Filed under: CIA, Dick Cheney, Dictatorship, Empire, federal crime, George Bush, Iraq, Karl Rove, nation building, neocons, occupation, scandal, scooter libby, Sex Scandal, supreme court, US Constitution, Valerie Plame, War On Terror, Washington D.C., White House
Cheney & Rove Win Plame Suit Dismissal Appeal
Bloomberg
August 12, 2008
A federal appeals court today upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit accusing U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, former White House political adviser Karl Rove and former Cheney aide I. Lewis Libby of illegally conspiring to reveal the identity of a CIA agent.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit said a trial judge was correct to dismiss the suit by Valerie Plame, who worked at the Central Intelligence Agency’s headquarters in Virginia, and her husband, former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson. They sued the three and former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage in July 2006.
Plame and Wilson accused the four men of violating their constitutional rights by leaking Plame’s identity to the media in retaliation for a New York Times opinion piece by Wilson that questioned the Bush administration’s basis for going to war in Iraq.
The decision “allows outrageous government conduct to go unpunished,’’ said Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility & Ethics in Washington, a watchdog group that represented Plame and Wilson. She said the group is considering asking the full D.C. Circuit to review the case and an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Filed under: Congress, Department of justice, Dictatorship, DOJ, Empire, federal crime, judiciary committee, Karl Rove, Media, MSNBC, Nancy Pelosi, scandal, Valerie Plame, War Crimes, White House | Tags: contempt, linda sanchez, pelosi, Subpoena
Judiciary Committee approves contempt charge for Karl Rove
Raw Story
July 30, 2008
The House Judiciary Committee has voted 20-14 to approve a contempt of Congress resolution against former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove for his failure to appear after a Congressional subpoena.
Voting along party lines Wednesday morning, the committee said Rove broke the law by failing to appear at a July 10 hearing on allegations of White House influence over the Justice Department, including whether Rove encouraged prosecutions against Democrats.
The committee decision is a recommendation. It remains unclear whether Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) will allow a final vote.
Rove has denied any involvement with Justice Department decisions, and the White House has said Congress has no authority to compel testimony from current and former advisers.
Yesterday afternoon, a coalition of groups including CREDO Mobile, People For the American Way, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, The Nation, Campaign for America’s Future, and Progress Now, delivered a petition calling for Rove’s contempt to Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-CA).
“I think it’s ridiculous that Karl Rove thinks that he doesn’t have to follow the law,” Sanchez said in a release. “Nobody in this country should be above the law.”
Excerpts from the markup memo of the resolution sent to reporters follows. Rove was overseas at the time of the hearing and alleged that the trip had been planned in advance.
Turd Blossom runs from questions of contempt charge
Filed under: ABC, Afghanistan, afghanistan deaths, CIA, citizen's arrest, CNN, Department of justice, Dictatorship, Dissent, DOJ, Empire, federal crime, George Bush, House, House Subcommittee, Iowa, Iraq, iraq deaths, judiciary committee, Karl Rove, Media, MSNBC, nation building, neocons, occupation, Protest, scandal, Troops, Valerie Plame, War Crimes | Tags: contempt, roy sekoff, Subpoena
4 arrested for attempting citizens arrest on Karl Rove
Iowa Politics
July 25, 2008
Four Iowans were arrested today while attempting to make a Citizens’ Arrest of Karl Rove in Des Moines, Iowa. Citing Iowa Code provisions for making Citizen’s Arrests as well as citing Federal Statute violations they claimed Rove had violated, the four were stopped at the gate of the Wakonda Country Club in Des Moines where Rove was scheduled to speak at a Republican Fundraiser.
The four arrested were retired Methodist minister and Peace and Justice Advocate, Rev. Chet Guinn, 80, as well as three Des Moines Catholic Workers, Edward Bloomer, 61, Kirk Brown, 25, and Mona Shaw, 57. All four were cited for trespassing and released.
The four maintained that they were acting within the guidelines of Iowa Code that obligate private citizens to make such an arrest if they believe a felony has been committed and turn Rove over to police officials to bring Rove before a judge for formal indictment. By law, a federal judge should consider the charges and determine if an indictment should be made.
