Or I can’t type. Can I plea bargain that, and have it sealed?
I also agree entirely with BobLibDem on Fitzgerald’s professionalism, and wish that Starr had shown that level of integrity and professionalism and been willing to state face up “we couldn’t find anything” rather than go serious fish-hunting just to get something he could pretend was worth the time and effort.
Having said that, I also don’t think Starr’s investigation of Whitewater was any more of a waste than special prosecutor investigations of Iran-Contra or Watergate. You can’t judge an investigation by whether it results in convictions; otherwise, you end up with witchhunts to prove someone did something like Starr did.
No, Rove was investigated because he was alleged to be responsible for a crime.
Clinton was also investigated because he was alleged to be responsible for a crime (exorting favors from a bank, covering up investments and use of campaign funds).
Did it turn into a fishing expidition? Sure. But if you’re claiming there was never a reason to raise any eyebrow about Clinton’s involvement in Whitewater, you’re delusional.
You don’t have to respect him, you can think he’s an idiot, you can think he’s rude, you can think he doesn’t add a thing.
So you don’t like Shodan, so you think he’s an idiot, so you think he’s an asshole. Fair enough. And that means he should be banned? I dislike plenty of posters here, I don’t recall ever advocating that someone I dislike be banned. He’s not a troll, and you know it.
I may be misunderstanding the story, but I thought it was well-established that Rove was party to the outing, and that the outstanding question was whether he’d be indicted for it.
Why, of course! Only a total partisan would ever be able to make up their minds about the evidence on their own. And I’m sure that everybody in this thread who came to the conclusion that it’s highly unlikely that the leak started with Scooter must, simply must be Democrats. :dubious:
No, John, that’s called judging individual cases on individual merit. It’s also called being desperate to set up false equivilancies for political purposes, or do you really think that 2003 was six years ago?
We know that someone in the administration leaked Plame’s info. We can surmise with great certainty that the order for this did not start with Scooter. We can, then, attempt to figure out who was most likely to have done so.
Moreoever, Clinton was investigated because they were trying to pin something on him. His relationship with Monica was “tangential” to another investigation. But here, we know someone leaked Plame’s info. Nothing tangential about it. No fishing trip to see what we find without even knowing that a crime occured.
You can find debate opponents where you are. If Shodan just stayed under the bridge debating with idiots on the left, that’d be fine–it’s when he comes out and interrupts the grownups having debates that he gets slapped down.
I suppose you’re right in that there might be reasons other than partisanship. One other reason would be ignorance-- assuming (as I think you have) that one has actually seen all the evidence, for example. In Rove’s case, have we seen any of Fitzgerald’s files?
I preface this by saying that I have no reason to suspect that Fitzgerald has erred in the decision he reached. That said, can we agree on the following facts?
Rove was complicit in outing Plame (see previous source).
Scooter was indicted, not for outing Plame, but for lying about his involvement in the matter.
Rove revised his testimony to the grand jury just a few days after Fitzgerald threatened Matt Cooper with jail time if he refused to cooperate with the grand jury.
Perjury charges may be avoided by such revisions on testimony, if they happen prior to the indictment.
In some investigations of political crimes, lower-level echelons receive immunity in exchange for testifying against upper-level echelons.
Fitzgerald hasn’t closed his investigation yet.
I believe that’s all correct. If so, I draw some conclusions:
a) Rove acted unethically, even if he acted legally.
b) Rove probably would have faced indictment had he not revised his testimony (pure speculation, but I believe it’s supported by Libby’s indictment).
c) We don’t have enough information yet to say why Rove was not indicted; there are multiple plausible explanations.
d) Anyone declaring victory in this scenario is a tool.
Are we allowed to see evidence before it gets presented to the court? When did they pass that rule?
John, why do you use that argument so frequently? People can and will form their own opinions of public figures based on those public figures’ past actions. I see no reason to believe that Rove was not aware of Plame’s outing, and less reason to think he would not do such a thing based on his past exploits. Add in this administration’s air of secrecy and refusal to acknowledge wrong doing, it makes it very difficult to stay objective and wait for evidence that we will probably never see.
No. If your previous soruce is the CNN article, can you point out the proof in that article?
Of course.
Yes.
If you say so.
Yes
Of Rove? I’m not sure about that.
a) No. (see 1, above)
b) Probably, but we don’t know why he revised his testimony. His excuse (IIRC) was that his memory was wrong. That souinds awfully fishy, but isn’t implausible.
c) That’s the entire thrust of my argument! Nothing more, nothing less.
d) Depends on how you define “victory”, and I’m not sure what relavance that has anyway.
