From our “This is News?” department comes the revelation that, in response to Joe Wilson’s attack on the President’s credibility, Bush’s top aide Karl Rove and VP Cheney’s top aide Scooter Libby collaborated on a response to Wilson’s charges of shaping intelligence on the Iraq-Niger uranium connection.

The NY Times story is interesting in that it says absolutely nothing. They don’t have one iota of news to impart to their readers. They do, however, have plenty of juicy speculation that they can disguise as news which for the New York Times, is pretty much the same thing.

The response they were working on was given by CIA Director George Tenet on July 12, 2003 in which Tenet insisted that the shaky Niger uranium story was the fault of bad analysis at the CIA. Rove and Libby were drawing up a statement in response to a request by Tenet himself who wanted to set the record straight.

A former government official, though, added another element to how the statement was prepared, saying that no one directed Mr. Tenet to issue it and that Mr. Tenet himself felt it was needed. The statement said that the “C.I.A.’s counterproliferation experts, on their own initiative, asked an individual with ties to the region to make a visit to see what he could learn.”

According to the Times, there may have been other more sinister reasons for the Rove-Libby collaboration:

It is not clear what information Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby might have collected about Ms. Wilson as they worked on the Tenet statement. Mr. Rove has said he learned her name from Mr. Novak. Mr. Libby has declined to discuss the matter.

The effort was striking because to an unusual degree, the circle of officials involved included those from the White House’s political and national security operations, which are often separately run. Both arms were drawn into the effort to defend the administration during the period.

“It is not clear what information Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby might have collected…”

What an extraordinarily biased statement! The reason it’s “not clear” what the two “might” have collected could very well be that they weren’t collecting anything! ABP makes the same point:

And what did they say between themselves about Valerie Plame. Nothing at all. But that doesn’t stop this “news” article from wondering, stating that It is not clear what information Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby might have collected about Ms. Wilson as they worked on the Tenet statement. Why not just say “There is nothing to suggest Rove and Libby ever discussed Valerie Plame”. Because it’s The New York Times of course.

The Times is a master at this form of attack. This not very subtle indictment uses pure speculation without any evidence to back it up. They’re just throwing crap against the wall to see if anything sticks.

It’s disgusting.

UPDATE

Tom Maguire links to the Times piece and highlights the possible role of Ari Fleisher in the scandal pointing out a discrepancy in Fleisher’s reported grand jury testimony about not seeing the State Department memo and an eyewitness who claims he did:

Well. I am sure he is a great American, but this is not good. And, as with Karl, since Ari was involved with the Wilson push-back, why would he not have seen the memo, or been apprised of it?

And yes, if Ari is The One, since he left the Administration on July 14, 2003, we are back to an Incredible Shrinking Scandal.

Possibly…but then there are still all of those statements by the White House denying Rove’s involvement which is, of course, a political not a legal problem. And by listening to the WH press corps, I doubt whether those questions are going to stop anytime soon.

Think Progress has Bloomberg piece by Richard Keil (not available as of 5:00 AM Central) which states that both Lewis Libby and Karl Rove’s claims to have been informed of Valerie Wilson’s status as a CIA employee from reporters is at odds with the testimony given by the journalists in question before the grand jury.

Rove claims to have first heard of Wilson’s agency job from Bob Novak. Libby is reported to have testified that he heard the story first from NBC’s Tim Russert. According to the Bloomberg piece, both reporters tell a different story:

Two top White House aides have given accounts to the special prosecutor about how reporters told them the identity of a CIA agent that are at odds with what the reporters have said, according to persons familiar with the case.

Lewis “Scooter’’ Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, told special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that he first learned from NBC News reporter Tim Russert of the identity of CIA agent Valerie Plame, the wife of former ambassador and Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson. Russert has testified before a federal grand jury that he didn’t tell Libby of Plame’s identity.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove told Fitzgerald that he first learned the identity of the CIA agent from syndicated columnist Robert Novak, who was first to report Plame’s name and connection to Wilson. Novak, according to a source familiar with the matter, has given a somewhat different version to the special prosecutor.

These discrepancies may be important because one issue Fitzgerald is investigating is whether Libby, Rove, or other administration officials made false statements during the course of the investigation. The Plame case has its genesis in whether any administration officials violated a 1982 law making it illegal to knowingly reveal the name of a CIA agent.

We already know of this “different version” given by Novak. Where Rove testfified that “I heard that too” when Novak told him of Mr.s Wilson’s employment at CIA Novak reportedly testified that Rove said something slightly different, but a similar gist.

Kos says:

What will the children think? It’s not the blowjob endangering national security by outing an undercover CIA agent, but the lies about it!

Actually, it is the national security thing. The lies are just the icinig on the cake.

Not so fast my boorish lickspittle. Before you hyperventilate yourself into a paroxysm of orgasmic ecstacy, perhaps you should have a look at Tom Maguire today:

Decison ‘08 sends me to this Bloomberg account of a discrepancy in Tim Russert’s story:

None of this came up when Russert chatted with Matt Cooper on his “Meet The Pravda” show last weekend.

Mr. Maguire is “steaming” over what he sees as a cover-up by the press. Perhaps not so much a coverup as a “CYA” exercise. It would appear that Mr. Fitzgerald is casting a wide net and, as demonstrated inumerable times in the past, special prosecutors feel duty bound to charge someone with something for all the time and money spent. No one wants to get caught up in the dragnet and that includes many members of the press who may or may not have known that Mrs. Wilson worked for the CIA.

It’s pretty clear that the Bloomberg article covers precious little new ground. But since notorious leftist Al Hunt took over as editor, Bloomberg has been agressively liberal in it’s slant of the news. A careful reading of Mr. Keil’s piece would seem to place it in the category of wishful thinking rather than good reporting. And as Mr. Keil reminds us at the end of his article:

Some Bush allies were hopeful that the Fitzgerald investigation, which dominated the news in Washington for the first part of July, would subside as the focus now is on Bush’s nomination of Judge John Roberts to fill the first vacancy on the Supreme Court in 11 years.

Yet special prosecutor Fitzgerald, not media coverage, will determine the outcome of this investigation.

Thankfully, that observation cuts both ways.

