In some ways, I feel badly for Marc Ash, Executive Director of Truthout.Org.
Thanks to Jason Leopold, he finds himself in quite a pickle. You may recall last May 13th that Mr. Leopold wrote in Truthout that Karl Rove had been indicted, that he had told the President that he would resign, that his lawyer Mr. Luskin met for 15 hours with Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald the previous Friday, and that God didn’t make little green apples and it don’t rain in Indianapolis in the summertime…
All of this was to be splashed across the front pages of America’s newspapers and become fodder for the screamers on cable news within 48 hours. When the 48 hours came and went, we heard from Truthout that it must have been “business hours.” And when the 48 business hours came and went, I was half expecting the folks at Truthout to tell us that they had it wrong, it was actually doggie hours Fitzgerald was working on.
Needless to say, Leopold and Truthout became something of a laughingstock on the right with Jeff Goldstein satirizing the situation unmercifully. (Yeah, I know. The words “Goldstein” and “mercy” used together where a lefty loon like Leopold is concerned is a little farfetched.)
Then, in what has to be considered one of the most striking examples of the Gods piteously toying with us mortals, playing us for the fools we truly are, the night before Fitzgerald informed us that Fitzmas had been cancelled due to his refusal to indict The Evil One, Marc Ash wrote in Truthout that they were standing by their man Jason and that we were right and the whole rest of the world was nuts.
They based this defiant conclusion on their anonymous sources who were insisting that Rove indeed was being measured for the orange jumpsuit and a curious “sealed indictment” (whether it is an indictment is a matter of dispute) that came for the same grand jury that Fitzgerald has been manipulating (as all prosecutors do) for months.
I would have loved to have seen the look on Ash’s face less than 24 hours later when Rove’s attorney announced that Fitzgerald was not going to indict his client. Again, Truthout was left with egg on its face and its bare bottom exposed for all the world to see. One would think these developments would bring a quick and contrite mea culpa from Ash and Truthout. After all, this would be the responsible thing to do, something that any publication with an ounce of integrity would do in a heartbeat.
I guess that lets out Truthout.
In a series of startling development yesterday and last night, after a week of silence on the matter, Marc Ash came out with both barrels blazing, insisting that his anonymous sources were right, that Truthout was right, that Leopold was right, and that the facts themselves were somehow wrong.
He granted an interview to Justin Rood of TPM Muckracker, a much more responsible lefty journal, and insisted, like Kevin Bacon in Animal House, that “all is well:”
So does Truthout stand behind Leopold’s reporting—or does it “defer. . . to the nation’s leading publications”?Ash doesn’t seem to think it’s an either/or proposition. “There is a perception here that Jason misreported facts, didn’t report facts accurately, wasn’t candid with his editors. None of that is true,” he told me. Right now, the publication is “reviewing all our sources. . . and trying to confirm, confirm, confirm.”
One would think before going to print with the biggest story of the young century that a responsible publication would have already tried to “confirm, confirm, confirm” but, hey! That’s just me. I mean, I could have gone with my bat boy story a couple of weeks ago but couldn’t confirm that the little bugger was actually related to James Carville. Looks like Weekly World News scooped me again.
Also in the interview with Mr. Rood, Ash made the rather tactful assertion that his staff is in hysterics:
“We’re suffering from hysteria here,” Ash said of the reaction to the mainstream press accounts which appear to contradict Leopold’s reporting. “And I don’t find that attractive and I don’t find it in the best interests of our readers. We are expressly endeavoring to mitigate hysteria,” said Ash.
One wonders if by “hysteria” Ash means that Truthout’s employees are rolling around on the floor laughing uncontrollably or shaking with palsied fits at the prospect of actually having to go out and get a job somewhere.