Again, I might be misreading this–is there an alternate reading by which this doesn’t mean that Rove was involved in outing Plame?
Perhaps someone can back me up on this; I’m almost certain I heard this back in October when Rove first went back to revise his grand jury testimony, and that the law works this way to maximize the chances that the grand jury will have accurate information to work with. (It may instead be that you can revise your testimony as long as the grand jury is still open–the salient point is that someone may avoid perjury charges by revising their testimony). This isn’t proof that Rove revised his testimony to avoid perjury charges, of course, but I agree with you that it smells fishy.
Not of Rove; his investigation in general. I’d be very surprised if Rove is still being investigated; I wouldn’t be surprised if his testimony is used as part of a future or sealed indictment.
Agreed entirely. I use my weasel words carefully :).
With C, yeah, I think we’re in agreement. I’m trying to lay out what I see as the current relevant points of a case that I personally find pretty confusing. As to D, that’s only got relevance regarding a certain neenerneenerer.
OK, I see what you’re getting at. But that pre-supposes that some folks were actually trying to “out” Plame (and to get back at Wilson). Rove and Libby claim that they were filling in an important part of the story in that Wilson’s article could be read to imply that Cheney personally sent him to Africa. I wouldn’t necessarily have read the article that way, but I can see it might have been read that way by others. So, I think you’re assuming that there was an “outing” to be complicit in, when that might not have been the case.
If I had to bet on whether there was a malicious outing or not, I’d bet that there was. And the fact that either Libby or Rove could’ve straightened this whole thing out before the investigaion began is a bit WTF? in my book. They both look slimy from that respect. But who knows what machinations go on behind closed doors in DC. Maybe it’s the scientist in me that is trained to avoid being duped by making too many assumptions up front. Or maybe I’ve seen too many political dramas where what goes on behind the scenes is often so very different from what the public perception is.
I didn’t mean that I doubted you, only that I didn’t know it to be true, but will accept your word if you say so.
OK on the first part, but I don’t see any other indictments coming out of this (unless you mean more indictments of Libby).
OK. I didn’t see that so much as a moral victory, but as a debate victory. I’ve been predicting all along that Rove would not be indicted, so in that case I can say I was right and claim victory in the sense of analyzing this correctly. I don’t know what Shodan’s motivations are. If he’s claiming some sort of moral vitory then I agree with you.
PS to Maureen: I hope that my answers to LHoD answer the question you raised in your post.
Interesting point. I can only say in my defense, that if they defend themselves by saying they were just filling in the story, I can defend myself by saying that I never used the term “malicious” to describe the outing, or said that they were “trying to ‘out’ Plame.” I think it’s uncontroversial that Plame was outed (well, there are those who say she was already outed, but I think their claim is totally bogus), and I think it’s uncontroversial to say that Rove was involved in that outing, even if it was inadvertant on his part. I agree with you that it was probably intentional, but I’m no psychic, so I’m happy to leave that “probably” in place.
Indeed, and it gets back to earlier administration claims regarding this case, that nobody from the administration was involved. It seems almost certain that somebody was lying there, even if their lie doesn’t rise to the level of perjury.
Granted I’d only heard of the sealed indictment through this thread; if that’s true, though, then there’s one more indictment we’ll see. WHen I say I wouldn’t be surprised to see Rove’s testimony used against someone else, that doesn’t mean that I expect to see it. That’s just part of my saying that we ought to take a wait-and-see attitude: Fitzgerald is running a famously leak-proof operation, making it dangerous to speculate on what will happen.
I suppose you can claim victory in a debate sense, but if you do it with a “neener neener,” I’ll call you a tool, too!
It does and it doesn’t. Yes, it certainly explains your methodology and why you personally don’t jump to conclusions til you see all the evidence in front of you, but it also seems like you’re suggesting we should all just sit back and wait and a reasonable, truthful explanation will present itself. I don’t have such high hopes.
No, I’m not suggesting that. I think you need to look at the particular post I was responding to. He claimed to be drawing a conclusion based on “the evidence” when in fact most of “the evidence” isn’t available to us. Just because you read a few news stories doesn’t mean you’ve seen what Fitzgerald has seen. I’m not talking what is probably some small, insignificant little piece of evidence, but the entire case he was trying to build.
