ew – I missed the implications of your reference to Judge Laurence Silberman. [My understanding is that he’s in semi-retirement from the regular appeal panels, and that most of his official duties are spent on the double-secret spy court.]

If it was to a lifetime Silberman’s spent flying on the right wing of U.S. foreign policy, I think there’s a number of indications he would be FAR harder on the game Team Libby played with Judge Walton. If there’s a better articulation of Silberman’s strongly-held views on leaking that in what he wrote on this as co-chair in the report of The Commission on the Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destructio [released March 31, 2005], I don’t know what that could be.

I’ve excerpted below part of what’s in â€Chapter 8: Analysisâ€, which is found near the end of the Report where the authors make their recommendations. I don’t understand the pagination system – these excerpts are either from pages 396 to 399 or 381 to 384. Anyway, the following is going to remind some folks about some well-known public statements by the Leaker-In-Chief’s progenitor:

“To accompany these institutional suggestions, we offer recommendations to help address two problems that have harmful effects on sources and methods:
(1) the problem of authorized disclosures and (2) the problem of unauthorized disclosures (more commonly referred to as “leaksâ€) of classified information

Authorized disclosures often have unintended and harmful effects.

THE PROBLEM OF MEDIA LEAKS

The scope of damage done to our collection capabilities from media disclosures of classified information is well documented. Hundreds of serious press leaks have significantly impaired U.S. capabilities against our hardest targets.

In our classified report, we detail several leaks that have collectively cost the American people hundreds of millions of dollars, and have done grave harm to national security. We cannot, however, discuss them in an unclassified format.

These and hundreds of other leaks have been reported to the Justice
Department by the Intelligence Community in the last ten years. However, to date, not a single indictment or prosecution has resulted.

According to past government studies, the long-standing inability of the
U.S. government to control press leaks results from a combination of factors – the use of unauthorized disclosures as a vehicle to influence policy,
the lack of political will to deal firmly and consistently with government
leakers in both the executive and legislative branches, the difficulty of prosecuting cases under existing statutes, and the challenge of identifying the leaker.

… And those responsible for the most damaging leaks can be held
accountable if they can be identified and if the government is willing to prosecute them.

Finally, there is one point regarding leaks on which the Commission could not come to agreement. During our work, we were repeatedly told that the greatest barrier to prosecuting leaks was in identifying the “leaker.†And many people with whom we spoke also said that the best (if not only) way to identify leakers was through the reporters to whom classified information was leaked. In this vein, we thoroughly discussed the advantages and disadvantages of creating some sort of qualified privilege for reporters, which might simultaneously protect both First Amendment interests and the government’s interest in protecting classified information. Regrettably, and despite all of our efforts, we could not reach agreement on the details of such a proposal.â€

The Report is book-length long, but it’s well-constructed and makes for a pretty brisk read – altho the color scheme can’t compete with the range we find on blogs. To me it seemed like a call for a return to the earlier more idealistic [?] days of the intelligence – the sort of views that attracted those like Ms. Plame into the CIA. It’s easy to find, but here’s a link:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washingt…..anel_x.htm

Also, ew, a couple of unrelated things:

1) I just caught up to the all the posts on your previous thread on the jury’s latest two notes, and I’d like to make a number of points [Thanks to all those who gave me high fives, I’m not worthy, etc. I think Cboldt and p.lukasiak were closest but missed with a few shots.] but it’s a little long [like that’s new for me] and this is your blog not mine so – might I have your guidance as to protocol?

2) My own favourite Martian is flying back to me today from a well-earned golf outing , during which I’ve kept my mouth shut on the bad news of own household’s Fearless Leader – the original authentic dancing lab [We’ve got one of his more whimsical episodes immortalized on digital video, strutting his stuff to Brenda Fassie and Paul Simon .]and his losing battle with the mortal coil. We get lots of fun from Steve Clemons’ posts of his own goof troup at his blog TWN, but as I expect you may agree, they’re not of the Great Breed. Would you consider posting another of yours? I think I’ll need all the help I can get in dealing with the Martian’s invariable response when we lose one of the family, and I’m really not looking forward to a spring of walking without one to pull me along.

