Roger L. Simon: "Senior Moments" at the Libby Trial

I have long last patience for the Valerie Plame Affair, but I had to smile when I read today's coverage by Byron York in the New York Post. This whole silly exercise in taxpayer waste has turned into a kind of Boomer Opera Bouffe filled with strange memory lapses. Judith Miller, Tim Russert... hardly anyone seems to remember what they did or heard. Can't say I blame them. I have similar lapses myself. And it's going to get worse. But there is hope, at least according to this report.

Of course, this is all about whether Scooter Libby lied to a grand jury, a crime for which he may pay dearly. Which is also ironic since virtually everybody connected to this creepy affair is lying in some way or other. Joseph C. Wilson, the instigator of this nonsense, lied quite publicly on the oped page of New York Times. As for the reporters covering the case, well, the less said the better. After all, they have their livelihoods to protect. Where would they be without illegal leaks?

This tedious business has turned into a money machine for lawyers and authors. But beneath is something serious - the ongoing rivalry between the DIA and the CIA. The latter, the mammoth bureaucracy famous for missing the fall of the Soviet Union, doesn't like its competition. Who does?

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"...has turned into a kind of Boomer Opera Bouffe filled with strange memory lapses."

Strange memory lapses? Nope, the memory lapses are nothing out of the ordinary. Most of us can barely remember what we had for breakfast a week ago. Scooter Libby, however, may very well be convicted. He is a white Republican Jew. It is likely that the black jurors will find any excuse to throw him into jail. Strangely, almost no one dares to admit the obvious. Patrick Fitzgerald would not have dared try this case in just about any other area of the country.

Russert's behavior in this drama is fascinating. See, e.g., http://justoneminute.typepad.com/main/2007/02/tim_russert_equ.html

The concept that absolute power corrupts absolutely is very evident when it comes to prosecutors. As with the Duke Lacrosse case that I have been following, this is truly surreal. So Libby may be convicted for lying about something he didn't do. Fitzgerald knew that Richard Armitage leaked the information and yet he continued to investigate. Why? His job was to find the person who leaked the information about Valerie Plame, not to catch someone, anyone, in a lie. It would be one thing if Libby was engaging in a cover-up for Armitage, but that was not the case. So why prosecute Libby?

Political trial. Criminalization of political differences. Bad sign. Should not've impeached the Arkansas Peckerwood. Now have to pay and pay and pay. Of course, Watergate was a stupendous miscarriage of rationality, too. It's a race between Hell and the freaking Boomers retiring (and I'm one of 'em).

I must confess that I don't remember one word I said to my colleagues at work four years ago.

Even if I kept a diary, or notes, or had a secretary follow me around (hah) and record my utterances, I still don't think I'd remember a single thing other than what was recorded, and if called to testify on that my testimony would always be preceded by, "... well, as far as I can remember based on what my idiot sainted secretary recorded that day ...".

Point is, if a perjury trial is to be based on a the demonstration of a falsehood, it ought to be an air-tight, locked-down, no wiggle room at all type of case. By the time you get to the fourth or sixth or tenth person who has memory problems -- for the prosecution! -- your case is done. Russet, Mitchell, Miller, Libby, Wilson -- all may be rogues, liars, scoundrels and reporters/politicans/lawyers (but I repeat myself). But this sort of case seems to be one that is better answered in a history book than at a trial.

There was no particular reson for the Washington, DC, insiders to remember the first time they heard about Valerie Plame's CIA employment status. It was a relatively boring fact. Such an individual is a dime a dozen in their social milieu. Moreover, they all knew she worked at the Langley headquarters---which meant that she could not have been a covert operator.

If the whole thing has been a DNC set-up, it has succeeded spectacularly, since the game plan is to demoralize the whole country whenever there's an (R) in the WH ("See? You're miserable, ain't ya?").

Roger appeared on Russert's Meet the Press on Sunday. Note that portion of the transcript which demonstrates the complete disconnect between Roger the Washington Press corps.

Howie Kurtz is the fearless defender of the MSM and Broder is so sad about this. Neither respond to Roger's comment about it being a show trial because it is. Very telling exchange.

Howie Kurtz, I want to ask you about the Scooter Libby trial. William Powers in the National Journal has an interesting column where he thinks that the fact that journalists have to testify is good because it will open up in terms of the public being able to see how reporters cultivate relationships to get information. You have a different view of that?

