On Mr. Leopold's story...

I don't know what exactly to believe. All I do have is a little blurb from history that might explain a little of what is going on. Y'all might remember hearing about this in "All The President's Men". Supposedly, Ben Bradlee the former editor of the Washington Post had a scoop about Lyndon Johnson replacing J. Edgar Hoover as the head of the FBI. Bradlee wrote the story, and Johnson came out and appointed Hoover head of the FBI for life. The leaker was told to tell Bradlee "fuck you."

Here is the part in the movie about this:
Once when I was reporting, Lyndon
Johnson's top guy gave me the word
they were looking for a successor to
J. Edgar Hoover. I wrote it and the
day it appeared Johnson called a
press conference and appointed Hoover
head of the FBI for life... And when
he was done, he turned to his top
guy and the President said, "Call
Ben Bradlee and tell him fuck you."
I took a lot of static for that--
everyone said, "You did it, Bradlee,
you screwed up--you stuck us with
Hoover forever" I screwed up but
I wasn't wrong.

This is true. May be Leopold screwed up, but wasn't wrong.

because leopold gave out a premature leak...
I am not sure i follow that.

You better watch out. That scraping sound you hear is straight razors on whetstones.

Had Leopold been correct, it would have looked like someone from Fitzgerald's staff leaked the information. And that might be grounds to discontinue the entire investigation or worse. Leopold said he would out the people who told him the information if it turned out to be wrong. Why has he not done so? There is something wrong with that aspect of his story.

LeoTold.

his credibility in my mind. He could have been Roved to discredit the liberal net-roots or it could very well have been a sealed indictment or some other explanation could have been handed down and he would have been exonerated. The fact he boldly came forward and explicitly said he'd out the leakers but has yet to do so is what sealed his fate for me. I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt for as long as I could but he dangled a big monition out there in an attempt at redemption without following through. I see no honor in that.

I'm still rooting for him to turn this around and hopefully regain the credibility he's lost. However, just as I cannot tolerate misinformation from the corporate media I feel doubly betrayed when I'm misled by one of my own.

you parallel woodward and bernstein and watergate with TO?
I'm sure I didnt read that right.

btw, woodward is a tool. a slow talkin' boring tool.

If anything, Fitzgerald would delay the indictment being announced.

Maybe Leopold's story is like the movie of All The President's Men -- fictionalized! Yeah, that's it. He made it up and now everyone's too embarrassed to back down and they just keep digging themselves in deeper and sacrificing their credibility. Yeah, I knew there was a rational explanation.

if he was wrong. If he did write a false story he should never work in any sort of journalistic capacity ever again because he abused the trust a reader places in a writer.

If on the other hand he didn't write anything false at the time, but Mr. Fitzgerald decided to act like Lyndon Johnson, then I feel truly and deeply sorry for him.

Of course what no one really asked was one simple question: where was Patrick Fitzgerald on that Friday? If he couldn't have been to see Rove's lawyers like the story says, then I think we shall then know if Mr. Leopold was full of crap.

I don't have enough guts to call up Mr. Fitzgerald's office. I might though if no one else will do it.

Hopefully they won't laugh me off the phone, or say "we do not give that sort of information out."

Hey, it's your dime. But if you honestly expect any answer out of his office, I've got a bridge to sell ya.

You might as well give luskin's office a call and ask the same question. LOL!

pretty tight

bur I think you're great for trying. thank you!!!

I just can't stomach that kind of hyperbole right now regarding this. He's probably in hell. It's been done to better people. Look what they did to Dan Rather. It's what they do. THEY are the ones tht should be strung up, if the leakers were Rove hit-men.

this part...

"If he did write a false story he should never work in any sort of journalistic capacity ever again because he abused the trust a reader places in a writer."

Already happened, a long time ago in a galaxy too far away for some here to believe I guess.

Leopold was Jason Blair before there was a Jason Blair.

You can find this info out, if you look hard enough and are resourceful. It's a ton of work, and you have to slog through a lot of documents, articles, etc. but the answers are out there.

The reason that the folks who buy into the TO fairy tale don't do it is because they won't like what they find.

in the Libby case, on Friday May 12, 2006. That is when the infamous Cheney News-clipping was filed, and it was filed late that evening..

or was the fact that Hoover was confirmed considered evidence that Johnson wanted to sack him?

If so, that's the kind of reasoning I don't think I'd like to even try to slip past anybody in my discipline.

History and philosophy show us that those who listen, and watch, and learn before acting have the upper hand when their turn comes.

There is the broad three-way possibility of what actually happened: an indictment was issued, but kept sealed; an indictment was issued, but withdrawn; no indictment was issued. Try assigning probabilities to each of those.

Then, there are the potential sources of the leak reported by Jason: someone within the Special Counsel's Office; someone within Luskin's office; someone else with special access; someone pretending to have special access. Okay, what are the probabilities here?

I count 3 possible variations on whether an indictment was issued and 4 potential sources for the story. I wouldn't even try to assign values to all these variables. That makes 12 possible permutations of unknowns.

Then there's the possibility that Leopold made the whole thing up. Make that 13 potential explanations. (The latter seems by far the least likely)

There just isn't enough evidence available to draw conclusions -- all this finger-pointing and pronouncing sentence seems to be a waste of time. So, just wait. Very frustrating.

:banghead:


See what I mean?

there is a web-published report by another person on the indictment meeting. I thought it would be most interesting to look at the two reports analytically and compare them. However, if you try to post, you get zapped.

It's impossible for an indictment to disappear. LBJ was more than capable of changing his mind to piss someone off; pissing people off was entertainment to him.

I doubt that Fitzgerald, a grand jury, and the entire federal courts system would "forget" about an indictment to piss off some nobody like Leopold.

Do people even understand how federal courts work when they make this stuff up?

I was just giving out a blurb from history. Quite frankly, I am pissed of at Mr. Leopold. I really have very little interest in defending him, and that was not the point of this. It has been three weeks between now and the story's "indictments."

This is what happened:
Leopold watched the news, heard Rove would be indicted soon, and wrote a BS story saying he would to get himself attention and praise for his "scoop."

Meanwhile, back in reality, Mr. Leopold fucked over real journalists using blogs because he abused the trust readers place in the medium.

This is very serious, if he were a public official I would say impeach him for abusing the public trust. He isn't, but it is the job of his peers to impeach his credibility.

Charge:
Mr. Leopold made up a story on or about May 12, 2006.

Evidence of guilt:
1. Said story not corroborated by MSM reporters following case
2. Said story flat-out denied by individuals with knowledge of "indictment"
3. In the three weeks since the story was published, no indictment has been announced
4. We know from previous experience with "Scooter," that a press release and press conference were given on the same day "Scooter" was indicted
5. Mr. Rove gave a speech at the AEI as he was supposed to have done; one would expect a person to be so focused on their legal problem, they would have canceled speech, this was in fact a rumor, but he did give the speech

Evidence of doubt of guilt:
1. It was widely reported Mr. Fitzgerald was in Washington, D.C. on May 10, 2006. This was only two days before he was supposed to have met with Rove's lawyers at Patton Boggs in the same city. It is at least plausible Mr. Fitzgerald was in the same city on May 12, 2006.


In light of the evidence I hearby find Mr. Leopold guilty of producing a fabricated story, unless Mr. Leopold would comes forward with the sources of the story, his credibility shall be impeached from this date forward.