that means libby or the white house cannot be charged w/passing state secret to someone on the outside.
I think that is wrong. Any security clearance is restricted to a specific field or issue. There is always “need to know”. If you click that link I provided you will also see that we don´t know if she ever really had a clearance. Her press handlers on the ground in Iraq say she didn´t had one.

Posted by: b | Oct 16 2005 17:24 utc | 4

There is always a security clearance issued in order to get in close proximity to high govt officials, just for safety’s sake. Not everybody gets onto Air Force One. But that doesn’t mean you get told or get to read classified information. That’s a whole different ball game.

Posted by: Ensley | Oct 16 2005 17:55 utc | 6

Lurching Towards Bethlehem, Two-Footed
If you’re a fan of Nick Park and his Wallace and Gromit
claymation characters, then October was an epiphany of
entertainment for you, although it was saddening when the
carrot sign fell across the hood of Hop2It, both grotesquely
chewed and grotesquely evocative of what happens when
a big-time talent is subsumed by America’s dreamworks.
OK, it was a homage to Speilberg, but so out of character
for Parks, that it became almost his magnum opus, his
great and probably last work of any true originality. From
now on, Wallace and Grommit will be as hyper-squeal lip-
synched as Crusader Rabbit Meets Disney’s Animaniacs,
dark CGI legions voiced over by Hollywood actors de juer,
all pumped out every September with the latest dark plastic
gew-gaws from our MFN, the PRC.
Anyway, who cares…right?
The *real* media chew toy, of course, is Rove Meets Plame.
George Stephanopoulos was almost Limbauish in questioning
his pundits what Fitzgerald’s indictments would mean for
BushCo’s version of Joseph Goebbels. Hey, this is a truly
Geraldo Rivera moment for the US media.
If it can be said that every women seeks that one romantic
tragedy in her life, and every man seeks an heroic moment
of war and violence in his, then surely, every media pundit
lives for their 15-seconds of Watergate, their W-moment.
If you study martial arts of fencing, there’s a move called
a feint. Actually, a series of moves, a coup double,
for example, where you feint, seem to withdraw, and then
as your opponent moves in to attack, you attack again.
It’s tremendously effective, almost a jujitsu-ish strategy,
using the opponent’s own momentum to skewer them.
So too the US media. We’re going to hell in a handbasket,
Rumsfeld running his own black ops operation, while now
the CIA is creating even *another* layer of secret purvue, in
an era when more documents have been classified and
taken out of public view, than at any time in our Republic.
What the hell is going on?! Well, we don’t know, but we
sure can tell you that if Rove is indicted, he plans to resign,
or maybe, well, yeah, that’s a rumor. We’ve got nothing.
The emperor may have no clothes, but we’ve got no eyes
to see it . The US media kaboodle, deaf, dumb and blind.
So in my mind, Rove Meets Plame is a non-starter, really,
a coup double to distract US from the real attacks.
So, let’s lurch off towards Iraq…ready?
“Kicking the can down the road,” George put it, describing
the last minute changes to the pending Iraqi constitution,
which allow amendments under a new Iraqi authority to be
elected thereafter. Effectively neutralizing the vote’s impact,
and validity, and why are we spending $B *every day* to
perpetuate this bloodbath?! 19 of our kids died last week,
and hundreds of Iraqi’s, and $7B went up in smoke.
The real news was in Syria, but the US media (and thanks
to Rove), the US CIA has no information gatherers there.
We’ll read in Haaretz, like the rest of the non-Arabic world.
Balanced, if a bit ethno-centric, but it’s the best we’ve got,
and Haaretz is telling US, hey, 40 more *years* of this shit!
There is no progress, and no end-game. To paraphrase
a much wiser writer, we are financing this fiasco in Iraq
with deficit borrowing from China and Saud, a deficit which
will either bankrupt US and our children’s children, or leave
US as perpetual indentured servants to them, one a martial
communist economy, the other an elite martial aristocracy.
“Two-blocked”, how we used to describe it. “High-centered.”
As graceless as a two-footed ballet dancer.
So let’s move on then…Peak Oil.
Meanwhile, half-way around the world from House of Saud
and the Star of China, Venezuala’s Hugo Chavez is warning
all of US that every dollar we spend at Wal-Mart for Chinese
dark plastic gew-gaws, is going right back into purchase of
strategic resources in Australia and South America, and that
we are on the threshhold of Peak Oil, all of US, rich and poor.
(Gew-gaws which you may have seen the news have been
found cancerous by US EPA … then buried below the fold.)
Hubris? Marketing strategy? I don’t think so. Venezuala,
and every other oil exporting country, is pumping as fast
as they can: http://tinyurl.com/7l6j9 http://tinyurl.com/ahxv4
Wouldn’t you think that George (either one) could find a
moment out of his busy lineup to talk about oil futures?
Nada. Toto por nada.
Bush’s call for voluntary cutbacks in personal energy use
fell on a blind US media and our deaf ears. Let the poor
eat PRC plastic, they’re not getting any of my gasoline.
And yet even as Bush is tasking US with cutbacks, he’s
cutting back on funding for alternative energy research.
His call a charade, our response a junkie tell-tale, the
winds are rapidly going out of our Ship of State’s sails.
But if you read the pundits, first one will tell you that
rental vacancies are at an all-time high, and therefore
higher interest rates can only plunge US into a housing
crash, while another pundit cries, hold, rental vacancies
are at their extreme shortness, and REIT’s are the single
best investment vehicle for 4Q05, as deficits are falling!
[SFX: Humming, while flipping finger against lips.]
So my tribute to our Man of the Year, that Road Warrior,
that man about town, Mad Max. “In the post-apocalyptic
American wasteland, a cynical drifter agrees to help a
great, gasoline poor, nation escape a band of terrorists.”
And homage to Nick Park, for entertaining US all, richly.
“”They’re all bills. We shall have to economise, Gromit.”
Economise, or insurrectionary anarchism will become
inevitable, as our Constitutional Rights are dissolved
under Neo-Con’s “national emergency” martial laws.
http://tinyurl.com/a3ud6
Or would you prefer the soup de juer instead, monsieur?