And don’t you just love “endeavoring to mitigate” the panic? Reminds me of the scene in the film Outlaw Josey Wales” where Chief Dan George playing the Indian Lone Watie was describing a meeting between the President of the United States and the Cherokee Chiefs who had come to Washington to negotiate. Watie says that the President told them to “Endeavor to persevere:”
LONE WATIE: We thought about it for a long time, “Endeavor to persevere.” And when we had thought about it long enough, we declared war on the Union.
Ash has apparently decided to declare war based on this defiant missive he published last night:
After spending the past month retracing our steps and confirming facts, we’ve come full circle. Our sources continue to maintain that a grand jury has in fact returned an indictment. Our sources said that parts of the indictment were read to Karl Rove and his attorney on Friday, May 12, 2006. Last week, we pointed to a sealed federal indictment, case number “06 cr 128,” which is still sealed and we are still pointing to it. During lengthy conversations with our sources over the past month, they reiterated that the substance of our report on May 13, 2006, was correct, and immediately following our report, Karl Rove’s status in the CIA leak probe changed. In summary, as we press our investigation we find indicators that more of our key facts are correct, not less.That leaves the most important question: If our sources maintain that a grand jury has returned an indictment – and we have pointed to a criminal case number that we are told corresponds to it – then how is it possible that Patrick Fitzgerald is reported to have said that ‘he does not anticipate seeking charges against Rove at this time?’ That is a very troubling question, and the truth is, we do not yet have a definitive answer. We also continue to be very troubled that no one has seen the reported communication from Fitzgerald to Rove’s attorney Robert Luskin, and more importantly, how so much public judgment could be based on a communication that Luskin will not put on the table. Before we can assess the glaring contradiction between what our sources say and what Luskin says Fitzgerald faxed to him, we need to be able to consider what was faxed – and in its entirety.
What appears to have happened is that – and this is where Truthout blundered – in our haste to report the indictment we never considered the possibility that Patrick Fitzgerald would not make an announcement. We simply assumed – and we should not have done so – that he would tell the press. He did not. Fitzgerald appears to have used the indictment, and more importantly, the fear that it would go public, to extract information about the Plame outing case from Rove.
Mark Coffey, in his usual calm, collected, and understated manner, responds:
In other words – we weren’t wrong! We’re heroes! Don’t you see, you fools? It was us – we forced Rove’s hand! We control space and time! Bwwwaaaaahaaaaaaahaaaaaa! And you thought we would apologize! And how do we know? By relying on our original mistaken sources and a sealed case with contents we have no earthly way of knowing about! BWAAAAHAAAAAHAAAA!
Suckers…
Yeah, well…I think that covers most everything.
The sane left is a little more circumspect:
Truthout claims that their sources for this information are “career federal law enforcement and federal government officials.” Truthout also claims that their senior editors have confirmed all this with their sources. They’re not just relying on Jason Leopold.
Is this true? I don’t have a clue, but I figure I should pass along the latest scuttlebutt regardless. And for what it’s worth, there is one thing that makes me wonder if Rove is really in the clear: the fact that he refuses to make public the letter from Fitzgerald saying that he “does not anticipate seeking charges” against Rove at this time. Rove’s spokesman says they won’t release the letter because they have an agreement with Fitzgerald that they “wouldn’t disclose direct communications or any documents between his office and ours.” This is a pretty laughable excuse, and it’s hard not to wonder just what’s in that letter that they don’t want anyone to see.
I suppose following the orders of a Special Prosecutor not to release direct communications between his office and Rove’s attorney could be considered “laughable” if there was no possibility that by disobeying that order you could find yourself once again in the prosecutor’s sights. That would seem to include Kevin Drum in the laughing category but not Luskin or Rove.
Regardless, Drum points out that Truthout is relying on “career federal law enforcement and federal government officials” and not just Leopold. I would wager that somewhere in the mix of sources for Leopold’s article are Larry Johnson and/or Ray McGovern. Given the violent reaction that Johnson had to the news Rove would not be indicted as well as his assuring the left in the immediate aftermath of the May 13th article that all was well, that Fitzmas was on the way, one wonders whether or not Larry the Loon had a personal stake in that story being true.
