Month: March 2007

It seems as though all other news has taken the back seat to the fallout from yesterdays conviction of Scooter Libby. I don’t feel like joining the crowd on this. There’s just too many people in the room talking about the same thing. Head over to Memeorandum and see for yourself. I will mention one notable read. It comes from the Washington Post.

The fall of this skilled and long-respected public servant is particularly sobering because it arose from a Washington scandal remarkable for its lack of substance. It was propelled not by actual wrongdoing but by inflated and frequently false claims, and by the aggressive and occasionally reckless response of senior Bush administration officials — culminating in Mr. Libby’s perjury.

This editorial hits the nail on the head.

At least in this case…

Visiting Iraq, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams learned from Army officers that Iraqis want U.S. forces to remain in their country, from NBC News Baghdad reporter Richard Engel that Al-Sadr’s insurgents have stepped down and are counting on pressure from anti-war opponents to provide them with victory, and from retired General and NBC News military analyst Wayne Downey that U.S. troops are proud of their mission. Traveling with Lieutenant General Ray Odierno for stories on his Monday newscast, Williams ran a clip of Army Colonel John Charlton proclaiming that Iraqis “do not want us to leave” and a soundbite from Army Lt. Colonel Charles Ferry who asserted: “The people here are very glad to see us.”

Williams marveled: “You just said, ‘They don’t want us to leave.’ That’s the tenth time today I’ve heard that. I’ve got to go back to the States and do a newscast that every night has another politician or 12 of them saying, ‘We have got to get out of that godforsaken place.'”

Read MSNBC’s report here.

Tom Raum of the AP puts together one of the first DNC press releases disguised as a news story on the Libby conviction. Reading this leads you to believe that Richard Armitage, a Bush critic and the primary leaker of Plame’s name, never existed. This kind of propaganda is key to helping the Democrats achieve their goal, which is to make sure uninformed Americans believe that Libby is just the tip of the iceberg. In order for this to work, they need to count on the American public being ill informed about the details of the Libby case. And that’s where the MSM comes in. Watch CNN this afternoon. Look for a number of stories like Raum’s tomorrow and the rest of this week. Watch the Sunday news shows. The playbook has been distributed and the game is underway.

Former White House aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby has been convicted of obstruction, perjury and lying to the FBI in the investigation into the leak of Valerie Plame’s identity as a CIA operative.

The Counts

Obstruction of Justice – The indictment charges that Mr. Libby did “knowingly and corruptly endeavor to influence, obstruct and impede the due administration of justice by misleading and deceiving the grand jury” about when and how he learned that Plame worked for the CIA.

False Statements – Mr. Libby made false statements to FBI investigators during their interviews with him on October 14 and November 26, 2003, about his conversations with Tim Russert of NBC News and Matthew Cooper of Time Magazine.

Perjury – Mr. Libby committed perjury before the grand jury on March 5 and March 24, 2004, when testifying about his conversations with Mr. Russert and Mr. Cooper.

Libby will be sentenced in June.

One thing is clear. The media will use this judgment as an indictment against the Bush administration. They wanted Bush so they could impeach him. They couldn’t get him. They wanted the next best thing (Rove), but they couldn’t get him. They settled for Libby and now will project this conviction as if it were imposed on the entire White House. We’ll be hearing about this from now til election day 2008.

MORE: New York Times | MSNBC | CNN | AP | WaPo |

John Belushi overdosed and died 25 years ago on this day, on March 5, 1982.

From Wikipedia…

Known for his drug usage, which eventually cost him his life, Belushi was found dead on March 5, 1982, at age 33, in a hotel room at the Chateau Marmont on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles, California. The cause of death was a speedball, an injection of cocaine and heroin. On the night of his death, he was accompanied by friends Robin Williams and Robert De Niro (at the height of their own drug exploits), who later left the premises, leaving Belushi in the company of Cathy Smith. His death was investigated by forensic pathologist Dr.Ryan Norris among others, and while the findings were disputed, it was officially ruled a drug-related accident.

RIP

Political prisoner Armando Valladares describes his time in Castro’s gulag.

Once in prison, if the guards felt like punishing us, they would put us in cages, with mesh roofs, and walk along the edge while pouring buckets of urine and excrement all over our bodies. Sometimes, guards would shoot prisoners for target practice.

h/t Babalu Blog

Following a weekend of press noting his high approval ratings, The Daily News submits this hit piece on Rudy Giuliani. According to the story, Rudy is a bad dad and a philanderer who makes a habit of playing marital musical chairs. The New York Times got in on the game too.

Welcome to the race for president Rudy. It’s only gonna get uglier.

From M-W

Pan·der
Function: intransitive verb
Inflected Form(s): pan·dered; pan·der·ing

:to act as a panderer; especially : to provide gratification for others’ desires – See Hillary Clinton

Now the question remains…if Hillary is willing to put on a (badly done) southern drawl just to collect money and/or votes from an African American constituency, how long will it be before she admits to being a lesbian just to pull the Hollywood vote?

Am I the only one who doesn’t ‘get’ the faggot comment by Ann Coulter? I mean, there has to be some kind of inside joke happening here, right?

It was a joke, wasn’t it?

Shock! Picture of twenty something Tony Blair proves he was a normal college student prone to a prank now and then.

So he was a twit. Big deal.