Posted by: tante aime | Oct 16 2005 18:32 utc | 8

We’re not even sure Libby was cleared to know if Plame was undercover.

Posted by: crone | Oct 16 2005 19:40 utc | 10

Annie,
you should know that holding a Secret clearance does not give you access to all secrets. you must also have what is known as “Need to Know”. IF Miller is only a journalist she certainly does not have the need to know that Mrs Wilson is/was an undercover agent which means that whoever gave her this information committed treason.
This kind of information regarding spooks and their work would most likely be classifed as Top Secret SCI (Sensitive Compartmented Information)

Posted by: dan of steele | Oct 16 2005 19:57 utc | 12

@ dan of steel, i don’t think that miller is ONLY a journalist DoD securiity clearance

There is one enormous journalism scandal hidden in Judith Miller’s Oct. 16th first person article about the (perhaps lesser) CIA leak scandal. And that is Ms. Miller’s revelation that she was granted a DoD security clearance while embedded with the WMD search team in Iraq in 2003.

Posted by: annie | Oct 16 2005 21:49 utc | 14

@annie, Please excuse me for inserting myself into this “Clearance” issue because nothing surprises me anymore- what normally wouldn’t happen does seem to popup in these times. The other thing that seems to popup often is misunderstandings of specific terms which lead to exaggerations. Until I read some authoritative source’s info on Miller having some Super-clearance (access to info not otherwise granted) I’ll be skeptical.
To say the obvious- when Miller acted as an embedded media-type she had limited access to Secret information concerning the movement of the unit she was attached to, had limited information about mission objectives, and probably was allowed to attend some ‘general’ briefings about daily mission objectives and the results thereof. If that is what Miller is refering to as having some clearance for SECRET, then it was probably understandable. IF it refers to Miller being fed, or having access to, ‘other’ Secret information then there is a BIG PROBLEM lurking in the weeds.
I believe its the former, not the later! Film at Eleven.
Soandso

Posted by: Soandso | Oct 16 2005 22:06 utc | 16

what pat has said is clear & implacable
you are are either inside the operation or outside it
i share pat’s unequivocal sense of whom ms miller is or was

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Oct 16 2005 22:26 utc | 18

To me the reference to Aspens with their roots connected signifies that Judy is part of the ‘gang’. It may not be the CIA though but she is a ‘plant’ in the Times from some alphabet soup agency.
Who it is is a pretty irrelevant distraction really because when we get caught up in the internecine politics of the self important intelligence industry, the only winners are the lamer ‘spooks’ trying to distract the public from seeing exactly how incompetent,wasteful and destructive they are.
It would be interesting to know whether Judy was ‘topped up’ in Aspen by her handlers. What I call topping up ranges from reintroctrination in the organisation’s ethos and the person’s committment to the “team” for those who are genuinely feared to be slipping the leash to specific intructions and incentives to deal with a known problem. With Judy it was probably the latter.
Whatever it was intelligence agencies are fond of these ‘triggers’ to keep operatives on the ‘same page’ as everyone else and to remind an operative of a specific set of instructions or a strategy that they have been ‘indoctrinated’ in. It is particularly useful to drop a key phrase when there is a concern that opponents may be able to get access to the message.
When the french stumblebums got caught blowing up ships in NZ the kiwi police put the two agents together in a bugged room for a short period to try and get them to discuss the situation.
The bossfella Mafart took the junior and obviously rattled Prieur out on to the balcony of the motel unit the police had put them in to ‘gather their thoughts’ and said “Remember the mountain” The police assumed that ‘the mountain’ was an image used by the french anti interrogation instructors to help subjects to focus on the ‘real’ issues during an interogation rather than the paradigm that the interogators construct.
So by bringing up Aspen so much later. Scooter would have been trying to get her to focus on the strategy or incentive that had been agreed to in Aspen. Because time had passed (a year I think) and Judy had been through considerable stress and changes to her life (prison does that to people) Scooter felt the need to ‘ground’ her or at least put her back in touch with the plan.
The fact that it was a security conference in Aspen makes me think that Scoot and Jude have some sort of connection (perhaps through roots but we won’t go there LOL) and the connection is some DIA, NSA, or even FBI sort of a parasite on the taxpayers of the US, which would explain the “bureau” reference. But I could also accept that it could be Freemasonry, or some Republican ‘ginger’ group or even some mutually beneficial ‘retirement plan’.
You see once we accept that there is a conspiracy to pervert the democratic process; discovering what organisation the conspiracy is structured around becomes far less important than ensuring it is unsuccessful; and that the public is aware of the attempt.
Lets face it any of the above plus a lot of other entities get up to this stuff all the time and since there’s Buckley’s chance of preventing groups of like minded people getting together to work with each other for their mutual benefit, the best we can do is make sure people are aware of this unwholesome tendency by those that have a need to control their environment and how to recognise the signs of it happening.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Oct 16 2005 22:46 utc | 20

