(Wa)Post Reporter (Walter Pincus) Held in Contempt in Civil Suit

[quaoar]

WaPo has moved this story over the wire services. Not yet on their website. Will post a link when they do.

By Charles Lane
The Washington Post

WASHINGTON — A federal judge found a Washington Post reporter in contempt of court Wednesday for refusing to reveal who gave him information about an investigation of nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee.

U.S. District Judge Rosemary M. Collyer ruled that Lee is entitled to know who reporter Walter Pincus’ sources are because his lawsuit against the government for alleged violations of federal privacy law cannot go forward otherwise, and because he has exhausted all other possibilities for getting the information.

Collyer’s order carried no threat of jail time. She imposed a fine of $500 a day until Pincus agrees to testify, but suspended the penalty for at least 30 days to give him time to appeal. The judge also gave Pincus 48 hours to seek his sources’ permission to reveal their names, “in order,” she wrote, “to avoid a repetition of the Judith Miller imbroglio.”

[Hapameli]

1. Mr. Mockinbird Pincus is having his share of legal troubles, isn't he?

Boo hoo... can't wait to read it.

[stevedeshazer]

2. Whoa...Pushback by the Bushies...

Now we know the terms of the Radical Right's counterattack....

[Athame]

3. yep, that's what it looks like to me, too

but a part of me wonders if it isn't the same crime and the same criminals. The Wen Ho Lee case was another baseless smear that they thought they could get away with by using the media lapdogs.

[quaoar]

4. Well, here is an AP version of the story that the Post has posted

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/16/AR2005111602014.html

[DoYouEverWonder]

5. Judge Finds Post Reporter in Contempt - Walter Pincus!

November 16, 2005, 9:41 PM EST

WASHINGTON -- A federal judge found Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus in contempt Wednesday, saying the journalist must reveal his government sources for stories about the criminal investigation of nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee.

U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer said that "in order to avoid a repetition of the Judith Miller imbroglio," Pincus must contact his sources to inform them of the court's order in case they wish to release him from his pledge of confidentiality.

Miller, a former New York Times reporter, served 85 days in jail for contempt in the CIA leak investigation, agreeing to talk only after she spoke by telephone with her source, former top White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

The ruling is the latest example of court-ordered pressure on journalists to reveal their confidential sources.

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/sns-ap-wen-ho-lee-reporters,0,1259425.story?coll=sns-ap-nation-headlines

[The Backlash Cometh]

6. Ho-Ho-Ho. Ya'll do realize that the right-wingers used this Wen Ho Lee

thingie as proof that Clinton was involved with Chinese espionage. I think they accused the Clinton administration of thwarting the investigation in order to protect himself.

When we get down to the truth of who spread these lies, we may find another player in the Clinton Witchhunts and the right-wing conspiracy.

[Uncle Roy]

7. Yup. They were perfectly willing to destroy Wen Ho Lee in order to smear

Clinton. It wasn't too hard to read the subtext in that one. The various Buddhist temple fund-raising bruhahas that came later struck me as more of the same.

Lee is looking for justice now, and I hope he gets it. It will help us ALL.

[Toots]

8. A constitutional right to know your accuser

He should add the Washington Post to the suit for denying him a constitutional right of being able to confront his accuser.

[stopbush]

9. WaPo: Walter Pincus Held In Contempt of Court

Post Reporter Is Held in Contempt in Civil Suit

By Charles Lane
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, November 17, 2005; A17

A federal judge found a Washington Post reporter in contempt of court yesterday for refusing to reveal who gave him information about an investigation of nuclear scientist Wen Ho Lee.

U.S. District Judge Rosemary M. Collyer ruled that Lee is entitled to know who reporter Walter Pincus's sources are because his lawsuit against the government for alleged violations of federal privacy law cannot go forward otherwise, and because he has exhausted all other possibilities for getting the information.

Collyer's order carried no threat of jail time. She imposed a fine of $500 a day until Pincus agrees to testify, but suspended the penalty for at least 30 days to give him time to appeal. The judge also gave Pincus 48 hours to seek his sources' permission to reveal their names, "in order," she wrote, "to avoid a repetition of the Judith Miller imbroglio."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/16/AR2005111602072_pf.html

[warrens]

10. Wanna bet these thugs WON'T give him permission?

They were lying through their teeth about Lee and they'll pay bigtime if he finds out who they are.

[Carolab]

11. How does this relate to Yang and Henry Nee?

Bush who became President amid claims of software fraud and vote scamming in Florida has according to our sources, systematically dismantled historical national security safeguards for access to sensitive data. At the same time Bush and his brother's political allies have worked as lobbyists for the Chinese and the Saudis to secure government contracts enabling the on-going infiltration. Bush's other brother Neil is also on the board of director's of a Chinese semiconductor firm with ties to the Chinese Army.

Federal court documents and secret intelligence reports obtained by Insider-Magazine show illegal alien spies working for those firms with deep connections to AL-Qaeda have been allowed access to the NASA computer files for downloading and were involved in exporting high-tech weapons and satellite technology. Those firms have received government contracts allowing them to penetrate the highest levels of United States security and government agencies.

One such firm is Yang Enterprises, Inc. a 250 employee software firm from Oviedo, Florida. The company is represented by Jeb Bush's former running-mate, Republican Congressman Tom Feeney. Yang Enterprises is a firm with government contracts at NASA, the Florida Department of Transportation and the Department of Law Enforcement now headed by former Bay County Sheriff Guy Tunnell.
Tom Feeney shown here with the President is also the registered lobbyist for the Yang Corporation whose employee, an illegal alien, Henry Nee was indicted by a federal grand jury in 2004 for exporting microchips to Beijing University. Nee subsequently pled guilty to the charges.

Confidential Insider sources say that China dismantled microchips and reverse engineered the Sanders and Lockheed Martin chips possibly remanufacturing and reprogramming them for export back to the United States and integrating them into existing U.S. weapons systems rendering them inoperable and functionally unstable.

China is renowned worldwide for theft of technology and flooding markets with knock-offs, counterfeits and imitations of products made with prison labor. China is the largest owner of U.S. Treasury notes due to an imbalance of trade and as early as last week the head of the Fed Bank is New York warned in a Wall Street Journal article that the U.S. economy could collapse if the China dumped their U.S. Treasury certificates.


http://www.insider-magazine.com/unrestricted_warfare.htm