Brown and Shaw made a similar attempt last March when Rove spoke at the University of Iowa, Iowa City. Brown and Shaw were arrested and released without charges following that attempt. Deaths in the Middle East since the March attempt number in the thousands including, 151 more US troops have been killed in Iraq, and 284 killed in Afghanistan as well as far more citizens of those two nations.
Rove remains unindicted and recently refused to cooperate with a Congressional subpoena in the Valerie Plame leak investigation. Despite mounting evidence of Rove’s wrongdoing concerning leading the U.S. to war as well as other actions, Congress and the U.S. judicial system remain reluctant to bring charges against either Rove or the Bush administration. Recent evidence includes Articles of Impeachment that will again be presented by Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich tomorrow. Vincent Bugliosi’s new book “The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder” carefully lays out a case against Bush and his administration for war crimes and felony murder. Bugliosi was prosecutor for the Charles Manson Family murders and author of the book “Helter Skelter,” which dealt with that crime.
To date there have been 4125 US Military deaths in Iraq, 896 in Afghanistan, 66,775 casualties (wounded as well as those removed for other injuries and illnesses), and more than 200,000 Iraqi and Afghani citizens killed and many, many more wounded.
Karl Rove should be in jail for contempt
http://youtube.com/watch?v=BWQ5ZMnz25I
Rove refuses subpoena, leaves country
http://noworldsystem.com/2008/..es-subpoena-leaves-country/
Filed under: 2-party system, CIA, Dick Cheney, FBI, federal crime, George Bush, Henry Waxman, House, House Subcommittee, John Conyers, Karl Rove, left right paradigm, Media, Michael Mukasey, MSNBC, Nancy Pelosi, neocons, Neolibs, Valerie Plame, White House | Tags: contempt, linda sanchez, Subpoena
Rove refuses subpoena, leaves country
Nick Juliano
Raw Story
July 10, 2008
Update: Conyers gives Rove 5 days to comply before pursuing ’all available options’
Former White House adviser Karl Rove has ignored a subpoena from congressional Democrats to testify about allegations of political pressure at the Justice Department and his alleged role in the prosecution of a former governor of Alabama.
A House subcommittee voted 7-1 Thursday to reject Rove’s claim that executive privilege freed him from an obligation to testify, leaving open the possibility the Republican political guru will be held in contempt.
During the hearing, Rep. Chris Cannon (R-UT) revealed that Rove was out of the country. According to the liberal blog ThinkProgress, Rove’s lawyer’s confirmed that Rove was out of the country on a trip scheduled long before the subpoena was sent.
Karl Rove failed to appear before the House Judiciary subcommittee. His lawyer revealed that he was out of the country.
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Wax..ontempt_unless_0708.html
Pelosi Opposing Contempt for Rove
http://noworldsystem.com/2008/07/09/pelosi-opposing-contempt-for-rove/
Filed under: 2008 Election, 4th amendment, Afghanistan, bill of rights, CIA, Dennis Kucinich, Founding Fathers, Iraq, nation building, occupation, scandal, Surveillance, US Constitution, Valerie Plame, War Crimes
Kucinich presents Bush impeachment petition
Sign it! here
Filed under: 2008 Election, 9/11, Afghanistan, Alberto Gonzales, bill of rights, CIA, Congress, Dennis Kucinich, Dick Cheney, Dictatorship, electron fraud, Empire, Fascism, gas prices, George Bush, gore vidal, gulf, Habeas Corpus, halliburton, House, Impeach, Iran, Iraq, kuwait, magna carta, Media, Nazi, neocons, Oil, Petrol, republic, supreme court, Tehran, Troops, US Constitution, us sovereignty, Valerie Plame, vote fraud, vote scam, War Crimes, War On Terror, WW3, ww4
Gore Vidal: Bush ended the U.S. as a Republic
Press TV
June 28, 2008
Gore Vidal, US novelist, historian and social critic says the Bush regime has killed all of the constitutional links that made the US a republic.
On early Friday morning Iran time, in an exclusive interview with Press TV, Vidal said that President Bush has rid the country of the Bill of Rights, habeas corpus and the entire legacy of the Magna Carta in the name of war on terror.
He also criticized the House of Representatives for not impeaching President Bush, over a wide array of subjects such as disclosure of CIA agent Valerie Plame’s covert status. Vidal did however single out Rep. Dennis Kuchinich for drawing up articles of impeachment against the president.
Vidal, long strongly critical of the Bush administration, said the administration has both an an explicit and covert expansionist agenda.