While some on the left continue to “wait and see” about the Rove indictment until Fitzgerald makes a formal announcement, Ash actually upped the ante by stating that it is possible Rove flipped on Cheney:
Our sources provided us with additional detail, saying that Fitzgerald is apparently examining closely Dick Cheney’s role in the Valerie Plame matter, and apparently sought information and evidence from Karl Rove that would provide documentation of Cheney’s involvement. Rove apparently was reluctant to cooperate and Fitzgerald, it appears, was pressuring him to do so, our sources told us.
In other words, Fitzy dangled the sealed indictment in front of Rove and threatened him with it unless he rolled on Cheney.
Interesting speculation. That’s not what the original Truthout article said nor did the follow-up article mention it either. I guess in this case, third time’s the charm. And lest ye be unbelievers in this matter, I would like to point out that every responsible individual who has covered the Plame affair has said that it would be a huge stretch for Fitzy to go after Cheney. And the fact that Rove is still working at the White House would seem to indicate that either Cheney has a death wish or that once again, Ash is talking out of his nether regions.
This is actually sort of a sad story in a way. Marc Ash has been had. And he is either too stupid or too naive to see it. Or, he may know the story is wrong but is scrambling to save the reputation of himself and his publication.
If I were him, I wouldn’t worry about that. As long as he keeps up with the Bush-bashing, he’ll have a massive audience. For on the left, sometimes leaving the “Truthout” really doesn’t matter.
UPDATE
Can you stand more Goldstien?
Of course, I suppose I should mention, for purposes of full disclosure, that it is TruthOut who has exonerated itself—citing the accuracy of its own earlier reporting as proof that its earlier reporting was, in fact, completely accurate. But then, that’s just nitpicking, really—and we shouldn’t get hung up on the niceties of the reasoning when what is at stake here is speaking Truthiness to Power, namely, the now-confirmed (albeit not yet quite “confirmed†confirmed) revelations that Karl Rove is a fat-assed liar who drove his own mother to suicide and who flipped on Dick Cheney.
And when the world sees Evil Dick with a pair of teardrop tats lifting weights in a federal pen alongside those Enron bitches, Jason Leopold will laugh and laugh and laugh!
Given the proclivities of Mr. Leopold, perhaps he will be spotting for his new buddy Karl?
8:57 am
So there’s not just a pony under all that manure, but a unicorn?
9:12 am
[...] Rcik Moran details Leopold’s repeated versions of the purple unicorn sighting. [...]
9:53 am
[...] Rick Moran is funny as always: Ash doesn’t seem to think it’s an either/or proposition. “There is a perception here that Jason misreported facts, didn’t report facts accurately, wasn’t candid with his editors. None of that is true,†he told me. Right now, the publication is “reviewing all our sources. . . and trying to confirm, confirm, confirm.†[...]
11:21 am
No, actually can’t really stand much of Goldstein in any case. Smarmy snark is not particularly enlightening or interesting.
Seems to me that TO is putting out a coherent story. Rove was indicted, and the indictment was used to pressure him into further cooperation, at which point it was dropped. As you yourself admit – interesting speculation. The only real public data point we have to work with is that any indictment of Rove seems not to have been brought to fruition, and that its over for him (based only on the word of his lawyer, with no access to the document). We really have no idea what has actually been going on behind the scenes.
Some things seem undeniable. Rove did not tell the truth to the grand jury originally. No real doubt about that. Fitz spent a long time dealing with this – including four more grand jury appearances by Rove. No doubt about that. A possible indictment of Rove seems also to have been a very distinct possibility – the enormous sigh of relief from the WH this past week seems to prove that Rove was really really in very real danger. In this context, the TO line of this past week does not seem absurd. In fact, it seems more likely to be accurate than the party line of the Republicans, which is that somehow Rove is “exonerated”. He may have spun and cooperated himself out of trouble, but he hardly emerges looking very good from all this – except of course to those who value him for his political skills, and have no interest in questioning his character or methods.