– LabDancer

This is my own crazy take on this, and IANAL, but I think they actually did sincerely want to put the VP on the stand that Thursday, until after Hannah testified. I’m not 100% sure, but I think that at that point, Fitz was obligated to turn over Jencks material on Hannah (which might have been the sealed v. sealed hearing). I’m guessing whatever was in that material really made it look bad for Cheney’s (and possibly Libby’s) testifying, so they had to scratch him, or else have Fitz catch him in a perjury trap.

I agree with Libby though, I think that they never really ever wanted him to testify, and even more so once they got Jencks on Ari, Martin and possibly Addington.

The fact that Mayfield, Edelman or Hannah never testified for the prosecution makes me think that they will be star witnesses in a possible Cheney/Libby conspiracy trial.

cboldt – â€I’ve wanted to see the â€defective appoint†issue litigated through appeal from the time it was handed down. I think it’s an important point of process.â€

As to your second sentence, could you be so kind as to state why? I’m somewhat of a process guy – it’s given me a pretty good life style – and frankly I don’t get it. You may be aware that when the moon gets fullish and I grow hair, I lurk over at Tom MaGuire’s blog – they don’t appear to be feeling too chipper these days, poor dears – and I’ve tried to provoke them into something a little more… intellectual, if I may be so bold, behind their several fixations under the rubric of â€process†on things which, to me, appear as largely if not entirely incidental to the constitutionality of a complaint’s journey to conviction. And all I get is outed as a snark [altho IMO I regard that as something of a promotion from my previous status as a troll}.

Anyway, you are far better accepted as an inter-blogger than me, I think mostly because while you limp to the right it doesn’t seem to have loosened your grip on your other faculties. So I can’t think of a better candidate to help me understand this view that this special prosecution is more Fitzcarroldo than fitting.

If Silberman gets this appeal you can count on the same judgin’ that Scalia & Co. delivered in Bush v. Gore. That said, how can a man that sat on the President’s Iraq Intelligence Commission (Silberman-Robb) possibly preside over an appeal that originated with a dispute about Niger-to-Iraq yellowcake allegations?

LabDancer: – could you be so kind as to state why [you think â€defective appointment†is an important point of process]? –

Just from the overarching point of view of how to conduct a critical (in the sense of objective, not in the sense of being important) investigation†when an allegation is against the usually investigatory (executive) branch. The Special prosecutor statute having lapsed, etc. It’s one of those things that plays between political and legal process, and so is just interesting to me.

More specifically relating to the Plame leak and Libby trial, my point of view is that the WH aimed to use a quasi-legal process in order to obtain a clean bill of health on an accusation of undertaking political dirty (but legal) tricks. Ironically, if the appointment was defective, it’s not a bad reflection on Fitzgerald, it’s a reflection on the pinheads that couldn’t produce a special appointment that wasn’t defective.

LabDancer

I may start tomorrow with a very goofy pic of mine. mr. emptywheel dressed him up for me–just one day before he started acting up, no doubt out of shame for having been treated taht way. You’ve given me one more incentive.

cboldt

What do you make of the Hubris assumption that the recusal was Ashcroft’s way of saving his political future? Then it wouldn’t be WH so much as Ashcroft. Add in teh manufactured smear about the prosecution being retaliation for the Marc Rich pardon (which COmey touched but Fitz did not), and you might be able to argue that they’re pushing that smear to get back at Comey, not Fitz. Comey, after all, is the guy who arranged it so Fitz could subpoena journalists.

joejoejoe and LabDancer

Silberman has ruled in appeals cases in teh past where he had clear conflicts, including on Iran-Contra. Though Walsh didn’t fight him that hard–I suspect Fitz has read enough to learn that lesson.

Though thanks for bringing that part of Robb-Silberman to the fore. It offers a very good way to make it difficult for Silberman to repeat his previous efforts at throwing out honestly won convictions.

There is no way to bring up that silly point without discrediting Libby. He was so busy with big important stuff but yet, he had time for a two hour breakfast/affair??? Either way it doesn’t work. Then it means that he really wasn’t dealing with such important stuff, and that he was irresponsbibly shirking his very important duties to cavort with a female??? You get no traction on that point Jodi.

