[ExI] plamegate: the plot thickens

[spike]

> Richard Loosemore
...
> Subject: Re: [ExI] plamegate: the plot thickens
> 
> spike wrote:
...
> > 
> > Notice the similarity to Keith Henson's case...
> > We have here two clear cases where the courts are being used for 
> > something other than what they are intended, as dealing out 
> political punishment.
> > 
> > spike
> 
> Spike,
... 
> What that means, here, is that we need to look at Libby's 
> actions and statements...  
> He was convicted of making a false statement in the context 
> of a situation that screamed of massive deception by himself 
> and many others...


Ah, I see where this goes, and it scares me.  The church of Scientology did
not like the fact that alt.religion.scientology even existed at all.  There
were a number of critics on that site that said things Co$ leadership didn't
like.  Many of the comments were made by people who are judgment proof, as
they owned nothing.  Finally the settled on Keith as a focal point to go
after.

Similarly Libby wasn't really the one they wanted.  I, you and others get
the feeling the trial was really about the decision to go to war in Iraq.
The problem is that Libby didn't make that decision.  So they went after a
theory that he was covering for some whitehouse leaker by saying he didn't
remember who told him Mrs. Wilson's identity as an undercover CIA agent and
that she was married to Ambassador Wilson.  Now we learn that it was Mrs.
Wilson herself that revealed that relationship.  We learn that Libby's story
that he couldn't recall who told him is now very believable, since a lot of
people knew it from the 2002 memo.  He thought it general knowledge, again
very plausible.

Even the jurists commented that they didn't have the right person on trial.
This whole trial was not really about Libby, it was about Bush.  Libby did
not make the decision to go to war.  He didn't leak Plame's identity.  The
jury convicted an innocent man.

Your line of reasoning scares me, for it reminds me of Samantha's repeated
warnings.  Using a court system as a blunt object with which to bludgeon
enemies is a Nazi tactic.  We have two apparent cases of that right before
us: Libby and Henson.


>  The "massive deception" could never, as I 
> say, be evaluated and proved in toto...

Oh?  Then there was no case worthy of a court of law.  


> but it is there, and to 
> anyone looking at that context his false statement was 
> clearly part of a larger picture...

That "false statement" is looking true now.  By the reasoning given, that
makes the "larger picture" look similarly true.

 
> Turning now to Plame.  Her "false" statement was completely 
> isolated, with very little impact or relation to the context...

Looks to me like an attempt to hang someone in the Bush administration for
something her own husband actually did.  After the Novak column identified
Plame as a "CIA agent," Mr. Plame went running around screaming that someone
had identified her as a "secret agent."  But notice that the magazine
article did not say she was a secret agent, Mr. Plame did that.  Wilson
outed his own wife a year after she outed herself.  

...
> 
> This, I think, is why the scales are not equal.  Plame 
> deserves the benefit of the doubt:  Libby does not...

If one wishes to advance this argument, I am back to the same place the
jurist concluded: the wrong person was on trial here.  Libby didn't make the
decision to go to war, Bush did.

...
> 
> Sadly, I also see the analogy to Keith Henson differently, 
> and in a quite massive way.  The Libby case was the tip of an 
> iceberg that was analogous to the massive use of money, power 
> and influence by a powerful force to crush two individuals 
> (Wilson and Plame-Wilson) who were standing in the way of an 
> attempt to start an unjustified war...

But Libby wasn't the tip of that iceburg, Bush was.  Libby didn't do this.
The comments for which he was accused of lying sure sound true now.  For a
conviction to be legitimate, there must be a specific charge and proof of
guilt.  That is the way our court system is supposed to work, altho I see
that it doesn't always. 

Regarding a powerful force to crush two individuals (Wilson and
Plame-Wilson) who were standing in the way, etc.  When Wilson returned from
Niger, the man didn't even write a report.  How important is a trip with so
few apparent findings that it wasn't worth writing a report?  To me and
others, that sounds as if there were no findings.  

There was no massive conspiracy to crush Wilson and Plame.  They were
nothing, microscopic.  It baffles me that Wilson would assume everyone in
the white house was talking about him, when the silly goof didn't even write
a report!  He wasn't the right person, an ambassador, not an intelligence
agent, wrong color so he couldn't blend in, shoule we be surprised didn't
find anything?  Sending him was a big mistake because it tipped off the
involved parties that someone was snooping around. 

>  Keith is similarly the 
> victim of money, power and influence by a powerful force 
> trying to crush him.
> 
> With respect, 
> Richard Loosemore.

Aint that the truth.  They couldn't find any one point to convict him for
threats, so they convicted him for something I didn't even know was a crime.
How many here knew that "interfering with a religion" was illegal?  In my
wildest dreams I never would have guessed that the first amendment right to
free speech would not cover picketing in front of a church.

Co$ likely did accomplish what they wanted however: to intimidate those on
the internet newsgroups, to watch themselves or face similar consequences.
It worked, didn't it?  We choose our words carefully even here on this
outspoken forum, knowing that Co$ers are likely watching.

spike