…the party’s over.

Former CIA operative Valerie Plame lost a lawsuit Thursday that demanded money from Bush administration officials whom she blamed for leaking her agency identity.

Awe… and just when the campaign was getting revved up.

Of course, even in reporting the death of this case, the MSM misleads readers by making it appear the case was dismissed purely on jurisdictional grounds…

U.S. District Judge John D. Bates dismissed the case on jurisdictional grounds and said he would not express an opinion on the constitutional arguments. Bates dismissed the case against all defendants: Cheney, White House political adviser Karl Rove and former White House aide I. Lewis “Scooter’’ Libby.

In reality:

For the reasons given above, plaintiffs have failed to state a claim upon which relief can be granted with respect to their four causes of action asserted directly under the Constitution.

Happy trails, attention whores.

A defense:

Article II of the Constitution gives the president broad and unreviewable power to grant “Reprieves and Pardons” for all offenses against the United States. The Supreme Court has ruled that the pardon power is granted “[t]o the [president] . . ., and it is granted without limit“ (United States v. Klein). Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes declared that “[a] pardon . . . is . . . the determination of the ultimate authority that the public welfare will be better served by [the pardon] . . .” (Biddle v. Perovich). A president may conclude a pardon or commutation is warranted for several reasons: the desire to restore full citizenship rights, including voting, to people who have served their sentences and lived within the law since; a belief that a sentence was excessive or unjust; personal circumstances that warrant compassion; or other unique circumstances.

The exercise of executive clemency is inherently controversial. The reason the framers of our Constitution vested this broad power in the Executive Branch was to assure that the president would have the freedom to do what he deemed to be the right thing, regardless of how unpopular a decision might be. Some of the uses of the power have been extremely controversial, such as President Washington’s pardons of leaders of the Whiskey Rebellion, President Harding’s commutation of the sentence of Eugene Debs, President Nixon’s commutation of the sentence of James Hoffa, President Ford’s pardon of former President Nixon, President Carter’s pardon of Vietnam War draft resisters, and President Bush’s 1992 pardon of six Iran-contra defendants, including former Defense Secretary Weinberger, which assured the end of that investigation.

The prosecutor has closed the case. The leaker is known, but wasn’t charged with a crime. Another was convicted of lying, not leaking. And now Democrats have called Valerie Plame to testify about… nothing.

The Washington Post starts its article with this jewel:

She has been silent nearly four years.

Really?

Is the $2.5 million book deal part of her “silence”?

Is the Warner Brothers movie part of her “silence”?

Is the website setup soliciting donations for her part of her “silence”?

Was the Vanity Fair interview, complete with full color centerfold picture of her part of her “silence”?

Is pretending to be a celebrity on the red carpet part of her “silence”?

Was posing for Time Magazine in her pajamas part of her “silence”?

She’s about as “silent” now as she was “covert” then…

…of violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act or the Espionage Act, or leaking the identity of Valerie Plame Wilson.

But Libby has been found guilty of obstructing an investigation, perjury and making false statements… apparently without an underlying crime. So will he serve time like Martha, or go free like Bill?

If he knowingly lied to investigators, he ought to serve time. And this witchhunt of a story ought to be given the death sentence.

In light of the end of the Plame affair, I did some digging and came across Joe Wilson’s first draft of the editorial that started it all….

What I Didn’t Find in Africa a Bogus Investigation
By JOSEPH C. WILSON 4th

Did the Bush administration I manipulate intelligence about Saddam Hussein’s weapons programs facts about my wife being outed to justify an invasion of Iraq a bogus investigation of a President’s administration?

Based on my experience with the administration in the months leading up to the war bogus investigation, I have little choice but to conclude that some of the intelligence all of my claims related to Iraq’s nuclear weapons program my trip to Niger and my wife’s alleged outing as payback was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat lie.