UPDATE

The Keil article is now up on Bloomberg’s website and differs slightly from the advance copy that Think Progress received.

One discrepancy I hadn’t noticed in the article was this ommission regarding Time Magazine’s Matt Cooper’s reported testimony before the grandy jury:

There also is a discrepancy between accounts given by Rove and Time magazine reporter Mat Cooper. The White House aide mentioned Wilson’s wife—though not by name—in a July 11, 2003, conversation with Cooper, the reporter said. Rove, 55, says that Cooper called him to talk about welfare reform and the Wilson connection was mentioned later, in passing.

Cooper wrote in Time magazine last week that he told the grand jury he never discussed welfare reform with Rove in that call

That’s true…up to a point. Cooper also wrote (and testified) that he originally called Rove to discuss welfare reform and left a message with Rove to that effect. When Rove returned the call, Cooper started by asking Rove about Wilson.

Gee…you don’t think the reason Mr. Keil left that little tidbit out of the story was because he’s like, ya know, biased or anything now, do you?

Kevin Alyward cuts to the heart of the matter:

If either Libby or Rove can be tied to the memo it’s game over for them. I’m still wholly underwhelmed by the story, but given the details that have emerged (and are likely to emerge), it’s just about time that both Rove and Libby take one for the team and step down.

I’ve been saying that for two weeks.

Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation into the Plame leak has now gone off on so many different tangents that if you’re trying to follow his line of inquiry, you probably need a scorecard to keep track of the players. Does this activity, as Donald Lambro suggests in today’s WA Times, mean that Fitzgerald is desperately casting about for someone’s scalp to hang on his wall for any transgression?

Possibilities include lying to the FBI, lying to him, lying to the grand jury, trying to cover up the lying, or trying to cover up something else of which at present, we’re unaware.

One thing is almost certain; even if Plame was on covert status as the Walter Pincus piece in today’s Washington Post suggests, Fitzgerald will still have a very hard time charging someone with violating the Intelligence Identities act.

Today’s controversy centers around a State Department memo written on June 10, 2003 almost a month before Wilson’s Op-Ed appeared in the New York Times after which Wilson’s wife was identified by Bob Novak in a subsequent column. Since Pincus doesn’t have the memo, there is no way to judge in what context Mrs. Wilson’s name came up. What’s important, according to Pincus, is that the paragraph that names her is preceded by the letter “S” – an indication that what’s contained in the paragraph is “secret.”

A classified State Department memorandum central to a federal leak investigation contained information about CIA officer Valerie Plame in a paragraph marked “(S)” for secret, a clear indication that any Bush administration official who read it should have been aware the information was classified, according to current and former government officials.

Plame—who is referred to by her married name, Valerie Wilson, in the memo—is mentioned in the second paragraph of the three-page document, which was written on June 10, 2003, by an analyst in the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), according to a source who described the memo to The Washington Post.

The paragraph identifying her as the wife of former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV was clearly marked to show that it contained classified material at the “secret” level, two sources said. The CIA classifies as “secret” the names of officers whose identities are covert, according to former senior agency officials.

After raising the specter of a violation of the law, Pincus adds this:

Anyone reading that paragraph should have been aware that it contained secret information, though that designation was not specifically attached to Plame’s name and did not describe her status as covert, the sources said. It is a federal crime, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, for a federal official to knowingly disclose the identity of a covert CIA official if the person knows the government is trying to keep it secret

In other words, in what would have to be described as a sensitive document dealing with the Iraq-Niger uranium issue, Mrs. Wilson’s name (not her maiden name) was used in connection with…what? Pincus doesn’t know but that doesn’t stop him from using “former government officials” (the same “officials” who have been leaking information damaging to the Administration?) to tell us how anyone who read this memo and used any information contained in the paragraph marked “S” for “secret” is in trouble.

Rove has denied seeing the memo although according to Pincus, Colin Powell brought the memo aboard Air Force I for the President’s trip to Africa. Others who may have seen it include Ari Fleisher, the President’s former Press Secretary who some have been speculating was primarily responsible for shopping the Wilson-Plame connection to reporters around town in the days following Wilson’s Times Op-Ed. Fleisher has remained unavailable for comment on the issue which may in fact indicate that he is a target of Fitzgerald’s investigation.

What continues to bother me about the reporting of this story is the failure of the mainstream press to highlight the all out war going on at the time (and still going on to this day) between the White House and a faction at the CIA who were trying to shift blame for the failure to find WMD’s from the agency to the warhawks in the Administration. For the life of me, I can’t see how you can give this story any context at all if you pretend this conflict didn’t exist or ignore it as Pincus has done since he talked to Wilson back in June of 2003 about his Niger mission.

Joe Wilson’s attempt to cover-up his wife’s role in getting him the Niger assignment has to be seen as an effort by Wilson to cover his tracks. He would have us believe that the reason he got the CIA assignment was because of his “extensive contacts” in the area. More basic than that, he would have us believe the entire Niger adventure was in response to a question from the Vice President’s office. To believe that, you would have to acknowledge that the CIA didn’t have any assets in Niger to carry out what on its face was a routine investigation. If Joe Wilson could sit by a pool sipping mint tea and talk with a few officials, why couldn’t such an inquiry be handled by agency personnel already in country? Why a “special mission?”

The answer is that the CIA wanted to make sure they got the right answers from the “investigation.” So they send glory boy Wilson on a made up errand to insure that the intelligence is “fixed” to absolve the Niger government of colluding with the Iraqis in what two separate inquiries have concluded was a real attempt to circumvent sanctions to purchase uranium. And to obscure that fact, Wilson has to make it appear that his talent and contacts alone were the reason he was sent to Niger not that his wife was part of a faction out to discredit the Administration’s WMD claims prior to going to war with Iraq.

This may in fact be the real cover-up. What started as a policy dispute between WMD experts at CIA and the “Neocons” in the Bush Administration may have escalated to include the CIA selective leaking of classified information in order to swing an election. And right in the middle of this cover up may be the Wilson-Plame connection regarding the Niger mission.

