD IT HAVE BEEN.
The reason why it was so important to Cheney to discredit Ambassador Wilson was because the evidence for Saddam Hussein having a nuclear weapon that he would provide to al Qaeda so they could blow up an American city was crap.
Quote:
You can continue to defend the casual outting of a CIA operative who was working to protect our country from WMD proliferation. You can continue to defend what should be considered treason. But the people you are defending haven't earned your support.
But that's not what happened, nor how it happened. That's only your spin on the facts, as you already believe Cheney is so daaaanngerous. The outting of the Wilsons holds no water what so ever.
Quote:The single greatest example of hyperbole and hypocrisy I've seen in a long time. It wasn't Bush who gave a way vital missle technology to the Chinese for campaign contributions, sold nights in the Lincoln bedroom, nor took advantage of office interns. Please, the Bush W.H. has its faults, but it's still light years ahead of Clinton on the issue of ethics.
This administration came into office promising to bring integrity back to the oval office. Instead, they have done everything that the Republicans accused the Clinton administration of doing, and done it to an even worse extent.
Quote:The second greatest display of hyperble I've seen in a while. Congrats.
It would be laughable if all they were doing was shitting on the carpet. But they're actually tearing down walls and ripping up floorboards and we may never get our system back in the shape it was before they came in through the side door.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:
Simply put, she's the reason her husband went to Niger, not anyone from the V.P.s office.= Auraptor
Quote:I cut and pasted your words exactly. They came from this paragraph: The 'Directorate of Operations' for this case was none other than Val Plame herself. How you can't see that is beyond belief. The 'transcripts ' are nothing mnore than the ad hoc attempt by the CIA and the Wilsons to play C-Y-A. Only in this scenario, it didn't work. There was too much external intel that showed Iraq was indeed looking to buy yellow cake iranium.
You're putting words on screen for me, words I never said.= Auraptor
So, how is it that you "never" said them? Are facts tough to hang onto for you? Auraptor, I have a simple question for you: Did Plame create the mission to NIger or did the mission originate someplace higher in the CIA?
---------------------------------
Always look upstream.
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It's pretty clear that Cheney is Bush's gatekeeper. The Decider is only deciding on stuff that Cheney has allowed through the filters. That puts Cheney in a higher position than Bush. The trade-off is we get a less petulant President (Bush gets disgruntled when he is confronted with information that goes against his narrow worldview) for a more powerful Vice-President. Now if you don't believe that the leader of the United States is arguably the most powerful person in the world then we'll just have to agree to disagree on that one (although I'd be curious who you think is more powerful).
Side note, for your theory to hold water, Ambassador Wilson and Valerie Plame would need to have more influence and access than they did.
Look back at the evidence that this administration used to sell the country on the nuclear threat that a Hussein-al Qaeda partnership would represent. There weren't that many claims: aluminum tubes and yellowcake and the 90s program were about it. The yellowcake claim, the one Bush wasn't allowed to use in a speech back in 2002 because the CIA had already decided it was crap, was snuck into the State of the Union by cleverly outsourcing it to the British. Secretary of State Powell refused to use that claim when he made the case before the UN a week later.
Why did the administration use a lawyer solution (British outsourcing) to make a claim that they already knew to be false? Because it strengthened their case for the need to invade Iraq right now. The case was already pretty weak - the IAEA knew exactly where all of Iraq's impounded 90s program stuff was and the general consensus was that the aluminum tubes were for conventional rockets. The administration needed people to believe that Hussein bought/sought* a significant quantity of enriched uranium from Niger because why would he buy/try to buy the stuff if he couldn't use it? Without that public belief, Cheney's statement - made three days before the war started - that Hussein had reconstituted nuclear weapons would have been treated to the ridicule that it, in hindsight, deserved.
Flash forward a bit. We're in Iraq. We've found nothing that the administration said was there. Granted, it's only been a short time, but it sure is starting to look like the IAEA and the UN and Scott Ritter were right and the administration was wrong. And now Wilson publicly repudiates one of the central claims that the administration had hyped.
