Well it's been a busy week in blogtopia (yes,
Skippy coined that term) and I haven't had time to catch up and write about it. So many bloggers to see, so little time.
A week ago I got together with Warren Bell from
The Corner, about whom I'd said a bunch of unfounded stuff over at
TBogg's place, because of course that's my favorite place to run my mouth. I'd read somewhere Warren's parents were agents, and I said he drove a Lamborghini. Warren wrote me a very nice email and let me know his parents were not in the business, and that he car was a Maserati.
What am I gonna do, ask him for W2s? I said I felt bad & took him to coffee, we had a very nice time, talked about the biz and mostly avoided politics, but he was a very nice guy who did not take himself as seriously as I'd assumed anyone at the Corner would.
What can I say, I'm an asshole.
Then
Kevin Drum had his counter-programming moment to the Corner's $1,000 a plate dinner with Buckley. Everyone was welcome to show up at the Farmer's Market and didn't have to pay a dime. John from
Crooks and Liars was there, as was
David E.,
RJ Eskow, Greg from
the Talent Show,
SteveAudio & his wife Pam, Arianna & Michael Owen from the
HuffPo, Joseph from the
Martini Republic (sorry, no Alex this time) and probably others I am forgetting. I drank too much caffeine and talked too fast, but not for the last time.
Then Thursday I finally lured
Digby into having coffee. What can you say? The suave, charming and brilliant Digby did not disappoint, we yammered non-stop for three hours and I would probably still be sitting there if I did not have a date to clean out my garage.
Then last night I ran into
Johnny Wendell from Air America. He thoughtfully spared all of you and allowed me to indulge my Valerie Plame obsession at great length. Do you know how fucked up you have to be when a talk radio DJ can't get word in edgewise? Yeah, it's that bad.
And now I will leave you to guess where this bit of gossip came from, because I promised not to tell. But one of the above-mentioned folks called me this afternoon to say that according to sources within the
Enquirer itself, the source for Bush's drinking story is -- an
incredibly pissed-off, recently scapegoated head of a federal agency who thinks that BushCo. done him wrong.
Oh the long knives are coming out now, aren't they?
And yes,
Kobe didn't attend any of these events for a variety of reasons, and boy is he miffed. If you read in the
Enquirer I'm back on the sauce, you'll know the source.
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Fearless Leader in disconnect once again. From the
WaPo:
U.S. President George W. Bush on Saturday called the federal government well prepared and organized to deal with Hurricane Rita as he sought to reassure Americans and repair his image tarnished by the slow and chaotic response to Katrina.
"It comforts me knowing that our federal government is well organized and well prepared to deal with Rita," said Bush.
CBS News:
The storm surge from Hurricane Rita caused havoc in New Orleans, cascading over the city's patched levees and causing new flooding just days after already-devastated neighbourhoods had been pumped dry.
"The first time is bad. After that, you numb up," said Quentrell Jefferson of the Ninth Ward....
"We believed the 2.4-metre elevation was sufficient" to protect the Ninth Ward, Wagenaar said.
Over at the
Left Coaster, Steve Soto tells us the Right is going back to their Hillary manual and trying to blame Bush's failures on -- Laura.
They can't be serious. I mean, the modern GOP is undoubtedly all about the institutionalized wrath of the Angry White Male. But it looks to me like Preznit Blow Binge has taken to writing his own talking points memos, 'cos this is the lamest one yet. (Typical alcoholic -- it's
everyone else's fault.)
We're getting into the deep aggression now. If this one doesn't fly and he runs true to form, expect Daddy to be #2 on the hit list.
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Mark Kleiman is right. There is something particularly barbaric about sitting around and taking pleasure in watching two people beat the shit out of each other. And yet I like it. I can't defend it, but I do.
I particularly like to watch the vintage fights on ESPN. Ever see Sugar Ray Robinson fight Jake LaMotta in the St. Valentines' Day Massacre? It's mesmerizing. Yet as Mark notes,
seven boxers have died from injuries sustained in the ring since 1982 in Nevada alone. The human body wasn't built to take that kind of punishment.
And you'll notice a definite dearth of rich kids in the ring.
