Yeah, I know, like what else is new?
This time it's about Plame. More finger-pointing, just not at the right people.
Time to get out your pens/keyboards.
(On NPR's All Things Considered today):
[Stop me if this has been diaried, I looked, really. Transcribing done by me; mistakes are my own. Original content (c) NPR.]
In response to clip of Wilson's press conference and Question re whether Bush is gonna step up:
Yeah, I think the President is not inclined to leap into this thing when we know so little and the investigation is still ongoing. It would stun me if George Bush were to walk away from Karl Rove. It would take a lot to pry that guy away from the other guy. ...
And I must say, the frenzy has been going around us all week. I still don't know there was a crime or anything particularly wrong going on here. Joe Wilson was going around saying that the Vice President sent him to Iraq, which turns out to be untrue. And Matt Cooper, from what we know of his memo, was looking into that story, and Rove said "No it wasn't the Vice President who sent him, his wife's a CIA agent."
Yeah, and this is OK how? Why couldn't Rove have just stopped at "No, it wasn't the Vice President who sent him."? Because Rove was involved in character assassination, retaliation, and worse.
[UPDATE:] Yes, this has been debunked. Frequently. Thanks, commenters, for bringing it up.
Q: What's Judy Miller doing in jail if there was no crime?
Well, she's there to protect a principle. The principle being you don't reveal sources, it has nothing to do with crimes.
So, so, shallow. I know, we've all argued about it.
And then again (in response to EJ Dionne's point that the WH lied about Rove's non-involvement and was engaged in tactics deliberately designed to undermine Wilson's report on WMD):
We're in Alice in Wonderland territory. The idea...Joe Wilson was the guy not telling the truth. He said the Vice President sent him, that turned out to from the Senate Intelligence Committee not to be true. He said his wife had nothing to do with him being sent. That turned out, according to the Senate Intelligence Committee, not to be true. Karl Rove, from what we know from Matt Cooper's memo, was the guy actually telling what it was that happened.
Again, so? As my mom would say, cut me a break. Classic avoidance - "Look over there!"
EJ Dionne: Wilson turned out to be right on the central point (the Niger story).
More Brooks:
Well, we don't want to get deep into that [of course not!] but the CIA said he did not look deeply into it enough, that Iraq was trying to get uranium, but that's deep into the weeds. It just shows how we're getting into Alice in Wonderland territory.
Yeah, we wouldn't want to get deep in the weeds.
Bite me, Brooks.