Memory Hole

by digby

Jane is reporting that Rove’s lawyer Luskin told Fitzgerald that “inveterate gossip” Viveca Novak told him that Rove was Matt Cooper’s source, which sent him and Karl rummaging frantically through the e-mails to refresh Karl’s sketchy memory. Apparently, it took them five months to find it, but whatever.

If Novak confesses that she did this, it certainly gives the lie to all this high minded posturing we’ve heard from all the journalists about their do or die committment to their promises of confidentiality. This little scenario requires that Cooper or his editor blabbed to Novak who then blabbed to Rove’s lawyer! Oh Lord, bless the majesty of the First Amendment that guarantees Freedom of the Press and Anonymous Juicy Gossip.

I actually find it hard to believe that she really told Luskin this. I’m going to withhold judgment until she writes her story. (Check out Jeralyn for the explanation of the legal ramifications of Novak telling Luskin.)

I think that the NIH should be looking into something else right away, however. There seems to be some sort of terrible medical condition that’s taking over Washington. Libby didn’t remember Cheney telling him that Plame was CIA. Rove didn’t remember telling Cooper. Woodward’s source is reported to have forgotten that he told Woodward. Miller forgot that Libby told her and couldn’t remember why she wrote down the name Plame. Pincus couldn’t remember Woodward telling him about Plame. Woodward can’t remember if he mentioned Plame to Libby. Mitchell doesn’t remember what she had for lunch.

And of the people who could have looked through their notes or checked their phone logs or even rattled their memory once the shit hit the fan — and it hit the fan within days or a week of hearing about all this — none of them did. Here we had this huge brouhaha, with Joe Wilson talking about frog-marching and claiming that the administration had outed his wife to punish him, and none of these officials and journalists remembered that they had spoken to one another about the very subject that was under discussion. It was only years later when confronted with documentary proof, jail time or someone coming forward that they decided to search their records or think back, and in most cases it was just too late.

These are elite journalists and the highest government officials. And they all seem to have some sort of serious memory defect. This explains a lot about what has gone wrong in our political system.

What do you think? Lead? Mercury? Huffing Glue?

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