Let's Get This Right, Please

Walter Pincus of the WaPo tries to report on the Mary McCarthy firing and manages to bungle a related story:

Democrats Suggest Double Standard on Leaks

Key Democratic legislators yesterday joined Republicans in saying they do not condone the alleged leaking of classified information that led to last week's firing of a veteran CIA officer. But they questioned whether a double standard exists that lets the White House give reporters secretly declassified information for political purposes.

"I don't know this woman, and I do not condone leaks of classified information," said Rep. Jane Harman (Calif.), ranking Democrat on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, referring to the firing of Mary McCarthy.

Harman added that "while leaks are wrong, I think it is totally wrong for our president in secret to selectively declassify certain information and empower people in his White House to leak it to favored reporters so that they can discredit political enemies," she said on Fox News Sunday.

Harman was referring to White House staff members disclosing the classified identity of CIA case officer Valerie Plame in 2003.

No, she wasn't referring to the Valerie Plame leak, or if she was, the WaPo should have noted her error rather than reinforcing it - per the recent Fitzgerald filing, Bush and Cheney authorized Libby to leak portions of the National Intelligence Estimate as part of the push-back against Joe Wilson.

Much as he seemingly wanted to, Fitzgerald offered nothing indicating he had any evidence indicating that Cheney had authorized a leak of Plame's CIA affiliation.  As to Bush's involvement in Libby's Plame-related chats, Fitzgerald provided this:

During this time, while the President was unaware of the role that the Vice President’s Chief of Staff and National Security Adviser [i.e., Libby, who had both jobs] had in fact played in disclosing Ms. Wilson’s CIA employment, defendant implored White House officials to have a public statement issued exonerating him.

Since Walter Pincus and Bob Woodward were Plame leak recipients, I am surprised that Mr. Pincus and his editors could be so misinformed on this point.  Especially since they seemed to have a firm grasp on the NIE connection just a few weeks ago.

MORE:  Mr. Pincus' mis-reporting aside, how fair is to to compare the Plame and Secret Prison's leaks?

I think we can all agree that Ms. McCarthy was well aware that she was leaking classified information.  But what about I. Lewis Libby or the other Plame leakers?

It's far from clear just what crime it might be that Special Counsel Fitzgerald is investigating.  We say this because someone (probably then-deputy Secretary Armitage) apparently leaked to Bob Woodward and Robert Novak, then only disclosed his leak to Novak in his early encounters with investigators; the Woodward leak was eventually disclosed in November 2005.

So somebody leaked twice, including to the person who first published Ms. Plame's CIA link, then mis-led investigators about his involvement.  What's a prosecutor to do?  Conceal his identity to shield him from embarrassment!  From the WaPo:

But Walton's decision to continue to protect the anonymity of one administration official, whom Libby's attorneys described as a confidential source about Plame for two reporters, one of them apparently Washington Post Assistant Managing Editor Bob Woodward, is a blow to Libby's case. Defense attorneys had said they needed to know the official's identity and the details of his conversations with the two journalists to show that Libby was not lying when he testified that many reporters knew about Plame's identity.

But Walton said the source's identity is not relevant, and there is no reason to sully the source's reputation because the person faces no charges.

The official's identity has been the subject of intense speculation since syndicated columnist Robert D. Novak published Plame's name in July 2003 -- eight days after her husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV, accused the administration of twisting intelligence to justify going to war with Iraq.

Defense attorneys in yesterday's hearing described the official as someone who did not work at the White House and was the source for two reporters. They said that one of those reporters had revealed in November that he learned about Plame from the official in mid-June 2003.

Well - per this example, leaking about Plame to the press and then lying about it does not seem to merit prosecution.  But did the White House know she was covert?  Here is Fitzgerald from a filing related to the Judy Miller subpoena:

To date, we have no direct evidence that Libby knew or believed that Wilson's wife was engaged in covert work.

OK, that was then.  But Fitzgerald's recent filing in which he noted the Bush-Cheney authorization of the NIE leak would have been enhanced by any mention that Libby knew Ms. Plame's status was classified, but it slid past that point, rather awkwardly - Fitzgerald noted that Libby was reluctant to discuss the classified NIE without authorization, but never asserted that Libby sought authorization to leak information about Plame, or that Libby believed Plame to be classified.

However, per a defense response, we get the opposite:

Mr. Libby was not, of course, a source for the Novak story. And he testified to the grand jury unequivocally that he did not understand Ms. Wilson’s employment by the CIA to be classified information.

Again, his silence speaks volumes - if Fitzgerald has contradictory evidence that Libby did know that Ms. Plame's status was classified, why not indict him on that point for perjury?

