Friday, July 15, 2005

Thursday Report

Three more people informed me that Stan Lee is not delivering mail for a living. I did three panels that all went well, I thought. Arnold Drake, God love him, closed the Golden/Silver Age panel with an original, a cappella song about the convention that brought down the house, as they say. This was after earlier bringing down the house with anecdotes about working for one of the less admirable editors in the business. The convention took the occasion of the panel to present its coveted Inkpot Award to Bob Fujitani, Lee Ames, Sy Barry, Dexter Taylor and Bob Bolling. Everyone seemed pleased.

The Sergio-Mark Panel was the Sergio-Mark Panel. The panel on Comic Book Weblogs seemed to satisfy its purpose and most attendees. No big news flashes from any of these but, hey, I had a good time. All in all, not a bad first day of the convention...though I sense a certain looming dread of the Saturday crowds.

Off to do more panels...

• Posted at 8:54 AM · LINK

Today's Political Rant

It strikes me, as I read all the news relating to Karl Rove and the Valerie Plame matter, that we know a lot less about this case than we think we do. The Special Prosecutor's office and the Grand Jury have leaked little, if at all. This, of course, hasn't stopped the partisans from making something out of nothing, building their cases in the press and on the 'net out of very few facts and any number of wishful assumptions. I am in receipt of a couple of mass-mailed messages that argue the case, some in each direction, and while some of the arguments will prove to be true, I think it'll be more a matter of dumb luck than because of any cogent analysis of what's known.

That said, I thought I'd offer up a smidgen of admitted guesswork here. All the pro-Rove e-mails I've received and much of the online spinners assert that Rove couldn't possibly be guilty of leaking the identity of an undercover C.I.A. agent because, they say, Ms. Plame was not undercover. Perhaps that will prove to be true but I have to wonder. Seems to me that if I'm the Prosecutor in this matter, the first thing I do is take the testimony of some high-level C.I.A. official and ask, "Was Valerie Plame undercover?" If he says no, then game's over and we can send the Grand Jury home with our thanks and some lovely parting gifts. If he says yes, then doesn't that become the operating assumption of the Grand Jury proceedings? They may or many not find enough evidence of a crime to return indictments against anyone in particular...but if this were, say, an inquiry into a possible murder, it wouldn't go on this long unless someone was willing to testify the first day that someone had been murdered.

At the same time, I think those eager to see Rove tumble downhill are leaping too quickly to the assumption that, since he's the evil genius who knows all, it's inarguable that he knew all. Already, this part of the story is turning from "Rove told reporters" to "Reporters told Rove." I think it's been established that Rove was more involved than his past statements on this matter indicated but so far, that's more of a political embarrassment than a certainty of indictment. I also see a lot of attempts to read things into each lawyer's statement that may not be there.

Still, all this is just me guessing. We may all be surprised...especially those of us who mistake all the blind speculation for solid info on what's going on. This happens with all these investigations but usually, we get a lot more leaks and facts so the spin isn't quite so far ahead of them.

• Posted at 1:24 AM · LINK