1 Boring Old Man

con·tempt
Pronunciation: k&n-‘tem(p)t
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French, from Latin contemptus, from contemnere
1 a: the act of despising : the state of mind of one who despises
1 b: lack of respect or reverence for something
2: the state of being despised
3: willful disobedience to or open disrespect of a court, judge, or legislative body <contempt of court>

From Prague, Budapest seems a long time ago, but it was only a week. The cities of Buda and Pest on either side of the Danube were merged after bridges were built to connect them.

Buda is a naturally fortified area with hills and the Danube protecting her – though they weren’t terribly effective as Ghengis Khan, Attilla the Hun, the Ottoman Turks, and the Austrians occupied the city for most of the last millenium. The Magyars migrated to the area and formed Hungary in 896 A.D. under King Stephen [Saint Stephen]. Probably the most amazing fact about Hungary is that it maintained its cultural individuality in spite of continuous occupation of one sort or another from 1200-ish until 1989, partly due to a unique language totally unlike any other European tongues. Buda is the ancient city with Castle Hill and the Medival walled town.

Our hotel in Buda is also a Spa – with hot springs baths used since the Ottoman occupation during the 14th century.

There was much to see in Budapest – like any other old European city – streets lined with palatial residences – many still showing the signs of WWII and the Communist years, many others renovated to their ancient splendor. One telling building, the Parliment dominates the Pest shore of the Danube.

I doubt that there is any more blatant example of the indulgence of the monarchal period of European history than this structure. Inside, every surface is marble, gold, gilt decoration, statues, heralds, tapestries. It’s staggering to imagine that such a building would be built. It was created for the 1896 celebration of Hungary’s millenium, even though they were part of the Austrian Hapsburg Empire. Many of the statues and huge monuments in the city were built for that celebration – and eerie prelude to the century that followed – WWI, the Arrow Cross [Hungary’s Nazi Party], WWII, and Communism. As terrible as the fate of Eastern Europe during those years, this building testifies to the excesses of the Monarchs that were replaced by these waves of turbulent political change. On the tourist circuit, one mostly sees the palaces and churches of that former time, and hears terrible stories of what finally ended the domination of Europe by the Church and the Nobility, but I expect that the commoners also suffered under the Kings supporting the Palaces and Cathedrals.

That said, Budapest is a magnificent place – well along the path of restoring its rich history. Currently, it is governed by the Socialist Party. But recently, the head of State made a speech to his Party Congress [he thought in private] admitting that many of his public promises were not true – a "vulgar" speech. It was secretly taped and published in all the papers. So now, the word on the streets is that his days are numbered and that a popular leader of the Democratic Party will win the next election. We humans vacillate between two great fears – on the freedom side, a fear of the freedom to fail, and on the government control side, a fear of being exploited. Both anxieties are at high levels in Hungary. Gone is the security of Communism – bringing new fears of personal failure. On the other hand, the possibility of government expoitation remains a near memory. I had the sense that their newly found freedom is both exciting and terrifying.

We’ve made it to Prague – off the boat and in a real hotel downtown. It was a lovely cruise on the Danube – Budapest, Esztergom, Bratislava, Wachau Valley, Melk, Vienna, Linz – now Cesky-Krumlov and Prague in the Czech Republic by bus. I’m sure I’ll be posting some highlights tonight – pictures of wonderous places, but for now, a land-based nap.

There is so much to learn from the history of these countries, it will take me months to sift through it. But the thing that screams through it all is that culture trumps power and ideology every time. Countries like Hungary, Czechoslovokia, Romania, Bosnia, Croatia, and Serbia have survived centuries of occupation, indoctrination, incorporation and are still aiming to follow the trajectory of their founders millenia ago. They’ve lived through the Roman Empire, invasions by Barbarians, the age of Monarchies, the domination by the Church, the coming of the Fascists, the years of the Communists, and they’re still firming up their prehistoric borders and playing with getting their own personal versions of what we would call socialist democracy working. In the end, there will be a united Europe – modelled somewhat on the U.S., though I expect they will never have so strong a central government. Given the abuses of power in the recent years of our country, that is a very wise decision. Concentration of power is like concentration of uranium – powerful and dangerous.