So Judy Miller was the Armstrong Williams without the $$$$ ?? Hmmm, that suggestion would lead me to……

Posted by: Soandso | Oct 16 2005 22:57 utc | 22

i’m back
Wapo

Several military officers say Miller led MET Alpha members to Chalabi’s compound in a former sporting club, where they wound up taking custody of Sultan, who was on the Pentagon’s “deck of cards” of the 55 most wanted Iraqis. The April trip to Chalabi’s headquarters took place “at Judy’s direction,” one officer said.
A top aide to Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress, Zaab Sethna, said he didn’t know whether Miller arrived that day “because she’s old friends with Dr. Chalabi or because she wanted to introduce that team she was working with to the INC.” But he said the idea of transferring Sultan to the MET Alpha squad originated in a conversation with Miller.
In reporting the handover of Sultan and an associate, Khalid Abdullah, Miller wrote that the two men “were questioned by an American intelligence official and then handed over to Chief Warrant Officer Richard L. Gonzales, the leader of a Pentagon Mobile Exploitation Team that has been hunting for unconventional weapons in Iraq.” She wrote that Gonzales “happened to be meeting tonight with Mr. Chalabi to discuss nonproliferation issues.”
On April 21, when the MET Alpha team was ordered to withdraw to the southern Iraqi town of Talil, Miller objected in a handwritten note to two public affairs officers. It said:
“I see no reason for me to waste time (or MET Alpha, for that matter) in Talil. . . . Request permission to stay on here with colleagues at the Palestine Hotel til MET Alpha returns or order to return is rescinded. I intend to write about this decision in the NY Times to send a successful team back home just as progress on WMD is being made.”
One military officer, who says that Miller sometimes “intimidated” Army soldiers by invoking Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld or Undersecretary Douglas Feith, was sharply critical of the note. “Essentially, she threatened them,” the officer said, describing the threat as that “she would publish a negative story.”

walks like a duck, quacks like a duck
seems kind of obvious to me the roots were the neocons. all turning together because they grow in clusters sounds like ‘we are all sticking to the same story’. perhaps judy has the ear of rummy, feith,libby, even whig BECAUSE SHE IS ONE OF THEM. the paragraphs above indicate to me she was in on some pretty coordinated plans, her role as a journalist was not only to report the news but to facilitate the creation of the story. just like w/plame

Posted by: annie | Oct 16 2005 23:42 utc | 24

In other news…
Captured SAS men ‘spying on drill torturer’
“Yeah, yeah, sure, sure, that’s it. Everyone KNOWS the Americans and British are really worried about Iraqi people being tortured, so THAT’S why the two SAS guys were dressed up like Arabs, carrying bombs, and shooting at the police. Yeah. Right. Sure. That’s it.”

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Oct 17 2005 1:31 utc | 26

Now, isn’t it the case that Judy Judy Judy’s conversations with her visitors–including Bolton–might have been taped? I don’t think that prisoners enjoy rights of privacy save when they’re with their lawyers.