How might Libby have found out about Ms. Plame's status?  Perhaps VP Cheney told Libby that Ms. Plame was classified.  It's imaginable, but who told Cheney?  From Murray Waas, we get this:

Cheney told investigators that he had learned of Plame's employment by the CIA and her potential role in her husband being sent to Niger by then-CIA director George Tenet, according to people familiar with Cheney's interviews with the special prosecutor.

Tenet has told investigators that he had no specific recollection of discussing Plame or her role in her husband's trip with Cheney, according to people with familiar with his statement to investigators.

Maybe Tenet remembers getting a Medal of Freedom, but this sort of evidence is not going to prove that Libby, or anyone, know that Ms. Plame had special status.

Let's wrap this by noting a quote from the notes of the INR analyst describing the Feb 19 2002 meeting that launched Joe Wilson's Niger trip - Valerie Wilson was "a CIA WMD managerial type and the wife of Amb. Joe Wilson".

Is "managerial type" spook-speak for "NOC", and are NOCs names bandied about in memos?  Please.

There is a reasonable possibility that the White House did not know her status was classified, although I can not conceive of documents that would prove that.  Similarly, there is an excellent possibility that First Leaker Armitage (if it was he) did not know either.

Well - the McCarthy/Libby comparison has an irresistible appeal, and post-Kerry Dems may have lost their zest for nuance and details.

Comments

[ghostcat]

Do we really need a Talmudist? I didn't think so.

Does the end justify the median? the mode?

Leo is an average student.

[topsecretk9]

Hitch Read from Start to finish

"...But now, instead of being rewarded for her probity, Mary McCarthy has been given the sack. And the New York Times rushes to her aid, with a three-hankie story on April 23, moistly titled "Colleagues Say Fired CIA Analyst Played by the Rules." This is only strictly true if she confined her disagreement to official channels, as she did when she wrote to Clinton in 1998. Sadly enough, the same article concedes that McCarthy may have lied and then eventually told the truth about having unauthorized contact with members of the press.

Well! In that case the remedy is clear. A special counsel must be appointed forthwith, to discover whether the CIA has been manipulating the media. All civil servants and all reporters with knowledge must be urged to comply, and to produce their notes or see the inside of a jail. No effort must be spared to discover the leaker. This is, after all, the line sternly proposed by the New York Times and many other media outlets in the matter of the blessed Joseph Wilson and his martyred CIA spouse, Valerie Plame...."

---and PeteUK will like this---

"Joseph Wilson update: In my article last week on Wilson's utter failure to notice the visit of Saddam Hussein's chief nuclear diplomat to Niger, I mentioned his substitution of another Iraqi name—Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf—as having just possibly approached some Niger businessmen and officials at an OAU summit in Algeria in 1999. Sahaf is now better known to us as the risible figure of "Baghdad Bob," which allowed Wilson to make mock of the whole thing. It is almost irrelevant when set beside the visit of Wissam al-Zahawie to Niger itself the same year, but at the time he attended the Algiers meeting, "Baghdad Bob" was—as I ought to have known and have since found out—Saddam Hussein's foreign minister. This fact is not mentioned in Wilson's terrible book, either. And Sahaf still had time to meet with some people from a tiny African state known only for its uranium!"

[Barney Frank]

"As your disability is now apparent, my apologies.

Mayhaps you should refrain from projecting
poor writing skills to those who confound
you."

I think you just answered for us your stand on whether the ends justify any means.

[Patrick R. Sullivan]

'Does the end justify the means in any
example you can think of?'

Hitler invaded France in 1940 to subjugate. The Allies invaded France in 1944 to liberate.

Same means, different ends. One justified the means, one did not.

Now go away and be in over your head somewhere else.

[Rick Ballard]

Squiggler,

Pedantic masturbation is its own reward. Sophists always believe they hold the truth in their hands when in fact it is something much smaller.

The best approach is to refrain from joining the onanistic circle.

Alternatively, Tom could open a Dorm Room Debate thread for those inclined to philosophize on generalities rather than examine specifics.

[boris]

</clueless></clown>

Testing ...

[Squiggler]

Can we get back to the subject at hand?

[Barney Frank]

Rick,

You and I have both noted his pedantic mood. "Mayhaps" he should be known as Pedanticleo from hereon out.

[Squiggler]

Or am I the only one who thinks the CNN report that she made multiple leaks to multiple reporters and that some included classified operation information is a bombshell?

[Semanticleo]

rather than examine specifics.

Never heard; 'the devil's in the details'?

It's not rhetoric. Details are the last
refuge of the lost cause when they take
precedence over common sense, as it clearly
does with the residents in this sanitorium.

