It's unfortunate that so many people took him seriously.

[therealUT]

Nevertheless, it now appears that the person most responsible for the end of Ms. Plame's CIA career is Mr. Wilson. Mr. Wilson chose to go public with an explosive charge, claiming -- falsely, as it turned out -- that he had debunked reports of Iraqi uranium-shopping in Niger and that his report had circulated to senior administration officials. He ought to have expected that both those officials and journalists such as Mr. Novak would ask why a retired ambassador would have been sent on such a mission and that the answer would point to his wife. He diverted responsibility from himself and his false charges by claiming that President Bush's closest aides had engaged in an illegal conspiracy. It's unfortunate that so many people took him seriously.

End of an Affair

Great article by the Washington Post.

 

[OneManGang]

After three years of panting calls for Karl Rove, President Bush, Dick Cheney, and/or Donald Rumsfeld to be frog-marched from the White House for this "egregious violation of national security" we now have the Left channelling Rosanne Rosanadana:

"Never Mind!"

NOW I want to see Chris Matthews, Bill Maher, Al Franken and every other commentator that called for the President's impeachment over this frog-marched out and under arrest for malicious slander.

Most notably, buried in this buried (page A-20) article is a HUGE admission that a key part of the whole "Bush Lied" scatology just evaporated as well:

Mr. Wilson chose to go public with an explosive charge, claiming -- falsely, as it turned out -- that he had debunked reports of Iraqi uranium-shopping in Niger and that his report had circulated to senior administration officials.

 

[CSpindizzy]

The funny thing about this is it took this long for a guy that supposedly did this in passing to admit it. It still reaks of something. It's hard to believe that a man who knows better about the intel community would just in passing throw out CIA staff identities. In this community you just don't say "so-and-so works for the CIA" without verifying if this can be done.

It is a matter of convenience that this came out at this time and was played out so long without being identified. It's convenient that the cover story is now 'oh he was against Bush in this all this time' when the guy was one of the loudest voices calling for Clinton to do this in 1998.

 

[volinbham]

Well the guy that outed Armitage is David Corn who was one of the original reporters to make a big deal out of this and has been slamming the Bush admin about it all along (and continues).



I think the Post article is dead-on. By making this a political issue, Joe Wilson inevitably caused the outing of his wife. Read the Senate report on pre-war intelligence and you'll see just how much Wilson's account of things departs with reality.

 

[volinbham]

It's convenient that the cover story is now 'oh he was against Bush in this all this time' when the guy was one of the loudest voices calling for Clinton to do this in 1998.

The significance of this is it shows how it was not a WH conspiracy to punish a war critic. The leak came from someone in the state department who was at odds with the approach of the Bush admin.

In short, Armitage was highly unlikely to conspire with Rove et al. to take down a war critic.

Wilson was a Kerry consultant and went to the NYT with a distorted and exaggerated story about his trip to Niger. All in an effort to defeat W. If there's a conspiracy, I look to the Wilson/Kerry/Plame camp...

 

[CSpindizzy]

In short, Armitage was highly unlikely to conspire with Rove et al. to take down a war critic.

You gotta be kidding me. That's the biggest assumption I've heard on this whole issue. So you're saying Armitage would never have a sense of loyalty to his party and his president to silence someone trying to cost an election?

 

[volinbham]

You gotta be kidding me. That's the biggest assumption I've heard on this whole issue. So you're saying Armitage would never have a sense of loyalty to his party and his president to silence someone trying to cost an election?

There is zero credible evidence suggesting Armitage was part of a Rove led conspiracy.

There is considerable evidence suggesting he was not -- including public statements from all the reporters involved in the leak.

 

[CSpindizzy]

But to sit here and say this vindicates a 'conspiracy' is ludicrous. There is NOTHING here clearing the possibility. Everyone is jumping on this "See Wilson lied" or "See Wilson was duped", etc. I'm not buying into this whole line of Armitage being so against this whole war this exempts him from a potential conspiracy.

 

[volinbham]

But to sit here and say this vindicates a 'conspiracy' is ludicrous. There is NOTHING here clearing the possibility. Everyone is jumping on this "See Wilson lied" or "See Wilson was duped", etc. I'm not buying into this whole line of Armitage being so against this whole war this exempts him from a potential conspiracy.

Conspiracies by their very nature do not require vindication. The burden of proof in claiming a conspiracy (or any criminal allegation for that matter) is with the accuser.

Wilson had been discredited long before the Armitage info came out. He even admitted taking "literary license" when confronted on inconsistencies in his account.

The press people involved have made public statements indicating how they received the information and those accounts suggest the information was made in passing and more importantly was not volunteered (except in the case of Armitage).

Believe it was a conspiracy if you want but it's a very long stretch and you have to ignore quite a bit of countervailing evidence.

Bottomline, I have zero respect for Wilson. He had to know that his actions put his wife's status in jeopardy. Any reporter worth his/her salt had to ask "Why did the administration send him?" Even if Armitage, Rove or whoever never mentioned anything, it was pretty much inevitable that some reporter would dig up the info. His reaction was over the top and harmful.

 

[CSpindizzy]

What evidence?