[TheDude]

Jeez, no thread about goings-on in DC? Like Valerie Plame filing suit against Cheney and Rove for her "outing." Some think the Impeachement ball is rolling faster and faster now, will it go all the way? Then there's all of those emails about the AGs, which ones will be loyal "Bushies" [sic]? Quite the tempest. Maybe time for that false flag to go up, too...the terrorist claiming responsibility for everything from JFK to Madrid was rich stuff.

[manu]

I was totally shocked that someone in the "Company" would get screwed like that. They do such good "work" all over the world. Let's get real, they are toilet paper for the elite.

[gg3]

Some of us are following this closely on other sites, for example www.dailykos.com has many threads up about this.

In a nutshell, Plame's status was covert (NOC), the present Director of CIA testified to that under oath on Friday, Plame herself did likewise. The information that she worked for CIA was classified: the identities of covert CIA case officers and agents are top secret.

NOC, Non-Official Cover, is the most highly secret status within CIA, because these are Americans who do not have diplomatic immunity overseas: they can be arrested, tortured, and executed by foreign governments.

The fact that she did rotations back to Langley don't change that, any more than a General is not still a General when he's rotated out of a combat zone.

Whoever initiated that leak is liable for at least a felony violation of the Agent Identities act, and since it occurred during wartime in a region of conflict, charges of treason could also be brought.

Bush claimed he would get to the bottom of this and see to it that whoever was involved would be fired and prosecuted fully.

We are still waiting.

And yes, there are almost certainly impeachable offenses involved, even if one doesn't count the treason charge.

Meanwhile it looks as if Alberto Torquemada might get thrown under the bus this week over the Federal Attorney scandal.

[jboogy]

I liked the head of white house security saying that the Bush administration did zero internal investigating after her identity had been blown. Remember the decider saying he was going to get to the bottom of this and punish whoever leaked her identity?I guess that's been proven to be a big pile of sh*t.I've lost the ability to be shocked by anything this administration does. Alberto apparently directly intervened in an investigation that he was going to be one of the subjects of by convincing the decider to deny security clearances to the people that would be investigating him about the FISA,wiretapping mojangle. Those damn pesky e-mails , Doh!Gonzales is toast. Doesn't a new AG have to be approved or voted on by the senate?If so that could be real interesting.

[Roy]

Occaisionally I tune into AM talk radio. Right wing hosts are all that's available here, except for a very weak Air America station out of Asheville.

Anyway, Rush and his guest were discussing Valerie Plame. They were saying that she wasn't covert, and that the clerk at her grocery store knew who she was, ergo, the idea that a crime was committed is merely Democratic scheming to hide their own crimes.

I just about spit up my lunch upon hearing this discussion

Station WORD out of Spartanburg SC. Like THE Word of God word.

Word up......

This is what the majority of talk radio listeners in the US hear. Air America, while informative, is only available in select cities and not much at all in the Southeastern US.'

Bullshit.
.

[Newsseeker]

My mom is more obsessed with this than I am with PO which is saying a lot. The people at firedoglake are rabid with anticipation....

[Eli]

Just to stir the pot and work my way towards fusion.

There is no way in heck that Bush will ever be impeached over the Valerie Plame issue.

The democratic left may think they will get Bush's head on a pike but the Senators like Hillary and others will never let it happen.

Politically it is a dumb idea, the dems will come off as being run by the far left. The would be a serious risk for the dems and would lesson their chances in the next election.

I do think we might see Rove or Cheney resign over the next couple of years just because with less than two years left it won't matter much.

[TheDude]

I don't think it's merely the contention of the "far left" that these people should be removed from office. There are plenty of disgruntled voters out there if you haven't heard.

[gg3]

The far left?! Eli are you smoking pot without a prescription? The far left hates the CIA. The far left could care less how many NOCs got outed. When I was in college the far left liked to go around outing case officers, and that is exactly what led to the Agent Identities Protection Act.

Look, outing a NOC in wartime is arguably treason.

And not only that.

Someone in the White House leaked that the US had successfully broken high-level Iranian diplomatic and military encryption systems, and Iran found out the very next day. To give you an idea how secret that kind of thing is, the fact that we broke the Axis crypto during WW2 was not declassified until the mid 1970s, thirty years later! Yet to this day, no one has been prosecuted for leaking the Iranian crypto secret.

Last time someone leaked our crypto secrets, they went up the river for life on espionage charges. I forgot the names but it was a famous case, it was all over the media at the time.

If it was up to me, I would bring impeachment action on the basis of the high crime of treason, two counts: Iran crypto, and Plame.

As for Rush & Co saying she wasn't a NOC: Call them up one of these days and ask if a General ceases to be a General when he comes back from a combat rotation for a stateside rotation. The answer is obviously No. Same case here: a NOC is still a NOC when s/he comes back for a stint at Langley. (And let's not have any NOC-NOC jokes, OK?:-)

Her supervisor also testified under oath that she was indeed a NOC throghout the entire period in question.

Now who do you want to believe? A senior member of CIA giving testimony under oath, or a radio blabbermouth who evaded the draft and later got hooked on narcotics?

[Eli]

Of course there are many unhappy voters but the idea that the Senate and the House are going to impeach Bush is a joke. There is no way that the Libby Plame thing will ever amount to impeachment.

The Scooter Libby thing is done, he was served up and Rove and Cheney are fine. Valerie Plame was brought out because she looks good on camera but it is old news, the Dems are just dragging it out because they can they are just putting on a show for their peeps. They want the appearance of due diligence.

Bush is a short timer and the Dems have a very good chance of actually winning the next election in spite of themselves.

And another thing is that there is just not enough time to start the impeachment of Bush. These Senators need to be out on the campaign trail not stuck in the Senate.