Gingrich for President

I just listened to an interview by Charlie Rose with Newt Gingrich. The question posed was "What will the incoming President have to do most importantly.?"
Newt expounded brilliantly, spelling out the stance that is necessary for the US to assume in the future. Citing Eisenhower as one of the great leaders of the modern age he stated that we should expand the State Dept. by at least 50% and take the time to go around the world and listen to what others are concerned with. Since we have been for the last eighteen years the sole superpower we don't have to prove ourselves. It behooves us to be benevolent not dictatorial. We must assume the leadership in the waar on global warming, or carbon reduction. He said all the right things about how we should behave in order to remedy the terrible reputation we have created for ourselves.

Although he never baldly criticized G. Bush he was obviously referring to the lousy job he has done. Re Iraq he first praised the brilliant military operation in toppling Saddam. He said we then fell off the cliff in botching the aftermath. Instead of creating an Iraqi government by retaining the Army and civil servants we attempted to form an American government and we thus created an occupation. All our trouble since have stemmed from that.

Also, without reference to Bush, he stated that he was deeply sorry for the way things have gone and how it has hurt the Republican Party. He is obviously a very bright fellow and has also had his share of foibles. The conversation was in the form of a memo to the "next" president yet it was a thinly veiled suggestion to the present Decider. We know well where things go from his suggestion box.

Different versions

In todays CCTimes the op-ed page contained a reprint of a Washington Post editorial.
To me it sounded like "sour grapes". The gist was that the whole Libby affair was a needless wasted of time and an assault on the freedom of the press. The latter being the way news reporters were treated by the investigators; particularly Judith Miller who spent some 80 days in jail.

The claim that Joseph Wilson's allegations, about the White House claim that uranium was procured from Niger, were false is patently untrue. It was proven that the White House lied. Demeaning Wilson is the administration's tactic because of it's being found out. Cheney camped over at Langley to get the intelligence reports so he could make his own determinations, not trusting the CIA. He indicated to the CIA that the Niger thing should be checked. Wilson's wife didn't "send" him. She merely suggested him since he had experience in the region. It was Tenent's decision to interview Wilson and sound him out. There is a question about the report Wilson did or did not prepare and who it was that received it. The Post's claim that all Wilsons allegations were false is just not the case

The status of Wilson's wife is of little import. Obviously Cheney felt obliged to disclose her employment at the CIA as a means of discrediting Wilson. He and the President went so far as to declassify specific information for the sole purpose of doing so. Libby was the pawn who sought out certain news hawks to leak information to. The machinations of the Vice President's office, it's apparent obsession with the Wilson article in the Times, not the Post, took up a great deal of Libby's time. With that kind of effort it is not plausible that he "forgot" who told him what.

As to the fact that Fitzgerald already knew who the leaker was does not mitigate the stupidity of the cover up. If the President, who must have been privy to the scheme had been forthright, very uncharacteristic of him, and called a halt to the matter by
bringing out the truth, it would have been over quickly. Such was not the case so things proceeded. That is not a fault of Fitzgerald's. He was given an assignment and went ahead with it.

All the hand wringing and recriminations are the fault of yet another misjudgment by the White House. Their record for being mistaken is pretty much perfect. The whole sorry mess is additional proof of the wrongheadedness of our going to war in Iraq.
That is the long and the short of it.

Guilty on 4 counts

Today the jury convicted Libby on four counts. The reactions vary greatly. The
President said he was sorry for Libby. The Vice President said he was disappointed.
Sen.Reid said he does not want the Pres. to pardon Libby. MSNBC spent two hours of "special programming" to report (gloat over) the details. Fox, as per usual, fairly tripped over itself in condemning the whole trial.

To me the significance of the trial was not so much Libby's guilt over lying and obstruction of justice as what the background was and is. The scenario began four years ago as the Administration was making its case for going to war with Iraq. The claim was made, among many other spurious claims, that Saddam was purchasing Yellow cake from Nigeria to use for nuclear weapons. Cheney, whose distrust of the CIA and FBI was very strong had been camping at Langley in order to get the intelligence reports before the CIA analysts because he felt he could detect meaningful data better than they could.The notion that yellow cake was being sold to Iraq came from an unreliable source in Germany. Cheney urges the CIA to check it out. It was a strong argument for the war. The British considered it but rejected the idea.
Former Ambassador to Nigeria, Joseph Wilson was asked to go there informally to determine the truth. The CIA was skeptical from the beginning. His report (not found)
was negative. No such deal.
In spite of that and over the objections of the CIA the President stated in his State of the Union Address that indeed Iraq was getting the material from Nigeria and the ability to make nuclear weapons was immanent. He conjured up the image of a mushroom cloud.
Ambassador Wilson wrote an op-ed piece to the NYTimes stating the fallacy of that claim. When Cheney read that, he was very upset and he and Libby discussed means of discrediting Wilson. Wilson's wife worked at the CIA as a counter terrorist special agent. It was decided to leak specially declassified information to certain news reporters concerning Wilson's wife. One of the selected reporters was Robert Novack.
Being a war hawk himself he put his conscience on hold and published the information.
This led to the CIA requesting an FBI investigation into the outing of its agent.
In the prolonged investigation and trial Libby lied about who knew what, and when.
Obviously he was protecting his boss,Cheney. A cloud hangs over the whole administration. The story is far from over.
Wilson is suing Cheney for his part in the ruination of his wife's career and is hopeful that in the discovery phase of the trial evidence will be forthcoming that will shed light on the Rove, Cheney,Bush, machinations that misled the country into this disasterous war. I only hope!!!!!