That's why it was necessary for Cheney to order Libby to start finding ways to discredit Wilson. And that's why it was necessary for Libby to lie to FBI investigators later that year (before Fitzgerald was even assigned to the case) when the FBI asked about what Libby knew about Valerie Plame and when he knew it.
A jury listened to all the witnesses and heard recordings of Libby's grand jury testimony and decided that he did indeed lie to the FBI, that he did indeed lie to a grand jury and that the reason he lied was to obstruct justice and prevent the investigation from continuing. He was found guilty of four felony counts and sentenced within the acceptable guidelines. And then the President rewarded Libby for subverting justice by making sure that he would not pay the penalty for his actions. In doing so, the President obstructed justice himself by making sure that the investigation could not continue.***
You can keep advancing your claim that all of this didn't happen but the evidence, and the jury in the Libby case, disagree with you.
* there's an interesting series of posts by eriposte, of The Left Coaster, tracking the Niger claim and how "bought" got changed over time into "sought".
** edited to add: One of the interesting things to come out in the trial was that Marc Grossman, who responded to Libby's request for information about the Niger trip, remembers telling Libby that Wilson believed the trip had been at the request of the Office of the Vice President. A month later Libby asks his CIA briefer why Wilson was told that his trip was because of a reques
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Quote:
I cut and pasted your words exactly. They came from this paragraph: The 'Directorate of Operations' for this case was none other than Val Plame herself. How you can't see that is beyond belief. The 'transcripts ' are nothing mnore than the ad hoc attempt by the CIA and the Wilsons to play C-Y-A. Only in this scenario, it didn't work. There was too much external intel that showed Iraq was indeed looking to buy yellow cake iranium.
So, how is it that you "never" said them? Are facts tough to hang onto for you? Auraptor, I have a simple question for you: Did Plame create the mission to NIger or did the mission originate someplace higher in the CIA?
I never said those words. Presenting the words 'Directorate of Operations' as I did was to show how Val was the one who nudged Joe toward being chosen for the trip. Saying Val was " the reason " for her husband being sent to Niger isn't by any stretch of the imagination the same thing as saying " she ORDERED " him there. All she had to do was to reccomend to her higher ups that Joe was the man for the job. What we have here are the Wilsons, both opposed to the war in Iraq and willing to do anything to trip up the Bush administration, conspiring together to accomplish their goals. Then, pinning the 'outting' on someone else, close to Bush , only makes the plan all that more appealing. They can publicly debunk one of the minor details for the war in Iraq, and then claim victim status as being part of some heavy handed move on behalf of the office of the V.P.
The sad thing is, it has conned enough folks that many think Cheney was the one who outted the Wilsons, when it was they who did it to themselves all along.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Black.
It's the new white.
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Auraptor please.... the Iraq war has been in the making since the '98 liberation act during Clintons tenure. the timing was secured to provide the Bush cronies the fodder to hoodwink and swindle the American public for all we were worth, based on untold numerous lies, disinformation and secrecy. why cant you see this? you need to stop defending them as if they arent the most despicable liars and traitors currently holding high offices. CLinton isnt president anymore.. Bush is, so i care about the crimes and injustices currently being committed, more then school grade, partisan apologetics and hypocracy
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Quote:
Originally posted by antimason:
Auraptor please.... the Iraq war has been in the making since the '98 liberation act during Clintons tenure. the timing was secured to provide the Bush cronies the fodder to hoodwink and swindle the American public for all we were worth, based on untold numerous lies, disinformation and secrecy. why cant you see this? you need to stop defending them as if they arent the most despicable liars and traitors currently holding high offices. CLinton isnt president anymore.. Bush is, so i care about the crimes and injustices currently being committed, more then school grade, partisan apologetics and hypocracy
Give some 'lies' of the Bush Presidency per the Iraq war. Those which allegedly got us INTO the war. Be specific, please..
