The Indictment(s)...
 

Since nobody else is going to bring it up, I guess I might as well. Admittedly, I don't know where to begin...

I suppose this link is the best place to start. But the short version is this, Joe Wilson started talking about how the Bush administration was cherrypicking the false yellowcake information, to justify the war in Iraq, and in retaliation, the spin the White House put on the story was that Wilson only got the job because his wife was in the CIA.

Unfortuantly, she was a NOC (Non Official Cover) opererative, and this sort of thing is a big no-no. That, and in the course of trying to discredit her, the front company that she worked for Brewster Jennings was brought into the discussion. Which of course forces that CIA front to be subsequently shut down. All this, plus the comprimising of all of Plame's contacts & co-workers, created a scandel that has led to one inditement thus far.

I say thus far, because Rove is still under investigation. I've heard on MS-NBC's Countdown, that up until the last minute Fitzgerald was going to indite him as well, but then Rove's attorney said something to Fitzgerald that gave him pause.

As to why the inditements have been along the lines of obstruction of justice & not the actual crime out outing Plame, I've heard to lines of reasoning. One, because Fitzgerald encountered so much resistance in his investigation, he wasn't able to get to the actual crime. I've also heard, that because the crime of outing a CIA agent has never been previously commited, its a fairly untested statute to prosecute on, so Fitzgerald fell back on things he knew he could nail Scooter on.

I suppose that covers the basics, but here's a few more links...

Fitzgerald's website:
http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/iln/osc/

Wikipedia article about Joe Wilson & his career:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_C._Wilson

Linkage to a Mediamaters article, which takes issue with the commonly used talking poing that Wilson lied
http://mediamatters.org/items/200510280010

And if you can't be bothered to visit this link, I'll give you the short version. Republican pundits, in their attempts to discredit Wilson, usually start off the conversation by saying that he lied. When they say this, they're not talking about Wilson's Yellowcake investigation, instead they're talking about a subsequent interview in which he states that the CIA sent him to Niger, on the requests of the Office of the Vice President.

Pundits claim this is a lie, saying that Cheney wasn't the one who sent him. But since Wilson is saying that it was the VP office, who asked the CIA to send somebody, the CIA in turn never went back to the VP office to tell them who they sent.

Wilson, to my understanding, was sent specifically for two reasons. One, he had a wealth of experience. Not only in his ability to speak the local language & having had dealt with some of the officials previously, but I've heard that he'd been sent on a very similar mission for Bush Sr. The other reason I've heard, was that because of his wife, the CIA was able to get him to go for free, or at very least on the cheap.

SWK

I too am following this matter with great interest.

What is of even greater interest is the doors that it is opening. Today, Senate Democrats invoked Senate rules to allow a special closed-door debate of the issue of the Administrations' presentation of intelligence data, after twenty previous resolutions to investigate the matter through bipartisan commission were sidetracked by Republican leadership figures. Naturally, the Senate Republicans were outraged at what they called the supposed "grandstanding" attempt...until, surprisingly, the Senate announced only two hours later that a bipartisan investigation would be conducted and concluded.

Now this is what's interesting, and what I would give my little toe to know, is what on earth happened behind those doors in two hours that would so dramatically change the stance of the Republican Party? The rule exists so that, while no vote could be taken in secrecy, the Senate could discuss sensitive matters without need to worry about public opinion.

It's going to be an interesting couple of weeks.

Looks like the democrats finally have learned the virtue of rules lawyering.

I found it interesting how the all-day news channels were simply waiting for the announcement. They would be sitting there and all of a sudden, they'd announce a 'Late-Breaking News'. The news would be that there has been no news yet.

It's kind of sad, actually.

The one thing that does baffle me about this entire case is this, why wasn't Novak brought in for questioning during the main investigation phase. Also of particular interest, is that Rove was apparently fired from Bush Sr. staff in 1992 for leaking information to Novak.

You can find that tidbit of info in the January 2003 part of the Plamegate timeline. Its the part that talks about Ron Suskind's article.

SWK

I have to admit, I am absolutely loving the whole process here. The Republicans are finally getting caught. (and elections aren't that far away) This thing is going to go all the way to Cheney and Rummy, so be prepared for some of the best Daily Show episodes you'll ever see. Now that Colbert got his own show, that's twice the fun. Seriously though, when the first guy indicted is named Scooter, then you know it's building up to something thouroughly entertaining.

...ah, so young, so idealist, so... so... so very much a Democrat.

As a South Park Republican (Demographic definition: We think Republicans are stupid. We think any given Democrat is two of the following three: naive, stupid, or insane.) I will foretell the future:

The media will fall on the Scooter thing as fast as possible, and they will (as they've been trained) fixate on it as much as possible. In the meantime, the Republicans will find/create the laws making Cheney and Rove untouchable, and society at large will relax back into its apathetic stupor after another aide is thrown out the White House door marked "sacrifices only."

Behold America, ladies and gentlemen, a melting pot of causes kept fluid by overwhelming, inescapable apathy.

Political philosophy aside, lets try to keep this discussion concerned with the events at hand.

One thing I'm begining to wonder about is the future of Rove. Some Republicans are breaking ranks, and suggesting Rove leave. Bush himself is trying to make a show of cleaning up his administration by having Harriet Miers develop some sort of ethics course (an empty gesture, but its at least an acknowledgment).

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2005/...html?from=top5

When you get down to the brass tacks, I don't think Rove has too many good ideas left in him. If you look at how he's handled the social security issue (Bush was left on the road way past the time he should've given up), the Terry Schivo issue, Cindy Sheehan, Katrina, and of course the Harriet Miers fiasco, it at least seems as Rove doesn't have as much of a handle on things as he once did.

Worse still, at least for Rove, the public has learned his name. Could anyone here, without doing any research into the matter, tell me the name of any Presidential political advisor? I certainly can't, and as such, Rove's ability to work behind the scenes is severely comprimised.

Personally, I suspect that Rove's fate will be tied closely with the new Supreme court nominee. If Rove starts to hurt the nominee's chances, Rove will be dropped instantly. If the nominee gets in, but Bush's opinion polls are still tanking, Rove will be gone.

SWK

One thing that I noticed is that the tendancy of this administration to pop out other news to overshadow these events, such as the supreme court nomination.
I just think that it is incredible that rumsfeld and cheney neither were supenoed(sp?)
what is really going on here and how far does it go up.
I just don't want the reps to gloss over the issues.
and the talking heads won't tell us anything useful anyway

...unless I'm very much mistaken, the supreme court stuff was started long before the indightments...

And much as I'd love to see Rumsfeld or Cheney called to task... you kinda need a little something we've been screaming at them about for a while now to do so.

Evidence.

"We hereby indight you, Donald Rumsfeld and Richard Cheney, on grounds that you act all sneaky and we don't like you" just somehow lacks that certain something.