WTF Is It Now?!?

A 'concerted effort' to discredit Bush critic
Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald for the first time described a "concerted action" by "multiple people in the White House" to "discredit, punish or seek revenge against" a critic of Bush's war in Iraq.

Bluntly and repeatedly, Fitzgerald placed Cheney at the center of that campaign, saying that Cheney and his aides saw Wilson as a threat to "the credibility of the Vice President (and the President) on a matter of signal importance: the rationale for the war in Iraq." They decided to respond by implying that Wilson got his CIA assignment by "nepotism."

They were not alone. Fitzgerald reported for the first time this week that "multiple officials in the White House"-- not only Libby and Karl Rove -- discussed Plame's CIA employment with reporters before and after publication of her name on July 14, 2003, in a column by [incontinent traitor] Bob Novak. Fitzgerald said the grand jury has collected so much testimony and so many documents that "it is hard to conceive of what evidence there could be that would disprove the existence of White House efforts to 'punish' Wilson."

Even if Bush turns out to have been a bit player in the effort, he is now explicitly tied to the decision to selectively disseminate classified information. Whether that constitutes a "leak" is a matter of semantics.

Fun fact: Controversy "may" sap sap's credibility, says the LA Times. Gee, you think?