Reid Shuts Down the Senate

This is making the rounds on some of the bigger blogs. Apparently Harry Reid has shut down the Senate, calling for a closed session, ostensibly to have it out over the pre-war intelligence on Iraq.

Democrats forced the Republican-controlled Senate into an unusual closed session Tuesday, questioning intelligence that led to the Iraq war and deriding a lack of congressional inquiry.

“I demand on behalf of the America people that we understand why these investigations aren’t being conducted,” Democratic leader Harry Reid said.

Taken by surprise, Republicans derided the move as a political stunt.

“The United States Senate has been hijacked by the Democratic leadership,” said Majority Leader Bill Frist. “They have no convictions, they have no principles, they have no ideas,” the Republican leader said.

Reid demanded the Senate go into closed session. The public was ordered out of the chamber, the lights were dimmed, and the doors were closed. No vote is required in such circumstances.

And it looks like he did it without warning Frist or any of the Republicans. I can’t help but wonder how much this has to do with the Plame affair, and in particular the news that reporter Matt Cooper has fingered Rove as the guy who outed Plame to him.

One of the reporters at the center of the investigation into the leak of the identity of an undercover CIA officer, says he first learned the agent’s name from President Bush’s top political advisor, Karl Rove.

Time magazine reporter Matt Cooper also said today in an interview with “Good Morning America,” that the vice president’s chief of staff, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, confirmed to him that Ambassador Joseph Wilson’s wife, Valerie Plame, was a CIA operative.

… “There is no question. I first learned about Valerie Plame working at the CIA from Karl Rove,” Cooper said.

Libby has since claimed that he heard the Plame rumors from other reporters. Cooper disputed that version of events. “I don’t remember it happening that way,” he said. “I was taking notes at the time and I feel confident.”

If a trial goes ahead, Cooper said he would name Rove as his source of the information.

Considering that Wilson’s trip was all about pre-war intelligence on WMDs and the presidents infamous “sixteen words” from the State of the Union address, it’s not much of a leap that this revelation, combined with the reality that Rove still sits in his White House office, may have finally been enough for Democrats to demand an accounting.

Technorati Tags: bush, current events, iraq, karl rove, politics, war on terror