Sergeant - That's how you reply when you've run out of false conclusions ? Sad.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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im not meaning to come off harsh, im really just in amazement. how do you feel you relate to these people? i assume your not part of the incestuous, elitist, east coast socialist blue-blood segment of society are you? thats all Bush is.. masquerading in conservatives clothing. he doesnt care about us, cause if the terror threat was legitimate, his concern for our well being would have led to some border enforcement by now
the post Iraqi invasion lies have all been covered before, you just dont believe the misinformation was deliberate. but i think we ought to examine the motives for war more closely... since we all know none of the then alleged threats panned out. i decided instead to look up a speech given by Ron Paul prior to the invasion, regarding the build up to war
Quote:
Ron Paul in the US House of Representatives, October 8, 2002
Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this resolution, which regardless of what many have tried to claim will lead us into war with Iraq. This resolution is not a declaration of war, however, and that is an important point: this resolution transfers the Constitutionally-mandated Congressional authority to declare wars to the executive branch. This resolution tells the president that he alone has the authority to determine when, where, why, and how war will be declared. It merely asks the president to pay us a courtesy call a couple of days after the bombing starts to let us know what is going on. This is exactly what our Founding Fathers cautioned against when crafting our form of government: most had just left behind a monarchy where the power to declare war rested in one individual. It is this they most wished to avoid.
As James Madison wrote in 1798, "The Constitution supposes what the history of all governments demonstrates, that the executive is the branch of power most interested in war, and most prone to it. It has, accordingly, with studied care, vested the question of war in the legislature."
Some – even some in this body – have claimed that this Constitutional requirement is an anachronism, and that those who insist on following the founding legal document of this country are just being frivolous. I could not disagree more.
Mr. Speaker, for the more than one dozen years I have spent as a federal legislator I have taken a particular interest in foreign affairs and especially the politics of the Middle East. From my seat on the international relations committee I have had the opportunity to review dozens of documents and to sit through numerous hearings and mark-up sessions regarding the issues of both Iraq and international terrorism.
Back in 1997 and 1998 I publicly spoke out against the actions of the Clinton Administration, which I believed was moving us once again toward war with Iraq. I believe the genesis of our current policy was unfortunately being set at that time. Indeed, many of the same voices who then demanded that the Clinton Administration attack Iraq are now demanding that the Bush Administration attack Iraq. It is unfortunate that these individuals are using the tragedy of September 11, 2001 as cover to force their long-standing desire to see an American invasion of Iraq. Despite all of the information to which I have access, I remain very skeptical that the nation of Iraq poses a serious and immanent terrorist threat to the United States. If I were convinced of such a threat I would support going to war, as I did when I supported President Bush by voting to give him both the authority and the necessary funding to fight the war on terror.
Mr. Speaker, consider some of the following claims presented by supporters of this resolution, and contrast them with the following facts:
Claim: Iraq has consistently demonstrated its willingness to use force against the US through its firing on our planes patrolling the UN-established "no-fly zones."
Reality: The "no-fly zones" were never authorized by the United Nations, nor was their 12 year patrol by American and British fighter planes sanctioned by the United Nations. Under UN SecNOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Posting Ron Paul's opinion on a political rival's action doesn't exactly equate to supporting your charge that Bush 'lied'. Fact is, Ron Paul was against the war long before Bush was even in office, back when Clinton policy , Paul claims, was leaning toward war with Iraq. I get it, it's fine to be against war. But don't allow that position to cloud your vision on the issues, as Paul has, and come to the conclusion that Bush some how 'lied' about Iraq. There's no evidence here in the post you offered. There's difference in opinions, and denial of historical events. Paul inexplicably suggests that Saddam did not use chem weapons on his own people. A stunningly ignorant remark, with what the entire world already knew, and now knows, about such acts.
