Hesitant Hillary: A Tale of Woe, and Rove

Ahh yes, that ever-reliable NewsMax exposes their anti-Hillary flair once again, this time with an actually interesting discussion-topic: one of Clinton's last-minute presidential pardons.

Before this post continues, I'm reminded of liberal talk radio host Ed Schultz' key rules of the Conservative political wing of the Republican party, aka: "those guys who are in power"{these are from memory, please correct them!}-

• Rule 1: These Guys are Vicious; They'll Do Anything to Win {The Plame Affair!}
• Rule 2: It's All Clinton's Fault {See below!}

Anyway. NewsMax exposes what they consider to be an important and meaningful connection between Hillary Clinton's relative silence in the Plame Affair. She has, notably, let other Democrats do the "dirty work" of condemning Libby and Rove's part in the ordeal and the President's waffling attitude. However, it should be noted firstly that all Democrats save a handful have been too quiet in the Affair, and we should question why they all are hesitant to continue to raise their voices against this ethical travesty.

NewsMax's explanation for Hillary's quietude:

No wonder 2008 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton [Well researched, NewsMax. Anybody document when the Conservatives became clairvoyant...? - GS] has been silent as a churchmouse about Karl Rove while her Democratic colleagues call for his prosecution for leaking classified information about CIA employee Valerie Plame.

Turns out - in the only case in U.S. history of a person successfully prosecuted for leaking classified information to the press - Hillary's husband pardoned the guilty party.

On January 20, 2001, President Clinton pardoned Samuel Loring Morison, a civilian analyst with the Office of Naval Intelligence. In 1984, Morison had been convicted of providing classified satellite photos of an under-construction Soviet nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to Britain's Jane's Defence Weekly.

He received a two-year jail sentence.

In pardoning Morison, Clinton dismissed the advice of the CIA.

"We said we were obviously opposed - it was a vigorous 'Hell, no,'" one senior intelligence official told the Washington Post at the time. "We think ... giving pardons to people who are convicted of doing that sends the wrong signal to people who are currently entrusted with classified information."

Morison is the only person ever successfully prosecuted under the 1917 Espionage Act, the law invoked by Democrats who want to nail Rove after it became clear that he didn't violate the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act.

Of course Hillary is going to be relatively quiet about this, and for this very reason. She knows that the Right is too vicious and slanderous to let her condemn Rove and not drag this asinine horsecrap argument out. She also knows that the Right can inflame furor about her for moronic reasons, and has little interest in purposely feeding those when she can avoid them.

This, Mr NewsMax Man, is called "political wisdom." She knows how the game is played and knows her hand has the perception of weakness. More power to her not to play it.

Now, on to the Argument itself.

This is an argument primarily about Clintonian Hipocracy. But there are some crucial places that, in this case, it falls apart. It should be noted that Clinton's last minute pardons, like all last minute Presidential pardons, were very controversial; and inherently political.

But the difference isn't whether Clinton appropriately pardoned a criminal under the code which Democrats are now trying to invoke upon Bush cronies. The difference is in Who Morison was and Why he did what he did, compared to Who Rove and Libby are, and Why they did what they did.

Morison was a naval intelligence contractor specializing in Soviet vessels; but also was a paid employee of British magazine Jane's, a defense magazine. In 1984, he had some difficulties with his administrators, and pursued a job at Jane's, taking some classified arial photography with him. This served two purposes: it gave him a better chance at a job at Jane's, and it strengthened his argument that America needed to beef up its military force against the Soviets.

[NewsMax should be reminded that Morison's job persual is an activity highly regarded among current Administration Cronyists; and that Morison's desire to beef up military forces, potentially for first-strike deterrant of what he saw as the Soviet capacity to deliver aircraft delivered WMDs and Nukes to American soil as a decent fit in The Administration's War on Terrrerrr.]

Clinton's Legal team for advise on Pardons had this to say:

As President Kennedy has said, "the ship of state leaks from the top." An evenhanded prosecution of leakers could imperil an entire administration. If ever there were to be widespread action taken, it would significantly hamper the ability of the press to function.

The desire for press censorship arises periodically in our republic. It was there in 1917, when Woodrow Wilson asked the Congress to take up what would become the Espionage Act. In his April 2, 1917 address to a joint session of Congress in which he asked for a declaration of war against Germany, Wilson cited spying as an example of the hostile intent of the "Prussian autocracy." On the same day an espionage bill, based on a draft by Assistant Attorney General Charles Warren, was introduced in the House. A companion bill was introduced in the Senate the following day.

...
Press censorship has been proposed since then, but never adopted. Ironically, we now have in Samuel Loring Morison a man who has been convicted for leaking information, while so many real spies are discovered but never prosecuted. Begin with the VENONA messages, Soviet spy cables intercepted during World War II and decrypted by the U.S. Army beginning in December 1946. VENONA exposed a network of Soviet agents operating in the United States, including at Los Alamos. Spies, such as Theodore Alvin Hall, who gave away our most sensitive atomic secrets to the Soviet Union, were discovered, yet never prosecuted.

What a different experience from that of Samuel Loring Morison. I have been told, though I do not know it to be true, that his rank - - not too high, not too low - - was a consideration in the decision to seek prosecution. I would hope that in your review of Mr. Morison's application for a pardon you reflect not simply on the relevant law, but the erratic application of that law and the anomaly of this singular conviction in eighty-one years.

Not too low, not too high; the ship of state leaks from the top; the erratic application; the anomaly of this singular conviction.

Why did Morison break the law? For a job and for a political perspective.

Now: on to Rove and Libby. Why did Rove break the law? and Why must the be held politically and personally responsible? Because the physically endangered American citizens [Plame and every covert agent that worked with her] and international sources; they injured the capability of America to collect and analyze vital information relating to national security, injuring the State; and they endangered non-nationals, such as informants.

Why did they do it? to slander one man, Joe Wilson, to protect their bullshit justifications for going to a War of their Choice.

Look, NewsMax, We at the AntiCentenarian are fond of something called "googling." It's not even really research. Try it out sometime. And then think about what the fuck you're writing.

blogs talking about this:
here, here, and OUR SIDE here.