Rather, I linked to an interview given to Hugh Hewitt by Mike Allen of The Politico, in which Allen reported that it was Schmidt who was sent to Iraq to improve the political efficacy of the U.S. military's war communications in Iraq

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Cheney_spokesman_departs_country_as_CIA_1011.html

"The chief spokesman for Vice President Dick Cheney, Steve Schmidt, left the United States Oct. 3 and won't return until Oct. 26, just as the investigation into who outed a covert CIA agent wraps up, RAW STORY has confirmed.

Schmidt has left for Iraq. A RAW STORY email sent to Schmidt's private White House address Tuesday yielded this reply: "I will be out of the country from October 3rd through October 26th and will have VERY limited email access. For assistance, please contact Jon Berrier at 202-XXX-XXXX. Thank you."

Time Magazine recently described him as "one of the White House's most aggressive strategists." Officials told the magazine in a largely unnoticed piece last week Schmidt planned to fly to Iraq to shore up the communications team there, and said he was sent at the request of the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalizad. Reporter Mike Allen said the trip "is supported at the highest levels of the White House.""

But everyone should read this anyway.....

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/opinion/29terkel.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

Thank you for being so good at what you do which is reporting facts and not fiction. Col. Boylan needs to look in the mirror and tell himself the truth. We were lied into a terrible war of choice and our brave soldiers are dying because of it. Now how about we go after the people who killed the 3000 on 911.

Then:

"May my food my body maintain,

may my body my soul sustain,

may my soul in deed and word

give thanks for all things to the Lord."

*

In the story about the feast, the guest, with their old heads bent over their folded hands, remembered how they had vowed not to utter a word about the subject, and in their hearts the reinforced the vow: they would not even give it a thought!

Good "food" and company, washed down with a sip of modern, "Amontillado!"

The startled general tasted the bouquet and its taste, remarks to himself, "It's the best wine and soup I've ever tasted."

Wow wee.

Cheers.

The general began to love each guest.

hint. Mr. Bush.

C'mon slackers, put down the paintcan.

But what an extraordinary exchange.

Perhaps someone else has commented on this, but there is an apparent contradiction in the original Boylan email.

He writes: "As for working in secret with only certain media [this claim] is laughable."

Next paragraph: "...you published our email conversation without asking, without permission -- just another case in point to illustrate your lack of standards and ethics."

Ergo, Boylan's "standards and ethics" hold that his email conversations (and presumably all communications) with journalists/bloggers are private. Yet he finds it comical that by holding to this standard, he might be suspected of working furtively with certain journalists.

So leaving aside Boylan's pettiness, it appears he's not the sharpest knife in the drawer either.

It's the same guy, Glenn.

I recall your prior correspondence wrt interview w/ Gen. Patraeus, and the idiotsyncranitic tone is unmistakeable. He (the alleged Col. Boylan) just added a few extra flouishes, this time.

And you say this missive was sent to you unsolicited, like manna falling from the wild blue yonder?!... I don't know what to say.

say,

bah.

Put the paint cans down.

Begin to brush toenails,

Pink!

*bah, bebop-o etc., ain't "anonymous"

but, bah hints what to think. End lies.

Wow, I laud your readers for having the patience and resolve to indulge your verbose tirades. Day after day, I note that your column receives among the most comments. Your readers deserve a medal. You might want to throw them a bone and get to your point in the first paragraph. Assuming you have a point.

Did it ever occur to GG that publishing the IP footprint could be a security breach in and of itself? And it appears that GG made no reasonable effort to authenticate the email until after he posted it. So why exactly am I suppose to believe that SB is the fraud and GG has deep regard for the truth?

And if GG is right, and this whole thing was some idiotic blogger set up, is there some way the taxpayers can be refunded? I mean, we're paying SB's salary.

Did it ever occur to GG that publishing the IP footprint could be a security breach in and of itself?

As many of the posters here have noted, the WHOIS information for this mailserver is a matter of public record, freely available online and at no charge.

The only real security breach is that some raving lunatic is impersonating an officer in the US military. And I'm not talking about identify theft...

So leaving aside Boylan's pettiness, it appears he's not the sharpest knife in the drawer either.

... is that he's not even a knife. He's a spoon who thinks he's a knife.

This guy rises to the rank of Colonel with the writing skills of seventh grader? We are all doomed.

Apparently Boylan's level of freep-esque public relations is the best the US has been able to manage in the last 4 years.

Condi Rice had this exchange with John Boozman in a House MidEast Subcommittee hearing on Oct. 24:

Summary: Boozman wants to know about the quality of US public relationa; Condi says, "Karen Hughes yada yada etc;" then: Ryan Crocker has requested a really good Arab speaker to assist him; we have responded to Crocker.

I hope I don't have to point out the irony, but it might be worthwhile to alert you to Condi's tortured syntax in discussing Karen Hughes' contribution to putting a face on the US in Middle East.

"REP. JOHN BOOZMAN, R-ARK.: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

When Ambassador Crocker was here not too long ago, I asked him about a concern that I've had really for quite a while about the quality of the information that we're trying to put out: the equivalent of Voice of America in the past.

And I know, in travelling with the region, you really get mixed results when you visit with the leaders of the country.

Some of it seems to be very, very good. Some of it seems to be, as they would term, silly or inappropriate or whatever. I mean, very, very mixed reviews.

I guess my frustration is a little bit, you know, we're dealing with some problems that are very, very difficult. That seems that that's one that we could fix.

And in visiting with Ambassador Crocker, when he was testifying, he shared concern that we were still, maybe, lacking a little bit in that area.

Could you comment on that, and...

RICE: Yes.

I think, first of all, we have gone, as you know, to great lengths to reorganize, under Karen Hughes, Public Diplomacy, to make it possible for our ambassadors around the world to respond. And we're working very hard to try to make sure that our messages get out.

Now, in Iraq, frankly, we've not -- we're doing better, but it's been insufficient. And one of the things that Ambassador Crocker asked for was a really first-rate Arabic speaker as his public affairs officer, who can go on television and, in good Arabic, defend our policies.

Because one of the problems that we have -- it's really not so much Iraq TV; it's that everybody in the Middle East watches Al Arabiya or Al Jazeera. And if you're not a part of that mix, you're not a part of the dialogue.

And so he has requested that. I think we've identified the right person for him.

We're going to beef up that operation.