11:31 am
You just don’t get it, do you. There is no “public data point” in any way shape or form that could possibily lead one to conclude that Rove was indicted and then the charges withdrawn. Non. Zero. Zilch. And TO was not “speculating” they were reporting it as FACT. My comment about “interesting speculation” had to do with the laughable idea that Cheney had any exposure in this case – something even Murray Waas says is ridiculous.
Face it. This is a story made up or wildly exaggerated by their “sources.” Of course Fitzy was considering indicting Rove for forgetting one fricking email out of how many goddamn thousands he gets. The guy is stuck. He has three years of investigations and all he’s got is Scooter Libby? And absolutely nothing on anyone when it comes to “outing” Plame.
This entire investigation is going to peter out and fade away. And btw, give me one good reason Fitzy wouldn’t correct Luskin’s contention that Rove is in the clear? You can’t because there aren’t any. And why would Luskin lie about it? He’d never work in DC again if he did. No one would trust him with anything more than jaywalking cases.
No. Face it, Tano. Your heroes at TO have feet of clay. And they’ve broken their promise to out their sources. Hell, the big lefty blogs are even backing away from them.
11:55 am
When it comes to Rove’s indictment, hope springs eternal for the Left. The only thing they are optimistic about, actually.
12:15 pm
You are right, Rick. “This is actually sort of a sad story in a way.” It is sad that the far left depends upon the likes of Leopold and Ash for their day of reckoning.
Right now the only way TO can rectify whatever is left of its reputation is to “out” their own sources. And what is the chance that will happen? So long as TO can keep the looney left on the edge of their seats drooling over whatever happens next, they will drag this story out.
12:35 pm
“TruthOut: That’s Where We Keep It”
2:18 pm
Rick,
Rove’s problem did not arise from “forgetting one fricking email”. He was not asked whether or not he recieved a particular email. He was asked whether he spoke to a particular person. The email was simply evidence that he had, when he claimed not to. This can only be construed as a problem of “forgetting an email” if you take the position that he should be free to make up any story he wanted to for the grand jury, taking care only not to run afoul of any evidence that might be out there. In that sense, yeah, he screwed up by forgetting the existence of evidence that contradicted his story. But the real problem is with the story.
As to public data-points. I specifically said that the data point was that ANY indictment (I meant any possible indictment – no assertion that one actually existed) didnt come to frutition. Thats true.
Nothing that has come out so far contradicts TO’s explanation. All we know is that Fitz is not anticipating bringing charges against Rove, based on an assertion by Rove’s lawyer. Thats it. Everything else is speculation. TO’s indictment – dropped indictment story is no less plausible (in fact probably more plausable) than your claim that their story was “made up”. It would be pretty bizarre for career officials to completely make up a story like that – what would be the point? If they did make it up, then clearly that would come out eventually, and they would be exposed as gross liars. What would be the temporary benefit that would outweigh this inevitable consequence? And why would Leopold make it up? What would be the benefit of a few days of buzz over a scoop if it were obvious that the “scoop” would be exposed, because it, in fact, never existed?
As to your questions. Fitz has a (very sensible) policy of not commenting on anything going on in the media, until and unless he has his own reasons for doing so. And I am not claiming that Luskin is lying about the fax. I am prepared to believe the basic claim – that Fitz does not anticipate bringing charges. The issue is not about some claim that Luskin is lying about the fact that no indictment is forthcoming. The non-indictment of Rove is actually consistent with TO’s story. Luskin’s account of the fax, and TO’s story could both be true.