Posted by: No Blood for Hubris | Oct 17 2005 2:27 utc | 28

They used to call them an agent of influence the greatest of whom was Harold ‘Kim’ Philby . Philby was an agent of MI6 ostensibly but has we all know now he had been recruited by the Soviet Intelligence service OGPU while at Cambridge University.
His ‘cover’ was that he was a journalist for The Times. For anyone that hasn’t followed this saga I suggest they do because nothing gives better insight into the worthless lying world of the Intelligence Industry that this unbelievable yarn. After Philby was unmasked MI6 put pressure on The Times to make him their correspondent in Beruit! They knew he was a Russian agent but because unmasking him would have been embarrasing and even worse he was a chap everyone knew from their schooldays they let him move to Beruit to stay out of everyone’s way and still earn a quid. I think they may have actually stopped his MI6 pension because the US got upset when his role in protecting the man who provided the Russians with the atomic secrets from The Manhattan Project , Donald MacLean.
The best bit is when Philby finally agreed to a media interview just before he died. He had escaped to Moscow from Beruit when the opposition media got enough evidence to publish his identity. MI6 sent an agent out to Beruit to warn him.
Anyway when the interview was granted he gave an ‘exclusive’ to his old employers at the Times! Murdoch had bought the rag by then and turned it into a shadow of its former self (sound familiar?) Of course that leaves one wondering who it was he had been working for all those years. Was he a triple agent still with MI6 or a simple double agent working for the Russians, or how about a journalist working for The Times?
The story goes that his soviet handlers didn’t take his intelligence seriously. They thought Philby “too good to be true”. Yet everything he gave them was on the up and up and when his information was acted on many British and US agents in Warsaw Pact countries were arrested and executed for spying.
As longs as these guys just stick to other intelligence industry employees they are probably harmless enough; but when they get involved with civilians they can really hurt people.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Oct 17 2005 3:40 utc | 30

Speaking of “policy”,
Meet 42 [and counting], casualties of the current Administration –they didn’t die in Iraq, or New Orleans, but were beleaguered administrators, managers, and career civil servants who quit their posts in protest or were defamed, threatened, fired, forced out, demoted, or driven to retire by Bush administration strong-arming. From Bunny Greenhouse to Richard Clarke to General Zinni to lesser-known folks like James Zahn, who was prohibited on no fewer than 11 occasions from publicizing his research on the potential hazards to human health posed by airborne bacteria resulting from farm wastes. A very wide-ranging list, covering everything from Public Health to War to Terror and Torture to Education to…
Also see:
Christie Todd Whitman who resigned as head of the EPA – there was some speculation she was forced out – and John DeIulio, the first head of faith based initiatives who resigned after less than a year. Lawrence A. Greenfeld, who worked for the U.S. DOJ, specifically in the Bureau of Justice Statistics. This is in relation to an attempt to cover up unfavourable statistics that were part of a traffic stop report on racial profiling. You can read about it here . The hubbub was that he was “demoted” but in reality he would have been fired were he not able to call upon policy that said as a former senior exec he had to be given work elsewhere. That would have been six months before full pension. He now does prison stats.
It seems to me, more and more Rove, and the beltway boys i.e. ‘team b’, must have methodically studied imfamous leaders of tyrannical regrimes, systems of totalitarian state apparatuses and radical ideology to impliment.They must have synthesized or picked the most ominous characteristics of each to bestow upon the world in a quest for the holy grail of absolute power.
more
via metafilter

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Oct 17 2005 5:00 utc | 32

It’s pleasant to see RGiap and Pat engaging in, dare I say it, dialogue. Giap’s reference to Hitler’s Willing Executioners is pertinent, since criminality and sadism must be condemned at whatever level they occur, yet I find myself very much in agreement with Pat that the responsibility and guilt lies on the shoulders of those who
conspired (yes, now even Frank Rich of the NYTimes agrees) to foist this abomination on a passive and docile American
public. I think that Finkelstein and Birn have rather convincingly dismantled Goldhagen’s thesis in HWE, and am
inclined to think that much the same might be true for American atrocities in Iraq: they undoubtedly exist, are undoubtedly crimes, and worst of all undoubtedly reflect
policy decisions made at the highest levels, but I still like to hope that many, possibly even the majority, of the rank and file troops are just as disgusted by the
torture, the pointless mayhem and degrading sadism of this war of agression as are the participants in this forum. I suspect that the level of discontent snaking through the U.S. armed services is well-nigh the point
of exploding, and the victims of those soldiers may soon include both the American Hessians of Blackwater and Dyncorp, and the sinister “leadership” that commands and bankrolls them as well.

Posted by: Hannah K. O’Luthon | Oct 17 2005 5:17 utc | 34

Hannah K,
‘Water-carriers’ is far too mealy-mouthed an ajective to describe the even this minority willing executioners of US foreign policy. On this argument, the Einzatzgruppen (a minority relative to the Army)who marauded through Eastern Europe were also mere water-carriers.
Kids in Iraq who torture, bully and kill do it in spite of the knowledge that it is illegal. The majority who abhor this brutality are complicit if they see it and do nothing. Members of the Israeli Defence force who refuse orders to use human shield, or refuse to serve in occupied territories are leading the way here.