Your point about the jury, made twice now, also seem pointless to me. Point is that they are not so split as to not be able to cover the animosity. There are certainly sometimes when the animosity is palpable. As in the case of the note to the judge…you can â€feel†the tension in that note. I hope that the jury understands that our troops lives and well being depend on them taking their time with the answer here…that the issue of Libby’s lies, is in fact, a matter of national defense. I hope they are more concerned with the importance of their decision than getting home…and I hope that if their is a hold out he will see that a mistake in the wrong direction has far more weight than the mistake of putting an innocent man in jail for 5 years. (if that were the worst case scenario on the other end of the polarity). If he’s guilty it means so much to the well being of the country and our troops that he be found so and that justice is served. The way I see it, putting an innocent man in jail for a few years if it is the worst case scenario is a tiny problem compared to not finding him guilty, if in fact he is.

There is no comparison when the entire country, the outcome of the war, the well being of the troops, the reputation of the USA, and the damage done to Plame and all her constituents as well as to our national security are at the heart of the issue. If I were a juror…I would make that point. There is far more at stake here than the a few year in prison for one man…who might be a mightly liar. No comparison when you weight the importance of the crime. Letting him go would have far worse consequences for our country than finding him guilty if he were not.

cboldt – Thanks for your response. I hope I see your point correctly, as something like this: Assuming the correct reading of the record of the investigation is that the appointee [Fitz] knew on or about the time of his appointment, or so early in the process of it that any distinction is meaningless, that not leak which underlay what led to the complaint by the CIA [which led to the authorization to investigate etc.] could be reasonably interpreted as constituting an offence of the IIPA, or any other statute, then it arguable that the appointee [still Fitz] failed in fulfilling his mandate of appointment by using it an opportunity to advance some political objective of his own or which he shared with the person who facilitated his being appointed.

I kind of doubt anyone at JOM would put that quite so diplomatically, but – do I have that right?

If I do have it right, then I have to say I take issue with the premise [and from what I can see through the redactions in the Tatel opinion on the subpoenas to the reporters, so did that appeal panel].

I don’t know if anyone in this story will face a charge of illegal leaking. And, with respect, neither do you. I think we agree that there is method behind Fitzgerald’s â€madness, madness†outrage, but I don’t see it as political at all.

For quite some time I was bothered by the apparently perpetual spin on the IIPA [It’s particularly discouraging that even Toensing, who claims some direct involvement in how in its existence, apparently doesn’t seem able to interpret it properly.]

On reading the plain language of the statute, I don’t have any difficulty whatsoever accepting that on July 14, 2003 Valerie Wilson qualified as a â€covert†agent under IIPA. I don’t have any difficulty concluding that her status as a CIA employee was disclosed. I have even LESS difficulty accepting that Libby was concerned that he was in the lead of an effort to disclose that someone who he knew to be a CIA employee â€may†be covert. Libby appears to have some quirks, but his behaviour in this story can’t be explained away by quirks of character [altho if we kick it up a notch into character FLAWS, then at least we’re in the ballpark].

What I DON’T know if whether what Libby was told about Valerie Wilson was enough to satisfy a jury the IIPA’s requirement for â€knowledgeâ€. Fitzgerald may know – or at least, if there’s more out there than we’ve seen in this trial and learned from bloggurus such as emptywheel and eriposte, you’d think he’d know.

But to me that’s critically different than whether I am prepared, and more importantly and appropriately whether FITZGERALD is prepared, to accept that what we know Libby DID know justified both the arc of his investigation [Waas always calls it a â€probeâ€, but that term just sets me off with the giggles.] I couldn’t tell you Fitzgerald’s reasons [altho I see them as coming from something like the same sense of public service I felt when I was a prosecutor], but I’m completely satisfied that AT WORST Libby was wilfully blind about whether Valerie Wilson qualified as â€covert†and met the overseas service requirement and that the CIA had taken steps blah blah.

What I don’t know as a matter of legal interpretation is whether Libby’s wilful blindness satisfies the statutes requirement for knowledge. I think it should, but that the social engineer in me talking, and I know that better than half the country would out me as a liberal for thinking that way.

What I also don’t know is whether the CIA would cooperate in producing in a public courtroom the level of proof it has that she is covert. Knowing what I do about such things from past experience, it is possible that providing that level of proof risks harm to other CIA â€assetsâ€. I’m not referring to Valerie Wilson’s string of agents; I’m referring to her direct superior(s) in the CIA. Because if she reported to a CIA George Smiley, then it seems likely to me that a lot of coverts report to that George Smiley.

