SABOTAGE IN THE WHITE HOUSE. CONGRESS, CLEAN OUT THE COCKROACHES.

Some months back the blogs were abuzz about a Fox interview of Dick Cheney by Brit Hume. In discussing the pending Libby trial, Cheney bragged about having had "declassification" authority at the time. "Outing" a covert agent and compromising a taxpayer-funded national security operative and operation is now to be buried under the euphemism "declassification"? ABC's Pierre Thomas weighed in on the incoherence of this argument on the February 23rd session of Washington Week in Review.

Cheney's comment was a CONFESSION, albeit wildly incoherent. Two possibilities present themselves and both may be accurate:

1. The White House KNEW Plame was covert, thus KNEW if they outed her they needed a fig leaf. They also obviously think the American public is stupid enough to ignore their abuse of power and the consequences of sabotage for the sake of some weak, technical "pass."

2. The "declassification" gambit is a desperate attempt to cover up criminal behavior and motive that shows the White House has NO INTEREST IN NATIONAL SECURITY MATTERS unless it happens to advance THEIR agenda.

Either scenario is enough to kick them clear out of the White House to Kingdom Come. These people are saboteurs of their own country's security! Anarchists… fifth columnists… seditionists…miscreants. Pick your favorite name for traitor. The "declassification" argument makes the undermining of Plame and Brewster-Jennings EVEN WORSE! It shows an AWARENESS that they KNEW what they were doing - KNEW they were violating the law and an existing intelligence operation. Nowhere in the world is anyone who has done this allowed back on the premises the next day.

It is both embarrassing and damning, as it exposes the White House as a HIGH SECURITY RISK, as frauds....that despite all their bluster on how they keep Americans safe, how national security is their JOB ONE! ...and WMD!….in Iran even! Despite all this, they will deliberately and consciously torpedo American national security resources if it serves their own agenda… if it suits their purposes.

To paraphrase from past discretions, these "nattering nabobs" of national security turn out to be an "effete corps" of ignorant saboteurs who characterize themselves as monopoly experts that no one is allowed to question.

These are the people who strong-armed Congress NOT to investigate 9/11, who used every ruse to stop an investigation and to avoid testifying before the 9/11 commission. Why? Because, they said, they alone knew how to do national security - they alone had the market cornered on how to protect Americans. September 11th exposed a massive flaw in the nation's air security (the much glorified 24/7 Air Force Alert system). How the hell could the White House know how to prevent a recurrence if they refused to investigate how it happened in the first place? For that reason ALONE, there is a high index of suspicion that they helped grease the wheels of 9/11.

PROTECTING AMERICA OR A RACKET?
Had they been on the ball, had they lined up with their hype, it would have been UNTHINKABLE to out Plame. It would have been OFF the TABLE! Did that realization come too late? Was it a thunderbolt for them to recognize that their SEEMING LACK OF AWARENESS of the consequences of their actions would reduce their credibility to ashes? What came next? To cover up the embarrassment of being exposed as nitwits, did some turn to the tool of euphemism?

Did they huddle together and say: Since we do have declassification authority, let's tell people this wasn't a selfish act of stupid carelessness by a bunch of frauds. Instead, let’s say that yes, we knew she was a covert operative, so in order for things to be on the up and up, we went through the perfectly legal process of declassification!

Then, did We The Public huddle together and say: Oh, look, they didn't do anything prosecutable. They actually KNEW it was illegal to "out" an operative, so they took the trouble to go through some declassification process as a fig leaf for their treason and destructiveness! Oh, that makes it so much better! Hey, they really 'gotcha'd' us on this one! Kudos to them. It's such a challenge keeping up with traitors in the White House! ha ha!

A fig leaf for their pound of flesh.

Consider the precedent of all this -- the implications for ALL intelligence operations, present and future. Does everyone have to look over their shoulder at their own government because they can't trust it? Again and again, this White House is too busy saving their own butts-in-power to address such heady matters. And the reason for that? You don't need a special thinking cap to figure out the answer: THEY ARE THE PROBLEM.

They were aware of what they were doing and they recklessly did it anyway. They knew the law and saw themselves ABOVE IT. Prior to Cheney's bizarre interview with Hume, we didn't actually have proof that they knowingly outed a covert operative. NOW we do.

You don't declassify something that isn't classified to begin with. You don't DECIDE to declassify something unless it's classified. This proves Cheney and the others had sufficient knowledge… that he was aware of the law and that he was breaking it…. (they were ALL breaking it)...and that he needed a loophole…..an out… kind of like one of those offshore Caribbean corporate addresses to avoid getting jailed for trading with an enemy.

Will they get away with it? THEY ARE getting away with it. For YEARS they've been getting away with it because Congress will not show the collective courage to march to the White House with warrants for their arrest and have them physically removed from the premises.

One can do a lot of sabotage in the span of "years" - and a lot of other things to ensure they won't suffer inside a courtroom.

Someone else will have to analyze the memo introduced into the Libby trial, the one where Cheney supposedly implicates Bush in the plot to out Plame and wreak vengeance on "their enemy." Even without it, it is obvious bush was an accessory to this crime and (once AGAIN, as in pre-9/11 times) lackadaisical in the extreme about dealing with it. With presidents and vice presidents like this, who needs to leave home to look for terrorists and saboteurs?

This White House is very accomplished in propaganda techniques. One in particular is avoiding official forums, but instead turning people in the direction of less depositional venues. Case in point: The GOP did NOT want to be on record in a debate on the Iraq war where critical thinking would be at a premium. So they gamed it. The usual lapdogs and lackeys then went straight to the microphones to "mix it up" with their demagogic sound bites -- dispensing nonsense that could never withstand the scrutiny of a congressional forum, but is very appealing. After all, a good lie combined with half-truths and cockamamie conclusions can succeed in evoking not thoughts or solutions, but FEELINGS in those people out there past the airwaves, who will then fistfight it out with each other.... dividing and conquering, letting others duke it out, damning or absolving and thus ultimately letting the so-called "leaders" off the hook. When no one extracts a cost for these crimes, do you think they would even hesitate to repeat them? They have already repeated them many times.

Game's up. Let's have Bush and Cheney in a courtroom or congressional hearing - or even a press conference - and explain to the nation this "declassification" authority to destroy intelligence resources. What you and I might posit in the electronic streets of America doesn't amount to a hill of beans.

Congress knows what they have to do. If they fail in that duty, America and all Americans will pay the price for these criminal activities and will suffer their condemnation forever. The world will not be the better for this. There's a cloud over all our heads.