MR. KURTZ: Yeah, I certainly don?t think it?s a good thing at all, and I think the reputation of journalists in this Libby trial have taken a hit. I was in the courtroom when you testified, Tim, and you looked uncomfortable during five hours of cross-examination, cautious, hesitant, as anybody would be. No journalist likes to be on the witness stand when, in this case, Libby?s lawyer was trying to take small statements you?d made and find discrepancies and ask you why, on the one hand, you were willing to talk to the FBI about your conversation with Scooter Libby but you resisted a subpoena. You said that it was because you didn?t want to get into a prosecutorial fishing expedition.

The problem for us as a profession is this: When journalists get up there and testify, beside?leaving aside the First Amendment question?it looks to people like?out there like we have become too cozy with senior Bush administration officials, not so we can ferret out information about national security, not so we can find out about corruption, but, in this particular case, in some cases, acting as a conduit for White House effort to put out negative information about Joe Wilson, Valerie Plame?s husband, a big critic of the pre-war intelligence. And I think that the people out there who don?t follow this all that closely think that we have become part of the club, too much the insiders. And that is a problem for journalism.

MR. RUSSERT: It is different when you can?t finish your sentence or complete your thought, when you?re restricted to yes-no answers. And it is uncomfortable. But it?s?if you?re called, you?re called.

But, Roger, to Howie?s point, do you think that the fact that journalists have to work their sources to get, get information is a bad thing for the public to see?

MR. SIMON: No, I think the public has a healthy realism about how the press operates. But I also have to say, this is a nutty trial that nobody except the people involved in it and the people covering it care about. Once again we have a prosecutor who can?t an indictment for the real crime?leaking the identity of a CIA agent?so he goes instead for the crime of, well, people didn?t tell him the complete truth when they talked to him. I mean, there?s no underlying crime here that anyone has been indicted for. This is just a show trial. And I?ve got to say, even if he?s convicted?and he may not be?but even if he?s convicted, would any judge send to prison a guy named Scooter? He wouldn?t last 48 hours.

MR. KURTZ: But, Roger, it?s a show trial that has put the spotlight on the Bush administration?s attempt to make a case about pre-war intelligence that turned out not to be true. That matters.

MR. RUSSERT: David Broder, Judy Miller, Matt Cooper and myself, and now Bob Woodward, Andrea Mitchell, Walter Pincus?you?re going to have a significant number of journalists going before a court, which will be all covered. What does that do to journalism?

MR. BRODER: Well, it hurts. And it hurts because I think it opens up something that has been worrisome, I think, to many of us in the press, which is the way in which relationships between reporters and government officials can be used by those government officials to plant stories, in effect, that are damaging to their political enemies using the reporters, in effect, to carry out their political mission. And that?s different from cultivating a source to get information that?s of value to you as a journalist. Here you are being used by the government official to carry out their political work.

Roger, it must have felt that you walked into the College of Cardinals at the Vatican. Such innocence and piety.

And here you were the only one who is saying the country has a healthy disregard for you phonies.

Russert, a lawyer, complaining about the yes no restrictions on witnesses and Broder observing that the press is being so abused by political operatives to do their dirty work and Howie complaining about the small statements used to impeach Russert as a truth teller.

Take from this: the press are a bunch of high priced prima donnas who never expect to be cross examined, are not all that smart or informed when pressed and deserve to keel hauled on this.

In England, they call talking head newscasters news readers, shouldn't we be calling them news readers here in the States?

Kurtz thinks we need a show trial on the Bush administration and decision to go to war.

If we're going the show trial route, I would personally like to see a show trial on the Democrats and their press accomplices, and their breathtaking assault on the American voters. Let's focus on the NYT's many acts of treason and their enablers on the reality-oriented side of the aisle. Or we could focus on Sandy Burger and turn a bright, bright light on the media's near total lack of interest on that. Or--well it is a target-rich environment, isn't it?

Or we could focus on the "foreign policy work" performed by many Democrats, directly against the Constitution. Say--Jay Rockefeller going to the ME to reassure that we would not attack. I think such a show trial could highlight quite a lot of treasonous activity by the Democrats, as well as restore the Constitution to attention.

See James Taranto @ WSJ cover the same exchange highlighted by jedrury above:
link

Amen, Bostonian. The indictment list would be very, very long. And would cover the by-far most important "activity" in the press/gov't arena: subversion hiding in plain sight.

Or better put, subversion of the political system masquerading as subversion of a political party, masquerading as "the people's right to know".

Also, such a case would touch on questions such as: Do we have an enemy? Who is that enemy? If a foreign enemy, does he too have a right to know?

You've got the wrong Roger Simon, but I do agree it's a show trial (though the show is getting a little boring)

Is it possible to harm your nation by harming your political opponent? If so, does that mean you should or should not pass on the opportunity to harm your political opponent?

February 11, 2007: "Senior Moments" at the Libby Trial

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