This looks like the kind of thing DUers could help with (Plame related)

[HFishbine]

From Susan G at DailyKos:

White House-credentialed fake news reporter "Jeff Gannon" from fake news agency "Talon News" was cited by the Washington Post as having the only access to an internal CIA memo that named Joseph Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, as a covert CIA agent. Gannon, in a question posed to Wilson in an October 2003 interview, referred to the memo (to which no other news outlet had access, according to the Post). Gannon subsequently has been subpoenaed by the federal grand jury looking into the Plame outing.

Looks like there's a possibility of a whole front for White House propaganda disguised as a news organization -- maybe. Want to help them dig? Check out the full thread: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/1/30/9415/11717

[BlueEyedSon]

1. More on scumbag Jeff Gannon:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=109x17850

[starroute]

2. Reposting stuff I posted on earlier threads that died

I seem to be Little Miss Thread-Killer today. But I'm going to have another try at putting up these links to threads from last fall about Bruce Eberle, the Leadership Institute, and Mike Krempasky.

There was a great deal about Bruce Eberle on the "Social Security Scam Letter" thread from last fall, including some things DailyKos hasn't come up with yet:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=1108892

Gannon's degree appears to be from the Leadership Institute. Daily Kos refers to the "Leadership Institute for Broadcasting Journalism," which doesn't exist, so I assume what is meant instead is the Leadership Institute's Broadcast Journalism School. (http://www.leadershipinstitute.org/02TRAINING/001BJS/001BJS.cfm)

The Leadership Institute was founded in 1979 by Morton Blackwell. (He's the guy who was handing out purple heart bandaids at the Republican convention -- not to be confused with Ohio's Ken Blackwell.) Blackwell was head of the College Republican National Committee from 1965 to 1970, when it became a school for Nixonian dirty tricks, and the Leadership Institute was created to serve the same function. Karl Rove and Grover Norquist are both alumni. See:
http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemID=17581
http://www.bates.edu/x48219.xml

Another interesting connection is with Mike Krempasky, who set up the rathergate.com site so quickly after the CBS memos flap broke that it raised suspicions he had advance warning. Krempasky worked for the Leadership Institute from 1999 to 2002 and also has ties to Roger Stone, another alumni of the College Republicans, who has a 35 year history of dirty tricks.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=2400623
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=2407402

I have no idea whether there's any dirrect connection between Krempasky and "Gannon" -- but it sure looks like they come out of the same context.

There's also one other possible connection. Bruce Eberle was a supporter of the Southeastern Legal Foundation, with which "Buckhead," who came up with the initial claims that the CBS memos were produced in MSWord, is associated. For more on Buckhead, see:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=835262
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=837236

(And, on a possibly irrelevant note, isn't "Gannon" the name of the bad guy in the Legend of Zelda and sequels? If it's a pseudonym, this fellow sure has a weird self-image.)

[peacetalksforall]

3. Southeastern Legal Foundation - weren't they responsible for

Clinton losing his law license in Arkansas?

Big loss, huh? Guess they thought they would disgrace him enough so that practicing law in AR would be all he had left.

Hope this comes pouring out all over the networks.

[starroute]

4. Mike Krempasky connected to Talon News

I don't know the extent of the relationship, but a little Googling comes up with numerous mentions of Krempasky's name at the Talon News and GOPUSA sites after he launched rathergate.com.

Here's a Talon News article by Bobby Eberle written as early as September 16, a week after the CBS program:
http://www.talonnews.com/news/2004/september/0916_blogs_cbs.shtml

What's in a name? Just ask Mike Krempasky, a blogger and political activist who purchased the web domain www.RatherGate.com last Friday afternoon. As the controversy over the authenticity of CBS memos that Dan Rather revealed on "60 Minutes II" last week has grown to a near-fever pitch, rathergate.com has become a big player in just three days since its launch.

"Friday was the single most exciting day I've ever seen on the Internet," Krempasky told Talon News. "It was amazing to see how quickly so many talented bloggers routed CBS eight ways from Sunday. I just wanted to help."

While the hallmark of the CBS controversy has been the staggering range of expertise collected by bloggers like PowerLineBlog.com, INDCjournal.com, LittleGreen Footballs.com, Allahpundit.com, and many more, Krempasky wanted to take a different approach -- action.

"While the rest of the blogosphere was flexing its collective muscle to root out these forgeries, I just wanted to give people a chance to act -- to contact CBS and express themselves," Krempasky told Talon News.

I could be wrong, but since I never heard of rathergate.com outside of the DU discussions about it, I get the impression that Talon News was talking up the site extremely hard.

And here's a guest column by Krempasky himself at the GOPUSA site, dated October 4, 2004:
http://www.gopusa.com/commentary/guest/2004/mk_1004.shtml

[H2O Man]

5. Very interesting.

I've seen a little on this on DU etc. As all old "Plame Thread" participants will recall, we have discussed how different groups have assets and agents in the different media. The most obvious examples of assets are Bob Novak and Uncle Armstrong, fellows who will print whatever is suggested by someone within a specific group. Agents are different; old-timers will recall that the infamous Howard Hunt of the Watergate scandal was not merely a CIA career officer: in the WW2 era, he was OSS, and a correspondent for LIFE magazine.

Intelligence agents have "covers." Think of a woman like Valerie Plame: other than her husband,none of her family knew what she did. None of her friends or neighbors knew. Likewise, there are women who might have the cover of a journalist. Maybe even for something like the NYTs. A woman like that might spread stories of Iraqi WMDs to promote a war. She might call an Arab front group to warn the FBI is coming. And she might even help the WH officials spread the shit about Plame. Holy, Judith! I have no idea who she might be.

Anyhow, this other journalist appears to fit the description of one of these two types of resources used to manipulate the media.