When Patrick Fitzgerald concludes the Grand Jury phase of the Plamegate investigation, the Media, and sadly, many of us, will solely focus on indictments. And indeed, that will be an important part of the story. But what of the
lying by the Bush Administration, including by Bush himself, regarding this matter?
Q: Given -- given recent developments in the CIA leak case, particularly Vice President Cheney's discussions with the investigators, do you still stand by what you said several months ago, a suggestion that it might be difficult to identify anybody who leaked the agent's name?
THE PRESIDENT: That's up to -
Q: And, and, do you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found to have done so?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes. And that's up to the U.S. Attorney to find the facts.
There was nothing ambiguous about the White House lie:
Q: All right. Let me just follow up. You said this morning, "The President knows" that Karl Rove wasn't involved. How does he know that?
MR. McCLELLAN: . . . I said it is simply not true. So, I mean, it's public knowledge. I've said that it's not true. And I have spoken with Karl Rove --. . .
Q . . . I'm not asking what you said, I'm asking if the President has a factual basis for saying -- for your statement that he knows Karl Rove --
MR. McCLELLAN: He's aware of what I've said, that there is simply no truth to that suggestion. And I have spoken with Karl about it.
Of course Karl Rove was involved up to his eyeballs. And Karl Rove still works at the White House. And George Bush is a liar. And where is the Media outrage at being lied to? Well . . . .:
More is at stake here than bringing down Karl Rove or some other White House apparatchik, or even settling some score with Miller, who is sometimes accused of taking this nation to war in Iraq all by herself. The greater issue is control of information. If anything good comes out of the Iraq war, it has to be a realization that bad things can happen to good people when the administration -- any administration -- is in sole control of knowledge and those who know the truth are afraid to speak up. This -- this creepy silence -- will be the consequence of dusting off rarely used statutes to still the tongues of leakers and intimidate the press in its pursuit of truth, fame and choice restaurant tables. Apres Miller comes moi.
This is why I want Fitzgerald to leave now.
Yes, this would be hilariously incoherent if it were not so serious. This is the Washington Establishment Media. Incompetent. Idiotic. Incoherent. Incapable of doing its job.
Interesting of course was their attitude about sex lies:
THE LYING OFFENDS THEM. For both politicians and journalists, trust is the coin of the realm. Without trust, the system breaks down.
"We have our own set of village rules," says David Gergen, editor at large at U.S. News & World Report, who worked for both the Reagan and Clinton White House. "Sex did not violate those rules. The deep and searing violation took place when he not only lied to the country, but co-opted his friends and lied to them. That is one on which people choke.
. . . "[S]ays Chris Matthews, who once was a top aide to the late Speaker of the House Thomas P. "Tip" O'Neill . . . "[t]here has to be a functional trust by reporters of the person they're covering. Clinton lies knowing that you know he's lying. It's brutal and it subjugates the person who's being lied to. I resent deeply being constantly lied to."
. . . "His behavior," says Lieberman, "is so over the edge. What is troubling is the deceit, the failure to own up to it. Before this is over the truth must be told."
. . . "The judgment is harsher in Washington," says The Post's Broder. "We don't like being lied to."
Apparently Dean Broder follows the new rule -- IOKIYAR.