In his writings he has made the assessment that for several years, the administration and its associates, many of whom are magnets in the oil and gas industry have had clear aims to control the oil of Central Asia which is to follow on the heels of gaining effective control of the oil of the Persian Gulf–a project that took a new twist with the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1991.
That event inadvertently served as the basis for the neo-conservative American Project for the 21st Century document and policy guideline that has been the hallmark of the Bush-Cheney years.
Regarding the September 11, 2001 attacks, Vidal has written the American intelligence community clearly warned it was coming but the event provided political cover and pretext for the plans that the administration already had in place for invading Iraq–plans that can be traced to the waning days of the first Bush family presidency. .
Filed under: CIA, George Bush, Impeach, Karl Rove, nation building, neocons, occupation, Propaganda, scandal, Scott Mcclellan, Valerie Plame, War Crimes, War On Terror, Washington D.C., WMD | Tags: daniel lungren, howard coble, jerry nadler, lamar smith, ric keller, Robert Wexler, steve king
Scott McClellan Under Oath: Video Highlights
ANP
June 20, 2008
Former presidential spokesperson Scott McClellan testified under oath before the House Judiciary Committee and laid out a damning case against Bush’s White House. Over the course of four tense hours, committee members clashed over calls for impeachment of President Bush and deception leading up to the invasion of Iraq.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/a..ylt=Aj4lbuTY4WyadQIxRt2zJqGMwfIE
McClellin: Bush Admits Authorizing Plame Leak
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oft4K3f8364
Former White House spokesman: Bush used ’propaganda’ to sell war
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Form..man_Bush_used_0527.html
Letterman: “Cheney Couldn’t Care Less About Americans”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TudvUGEDnkA
McClellan: Bush’s Iran rhetoric serious
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=58111§ionid=351020101
Bush ‘involved’ in CIA leak case
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7105001.stm
Filed under: Afghanistan, army, CIA, david letterman, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, George Bush, Guantanamo, Impeach, Iraq, iraqi deaths, marine, middle east, Military, nation building, neocons, occupation, Oil, scandal, Scott Mcclellan, Torture, Troops, Valerie Plame, War Crimes, War On Terror
Letterman: “Cheney Couldn’t Care Less About Americans”
Filed under: CIA, CIA leak, CNN, DEBT, FBI, George Bush, Henry Waxman, Impeach, Iraq, John Conyers, Karl Rove, Media, MSNBC, nation building, neocons, occupation, Propaganda, Psyops, scandal, scooter libby, scott mcCellen, Valerie Plame, War Crimes, War On Terror, White House, WMD
McClellan Will Testify Before House
AP
June 10, 2008
President Bush’s former spokesman, Scott McClellan, will testify before a House committee next week about whether Vice President Dick Cheney ordered him to make misleading public statements about the leaking of CIA agent Valerie Plame’s identity.
McClellan will testify publicly and under oath before the House Judiciary Committee on June 20 about the White House’s role in the leak and its response, his attorneys, Michael and Jane Tigar, said on Monday.
In his new book, “What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception,” McClellan said he was misled by others, possibly including Cheney, about the role of I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby in the leak. McClellan has said publicly that Bush and Cheney “directed me to go out there and exonerate Scooter Libby.”
The statements prompted House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., to invite McClellan to the hearing “concerning reported attempts to cover up the involvement of White House officials in the leak of” Plame’s identity.
Plame’s CIA identity was leaked to the news media by several top Bush administration officials in 2003, including Libby and former top White House political adviser Karl Rove. Last July, Bush commuted Libby’s 2 1/2-year sentence, sparing him from serving any prison time after being convicted of perjury, obstructing justice and lying to the FBI.
House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., also is seeking more FBI documents about the leak in part because of McClellan’s description of the way he was instructed to respond to questions on the matter.
At Libby’s trial, witnesses testified that Cheney, Libby and other Bush administration officials mounted a campaign to counter criticism of the Iraq war by Plame’s husband, Joseph Wilson. Cheney’s spokeswoman, Cathie Martin, testified that Cheney personally wrote out statements and talking points for Libby and other aides to give to reporters to rebut Wilson’s allegations.