Posted by: theodor | Oct 17 2005 5:50 utc | 36

Thank you, theodor. At least 5,000 have deserted the US military–there is a choice.
Also, while morale is low, the military is full of sadists who really do get off on the killing.
As longs as these guys just stick to other intelligence industry employees they are probably harmless enough; but when they get involved with civilians they can really hurt people.
yes, reminds me of “Our Man in Havana” by Graham Green

Posted by: Malooga | Oct 17 2005 6:01 utc | 38

5,000 sounds good, but what would be the average number of AWOLs even in peacetime?
Pat, that was some sort of sarcasm, but I missed it, sorry. Can you spell it out off-thread to save others from your tedious buzzing.

Posted by: theodor | Oct 17 2005 6:11 utc | 40

Cheney May Be Entangle
Bloomberg

Fitzgerald has questioned Cheney’s communications adviser Catherine Martin and former spokeswoman Jennifer Millerwise and ex-White House aide Jim Wilkinson about the vice president’s knowledge of the anti-Wilson campaign and his dealings on it with Libby, his chief of staff, the people said. The information came from multiple sources, who requested anonymity because of the secrecy and political sensitivity of the investigation.

Posted by: annie | Oct 17 2005 6:25 utc | 42

Yikes!

Posted by: theodor | Oct 17 2005 6:42 utc | 44

some stingers in the entangleD article, i like this part

In an interview yesterday, Wilson said that once the criminal questions are settled, he and his wife may file a civil lawsuit against Bush, Cheney and others seeking damages for the alleged harm done to Plame’s career.
If they do so, the current state of the law makes it likely that the suit will be allowed to proceed — and Bush and Cheney will face questioning under oath — while they are in office. The reason for that is a unanimous 1997 U.S. Supreme Court decision ruling that Paula Jones’ sexual harassment suit against then-President Bill Clinton could go forward immediately, a decision that was hailed by conservatives at the time.

Posted by: annie | Oct 17 2005 6:47 utc | 46

“He’ll be along shortly.”
Rememberinggiap, that is.

Posted by: Pat | Oct 17 2005 6:59 utc | 48

Hannah, it’s a question of how you define American Public. Is supporting the bidding of the Empire in Latin America serving the interest of its American Public? Etc.
Annie, your last post is definitely a contender for Post of the Week! But it could be a busy week…

Posted by: jj | Oct 17 2005 7:08 utc | 50

My ode to NYT’s JUDAS MILLER: (Farewell, my pet. You murderous bitch!).

Don’t fret precious I’m here,
Step away from the window
Go back to sleep
Safe from pain and truth and choice
And other poison devils
See, they don’t give a fuck about you,
Like I do
Count the bodies like sheep (like sheep…)
Count the bodies like sheep (like sheep…)
Counting bodies like sheep
To the rhythm of the war drums
Count the bodies like sheep (like sheep…)
Go back to sleep
Go back to sleep
Counting bodies like sheep
To the rhythm of the war drums
Go back to sleep
Go back to sleep
Counting bodies like sheep
To the rhythm of the war drums
Go back to sleep
Go back to sleep
Counting bodies like sheep
Go back to sleep
Go to sleep [x14]
Go back to sleep
Go back to sleep
Go back to sleep
Counting bodies like sheep
Go back to sleep
Go back to sleep
Counting bodies like sheep
Go back to sleep
Go back to sleep
Counting bodies like sheep
To the rhythm of the war drums
Go back to sleep
Go back to sleep
Counting bodies like sheep
To the rhythm of the war drums
Go back to sleep
Go back to sleep
Counting bodies like sheep
To the rhythm of the war drums [x2]
I’ll be the one to protect you from
Your enemies and all your demons
I’ll be the one to protect you from
A will to survive and a voice of reason
I’ll be the one to protect you from
Your enemies and your choices son
One in the same,
I must isolate you
Isolate and save you from yourself

– by the band “A Perfect Circle” off the album entitled: “Thirteenth Step,” lyrics the of the song, “Pet”.
I as well as a small contingent of like minded friends, who have kept up w/this un-sane circus, dedicated this track to Judith Miller at a party recently. It went over pretty well. If you are able to listen to it, it is so much more than just the above lyrics, it the way in which the lyrics and music and approach to the vocals combine to convey a terrible beauty. It’s quite haughtingly, beautifully apropos.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Oct 17 2005 7:21 utc | 52

“The only thing I can say is that people who consider grunts or squaddies ‘water carriers’ would do well to study all the occasions where a standing army of professional soldiers is put out to fight.”
It’s the family business, Debs. I know all about it.

