Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald cannot be faulted for charging I. Lewis Libby with perjury and obstruction rather than proceeding under Title 50, Section 421, the disclosure statute. That statute is the prosecutor’s nightmare, containing such phrases as “intentionally discloses,” “Disclosure … in course of pattern of activities intended to identify,” and “with reason to believe that such activities would impair or impede the foreign intelligence activities of the United States.”

The fact that Valerie Plame was a covert agent was classified information. However they found out, anyone with a high-level security clearance knew that her status was classified. The indictment identifies only “Official A” as the source of Robert Novak’s column exposing her. Official A is widely thought to be Karl Rove. Whoever it is, they are entitled to a presumption of innocence in a criminal trial. He is not so entitled concerning his security clearance.

By a copy of this letter to all members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, I am requesting Rove’s access to classified information be suspended until this matter is resolved and revoked if he is the source of Novak’s column.

In World War II I was a cryptographer in the Army Air Corps with a top secret clearance. If I had disclosed the serial number of even one airplane out of commission due to engine change I would have been stripped of my clearance and probably jailed.

Let us not tolerate a far greater offense.

Samuel B. Davis Jr.

Hampton

How can anyone still support him?

A recent Wall Street Journal / NBC News poll put the president’s overall approval rating at around 38 percent.

What strikes me about that percentage is not how low it is, but how high it is.

How could anyone continue to stand up and support a man who is bringing our country to its knees?

I mean let’s look at the numbers.

Only 32 percent of Americans approve of the way Bush has handled the economy.

A dismal 35 percent believe that he has a clue on foreign policy (even less think he knows what the word &uot;foreign&uot; means).

And an astounding 68 percent of us think a dancing monkey could have handled the situation in Iraq better.

At least with a monkey in control, even if the war continued to go bad you could say, “Well what did you expect, our leader was a chimp!”

Even more astonishing, 56 percent of Americans believe that President Bush deliberately misled the public when making the case for the war.

Fifty-eight percent do not believe the war will end successfully and 57 percent believe that we should begin to withdraw our troops.

Nearly two-thirds of the country not only thinks he’s doing a terrible job, but just over one-half believes that he intentionally lied to us!

It amazes me how far people who support our president will go to defend and protect him.

In their eyes, he can do no wrong.

It doesn’t matter to them that he has single-handedly alienated us to a world that already wasn’t very fond of us.

It doesn’t matter to them that he has run up the national debt like an 18 year-old with their first credit card.

It doesn’t matter that instead of putting qualified people in charge of major governmental agencies and departments, he’s putting in his drinking buddies from 10 years ago.

It’s almost as if he were a child and speaking ill of him would stunt his growth or hurt his fragile ego.

People condemned President Clinton for getting on television and lying to the American public about an affair.

They condemned him for committing a “horrible unethical act” in the sacred Oval Office.

They demanded that he be impeached and did everything short of dragging him out of the office carrying pitchforks and torches.

All of this for committing an act that in all honesty was a personal matter between him and his wife.

President Bush and Dick “the puppet-master” Cheney get on television and lie to the American public not about personal matters, but instead about our economy, the war on terror, Iraq, foreign policy, and just about everything else that suits their agenda.

They lie to us about the issues that we have put them in place to handle, and no-one demands that they answer for there misdeeds?

No-one demands that they step aside?

They have convinced us that anyone who questions them is un-American.

Who would have ever thought that they would see the day where expressing your freedom of speech to question the people we “elected” to run our country could be seen as treasonous?

Who would have ever thought that not supporting the war meant that you didn’t support our troops?

President Bush is proof that (given the right attitude, chunks of dirty money, or family birthright) even the village idiot has the potential to one day become the leader of our great country.

And sure he might lead us into an apocalyptic war, crippling recession, and monstrous debt which will result in our nation being acquired by China.

But hey, at least we don’t have to worry about him having sex in the Oval Office.

I know I’ll sleep easier tonight knowing that.

Casey Simpkins

Suffolk