Plame resigns – why the celebrations?

[RichardR]

Valerie Plame resigned today.

Here’s what I don’t get: why is it the conservative bloggers are so happy about this. For example we have Michelle Malkin’s pithy:

DON'T LET THE DOOR HIT YOU...

Then there’s this “Decision 08” blog (that I found when perusing Orac’s rivals):

Parting Is So Little Sorrow

Valerie Plame is leaving the CIA - I know, I know, dry your tears, people, get a hold of yourselves!

Now, I can understand conservatives not liking her husband. I can understand they don’t think Libby should have been indicted, etc etc. But Plame was a weapons proliferation expert working for the security of the US. She was with the CIA for 20 some years so I assume she was at least competent. It’s reasonable to think she was, in some way, helping to make us safer. Maybe in a small way – she was a small cog – but nonetheless on our side. One of the good guys. So why the joy that she effectively had to quit?

I’m genuinely curious.

 

[Mark]

Valerie Plame resigned today.

Here’s what I don’t get: why is it the conservative bloggers are so happy about this. For example we have Michelle Malkin’s pithy:



Then there’s this “Decision 08” blog (that I found when perusing Orac’s rivals):


Now, I can understand conservatives not liking her husband. I can understand they don’t think Libby should have been indicted, etc etc. But Plame was a weapons proliferation expert working for the security of the US. She was with the CIA for 20 some years so I assume she was at least competent. It’s reasonable to think she was, in some way, helping to make us safer. Maybe in a small way – she was a small cog – but nonetheless on our side. One of the good guys. So why the joy that she effectively had to quit?

I’m genuinely curious.

The Administration's tactic of demonizing their opponents works very well with some people. This is a perfect example.

 

[Jocko]

I don't get it, myself. I skew conservative and I couldn't care less (now, Wilson hitting the road, that's something to celebrate). Though to be honest, I had no idea she was still with the agency.

 

[Grammatron]

Because <insert standard partisan comment here>

Edit: Oh I see Mark beat me to it.

 

[bob_kark]

Valerie Plame resigned today.

Here’s what I don’t get: why is it the conservative bloggers are so happy about this. For example we have Michelle Malkin’s pithy:



Then there’s this “Decision 08” blog (that I found when perusing Orac’s rivals):


Now, I can understand conservatives not liking her husband. I can understand they don’t think Libby should have been indicted, etc etc. But Plame was a weapons proliferation expert working for the security of the US. She was with the CIA for 20 some years so I assume she was at least competent. It’s reasonable to think she was, in some way, helping to make us safer. Maybe in a small way – she was a small cog – but nonetheless on our side. One of the good guys. So why the joy that she effectively had to quit?

I’m genuinely curious.

I think some people get so caught up in their political/partisan thinking that they become mindless, petty zealots, on both sides of the fence. I think its a bit much to cheer on the resignation of someone who's life was placed in jeopardy, allegedly by members of the administration she was working for, simply for political gain. I suppose winning the arguement is sometimes more important than maintaining moral values.

 

[Mephisto]

I think some people get so caught up in their political/partisan thinking that they become mindless, petty zealots, on both sides of the fence.

I'll second that. It's evident on this forum every single day.

Regarding the OP, I can't understand why they'd be happy either, unless it's because they blame her (they'll never accept blame themselves) for being "outed." Of course, the neo-cons never make much sense to me either so who can say?

 

[Tricky]

She wanted to do undercover work. She couldn't do it anymore. The job was no longer satisfying. While she has a good case for suing the hell out of Libby (et. al.?) the obvious thing was that in the CIA, she could no longer do what she liked, so she quit. What's the big deal?

 

[RichardR]

She wanted to do undercover work. She couldn't do it anymore. The job was no longer satisfying. While she has a good case for suing the hell out of Libby (et. al.?) the obvious thing was that in the CIA, she could no longer do what she liked, so she quit. What's the big deal?

The big deal is that the two conservative bloggers I quoted seem extraordinarily happy – gleeful even – that she is gone. I know why she left. But shouldn’t we all be a little sorry that a weapons proliferation expert will not be lending her expertise to the war on terror any more? Why are these conservatives so damn happy about it?

