{"id":5560,"date":"2005-10-18T10:31:06","date_gmt":"2005-10-18T14:31:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=5560"},"modified":"2005-10-18T10:31:06","modified_gmt":"2005-10-18T14:31:06","slug":"the-plame-game-civil-suit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/the-plame-game-civil-suit\/","title":{"rendered":"The Plame Game civil suit"},"content":{"rendered":"

Way back in July, I wrote a bit<\/a> about the possibility of a civil suit in the Plame scandal. It seems to be an idea that’s catching on<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In an interview yesterday, [Joseph] Wilson said that once the criminal questions are settled, he and his wife may file a civil lawsuit against Bush, Cheney and others seeking damages for the alleged harm done to Plame’s career. <\/p>\n

If they do so, the current state of the law makes it likely that the suit will be allowed to proceed — and Bush and Cheney will face questioning under oath — while they are in office. The reason for that is a unanimous 1997 U.S. Supreme Court decision ruling that Paula Jones’ sexual harassment suit against then- President Clinton could go forward immediately, a decision that was hailed by conservatives at the time.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The right sure did love that lawsuit nine years ago. I wonder how they’d feel about it now?<\/p>\n

I’m not going to pretend to be an expert in this area, but there seems to be elements of a good case here for Wilson and Plame. To read an analysis from someone who is<\/i> an expert, Anthony Sebok, a professor at Brooklyn Law School, wrote a compelling two<\/a>–part<\/a> series on what would be involved in a Plame civil suit a few months ago.<\/p>\n

At a minimum, think about how much fun discovery could be. Remember, a decade ago, Paula Jones’ lawyers used a civil suit to pursue discovery, force her ideological enemies into under-oath depositions, and fish arond for politically damaging information. <\/p>\n

I wonder what would happen if Wilson and Plame pursued a similar course? What do you suppose they could ask Bush and Cheney once they’re<\/i> under oath?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Way back in July, I wrote a bit about the possibility of a civil suit in the Plame scandal. It seems to be an idea that’s catching on. In an interview yesterday, [Joseph] Wilson said that once the criminal questions are settled, he and his wife may file a civil lawsuit against Bush, Cheney and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5560"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5560\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}