Warhol was right. The bar for "Political Columnist" is set right above the bar for garbage collector. I like the blogging thing, and I generally like a diversity of guests, but we've fallen considerably from the days when Vidal and Buckley tore each other up on television. Ensler commenting on Huffington is like Flava Flav critiquing the new cast of the Surreal Life.

"Cunt" fits neither of them; it implies a conniving intelligence they couldn't pretend to on their best day.

And now, an idiot from the right [ahem] side of the aisle
 

He's Bush's strawman. He'll take the heat from the right. I think he'll come out as a huge Gonzales supporter soon, if he hasn't already.

Either the link is broken, or the VRWC has strong-armed Yahoo! into removing the article.

He'd like to buy the world a Coke...
 

I was aware of that -- but Spanky's post was that the peace movement made WWII "a thousand times worse." That is what I was questioning.

It wasn't a "peace movement" stopping the US from joining the war, but isolationist sentiment.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...e_050710230610 Try this one

WaPo is standing tall against those forces, at least for the moment, so read it quickly.

But more seriously, see this:

• Cooper, according to an internal Time e-mail obtained by Newsweek magazine, spoke with Rove before Novak's column was published. In the conversation, Rove gave Cooper a "big warning" that Wilson's assertions might not be entirely accurate and that it was not the director of the CIA or the vice president who sent Wilson on his trip. Rove apparently told Cooper that it was "Wilson's wife, who apparently works at the agency on [weapons of mass destruction] issues who authorized the trip," according to a story in Newsweek's July 18 issue.

If this was the conversation, I really don't get the distinction that Rove is drawing when he says "yeah, but I didn't mention her name -- so you'll neva get me, coppas!."

So? He said that it was Plame's wife, but it matters whether or not he said that Plame's wife's name was Valerie?

I don't get it.

I think Rove is saying that Wilson is, in addition to all of his other anti-American sins, a polygamist.

See, they have different last names, so obviously no one would make the connection.

Yet another reason to doubt Wilson's credibility. It's bad enough that he only got the cushy gig to do some exotic travel on Uncle Sam's dime because of her, but what kind of a pantywaist allows his wife to keep her maiden name? Sheesh.

From article linked by Gatti --

"Rove did not mention her name to Cooper," Luskin said. "This was not an effort to encourage Time to disclose her identity. What he was doing was discouraging Time from perpetuating some statements that had been made publicly and weren't true."

What statements is he referring to? Was whatever information Wilson had about the uranium false?

You beat me to the punch on this one. I had the same reaction, and looked around for some additional information which would explain how such a "defense" could work. There is nothing. Rove is saying "I said 'Joe Wilson's wife' was an operative, not 'Valerie Plame.'" I don't see how that gets around a statute that makes it a crime to "identify" an operative, but my guess is, that's Rove's first (throwaway) line of defense. He'll burn up some time arguing that, and once that collapses, he'll go to the second defense, which is "I didn't 'knowingly' do it." Hopefully, by then, the story will have lost its legs. But this Fitzgerald fellow might be tough to deal with. From what I've read, he's a really principled fellow who digs in and doesn't let go for any political reason. Lets hope the characterization is accurate. Purging Karl Rove from politics is a step in the right direction for everyone.

FYI: Rove has already been hired by Frist to consult on Frost's 2008 bid.

If I understand it correctly, the salient point is that he did not identify her as spy (i.e., he did not "out" her). There is nothing illegal in saying that person X works for the CIA in WMD.

This pantywaist. You think I have the time to go read the boring forms I'd have to fill out to change her name? Fuck that.

What kind of Katherine Milquetoast woman takes her husband's name?

It was only anal. Thats not "really" cheating.

So you have to identify that they are undercover? Was it known that she worked for the CIA previously? Because if she had a fake job, like Jennifer Garner in Alias, then saying she works for the CIA when she ostensibly works for something else makes it pretty clear that she must be undercover.