"Libby, on Cheney’s instruction, then leaked the information to members of the media."

[kpete]

McClellan writes, “President Bush had actually engaged in just such selective declassification himself ...

........................

In an understatement, McClellan acknowledges in the book that the fact Bush “had authorized the selective leaking of national security to reporters made this look hypocritical.” He adds that “the president has inherent legal authority to declassify anything he chooses. But the Democrats were quick to point out that the secret way he’d done it, as well as the underlying objective — to anonymously discredit a White House critic — smacked of politics.”

McClellan writes that “the only person the president half-shared the declassification with personally was Vice President Cheney. ... No one else was told about the secret declassification,” not White House chief of staff Andy Card nor Rice. Libby, on Cheney’s instruction, then leaked the information to members of the media.

More than merely smacking of politics, it could be argued that what Bush did in his little secret conspiracy with Cheney and Libby smacked of an impeachable offense. But so much for the president’s early admonition, via McClellan, that anyone involved in the leak “would no longer be in this administration.”

more at:
http://www.examiner.com/a-1419392~Jules_Witcover__Bush_s_potentially_impeachable_offense.html

Jules Witcover, a Baltimore Examiner columnist, is syndicated by Tribune Media Services. He has covered national affairs from Washington, D.C., for more than 50 years. His latest book, on the Nixon-Agnew relationship, is “Very Strange Bedfellows.” [e-mail].

[elizfeelinggreat]

1. k & r

[jimshoes]

2. Boy, when Sandy Berger had a slight lapse in

judgement, and took some papers out of the library, the wrong wing wanted to shoot him for treason. This is so much more dastardly and there won't be so much as a peep out of the media.

[Supersedeas]

3. Gibson and Williams think the coverage of the Admin has been fair

[Hepburn]

4. Holy fucking shit!

:wow: I never thought the ugly truth would see the light of day.

[MissWaverly]

5. But I thought the CIA Director had to agree as well

before classified information was declassified

[Disturbed]

6. If actual proof existed that Busholini & Darth sponsored the

leak of V. Plame, the Congress would have no other choice than to Impeach them both.

So far, no actual proof exists.

[MissWaverly]

7. they need to get Scottie to testify then

In the book, Scottie said that Bush told him that he authorized the leak.

[Senator]

9. This statement is "actual proof" -- to the standard necessary for impeachment.

Because impeachment is not a legal procedure. There are no rules of evidence, admissibility thresholds, or standards of proof like "beyond a reasonable doubt." Members of Congress are simply required to act on their own reasonably-held beliefs about these things.

And it is now virtually irrational to think that any other set of circumstances existed than what is being reported by McClellan.

Of course this has been true of the torture and illegal spying activity for literally years now, and Congress still chooses to remain the regime's firewall against enforcement of the Constitutional requirements. A failure that is in fact far more damaging to our nation than the acts of the regime -- in that it, in essence, approves such lawlessness -- thus rendering the impeachment clause and the Constitution itself defunct.

---

[bluesmail]

8. Recommending. ( Although it's too early to tell what the true

truthiness is). A Tangled Web.