You say Bush is masquerading as a conservative, and I'd agree. His stance on illegal immigration clearly shows he's no fan of stemming the tide of illegals into this country. Even after 9/11. But I've never given credence to the claims that Bush 'lied' before because just about everything he said was verbatim what Dems were saying before Bush was in office, before 9/11 and even up until the eve of the war. Ron Paul's speech changes nothing, and simply shows he was against the war, whether it was Clinton or Bush who was President.
Were there mistakes made ? Yep. Were there holes in the info we were TOLD we had, info that the CIA said was solid, but then backed off as we moved toward war ? Yep. But a choice had to be made, and based on what OUR intel said, as well as what other agencies were saying, there was a strong level of suspicion w/ Iraq. Adding to the fact that it had violated UN sanctions, as well as rules which constituted a break in the case fire from the 1st Gulf War ( there never was a treaty of peace signed ), a choice had to be made. And W made it.
I'm sorry, but your posting of Ron Paul's disapproval of Bush's policy does not amount to proof that Bush 'lied'.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
Sergeant - That's how you reply when you've run out of false conclusions ? Sad.
No, that's how I respond to awkward regurgitations of Rove's sophistry. Not sad. Funny! ["The Wilson's outed themselves!"] hehe...
I suppose Iraq invaded itself too, eh?
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Quote:So, the mission to Niger originated someplace higher up than Valerie. Her role was to "recommend" her husband, and she was high up enough in the food chain where her recommendations carried some weight but not so high up that she could move all the pieces into place by herself. Did the CIA dream up this inquiry on its own as part of a plot to bring Cheney down? Or did a request come from some place outside of the CIA? The reason why I'm asking you to take me though this, step by step is because I don't quite see how this was supposed to work. Are you saying that the Wilsons "outed" Valerie themselves? How did they manage that, when even YOU said that Armitage was the source?
the reason " for her husband being sent to Niger isn't by any stretch of the imagination the same thing as saying " she ORDERED " him there. All she had to do was to reccomend to her higher ups that Joe was the man for the job. What we have here are the Wilsons, both opposed to the war in Iraq and willing to do anything to trip up the Bush administration, conspiring together to accomplish their goals. Then, pinning the 'outting' on someone else, close to Bush , only makes the plan all that more appealing. They can publicly debunk one of the minor details for the war in Iraq, and then claim victim status as being part of some heavy handed move on behalf of the office of the V.P.
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Always look upstream.
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Quote:
Originally posted by MalBadInLatin:Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
I'd like to hear now from the morons who still support this administration. Care to dance for us?
Her name is Ann Coulter, and trust me, you don't want to see her dance, or even talk, eeesh! all those lanky fingers and scrawny legs.
If you're not on Malbadinlatin's side, you're with the terrorists.
That is scary without the bouncing adam's apple and swinging ball sack........
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Quote:
Originally posted by BigDamnNobody:Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
I'd like to hear now from the morons who still support this administration. Care to dance for us?
I just love being the Devil's advocate, moron that I am. Libby, while spared jail time, must still pay a $250,000 fine, get 2 years probation, and have a criminal record. How can that be equated to skating?
BDN,
Ever try to skate.....it's kinda hard....
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Hopefully Auraptor you will answer my questions.
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Always look upstream.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:Quote:So, the mission to Niger originated someplace higher up than Valerie. Her role was to "recommend" her husband, and she was high up enough in the food chain where her recommendations carried some weight but not so high up that she could move all the pieces into place by herself. Did the CIA dream up this inquiry on its own as part of a plot to bring Cheney down? Or did a request come from some place outside of the CIA? The reason why I'm asking you to take me though this, step by step is because I don't quite see how this was supposed to work. Are you saying that the Wilsons "outed" Valerie themselves? How did they manage that, when even YOU said that Armitage was the source?
the reason " for her husband being sent to Niger isn't by any stretch of the imagination the same thing as saying " she ORDERED " him there. All she had to do was to recommend to her higher ups that Joe was the man for the job. What we have here are the Wilsons, both opposed to the war in Iraq and willing to do anything to trip up the Bush administration, conspiring together to accomplish their goals. Then, pinning the 'outing' on someone else, close to Bush , only makes the plan all that more appealing. They can publicly debunk one of the minor details for the war in Iraq, and then claim victim status as being part of some heavy handed move on behalf of the office of the V.P.
