FDL Late Nite: Comstockian Hubris
The Barbara Comstock story just gets better and better. Valley Girl went on a Lexis/Nexis search and found that the head of Scooter Libby's defense fund is quite proud of her collection of scalps.
From Roll Call, June 9, 2005:
Which brings us to many of the people who attended a book party for Posties Susan Glasser and Peter Baker, who co-wrote "Kremlin Rising," and John Harris, author of "The Survivor," a look at the presidency of Bill Clinton, whose darn near entire staff was deposed in one scandal or another during his eight-year stretch.How charming. Somebody lets a bloodthirsty ghoul into the building and they proceed to treat her like a human being. That's what happens when you forget to festoon the door with garlic in DC.
A look around the book party revealed plenty of former Clinton aides who gave depositions during Whitewater, Travelgate, Filegate, Monicagate, campaign finance investigations - you name it. Amid the Clintonites packing the party at the German Marshall Fund of the U.S. was one woman who stood out like a sore thumb: Barbara Comstock, who as a Hill counsel in the 1990s was one of the leading GOP attack dogs against Clinton and Co.
The affable Comstock was chatting with Post Whitewater reporter Susan Schmidt, who, like Comstock, is also loathed by the Clintons. Then suddenly the two ladies found themselves chatting in the same circle of partygoers as Marsha Scott, a supreme Clinton loyalist who was deposed in the Clinton Whitewater and Travelgate investigations ... by none other than Comstock.
Comstock said hello to Scott and then turned to Schmidt and said, "Sue, have you ever met Marsha? She was one of our favorite people we deposed."
Comstock tells HOH that she and Scott have remained friendly over the years, and it was a perfectly pleasant moment at the book party the other night. "I deposed Rahm. I chatted with him, too," Comstock said, referring to now Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), a former senior aide to Clinton.
Emptywheel has a superb treatise on how Fair Barbara during her tenure at the DoJ waged a war against Eric Lichtblau at the New York Times and blackballed him for reporting on stories unfavorable to the Republicans that quite probably included the current NSA wiretapping story. It's a fascinating read that further illuminates the small cadre of GOP thugs who always seem to be pulling an infinite number of unseen strings.
It's valuable to shine lights on gorgons like Comstock who have built personal fortunes dishing it out -- but can she take it? The real fun will come in the fall of 2006 if the Dems take back one of the houses of congress and get the power of subpoena back in the committees. Then it won't just be K Street lobyists shaking in their boots, it'll be the Barbara Comstocks of the world whose profiles we will continue to raise to the point where they can hopefully be held accountable.
So if you'd like to help fight for a new Democratic congress, I can think of no better way than contributing to the campaign of Ciro Rodriguez. We've now raised $15,275 for Ciro on this site. So if you want to make the Comstocks of the world feel a little less safe tonight, throw a little dough Ciro's way.
(graphic by Graham G.)
posted by Jane Hamsher @ 2/13/2006 10:21:00 PM
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