[Squiggler]

No I'm not the only one. This from Jeff Goldberg:

I still think we need to proceed with caution here, but CNN’s report suggests—to me, at least—that perhaps a few media outlets are sensing a large scandal is about to break, and that Mary McCarthy’s is the wrong horse to back, early media attempts to either minimize the importance of the story or to paint McCarthy as a victim and a brave whistleblower (which she is not, either legally or ethically) notwithstanding.

Instead, it is beginning to look as though Ms McCarthy may (and I can’t stress that enough) have been part of a larger intentional and orchestrated effort to try to damage the Bush administration—and that the MSM, with a few predictable exceptions, are going to have to hold their noses and dive in, or else risk being scooped by more conservative media outlets (and come out looking as if they are trying to bury an important story).

[larwyn]

Think I will give a friendly attorney and perhaps the ACLU to initiate a suit against Semanticleo. He has offended me, and I am sure with proper talent - we can call it a HATE CRIME against an "annointed victim class".

I am betting that it will not be difficult to find out who "it" is, being so proud of its "intelligence".

I will be sure to select an attorney to engage that will use all proper forms of writing.

Posted by: Squiggler | April 24, 2006 at 02:01 PM

Go AWAY - COME BACK WHEN YOU HAVE GROWN UP!

As your disability is now apparent, my apologies.

Mayhaps you should refrain from projecting
poor writing skills to those who confound
you.

Posted by: Semanticleo | April 24, 2006 at 02:05 PM

LIBERALS - we want all barriers to the Handicapped down (unless they are right wing). %)

[Semanticleo]

Are you Larwyn or Boris?

Read the thread. Idiot.

[Squiggler]

Excuse me, but I did not post that garbage.

[Semanticleo]

Can we get back to the subject at hand?

By all means. Get to rollin around in it.

It's comforting

[Rick Ballard]

Squiggler,

That leads us back to Vnjagvet's supposition of the possibility of charges of conspiracy. I would toss in Dave in W-S's take on a potential Hatch Act violation. I do think that a press pullback from beatification is an indication that a petard, if not a bombshell, may explode. If it reaches into the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence or into the Kedwards campaign itself, it will be a bombshell.

Which path will it follow? The VIPers trail or the Berger/Beers/Clarke connections? (There is only a subtle difference but one does exist.)

[Squiggler]

>>There are numerous barristers and self-appointed legal pundits who enjoy
the knock down/drag out of legalspeak and
'technicalities' both pro and con defense,
but does anyone here ever address 'right
vs wrong'?

Myopia seems a resplendent disease of choice
for those who make a career out of 'gulping
down the camel, yet straining out the gnat'.
but do any of you ever get airborne to
see the lay of the land?. You know, the big
picture?

Or is everything reducible to the GWOT,
therefore, the end justifies the means?<<

That was your original question ... so here's the answer -- YES! We are at war and the neither the ends or the means are always clear during the fog of war. At absoultely NO TIME is there justification to reveal classified operational details ... and I'll repeat ... THIS GETS PEOPLE KILLED.

I am neither dyslectic nor reading challenged. Now, you've make your point, you've hurled your insults, and frankly you've become boring.

[topsecretk9]

taking it back, too bad for those pesky machine results

---The fired official, Mary O. McCarthy, “categorically denies being the source of the leak,” one of McCarthy’s friends and former colleagues, Rand Beers, said Monday after speaking to McCarthy. Beers said he could not elaborate on this denial and McCarthy herself did not respond to a request for comment left by NEWSWEEK on her home answering machine. A national security advisor to Democratic Party candidate John Kerry during the 2004 presidential campaign, Beers worked as the head of intelligence programs on President Bill Clinton’s National Security Council staff and later served as a top deputy on counter-terrorism for President Bush in 2002 and 2003. McCarthy, a career CIA analyst, initially worked as a deputy to Beers on the NSC and later took over Beer’s role as the Clinton NSC’s top intelligence expert.----

[ghostcat]

Leo -

Glad to know Big Medicine found a use for the malignant portion of Tony Snow's colon.

[Squiggler]

Perhaps Beers should get his facts together before going out on a limb ...

McCarthy admitted to multiple unauthorized contacts with journalists after failing a polygraph test, one of "dozens" conducted at the CIA since January of personnel knowledgeable about compromised programs, sources said. Those who took polygraph tests included CIA Director Porter Goss and the agency's inspector general, John Helgerson, according to U.S. intelligence officials.

[Neo]

This whistleblower stuff is do-do.

Take a step back and ask the right questions.

How many people on Capitol Hill knew of the rendition "prisons" operations of the CIA ? How many knew of the NSA communication intercept program ? Did any of them try to stop it (beyond a CYA letter) ?

