The very first GOP talking point

A summary of the trouble

... the Bushies are in over Leakgate, from Daily Kos:

Bloomberg is reporting that Rove and Libby both gave testimony to the grand jury that flatly conflicts with the testimony given by those they said they talked to.

We now know that the Top Secret memo most consistent with the talking points that Rove and Libby told reporters was seen in the hands of Press Secretary Ari Fleischer in the days before the leak occurred. And that he told the grand jury he never saw it.

And Steve Clemons has verified that John Bolton was one of Judith Miller's regular sources on WMD issues, and that MSNBC stands by its story that Bolton gave testimony to the grand jury about the State Department memo in question. Bolton, you may recall, has previously been identified to have been involved in the Niger uranium claims that Wilson's trip helped disprove ...

... the Bushies are in over the latest Abu Ghraib torture photos they're refusing to release:

On July 22, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) denounced the latest efforts of the Bush Administration to block the release of the Darby photos and videos depicting torture at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison facility. On June 2, 2004, CCR, along with the ACLU, Physicians for Human Rights, Veterans for Common Sense, and Veterans for Peace filed papers with the U.S. District Court, charging the Dept. of Defense and other government agencies with illegally withholding records concerning the abuse of detainees in American military custody. Since then, the organizations have been repeatedly rebuffed in their efforts to investigate what happened at the prison.

In June, the government requested and received an extension from the judge stating that they needed time in order to redact the faces of the men, women and children believed to be shown in the photographs and videos. They were given until today to
produce the images, but at the eleventh hour filed a motion to oppose the release of the photos and videos, based on an entirely new argument: they are now requesting a 7(F) exemption from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act to withhold law enforcement-related information in order to protect the physical safety of individuals. Today’s move is the latest in a series of attempts by the government to keep the images from being made public and to cover up the torture of detainees in U.S. custody around the world.

... and ...

The images, according to those lawmakers who have seen them, paint a picture of torture at Abu Ghraib far, far worse than most Americans have yet been willing to admit. Via the Boston Herald, May 8th, 2004:

Signaling the worst revelations are yet to come, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said the additional photos show "acts that can only be described as blatantly sadistic, cruel and inhuman." ...

The unreleased images show American soldiers beating one prisoner almost to death, apparently raping a female prisoner, acting inappropriately with a dead body, and taping Iraqi guards raping young boys, according to NBC News.

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said the scandal is "going to get worse" and warned that the most "disturbing" revelations haven't yet been made public. "The American public needs to understand, we're talking about rape and murder here," he said. "We're not just talking about giving people a humiliating experience; we're talking about rape and murder and some very serious charges."

And from Seymour Hersh:

The women were passing messages saying "Please come and kill me, because of what's happened". Basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys/children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. The worst about all of them is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking.

Note these links are from 2004. The administration, and several members of Congress, have known about these additional abuse cases, including photos and video not released to the public, for over a year. And yes, the rest of the world already knows.

So we've been sodomizing children. In the name of freedom.

Can you stand some more?

The White House on Thursday threatened to veto a massive Senate bill for $442 billion in next year's defense programs if it moves to regulate the Pentagon's treatment of detainees or sets up a commission to investigate operations at Guantanamo Bay prison and elsewhere.

The Bush administration, under fire for the indefinite detention of enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and questions over whether its policies led to horrendous abuses at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, put lawmakers on notice it did not want them legislating on the matter.

"If legislation is presented that would restrict the president's authority to protect Americans effectively from terrorist attack and bring terrorists to justice," the bill could be vetoed, the statement said.

So on the one hand, the Bush administration is blocking the release of the photographic proof of the most horrific war crimes committed in U.S. military-run prisons. And on the other hand, they are threatening to veto any attempts by Congress to establish laws banning such torture -- or even to investigate the torture already documented.

Had enough? Apparently, some have:

A rapid series of car bombs and another blast ripped through a luxury hotel and a coffeeshop in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheik early Saturday, killing at least 83, a hospital official said. Terrified European and Arab tourists fled into the night, and rescue workers said the death toll could still rise.

It was another day of high tension, disruption and fear on the London Underground. The union for subway and bus drivers said workers would be justified in staying away from work if the government fails to take more precautions to make the operators safe. "I think they're going to strike again," commuter Warren West, 27, said of the bombers. "I think they're doing to London what's happening in Iraq."

Is George Bush still making everyone feel safe?

Congressional hearings on Leakgate

are currently being televised on C-SPAN3.

On a relevant tangent, it appears that special prosecutor Peter Fitzgerald is focusing on crimes that can be easily proven, namely perjury and obstruction of justice, against two of the highest White House officials, presidential advisor Karl Rove and Dick Cheney's chief of staff Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

Now the questions become familiar, echoing back from history: what did the Vice President know, and when did he know it? And the President?

I was fourteen years old during the summer of Watergate and the last time a Republican administration collapsed under the creaking weight of its own corruption. The similarities between that scandal and this one -- sordid political dirty tricks taken to a criminal extreme for the sole apparent purpose of blackmailing a political opponent -- seem today to pale in comparison to 1770 dead American soldiers, thousands of innocent Iraqis killed as collateral damage, billions of dollars wasted in every direction and even misplaced, and the reputation and goodwill of the United States of America ruined.

And as of this post, not a single elected Republican official has yet broken ranks with this White House over this scandal, these lies, these crimes.

That's another difference between Watergate and Leakgate.

There is no member of the President's political party that has yet summoned the strength, the will, the courage, to speak out. No Howard Baker this time around. Eventually as this scandal continues to unfold -- sooner or later -- that will change, and our nation will be the better for that man or woman's bravery.

I think we're still many days away from that day.

Comments evaporated -- accidentally

As part of the new Haloscan code which adds the trackback feature and revises the comments box to this blog, all previously posted comments appear to have been vaporized.

I didn't do it on purpose. Honest. I didn't even want Haloscan comments, but I did want trackback, but I couldn't have one without the other, blah*blah*sob ...

Please continue to give your opinions here (in the hopes that future technological advances won't cause me to lose them).

Annnnnd we're back on Rove

The nomination of John "Here's how you can appoint your brother Prez, Jeb" Roberts gave the White House all of a 36-hour break from Rovegate. It's refreshing to see our plodding yet methodical MSM staying on the case. Barbara at Mahablog has the analysis.

"How high does this go?" asks Booman. (To Cheney, is his answer.)


Yet I am dismayed again today by the apparent capitulation of Joe Lieberman and other "moderates" who have already chosen not to contest this SC nominee, and rushed to the microphones to tell us so.

Why do they do that? Why do they give up before the bell sounds for the first round? How long will it take them to realize that the GOP places no value on temperance?

This lack of fighting spirit, this missing intestinal fortitude -- this weakness -- has gone unrewarded by the electorate enough times already as to be proven the wrong strategy.

Stand aside, Joe. We're looking for fighters from now on.

Rove's Last Stand

(From Billmon. Full size image here.)