The Disingenuousness of the Left on Leak-Gate

Syndicated columnist Brent Bozell makes an excellent point - namely that it takes a lot of gall for the Left to all of a sudden be concerned about protecting the identities of covert operatives.

Ever since the excesses of the Agency in 1960s and 1970s the Left in America have done every thing they can to hamstring the CIA. Take, for example, the investigations by the Pike and Church Committees, the investigative reporting of Seymour Hersh and Daniel Schorr, and the de-emphasis on human intelligence gathering by the CIA under Stansfield Turner.

When Congress was considering the Intelligence Identities Protection Act in 1982, many Democrats voted against it. Of course, now that Democrats think they have found a brickbat with which to beat the Bush administration, they are enamored of this little-known law (even though it doesn't apply in the Plame kerfluffle).

Even worse is the indictment of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby. Basically, Libby is being charged with perjury in a case of "he said-she said". Libby remembers his conversations with Time's Matthew Cooper and The New York Times' Judith Miller differently than they do. So, of course, Libby - who works for arch-villain Dick Cheney - must be lying. Never mind that he hasn't been charged with anything remotely resembling revealing Valerie Plame's name. The Left will point to his indictment (indictment - not conviction) as proof-positive that the Bush administration cooked the books on intelligence leading up to the Iraq War. (Never mind that it is mostly Joseph Wilson's claims regarding Iraq's efforts to obtain uranium from Niger that have remained unsubstanatiated.)

I am also curious about where the indignance has gone over out-of-control special prosecutors. During the investigation into the Paula Jones case the media demonized Kenneth Starr as some kind of closet pervert, while lionizing Bill Clinton as some kind of modern-day John of Arc.

And where is the Left's blase attitude about perjury? When Bill Clinton did it, we were told it was "no big deal" since it was about private (albeit reprehensible) behavior. Again, now that the Left thinks it has a "gotcha" on the Bush admininstration, perjury and making false statements are again cause for concern.

And people wonder how I can call myself a Republican. I am more mystified how anyone can align themselves with the likes of Bill Clinton, Al Gore and John Kerry.