And so to bed…

One of the great things about history is that one remembers the fine things and forgets the day to day agonies. I’ll remember being pampered in first class on the transatlantic flight to Budapest. And I’ll forget the airport delays in Atlanta, and the girl who wanted to put her wedding gown [for her wedding in Istanbul] in my overhead locker, and the two and a half hour wait in New York sitting in the plane waiting to take off, and the friend’s bag that didn’t make the flight, and what a six hour time difference feels like. We decided that all we could handle was a dip in the "baths," a bus tour of the city, dinner, and bed [which was only slightly more than we could handle].

Budapest is two cities, Buda and Pest separated by the Danube. The classical architecture attests to its hey-day [not anytime recently]. Unlike the prosperous European cities, the buildings show their age, having taken a major neglect hit from the years under the Nazis and the Communists. Our bus tour guide, Agnes, was great and showed us her city proudly. The history was a sad one. Hungary was settled by the Magyars from the Ural Mountains in 900 A.D., but its location [East meets West] means that for most of its history, it has been an occupied land. Like the history of our trip, one had the sense of much forgotten hardship – more than most places. Hungary was occupied by the Tartars, the Huns, the Ottoman Turks, and then played second fiddle in the Austria-Hungarian Empire. In the mid 19th century, they tried and failed to become independent, and things got even worse with the First World War. They were linked with Germany until the end of the Nazi era, then they were consumed by the USSR. There was a brief [and proud] moment in 1956 when Hungary revolted against Russia. Their revolt was unsuccessful, but it was an emerging moment for Hungary’s national pride. Finally, when the Berlin Wall came down in 1989, Hungary was born as an independent country for the first time in modern history. I asked Agnes [whose parents were participants in the 1956 Revolt] if they have good government now. "No," said she. "The Communists changed their name to Socialists. Same government as before." But that said, Budapest is a beautiful place – "restoring" rather than "restored," "modernizing" rather than "modernized." Some of the buildings here surpass any I’ve ever seen – like their Parliment building, but the Internet  connection is too weak on the boat to upload pictures tonight.

Today, it was a drive north to the "bend" area of the Danube with a private guide, Gabriella, even better. The Hungarian countryside is beautiful – truly quaint. We saw ancient Palaces and Castles, cobblestone streets – country unspoiled by signs and "modern" construction. The Danube flows down from the Black Forest in Germany to the Black Sea through and is undeveloped by American standards. But for me, the best part of the trip was our talkative guide, a woman in her 40’s whe grew up in Communist Hungary. She was less hostile to the Russians than the older guide from the day before. She talked about the days before "the change" and after in a more balanced way – advantages and disadvantages. She was originally a psychologist working with handicapped children. Her training was Pavlovian – though she and her classmates had carefully hidden photostats of Freud and Jung. She and her teacher-husband married around the time of "the change." They were given a loan on their apartment contingent on having two children within their first four years, which they did. Her father lost his job in a factory that made buses ["obsolete"] when Hungary became independent, so he now has a small vinyard and makes wine. Her husband, a Latin teacher now is an editor.

Her version was different – the anxieties of freedom [freedom to fail] versus the torpor of socialism. She said that unlike Americans who "live to work," she misses the fixed hours of her life before, though she enjoys the opportunities after "the change." She did not like the Russians ["sercet police"] but enjoyed the security of the Socialist state [which, by our standards, Hungary still has]. What’s wrong with communism is "it is not human nature." She had an interesting take on our war with Iraq. In the 1956 uprising, the Hungarians hoped America would come and rescue them – "it was naive, but that’s what we hoped. Life in a dictatorship is hard. Rescuing the Iraqis might be a good thing." But she followed with, "You’re in a mess now. Was it about the oil?" Then she told us a Hungarian joke. "We [Hungary] sent 300 soldiers to Iraq. The joke was, "We’re always on the losing side. Americans didn’t know what they were getting." Favorite Presidents? Roosevent [World War II], "Jimmy" who gave us back our crown" [in Fort Knox from WWII], and Reagan [the Berlin Wall]. Our response? "Jimmy was from Georgia." She enjoyed our telling her that in American-ese, "the change" means menapause. You could see her planning to incorporate that into her next tour. Her comment? "Another hard time."