It's about time that these Senators and Congressfolks get off their fat asses and do some the "heavylifting" themselves. They are the elected ones. They are supposed to do the right thing, not stupid partisan zealots like Mrs. McCathy, who are no better than UBL's suicide bombers who should be shot, just for being so damn stupid.

Just by the silence on the Hill, it is obvious that these "leaks" were purely political. I mean, how many Senators or Congressfolks would stand by as the Constitution is being shreaded ? I know, too many, but I think Diogenies could find at least one.

[Lew Clark]

I can't stand to listen to Kerry, so I have to read his "wisdom" after the fact. If he were an honest man (which he isn't), he should have said. "I went to Paris to confer with North Vietnamese while still a U.S. Navy Officer and while we were still at war with them. I then lied to a Senate subcommittee about the conduct of the U.S. military in war. Now if I can commit treason and perjury and become a U.S. Senator and almost become President, I think, at a minimum, Ms. McCarthy should be promoted to CIA Director for selling out her country.

[topsecretk9]

WOW, pre Newsweek...McCarthy looks to pass the buck to Dana Priest for soliciting McCarthy to break the law and confirmed for her...Newsweek knuckleheads are obviously too dimwitted to get what they are suggesting.

Sweet...LOVE IT

[Neo]

Does this spell the end for the (exempt) media shield law ?

[topsecretk9]

SHOCK, no mention Larry is a VIPS Bubba calling for the leaking of classified

"Larry Johnson, a former CIA analyst who got into a dispute with McCarthy in the late l980s when she was his supervisor and remains critical of her management style, nonetheless says that he “never saw her allow her political [views] to cloud her analytical judgment.” Johnson maintains the Bush White House is “really damaging the intelligence community” by sending a message to career officials that “unless you are a partisan of the party in power, you cannot be trusted.” This message, Johnson says, is destroying the intelligence community’s “professional ethos.”"

I love how Larry tries to distance himself from her, noting her bad management style, as if to indicate he would have NO CONTACT with her all this time because he didn't like her...sure.

[ghostcat]

Secret Top Dog -

Mary Mc's recant/denial/whatever suggests her attorney now smells prosecution. Being fired and losing her pension are now the least of her worries.

[clarice]

Newsweek is such a rag, you can get the truth from it only by adding a negative to every assertion.

Glad to see, however, that the character challenged Beers has jumped into this. There is only one way, of course, for him to know with certainty that McCarthy wasn't the leaker, isn't there?

[topsecretk9]

Well Newweak really went the Mary the Martyr route, line and sinker...I can't believe what total whores and the depths these "journos" have go. It's hackdom super-sized.

Hilarious.

[PeterUK]

"END JUSTIFIES MEANS?"

Semanticleo,you have gangrene in your leg,we amputate to save your life.
Do you know what it means to save your end?

[topsecretk9]

ignore typos please ::--))

[ghostcat]

PeterUK -

Bonus points!

[Sue]

Peter,

::grin::

[Lew Clark]

Wow! The left is getting a little disjointed in putting their spin together. Was McCarthy: 1. A noble patriot shining the light on Chimpyhitler and his criminal thugs? 2. An innocent victim of the Lying Liar Administration who leaked nothing., or, 3. A victim of a crazed journalist who tortured her into revealing state secrets?
And what about the Duke lacrosse team and drugs and alcohol? If they were involved, (and they probably were), no wonder she didn't know what she was saying during and after the polygraph.

[PeterUK]

""Kerry prefaced his remarks by noting: "Clearly, leaking is against the law. And nobody should leak. I abhor leaking. I don't like it."

Well even a man with perfect hair has to take a leak.

[ghostcat]

Depends.

[brenda taylor]

kerry and all his cohorts are involved.just think back when this monster was aiding the enemy in vietnman.no doubt in my mind.and it dont take to much intellegene to figure that out.but its scary.

[SunnyDay]

From the second page of that MSNBC article:

"A counter-terrorism official acknowledged to NEWSWEEK today that in firing McCarthy, the CIA was not necessarily accusing her of being the principal, original, or sole leaker of any particular story. Intelligence officials privately acknowledge that key news stories about secret agency prison and “rendition” operations have been based, at least in part, upon information available from unclassified sources."

This is what Dana Priest said in another news release - McCarthy verified the info but was not the original source.

[PeterUK]

Mr Ballard,
Sorry about Semanticleo,one of the Sorosco creative writing chips,the Doggerel II got swallowed by the lab monkey,but as the saying goes ,"This too will pass".

[vnjagvet]

Rick:

Andy McCarthy's post in NRO today has a good analysis of potential violation of the classified secrets act.

