:: Running from the Thought Police ::

:: Sunday, October 30, 2005 ::

An Important Perspective

Hunter over at Daily Kos has been watching more TV and reading more websites than I have, and thinks that punditry really isn't appropriate to Plamegate and the apparently recurring holiday of Fitzmas. While you should read the whole thing, I think this exerpt is the most appropriate.

Throughout the entire pundit brigade -- blogosphere included -- everyone is trying to decide whether or not the Fitzgerald indictments are a "victory" for their side or the other side. It's not, OK? It's just not. There is nothing good or victorious about this situation, for either side. Nothing. Nothing.

We've got exactly two choices here. Either the White House outed a covert agent because they handled sensitive and classified information so incompetently that it was distributed throughout the administration and into administration-selected leak receptacles without anyone realizing that the classified information was, duh, classified...

Or, they did it on purpose. I say "they", because we know that even though Libby is currently the only one indicted, the public record already shows, at minimum, Karl Rove as being one of the other administration figures that discussed Plame's classified CIA status with multiple reporters. That little tidbit ain't going away, regardless of how it's spun.

Incompetence, or intentional...that's what we're left with.

I want one thing out of this entire investigation. I want to find out what happened, and why. In that Scooter Libby has now been indicted for obstructing prosecutorial attempts to find out -- by flatly lying, on multiple occasions -- than yes, I freely admit I take a certain grim satisfaction in a prosecutor dragging him out of the White House by his ankles, and the prospects of depositing him, eventually, in a jail cell. But there's nothing happy about this week, or the month before it, or the two years before that. And there won't be much to celebrate even when this whole sorry mess is finally done and over with.

Remember, this particular scandal involves the compromising of our national security for political gain, which Fitzgerald could ultimately decide to turn into a charge of Treason and make it stick. (And this is real treason we're talking about here, not what Ann Coulter accuses liberals of.) While this is a vindication of sorts for the liberal bloggers who've been following the investigation since the original crime back in 2003, we're talking about an act which could've adversely harmed our country, and that's bad for all of us no matter our political leanings.

:: The Squire 7:44 PM :: email this post :: ::
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