I've heard Armitage was the source for Novak, but that there were multiple times when Joe and Val both outed themselves, based on their own actions. As for the details of how the trip to Niger panned out from inside the CIA, I can't diagram, nor do I think it matters. It didn't come from Cheney, as Joe claims it did. That alone is good enough for me. Never mind that Joe's various reports don't conclude the same things, and that even he admitted the possibility existed that Iraq could be seeking to buy Yellow cake. The whole point is that there was no underlying crime here, and yet some folks are acting as if this were bigger than Watergate. The Left can dream, I suppose.
Sergeant, yes, the Plames outed themselves. Being against the war,wanting to sabotage the Bush administration, not wanting the faults of the CIA to see the light of day,.... take your pick. Joe and Val knew the Left wing elites would fall all over themselves to praise them, and come to their aid after buying into the Wilson's story.
" That mean, evil Dick Cheney won't get away with it ! We've got to tell somebody...quick! Off to Vanity Fair!! "
Please.
And no, I don't get a news letter from Rove's office, so don't even try to claim I'm simply parroting his views. It's just common sense, and a dose of reality, that's all.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Did the CIA dream up this inquiry on its own as part of a plot to bring Cheney down?
The CIA had reports of the Niger business from several sources, most important of which was Great Britain. They wanted to seek independent confirmation. At that point Ms. Plame suggested her husband. He was a logical choice as he had diplomatic experiance with Iraq and ongoing business contacts with Niger.
It should be noted that Ms. Plame has offered several versions including two seperate versions under oath (one to Congress, the other to the Grand Jury) as to how this selection occurred.
It should also be noted that Wilson did this trip twice, once in 1999 and again in 2002.
It should finally be noted that Wilson's actual report supported the British claim rather then throwing it into doubt. The source of the doubt comes from Wilson's editorial which contains glaring factual omissions and conclusions not contained in his 'official' report to the CIA. That report remained classified at the time, so there was no way for the media to check what he was saying.
Quote:
Or did a request come from some place outside of the CIA?
The White House requested in 1999 and 2002 that the CIA seek to confirm the British reports. Likely, from reports, the 2002 request came from VP Cheney's staff as part of the National Security Council's review of Iraq intel.
Quote:
Are you saying that the Wilsons "outed" Valerie themselves? How did they manage that, when even YOU said that Armitage was the source?
Your confusing yourself I think. Armitage was Novak's source for his story. The reason it was not a crime was because she was no longer covert (after all if your covert identity is working openly at the CIA, then you need a new covert identity). The law requires protection for a period after the covert status ends. Her protected status expired in 2002, prior to the so-called leak.
All of that is not relevant, because prior to 2002 it was common knowledge in DC circles that Ms. Plame was a former covert operative. The Wilsons had shared that information with friends and neighbors. Rather then being secretive about her job at the CIA she was quite open. It is reported that this is why her covert status was terminated when she was married, because the cat was out of the bag.
This is why nobody was charged despite the fact the Grand Jury was told by everyone who was responsible. No underlying crime was committed.
H
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Auratptor, Hero:
Quote:Such as....? I keep hearing this, but when their neighbors were interviewed for a story, NONE of them knew what Mrs Wilson did for a living. And I can link to those interview.
I've heard Armitage was the source for Novak, but that there were multiple times when Joe and Val both outed themselves, based on their own actions.
AFA being "common knowledge" in DC circles... Is there anyone who claims to have known what Mrs. Wilson did before Novak's story? Anyone specifically who has stepped out and said "Yeah, she told me herself?" or "I figured it out"? It seems to me if such a person could be identified it would be powerful ammunition for the Administration, and yet all I hear are rumors and innuendo. You claim, for example that her covert status ended by 2002. What do you have to back up that claim? The CIA specifically said she WAS covert. Are they lying?