McClellin: Bush Admits Authorizing Plame Leak
Democracy Now
May 30, 2008
Former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan took to the airwaves Thursday to explain his speaking out on his former bosses in the Bush administration. In a new memoir, McClellan accuses the administration of deliberately manipulating the public to wage the war on Iraq. McClellan also criticizes his former bosses for the handling of Hurricane Katrina and the CIA leak case. Appearing on the Today Show, McClellan said he had mistakenly allowed his personal admiration for President Bush to overshadow concerns about the deceptive rush to war in Iraq.
Scott McClellan: “I felt like we were rushing into this, but because of my position and my affection for the President and my belief and trust in he and his advisers, I gave them the benefit of the doubt. And looking back on it and reflecting on it now, I don’t think I should have.”
McClellan went on to say President Bush had personally told him he authorized the leak of former CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity. McClellan says he asked President Bush aboard Air Force One if he was the one who approved outing Plame to the media. McClellan says Bush replied, “Yes, I was.”
Filed under: CIA, CIA leak, CNN, cocaine, DEBT, George Bush, Impeach, Iraq, Karl Rove, katrina, Media, Military Industrial Complex, MSNBC, nation building, occupation, Propaganda, Psyops, scandal, scooter libby, scott mcCellen, Valerie Plame, War Crimes, War On Terror, White House, WMD
McCellan: Bush Admits He Authorized Plame Leak
Mike Sheehan
Raw Story
May 28, 2008
Update: Bush ’didn’t remember’ whether he’d tried cocaine, McClellan writes
In a new tell-all memoir on sale next week, former White House press secretary Scott McClellan writes that President Bush depended on propaganda to sell the Iraq war to the American public, The Politico reports.
According to the Atlanta Journal Constitution, McClellan also reveals new details about allegations regarding Bush’s former drug use that shadowed his 2000 campaign.
McClellan tracks Bush’s penchant for self-deception back to an overheard incident on the campaign trail in 1999 when the then-governor was dogged by reports of possible cocaine use in his younger days.
The book recounts an evening in a hotel suite “somewhere in the Midwest.” Bush was on the phone with a supporter and motioned for McClellan to have a seat.
“’The media won’t let go of these ridiculous cocaine rumors,’ I heard Bush say. ’You know, the truth is I honestly don’t remember whether I tried it or not. We had some pretty wild parties back in the day, and I just don’t remember.’”
“I remember thinking to myself, How can that be?” McClellan wrote. “How can someone simply not remember whether or not they used an illegal substance like cocaine? It didn’t make a lot of sense.”
Bush, according to McClellan, “isn’t the kind of person to flat-out lie.”
“So I think he meant what he said in that conversation about cocaine. It’s the first time when I felt I was witnessing Bush convincing himself to believe something that probably was not true, and that, deep down, he knew was not true,” McClellan wrote. “And his reason for doing so is fairly obvious — political convenience.”
In the years that followed, McClellan “would come to believe that sometimes he convinces himself to believe what suits his needs at the moment.” McClellan likened it to a witness who resorts to “I do not recall.”
McClellan’s “surprisingly scathing” and “often harsh” What Happened: Inside the Bush White House… also contains, as Mike Allen writes for Politico, other standout revelations such as:
-
Bush and his aides “confused the propaganda campaign with the high level of candor and honesty so fundamentally needed to build and then sustain public support during a time of war”;
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Some of McClellan’s assertions before the White House press corps were, in retrospect, “badly misguided”;
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Karl Rove and Lewis “Scooter” Libby “had at best misled” McClellan about their roles in the notorious CIA leak case, even as McClellan publicly defended them;
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The White House was in a “state of denial” during the first week after the Hurricane Katrina disaster;
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Bush was “steamed” about his top economic adviser telling The Wall Street Journal that a possible Iraq war could cost as much as $200 billion. “He shouldn’t be talking about that,” said Bush, according to McClellan;
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The press was “probably too deferential to the White House” when it came to public discourse over the choice to go to invade Iraq. McClellan also says the “White House press corps went too easy on the administration,” reports Allen.
Despite the book’s criticisms of the administration he once worked for, McClellan writes, “I still like and admire President Bush,” reserving most of his rancor for Bush’s top advisers, especially Karl Rove.