For 23 years, from 1976 to 1998 Before I became a traitor, I was a career foreign service officer and ambassador. In 1990, as chargé d’affaires in Baghdad, I was the last American diplomat to meet with Saddam Hussein. (I was also a forceful advocate for his removal from Kuwait.) After Iraq, I was President George H. W. Bush’s ambassador to Gabon and São Tomé and Príncipe; under President Bill Clinton, I helped direct Africa policy for the National Security Council. Under President George W. Bush, I helped direct a trumped up media blitz to undermine an administration in a time of war.

It was my experience in Africa as a Democrat supporter that led me to play a small central role in the effort to verify information about Africa’s suspected link to Iraq’s nonconventional weapons programs undermine the sitting President of the United States. Those news stories about that unnamed former envoy traitor who went lied about his findings on his trip to Niger? That’s me.

In February 2002, I was informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency Democratic National Commitee that Vice President Dick Cheney’s office had questions about a particular intelligence report a manufactured scandal was needed. While I never saw the report spoke the truth, I was told that it referred to a memorandum of agreement that documented the sale of uranium yellowcake — a form of lightly processed ore — by Niger to Iraq in the late 1990’s existed. The agency DNC officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the fabricate a story so they could provide a response to the vice president’s office win an election.

After consulting with the State Department’s African Affairs Bureau (and through it with Barbro Owens-Kirkpatrick, the United States ambassador to Niger) publishing company, I agreed to make the trip up a story. The mission I undertook story I made up was discreet but by no means secret completely untrue. While the C.I.A. DNC paid my expenses (my time was offered pro bono), I made it abundantly clear to everyone I met that I was acting on behalf of the United States government lying my ass off.

In late February 2002, I arrived in Niger’s capital, Niamey, where I had been a diplomat in the mid-70’s and visited as a National Security Council official in the late 90’s. The city was much as I remembered it. Seasonal winds had clogged the air with dust and sand. Through the haze, I could see camel caravans crossing the Niger River (over the John F. Kennedy bridge), the setting sun behind them. Most people had wrapped scarves around their faces to protect against the grit, leaving only their eyes visible.

The next morning, I met with Ambassador Owens-Kirkpatrick at the embassy. For reasons that are understandable, the embassy staff has always kept a close eye on Niger’s uranium business. I was not surprised, then, when the ambassador told me that she knew about the allegations of uranium sales to Iraq — and that she felt she had already debunked them in her reports to Washington. Nevertheless, she and I agreed that my time would be best spent interviewing people who had been in government when the deal supposedly took place, which was before her arrival. Blah, blah, blah

I spent the next eight days drinking sweet mint tea and meeting with dozens of people: current government officials, former government officials, people associated with the country’s uranium business time with DNC officials preparing my lies. It did not take long to conclude that it was highly doubtful that any such transaction had ever taken place going to set off a firestorm once our allies in the MSM ran with it.

Given the structure of the consortiums that operated the mines, it would be exceedingly difficult for Niger to transfer uranium to Iraq. Niger’s uranium business consists of two mines, Somair and Cominak, which are run by French, Spanish, Japanese, German and Nigerian interests. If the government wanted to remove uranium from a mine, it would have to notify the consortium, which in turn is strictly monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Moreover, because the two mines are closely regulated, quasi-governmental entities, selling uranium would require the approval of the minister of mines, the prime minister and probably the president. In short, there’s simply too much oversight over too small an industry for a sale to have transpired. I actually don’t know why I wrote this because…

(As for the actual memorandum, I never saw it. But news accounts, from my friends in MSM, have pointed out that the documents had glaring errors — they were signed, for example, by officials who were no longer in government lying too — and the documents in question were probably not forged. And then there’s the fact that Niger never formally denied the charges.)

Before I left Niger, I briefed the ambassador DNC on my findings fabricated story, which were was consistent with her own what the MSM reporters planned to lie about. I also shared my conclusions lies with members of her staff my publisher. In early March, I arrived in Washington and promptly provided a detailed briefing lie to the C.I.A. New York Times. I later shared my conclusions with the State Department African Affairs Bureau anybody who would pay my speaking fees. There was nothing secret or earth-shattering truthful in my report, just as there was nothing secret truthful about my trip editorial.