UPDATE

John Cole shamelessly steals the title to one of my previous posts on the Rovian mess (“Drip…Drip…Drip) while linking to the Pincus piece in WAPO. The alliteration in the title of his post is sublime as is his observation that ” Things will be fast and furious tomorrow, though, as the spinning goes into high gear.” My spin, of course, is that the spooks are guilty of trying to sway an election while selectively leaking a heap of classified documents to show how clever they were.

If they were so clever, why’d they send such a clown as Wilson on such an “important” mission?

UPDATE II

The definitive word comes, of course, via Tom Maguire who believes a case is building against Rove. He also points to Ari Fleisher’s name being bandied about more as well as Steve Hadley.

Here’s Tom’s take on possible Rove exposure:

A quick summing up – it is getting easier to make the case that Rove knew, or should have know, that the info he passed to Cooper was sensitive. In other words (his words, actually), Rove had said too much. But the IIPA looks like the wrong statute.

Sidebar – Ari Fleischer’s name is appearing in more articles. He and Steve Hadley are the forgotten men here.

In other words, Rove’s trouble may hinge on when he told authorities he knew of the Wilson-Plame connection. If he heard about it from the memo, he may be cooked. If he heard about it from another journalist, he may be guilty of nothing more than confirming gossip.

Either way, I don’t think he can survive. The press will not let go of this. And Fitzgerald may not indict him but will certainly single him out for some stinging criticism. In short, he’s now damaged goods and needs to go.

James Joyner makes some interesting observations about the State Department memo:

It’s rather unlikely that Rove or Libby saw a memo for the eyes of an Undersecretary of State, let alone read the footnotes. It’s also unclear to me why her name would be classified “Secret,” given that she had not worked in a covert capacity or overseas for years. It’s rather odd for the fact that someone who works at CIA headquarters under their own name to be classified.

Of course, that won’t stop the conspiracy theorists. Kos and John of AmericaBlog think this thwarts the administration’s plan to divert attention from the Rove affair by rushing the appointment of John Roberts to the Supreme Court. Because, goodness knows, trying to get a new Justice to replace Sandra Day O’Connor, who is often the deciding vote against their interests, in place by October would not be something the Administration was interested in.

James makes an excellent point. The way the left is spinning this, it’s like Bush’s inner circle sat around passing a secret document back and forth trying to figure out how to smear Joe Wilson. I doubt if Powell let the darn thing out of his possesion however, he may have shared the tidbit about Mrs. Wilson with a few key people.

Tom Bowler agrees with my conclusion that the CIA may be undermining policies they disagree with by leaking classified material. Whether or not it would be within the scope of Fitzgerald’s mandate to investigate is another question.

UPDATE III

Ace’s post on this warrants its own update. First, he educates us about classifications:

I should note that “secret” is just about the lowest, if not the lowest, level of classified information. Not sure, but I think only “confidential” is lower on the scale. And the three classic categories—Confidential, Secret, Top Secret—don’t even cover real secrets. Those are bullshit classifications. Real secret stuff is protected by codeword-clearance, where only a limited number of folks are allowed to see the information, and you have to be cleared specifically to view information designated by a particular codeword.

Then he gives the most logical explanation for Plame’s continued “covert” classification:

But… there is the possibility that, while she was known by her neighbors as being a CIA officer (and of course known to every foreign intelligence service worth a damn, since she drove to Langely every day for the last five years), her identinty was still technically classified, owing to bureaucratic inertia and incompetence, and so it’s possible that someone is technically guilty of revealing classified information.

Assuming they read the memo at all, and did not in fact simply hear this from reporters

And finally, he jibes our memory about Sandy “The Burgler” Berger:

PS: The stuff Sandy Berger stole from the archives? Codeword-clearance. The press didn’t seem particularly interested in his theft (and admitted DESTRUCTION!) of original copies of genuine secret documents from the archives.

But some State Department memo has an (S) on it and Walter Pincus gets a dangerous erection lasting more than four hours.

He also makes the point via two of his commenters that they wouldn’t classify one paragraph of a document without classifying the rest.

Gee…do ya think those “former government officials” who’ve been leaking to Pincus for two years in order to damage the Administration may have taken Walter for a ride?

UPDATE IV

The Captain makes the same point I do in the main post – that Pincus only casually mentions that the “S” designation might not mean that Plame’s identity was covert.

That sounds pretty damning—and it might still be, but this description and the rest of the article doesn’t establish this as dispositive at all. In any classified document, each paragraph has to carry a label indicating the level of classification for the information contained within. Later in the article by Walter Pincus and Jim VandeHei, we find out that the paragraph contains seven sentences, and that Plame only gets mentioned in two of them. That doesn’t establish that her identity was classified, although it could. It could just as easily mean that other information in the same paragraph carried that classification.

Again, we have to remember Pincus’ sourcing here. These are former CIA “officials” who have been passing on selective, damaging leaks to Pincus for more than two years. And Pincus, for whatever reason, is playing along.

The war continues.

There are times when Clio, the muse of history, decides to play the role of Shakespeare’s mischievous fairy Puck whose antics in A Midsummers Nights Dream drove the mortals crazy, much to the amusement of his fellows. “Lord, what fools these mortals be” Puck sighs as another one of his tricks hits its intended mark.

Clio was working overtime today as history and fantasy collided in such a way as to jar our sensibilities and shake our complacency about what the Greeks referred to as “the fates” – three sisters who sing of what was, what is, and what will be.

Today, a small part of our past died when James Doohan who played the character Scotty on the original Star Trek series passed away at the age of 85. In a delicious irony that Clio herself would enjoy, we also celebrate the 36th anniversary of what can honestly be described as the most significant technological achievement of the human race; placing the footprints of man on the surface of the moon.

At first glance, the two events would seem to have little in common. After all, Star Trek was off the air by the time Neil Armstrong stepped off the bottom rung of Eagle’s ladder to take the small step for man that sadly, seems to have stalled in mid leap. The last episode of Star Trek aired on June 3, 1969 much to the chagrin of the series’ fanatical followers. But in a very real sense, the death of Scotty and the remembrance of Apollo 11 has everything to do with what we humans dream and how those dreams inspire us and drive us forward to achieve great things.

James Doohan played the Chief Engineer, one of the more popular characters on Star Trek. His “can-do” attitude toward the technical problems associated with the complex and futuristic systems on the starship Enterprise called to mind those NASA engineers who made so much of the space program look effortless.

