Extreme Media Reined In Fitzgerald

Hmmm; this is a portion of last Friday's press conference that I somehow missed:

Announcing the Libby indictment on Friday, Fitzgerald made it clear that he wanted to spring his Leakgate October Surprise a year earlier - at the eleventh hour of the 2004 presidential campaign:

"I would have wished nothing better that, when the subpoenas were issued in August 2004, [that] witnesses testified then, and we would have been here in October 2004 instead of October 2005," he told reporters.

You know that benefit of the doubt I (and quite a few others) have been giving to this guy? Well, to hell with that, at least as far as I'm concerned.

On the lighter side, eight-time losing presidential campaign consultant Bob Shrum came right out and said on Hardball last night that the one and only purpose of "Leakgate" was to drive George Bush out of Washington in tar & feathers. And that it would have been successful - but for the New York Times and other media outlets and their failure to cooperate in an expeditious manner, which delayed the investigation beyond the presidential election.

To modify an old phrase, "A coup delayed is a coup denied."

And that's what I call poetic justice.