The Hatch Act is a possibility, although its penalty is loss of job or suspension. It is not a criminal statute, but a statute regulating civil service employment.

I am particularly interested in the web of bureaucratic connections within the federal foreign policy establishment. All have had a penchant for making themselves heard through influential establishment reporters in the major national news outlets, both newspaper and broadcast.

Russert, Mitchell, Priest, Pincus, Matthews, Olberman, Krugman, Kristof, Miller, Thomas, Isikoff, Novak, Woodward, and others all have had some juicy stuff to purvey with the help of "leakers" and "senior administration officials who have requested their names be withheld".

This story is going somewhere, prosecution or not.

[brenda taylor]

kerry and all his cohorts are involved.just think back when this monster was aiding the enemy in vietnman.no doubt in my mind.and it dont take to much intellegene to figure that out.but its scary.

[ghostcat]

She'd heard that too!

[SunnyDay]

She'd heard that too!
********************

Hahaha! They have lawyered up, perhaps?

[ghostcat]

SunnyDay -

Seriously, that's the classic UGO/journalist minuet. Let's assume it's true. Mary Mc's still in deep doo-doo, and someone else is Dana's original source ... i.e. Dana did her double-source duty.

[Syl]

I know I shouldn't go there but this:

it is about who we are and who we want to be.

is the supposedly justified end, the means being leaking about 'secret gulags'.

And it's bullshit. Complete bullshit.

This is who we are as a people:

We are a people who grab al Qaeda terrorists, who are in the command chain and at war with us, and interrogate them about their operations. We do this somewhere unknown to the ACLU and army of lawyers who would disallow the questioning as if these men are common criminals instead of belligerants hellbent on killing as many of us as possible.

It is ASSERTED by people on the left that we use torture in our interrogations though they refuse to define that word. It is ASSERTED that because we use torture, which to them seems to mean simply making somebody uncomfortable or hurt in their self-esteem, that we are betraying ourselves as a nation.

What bunk. What a lie.

As a nation what we are doing is protecting the rights of the left to believe this bunk by assuring they remain alive to continue their nonsense.

These people of the left are too cowardly to face humanity as it is rather than what they think it should be. We as a nation know better.

[larwyn]

Brenda,
On Kerry:
The church that is the LEFT swipes and corrupts bits from all other religions.
They have an expidited version of the Catholic Sacrament of Confession going.
We Catholics must go to Confession with an understanding that we have actually sinned and that we repent of those sins. We then sincerely do our assigned pennance and we are forgiven.
Now if you are a D - all you need to do if to keep being useful,
donate or bring in donations and
magically (no pennance) required whatever you have done will be
erased from their list of SINS.
If a D can be very useful,
the SIN will become a VIRTURE.

Many Dems who have not paid close attention over the years to the above, are running head on into the repercussions of all that magic. Many want to deny it (read
Dr. Sanity's Denial partsI,II & III) that's why they drop by and cannot offer true debate.

Kerry is not a traitor he was trying to save Cambodians from U S bombs. Dana Priest' Hubby NYT's Op Ed "Starving in Cambodia" will tell you all about that. He'll tell you how wonderful Castro is too.

The Magic of the Democrats for all to see.

[ghostcat]

Syl -

But Semicolon, et al, are "Citizens of the World", don't you know. We are mere jingoists. Nonpareil!

[Foo Bar]

Foo,
Quick question for ya. Let's see if you know the answer. Who were the most popular presidents that ran on the platform of "tax cuts spur the economy"? Give us the benefit of all your economic and presidential knowledge pal.

I presume you want me to say Kennedy, who did indeed campaign on tax cuts (primarily demand-side ones). The bill he pushed through cut the top rate all the way down to 70 percent- what a right-wing ideologue! And while he is popular in retrospect, I don't know that it's right to refer to him as all that popular at the time, given that he barely eked out an election victory, probably with the help of some dubious activity in Illinois. Note also that he railed against Eisenhower and Nixon about a supposed missile gap with the Soviets that did not actually exist, and Nixon valued national security highly enough to allow this falsehood spouted by Kennedy to go uncorrected throughout the election, since the truth was classified.

But hey, I'm just an ignorant, mindlessly partisan Democrat, so who cares what I think?

Look, when somebody argues that maybe a tax hike might be harmful to a recovery, I can sort of respect that, but to claim (as some do) in the face of the economic history of the 1990s that it's a sure thing that it would kill a recovery is just not intellectually respectable, in my opinion.

The possible effects on the economy of a tax hike to pay for war costs are speculative and uncertain. What is a sure thing is that by borrowing the money, we're passing the bill on to future generations.

