cresttwo

Uh, no concern for the egregious violations of Rep. Harmon's constitutional rights, sleezy slimeball that she is?

Glenn

According to the reports, the wiretaps were LEGAL ones approved by the FISA court as part of an investigation into an Israeli agent -- the one with whom Harman spoke. If that is correct, that is exactly what the FISA law is for.

As usual, in your desperation to prove how fair-minded you are, you simply make up facts and don't bother to find out if you have any idea what you're talking.

According to what reports Glenn were the wiretaps legal or otherwise? Would that be "legal" as said so, by some unnamed person talking to Stein and giving him a partial, edited account on behalf of who knows who? And why use CQ? Sounds like a fucking men's magazine I'd never heard of before. (if the have any Givenchy scratch and sniff I might get a copy sometime)

I'm beginning to get a different picture from what is emerging than the common one here at Salon.

Three things to consider. Who instigated the phone call? Why didn't Stein tell us? The proper context in which the word "waddle" was used and why later after denying having received any call did she try and put out as fast as, that whoever she was speaking to it was American.

Here is my take. She is indeed a "friend" of Israel. I put the word in quotes because even though there might be some big bucks coming your way one way or 'tother you don't really want to be a friend of Israel because they have a tendency to such in their "friends", use them then blow them out in little bubbles when they have no more need for them.

Harman did not go soliciting help to acquire the Intelligence seat offering to do the AIPAC people a good turn. Two reasons why not. First if AIPAC thinks it needs something done it doesn't stand around waiting for someone to offer their services it phones you. Second if you were to offer your services on a quid pro quo you wouldn't talk about "waddling" into the justice dept.

So Harman gets a call but not from an American. Its from an arrogant Israeli (is there any other kind) working for Israel inside America. This Israeli puts the pressure on and ties to get her to interfere to the benefit of the AIPAC people. Harman like any adult in America knows that you can't approach Justice to try to get them to drop charges. In spite of how totally fucking weird America now is that would still be considered a criminal offence of trying to pervert the cause of Justice.

That's what Harman told him. She said words to the effect, "This is America, I can't just "waddle" into the Justice dept and get them to drop the charges."

So then, the no doubt pure bred, Mossad trained long horn tries the other approach of sticking it to her with the carrot. The telephone conversation has now gone even beyond the pale then currently operative in the United States of Bannadom. So entirely forgetting her own stupidly sterling efforts to ensure that everybody's thoughts can now be recorded she ends the call by saying, "This phone call doesn't exist."

Of course the phone call did then and still now does exist and now she and we can begin to appreciate another perhaps unforeseen difficulty that arises.

And that is the partial and dubiously self interested and selective use that transcripts can be put to.

Who the fuck has decided that wire tap transcripts even done legally should be released in this suspect manner?

Should anyone who cares for the rule of law approve? Does the well understood need to snigger and snark when it is to ones taste take precedent over the need to have some consistent law & order applied to the transcripts.

Can one condemn the outing of Plame on the one hand and then take glib pleasure at the discomfort of Harman?

Last point, when Harman says that although she can't remember the call she is nonetheless sure it was an American she was not talking to, she's not just doing this to avoid being considered in an act of treason.

No, the far more pressing reason is it's wishful thinking on her part. She like lots of the critters congress are no doubt ruing the day when they allowed themselves to become best friends of Israel.

Think of it like being held in a headlock by Tony Soprano and being half chocked while he kisses your head repeatedly telling you how he thinks of you as his best new friend.

Think of it like the Nazis second visit to Darlington Hall in the Remains of the Day.

A minor point, but I've noticed that Glenn has said this before: the Harman-Lichtblau conversation ("You should *not* be talking about that here," etc.) was likely in 2005, not 2004. In his book "Bush's Law", Lichtblau frames the time by saying "Risen was now on sabbatical"; according to a story by Gabriel Sherman, that sabbatical began in January 2005.

This isn't to say Harman wasn't busy trying to squelch the story earlier than that. Bill Keller just confirmed that she did, in "October or November of 2004." (from the Lewis & Mazzetti piece in the NYTimes, 'Lawmaker Is Said to Have Agreed to Aid Lobbyists').

While I'm on the subject of timing, there's also a small question about Stein's piece. He says "AIPAC dismissed [Rosen and Weissman] in May 2005, about five months before the events here unfolded." When I googled "Rosen Weissman fired" to try for a precise date, most accounts say the firings were in March 2005. Stein is also a little vague about how much time elapsed between the wiretap and Gonzales's decision to squelch the resulting Harman probe.

(I'm working on a best-guess "FISA in the Bush years" timeline here: http://tinyurl.com/df8eqn )

There is an assumption implied in Glenn's comments that Alberto Gonzalez might have/could have/would have made the connection between preserving Jane Harmon's political viability and the wiretapping program without direction and consent from higher ups, at the time. I'm not sure this is plausible.