It's hard to call for a ban -- these are adults, after all, who knowingly engage in the sport. And people do strange, dangerous stuff all the time for money -- NASCAR is dull as dirt 'til somebody chalks up a fiery wreck. There is only so much you can do to save people from themselves, and most of us are not willing to make the ultimate sacrifice that would surely put a halt to the madness, i.e., stop watching.
But I do like Mark's idea of returning boxing to its turn-of-the-century days of bare knuckles fighting:
As long as prizefighters wear boxing gloves, which protect the delicate bones of their hands so they can safely concuss one another's brains, a few of them are going to die and a lot of them are going to suffer permanent neurological injury. The deaths are more newsworthy, but to my mind the injuries are more heartbreaking.
The contrast between the witty, agile Cassius Clay who struck down Sonny Liston and the brain-damaged stumblebum who is now Muhammed Ali is all the evidence anyone should need to conclude that a major reform is necessary.
And that reform couldn't be simpler: take off the gloves. Then fighters will pound one another's bodies for hours on end, as they did in the Gentleman Jim Corbett era. That might not be as exciting as watching shorter bouts decided by knockouts, but unlike contemporary prizefighting it would be a sport that a decent person who understood was happening could watch without disgust.
Oh and if Mark Burnett and Jeffrey Katzenberg do return the "noble and heroic" sport of boxing to TV as
The Contender returns (pointing to brain-dead Muhammed Ali as an example -- WTF?), the first two people who step in the ring and take a beating should be the rich, white Mark Burnett and Jeffrey Katzenberg.
Talk about a ratings bonanza. HBO could pry my wallet open real wide for a pay-per-view fee on that one.
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Preznit Sippin' Whiskey must've been erroneously told to expect
Jeff Gannon's replacement today as in-house softball lobber:
THE PRESIDENT: Bianca. Nobody named Bianca? Well, sorry Bianca's not here. I'll be glad to answer her question.
Q I'll follow up.
THE PRESIDENT: No, that's fine. (Laughter.) Thank you though, appreciate it. Just trying to spread around the joy of asking a question.
Q How is the strategy outlined today by General Casey different from what the United States was doing in the past? What lessons would you say have been incorporated in it? And based on that, how much closer do you think we are to being able to turn over full control of the security situation?
THE PRESIDENT: It's going to be a while to turn over full control. Full control says that the Iraqis are capable of moving around the country and sharing intelligence and they got a command control system that works like ours, and that's going to be a while. Turning over some control to Iraqis is now taking place. As I told you, there are more Iraqis in the lead -- Iraqis are in the lead in this mission for the first time on a major operation.
What General Casey briefed us on was how our strategy of cleaning out the terrorists out of a city and being able to fill in behind, or leave behind Iraqi forces, is beginning to pay off. And what hadn't happened in the past was the capacity to fill that void with a capable force that would prevent the terrorists from coming back in.
Q Mr. President, could we talk more about --
THE PRESIDENT: Are you Bianca?
Q No, I'm not. Anita -- Fox News.
THE PRESIDENT: Okay.
Q Just a quick question --
THE PRESIDENT: Okay. I was looking for Bianca. I'm sorry.
Well, either that or he was jacked out of his mind on some primo Medalin blow. What is it about the Bush brothers and their
imaginary friends?
Christ. It's just one family.
Everyone can't be Fredo.
Update: Froomkin in the WaPo:
"Will any member of the White House press corps risk scorn from McClellan -- and maybe even mockery from colleagues -- by asking the press secretary to set the record straight about what appears to be an utterly scurrilous report in the National Enquirer that Bush is hitting the booze again? Some brave soul should."From
Democratic Underground:
"Ed Schultz just interviewed an editor with the National Enquirer. The editor said the paper stands by its story "150%" and would go to court over it if they had to. He said that they have 2 different sources for the story, and that the sources had been informing the National Enquirer about this story for about the last month or so.Notably, the editor said that a "highly respected" newspaper has also been working on the story and could well publish something on it in the next week or two. On edit: He also said to expect Laura to be traveling alot more with Bush so she can keep a close watch on him."Oh and Sadly, No is on
Blow Watch.