Quote:If you don't know where it came from, how do you know where it DIDN'T come from? Because Cheney said so? AFA Joe Wilson is concerned, isn't it possible that the CIA TOLD him it came from Cheney's office? Maybe he was just passing on questionable info in good faith. My understanding is that Cheney first became interested in the topic because of a memo
As for the details of how the trip to Niger panned out from inside the CIA, I can't diagram, nor do I think it matters. It didn't come from Cheney's office, as Joe claims it did. That alone is good enough for me.
Quote:Your "reality" is sorely lacking in verifiability, details, and common sense. The things that don't fit together you gloss over. I still have questions.
And no, I don't get a news letter from Rove's office, so don't even try to claim I'm simply parroting his views. It's just common sense, and a dose of reality, that's all.
I agree there was ill will between the WH (on the one side) and the CIA and State Dept (on the other side). I've been saying this for... oh... years. Feel free to backtrack my posts on the topic. But what would have to happen for this sort of conspiracy to take place would have to have started back in 2003, with the forging of a memo to Saddam Hussein about a “Niger Shipment,” which referred to an unspecified delivery (“believed to be uranium” according to the Telegraph, citing believing Iraqi officials who remained unnamed) that had been transported to Iraq via Libya and Syria.
www.dissidentvoice.org/Nov05/Leupp1106.htm
because it was that memo that supposedly kicked off the whole Niger -uranium investigation.
So who forged the memo? Who initiated the mission to Niger? Was it part of a "grand CIA conspiracy" to discredit Cheney? If so, how was that supposed to work? Was the goal to trap the President into saying something about uranium that the CIA knew to be false, which could later be discredited? Or did it depend on Cheney's office "killing the messenger"? In either case, wouldn't it depend on a deceptive and/ or vengeful Administration?
No matter how I turn this around, I can't piece together ANY sort of "conspiracy" on the part of a lone CIA officer and her husband. It would have to be much more far-ranging than that, or nothing at all.
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Always look upstream.
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Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
...And no, I don't get a news letter from Rove's office, so don't even try to claim I'm simply parroting his views. It's just common sense, and a dose of reality, that's all.
I'll take your word for it. But I'd wager the blogs you're getting this stuff from do. Have you asked them?
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
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Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
So who forged the memo?.
The answer to that comes from NPR. As I heard it a NY Times reporter was offered the Niger documents by an Italian source. It failed the sniff test so she refused to buy it.
Interestingly at that time she brought it to the attention of a CIA contact she had and they pretty much told her it was fake. The documents where later sold to Italian Intelligence who shared it the resulting intelligence with the British. The British passed the information to the CIA BUT not the documents it was derived from.
Now the CIA knew about the earlier NYTs inquiries and believed that the British information was a second independant source. This caused them to re-evaluate the information and deem it credible. So, in effect, the forged documents became their own colaborative information.
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Quote:
Originally posted by Fletch2:Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
So who forged the memo?.
The answer to that comes from NPR. As I heard it a NY Times reporter was offered the Niger documents by an Italian source. It failed the sniff test so she refused to buy it.
True. But the Niger-Uranium connection was a series of intellegence reports, mostly European and most credibly Britsh that dated back as far as 1994.
Wilson, at the request of the CIA (and using liberal reasoning, he was under orders from ALGore...ha, like anybody named Gore or Clinton could take five minutes for national security), traveled to Niger in 1999 to confirm or deny the reports. At that time he learned that while Saddam was trying to make the deal, no deal had yet been made. Niger was not willing, at that time, to violate the sanctions.
The 2003 memo was discredited because the dates and addresses mentioned were not correct. Wilson's 2003 trip found that the errors were nominal errors (like list '21' in place of '12' on an address). He concluded in his official report that while the memo was likely false, the information contained in it was largely true. The situation in 2002 was similar to 1999, Saddam was buying, but nobody was selling.
