Your White House Press Corps

Tucked into Dan Froomkin's Washington Post piece about Bush's press conference (during which he neither denied White House involvement in the destruction of the CIA tapes, nor even bothered to say it was wrong), came this little gem:

It's all highly reminiscent of Bush's no-comment strategy during the investigation of the White House role in the leak of Valerie Plame's identity as a CIA agent. Then, as now, Bush could have demanded that his aides tell him what they had done. But he obviously didn't want to hear it.

And now, as then, Bush can insist that he wants to wait for others to determine the facts, and then refuse to comment while an investigation is ongoing -- until the press corps loses interest in the matter.

Today, since former vice presidential aide Scooter Libby has dropped his appeal in the Plame case, the coast was clear for reporters to ask Bush any of the many important, unanswered questions about that case. But nobody did.

The Kewl Kidz have decided that the outing of an undercover CIA agent, who was working to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction to Iran, doesn't matter. The judge threw out the lawsuit because breaking laws and undermining national security is just part of the Administration's job. Scooter Libby shouldn't have had to go to jail because he's just too good a guy to have to actually suffer consequences for breaking laws and undermining national security. And all those questions about breaking laws and undermining national security that the Scottys and Tonys and Danas told us would have to wait until the legal process had ended? Well, it's holiday season, and who wants to risk being thrown off Sally Quinn's guest list?

Your Law and Order Republicans

Rudy Giuliani

After evaluating the facts, the president came to a reasonable decision and I believe the decision was correct.

Tell us, Mr. Former-Federal-Prosecutor, what exactly is reasonable about commuting the sentence of a man convicted of lying to federal investigators about his role in a conspiracy to out the secret identity of an undercover CIA agent?

John McCain:

Election Central just sent an e-mail to John McCain campaign spokesman Danny Diaz, asking if the Senator has any comment on the Libby commutation. His reply: "Nope."

Because, God knows, leaders know when to lead.

Mitt Romney:

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, who as Massachusetts governor refused to pardon an Iraq war veteran's pellet gun conviction, on Tuesday called U.S. President George W. Bush's commutation of Scooter Libby's prison sentence "reasonable."

Defending Bush, Romney said at a campaign stop that "the president looked very carefully at the setting" before deciding to commute the 2 1/2-year sentence of Libby, the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, who was convicted in the CIA leak case.

The prosecutor in the case "went after somebody even when he knew no crime had been committed," Romney said. "Given that fact, isn't it reasonable for a commutation of a portion of the sentence to be made?"

No crime? You mean other than perjury and obstruction of justice? Very carefully? You mean that, facing actual prison time, Libby might have decided to talk to prosecutors about who else was involved in the criminal conspiracy to out the CIA agent's identity, so Bush very carefully concluded that any minor backlash against the commutation would be better than risking the truth being revealed?

Fred Thompson

I am very happy for Scooter Libby. I know that this is a great relief to him, his wife and children. While for a long time I have urged a pardon for Scooter, I respect the President's decision. This will allow a good American, who has done a lot for his country, to resume his life.

Thanks for your concern for the treasonous felon. Any concern for the former CIA agent, whose career was destroyed? Any concern for the lives of the network of undercover agents she managed? Any concern for our nation, which lost a critically important national security team that was specifically focused on stopping the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction?

As Joshua Marshall points out:

Paris Hilton did more time than Scooter Libby.

Treason

Valerie Plame Wilson finally had the opportunity to speak at a Congressional hearing.
From the Washington Post:

Valerie Plame, the former CIA officer at the heart of a four-year political furor over the Bush administration's leak of her identity, lashed out at the White House yesterday, testifying in Congress that the president's aides destroyed a career she loved and slipped her name to reporters for "purely political motives."

Plame, breaking her public silence about the case, contended that her name and job "were carelessly and recklessly abused" by the government. Although she and her colleagues knew that "we might be exposed and threatened by foreign enemies," she said, "it was a terrible irony that administration officials were the ones who destroyed my cover."

And despite the completely unsubstantiated right wing blather that her professional identity had been well-known:

"I am here to say I was a covert officer of the Central Intelligence Agency," Plame told House members, a horde of journalists and a few antiwar activists. Her work, she said, "was not common knowledge on the Georgetown cocktail circuit."

And the New York Times adds:

“My name and identity were carelessly and recklessly abused by senior government officials in both the White House and the State Department,” Ms. Wilson testified before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform in a hearing room packed with reporters, photographers and spectators....

She said the security breach might have endangered agency officials but also “jeopardized and even destroyed entire networks of foreign agents, who in turn risk their own lives and those of their families to provide the United States with needed intelligence. Lives are literally at stake.”

That's where the media and the White House defenders have truly revealed their hypocrisy. For all their propaganda about National Security, the Administration, for purely political reasons, deliberately outed the identity of an undercover security agent, jeopardizing lives and entire networks of agents. They did it in petty retribution for her husband's having revealed that one of Bush's claimed reasons for needing to go to war with Iraq was a flat-out lie. The cynicism and irresponsibility cannot be over-emphasized. This was treason, pure and simple. Treason.

Only the beginning...

Murray Waas of the National Journal has been one of the best reporters on the Plame leak case. As the Libby trial wraps up, he offers this tantalizing hint:

If Libby is found guilty, investigators are likely to probe further to determine if Libby devised what they consider a cover story in an effort to shield Cheney. They want to know whether Cheney might have known about the leaks ahead of time or had even encouraged Libby to provide information to reporters about Plame's CIA status, the same sources said.

And don't forget the pending civil trials. This story is far from over...