Valerie Plame Scandal - Fiasco

July 17th 2005

The Year: 1993. The President: Bill Clinton. The Fantasy-Scenario Crime:
Clinton buddy and advisor Ted Danson leaks private CIA stuff on Oprah, with his comments outing an undercover CIA agent.

The Result: After being briefed for 30 seconds at the Congress snack bar, Newt Gingrich sprints to the White House – shirt off, tie used as a bandana, pants shortened to the ankles and frayed, shoeless – bursts into the Oval Office, grabs Bubba and rips his jugular out with his teeth.

Minutes later, blood and sinew still dripping from his mouth, Gingrich announces to a televised audience that he is now “Leader” and would set everything right. Then he sentences all minorities and people earning under $10K per year to death in the gas chambers.

I went too far, didn’t I? Sorry.

But if you are following the whole he-said, she-said, Valerie Plame scandal, I hope you catch my drift. I mean, Clinton did what he did, and the republicans went Lord of the Flies on him. If anyone within earshot of Clinton had uncovered a U.S. spy, they’d have executed him on pay-per-view.

Now, while all the Washingtonians are running around playing spin the issue in regards to what Karl Rove did or didn’t say, I will admit that there is still a lot of this case I, and the rest of the general public don’t know. What happens with Rove needs to be decided by intelligent people with non-partisan leanings. And I asked and they said "no".

Regardless of how it all plays out, there is only one thing certain, Mr.And Mrs. Joe Six-pack out there are seeing the Valerie Plame fiasco this way:

The CIA sent a guy (Joe Wilson) to Niger to find out if Saddam had been buying life-threatening WMD stuff (yellow cake. Nope, I don’t know either.) Wilson told Bush he could find no cake, but the tea was fabulous.  Bush hates this because he knows Saddam is a baddie, even though all his documentation is failing him. So Bush gets his evil, White House buddy (Karl Rove) to accidentally let it slip that Wilson’s a fine fellow and that, oh, his wife (Plame) works undercover.

Or: Bush outed an undercover CIA agent for political revenge. Things aren’t always what they are, they are what they seem. And this all seems really bad for a group ushered in on patriotism.

For me, this is yet another situation that makes me look back and believe that Bush being re-elected was actually a good thing. Face it, if Kerry had been elected, people would have felt like they accomplished something.  And soldiers, civilians and children would still be getting killed daily in Iraq.

No, this is for the best. This whole, bizarre neo-con nightmare, careening drunkenly in a Hazelwoodian-stupor of power is heading for the rocks.  We’ve known all along that politicians lie, but these guys brag about it, then hire “reporters” to brag louder.

In regards to the Valerie Plame Scandal, republicans have shown us the way. If a President or one of his underlings lie, it needs to be examined to the fullest. And every matter connected to it in anyway needs to be investigated fully, as well. I say we order one less bunker-buster bomb, give Ralph Nader $100 million and see what he can come up with. He has had some time on his hands, I hear.

More important, however, is that something needs to be done. This is a time of action. Because, if we don’t do something, Howard Dean will have his shirt off and frayed pants on in no time.
 

Related Stories:
Was a crime committed in the Rove / Plame scandal

William K. Wolfrum is a freelance writer based in Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil.
His work has appeared in numerous magazines, newspapers and Web sites.

Keywords and misspellings: Plume Valery yellow-cake yellowcake