[Rick Ballard]

Brava, Syl

The tissue of lies has to be exposed and the sophists positing a situational ethic based upon rank supposition of 'evil' without evidence laughed out of existence.

[Squiggler]

FooBar ... so is it the President who is responsible for high gas prices or maybe it is the high taxes tacked onto the gallon of gas you pump? Or maybe it is those terrible companies, oh say like Halliburton and Exxon, who are price gouging. I go with the high taxes and for proof I would refer you to my blog and a look at the correlation of the maps of red/blue state voting and the map of where gas prices are the highest.

[PeterUK]

Syl,
What is delicious is that the radical Islamists detest the liberal left above all else.We should do the decent thing....hand them over,I'm sure they are willing to make the sacrifice.

[MayBee]

If a defense attorney believed, in his heart of hearts, that the man he was defending was actually a killer, would society be better off if he told the press his man was guilty? Even as the man proclaimed his innocence in court?

On the one hand, we depend on defense attorneys to maintain their silence in such matters for the good of the system. On the other hand, being principled might just put a killer on the street.

It seems like a dilemma, but the answer is really easy.

We trust some people to keep their mouths shut, no matter how it may go against their personal morals or what good purpose they believe they are serving. Mary Mc Carthy broke that trust.

[brenda taylor]

its amazing how these people will ruin there lives to be this invested in covert acts for.the demowits.and to think she might get jail which she deserves while dana strolls around with her pulitzer.sickening.

[larwyn]

***VIRTURE = corrupted VIRTUE****

[larwyn]

***Virture - sounds a bit French?

[noah]

Foobar, Federal tax receipts started falling in 2001 and continued to fall until after the tax cuts of the Spring of '03 despite dramatic interest rate cuts. Tax receipts have continued to rise steadily and are now highest in history (google "federal tax receipts"...skip to link to "skeptical optimist" which has a nice graph).

Gas prices are supply demand problem driven fundamentally by world wide demand for crude...now if the environmentalists would stop forcing senate dems to filibuster steps to increase domestic consumption we might see some improvement in the future but all liberals generally want to do is whine.

[cathyf]

Not sure why the simple question has to be muddied up. answer according to your own moral code.

I know I'm coming late to the exam, but just in case nobody else has supplied it already, the answer is:

42

cathy :-)

[Foo Bar]

FooBar ... so is it the President who is responsible for high gas prices or maybe it is the high taxes tacked onto the gallon of gas you pump? Or maybe it is those terrible companies, oh say like Halliburton and Exxon, who are price gouging

I hope you're criticizing those demagoguing politicians making noises about price gouging.

To answer your question: no, I don't think GWB bears a great deal of responsibility for gas prices right now. The way he's shaken things up in the Middle East and added to the uncertainty about supply out of that region probably hasn't helped matters, but I don't think that's a primary reason for current price levels. Note, however, that Laurence Lindsey, one of his economic advisers, said before the war that liberating Iraq would facilitate an increase in world oil supply, which would tend to keep prices down, and postwar Iraq has so far largely struggled to get its oil production up to prewar levels, so that prediction isn't looking too good so far. That may change, though.

[noah]

"increase domestic production"

[Semanticleo]

You guys give Bush Deranngement Sydrome
it's second wind, and I do mean a Mighty
Wind! Political Projection at it's finest
to call BushHate BDS when it is a creature
that best describes your SOM.

"These people of the left are too cowardly to face humanity as it is rather than what they think it should be. We as a nation know better."

"What is delicious is that the radical Islamists detest the liberal left above all else.We should do the decent thing....hand them over,I'm sure they are willing to make the sacrifice."

"kerry and all his cohorts are involved.just think back when this monster was aiding the enemy in vietnman.no doubt in my mind.and it dont take to much intellegene to figure that out.but its scary."

"Glad to know Big Medicine found a use for the malignant portion of Tony Snow's colon."

Don't know what the hell that means, but it
is the closest thing to wit I see.

Christ. You guys belong on Little Green Boogers, or BlameBush or some other thinktank of nouveau intellectuals.

No wonder Maguire pokes his head out and
comments so infrequently.

[noah]

Thanks for sharing!

[noah]

Another thing...true we have run up enormous deficits...but the total federal debt/GDP is about 65%...at the end of the Clinton era it was about 60% IIRC.

[noah]

Halliburton is not an oil company!

[Foo Bar]

Tax receipts have continued to rise steadily and are now highest in history

This is only true in the relatively meaningless sense of "highest", i.e. nominal dollar terms, as opposed to inflation-adjusted dollars or % of GDP (and yes, Democrats are often guilty of using nominal rather than inflation-adjusted or GDP % numbers in order to exaggerrate fiscal problems).