Like most places we’ve been in the world. The first day of a trip is about the differences. After that, it’s about the similarities." And, as always, they know a lot more about our history and culture than we know about theirs.

July 4

I tried not to think too much about our War, our torture, and Gitmo, but it didn’t work. I wanted to think "never forget" – not to hear about Bush commuting Libby’s sentence [on July 4th!]. I’m in no place to talk about that right now – I’ll just rant. The idea of America renouncing the Geneva Conventions, torturing prisoners, politicizing our justice system, and having a President that undoes the decisions of our courts is way to close to what I saw in that museum today. Way too close…

Packed and ready with time on my hands. So, emptywheel is still at it. She’s on the Tatel Opinion about whether Judith Miller and Matt Cooper have Privilege that was just released. In her last piece, she points to Novak telling the Grand Jury:

According to Novak, when he “brought up” Wilson’s wife, “Mr. Rove … promised to seek declassification of portions of a CIA report regarding the Niger trip, which Rove said “wasn’t an impressive piece of work or a very definitive piece of work”

Tatel appears to believe this is statement supports an argument for perjury; so either Rove testified he said no such thing, or there is a discrepancy about what was said. But consider another really important aspect of this. On July 8 and 9, when Rove is reported to have had this conversation, this report was still classified (as Novak’s column makes clear). Yet, Novak says, Rove discussed it and–from the content of Novak’s column–someone gave him details of it. This issue is all the more interesting as it would mark Rove as having seen the classified report from the CIA, even while he claimed not to know about Plame.

Wilson made an oral report in Langley that an Iraqi uranium purchase was "highly unlikely," though he also mentioned in passing that a 1988 Iraqi delegation> tried to establish commercial contacts. CIA officials did not regard Wilson’s intelligence as definitive, being based primarily on what the Niger officials told him and probably would have claimed under any circumstances. The CIA report of Wilson’s briefing remains classified.

In either case, either Rove leaked details of the report even as he told Novak the report was still classified, or someone–Libby–leaked Novak those details after the Rove conversation.

But what’s the point of all of this. There’s increasing inneundo that Patrick Fitzgerald thought that Rove and maybe Novak lied too, obstructed justice too, and that he was pursuing avenues to try to prove it. I, of course, can’t be trusted to evaluate anything since I would convict Rove at this point on looks alone. But to my totally biased eyes, there’s perjury here. Rove is saying "I heard that too" to imply some benign alibi they cooked up [heard about Plame from Reporters]. But what he really told Novak was that he knew about Wilson’s report, and then he leaked what it said. I think that’s against the law. But Fitzgerald didn’t indict Rove, so there’s something unclear about all of this to me.

emptywheel doesn’t think the Plame case is over and I don’t think the Plame case is over [or, we agree, because the case isn’t over]. Somewhere in the chain of information, somebody who knew Valerie Plame was undercover told somebody else about her. That is simply a fact. Somewhere, somebody gave the coordinated go-ahead to leak her identity to the Press. That’s also a fact. So this is an open case. Scooter Libby may go to jail for not telling us the answer, but that doesn’t negate the question.

So long… 

The Cheney Vice Presidency
Barton Gellman
Washington Post National Reporter
Monday, June 25, 2007; 1:00 PM

Preston, Minn.: I have seen patients that have had startling and profound personality changes following coronary events and other life threatening health problems. Has there been any evidence Cheney has had such an effect? I remember reading a quote by someone to the effect he is no longer the person he once was.

Barton Gellman: There have been two main grounds of speculation that Cheney has changed fundamentally: grave health threats and the experience of 9/11 itself. We can’t see inside his head, so we can’t know. But I don’t think you need either theory. Cheney’s views have been remarkably stable over the years; what’s changed is his power to apply them. Brent Scowcroft famously said "Dick Cheney, I don’t know any more" (that’s pretty close if not verbatim). I’d submit that the Dick Cheney he knew had about the same views in the first Bush administration, but lost many of the internal debates to Scowcroft, Jim Baker and of course President Bush (41) himself.