Posted by: Pat | Oct 17 2005 7:46 utc | 54

Above, $cam posted a link to an article entitled casualties of Bu$hCo. Since there are so many curious deaths associated w/them, someone should rethink the loose use of language. Call that list Gutted Careers, and add this to the Actual Casualty list, which is probably up near 42 as well, at least if one includes the Scientists. This guy is a Brit, so perhaps we need a subsection, headed by Dr. David Kelly, to which we can add the name of Capt. Masters:
A senior British military police officer in Iraq involved in the investigation of alleged abuse of Iraqi civilians by soldiers has been found dead at a camp in Basra.
The body of Captain Ken Masters, the commander of 61 Section of the Special Investigations Branch (SIB), was found in his bed at the airport at the weekend. The death is being investigated by the SIB.
Defence sources said the death was “not due to hostile action and also not due to natural causes”.
However, it is believed that investigators have not found a suicide note, nor firearms related to the incident. Capt Masters was not receiving any medical or psychological treatment. link

Posted by: jj | Oct 17 2005 7:56 utc | 56

Sorry, all.
Stop being so paranoid.

Posted by: Pat | Oct 17 2005 8:14 utc | 58

“It’s the family business, Debs. I know all about it.”
I had a feeling it may be and I wont go all tedentious about my views on war as a business except to say that soldiers should be no less prepared to face the consequences of their actions than anyone else.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Oct 17 2005 8:41 utc | 60

Most ARE preprared, Debs.

Posted by: Pat | Oct 17 2005 8:49 utc | 62

“Most ARE preprared, Debs.
Good. Then they won’t be taking the ‘water carrier’ cop out.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Oct 17 2005 10:04 utc | 64

friends theodor & hannah – are correct – the einsatzgruppen were in their way water carriers – that is they followed policy with a minimum of initiative
what is important- their genocidal actions would have been impossible without the knowing & complict acceptance by the standing army. there were notable exceptions within the general staff who refused to follow what was called the commisar order – which was the administratif edict for the genocide to come & while some in the army refused to take part – the great majority of that standing army allowed it to happene – or as in many instances they took part in the einsatzgruppen actions especially in the baltic where they were ably asssisted by the population
theodor, the black helicopters have passed on my way to work to do my small attacks on the empire

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Oct 17 2005 10:13 utc | 66

there seem to be some good news coming rom washington this weekened – huffington post firedoglake etc but have become so used to the proverbial straw on the camel’s back not breaking it – but rather permitting it to break wind in our faces
in these weeks i have taken a provisional belief in the power of prayer

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Oct 17 2005 10:22 utc | 68

welcome borther outraged – i really am on my way to work – the black helocopter have long gone to observe people who can type properly

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Oct 17 2005 10:37 utc | 70

When the mathematician Ouspensky was studying with Gurdjieff, he found it very hard, at first, to understand this unique human capacity to forget where one is, what one is doing, and what is going on around one. He was especially dubious about Gurdjieff’s insistence that this forgetting was a type of hypnosis. Then, one day, after World War I had begun, Ouspensky saw a truck loaded with artificial legs, headed toward the front. Educated as a mathematician and trained in statistics, Ouspensky remembered that just as it is possible to calculate how many persons will die of heart attacks in a given year, by probability theory it is possible to calculate how many legs will be blown off in a battle. But the very calculation is based on the historical fact that most people, most of the time will do what they are told by Superiors. (Or, as some cynic once said, most people would rather die, even by slow torture, than to think for themselves.) In a flash, Ouspensky understood how ordinary men become killers, and victims of killers. He realized that normal consciousness is much like hypnosis indeed. People in a trance will do what they are told even if they are told to march into battle against total strangers who have never harmed them, and attempt to murder those strangers while the strangers are attempting to murder them. Orders from above are tuned-in; the possibility of choice is not-tuned-in.
War and crime the major problems of our century and chronic problems of our species seem, to the existentialist-humanist psychologist, the direct results on drifting off into self-hypnosis, losing track of experience and living in a Real Universe. In the Real Universe, the Right Man is always Right, and the blood and horror incidental to proving that is only an appearance, easily forgotten. Besides, the Right Man knows that he is only a re-acting mechanism and ultimately The Real Universe itself is to blame for making him explode into such furies.
The Fool sees not the same tree the wise man sees.- -W. Blake

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Oct 17 2005 10:53 utc | 72

Uncle Scam and Outraged say some of the things I think except that even if notions of ‘rightness’ and ‘honor’ are intentional constructs by a culture determined to provide their killers with a ‘back story’ as individuals we still choose whether we buy into that construct or hypnosis. If we don’t acknowledge that to ourselves we have bought into the ‘perpetrator is a victim’ mindset which explains all but demands nothing.
Then I came across NZer faces jail in Britain after refusing to serve in Iraq.
In other circumstances I have been dubious about volunteer military personnel deciding that they won’t fight once the opportunity arises particularly when they have signed up to a foreign service, but this bloke’s nationality is confused. It is one thing to decide not to take the shilling but once you have I think your decision has been made. So don’t take it in the first place.
However this guy has already served and been decorated for his service in Afghanistan and Iraq. He claims that since he has read the Goldsmith opinion known as the Downing St Memo he believes the war to be illegal and that he cannot fight in an illegal war.

