Libby Verdict: Is the Washington Post a Subsidiary of the National Review?

WaPo’s editorial can be found here:

The fall of this skilled and long-respected public servant is particularly sobering because it arose from a Washington scandal remarkable for its lack of substance. It was propelled not by actual wrongdoing but by inflated and frequently false claims, and by the aggressive and occasionally reckless response of senior Bush administration officials – culminating in Mr. Libby’s perjury. Mr. Wilson was embraced by many because he was early in publicly charging that the Bush administration had “twisted,” if not invented, facts in making the case for war against Iraq. In conversations with journalists or in a July 6, 2003, op-ed, he claimed to have debunked evidence that Iraq was seeking uranium from Niger; suggested that he had been dispatched by Mr. Cheney to look into the matter; and alleged that his report had circulated at the highest levels of the administration. A bipartisan investigation by the Senate intelligence committee subsequently established that all of these claims were false – and that Mr. Wilson was recommended for the Niger trip by Ms. Plame, his wife. When this fact, along with Ms. Plame’s name, was disclosed in a column by Robert D. Novak, Mr. Wilson advanced yet another sensational charge: that his wife was a covert CIA operative and that senior White House officials had orchestrated the leak of her name to destroy her career and thus punish Mr. Wilson. The partisan furor over this allegation The partisan furor over this allegation led to the appointment of special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald. Yet after two years of investigation, Mr. Fitzgerald charged no one with a crime for leaking Ms. Plame’s name. In fact, he learned early on that Mr. Novak’s primary source was former deputy secretary of state Richard L. Armitage, an unlikely tool of the White House. The trial has provided convincing evidence that there was no conspiracy to punish Mr. Wilson by leaking Ms. Plame’s identity – and no evidence that she was, in fact, covert.

So many lies – so little time. So let me turn this task over to Faiz. Kevin Drum has a suggestion:

Really, guys, if you’re just going to transcribe White House talking points, why not ditch the pretense and outsource the whole editorial page to Tony Snow? It might save everyone some effort in the future.

Steve Soto reminds us that the folks at the Washington Post have been defending this abuse of power for about as long as the National Review has. Steve ends with this:

What good is a free press when the elite think more of cocktail weenies than they do about scrutinizing government?

Update: For a contrast to the BS from the WaPo, let’s check out what Larry Johnson has to say:

If a President can be impeached for lying about a blow job then by God a Vice President should be impeached for setting in motion the forces that destroyed an intelligence network during a time of war.