TO people are not “my heros”. One does not have to choose up teams and go to bat for them no matter what. I am just trying to make sense of all this like a normal person (differentiating myself from partisans on either side). I find your tone to be not all that different from the tone of advocates on the other side. You seem to have no interest in what actually went down, just scoring points against people you percieve to be on the other side.
Libby lied – there seems to be a pretty strong case for that, so I don’t really understand the sympathetic noises I hear about him. Rove didnt tell the truth either, and the convenient forgetfulness defense kinda stinks, to my nose. No doubt the lefties would love to bring these people down, whether they are actually guilty of anything or not. But the RWers I read all seem to want to protect these people, once again, whether or not they did anything wrong. Here is an idea. If the TO story is wrong, why not try to find out what really went down, in all the gory details?
2:44 pm
TruthOut = LiesIn
That’s the ticket
3:59 pm
Tano, what went down is really simple. Leopold wished for something to be true. So he “pushed the button” in order to make it so. He decided that if he could crank up the volume enough he could force the issue. It did not work.
Is it true? Is this what really happened? I don’t know but it is just as likely as anything you have put forward in your comments.
And if you really gotta know the gory details? Great. Have TO bring out their smoking guns and show them off. It is really that simple – Have TO reveal their sources.
4:03 pm
Sure, absolutely. I would love to know who TO’s sources were, and I certainly would expect them to reveal them if, in fact, this is the end of the story.
Your claims about Leopold dont seem quite plausable. How could he expect to “force the issue”? What issue could he force? Could he imagine somehow that he could force Fitz to indict Rove by claiming that he already did? Seems kinda absurd to me….
4:12 pm
“Seems kinda absurd to me….”
Just like all of your comments!
4:59 pm
SShiell,
Thanks for your insightful remarks. You’ve made a real contribution today…
5:38 pm
Tano, Thank You so very much. Too bad I can’t say the same for you! But you never know. Maybe you are just having a bad day. Or week. Or month – oh hell – maybe this whole year just hasn’t been all that good for you. You know, this could all be just a bad dream and in the morning you will wake up and find the headlines reading “Rove Indicted! Leopold Vindicated!”
Heh!
1:30 am
[...] Oh, man. Rick Moran’s post on the Truthout debacle is really quite good, so I hope he doesn’t take it the wrong way when I say that my favorite part of it was the link to the story proving a DNA link between James Carville and Bat Boy. Highlights from the Weekly World News piece: While outspoken Carville — nicknamed the “Ragin’ Cajun” — is famous for being hyper-aggressive, no one has questioned his place in the human species before. [...]
1:31 am
Thanks for the link to the story about the Bat Boy/Carville connection.
2:17 am
The Truth Is Out There
...
8:26 pm
For the record, Lone Waite states that it is the Secretary of the Interior, not the President who tells the chiefs to “Endeavor to perservere”.
“I’m an Indian alright but here in The Nations they call us the civilized tribes. They call us civilized because we are easy to sneak up on.
White men have been sneaking up on us for years.
They sneaked up on us and they told us we wouldn’t be happy.
They told us we would be happy in The Nations.
So they took away our tribal lands and sent us here.
I had a fine woman and two sons but they all died on the Trail of Tears.
I wore a frock coat to Washington before The War.
We wore them because we belonged to the five civilized tribes.
We dressed ourselves up like Abraham Lincoln.
We got to see the secretary of the interior.
He said, “Boy, you boys sure look civilized.”
He congratulated us and he gave us medals for looking so civilized.
We told him about how our tribal lands had been stolen and how our humans were dying.
When we finished he shook our hands and said “Endeavor to preserver!!”
They stood us in a line John Jumper, Chili McIntosh, Buffalo Hump, Jim Buckmark, and me, I am Lone Waite.
The newspapers took our picture and said, “Indians vow to endeavor to preserver.”
We thought about for a long time, endeavor to preserver, and when we had thought about it long enough, we declared war on the Union.”
Lone Waite, Indian chief – from “The Outlaw Jose Wales”