Judge dismisses Condit lawsuit against author

[Newsjock]

Source: Modesto Bee

WASHINGTON — A federal judge has thrown out former San Joaquin Valley congressman Gary Condit's defamation lawsuit against author Dominick Dunne, extending the one-time lawmaker's costly courtroom losing streak.

In a 22-page opinion issued this morning, U.S. District Judge Peter Leisure summarily dismissed Condit's suit and ruled the First Amendment as well as California law protected Dunne's expressions of opinion. The ruling further shrinks Condit's legal maneuvering room.

... Condit's lawsuit revolved around public speculations about the nature of his relationship with former Washington, D.C. intern Chandra Levy. Condit and his wife Carolyn have filed roughly half-a-dozen related defamation lawsuits since 2001, the year Levy's disappearance drew fevered national attention.

None of the lawsuits have gone to trial. Several were settled privately, while others were dismissed outright.


Read more: http://www.modbee.com/breakingnews/story/353509.html

[yardwork]

1. Dunne really was a jerk about it, though.

I remember Dominick Dunne going on all the talk shows and speculating that Gary Condit had Hell's Angels kidnap Chandra Levy. Condit's behavior was abominable, but he turned out not to have anything to do with the woman's murder.

[kskiska]

2. I lost all respect for Dunne at that point.

He suggested she was kidnapped and transported into white slavery. His contact failed to show, I think, at a British racetrack.

[Peace Patriot]

3. I've always been fascinated by the fact that Condit met with Dick Cheney

on the very day of Chandra Levy's disappearance, and during her very disappearance hours (initially reported as circa 10:00 am, later revised to 12:00-3 pm; Condit's meeting with Cheney was at noon, later described by Cheney aides as 20 minutes long with others present; which leaves a 2.5 hour blank hole in Condit's schedule that day; and--I found this exceedingly odd--no one in our benighted press corps ever asked Cheney or his aides about that meeting (like, did it occur? how long? about what? who was there?); the aides planted Cheney's story about it in Newsweek long after the event, and after the police had revised her disappearance hours, based on her computer use, which it took the FBI lab three months to figure out; so, is the FBI lab incompetent? did the police deliberately mislead the public about her disappearance hours, for police reasons? or, was some shit happening to give Cheney time to get his story together and planted in a news rag?).

Interesting, huh? Another tidbit: Three days after Levy's disappearance (and his meeting with Cheney), on May 1, 2001--Condit was one of only ten Democrats (the "Blue Dog" Democrats) who voted FOR Bush-Cheney's first tax cut for the rich (on May 3, 2001). It's hard to remember back, because so much has happened since, but this was a critical vote--the first test of the eight year Bush/Cheney looting expedition--and it was a big deal that a Democrat voted for it. It was a very close vote. Whacking somebody's mistress in exchange for an important vote, in hindsight, seems to me like it would be routine housekeeping for Dick Cheney. But who knows what was at stake, or what was discussed, in that Cheney-Condit meeting? There was also a serious shake-up (shake-down?) going on between the Bushites and the FBI that summer--with a big headlines House investigation. Condit sat on the House Intelligence Committee, with privileged access to many secrets, during that investigation.

Some other things that were happening that spring/summer: Cheney's secret energy meetings (spring 01). Rumsfeld was pulling all NORAD emergency decisions into his own hands (June 06). John O'Neill (Yemen Al Qaeda money trail) was getting drummed out of the FBI. (He went to work in private security in the WTC the week of 9/11, and died therein.) And the war on Iraq was being laid out in the War Room.

And, finally, a humorous note: Condit was the guy who introduced a bill to require that the Ten Commandments be posted in all public buildings. I mean, can you beat that? (Oh, and I forgot--Levy--whose Bureau of Prisons internship had been abruptly and mysteriously ended two weeks early, just before her disappearance-- was plying Condit to get her a job with the FBI. According to many reports, she was determined to stay in DC and convince Condit to leave his wife and marry her. His other mistresses were apparently quietly acquiescent to their mistress status. Not Levy.)

What does all this add up to? Hell, I don't know. But it has all stuck in my brain as...bothersome, nagging, in need of a really good investigator. Levy's body (basically her skeleton) was eventually found in Rock Creek Park, post 9/11, in May 02, a year after her disappearance. Nobody ever explained that either--how all the searches of Rock Creek Park, in summer 01, could have missed it. It was not far off a path.

[Peace Patriot]

5. CORRECTION: Typo in the above comment. June 06 should be June 01.

In the paragraph about some other things that were happening--Cheney's secret energy meetings (Spring 01), etc.: Rumsfeld pulled all NORAD emergency decisions into his own hands in June 01--NOT June 06 (typo)--during the first part of the investigation of Levy's disappearance. 9/11 was only two months away, while the hunt for Chandra Levy was going on in spring/summer 01. I meant to imply that the Bush Junta (or some cabal within it, including Rumsfeld) was planning its attack on the U.S. at the same time. I think that the NORAD standdown on 9/11 was Rumsfeld's doing, and that it is the loosest thread in that tapestry of deceit.

It's interesting that Chandra Levy's disappearance--one of the wildest corporate media events in faux news history--completely smothered all other 'news' that summer--in the lead up to 9/11--including what may have been a Bushite purge of the FBI, preparatory to 9/11 and the Age of Terror (a high profile House investigation of the FBI). While Condit sat on the House Intelligence Committee, investigating the FBI, the FBI was investigating Condit on the disappearance of Levy--a singularly incompetent investigation, in which the FBI failed to interview Condit's wife (who had made an unusual trip to DC the week of May 1) until later in the summer, and apparently failed to ever interview Dick Cheney about his meeting with Condit during Levy's disappearance hours. (In August, in Newsweek, Cheney aides said no one had asked Cheney or them about the meeting.) The FBI also possibly covered up Levy's true disappearance hours until Cheney had gotten his story together about the Cheney/Condit meeting (only 20 minutes long, routine, others present). It seems likely, too, that Cheney had a dossier on Condit, at the Condit/Cheney meeting (either from the FBI or private sources). Was he blackmailing Condit to get Condit's vote on first tax cut for the rich? Was he blackmailing or using Condit on something else--something to do with the purge of the FBI? (Remember, FBI agent John O'Neil was following the Al Qaeda money trail, and was forced out of the FBI, that summer--soon to die in the WTC on 9/11.) Also--not out of the realm of possibility, given what we now know about the Bush Junta--was the Condit story, including Levy's death, primarily a planned 'news' distraction?

Levy seemed to think that Condit could get her a job with FBI. The original discovery that she was missing occurred when Levy's mother called Condit and told him she hadn't heard from Chandra, could he look into it? (Condit was her Congressman and her daughter was a DC Bureau of Prisons intern, but as I recall she also knew Condit was a particular friend.) Condit called his contacts in the FBI and they (those contacts and Condit) made a warrantless visit to Chandra's apartment (circa May 7). It has never been published, that I know of, who those FBI contacts of Condit's were, or what they did in Chandra's apartment--but, lacking a warrant, nothing they saw or took from the apartment would be usable in court. The official FBI investigation then began, and consumed the corporate 'news' media all summer up to 9/10.

[Gman]

4. Hey! Now that you mention it... there haven't been any drop dead gorgeous white blondes

missing this summer. The media's losing it's touch.