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According to the
National Enquirer:
"When the levees broke in New Orleans, it apparently made him reach for a shot," said one insider. "He poured himself a Texas-sized shot of straight whiskey and tossed it back. The First Lady was shocked and shouted: "Stop George!"
Okay, first a word about the Enquirer, speaking as someone whose career choice predisposes them to know. They wake up in the morning knowing they are going to get sued. So they pay people money -- big money -- to go on the record to give their lawyers the kind of legal cover they are going to need to defend themselves.
Sometimes their sources turn out to be bullshit, but more often than not they are solid. The Enquirer usually requires two independent sources for any story. Now their burden of proof may be lower for the President, who is unlikely to sue, but still. There is a lot less unverifiable garbage being perpetrated in the Enquirer these days than in, say, the NY Times.
So from a realistic standpoint (and by that I mean drunk-wise) how likely is it that the story is true?
Another source said: "I'm only surprised to hear that he hadn't taken a shot sooner. Before Katrina, he was at his wit's end. I've known him for years. He's been a good ol' Texas boy forever. George had a drinking problem for years that most professionals would say needed therapy. He doesn't believe in it [therapy], he never got it. He drank his way through his youth, through college and well into his thirties. Everyone's drinking around him."
Yeah, like Dick Fucking
DUI Cheney.
Doesn't believe in therapy? Won't get any kind of help or treatment? As someone who is a member of the club, so to speak, I can tell you that any untreated alcoholic (or "
dry drunk," as I've discussed before) is extremely likely to crack under a certain kind of pressure. But not the pressure the Enquirer speculates about:
"The war in Iraq, the loss of American lives, has deeply affected him. He takes every soldier's life personally. It has left him emotionally drained."
Bullshit. Alcohol and drugs are the things that addicts use to protect themselves from their own feelings all right, but an untreated drunk only gets really shook up about one thing: blows to his or her own self-esteem. They are really not capable of much compassion or even having a perspective outside of their extremely shrunken world where their absorption with their own self-image reigns supreme.
Which is not to say that all untreated addicts are bad people, frequently they are just really sick and can't find within themselves anything better to offer the world. Dubya has the unique distinction of being both a drunk
and a sadistic jackass.
Bush didn't even know for two days that Katrina was a problem. Nobody in his administration wanted to tell him he needed to end his vacation. We know he wasn't watching his fucking TV because he and Brownie seemed to be the only two people in America who didn't know there were people at the Convention Center dying on Thursday after the storm.
No, my guess is that if the first drink came it arrived with the first bad polls, in the wake of not only Katrina but his Social Security defeat and the Iraq debacle he has mired us all in. Not to mention the sword of damocles hanging over the whole administration in the form of Patrick J. Fitzgerald.
(Note to self: take up collection for Fitzgerald Kevlar vest.) And let me tell you one thing. You can believe me or not, I don't really care. If you're an addict and that kind of emotional shitstorm is raging around you, and you have nobody you can lean on for help -- no health care professionals, no support group, nobody you have been consistently involved with for a long period of time to stand with you against a very strong physical compulsion (and no, your nagging Al-Anon wife does not count) --
you will eventually drink and use. It's
what you know. It's
what we do.
Wet or dry drunk, it doesn't really matter. As an untreated alcoholic he's got as much business being the President of the United States as my dogs do being the head of the IMF.
I resist saying it, because it's such a facile way to end a post, but this time I really must.
Worst. President. Ever.
Update: The
Sadly, No crew astutely speculate that the drinking story was leaked by the White House to cover up for the fact that Preznit Jutting Jaw is probably coked out of his mind. Which is entirely probable, but the distinction between drinking and doing blow for an addict is only meaningful to geriatric fundies high on Jeebus, and only an idiot would think this was a good cover story. If he's One Of Us, it's all the same, and only a matter of time before he leaps from one to the other. As a member o' the club said the other day, "drinking is something you do when you're driving around looking for drugs." That's just how it goes.
Mind -- we're talking about
addicts here. If your teenage kid is caught pulling bong hits, it doesn't mean they'll be sticking a needle in their arm the next day. If a stone-cold dope fiend starts drinking again, on the other hand, a raised eyebrow is definitely in order.