So, I respect your point of view on this, and for all I know some appeal panel might agree with it [which is the main theme of this thread]; but I’m afraid I can not agree that it raises any truly constitutional issues.

By the way, thanks for your website with all the filings – I enjoy your comments on them. I also liked some of what you said on Counts 1 and 3 of the Indictment, and I’ll write something somewhere on your, and p.lukasiak’s also, on my views on the drafting of indictments.

It’s unnerving that the notes look like they are written by stoner law school dropouts. Even so, I’ll bet that their collective note-taking during testimony produced an accurate timeline, and putting the puzzle together was a bonding experience. This jury is acutely aware that by convicting Libby, they are convicting this Administration. It is a momentous responsibility for them to share.

â€Humanly possible.†I can see how that weighs on a conscience. My best bet on that? There’s a juror who is torn by the remote possibility that Libby was remembering some conversation with a journalist about Wilson’s wife but that it wasn’t Russert. Remember how breezy and confident Libby was on tape, recounting his conversation with Russert? Could Libby really have lied so glibly? Could Libby possibly have â€transposed†a memory when questioned by the FBI and in front of the grand jury?

No, it isn’t humanly possible, and that juror will ultimately convict (I predict). But remember that Libby was already building his memory defense as his eight hours of grand jury testimony progressed. Are we surprised that there’s someone sympathetic to him?

cboldt – Thanks very much for your response at 17:55. I’ll try to pull together everything you’ve put me on to over the next few evenings [Where in hell did my Sunday go?] and get back to you once it’s all made it through the filters to the bottom of my food dish. Since with the necessarily-related subjects the chances of it getting long goes WAY beyond mere possibility, I may try to post it elsewhere and return here just with a link. [Thanks, ew.]

Before I get dragged back into ’real’ life, I should like to have some predictions memorialized to put my .ephemeral digitalized comments where my mouth has been. According to my best reading on the cold tea leaves, as of this moment I see the immediate results in US v. Libby as follows:

Count 1 – guilty
Count 2 – guilty
Count 3 – not guilty
Count 4 – guilty
Count 5 – guilty

I foresee sentencing being scheduled down the line for the attorneys to â€prepare their submissions†[and more to the point to allow the verdicts to sink in so the parties can get down to the serious business of seeing whether Libby wants to deal – because Libby and the lawyers on both sides know that a pardon is well short of guaranteed.]

I foresee Fitzgerald asking Judge Walton to impose some pretty serious terms on Libby before he is released pending sentencing and appeals etc.

Then sometime before June, after Fitzgerald has finished stripping one-time press baron Lord Barfington, er Black, of his pretentions, what remains of his known sources of income and case, and of course his freedom [and possibly his trophy wife – who I gather is Canada’s answer to Judith Miller], we can find out who gets to Cheney first – Fitzgerald or Waxman.

While I recognize I’ve been received for more than my share of indulgence over the last two threads, may I be foregiven one more indulgence before toodling up the freeway to the airport to pick up my favorite Martian.

On the remote chance the traffic en route hastens my demise, I should like to know before I ’go’ whether the posts over the name â€Jodi†emanate from an actual corporeal entity who holds honestly to the beliefs reflected in her comments to, or is in reality not at all â€in reality†but instead literary device. I realize I myself of a full moon am wont to embark on a walk on the wild side among the Pushtans at JOM – but I do so under a rationale that there may be some who post there who have some worthwhile point of view, something which might confound my smug assumptions, or illuminate the discussion, to throw a pie in its face at the very least.

And of course there are such worthies – foremost among them the aforementioned cboldt, and it would be unseemly to fail to mention in this vein JOM’s overseer, ew’s alter ego made flesh, Tom Maguire, their TM to our MT. And others.

But surely by this time no one in their right mind – I’m sorry that phrase suddenly seems to have outgrown its cultural genesis and henceforth I will take pains to avoid using it – no one in a PROPER FRAME of mind, I should say – would put up with the abuse Jodi has called down on herself. And especially when JOM’s hearth seems far more welcoming to those of her faith.