TITLE V—MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS

SEC. 501. RESIDENCE OF UNITED STATES ATTORNEYS AND ASSISTANT UNITED STATES ATTORNEYS.

(a) IN GENERAL.—Subsection (a) of section 545 of title 28, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the following new sentence: ‘‘Pursuant to an order from the Attorney General or his designee, a United States attorney or an assistant United States attorney may be assigned dual or additional responsibilities that exempt such officer from the residency requirement in this subsection for a specific period as established by the order and subject to renewal.’’.

(b) EFFECTIVE DATE.—The amendment made by subsection (a) shall take effect as of February 1, 2005.

SEC. 502. INTERIM APPOINTMENT OF UNITED STATES ATTORNEYS.

Section 546 of title 28, United States Code, is amended by striking subsections (c) and (d) and inserting the following new subsection:

‘‘(c) A person appointed as United States attorney under this section may serve until the qualification of a United States Attorney for such district appointed by the President under section 541 of this title.’’.

Iraq, al-Qaeda and Tenet’s Equivocation
By Christina Shelton

On Aug. 15, 2002, I presented my part of a composite Pentagon briefing on al-Qaeda and Iraq to George Tenet, then CIA director. In his recent book, "At the Center of the Storm," Tenet wrote that I said in opening remarks that "there is no more debate," "no further analysis is required" and "it is an open-and-shut case."

I never said those things. In fact, I said the covert nature of the relationship between Iraq and al-Qaeda made it difficult to know its full extent; al-Qaeda’s security precautions and Iraq’s need to cloak its activities with terrorist networks precluded a full appreciation of their relationship. Tenet also got the title of the briefing wrong. It was "Assessing the Relationship Between Iraq and al-Qa’ida," not "Iraq and al-Qa’ida — Making the Case."

That day I summarized a body of mostly CIA reporting (dating from 1990 to 2002), from a variety of sources, that reflected a pattern of Iraqi support for al-Qaeda, including high-level contacts between Iraqi senior officials and al-Qaeda, training in bomb making, Iraqi offers of safe haven, and a nonaggression agreement to cooperate on unspecified areas. My position was that analysts were not addressing these reports since much of the material did not surface in finished, disseminated publications.

Tenet revealed in his book that the CIA’s terrorism analysts "believed to be credible the reporting that suggested a deeper relationship" between al-Qaeda and Iraq but that the agency’s regional analysts "significantly limited the cooperation that was suggested by the reporting." Therefore, according to Tenet, an alternative view existed within the ranks of his analysts.

…

A more complete understanding of Iraq’s relationship with al-Qaeda will emerge when historians can exploit the numerous seized documents free from the politics of the Iraq war. For his part, Tenet, who was at the center of the political thicket, placed himself on both sides of the issue: providing intelligence on al-Qaeda and Iraq’s relationship while at the same time inferring that no ties existed, only "concerns."

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The writer was an intelligence analyst at the Defense Intelligence Agency from 1984 to 2006.

Scooter Libby committed a crime. It’s against the law to lie to a Grand Jury, and it’s against the law to obstruct justice – to try to keep a Grand Jury from learning the truth. And, thus far, he was successful in obstructing justice. While he’s on the way to jail for his crime[s], we still don’t know what really happened with Valerie Plame’s improper exposure as a C.I.A. Agent. All we really know is that we don’t know the truth. We infer, but haven’t proved, that the "action central" for her exposure was the White House – probably directed by Dick Cheney, the Vice President and sometimes member of the Executive Branch of our government. There are two potential crimes involved. First, the outing of Valerie Plame, an undercover C.I.A. Agent. The second, falsifying evidence [intelligence] that Saddam Hussein’s Iraq had Weapons of Mass Destruction – specifically knowingly passing off as if it were true the forged claim that Niger sold Hussein Uranium.