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A while back I asked
Mark Kleiman WTF was up with the fact that the Justice Department is all about
busting low-level pot smokers and trying to convince the world that
meth was not a problem. Because really, I just could not get my head around it, considering Pfizer and other drug companies have figured out new ways to make money off of
cold products that do not require pseudoephedrine, the
sine qua none of meth manufacturing.
Mark said that it was an extension of the culture war, and I'm going to paraphrase badly here, but the gist of it is that BushCo. is still fighting some antiquated 60's paradigm of pot smoking free love tie-dyed hippies. Which sort of jibes with my theory about why the right hates Clinton so deeply -- he is a symbol to them of that cultural moment, even though it's laughable to those on the left that someone so DLC as Bubba, who played golf with Ken Lay and signed every bill Newt Gingrich ever handed him, could be considered counter-culture or anti-establishment in any way.
But I do believe that this is how the 1600 Crew see him, and they are attempting to use the long arm of the law to stamp out everyone they view on the other side of this perceived cultural divide. Which is weird, because as far as I can tell the left does not have any exclusive corner on the weed smoking market. Shit, my right wing red neck cousins like nothing better than to smear themselves with deer piss, smoke a fattie, grab a rifle and climb a 40 foot tree stand and wait for Bambi to wander by.
But now the FBI is abetting BushCo.'s absurd culture war and extending it to
porn hounds. And they're looking for a few good
beat offs men:
The new squad will divert eight agents, a supervisor and assorted support staff to gather evidence against "manufacturers and purveyors" of pornography -- not the kind exploiting children, but the kind that depicts, and is marketed to, consenting adults.
Now remember, we're not talking about child pornography here. We're talking about some granny in Wichita who loses her shit over Jenna Jameson.
"I guess this means we've won the war on terror," said one exasperated FBI agent, speaking on the condition of anonymity because poking fun at headquarters is not regarded as career-enhancing. "We must not need any more resources for espionage."
Among friends and trusted colleagues, an experienced national security analyst said, "it's a running joke for us."
A few of the printable samples:
"Things I Don't Want On My Resume, Volume Four."
"I already gave at home."
"Honestly, most of the guys would have to recuse themselves."
So they want to recuse the porn hounds? I can think of a good test. Eliminate anyone who can instantly tell a set of fake hooters who is not a) a member of the American Board of Plastic Surgery or b) an a-list Hollywood director. The only way the average Joe comes by that kind of expertise is courtesy of Vivid Entertainment or your local titty bar.
Even the normally obedient Depends Media can't report on this with a straight face. I mean, what hope do bloggers have when we're being outsnarked by the fucking WaPo?
Explicit sexual entertainment is a profit center for companies including General Motors Corp. and Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. (the two major owners of DirecTV), Time Warner Inc. and the Sheraton, Hilton, Marriott and Hyatt hotel chains.
Which means they'll have to go after the do-it-yourselfers and the amateurs. And that's the best kind. (I'm an Ed Powers fan myself.)
But Gonzales endorses the rationale of predecessor Meese: that adult pornography is a threat to families and children. Christian conservatives, long skeptical of Gonzales, greeted the pornography initiative with what the Family Research Council called "a growing sense of confidence in our new attorney general."
Well that's great. Because the rest of us think this makes him look like an even bigger douchebag than he already was.
Applicants for the porn squad should therefore have a stomach for the kind of material that tends to be most offensive to local juries.
Oh I think I know the
perfect guy for the job. (No, not TBogg.)
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Arianna has a post up which seems to confirm what has long been suspected -- that the original target of Patrick J. Fitzgerald's investigation is John Bolton's office. When I saw Arianna over the weekend she said she was almost ready to go with the story, but considering the ire that has been brought down on her for leaking things like Karl Rove's off-the-record statements, she wanted to be absolutely sure before she ran with the story. Due to the fact that she has been proved
fucking right correct about all her Traitorgate stories to date, I see no reason to doubt her sourcing on this one, either.
