And they impeached Clinton for what?

[Zarcath]

nothing in the bible about not outing CIA agents. Unfortunately for Clinton getting a BJ from a tubby is against god's will.

[Ashes Emberblade]

Now that Iraq is going reasonably well all the little leftists are grasping for straws. This is about as news worthy as the mortgage meltdown, which always cracks me up, considering that the news types equate a minor bump in the lending market to a nuclear disaster.

[Arbuste]

It's more of a crime against a person. If you think it's the worst kind of treason, what will you say when Hillary Clinton sells the nuke codes to the North Korean commies for a used Prada bag?

Seriously, I simply think a President in a country like the US shouldn't be impeached for something so trivial. Among everything you can say against Bush and his mistakes, it's really very little.
Personally, I find this shocking, but objectively, it's not a big deal. He has done worse.

Given his whole Presidency, I wouldn't be devastated if he was impeached. I disagree with pretty much everything he represents as a politic and a man. I also really don't like him. But impeaching him on that case wouldn't be serious. And, honestly, even if you find this affair bad enough, the US don't need that right now. That's why I would be surprised if the Democrats pushed that very far.
On the other hand, in the opposite situation, I'd have been surprised if the Republicans hadn't fucked up everything as bad as they could.

Originally Posted by chaos

K, really trying to be civil here, for the sake of discussion, so let's put it all on the table, what really happened. Valerie Plame's husband was publicly critical of Bush policy. Bush and Cheney, in order to get political revenge on his, OUTED A COVERT CIA AGENT. Classified information was released and a coverup to prevent the public from knowledge of that disclosure was performed. Not only was Plame outed, but her shell company was outed as a CIA cover for agents. Who knows how many agents were outed, how many operations were put in jeopardy, how many people are dead.
This woman was working on stifling nuclear proliferation in Iraq and Iran. OOPS.
This is not no big deal, this is a huge deal. If you or I did this we would be put to death. It is treason, plain and simple.

Or maybe it's worse than I thought. Even if the consequences were much more tragic, I don't think it's in the country's interest to push it too far. That's why everybody is agreeing to lay low for the last few months and just hope he doesn't fuck up anymore.

[kasey]

Iraq is a trainwreck, blood for oil is wrong and any reasoning pro preventive wars is bull unless they are about to push the button for the nukes. Happy now?!

[Indiana]

Does the law apply only when it's convenient to the establishment? Where is all this apathy coming from? Have we just resigned ourselves to the fact that the Bush administration has been a collossal clusterfuck? Would there be stronger reactions if this cover up had come to light in his first term?

[Menahem]

I dunno about you, but i thought the law applied to everyone, no matter how high ranked or low ranked they are. But i guess we can let the constitution and all that gibberish lax on a few issues, aslong as we stand up and die for it on some other issues! HO HA!

[chaos]

This is the number 1 thing that pisses me off about Bush. The war I could care less about, we have historically had an economic interest in wars, it's fine, l2p.

But this. For the past 7 or so years I go through (at least) annual training on the proper dissemination of classified materials, on what it means to be a traitor in America, on the proper safeguards to take with classified materials, etc etc.

And then this happens. What does this tell me? Or any soldier or sailor or airman or marine out there? Do youw ant to be a covert CIA agent at this point? Do you trust your executive branch if you are one of those agents?

Fuck politics for a second, I don't care who does it, if you do this you should be impeached. I don't care if you are Roosevelt or Kennedy or Reagan or Clinton or Bush. This is FUCKED UP.

[xilsharn]

Originally Posted by Ashes Emberblade

Now that Iraq is going reasonably well all the little leftists are grasping for straws. This is about as news worthy as the mortgage meltdown, which always cracks me up, considering that the news types equate a minor bump in the lending market to a nuclear disaster.

Maybe you're a professional economist, I don't know, but I would not classify the subprime meltdown (cliched metaphor is getting tired already) as a minor bump. Just the drop in equity cashouts is going to equate to a huge drop in consumer spending. Hell, it already is.

[xilsharn]

Originally Posted by chaos

This is the number 1 thing that pisses me off about Bush. The war I could care less about, we have historically had an economic interest in wars, it's fine, l2p.

But this. For the past 7 or so years I go through (at least) annual training on the proper dissemination of classified materials, on what it means to be a traitor in America, on the proper safeguards to take with classified materials, etc etc.

And then this happens. What does this tell me? Or any soldier or sailor or airman or marine out there? Do youw ant to be a covert CIA agent at this point? Do you trust your executive branch if you are one of those agents?

Fuck politics for a second, I don't care who does it, if you do this you should be impeached. I don't care if you are Roosevelt or Kennedy or Reagan or Clinton or Bush. This is FUCKED UP.

Don't understand how Bush is directly responsible for something a columnist wrote.

[chaos]

Him being involved in the coverup, assuming ONLY Libby and Rove were involved in giving that information to Novak, is good enough to me. That does not seem to be the case though according to our man here.

[Etoille]

Originally Posted by xilsharn

Don't understand how Bush is directly responsible for something a columnist wrote.

The law holds you responsible for reasonably forseeable consequences of your actions. Bush and his admin had reason to know, or rather it is reasonably forseeable that giving the name/telling someone to give the name of a covert CIA operative to a member of the press would result in disclosure of that name.

He is directly responsible in the eyes of the law. Period. He knew it was going to happen, he conspired to cover it up.

Chaos is right. If you or I did this we'd be convicted so fast it'd make your head spin.

Edit: Chaos picked up on something that I did not. The crime is the initial disclosure from admin to journalist not journalist to public. What I said is correct in terms of intent/forseeable consequences but it is wholly irrelevant under these circumstances because the initial crime was disclosure to the journalist in the first place. The forseeability aspect is merely evidence in this case, of intent.

[chaos]

The crime was committed when Novak was told the identity of the agent, not when he published it. Journalists do not have teh same responsibilities in reference to classified information that government employees do.

[Millie]

Bush is so lame!

[CyrusReij]

Paging Dr. Khorum.....

[xilsharn]

Originally Posted by chaos

Him being involved in the coverup, assuming ONLY Libby and Rove were involved in giving that information to Novak, is good enough to me. That does not seem to be the case though according to our man here.

How was he involved in the cover up?