The scientists and technicians who sent Americans into space were thought of as our country’s best and smartest. They were for the most part young, talented men who graduated from the best schools and came to NASA to participate in the great adventure of space flight. And while the NASA PR machine made it seem as if just about everything was always perfect, behind the scenes – like Scotty on the Enterprise – the engineers in Houston dealt with one problem after another and through sheer brainpower and the occasional piece of good luck, brought the astronauts home.

Scotty would have felt right at home working at NASA in the 1960’s. Scotty, like the NASA techies, lived, breathed, and slept their jobs. To some extent, I’m sure they still do. But when you look back at that effort to place a man on the moon in fulfillment of President Kennedy’s pledge, one is awestruck at some of the figures:

1. Nearly 500,000 human beings laid their hands on one component or another of Apollo 11.
2. Almost 25% of all the man hours worked on the spacecraft were in unpaid overtime.
3. At liftoff, the massive Saturn V rocket generated 7.5 million pounds of thrust. It was as tall as a 37 story building.
4. It took the coordinated efforts of 20,000 people to make the mission a success from launch to splashdown.

The Apollo program dwarfed in size, cost, and scope any other endeavor in human history.

What fascinated so many of us at that time was the same thing that drew us to the TV every Wednesday evening to watch Star Trek – the belief that space flight would somehow change the world for the better. The society invented by Gene Roddenberry for Star Trek, I see now, was ridiculously simpleminded. As one wag put it: In a society where people can be anything they want to be and where there’s no longer any need for money or wealth, who will clean the toilets? The point being not everyone can be a starship captain like James Kirk nor a chief engineer like Scotty.

But that shouldn’t stop us from being inspired by Star Trek. Nor should it keep us from dreaming of a future where we can go from planet to planet as easily as we might travel from Chicago to St. Louis. Because without Star Trek and other fantasies, what would there be to challenge our notions of the possible? Because in the end, that’s what the Apollo program was all about. When the actual Apollo program became part of NASA planning to go to the moon, we had sent exactly 6 men into space for a less than 50 hours total. Not only entirely new systems would have to be invented but entire industries would have to spring from nothing to make a moon landing a reality. It was breathtaking in its audacity.

As we look back and remember both Star Trek and the moon landing, it may be well to also remember the dreams and aspirations of today’s children. What kind of technological future are we going to leave them? Will it be a nightmare future where the very few enjoy the benefits of the best that the human mind can dream? Or will it be a future where, like the world of Star Trek, most can share in the magic and the miracles and the unlimited potential of the human spirit realized through our dreams of what can be accomplished when we are inspired by the better angels of our nature.

This article originally appears in The American Thinker

We interrupt this scandal to ask a question that, due to it’s “explosive” nature was never asked when the story broke almost exactly a year ago…

What were 500 tons of yellow cake uranium still doing at the nuclear research center of Al-Tuwaitha in Iraq when American tanks rolled into Bagdhad?

The fact that the material was under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for more than a decade opens an entirely different line of questioning: Is the entire group of United Nations bureaucrats running the IAEA legally insane?

These issues are somewhat separate from the Plame-Wilson-Rove dust up that’s been roiling Washington recently but nevertheless shed light on why Joe Wilson went to Niger in February of 2002 and why the bureaucratic tussle over those 16 words about the Iraqi-Niger yellow cake connection was so fierce.

The story begins at the end of the first Gulf War when inspectors found a 500 ton cache of refined yellow cake uranium at Iraq’s primary nuclear research facility in Al-Tuwaitha outside of Bagdhad. The cache was part of a huge inventory of nuclear materials discovered by UN inspectors that included low-level radioactive material of the type used for industrial and medical purposes as well as a quantity of highly enriched uranium suitable for bomb production. This HE uranium was shipped to Russia where it was made relatively harmless by a process known as “isotopic dilution” – but only after the Iraqis dragged their heels for more than 6 months following the cease fire by playing a cat and mouse game with the IAEA’s inspectors. The history of those early IAEA inspections can be found here and is an eye opening look at both the gullibility of the IAEA and the lengths to which Saddam sought to keep as much of his nuclear bomb making capability as he could.

The IAEA placed a seal on the nuclear materials in November of 1992. From then until the fall of Saddam, the agency attempted to make sure that Iraq did not use the yellow cake to reconstitute its nuclear program, something the IAEA acknowledged could be done if the Iraqi’s were able to rebuild its centrifuges and gain access to additional fissile material. Keeping track of the material was made extraordinarily difficult by the Iraqis who regularly impeded IAEA officials from carrying out even the most routine inspections.

Flash forward to 1999 when British intelligence found out through multiple sources that representatives of the Iraqi government had met with officials from the Niger government. This fact is not in dispute. The mystery is in what they talked about. A memo obtained by the British – later proven to be a forgery – purported to show the Iraqis were interested in purchasing 500 tons of yellow cake uranium from Niger’s mines. Forgery or not, since Niger’s exports are extremely limited, consisting largely of uranium ore, livestock, cowpeas, and onions, one doesn’t have to be an intelligence analyst to figure out which one of those items the Iraqis might be interested in.

Both the Butler Review and the Senate Select Committee on Pre War Iraq Intelligence (SSCI) point to other efforts by Saddam to purchase uranium, most notably from the Democratic Republic of the Congo . The Butler Review states in 2002 the CIA “agreed that there was evidence that [uranium from Africa] had been sought.” In the run-up to war in Iraq, the British Intelligence Services apparently believed that Iraq had been trying to obtain uranium from Africa; however, no evidence has been passed on to the IAEA apart from the forged documents.

This then was the context in which Ambassador Joe Wilson went to Niger in February of 2002. Based on multiple sources and the best judgement of the CIA, Saddam Hussein was trying purchase uranium. Since there were no working commercial nuclear reactors in all of Iraq, his interest could only be based on his desire to reconstitute his nuclear weapons program. There was no “fixing” of intelligence or “shaping” intelligence to fit some preconceived agenda. Despite UN resolutions and sanctions, Saddam was looking to build the bomb.