So, while I confess that being caught by one’s ditsy neighbour in an occasional exchange holds its occasional ’charms’ amid its usual frustrations – I’d hate to be forced into early retirement from this mortal coil under the delusion of her corporeal existence when she’s but the alter ego to some whacky funster.

cboldt

One, of many, weakness in your position–Fitz knows the actual facts of Plame’s work, not just what the CIA told him. If there was no cause for IIPA, he’d know.

cboldt said: In the other fork, Fitzgerald suspected, maybe knew that there was no possibility of an IIPA or Espionage Act or any other criminal violation, for want of â€covert†or appropriate classified status.

I am not sure if I am following what you are saying, but in the indictment Fitzgerald specifically said that Plame’s status was classified during the relevant time in July 2003.

Pete: – even if one assumes that Plame had enough influence to get Joe Wilson sent on the trip, how does the disclosure benefit the country? –

It had a tendency to cause people to question Wilson’s objectivity. In general, I think questioning the objectivity of a presenter is good. I also think Wilson is a liar, in general, in that he carefully states things to lead the listener to a false conclusion. So inasmuch as (true or false) saying he was sent to Niger as a bit of nepotism results in the listener question (and look more carefully) both at what he says on the subject, and what the CIA says about the subject.

Pete: – in the indictment Fitzgerald specifically said that Plame’s status was classified during the relevant time in July 2003. –

He used an odd phrase, â€employment status is classified.†That phrase does not appear in any statute. I think that phrase is intended to preserve the legitimacy of the investigation – the leak was â€important†(otherwise, why bother with a special counsel?). I discuss that a bit in Covert or Not in Purple Blogistan, and covered it in more detail in extended e-mail conversation with Mark Kleiman.

In short, I’d be looking for a phrase that says outright â€the fact that Plame was employed by the CIA was classified.†It’s easy enough to write, it would track the IIPA statute, it would track the general boilerplate language at 1.d in the indictment. But Fitzgerald uses two phrases with no legal significance: â€her employment status was classified†and â€affiliation with the CIA was not common knowledge outside the intelligence community.â€

If Plame was in fact covert, it would have made conviction a slam dunk, by causing paragraph 1.f to read …

Joseph Wilson was married to Valerie Plame Wilson (â€Valerie Wilsonâ€). At all relevant times from January 1, 2002 through July 2003, Valerie Wilson was employed by the CIA, and the fact that Valerie Wilson was employed by the CIA was classified.

The words in the indictment are carefully chosen (for the most part), and â€her employment status was classified†has ALWAYS stuck out like a sore thumb – I commented on that even at the time of the October 28, 2005 Fitzgerald press conference announcing the indictment. See, for example, my posts at FreeRepublic here and here and here.

emptywheel: – Fitz knows the actual facts of Plame’s work, not just what the CIA told him. If there was no cause for IIPA, he’d know. –
I figure the CIA is the authority regarding anything â€covert†or â€classified†about Plame’s association with the CIA. Just where, besides the CIA, would Fitzgerald obtain authoritative input regarding â€the actual facts of Plame’s work?â€

As for â€no cause for IIPA,†as you know, there are multiple elements, failure of any one of which ends the inquiry. Fitz has no evidence of Libby’s mens rea. IIPA fails. Does he push back on the CIA to prove covert status so IIPA can be made on â€covert?†Why bother if it fails on mens rea?

In the end, the left is determined to see IIPA in the fact pattern, the right is determined to see absence of it, and neither side is going to budge. I have fully expressed, over a period of a year and half, why I come down where I do, and intend to leave it at that, period, end of my contribution to the discussion.

cboldt said, â€It had a tendency to cause people to question Wilson’s objectivity. In general, I think questioning the objectivity of a presenter is good. I also think Wilson is a liar, in general, in that he carefully states things to lead the listener to a false conclusion. So inasmuch as (true or false) saying he was sent to Niger as a bit of nepotism results in the listener question (and look more carefully) both at what he says on the subject, and what the CIA says about the subject.â€

Why would the fact that Wilson’s wife sent him (assuming it was proved that was the case, which it has not) cause anyone to question Wilson? Assuming that Wison was qualified for the trip (he was), how does the assignment by the wife tar Wilson? And we are talking about the Bush administration where Dick Cheney can get Elizabeth Cheney a plum assignment in the State Department with little relevant experience, where Bush cronies can get jobs in the administration with little relevant experience (heckuva job Brownie, for example) – contrast these to Wilson who has already been sent on a similar mission to Niger by the CIA previously.