These two crimes are obviously related. Valerie Plame’s identity was revealed to discredit her husband, Joe Wilson, who had directly charged that the Administration had falsified the Niger intelligence – based on his own visit to Niger at the request of the C.I.A. Evidence of the falsification of the Niger claim and the outing of Joe Wilson’s wife point to Vice President Cheney. He was pushing the C.I.A. to investigate the Niger claim. His Chief of Staff was pushing to get the Niger claim into the President’s speeches. His Chief of Staff was a prime mover in revealing Ms. Wilson’s secret identity after Wilson went public with his allegations. There aren’t too many dots left to connect the Vice President to both of these crimes.

Back in the days when this scandal was young, there came a time when the Special Prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, subpoenaed two reporters, Matt Cooper and Judith Miller, to testify. They refused, evoking their First Amendment Rights – Freedom of the Press – the right to confidentiality with their sources. Fitzgerald took them to Court and won – resulting in both reporters ultimately testifying to the Grand Jury and in the Libby Trial. The decision was rendered by Judge Tatel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The transcript of Tatel’s judgement has recently been released. And emptywheel of The Next Hurrah, America’s primo Plamologist, has a post up about that 83 page transcript [speculating about what must be contained in its two REDACTED pages]. It’s about the crimes.

… the most interesting part of the Tatel opinion is the two-page section that remains redacted, explaining why Fitzgerald suspects Rove perjured himself in his testimony about Novak and Cooper. I believe that section includes:

• An assertion that Rove lied when he testified that he responded to Novak’s story about Plame by saying, "you heard that too?"
• A description of some way that Rove’s testimony contradicts Novak’s description that Rove promised to declassify the CIA report on Wilson’s trip
• A description of Rove’s presumably changing testimony about Cooper – and possibly a description about the magically rediscovered Rove-Hadley email
• A description of one more piece of involvement on the part of Cheney

Although uncontradicted testimony indicates that Novak first learned Wilson’s wife’s place of employment during a meeting on July 8 with Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage (see 8/27/04 Aff. at 18), Novak said in grand jury testimony that he confirmed Plame’s employment with Rove (II-153-54), a longstanding source for his columns (II-121-22). According to Novak, when he “brought up” Wilson’s wife, “Mr. Rove said, oh, you know about that too” (II-154) and promised to seek declassification of portions of a CIA report regarding the Niger trip, which Rove said “wasn’t an impressive piece of work or a very definitive piece of work” (II-158). In an October 2003 column describing his sources, Novak identified Armitage’s comment as an “offhand revelation” from “a senior administration official” who was “no partisan gunslinger.” (II-20.) He referred to Rove simply as “another official” who said, “Oh, you know about it.” (II-20, 209-11.)

There was other indirect evidence last week that speaks to the Niger Forgeries and the Plame outing – modus operandi evidence. In both the Washington Post series and the Rolling Stone article about the assault on Global Warming theory, Cheney’s working with political operative Karl Rove and Cheney’s distortion of questionable information were all over the place. Cheney and Rove were both part of the Klamath River story – working in concert. There were plenty of examples of Cheney scouring for any evidence that validated what he wanted to do, then jumping on it as if it were on a stone slab from Mount Arrarat given to Moses. The distortion of the Niger forgeries and the outing of Valerie Plame used methods that were standard operating procedure in the OVP. Like in an investigation of a serial killer, Cheney’s modus operandi was all over both crimes.

Justice Department official resigns

A Justice Department official who was eyed as a possible replacement for one of several fired U.S. attorneys announced her resignation Friday.

Rachel Brand, the assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Policy, will step down July 9, the department said in a statement. The statement did not give a reason for her departure, but Brand is expecting a baby soon.

Brand was a member of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ leadership team. When officials were planning to fire U.S. attorneys in San Diego, San Francisco, Michigan and Arkansas, Brand was named as a possible replacement for Margaret Chiari in Michigan, according to documents released as part of a congressional inquiry.

The firings have led to congressional investigations, an internal Justice Department probe and calls from Capitol Hill for the resignation of Gonzales.

Brand previously served as associate counsel to President Bush and helped shepherd Supreme Court Justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito through Senate confirmation.

…

Brand recently testified before the House Judiciary Committee about the Justice Department’s opposition to a bill that would shield reporters from being forced by prosecutors to reveal their sources.