What about that 500 tons of yellow cake under seal at Al-Tuwaitha? As long as the sanctions were in place, the inspectors would be able to confirm, albeit with great difficulty, that Saddam would not be able to use the material for his bomb building program. But that fact doesn’t answer the question of why would any organization charged with keeping a lid on nuclear proliferation allow that much fissile material to be kept by a bloodthirsty tyrant who had already demonstrated a desire to construct a nuclear weapon?

In an article that appeared in The American Thinker on July 20, 2004, Douglas Hanson draws some rather unflattering conclusions about the IAEA and their mission:

The actions, or more appropriately, the inactions of the IAEA regarding Iraq since the end of Gulf War I, betray the agency’s true agenda. Rather than inspect, report, and implement restrictions in accordance with the provisions in the treaty, the agency has in effect become an enabler of rogue nations who are attempting, or who have already succeeded in developing or acquiring special nuclear material and equipment. In other words, the IAEA is simply a reflection of its parent organization, which routinely delays and obfuscates the efforts of the US and the UK in controlling banned substances and delivery systems.

Time after time, the agency has either intentionally or naively bought into the lies and deceptions contrived by nations of the Axis of Evil during IAEA visits and inspections. In most cases, the IAEA avoids confrontation like the plague in order to maintain access to the facilities. If they are booted out, as was the case with North Korea, their impotence is on display for all to see. In other cases, the agency joins in the deception, thereby allowing these rogue states to level the nuclear playing field with the West and Russia.

Clearly then, the IAEA was totally dependent on the sanctions to even carry out the limited inspections it was performing in the 1990’s. But how long would the sanctions be in place?

It is an article of faith with critics of the war that “Saddam was in a box” and there was no need for an invasion to remove him. It’s a pity that many of those critics have such a short memory because a review of what many of them were saying about the sanctions prior to September 11, 2001 would show that they were eager to lift the very same sanctions that they now claim was keeping Saddam in check. Thanks to a remarkable propoganda program that included funeral processions of Iraqi babies whose dead bodies were used over and over again in macabre effort to make it appear that the death toll of infants was higher than it was, the world community was, by 2001, agitating for the lifting of sanctions on the Iraq economy. And while the lifting of economic sanctions would not have meant a lifting of the arms embargo, given the limited resources available to both The United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) and the IAEA as well as Iraq’s demonstrated ability to impede, obstruct, and deceive inspectors, it stands to reason that the continuation of the arms embargo would have been a sham. Even with the embargo, the Dulfer Report showed that Saddam’s ability to evade the sanctions and purchase illicit weapons was extremely troubling.

For the forseeable future, Judge Roberts would appear to be the kind of Supreme Court nominee we’re likely to get; relatively young, limited service on the appellate bench, hence, limited ammunition that can be used by the President’s political opponents to block a potential nominee.

In short, with nothing much to hang their hat on with regards to Roberts’ record, the Democrats will be forced to make his appearance before the Judiciary Committee a time for speechifying rather than serious questioning of the candidates qualifications.

This will no doubt anger their more rabid partisans at the Alliance for Justice, People for the American Way, and the other far left organizations who have taken over the grass roots of the Democratic party. But the fact is, unless some transgression committed by Judge Roberts can be found, there is very little chance the Reid-Boxer-Kennedy wing of the party can block him.

Looking at statements made by the few center-left Democratic Senators left, the President should be encouraged. Here’s Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE):

The best case scenario for Judge Roberts, the President and the country is for Judge Roberts to emerge from these proceedings with broad appeal. There’s always a danger in being defined as an activist judge with an agenda and a willingness to legislate from the bench. The confirmation process will shed light on Judge Roberts’ and what kind of Justice he might become.”

Senator Landrieu (D-LA):

“As I wrote the President last week, I hoped for a nominee who could unite the nation and muster the enthusiastic consensus support that Justice O’Connor and six other current Justices earned. As the Senate examines Judge Roberts’ credentials and hears his testimony, we will begin to learn whether this support is attainable.

And Senator Lieberman said last week that if Roberts were picked, he would “be in the ballpark” as far as acceptability.

These three Democrats, along with Mark Pryor (D-AR) and perhaps Ken Salazar (D-CO) could make this a fairly easy confirmation if they get on board early enough. Their support would more than offset any opposition from Repbublican moderates like Chaffee and Snowe.

Lincoln Chaffee may be a lost cause given that he’s in a tight re-election fight in liberal Rhode Island. But the Maine Senate duo of Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins would probably be inclined to support Roberts despite his being wobbly on Roe. As for others in the gaggle of 7 GOP Senators who voted to stop the nuclear option, Senators Graham, Warner, and McCain will almost certainly vote to confirm and Senator DeWine will want to start repairing the damage he did to his base in Ohio following his participation in the “gang of 14.”

What are the prospects for a filibuster? Captain Ed has an interesting scenario:

My prediction: we will see a Bolton-style stall tactic, where the Democrats demand more and more documentation from prior cases, and then filbuster when the White House finally balks. The Democrats started this tactic during Miguel Estrada’s confirmation hearings.

Interesting scenario but, I think unlikely. First of all, unless the Democrats are going to demand raw FBI reports on Roberts, just about everything else is about him is in the public domain. As far as his work at the Justice Department in the late ‘80’s and 90’s, I’m almost certain the White House has vetted that documentation very carefully and would probably make them part of the confirmation package they send to all Senators on the Judiciary Committee. In short, unless the White House rushed the nomination in order to drive the Rovian mess off the front pages and have been careless in their vetting of the nominee, I doubt whether the Democrats could stall the nomination by asking for “further documentation.”

Here’s some reaction from some of the saner members of the left:

Out Loud:

the gop controls all three branches of our government. it’s just not going to happen. this doesn’t look like the “extraordinary circumstances” that was part of the filibuster deal. in addition, we are basically sitting where the GOP was when clinton got his two picks. the GOP mustered token opposition, but ginsburg and breyer got through easily.

Shadow of the Hegemon:

According to common sense, he’s worth of a filibuster if anybody is.

According to Demosthenes, he’s a test of courage. If the Dems don’t act, they’re invertebrates.

MyDD:

You know what? If Republicans are forced to use the nuclear option to confirm Roberts, then so be it. As far as I am concerned, that is the only way he should be confirmed. People will pay attention to this one. We just have to make the case ot them why he was unacceptable.