 

[peptoabysmal]

She wanted to do undercover work. She couldn't do it anymore. The job was no longer satisfying. While she has a good case for suing the hell out of Libby (et. al.?) the obvious thing was that in the CIA, she could no longer do what she liked, so she quit. What's the big deal?

Then she's been unhappy in the job since 1997?

Plame worked in the Langley, Virginia, CIA headquarters since 1997, when she returned from her last assignment, and married Joe Wilson and had her twins. It is very unlikely that a CIA employee commuting to the headquarters building each day would be a covert agent.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valerie_Plame

 

[peptoabysmal]

I don't get it, myself. I skew conservative and I couldn't care less (now, Wilson hitting the road, that's something to celebrate). Though to be honest, I had no idea she was still with the agency.

I second that emotion.

 

[Manny]

She wanted to do undercover work.

Or, alternatively, she did her 20 and she's not on the promotion list so she's out.

Either way, I've never seen a shred of evidence to indicate anything other than that she was an effective, diligent, and loyal CIA agent. So Michelle Malkin and anybody else can go pound sand; I'm saddened.

 

[RichardR]

Then she's been unhappy in the job since 1997?

Strange, since even her friends and family didn't know she worked for the CIA.

“It's a spy agency. And you don't expose people working for a spy agency. And no one knew that she was working for a spy agency until she was exposed,” says Jim Marcinkowski, a deputy city attorney in Royal Oak, Mich. In the late 1980’s, he was a covert CIA agent spying in Central America. Like all recruits, he was sent to the agency’s top-secret training facility in Virginia known simply as “the farm.”

That’s where he first met a 22-year-old graduate of Penn State University named Valerie. Marcinkowski says he knew her simply as Val P., since recruits went by the initial of their last name.

...

Two years ago, when columnist Robert Novak put the name “Valerie Plame” into the public debate over the war in Iraq, Marcinkowski says it took him a few weeks to determine that it was “Val P.” who had been compromised.

...

In recent years, she told people she worked at an energy consulting firm called “Brewster-Jennings & Associates.”

She was a secret agent.

 

[RichardR]

Either way, I've never seen a shred of evidence to indicate anything other than that she was an effective, diligent, and loyal CIA agent. So Michelle Malkin and anybody else can go pound sand; I'm saddened.

Yes, my thoughts exactly.

 

[jj]

Or, alternatively, she did her 20 and she's not on the promotion list so she's out.

Either way, I've never seen a shred of evidence to indicate anything other than that she was an effective, diligent, and loyal CIA agent. So Michelle Malkin and anybody else can go pound sand; I'm saddened.

Goodness. We agree on this.

Waste of talent.

 

[peptoabysmal]

Strange, since even her friends and family didn't know she worked for the CIA.


She was a secret agent.

"She was a secret agent."

You have the emphasis wrong.
She was a secret agent... like in the 1980's. I hear she went by the name of "Kharma Chameleon."

 

[Ladewig]

Valerie Plame resigned today.

So why the joy that she effectively had to quit?

I’m genuinely curious.

It is possible that the two blogger you quoted were just plain kooks. I wouldn't worry about it until administration officials or mainstream media folks express joy at it.

 

[rikzilla]

I second that emotion.

Thirded.

One of the last things that the late Vince Foster noted was that in Washington D.C.; "ruining people is considered sport."

I've been here since '92 and must say; the man had a point.

-z

 

[RichardR]

It is possible that the two blogger you quoted were just plain kooks. I wouldn't worry about it until administration officials or mainstream media folks express joy at it.

Michelle Malkin certainly is. The other guy did agree that perhaps he had been a bit harsher on Plame than she deserved. (See the comments.)

 

[gnome]

An admittedly partisan reason to be pleased that Plame had to resign: satisfaction that Wilson's family suffered for his criticism of Bush's war policy.

 

[shemp]

I wouldn't get out of joint just because a couple of dicks are gleeful over the ruin of a good woman's career. If Dubya does a jig over it, then I'd get pissed.