As a % of GDP, tax revenues in '03 and '04 were the lowest since the 50s, and even in '05 they were on the low side by historical standards. Meanwhile, even non-defense discretionary spending has gone up as a % of GDP under GWB.

Another thing...true we have run up enormous deficits...but the total federal debt/GDP is about 65%...at the end of the Clinton era it was about 60% IIRC.

Well, part of leaving future generations with a better tomorrow involves striving to make sure this percentage is smaller when you leave office than when you start. I don't have the numbers including SS handy, but in terms of debt held by the public (the primary national debt) Clinton brought it down from 48% when he started to 35% when he left, and GWB has ramped it back up to 37.4% so far.

[Squiggler]

I know that noah, but they are the great Satan according to the trolls. In fact, they are far more dangerous than the terrorists or those who give up "operational secrets" to our enemies. And, of course, they are responsible, along with Bush and Cheney, with all that's wrong in the world. Doncha' know anything? :)

[Squiggler]

Oh FooBar, how misguided can you be ... sure that is a goal, but at what cost, speaking Arabic and worshipping at the foot of the Muslim Extremists.

[cathyf]

Or am I the only one who thinks the CNN report that she made multiple leaks to multiple reporters and that some included classified operation information is a bombshell?

The implication is that the Serial Leaker told more than one reporter things that were beyond the pale even for them, and they kept their mouths shut about the really egregious stuff that even a reporter could tell would get people killed if printed. If that happened, then "word" has had 3 days to travel on the media grapevine...

cathy :-)

[noah]

Foobar, go look at the graph and report back...everything is infation adjusted FYI...

[Squiggler]

Or how about this little nugget:

Michelle Malkin reports that our National Anthem was re-recorded in Spanish by several Latino artists and renamed Nuestro Himno as a "show of support for migrants in the United States."

[PeterUK]

Semanticleo,
If it meant getting you in an orange jump suit,I'm sure it would encourage many to convert.

[MayBee]

OK, I have a dumb question.

The CIA leakers gave sensitive classified information to a journalist to use in a globally-available forum. Any agent of any foreign government could read it. How different is that from the leaker giving it directly to a foreign agent?

[PeterUK]

"Clinton brought it down from 48% when he started to 35% when he left, and GWB has ramped it back up to 37.4% so far."
Yes Clinton did a lot of Enron accounting.

[Specter]

Except Foo for the fact that we have the most robust economy in many, many years - following the Clinton Recession. LOL.

But honestly - the President has nothing to do with the economy. It is based on how much people spend. Seems they are spending a lot now.

[Semanticleo]

"If it meant getting you in an orange jump suit,I'm sure it would encourage many to convert."

Code for; I know I had something to say,
give me a minute........."

[Squiggler]

The CIA leakers gave sensitive classified information to a journalist to use in a globally-available forum. Any agent of any foreign government could read it. How different is that from the leaker giving it directly to a foreign agent?

In my eyes, it is all the same. Aid and comfort can come in many guises. Also, I'm hung up on the CNN.com report that she revealed "operational information" that smacks of "methods and sources."

[Foo Bar]

noah,

First of all, if you want people to read a certain web page, rather than expecting them to do a google search and page through results, you can add a link in your comment by typing the following:

<a href="http://www.optimist123.com">read this</a>

Now, you may ask, why doesn't it look like a link in my comment? Because I used a little advanced html trick to show you what to type rather than actually including a link. But if you enter the html above as it appears to you in my comment, an actual link will appear. Try it!

That said, I did go to the trouble to wade through Google and look at your page, and it does not even mention the word "inflation" once, so what makes you so sure that your graph is inflation-adjusted? The numbers from your graph match up quite well with the numbers from the cbo link I provided above, which are not inflation adjusted, so I rather doubt that your numbers are.

[Neo]

All this story needs, to make it complete, is a tie in to the Barrett Report.

[Foo Bar]

Oh FooBar, how misguided can you be ... sure that is a goal, but at what cost, speaking Arabic and worshipping at the foot of the Muslim Extremists.

That's right- if we made any attempt at all to raise tax rates we would weaken ourselves to the point where Bin Laden would conquer us all. My apologies; I am duly chastened in my concern about the national debt.

[Squiggler]

No Foobar, you are just a person who has heard the democratic talking points, is parroting back what you heard with no context and little understanding, and, unfortunately, not interested in what it takes to fight a war. But, I'll bet you go about your life safe within the freedom that is being fought for you all the while you whine about that terrible Bush and pine for the great days of Clinton.

