Do not make the mistake of thinking that because my conclusion is the same as another person's that my reasoning is the same
Because, in the end, Americans are NOT STUPID.
By Dana Milbank and Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, October 2, 2003; Page A01
Nearly seven in 10 Americans believe a special prosecutor should be named to investigate allegations that Bush administration officials illegally leaked the name of an undercover CIA agent, according to a Washington Post/ABC News poll released yesterday.
The poll, taken after the Justice Department announced that it had opened a criminal probe into the matter, pointed to several troubling signs for the White House as Bush aides decide how to contain the damage. The survey found that 81 percent of Americans considered the matter serious, while 72 percent thought it likely that someone in the White House leaked the agent's name.
Confronted with little public support for the White House view that the investigation should be handled by the Justice Department, Bush aides began yesterday to adjust their response to the expanding probe. They reined in earlier, broad portrayals of innocence in favor of more technical arguments that it is possible the disclosure was made without knowledge that a covert operative was being exposed and therefore might not have been a crime.
As the White House hunkered down, it got the first taste of criticism from within Bush's own party. Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) said that Bush "needs to get this behind him" by taking a more active role. "He has that main responsibility to see this through and see it through quickly, and that would include, if I was president, sitting down with my vice president and asking what he knows about it," the outspoken Hagel said last night on CNBC's "Capital Report."
At the same time, administration allies outside the White House stepped up a counteroffensive that seeks to discredit the administration's main accuser, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, whose wife was named as a CIA operative. [p6: That's what got your ass in a sling to begin with. Idiots.] Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie gave a string of television interviews with the three-part message that the Justice Department is investigating, that the White House is fully cooperating and that Wilson has a political agenda and has made "rash statements."[p6: Rash, maybe. But incorrect? I don't think so.]