I totally disagree with the â€or false†part of your â€true or false†comment – the ends do not justify the means and one should not be using false allegations to have people question anyone or anything.

And you duck the more important question. If in your opinion, the nation benefits by disclosure, aren’t the disclosures by the Bush administration about how the intelligence was gamed far more important?

Pete: – Why would the fact that Wilson’s wife sent him (assuming it was proved that was the case, which it has not) cause anyone to question Wilson? Assuming that Wison was qualified for the trip (he was), how does the assignment by the wife tar Wilson? –

Assuming he was qualified and objective means to take it as stipulated. So, if the assumption is that he’s qualified, bringing up â€how he got the assignment†becomes irrelevant.

But if his assignment was driven in part by his wife’s suggestion, then qualified or not, the assignee comes off as having a bias to come up with any preconceived notion the wife or employer want him to deliver.

My point was meant to be a simple and fundamental one. I think it’s good to question everybody’s qualifications, motives, backchannels, etc. I find my understanding of issues is much better when I research contentions, rather than assume they are true.

And that’s not to say that what the person reported was false – just to say that’s it’s healthy to question, and that the pubic, in general, does a lousy job of getting to the bottom of any issue.

Pete: – I totally disagree with the â€or false†part of your â€true or false†comment – the ends do not justify the means –

I’d be surprised if you felt otherwise. My moral compass operates from beliefs about this case that are radically different from yours (it’s not unlikely that we are at polar extremes of opposition), and we probably have different degrees of tolerance for mudslinging politics.

I don’t think telling the world that Plame worked at the CIA resulted in any compromise of national security. I further find Joe Wilson’s delivery of information to be intentionally misleading to the casual reader, much as I find Fitzgerald’s â€employment status was classified,†and the White House â€no leak of classified information†as intending to mislead the reader to a false conclusion.

Pete: – If in your opinion, the nation benefits by disclosure, aren’t the disclosures by the Bush administration about how the intelligence was gamed far more important? –

Ranking the relative importance of the Plame disclosure and the rationale for prosecuting a military invasion of Iraq is a no brainer.

P.S. I can think of Bush cronyism nominations and appointments that bug me more than the Cheney daughter assignment. Gonzales, Julie Myers, and Harriet Miers come to mind readily.

I think that Jodi is a high school graduate working as a secretary for somebody’s aide in some office of some political arm of the Republicans. Her syntax is not masters or doctorate level.
Oh, and LabDancer, are you, by any chance, a southerner? I ask, because your florid language is suggestive of the Demosthenian Society rhetoric I had the â€pleasure†of hearing as one of only two female guests at their annual dinner, hosted by the late, great Albert Sayre, Constitutional expert and professor of political science at the University of Georgia in the early 1960’s.
Ah, and Emptywheel, your book is extremely well-written and a necessary accompaniment to the discussions on your blog. Thank you for your erudition and great humor.

LabDancer, I misled you by placing quotation marks around plesure, in referring to Dr. Albert Sayre’s remarks at the Demosthenian dinner. He was a great, gallant, old time southern gentleman, and one of the most compassionate, respectful gentlemen I have ever had the pleasure to know. He had great integrity and was called upon by the Supreme Court justices for advice, from time to time in Constitutional matters.
I only remember the rhetoric as being florid and very oh, say, Addison and Steele-like in its wit and construction. It was an honor to have been chosen to be one of the only two women invited, as it was an all male debating society. It was an extremely civilized occasion, and I cherish the memory of it and his remarks about feminine virtues, their intellect, and their and naturally â€superior,†womanly gifts. I think he would have adored Marcy.

If you aren’t southern, I forgive you. I am, and I’m proud of it, mostly because of people like Dr. Sayre. And, I do enjoy your convoluted and original language.

All.

Kind of anticlimatic once it is over…

The Monday Morning game analyzers will have a spurt of activity.

Sentencing in June.
Motion for new trial.
Appeals.
Maybe a little excitement in Jan 2009.

I am sure many here will enjoy for a little while, what previously they would have considered a mere pittance, a few crumbs, compared to their hopes a year or so ago, but

the anticipation is over, the fun is done.