“He is not arguing that he is a conscientious objector. He is arguing that the war is manifestly unlawful”

I don’t suppose the Brits will be expediting this court martial.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Oct 17 2005 11:32 utc | 74

Uncle, I did include dead scientists:
Call that list Gutted Careers, and add this to the Actual Casualty list, which is probably up near 42 as well, at least if one includes the Scientists.

Posted by: jj | Oct 17 2005 16:07 utc | 76

b quoted:
“Another character in the drama remains unnamed: the original source for columnist Robert Novak, who wrote the first piece naming Plame. Fitzgerald, says a lawyer who’s involved in the case, “knows who it is—and it’s not someone at the White House.”
Bolton?
—-
No, someone from the CIA. Bet you a bottle of your favorite. Mine being red wine.
Why? Mainly: Because this whole story has to do with Plame and the CIA, not (or only tangentially) with Wilson and yellowcake, as I, and others, said in previous posts. Not sure about the Brewster Jennings piste though.
Details, just one: discussions about Victoria Wilson or Valerie Plame pre-date Joe Wilson’s NYT article.

Posted by: Noisette | Oct 17 2005 17:22 utc | 78

So are you saying he was made an example of for the edification of others?

Posted by: Malooga | Oct 17 2005 17:39 utc | 80

Malooga, maybe. Or perhaps it was just an unconsidered wild move – Hit out where you can – the need for action, etc.
But it is possible that there were other reasons for getting rid of Kelly. Unknown to us.
I don’t want to spin plots or speculate in the void.
Either:
1) Plame was outed for revenge on Wilson who publicly debunked the yellow cake business and Kelly died because he questioned the 45 minute claim, hounded or murdered.
Or:
2) There is more to it than we understand.
I favor 2) as 1) seems outlandish to me.

Posted by: Noisette | Oct 17 2005 18:28 utc | 82

From Digby’s 10/12 post,Two Tense Weeks (scroll down), which quotes Robert George regarding the coordination between US and UK propaganda to hype their invasion of Iraq and Miller’s connection to both efforts:

George wrote:
“… if we go back to our timeline tracking the furious developments that were going on in both the U.S. and the U.K., we note that July 12, 2003, was the one of the two days not really accounted for in previous news stories. In between the first and second times Miller and Libby spoke, the following things occurred:
On July 9, in the UK, Blair’s government has orchestrated the outing of scientist David Kelly as the source of BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan’s explosive report that the Blair government “sexed-up” its Iraq intelligence dossier. In the U.S., Robert Novak talks with Karl Rove (Wilson’s op-ed had appeared three days before).
On July 11, George Tenet releases a statement asserting that the “16 words” about yellowcake uranium shouldn’t have been in the president’s State of the Union address. The same day, Karl Rove talks to Matt Cooper about, among other things, Joseph Wilson and his wife.
[…]
Why was Miller behind bars for three months concerning sources to a story which that she never wrote about?
The answer is obvious: Judith Miller emerged as a central figure because she MADE herself a central figure and, arguably, BECAUSE she didn’t “writ[e] a story about the case.” This is the Judith Miller who, four days later, wrote words of encouragement to British scientist David Kelly: “David, I heard from another member of your fan club that things went well for you today. Hope it’s true, J.”
These don’t seem like the words of a disinterested journalist. These are the words of someone who has some sort of interest in how a witness performs in a parliamentary hearing.
How is it that – two years later and after Judith Miller has spent 90 days in jail for refusing to cooperate with a criminal investigation – not one media organization has deemed it important to wonder: Who is the other “member of [Kelly’s] fan club”? Is it Scooter Libby? Is it John Bolton (who visited Miller in jail and we know was questioned by the State Department Inspector General the same day Kelly’s body was found)? Is it someone else? If it is indeed an American, exactly what is that person’s interest in a British Parliamentary inquiry?
Judith Miller is the missing link between two different investigations. She’s not a mere reporter. How do we know? Because, she has “reported” none of this.

Posted by: lonesomeG | Oct 17 2005 18:40 utc | 84

For one who’s lived through Watergate and Iran-Contra, the low level of attention paid to Fitzgerald by the MSM has been nothing less than “fantastic” (having all the dissociating spookiness of fantasies overwhelming our routine habits of thought). And when the indictments come down–multiple felony charges against the major players in the Executive Branch–it won’t surprise me at all if the public at large greets the whole thing with a yawn of collective bewilderment, blowing it off as if it were nothing more than a re-run of that elaborate assassination attempt against Bill Clinton. Whence the importance of Fitzgerald’s astonishing discipline: by keeping away from the press, he has prevented the public (and the MSM) from blowing off his proceedings in detail. And when the indictments come down in all their mind-numbing specificity, there will be no time for the public to conjure them away: indictments will lead to trials, trials to sentences, and sentences to jail terms, all in the space of a few short months. Just think of it: the Bush administration–Bush himself excepted, I suppose–will be in jail long before the 2008 presidential election campaigns get up to speed. A spectacle of pure anarchy? No, I don’t think so, not at all! Because the executive branch will be recaptured and set in order (largely) by the very men and women who launched this exercise in the first place, namely the (more-or-less anonymous) civil servants who actually run the place, and who’ve been so rudely inconvenienced by Rumsfeld and Cheney, those arrogant and clueless losers, those bad sports who’ve never done anything right from the day they were born (“Base-born products of base beds,” to borrow a line from Yeats)…. Not that any of this will have the slightest effect on the war in Iraq–a war which will continue to enjoy the uncritical support of Democrats and Republicans alike, long after the last American soldier is blown away by the last (and most potent) IED that human ingenuity can devise….