MSNBC: White House Officals Are ‘Flat Out Angry,’ Calling McClellan ‘Traitor,’ ‘Benedict’
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/05/28/mcclellan-traitor/
McClellan: Plame leak the ’turning point’ in his disillusionment
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/McClellan_I_have_higher_loyalty_to_0529.html
CNN’s Yellin: Network execs killed critical White House stories
http://www.politico.com/blogs/mich.._killed_critical_White_House_stories_.html
Bill O’Reilly on “Judas” Scott McClellan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXjP72T0HKI
Filed under: CIA, Congress, Dick Cheney, false information, George Bush, Impeach, Iraq, neocons, Robert Wexler, scooter libby, Surveillance, Valerie Plame, White House, WMD
Impeachment of Dick Cheney has passed the House
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQDLyKGX268
Cheney Impeachment Hearings Can Begin With Your Help
http://littlecountrylost.blogspo…t-hearings-can-begin.html
Dem Congressman takes ‘impeach Cheney’ appeal to Web
http://rawstory.com/news/2007…pers_Dem_Congressman_1214.html
Filed under: CIA, Dana Perino, Dick Cheney, false information, George Bush, Impeach, Iraq, joseph wilson, Karl Rove, scooter libby, Scott Mcclellan, Valerie Plame, War On Terror, White House
Bush ‘involved’ in CIA leak case
BBC
November 21, 2007
A former White House press secretary has said the US president was involved in misinforming the public over the leaking of a CIA agent’s identity.
In an excerpt from his book, Scott McClellan says George W Bush helped mislead the public over the role in the affair of two White House aides.
The CIA agent, Valerie Plame, says her identity was leaked because her diplomat husband opposed the Iraq war.
The White House said Mr Bush would not ask anyone to pass false information.
Lawsuit
Mr McClellan’s book is not scheduled for publication until April and the excerpt released was brief.
It refers to a White House press conference he attended in 2003.
WHAT IS CIA LEAK CASE ABOUT?
Libby was found guilty of lying to the FBI and a grand jury over revelations about CIA agent Valerie Plame’s identity
Critics said the White House leaked Ms Plame’s identity to undermine her husband, ex-ambassador Joseph Wilson
He had publicly cast doubt on the Bush administration’s case for war in Iraq
The alleged cover-up, rather than the leak itself, was the subject of the Libby trial
At the conference, Mr McClellan told journalists that the two aides Karl Rove and Lewis “Scooter” Libby were “not involved” in leaking Ms Plame’s identity.
The excerpt reads: “There was one problem. It was not true.
“I had unknowingly passed along false information. And five of the highest ranking officials in the administration were involved in my doing so: Rove, Libby, the vice-president, the president’s chief of staff, and the president himself.”
Mr McClellan, who served as press secretary from 2003 to 2006, and his publisher later clarified the excerpt.
Peter Osnos of Public Affairs Books said Mr McClellan was not suggesting Mr Bush deliberately lied.
“He told him something that wasn’t true, but the president didn’t know it wasn’t true,” Mr Osnos said. “The president told him what he thought to be the case.”
Libby, Vice-President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff, is the only person charged over the affair. He was sentenced to 30 months in jail for obstructing an inquiry into the leaking of the identity.
However, Mr Bush intervened in July to prevent Libby from serving a prison term.
Ms Plame said Mr McClellan’s excerpt was “shocking” and that she believed Mr McClellan had been “sent out to lie to the press corps”.
Current White House press secretary Dana Perino said: “The president has not and would not ask his spokespeople to pass on false information.”
In July a judge dismissed a civil lawsuit brought by Ms Plame against Mr Cheney and other Bush administration officials.
She maintained her cover had been blown after her husband, Joseph Wilson, a former ambassador, said the Bush administration had manipulated intelligence on Iraq to back its case for war.
Filed under: Alberto Gonzales, Big Brother, Dick Cheney, Dictatorship, DOJ, FBI, George Bush, NSA, Police State, Surveillance, Valerie Plame
Payback Time: FBI Raids Home of Suspected NSA Leaker
Perrspectives
August 6, 2007
This past week, the Bush administration added insult to injury over its illegal program of NSA domestic surveillance . During the very time Congress was debating codifying President Bush’s lawbreaking by revising the FISA law many of his allies had been afraid to publicly challenge as unconstitutional, Alberto Gonzales’ DOJ was raiding the home of a former Justice official to identify the person who first brought the illicit program to light.
