Wait. The Washington Times broke the passport story???????

[grasswire]

Now this all makes sense. Right wing meddling. The Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy lives on, a decade after the WT was part of the Mighty Wurlitzer consisting of Drudge, Scaife, Rev. Moon's Times, Judicial Watch, FOX, and a few others.

They invented dirty tricks and the politics of personal destruction.

Anyone who takes the rumors and details without corroboration is a naif.

[bicentennial_baby]

1. Yeah this is all very weird...

I'm reserving judgment, for the time being.

[dchill]

2. They have been covering Maura Harty for years...

and not in a positive way.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/

http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070625/EDITORIAL/106250005

[grasswire]

9. yeah, and attacking the Clintons for years, too

Rev. Moon is a Bush ally and associate. The Bush family has made a small fortune from Moon.

[DearAbby]

3. I thought it had been confirmed

they are talking of investigations.

[Recursion]

4. "Reverend" Moon's paper

Weirder and weirder. Though I think any paper would give up any "ideology" it has for a scoop.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

5. (Hearsay) Someone mentioned Conason was about to break story.

So it's leaked to WaTi to minimize damage.

There's a 97% chance that this is GOP.

[HereSince1628]

10. What would the GOP have to gain by this?

What sort of information does the passport division keep that would be useful to a political cause? I think SS#s and birthdates are easier to get by hiring a firm to do an employee background check.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

12. Dotting the "i's" and crossing the "t's."

Oppo research.

Turning rocks over.

[Johnny__Motown]

6. This isn't a rumor, it happened 3 times. 2 people fired and 1 disciplined.

We don't know much more than the fact that these things did happen but we do know that.

[grasswire]

8. I was talking about the rumors regarding...

...the identity and motives of the perps.

[Skwmom]

7. Clinton will blame the "vast right wing conspiracy," the right wing will blame Clinton.

The problem for the Clintons - many people won't automatically buy into the "I am completely innocent, it's the vast right wing conspiracy" mantra (which really speaks volumes about the Clintons conduct during this primary).

[Cass]

11. The way I see it is this way - republicans hope to pit the 2 dem candidates

against each other. Its happened twice before in this campaign. First with the Novak article circulating phony rumors about Clinton having dirt on Obama and then the Drudge photo uproar. Both times Obama took the bait and blamed Clinton. We then had the 2 dems fighting each other and not republicans. Its a Divide and Conquer tactic.

Last night an ever-so-slight innuendo was made by NBC that the person involved in this passport incident had ties to Clinton. They wanted Obama to take the bait, as he had done the two previous times, to start pointing fingers at Clinton and get them spitting venom at each other. Turns out that the person involved is a career employee not a Clinton tool so that dog won't hunt.

This passport breach is alarming but not surprising to me. Poppy Bush did this SAME thing to Bill Clinton back in the 92 race. I figured Junior Bush and his domestic warrantless wiretapping program was probably targeting dems all this time and that's maybe why they don't challenge him on much.

[DearAbby]

13. State Department confirms breach on Obama's passport file

State Department confirms breach on Obama's passport file

(CNN) — The State Department has confirmed a breach on Sen. Barack Obama's passport file, his campaign told CNN.

"This is an outrageous breach of security and privacy, even from an administration that has shown little regard for either over the last eight years," said Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton in a statement. "Our government's duty is to protect the private information of the American people, not use it for political purposes."

The campaign called for "a complete investigation" to find out who looked at Obama's passport file and why.