Specifically, Arianna points to former CIA Agent and Bolton chief of staff, Fred Fleitz, as the person who probably knew Valerie Plame's identity. While he worked for Bolton he also worked at the CIA's WINPAC division, responsible for stovepiping some of the most egregious WMD intelligence to the top of the executive branch. WINPAC was also an original recipient of Joe Wilson's report on the Niger uranium (according to the
SSCI, p. 43).
It is telling that neither Bolton nor Fleitz have been interviewed by Fitzgerald's grand jury, this according to Steve Clemons at the
Washington Note who predicted earlier this year that Fleitz could well be the original leaker. He also goes on to note that Fleitz
does not sneeze without Bolton's approval. But he got it wrong when he noted that Fitzgerald's failure to question both Bolton and Fleitz was an indication that they were not suspect in the matter. As former prosecutor Reddhedd says, the
target of a grand jury investigation is expressly someone who would
not be interviewed:
In most cases, you are dealing with an investigation with clearly identified targets up front. Targets are almost never called before the grand jury to testify -- you just use investigating officers, witnesses to the particular crime (e.g. drug deal), etc., so you have absolutely no need of calling in your alleged defendant....In my experience, though, you try to not tip your hand that someone is a target until you show up with your warrant and handcuffs.
According to the
US Attorney's Manual, a "target" is a "putative defendant." A "subject" is someone "whose conduct is within the scope of the grand jury's investigation," as opposed to someone who is just a "witness," and under no suspicion of having engaged in criminal activity. While Rove's lawyer has said that in the past Fitzgerald has informed him that Rove is not a "target," that status can change. And as Lawrence O'Donnell wrote, Rove has made
three trips to the Grand Jury. "Three trips to the same grand jury is frequently an indicator of subject status," he notes.
So while Bolton and Feitz may have been the original "targets," Rove and Libby (and untold others) may have morphed into targets as the investigation progressed. With Jailhouse Judy now softening up and reputedly looking to get back to her lucrative book deals and lecture gigs by ratting EVERYONE out, more will undoubtedly be revealed.
Update: Quicksilver has an interesting observation -- when Biden asked Rice in July whether Bolton had ever testified in front of the grand jury, he was probably doing so quite pointedly. And Bush probably thought when he nominated Bolton to the UN last March that his good buddies in the Supreme Court who gave him the presidency would also uphold some sort of privilege for Miller. Which allowed Rove and Libby to scapegoat her as their source.
Woops.
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You knew it had to happen eventually. Someone at
The Corner went cold turkey on the Kool-Aid. Results predictably hideous:
RE: THE OSTRICH EFFECT [Rod Dreher]
I don't at all get this attitude among many on the right that our sworn duty is to back anything President Bush and the GOP choose to do. We are conservatives before we are Republicans, are we not? Facts are better than dreams, and the fact is, the president is acting like the second coming of Lyndon B. Johnson with his spending proposals on Katrina thing, and it is past time for the grassroots to have hit the wall on the spendthrift Republican president and the spendthrift Republican Congress. What is the point of electing Republicans if they're going to spend worse than Democrats? Moreover, I'm absolutely with Michelle Malkin on this outrageous Bush cronyism regarding the new Immigration and Customs Enforcement chief over at the Department of Homeland Security. I find it impossible to believe that this administration or their GOP Congressional enablers care about enforcing the immigration laws of this country. And I find it impossible to believe that this doesn't matter. A lot.
At some point, we conservatives have got to ask ourselves if we stand for principles, or merely maintaining power. We have got to ask ourselves just which conservative goals are being served by the Republican governing status quo. We have got to ask ourselves if our conservatism stands for much more than The Democrats Must Lose. I was having a beer with a fellow religious and social conservative that first Friday after Katrina, and we were both just livid about the administration's response. We both agreed that we'd vote in a heartbeat in 2008 for a social liberal like Rudy Giuliani, who inspires confidence in his competence and judgment, over the present crowd that we both helped vote into power. I hope next year brings forth a raft of primary challengers to GOP Congressional incumbents. If we go on like this for much longer, it will be a long time before the American people trust the government to our side again. The Democrats aren't going to remain more hapless than the Republicans forever, and the denial in which too many Republicans wish to live in right now does the cause of conservatism no good.