Daily Kos (Kos Post):

So who is this guy Roberts? He has only two years of judicial experience, and his legal advocacy can be dismissed as doing the bidding of his bosses.

But he has to be honest and forthcoming, unlike his previous confirmation hearing. The Senate must take its time deliberating over the nomination. And this is something that all sides should want, not just ours. For all the right wing knows, this guy may be the next Souter who simply pretended to be virulently anti-privacy.

I think that if the Senate Republicans can peel off 3 or 4 Democratic Senators then the prospects of a filibuster are lessened considerably. There would be two reasons for this:

1. Reid may not want to appear to be too obstructionist.
2. Senate Democrats may want to save the filibuster to use against a successor to Rehnquist.

By getting 58 or 59 votes to confirm, Reid and the left may want to throw in the towel on Roberts and keep their powder dry for the day when Rhenquist finally leaves. And, as some believe, if Rehnquist is delaying his announcement until the fall, the confirmation battle would butt up against the 2006 Congressional elections. This would give the Democrats exactly what they want; a bruising confirmation fight where they would force the Republicans to “destroy the constitution” in order to confirm the President’s choice.

Then again…I may be completely wrong and Reid, Boxer, and the entire Democratic party may be under such pressure by the moonbats at Moveon that perhaps they’ll feel they have no choice but go to the mat over Roberts. Are they that stupid?

Time will tell.

UPDATE

Captain Ed has an excellent round-up of major newspaper editorials that show some respect for Bush’s political skills in choosing Roberts as well as a measured “wait and see” attitude that’s somehow refreshing. The Captain also correctly identifies a probable line of attack against the nominee:

On the other hand, the LAT finds the two issues I think will likely be the biggest hurdles of his confirmation, apart from Roe: his membership in the Federalist Society and his recent vote upholding military tribunals for terrorist detainees at Gitmo and elsewhere. Given the recent histrionics in the Senate involving Gitmo, I expect the latter will give Democrats not just an opportunity to beat up Roberts, but to use him as a proxy to grandstand against the Bush administration on the war.

The Powerline crew mentions possible avenues to attack Roberts but curiously leaves out the detainee decision which upheld the idea that the government could create special tribunals for the terrorists being held at Guantanamo. I agree with the Captain that along with his views on Roe, Roberts will receive the most flack for that decision.

Hugh Hewitt has a personal recollection of Roberts that makes him sound compelling:

Judge John Roberts may be the smartest lawyer I have known, and he combines that intellect with a graciousness and good humor that will make it hard for any except the most extreme ideolouges to oppose him. Here’s his bio, but it cannot fully convey the great intellectual force which Justice Roberts will bring to the SCOTUS.

Calling Roberts a “judicial superstar,” Mark Noonan is extremely pessimistic about the prospects for a relatively easy confirmation:

Some people are saying that there might not be that big a fight over this nominee – that with Roberts having been confirmed for his current position by unanimous consent, there is no way “extraordinary circumstances” can come into play; that while there may be some delaying tactics employed, what we should look forward to is a swift and painless confirmation of this nominee. That, unfortunately, is nonsense. Our Democrats, it must be remembered, are entirely enthralled to the far left these days – additionally, we have learned in the Delay and Rove affairs that nothing as trivial as facts and common decency will divert Democrats from their attack-dog tactics. We’re in for a very large and long fight on this nominee.

I don’t usually disagree with Mark but in this case, I think he’s wrong. If Reid can’t get his caucus to march in lockstep on this one – and it appears to me that would be a steep, uphill climb at this point – there’s no way he’s going to advocate a filibuster. Why waste your best ammunition on a lost cause? Better to wait and use it to block either a replacement for the Chief or, more likely, a nominee to fill Rehnquist’s seat. Remember, when Rehnquist goes, there will be two confirmation fights; one on Bush’s choice for a new Chief and one on a replacement for Rehnquist.

And a very interesting take on the battle shaping up between Schumer and Roberts via Thomas Lifson at The American Thinker:

Schumer, who loves TV cameras almost as much as he loves being the smartest guy in the room, is about to clash with a guy who outdid him. John G. Roberts and Chuck Schumer both did the Harvard College and Harvard Law School thing. But Roberts graduated from Harvard summa cum laude, and from Harvard Law School magna cum laude.

These are not just funny words. They mean something. A lot, in fact.

Read the whole thing. I think Lifson has Schumer down to a “T.”

UPDATE II

Jeff Goldstein asks the question of questions…the mother of all interrogatories…a plaintive cry from the blogging wilderness that all bloggers ask themselves but don’t have the cohones to actually put out there for all to see:

Question for the blogosphere: Who does a guy have to bang to get included in a roundup these days?

Thirteen updates!

That much work deserves recognition, even if it comes from me and my small, insignificant corner of the Shadow Media. Therefore, in recognition of yeoman’s work done in rounding up reaction from left, right, center, and other planets not of this solar system, I hereby link to Protein Wisdom and recommend that any and all attend to his site and read what Jeff hath wrought.

As expected, the liberal left has eschewed partisan politics and, as is their wont, taken the high road in their opposition to John Roberts to replace Sandra Day O’Connor as Supreme Court Justice.

Don’t believe me? Here’s a comment thread at Daily Kos that shows the kind of principled opposition we can expect from our patriotic friends on the left:

Did You Catch His Wife?

And an alcoholic and drug addict…That’s how Karl starts the smearing process, isn’t it???

What a brilliant and ethical approach to opposing the Supreme Court nominee; go after his children!

Not to be outdone by their fellow tin foil hat wearers, the Democratic Underground weighs in with their own special definition of “The Reality Based Community”:

With his bush close ties and background he’ll be an internal spy on the Supreme Court for bushco for years to come. Just the 2000 election advice/crap should make him suspect. Bush is surrounded by people that can blackmail him…and people he can blackmail.

Fortunately they are in recess for the next five weeks, so nothing is going to happen. We’ve got five weeks to pick this guy apart and find the ghosts in his closets. Bush is proving how desperate he is. Otherwise he would have waited until Congress is back in session so that there wouldn’t be time to dig up any dirt on this one.