As Michael Isikoff details in Newsweek, a team of FBI agents raided the home of Thomas M. Tamm, a veteran prosecutor and former official of the Office of Intelligence Policy and Review (OIPR) within DOJ:
The agents seized Tamm’s desktop computer, two of his children’s laptops and a cache of personal files. Tamm and his lawyer, Paul Kemp, declined any comment. So did the FBI. But two legal sources who asked not to be identified talking about an ongoing case told NEWSWEEK the raid was related to a Justice criminal probe into who leaked details of the warrantless eavesdropping program to the news media. The raid appears to be the first significant development in the probe since The New York Times reported in December 2005 that Bush had authorized the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on the international phone calls and e-mails of U.S. residents without court warrants.
Even as Alberto Gonzales was feebly deflecting perjury charges by apologizing for “creating confusion” with his comments about ” no serious disagreement ” in 2004 within the administration over its NSA homeland spying scheme, the Attorney General was dispatching the FBI to investigate one of those purportedly disagreeable officials. At its worst, the campaign to punish NSA whistle-blowers reflect not only the administration’s misplaced priorities, but its absolute commitment to seeking vengeance against its opponents:
The raid also came while the White House and Congress were battling over expanding NSA wiretapping authority in order to plug purported “surveillance gaps.” James X. Dempsey of the Center for Democracy and Technology said the raid was “amazing” and shows the administration’s misplaced priorities: using FBI agents to track down leakers instead of processing intel warrants to close the gaps. A Justice spokesman declined to comment.
After the revelations about the NSA program by the New York Times in December 2005, On December 19th, President Bush raged about what he deemed “a shameful act” that is “helping the enemy”. Claiming he didn’t order an investigation, Bush added “the Justice Department, I presume, will proceed forward with a full investigation” At a subsequent press conference that same day, Alberto Gonzales suggested the retribution that was to come:
“As to whether or not there will be a leak investigation, as the President indicated, this is really hurting national security, this has really hurt our country, and we are concerned that a very valuable tool has been compromised. As to whether or not there will be a leak investigation, we’ll just have to wait and see.”
The disturbing irony, of course, is that the vendetta against leakers by President Bush and his allies is highly selective. In 2003, Vice President Cheney famously authorized the cherry-picked declassification of elements of the 2002 Iraq NIE as part of a campaign to smear Ambassador Joseph Wilson over his public decimation of the White House’s uranium in Niger canard. As the National Journal reported in April 2006, leak plugging stalwart and Kansas Senator Pat Roberts (then the Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman) leaked details regarding Saddam Hussein’s whereabouts on March 20, 2003 even as the Iraq war was just underway. And just last week, House Minority Leader John Boehner described classified details of the supposed “intelligence gap” created by a FISA judge’s ruling, all in an effort to pressure his Democratic opponents to cave to President Bush’s demands for expanded domestic surveillance authority.
Which, as it turned out, is exactly what came to pass. So while Congressional Democrats blinked by cowardly ratifying the lawlessness of an unpopular President and his Attorney General on life support, the White House continued its policy of payback – without blinking.
(For the latest news, key documents, legal developments and other essential materials, see: ” The NSA Scandal Documents Center .”)
UPDATE 1: Several readers have already commented about PlameGate and President Bush’s supreme hypocrisy when it comes to his selective crusade against leakers. As you might recall, a nonchalant President Bush had this to say about the person(s) who outed covert CIA operative Valerie Plame on October 7, 2003 :
“I don’t know if we’re going to find out the senior administration official. Now, this is a large administration, and there’s a lot of senior officials. I don’t have any idea. I’d like to. I want to know the truth. That’s why I’ve instructed this staff of mine to cooperate fully with the investigators — full disclosure, everything we know the investigators will find out.”
Don’t expect that Vegas will start taking odds on a pardon for the NSA leaker…
UPDATE 2: Over at DailyKos, Ballerina X asks if the Thomas M. Tamm whose home was raided by the FBI last week is the same Thomas M. Tamm who commented at Media Matters on July 25th. There, Tamm identifies himself as a “former DOJ lawyer” and raises the issue of political interference inherent in Gonzales’ blocking U.S. prosecutors from pursuing Congressional contempt charges.
FBI raids DOJ attorney’s home in search for warrantless wiretap information leaker
http://rawstory.com/printstory.php?story=7101
noworldsystem.com 