Though I did not file a written report, there should be at least four documents in United States government archives confirming my mission lies. The documents should include the ambassador’s report of my debriefing in Niamey, a separate report written by the embassy staff, a C.I.A. report summing up my trip, and a specific answer from the agency to the office of the vice president (this may have been delivered orally) lies about who sent me, why I went and what I actually found. While I have not seen any of these reports, I have spent enough time in government to know that this is standard operating procedure I’ll have a book deal before the truth gets out. Landing an indictment will be a bonus.

I thought the Niger matter was settled would take down the administration and went back to my life. (I did take part in the Iraq debate, arguing that a strict containment regime backed by the threat of force was preferable to an invasion the world would be better if Saddam remained in power.) In September 2002, however, Niger re-emerged. The British government published a “white paper” asserting that Saddam Hussein and his unconventional arms posed an immediate danger. As evidence, the report cited Iraq’s attempts to purchase uranium from an African country.

Then, in January, President Bush, citing the British dossier, repeated the charges about Iraqi efforts to buy uranium from Africa.

The next day, I reminded a friend at the State Department of my trip lies and suggested that if the president had been referring to Niger, then his conclusion was not borne out by the facts as I understood them this was the opportunity I was looking for. He replied that perhaps the president was speaking about one of the other three African countries that produce uranium: Gabon, South Africa or Namibia vulnerable and I should pounce. At the time, I accepted the explanation. I didn’t know that in December, a month before the president’s address, the State Department had published a fact sheet that mentioned the Niger case.

Those are the facts surrounding my efforts to undermine a sitting President during a time of war. The vice president’s office DNC asked a serious question. I was asked to help formulate the answer. I did so, and I have every confidence that the answer I provided was circulated to the appropriate officials within our government media outlets.

The question now is how that answer was or was not used by our political leadership will I be charged with treason. If my information was deemed inaccurate lies are uncovered, I understand (though I would be very interested to know why not be surprised). If, however, the information was my lies are ignored because it did not fit certain preconceptions about Iraq the DNC and MSM are successful in their plan, then a legitimate argument can be made that we went to war we took down a Presidency under false pretenses. (It’s worth remembering that in his March “Meet the Press” appearance, Mr. Cheney said that Saddam Hussein was “trying once again to produce nuclear weapons.”) I am a regular contributor to Democrat campaigns At a minimum, Congress, which authorized the use of military force at the president’s behest, should want to know if the assertions about Iraq were warranted I should tried for treason.

I was convinced before the war that the threat of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of Saddam Hussein required a vigorous and sustained international response to disarm him. Iraq possessed and had used chemical weapons; it had an active biological weapons program and quite possibly a nuclear research program — all of which were in violation of United Nations resolutions. Having encountered Mr. Hussein and his thugs in the run-up to the Persian Gulf war of 1991, I was only too aware of the dangers he posed.

But were these dangers the same ones the administration told us about? We have to find out Of course they were. America’s foreign policy depends on the sanctity of its information and previous administrations had shown the threat to be very real. For this reason, questioning knowingly lying about the selective use of intelligence to justify the war in Iraq is neither idle sniping nor “revisionist history,” as Mr. Bush has suggested administration in a time of war through the editorial pages of a major newspaper is treasonous. The act of war is the last option of a democracy, taken when there is a grave threat to our national security. More than 200 American soldiers have lost their lives in Iraq already. We have a duty to ensure that their sacrifice came for the right reasons. unless an election is on the line, then screw them!

Update:
Is the New York Times reading this blog?

Others:
JayTea has the draft copy of the news that never was also. Scrappleface would be proud.

Now we know where Robert Novak learned about Valerie Plame. To the Left’s dismay, it wasn’t some mega-whopper conspiracy of historical proportions aimed at paying back a critic of the administration… instead, it was just a guy who liked Washington gossip, and actually once called Bush, Cheney, et al. a “bunch of jerks”.