Most of us would prefer to argue the merits of Judge Robert’s nomination based on his knowledge of the law, his judicial temperament, and perhaps opinions he has authored. For some reason – probably because they realize they can’t win that way – the left will take the low road here and dig up something that I’m sure Mr. Roberts, Mrs. Roberts, and his children would prefer not see the light of day.

And the sad thing is, they will have willing partners helping them do their dirty work; the mainstream media and its thirst for scandal and controversy.

UPDATE

D.J. Drummond has a much more complete, er profile of the sanity or lack thereof from our lefty friends. One sample jumped out at me:

A great indicator of the Leftist mind is presented by Volvo Liberal, who suggests “Draw Blood, Move on. We really don’t have a winning hand here, and in the big pig picture, we are making traction with the American people. So my suggestion is:

Yeah, that’s a real good idea, trashing what little image of restraint and rational consideration the Democrats have left. It’s worked out real well the last few elections, hasn’t it?

And Bill Ardolino links to a post from Conservative Yankee that says little Jack Roberts is in kindergarten. So what line of attack can the pond scum take to smear a 6 year old?

Tell us, Conservative Yankee-dog, does he put away his toys? Sass his parents? Does he have a paste-eating habit?

Just what exactly does Jack Roberts have to hide?!

Bill also thinks Roberts looks like the “auto-pilot” Otto of Airplane II fame. Surely, he must be joking?

No he’s not…and don’t call him Shirley!

That noise you hear is exploding heads over at Daily Kos:

President Bush named federal appeals court judge John G. Roberts Jr. to a seat on the Supreme Court Tuesday, delighting Republicans while unsettling some Democrats with the selection of a young jurist with impeccable conservative credentials.

“John Roberts has devoted his entire professional life to the cause of justice,” Bush said in a prime-time announcement at the White House, “and is widely admired for his intellect his sound judgment and his personal decency.”

If confirmed by the Republican-controlled Senate, the 50-year-old Roberts would succeed retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, who has long been a swing vote on a court divided narrowly on issues such as abortion, affirmative action, states’ rights and the death penalty.

If people never say anything else good about Bush 50 years from now, they’ll say that the man had some major league gonads. All the talk over the last few weeks about Bush losing his mandate and already being a lame duck just went out the window. He’s slapped the left across the face and thrown down the gauntlet daring them to be obstructionists.

I’m sure they’ll oblige.

The fact is that this choice is armegeddon for the left. Roberts is on record in favor of overturning Roe and for every left wing political group that matters, this would be absolute catastrophe. The reason? Not because abortions would stop, because they wouldn’t. But the catastrophe would be that it would force these groups to fight 50 different fights in 50 different states rather than fighting one big fight in Washington. As the abortion battle moves to where it should have been all along – the state legislatures – some states will allow it, some won’t, and some will probably leave it up to local communities as to whether or not to allow it. The rules governing abortions will also vary from state to state with some rules being restrictive and others not.

This is how it should have been all along. Only when the people feel they have a voice in decisions like this – not the very personal decision of whether or not to abort a child – but the political decisions that set down rules to govern people’s live.

Is there a chance that Roe would be completely overturned and all abortions made illegal? I would place those chances at zero. The body of law that has grown up around Roe is too intertwined with other issues of privacy to completely jetison it. More likely, parts of Roe will be struck down which would allow states to regulate abortion.

As for other issues like federalism and property rights, if Roberts aligns himself with Scalia and Thomas on a regular basis, that would be four solid conservative votes (with Rhenquist or his successor) which means that one of the more moderate Republicans like Souter or Kennedy would hold the balance of power in the court. I’ll take my chances with Kennedy who has proven himself to be a thougtful jurist when it comes to issues like affirmative action and states rights.

So cinch it up and strap it down because Kansas just went bye bye. It’s going to get bloody and probably pretty dirty.

A few links for your reading pleasure.

Michele Malkin has her usual tremendous round-up of the big story.

The Captian was live blogging the announcement.

The boys over at Powerline have been all over the story and link to a good profile of Roberts.

Ace has some thoughts.

And Hugh Hewitt is extremely happy. Here in the midwest you can catch Hughe’s special show that will go on till midnight.

Polipundit: “Now watch the far left squirm.”

Summer in the Midwest has arrived with a vengeance as heat, humidity, and electricity bills are all on the rise. Also arriving, as if on cue, are what we used to call “The DC Follies.” It seems that as the temps rise in Washington, D.C. there is a direct correlation with the amount of cluelessness exhibited by its hot and bothered denizens.

The most obvious manifestation of this phenomena is the scandal-that-has-yet-to-be-named involving Karl Rove (has something of a clue), Valerie Plame (clueless, but cute), and Joe Wilson (clueless, not cute, and a lying SOB to boot). But the clueless cohort of Wilson-Plame has got nothin’ on the Washington press corps. As the Captain has pointed out on several occasions this week, both reporters and columnists who continue to lionize the lying lickspittle Wilson need to take a remedial reading course so that they can write the facts instead of the spin they concocted to protect the CIA errand boy and pass him off a some kind of “whistleblower.”

But to understand what the weather does to the inhabitants of the swamp along the Potomac, one need look no further than Republican Congressman Tom (nuke ‘em all and let God sort ‘em out). Tancredo’s completely clueless remarks about what the US should do if hit by a terrorist nuke. His solution? Bomb Mecca! Not only does Tancredo’s cluelessness extend to a problem with “enemy identification” in that as of now, we are not at war with the Saudis but he also has a small problem with arithmetic in that he would seem to prefer having one billion angry Muslims as enemies rather than the relative handful we’re facing now. This brings to mind the old Russian joke about a potential war with China:

On the first day of the war, the Russians killed 50 million Chinese.
On the second day of the war, the Russians killed 100 million Chinese.
On the third day of the war, the Russians killed 200 million Chinese.
On the fourth day of the war, the Russisans surrendered.

So hats off to Tom Tancredo! The effort put forth to appear that clueless in public deserves recognition!

“‘Tis better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt.”
(Abraham Lincoln)
“I wonder if Honest Abe was thinking of Michael Moore when he said that.”
(Me)

Don Surber has one of those “Ripley Believe it or Not” posts that describes the new “environmentally friendly” building named for former KKK Kleagle Senator Robert Byrd. This is a really, really environmentally friendly structure.

