A Couple o' Random Thoughts Regarding Leaky Libby:
On the Bush-Cheney-Libby Confluence:
Anonymous Liberal over at Glenn Greenwald's place is right: something doesn't add up here. Here's the exact quote from the court document filed by Patrick Fitzgerald: "Defendant's participation in a critical conversation with Judith Miller on July 8...occurred only after the Vice President advised that the President specifically had authorized defendant to disclose certain information in the NIE." So Libby never heard it from Bush, only that Cheney said that Bush said so.
Now here's Cheney back in February, talking about shooting faces and leaked secrets with Fox "News" host Brit Hume: "There is an executive order that specifies who has classification authority, and obviously focuses first and foremost on the President, but also includes the Vice President." This was in response to Hume asking Cheney if he had ever declassified material "unilaterally." So Cheney was asserting that he had the power to classify and declassify material without the President's "okay." By the way, the executive order itself says that the Vice President may do the classification voodoo dance "in the performance of executive duties." In other words, Cheney's own words imply that he could have given Libby the go-ahead without Bush's approval and remained in the realm of "legal" (especially considering that the White House is asserting that the President can't really "leak" anything, an absurdist defense discussed below). Perhaps someone can connect these magical dots.
The Rude Pundit believes this at the bottom: Cheney's a lying piece of shit and the President is a rube and an idiot of titanic proportions (fuck all those people who say, "No, he's really not that dumb"). Either Cheney outright lied to Libby about Bush giving the thumbs-up or the conversation went something like this: Dick Cheney slithered into the Oval Office and said, "George, listen, there's some shit I'm gonna get Scooter to do. You don't give a happy ratfuck, right?" And the President said it was fine, whatever, lemme play more Madden. So Bush "knew" in the sense that he was told, but "knowing" and "Bush-knowing" is a little like the difference between telling your husband you love him while lying in bed awake together or while he's in a coma.
On the President Not Being Able To "Leak":
Let's say, and why not, that you are a dopehead living in Amsterdam and you are one ganja-smokin' motherfucker. You wake and bake; you do a three-toke lunch; you head over to one of the many fine, fine "coffeeshops" every evening to meet up with hookah-suckin' friends to get toasted, toasted, nice 'n roasted on the latest greenhouse-grown organic shit. And it's all cool, man, 'cause pot's legal in Amsterdam. But let's say you run a website that's specifically targeting Americans in America, tellin' 'em not to smoke pot. In fact, the website is all about how bad it is, how it should not only remain criminalized, but the penalties oughta be more severe, how smokin' marijuana is a gateway drug, even though you've never found yourself suckin' a glass crack pipe or stickin' needles in your arm.
Let's say that eventually you are outed, that someone says you are, in fact, a number one stoner, not the model of drug free living you advocate. Now, the proper response would be to hang your head in shame as you are beaten with sticks like a rabid cur, chased down the street until you disappear over the horizon. But, no. Instead, you simply state that no, you are not like American dopesters 'cause it's legal for you. You never broke the law, unlike all those fuckin' tokers in the USA.
When "senior White House officials" declare that President Bush can't "leak" classified material because he, in fact, is in charge of declassifying it, despite having said repeatedly that Bush would take any leakers in his administration, rip out their tongues and shove them up their own assholes, well, shit, it's still time to break out the sticks and clear the road for the horizon's beckoning.