Was the memo forged? Yes. Was it false? No. It was likely forged to provide confirmation of information that was obtained by other means, in order to protect the source of that information (undercover operative, confidential informant, super code breaking device, telepathic Nazis in Her Jewish Majesty's service...who know...)
H
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"Was the memo forged? Yes. Was it false? No."
Wrong again. Here are some of the problems with the concept:
"One letter, dated October 10, 2000 [The article’s editor at La Repubblica identifies this as the "memorandum of understanding" between Niger and Iraq] was signed with the name of Allele Habibou, a [Niger] Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, who had been out of office since 1989". Seymour Hersh 31 March 2003 in the New Yorker
The memo (as noted in the Senate Report) was filled with major errors. There are two mines the uranium could have come from (from which yellowcake is made) "One of the two mines cited by the source as the location of the uranium oxide is flooded. The other mine cited by the source is under the control of the French authorities" (Senate Report)
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Hussein not only did not try to buy yellowcake from Niger, he could not buy it.
Is this how you do your job Hero? Cook evidence, lie, and weasel ? First the trial, then the hangin', right ? 
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"Global warming - it's not just a fact, it's a choice."
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The problem seems to be one of acreditation. The information the CIA got from the British cited credible reports from another European intelligence service (which we now know to be Italy) however only the citation was passed back not the actual source document. Without knowing the source of the British information this seemed to suggest to the CIA that there were at least two seperate sources for the same info. Even then we must assume the CIA didn't completely believe it if they sent Wilson to try and confirm it independently.
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Immediately after Bush's SOTU speech ("The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa") the Senate convened an inquiry to determine how that phrase got into the speech. It was known at the time that it was in fact a bogus claim.
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"Global warming - it's not just a fact, it's a choice."
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Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:Quote:
Originally posted by AURaptor:
...And no, I don't get a news letter from Rove's office, so don't even try to claim I'm simply parroting his views. It's just common sense, and a dose of reality, that's all.
I'll take your word for it. But I'd wager the blogs you're getting this stuff from do. Have you asked them?
SergeantX
Hope you don't gamble for a living, because I rarely do the blog scene. I go on news reports and yes, talk radio. I only flip on cable news when some good video is being looped, watched it a time or two, then move on. So spare me the 'FAUX NEWS 'crap. If there's a question I have on the matter, I will double check the facts my self on the internet. I might not have much of a life, but it does keep me somewhat busy so that I can't spend 24/7 looking all this stuff up. Make of it what you will, but all the evidence I've seen leads me to a conclusion of the Plames being the villains here, not Cheney, and not Libby. Basically, this is such a non issue, I'm growing bored w/ the whole damn subject. Bush can pardon Libby for all I care.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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Auraptor,
One of the things you have consistently demonstrated over this long while is your ability to go past the facts and find the rare tidbits you like.
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"Global warming - it's not just a fact, it's a choice."
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Quote:
rue wrote:
Monday, July 09, 2007 12:51
Immediately after Bush's SOTU speech ("The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa") the Senate convened an inquiry to determine how that phrase got into the speech. It was known at the time that it was in fact a bogus claim.
It got in there because the President and his speech writers wanted it in there. It was not a bogus claim, as British Intelligence STILL holds claim to that info being correct. The State Dept. and CIA might not like it or even agree, but the statement is true.
People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy. - Joss
" They don't like it when you shoot at 'em. I worked that out myself. "
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The claim about uranium was yanked by the CIA from TWO previous speeches. It got into the SOTU because the administration didn't submit it in time for CIA vetting. (Any guesses why not?)
The wording (The British government ...) - also known as word-smithing - shows an intentional attempt to deceive the US public.
You're like the little boy who says "I didn't break the cookie jar mommy .." thinking "the floor did ..." Why you think such a pathetic excuse flies with rational adults is beyond me.
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"Global warming - it's not just a fact, it's a choice."
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