How long do you suppose it will be before K.Lo comes down off the ceiling and yanks HIS magical posting powers?
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Interesting article by
Margaret Kimberly on race and journalistic culpability:
The Times told Martin Luther King to shut up and mind his own business when he dared to speak out against the war in Vietnam. Dr. Wen Ho Lee went to jail because of the Times'’ hyperventilation, only to be cleared of any wrongdoing. Tons of newsprint went into reporting the Whitewater non-scandal.
The Times hasn'’t always lived up to its highly vaunted reputation. Today it faces a scandal involving a reporter who makes Jayson Blair look like a paragon of journalistic virtue.
(snip)
Judith Miller and her bosses at the Times are all complicit in bringing hell to the people of Iraq. They aided and abetted the Bush administration’s web of lies that convinced many Americans to support making war on a helpless people. When Judith Miller reported that a confidential source provided her with proof of the existence of WMD, already spineless members of Congress turned completely to jelly. They held their fingers in the political winds and concluded that shock and awe was a great idea after all.
(snip)
It will be interesting to see how others react too. As always happens when one Black person is involved in a scandal, every Black person in America was called to account because of Blair. Was Blair an affirmative action hire? Was Black editor Gerald Boyd protecting him? Should Black people be allowed to work in journalism? Should any of us be allowed to work anywhere at all?
No such questions have arisen because of Miller. No group that she claims affinity with will be asked to pledge loyalty, explain itself or prove that it hasn't been given some special privilege.
(snip)
If Miller is treated like other lying white journalists she will do just fine when she walks out of jail. She will have no problem finding work and the corporate media will continue to defend her. If they don'’t they will have to tell the truth about their own complicity in feeding lies to their readers and viewers.
She's absolutely right. Judy will get book deals. She will have lucrative speaking engagements. She will be the heroine of useless gasbags everywhere.
How many pointless and illiterate editorials did the Times run in defense of Blair? Is Tom Brokaw running around cheering for him to get a second chance? Is Bob Dole carping about how he was much maligned and trumpeting him as pillar of journalistic integrity?
I am noticing a dearth of well-fed white men like
Rush Limbaugh and
Mickey Kaus saying "tisk tisk, affirmative action" with regard to Miller.
Am I missing something here?
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It didn't occur to me at the time I read it, but Reddhedd emailed me about an interesting point with regard to
Schumer's statements yesterday, i.e. that former CIA Director George Tenet is reportedly really angry that Judith Miller might walk out of jail sometime within the month:
Tenet is not at all happy with Dubya, but he is even less happy with Cheney and his behind the scenes machinations to keep his hands looking squeaky clean publicly. Thus, the speculation that Tenet has been talking and then some, along with several of his lieutenants, all of whom have been very displeased with the Cheney stranglehold on politicizing intelligence and the NSA's inability to actually do its job in independently reviewing matters for the WH, etc., etc. Guess we'll see when the SGJ reports indictments and the trials start whether or not Tenet and company have a starring role. Seems to me you have to have a pretty large set of cajones to try and dump on the former head of the CIA -- no matter how many contacts you may think you have, he can one-up you in spades and find out where you've buried each and every skeleton from the time you were in the first grade forward.
But why would Tenet care about Judy Miller exchanging her testimony for liberty, any more than he did about Matt Cooper or Walter Pincus or Tim Russert? If what Schumer says is true, and Tenet is running around extremely hacked off despite that nice shiny medal o' freedom (Gawd, what
does it take to get a guy to clam up these days, eh, Dubya?) then Judy must've done something much worse than the others did, at least in the eyes of the former CIA director.
Curiouser and curiouser....
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Well, the laughably incompetent
Floyd Abrams is not counting on his
superlative legal skills to get his client Judith Miller out of jail any time soon, it seems:
Although Miller is due to be released when the federal grand jury closes its investigation of the case on Oct. 28, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald could seek an extension or ask that a new grand jury be convened.
