skippy the bush kangaroo: so smelly even fox noise calls foul

Sunday, August 19, 2007

so smelly even fox noise calls foul

emptywheel, over at fdl, points out that karl rove's appearance on "pr tonite" (or whatever the nbc sunday news show is called) was so full of it that even once-loyal party machines are holding their collective noses:

four years, three books on the subject, and millions in legal fees later, and karl rove is still lying about joe wilson’s op-ed. from my long-winded debunking of turdblossom:

mr. rove: no. look, her husband wrote a op-ed that we now know by—in a statement issued on july 11th by the director of the cia, backed by a report by the senate select intelligence committee, was misleading and inaccurate. the vice president, the white house and the director of the cia did not send mr. wilson to africa to look into—to the question of uranium cake from niger to iraq.

okay, check for yourself. does joe wilson say–anywhere in the op-ed–that the vice president, the white house or the director of the cia sent joe wilson? here’s the exact quote:

in february 2002, i was informed by officials at the central intelligence agency that vice president dick cheney’s office had questions about a particular intelligence report. while i never saw the report, i was told that it referred to a memorandum of agreement that documented the sale of uranium yellowcake — a form of lightly processed ore — by niger to iraq in the late 1990’s. the agency officials asked if i would travel to niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president’s office.[my emphasis]

wilson said that “agency officials” asked him to go to niger, not cheney, tenet, or the white house. and in fact, tenet’s statement doesn’t refute this scenario, either–it completely supports it. rove’s statement is just a shameless lie–and gregory likely knows that, too, since he was critical of all the white house prevaricating the week of the leak.

update: jeebus! it’s a testament to how conflicted nbc is on this particular story that fox news (i know) challenges rove more on his fishy story than gregory does!

indeed, chris wallace of fox noise did seem to be challenging rove:

wallace: question: did you mislead the present and scott mcclellan?

rove: no, i didn't. in fact, the president said classified information. i was very clear right from the beginning on this with both the counsel's office and with the fbi.and look. if i had leaked classified information, peter (sic) fitzgerald would have done something different. and what i told scott mcclellan was i didn't know her name, didn't know her status at the cia.

wallace: when was the first time you told the president?

rove: i'm not going to — again, nice try. i've said i'm not going to — there is a civil lawsuit. i'm not going to expand the public record.what i've just said to you is available on the public record before today.

wallace: well, thank you for making it seem even more important, mr. rove.question: what do you think of joe wilson?

rove: i'm not going to comment. nice try.

wallace: finally...

rove: what do you think about mr. wilson?

wallace: nice try.

rove: thank you.

isn't that one of the signs of the coming apocalypse?

[ed. note: in our opinion, chris wallace of fox news may be a lot of things, but he does perceive himself to be a journalist of the old school variety. we are not surprised he challenged mr. rove. we just wished he did it more often.]

Labels: fdl, fox news, multi-millionaire media, plame, rove