[Syl]

I'd still like to know who Andrea Mitchell's current source is in the CIA who leaked to her the lie detector stuff.

I don't consider that a 'bad leak' per se. Journalists have to be able to get something now and then. A little bone.

It's the classified leaks that are really bad.

And whoever leaked that a referral was sent on the Plame business should be fired. Referrals, and their existence are classified.

That's because most often when classified info is released, the general public may not realize there's any classified info at all. Buried detail in a story. A foreign agent will see it and know what it means, and will hunt for verification.

The existence of a referral to justice is proof to them that the leak is true.

It's just sooooo easy for so many people to assume something is classified on a whim when in actuality there are valid reasons for classification.

[Squiggler]

I should have said the great days of the Clinton recession, or maybe you pine for the Jimmy Carter days.

[Squiggler]

Syl, it was my understanding that orginal info on McCarthy's firing due to the failure of a polygraph came from McCarthy herself. I think the inital report said the unamed employee who was fired.

[Squiggler]

Also, Syl, I'm not sure it was Andrea Mitchell who had it first as I heard it in a Brett Baier report on Fox News a good half hour to an hour before Mitchell first gave her report. The only difference was that Mitchell's report when slightly further and included the information that a referral had been sent to DOJ.

[Squiggler]

when = went Sorry

[Syl]

Squiggler

I'm talking about later reports. Not the initial ones.

[PeterUK]

Lame Cement,very lame.

[Squiggler]

Oh sorry. Well in that case, I'm with you.

[Foo Bar]

Squiggler,

Perhaps you could review my discussion of Kennedy and Nixon earlier in this thread and contemplate whether my comments there(particularly in regards to the missile gap issue) seem to conform to Democratic talking points.

I apologize for the sarcasm earlier, but it seems to me that suggesting as you did that if GWB were to roll back some of his tax cuts then we'd be doomed to lose the war against Islamic extremism- well, that does seem a bit hyperbolic to me.

[noah]

Foobar, you really don't have a clue do you? NOBODY ever reports economic data in nominal dollars. Similar graphs can be found elsewhere at the same google page if you look around...that particular one is the most striking since it explodes the other myth of liberals about "widening" federal deficits?

But I didn't really expect to change your mind...if you did "you" would be a candidate for a zoo or a medal.

[Squiggler]

Calling **** CLARICE ****

There has been tons of disucssion about the Libby and Fitz filings and the various motions, especially the Motion to Dismiss. My question is:

Who would know on the Libby team that this firing and the McCarthy mess was in the works, if anyone?

Also, I know I asked this the other day, but let's try it again ...

How will, or how could, the McCarthy firing and subsequent DOJ referral for leaking and her connections to all the Plame/Wilson players affect the Libby case?

It seems to me that if the Judge knows that there is a bona fide leaker in the very high ranking and "in the know" position as was McCarthy, that would have to have some effect in his thinking, if nothing else.

[noah]

Correction: historical data are conventionally inflation adjusted by GDP deflator.

[Squiggler]

Going further with my thought ...

It seems that if CIA Leaker McCarthy tells her reporter friends X and they testify to that at the GJ and Libby says Y because he is telling what was the truth as his office knew it, then there is no way to say Libby is lying and the reporters are telling the truth. All we can say is the reporters are parroting what a leaker was leaking, not necessaily what actually happened or was said.

[Squiggler]

I apologize for the sarcasm earlier, but it seems to me that suggesting as you did that if GWB were to roll back some of his tax cuts then we'd be doomed to lose the war against Islamic extremism- well, that does seem a bit hyperbolic to me.

Huh?

I never said anything about if the Bush tax cuts were rolled back the result would be Islamic extremism. My point was that one of the reasons spending is up is because we are fighting a war.

[Semanticleo]

How will, or how could, the McCarthy firing and subsequent DOJ referral for leaking and her connections to all the Plame/Wilson players affect the Libby case?

More wishful thinking.

[boris]

</clarabell>

[boris]

</bozo>

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Well even a man with perfect hair has to take a leak.

Posted by: PeterUK | April 24, 2006 at 02:58 PM

Depends.

Posted by: ghostcat | April 24, 2006 at 03:01 PM

Oh. My. Gawd.

[Barney Frank]

boris,

LOL.

[Foo Bar]

Noah,

I have a present for you.

Check out page 26 in the document itself (page 30 in the pdf viewer). Look at the "Receipts" subheading under the "In Constant (FY 2000 Dollars)" heading. In 2000, we have 2.025 trillion in receipts. In 2005, we have 1.898 trillion in receipts.

Note that our ever-optimistic government isn't even projecting that what you claimed for '05 will be true in '06 or '07.

Enjoy!