Posted by: alabama | Oct 17 2005 21:11 utc | 86

Who at the Pentagon did this – granting access they had no authority, no official, legal means, to grant?
Posted by: Pat | Oct 17, 2005 4:45:27 PM | #
i know it may appear a dumb & even a naïve question, pat – but who do you think was capable of that -outside of the obvious rumsfield, perle etc – would it have been perle or higher, permanant functionary or flyby nighter advisers to cheney/bush
there seems here to be a fratricidal relation ocuuring between intelligence agencies that were said to be cooperating – that his warfare is so public & so ugly – beggars belief but when i read anything from that group of ex veterans of intelligence it start to seem clearer – perhaps that to is an illussion

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Oct 18 2005 0:19 utc | 88

alabama
(just a parenthesis) new book here – thought you might be interested – misère de la litterature, terreur de l’histoire – phillip roussin – nrf essais – gallimard)

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Oct 18 2005 0:22 utc | 90

@jonku
Les Aspin oversaw the easing of restrictions on homosexuals in the military and expanded the role of women in the armed forces, but ill health and criticism of his management of the Defense Dept. led him to resign.
mmmm..

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Oct 18 2005 1:08 utc | 92

it was a copy and paste job, sorry for the alarm. i considered rewriting it . i am to lazy.
tin hat, wonder if aspins downfall/retreat/ whatever you want to call it is related to libby’s aspen reference in the note?

Posted by: annie | Oct 18 2005 1:15 utc | 94

les aspin – “Aspin continued to serve as secretary of defense until 3 February 1994, when William J. Perry took office. He then joined the faculty of Marquette University’s international affairs program in Washington. In March he became a member of the Commission on Roles and Missions, and in May Clinton chose him to be chairman of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board. In March 1995 he began work as chairman of still another study group, this on the Roles and Capabilities of the Intelligence Community. Shortly thereafter, on 21 May 1995, he died in Washington after a stroke.”
aspin was more than cozy w/ defense contractors, supported the contras & no doubt had a lot of inside information. this medical site uses his death as an example of Familial hypertrophic cardiomyopathy though.

Posted by: b real | Oct 18 2005 2:54 utc | 96

wapo
Cheney’s Office Is A Focus in Leak Case

In a move people involved in the case read as a sign that the end is near, Fitzgerald’s spokesman yesterday told the Associated Press that the prosecutor planned to announce his conclusions in Washington, where the grand jury has been meeting, instead of Chicago, where the prosecutor is based. Some lawyers close to the case cited courthouse talk that Fitzgerald might announce his findings as early as tomorrow, though hard evidence about his intentions and timing remained elusive.

Posted by: annie | Oct 18 2005 4:59 utc | 98

Senior Democrats call for explanation of reporter’s ‘WMD clearance’
Article includes a full copy of the Senators letter sent to Rumsfeld … simply beautiful …
@Anna Missed
In brief any ‘Clearance’ must be for an approved ‘official’ purpose/role … formal paperwork must be submitted and processed by ‘vetters’ who specialize in researching and ultimately recommeding (or not) the subject for approval to a particular cearance level … an authorized ‘Officer’ must then execute executive authority to grant or deny the clearance … the higher the clearance level and or compartmentalised briefing the more intrusive and extensive the investigation of the subject (in some cases taking more than 6 months to complete …), including detailed classfied interviews of both nominated and unomminated ‘referees’ re the subject going back a minimum of ten years of the subjects life … every aspect re suitability for issuance of a clearance is investigated, sexual preference, politicial views, financial history/status, mental health and history, ‘character’ etc … it is all documented and must be retained on record for future reviews/upgrades/downgrades/breaches etc.
Did Rummy just use his executive authority to grant it unilaterally (Illegaly? Undue process ?) ?
Seems thats what the senators are sniffing about after … contrary to the press reports there are provisions for a limited waiver re clearance or the issuance of a temporrary clearance primarily at the Secret and below levels, very rarely at Top Secret (non-briefed) levels, however a relevant authority (individual) must personally grant it and effectively accept responsibility for the actions of the subject re classified material ….

Posted by: Outraged | Oct 18 2005 7:49 utc | 100