Liars, Non-leakers, and Wrongful Convictions

It's a tough life out there...especially for a liar. Hey, I didn't say it first, the Washington Post did:

Mr. Wilson was embraced by many because he was early in publicly charging that the Bush administration had "twisted," if not invented, facts in making the case for war against Iraq. In conversations with journalists or in a July 6, 2003, op-ed, he claimed to have debunked evidence that Iraq was seeking uranium from Niger; suggested that he had been dispatched by Mr. Cheney to look into the matter; and alleged that his report had circulated at the highest levels of the administration.

A bipartisan investigation by the Senate intelligence committee subsequently established that all of these claims were false -- and that Mr. Wilson was recommended for the Niger trip by Ms. Plame, his wife.

How dare they turn on poor Joe Wilson? Arg. Jonah Goldberg has this all characterized in its absolutely correct light. No matter what we may hear in the news about how the Libby verdict means the White House was out to get Plame and Wilson, it's wrong. Just plain wrong. It's mindboggling to think that they can spout such wrongness, but apparently journalists are down with that sort of thing.

For the record and in clear and plain English - Libby did not leak anything.
Nothing. Libby was not the leaker.
What's more, before this trial even started, we all knew he wasn't the leaker. (The leak came from the State Department.) Did the jury understand Libby wasn't the leaker? I'm not sure. Did they all understand what they were even convicting him of? I'm not sure of that either. [See right there? I'm so frustrated that I'm ending a sentence in a preposition!]

Anyway, here are some excerpts from Jonah's piece:

A man of less mettle might grow frustrated with the effrontery of the Washington Post's editorial page calling him a liar, a blowhard and the real destroyer of his wife's career. Simply because it's true hardly justifies stepping on his story line. Don't they know he's the author of a book, "The Politics of Truth," and a winner of awards for his self-proclaimed courage for "speaking truth to power"? Why should a bipartisan Senate intelligence report cataloging his dishonesty and distortions stand against a man with such important hair?
...
The Wilsons' civil lawsuit against Dick Cheney, Rove et al — filed, they assure us, "with heavy hearts" — claims that the White House's revelation of her identity put her life and the lives of her children in danger. (Never mind that it wasn't the White House who outed her but Richard Armitage over at the State Department.) Even after baring all for Vanity Fair, the golden couple clearly take every effort to maintain their privacy. While heading for a vacation getaway, Wilson couldn't resist giving one last interview at the Houston airport. One of his sons blurted out for everyone to hear, "My daddy is famous, my mommy is a secret spy." Clearly the pressures of the Wilson family code of silence had gotten to the lad.
...
Lesser mortals might have a hard time sleeping at night knowing that they're having the time of their lives through a level of dishonesty dwarfing the transgressions that may send Scooter Libby to prison. But, thank goodness, the golden couple is better than that. They're troopers.

I'd even say there were multiple levels of dishonesty. Mindboggling, truly. I can only shake my head in shock.

(However, must say that my shock is mixed with pride for the Washington Post for speaking truth to Wilson. :)

No, please, not a movie!

...Anything but a movie!!!

But unfortunately my pleading will probably not be answered. JustOneMinute (who has an awesome subtitle, by the way) reports that there is going to be a Joe and Valerie movie.

Why?? Why?!!!

Sigh.
And here's a gem from the Variety article:

WB has secured the life rights of Plame and Wilson. Studio also will use Plame's memoir, "Fair Game," if the CIA permits her to publish it. Plame made a reported publishing deal in the $2.5 million range last year, and Simon & Schuster is expected to publish late this year. While it would be ironic for Plame's story to be illegally leaked by the White House, only to have another government branch deny her the right to tell it herself, the CIA has the latitude to silence Plame.

Yeah, sure, ironic. You know what I find even more ironic? That the Wilsons are suing for the alleged outing AND planning to make at least $2.5 million off it. They can't really claim pain and suffering in that case.

Moreover, how can Variety say that Plame's story was "illegally leaked by the White House?" If something illegal happened in the telling of the story, wouldn't that person have been arrested? Are they forgetting that Libby is not on trial for leaking anything, but rather for, essentially, having a bad memory?

Sigh.

This just goes to show the problem with all of this. No one really understands the intricacies of this story, often because they don't want to. It's easier to blame the White House. It's just like Global Warming in that way. Which, sadly, is why liberals will eat it up.