Hey! The Gaijin Biker from Riding Sun has joined the Carnival! The MP From the Al Qaeda Party reveals BBC world affairs editor John Simpson to be the real clueless McCoy.

Remember Muqtada al-Sadr? You may recall he thought his Mahdi militia could take on the United States Marines in Najaf? You may also recall what a truly clueless idea that was. Giacomo of Joust the Facts has an interview with the moonbat that’s a must read.

Minh-Duc of State of Flux takes George Bush #41 to task for his “Policy of Shame” from 1991 where we abandoned the Shias to their fate following Gulf War I. Well written and a excellent points made.

Mr. Right at The Right Place writes of the far left’s favorite soap opera and why it should be canceled. Good thing I can still write “heh” although there appears to be a problem with “Ind**d.”

As the lovely Pamela from Atlas Shrugs points out, if the cluebats who put Live8 on would listen to Africans about what Africa needs, maybe they would have done a little bit more than just have a bunch of overpaid, overstuffed celebrities mug for the cameras.

Some “Torturous Investigating” at Willisms that takes on a favorite theme of moonbats that putting a thong on someone’s head is an egregious violation of human rights. I prefer issues of National Geographic – you know, the ones with pictures of island women from the 1960’s?

The Pirate’s Cove has the latest cluelessness from Hilliary. I hope for her sake that she’s leaving a trail of bread crumbs as she continues her quixotic journey from far left to the center. She’s still got a long way to go.

Gullyborg of Resistance is Futile has some water safety tips for Ted Kennedy gleaned from his home state’s website. Did anyone else snicker when Martini Boy complained about “waterboarding” at Gitmo?

The Maryhunter is in Hoboken today. That didn’t stop him from piling on Chuck Schumer for his change of heart in outing secret agents. There seems to be a lot of that going around lately.

Tom Bowler at Libertarian Leanings has the skinny on the “International Convention of Moonbats” or as it was curiously renamed “Campus Progress National Student Conference.” This is where Paul Begala uttered the immortal words “Republicans want to kill me!” No cure for that kind of cluelessness.

Evil Otto (instead of Pink Kitty who I originally gave attribution) at Machine Overlords has some pretty strong words for LA Times moonbat Joel Stein who not only likes to pose with dolls but also has some unkind words for Harry Potter. Stein should pick on someone whose intellect matches his own…like Barbie.

I’ve only got one question for Ferdy the Cat...How do you get your little paws around the microphone to do The Conservative Cat Podcast? I would hope that Bruce gives you a helping hand, although I realize the difficulty in training us dummy humans. Maybe if you gave him a cheeseball…

AJ at The Strata-Sphere gives us a glimpse at collectively speaking, the most clueless bunch of cluebats outside of Moveon; the United Nations. Can’t anybody add and subtract at the UN?

Van Helsing of Moonbattery has some strong words for Oliver Stone and his outer rim ideas about 9/11. I don’t mind so much a film about 9/11 as much as I think Stone will find some way to make it seem to have been our fault.

Mark Coffey at Decision ‘08 takes the nutty professor Juan Cole apart for being…well, nutty. Congratulations professor for being named “Jackass of the Week.” You certainly earned that one.

Beth at MVRWC has a leftard on the ropes for some idiocy about the Rovian kerfluffle. Besides attracting flies, the left’s constant preoccupation with excrement-laden insults makes one think that they’re all suffering from chronic diarrhea.

Two dogs at Mean Ole Meany takes on the splodeydopes who think that laws were broken in outing Mrs. Wilson. I guess some people think Vanity Fair should be marked “classified.”

Fiesty Republican Whore is walking the internet streets again and guess what she’s found? Pornography! Of course, our intrepid whore is just jealous because Hillary found it first.

He’s baaaack! The “Junior Senator from Massachusetts” and Cluebat Hall of Famer John Kerry has once again made our “A” list of clueless cads. Via Raven comes this excellent fisking by Flight Pundit of Kerry’s rant against Rove.

How clueless was Mahdi Obeidi, Saddam’s nuclear Dr. Frankenstein? Read Cao of Cao’s blog and her post on Obedei’s fear and you’ll get an understanding of how near a thing – a matter of a few years once the sanctions were lifted – Saddam’s nuke ambitions became a reality.

Harvey at Bad Example has a suggestion for how to target Islamist scum like Professor Tariq Ramadan who believes the attack on London was justified. At least, as Harvey points out, we don’t have any problem in enemy identification when it comes to people like the professor. “It’s the quiet ones we have to worry about.”

Jay at Stop the ACLU has a project we can all get behind. The moonbats at ACLU think that child porn is just fine and that we should have more of it. That would be the consequences of legalizing it I should think.

TEB submits an article from The Wall Street Journal that highlights some really clueless quotes from Time Inc. Editor in Chief Norman Pearlstine in which he complains about being criticized in “broad brush strokes.” Quoth TEB: “This poor gentleman receives just a stroke from the broad brush that he and his ilk have been slopping with for years, and we’re supposed to feel sorry for him?” Indeed.

Ogre at Ogre’s Politics and Views has some interesting “facts” about the North Carolina Legislature. Attention all you hyped up federalists out there! Please read and then tell me if you’re really all that gung ho for “states rights.”

Northstar at The People’s Republic of Seabrook takes the Bush Administration to task for stonewalling on the Rovian mess. Oh, if walls could talk what interesting things we could have heard in Rove’s office when talking with Matt Cooper of Time.

Mr. Satire catches the “Reality Based Community” engaging in a little unreal speculation involving ghosts. Frankly, I thought the ideological split on this issue would have been the other way around.

The votes were cast last week in the weekly Watcher’s Council’s best post contest and the winner in the Council category was a great read by Jimmie at The Sundries Shack entitled I Despair. Second place went to Dymphna’s post at Gates of Vienna called A Functional Philosophical Structure Must Have an Understanding of Evil.

In the non-Council category, Winds of Change with their excellent flash presentation on terrorism finished in the top spot. Neptunus Lex and Rythmns Part 8 finished in the runner up position.

If you’d like to participate in the Watcher’s Council vote, go here and follow instructions.