"The prosecutor in open court talked about the possibility of convening a new grand jury," Abrams told E&P Monday, referring to the original sentencing hearing. When Miller was put behind bars on July 6, the sentence was for 18 months or until the grand jury ends its investigation.
Did he really think Fitzgerald was just going to shrug, throw up his hands and say "well, nice try" at the end of October? Watch his two year investigation circle the drain because Judy's a heck of a broad and Tom Brokaw thinks she should go free?
"The sentence imposed by the judge would end on the 28th," Abrams said. "We're hoping that it will end then. I am just not going to go beyond that."
Fitzgerald can either extend the present grand jury, convene a new one, or just say screw it and go snorkling in Aruba. Floyd Abrams must be the only person in the world who actually thinks Door #3 is a realistic option.
Abrams would not comment on previous reports of plea negotiations being done on Miller's behalf, but said he had not spoken with the prosecutor about Miller.
Because as
Arianna reported recently, the NYT finally decided to get some realistic legal advice and are no longer relying on dithering idiots like Abrams to salvage what meager hope of any future journalistic credibility they might once again lay claim to.
So Abrams must earn his fat fee by pimping the myth of the Bleeding Martyr:
"She's about the same, It's a difficult situation," Abrams said of her condition. "She's doing the best she can in a very difficult situation."
Oh, wait...there's a tissue here somewhere. Methinks I must daub my weeping eyes.
Or I could just offer a few keystrokes in support of an LTE at
Editor and Publisher this morning:
Maybe you should save your pity for the too-many journalists who have died in Iraq....For her publicizing disingenuous lies and disastrous disinformation in The New York Times and for her help in ginning up the war fever in America, she merits a plaque on the wall of Journalism's Hall of Shame.
I feel pretty safe in predicting that if Judy can't fashion some new self-starring drama whereby she heroically rats out her sources in the coming weeks, Fitzgerald will unleash unholy hell on her, the
Times and anyone else who impedes his investigation. Even
Times Editor Bill Keller has
turned apostate, acknowledging both that a) journalistic privilege is not absolute, and b) he's on thin fucking ice.
Fireworks a-coming, kids. Stay tuned.
PS: In the coming weeks I'm going to be doing a series on Fitzgerald for the
Huffington Post. So if anyone has any great contacts within the Justice Department or folks who may know him, please email me.
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Tbogg:
...and thank god they didn't have time to have kids and square the piggy-eyed gene.
Anyone who thought I was above reprinting that now knows better.
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I can't figure out whether Chuck Schumer is an idiot or just trying to grease the ladies up for the Roberts vote, but at a fundraiser yesterday he stated that he thought Roberts would
vote in favor of Roe v. Wade.
How. Fucking. Stupid. Can. You. Be. The only thing Roberts did all week was find new and cute ways to evade answering Democratic questions about Roe v. Wade. He's spent the last year campaigning for the job, meeting with every right wing wacko uber bigot and earning the good fascism seal of approval. Do you think he smiled winningly and earned
James Dobson's backing by saying he couldn't answer any questions on abortion because it was something that might one day come before the court?
Hmmmm, I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess not.
Ron Wyden said that after meeting with Roberts for an hour there was no doubt in his mind Roberts would
vote to overturn Roe v. Wade. Is Schumer really just a world-class sucker? My guess is he isn't. When he nods in acquiescence and casts his "yes" vote he'd like the ladies to think he's representing for them. Well, Chuck, with friends like you, who needs enemies.
You'll be voting "yeah" on a man who's got scant experience as a judge and putting him in the highest judicial seat in the land. He's about as qualified for the job at this point as Michael Brown was to be head of FEMA.
Oh, and Bush made you his bitch once again by refusing to release 5,000 pages of documents that could have been very helpful in carrying out that whole "advise and consent" thing responsibly. But hey, Roberts has got a nice smile, a Stepford wife and a couple of stunt kids to warm the hearts of people who just aren't thinking very deeply about this whole thing. That ought to give you a free PR pass, huh?
So from the ladies, really. Thanks. Thanks so very much, Chuck. You are the original "ladies' man." Whenever we break out the Barry White, the Chivas and the aqua lube, we will think of you.
And we will remember this vote for a long, long time to come.
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