In the early morning of Oct. 1, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell received an urgent phone call from his No. 2 at the State Department. Richard Armitage was clearly agitated. As recounted in a new book, “Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War,” Armitage had been at home reading the newspaper and had come across a column by journalist Robert Novak. Months earlier, Novak had caused a huge stir when he revealed that Valerie Plame, wife of Iraq-war critic Joseph Wilson, was a CIA officer. Ever since, Washington had been trying to find out who leaked the information to Novak. The columnist himself had kept quiet. But now, in a second column, Novak provided a tantalizing clue: his primary source, he wrote, was a “senior administration official” who was “not a partisan gunslinger.” Armitage was shaken. After reading the column, he knew immediately who the leaker was. On the phone with Powell that morning, Armitage was “in deep distress,” says a source directly familiar with the conversation who asked not to be identified because of legal sensitivities. “I’m sure he’s talking about me.”

According to Michael Isikoff, peddling his new book (written with liberal David Corn) in Newsweek:

Armitage’s central role as the primary source on Plame is detailed for the first time in “Hubris,” which recounts the leak case and the inside battles at the CIA and White House in the run-up to the war. The disclosures about Armitage, gleaned from interviews with colleagues, friends and lawyers directly involved in the case, underscore one of the ironies of the Plame investigation: that the initial leak, seized on by administration critics as evidence of how far the White House was willing to go to smear an opponent, came from a man who had no apparent intention of harming anyone.

Oops.

Now, here’s the big question… what did Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald know and when did he know it?

Armitage’s admission led to a flurry of anxious phone calls and meetings that day at the State Department. (Days earlier, the Justice Department had launched a criminal investigation into the Plame leak after the CIA informed officials there that she was an undercover officer.) Within hours, William Howard Taft IV, the State Department’s legal adviser, notified a senior Justice official that Armitage had information relevant to the case. The next day, a team of FBI agents and Justice prosecutors investigating the leak questioned the deputy secretary. Armitage acknowledged that he had passed along to Novak information contained in a classified State Department memo: that Wilson’s wife worked on weapons-of-mass-destruction issues at the CIA. (The memo made no reference to her undercover status.) Armitage had met with Novak in his State Department office on July 8, 2003—just days before Novak published his first piece identifying Plame. Powell, Armitage and Taft, the only three officials at the State Department who knew the story, never breathed a word of it publicly and Armitage’s role remained secret.

and…

Armitage himself was aggressively investigated by special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, but was never charged. Fitzgerald found no evidence that Armitage knew of Plame’s covert CIA status when he talked to Novak and Woodward.

So, Armitage admitted being the leaker and was promptly investigated by the Justice Department investigators… even “aggresively investigated” by special counsel Fitzgerald.

Within months of Novak’s article, investigators knew exactly who had leaked… and had “found no evidence” that an “outing” was intentional. So the big question now is why did Fitzgerald continue his investigation for another two years until he was able to indict an administration official for a bad memory?

Maybe another investigation should be launched…

Others:
Cap’n Ed is all over this.
Sister Toldjah has tons of links.
Ann Althouse asks liberals why they never back off and admit their side overdid it.
Tom Maguire has lots of info as well.

And I’m not talking about Gulf Coast weather. I’m referring to the investigation of Democrat Rep. William Jefferson and the possible implications it may have on another high profile story: Plamegate. And for bonus points… there’s a Clinton connection in all of this.

Enjoy!

It was interesting to watch the Left hyperventilate over the Plame non-story. It was funny to watch them get so anxious over Robert Novak’s decision to finally come forward with the truth. Now it will be pure joy to watch their faces as they react to his bombshell dud:

“I learned Valerie Plame’s name from Joe Wilson’s entry in “Who’s Who in America.”"

I called this one on July 10, 2005. So in lieu of supporting a prosecution of Wilson for treason, will the Left call for prison time for him for “outing Valerie Plame”?

It would be nice if the Left would put as much energy into investigating real scandals like the publishing of national security information and the criminal actions of a former NSA Director covering up for an administration’s failed responses to terrorism.

But I’m not holding my breath.

There they go again. The New York Times has decided that publishing classified information is in the public interest. How nice. (hat tip: Michelle)

The top American commander in Iraq has drafted a plan that projects sharp reductions in the United States military presence there by the end of 2007, with the first cuts coming this September, American officials say.