– Jodi

Sorry for the late response to cboldt:

Assuming he was qualified and objective means to take it as stipulated. So, if the assumption is that he’s qualified, bringing up â€how he got the assignment†becomes irrelevant.

My point exactly.

But if his assignment was driven in part by his wife’s suggestion, then qualified or not, the assignee comes off as having a bias to come up with any preconceived notion the wife or employer want him to deliver.

I don’t know which employer you are referring to (I assume you mean CIA but that makes no sense). The point about the wife makes no sense, since just because a wife suggests her husband be given an assignment does not automatically imply that there is bias in the work performed by the husband. Especially when you have not been able to demonstrate anything wrong in the work performed by the husband.

My point was meant to be a simple and fundamental one. I think it’s good to question everybody’s qualifications, motives, backchannels, etc. I find my understanding of issues is much better when I research contentions, rather than assume they are true.

Sure, but one could question Wilson’s motivations without dragging in his wife.

And that’s not to say that what the person reported was false – just to say that’s it’s healthy to question, and that the pubic, in general, does a lousy job of getting to the bottom of any issue.

Here is where I largely disagree with you. You are saying (loosely paraphrased) that Wilson’s report was correct but we should still raise issues about the report because Wilson was suggested by his wife.If you really want to question motives, question who was sent by whom, then you should have a big issue with the way the Iraq intelligence was presented to us by the Bush administration. The information turned out to be false. The bias and motivations of the Bush administration are clear. I am not sure of where you stand on this and your “no brainer†comment.

I further find Joe Wilson’s delivery of information to be intentionally misleading to the casual reader,

What was misleading in Wilson’s NYT article?

much as I find Fitzgerald’s â€employment status was classified,â€

Here is another Fitzgerald quote from his press conference: “In July 2003, the fact that Valerie Wilson was a CIA officer was classified.â€

Pete: I consider you to be the left’s equivalent of Cecil Turner (hint: he’s on my twit-list for being pedantic and chronically misrepresenting the record), and will leave it at that. Parse my rhetoric however you please, others can do the same. As I said, we are probably polar opposites ideologically, and nobody’s opinion (not yours, not mine, not any reader here) hangs in the balance of an argument between us.

Please. I’ve been fairly respective of you, I have not personally attacked you. If you want to show how I’ve been â€pedantic†or â€misrepresented the record†by all means do so. But to leave those comments out and compare me to someone I know little about is simply engaging in a dishonest dialog.

Cut and paste typo above — I meant to say that taking Fitz’s â€the fact that Valerie Wilson was a CIA officer was classified†out of context is a gross misrepresentation of his position.

The general point I was trying to make (before) was that I find Fitz’s use of the phrase â€employment status was classified†to be misleading to the casual reader, and deliberately so. I still think Fitz was justified in pursuing and prosecuting Libby for false statements, FWIW. I use Fitz’s misleading phrase as an example of misleading casual readers, and I accuse Wilson of likewise using carefully tuned phrasing to cause casual readers to jump to false conclusions. The contentions of people who use carefully tuned phrases should be examined carefully.

To go back and visit my original point that you find distasteful, some readers have to be hit with irrelevant stuff in order to cause them to look closer. That isn’t a concession that â€Wilson’s wife worked at the CIA and suggested him for the assignment†is irrelevant, just saying that different readers respond to different stimulus.

I assume that you (and most readers at TNH) will never agree with my point of view that â€outing†Plame was a net benefit for the country – and in hindsight I probably should have let your objection stand without any attempt on my part to explain it.

To go back and visit my original point that you find distasteful, some readers have to be hit with irrelevant stuff in order to cause them to look closer. That isn’t a concession that â€Wilson’s wife worked at the CIA and suggested him for the assignment†is irrelevant, just saying that different readers respond to different stimulus.

Sure. But some things cannot be said even if there may be some benefit to disclosing them.

Consider the following information stated in Libby’s indictment:

Shortly after publication of the article in The New Republic, LIBBY spoke by telephone with his then Principal Deputy and discussed the article. That official asked LIBBY whether information about Wilson’s trip could be shared with the press to rebut the allegations that the Vice President had sent Wilson. LIBBY responded that there would be complications at the CIA in disclosing that information publicly, and that he could not discuss the matter on a non-secure telephone line.

So while there may be a benefit to getting a certain audience to respond, even Libby knew the dangers of a public disclosure.