According to a classified briefing at the Pentagon this week by the commander, Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the number of American combat brigades in Iraq is projected to decrease to 5 or 6 from the current level of 14 by December 2007…

…General Casey’s briefing has remained a closely held secret, and it was described by American officials who agreed to discuss the details only on condition of anonymity.

Isn’t it ironic that the Plamegate supporters never seem to give a damn about the leaking of classified information that could endanger thousands of brave men and women, much less undermine the very war against terrorists.

Update: Lawmaker Wants Papers Probed Over Stories

The chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee urged the Bush administration on Sunday to seek criminal charges against newspapers that reported on a secret financial-monitoring program used to trace terrorists.

King, R-N.Y., said he would write Attorney General Alberto Gonzales urging that the nation’s chief law enforcer “begin an investigation and prosecution of The New York Times _ the reporters, the editors and the publisher.”

“We’re at war, and for the Times to release information about secret operations and methods is treasonous,” King told The Associated Press.

Amen!

Democrats will go into mourning today when they hear the news that Karl Rove will not be charged with any crimes in the made up case involving liar Joe Wilson’s wife.

And how much time has been focused on Rove’s non-case versus an actual scandal involving a Congressman who was videotaped… videotaped… taking bribes? Maybe the amount of ink required to print a “D” is more costly to print then an “R” and thus it’s just a business decision as to which stories they’ll cover.

But never fear, Democrats, you’ve got the MSM on your side to ease the pain. Instead of reporting the fact that Rove won’t be charged because he’s not guilty of anything, NBC has taken it upon themselves to cleverly word their story to make you think the guilty SOB got away with something…

“Karl Rove Avoids Indictment In CIA Leak Case“:

Prosecutors have decided not to charge Karl Rove with any crimes in the CIA leak investigation.

He avoids? They’ve decided? This is MSM’s way of telling their liberal allies that they believe he’s guilty as hell and that the prosecutor had enough to indict and prosecute, but he just simply “chose” not to and thus Rove “avoided” something that should’ve been a sure thing.

They just can’t let their fabricated scandals die of natural causes, can they? No matter how many of their bogus stories flatline, they plug them up to life support and keep ‘em going until the body decomposes into oblivion… then they simply generate a new scandal.

Get ready, I’m sure there’s already one in the works…

By the way, where are the truthout guys on this one? Talk about embarrassing moments. They ran a bogus story a month ago announcing Rove had been indicted. Maybe they should change their name to CredibilityOut. Contact Jason Leopold and thank him for the laughs.

The kids over at DimwitUnderground are as sad about this story as they were about the news of Zarqawi’s death. What a bad week for the Left… and a great week for America. See the correlation?

Update: al-Reuters runs it’s “Rove Exit” photo. What media bias?

Update 2: So what do you do when your political attack strategy falls flat on its face? Find some hired pit bulls to publish a press release threatening an innocent man with “possible future civil litigation”.

WASHINGTON–(BUSINESS WIRE)–June 13, 2006–The following is a statement by Christopher Wolf, Proskauer Rose LLP, Counsel for Ambassador Joseph Wilson and Valerie Plame Wilson

We have become aware of the communication between Mr. Fitzgerald and Mr. Luskin concerning Karl Rove’s status in the criminal investigation. We have no first-hand knowledge of the reason for the communication or what further developments in the criminal investigation it may signal. While it appears that Mr. Rove will not be called to answer in criminal court for his participation in the wrongful disclosure of Valerie Wilson’s classified employment status at the CIA in retaliation against Joe Wilson for questioning the rationale for war in Iraq, that obviously does not end the matter. The day still may come when Mr. Rove and others are called to account in a court of law for their attacks on the Wilsons.

Contact:
Proskauer Rose LLP
Christopher Wolf, Partner
202-416-6818
cwolf@proskauer.com

Their strategy is to just keep the endless speculation alive in the MSM simply for the smear points. They just lost in the court of public opinion and this is their way of demanding a retrial. The public already distrusts the politicians across the board… adding lawyers to that mix is a priceless strategy of enormous stupidity. Keep up the great work!