Friday, September 30, 2005 More Bad News for GOP: Larry Franklin Guilty Plea Larry Franklin pled guilty to violations of the Espionage Act. Franklin was one of the Pentagon's policy experts on Iran and the Middle East. He was indicted in June on charges of providing classified information to an Israeli official and members of a pro-Israeli lobbying group, which is disclosing national defense information to people not entitled to receive it, and for leaking top secret information about 2 unidentified Middle Eastern officials to the media. This has got to have Rove, Libby, & the cabal of War Fans shitting kittens b/c, as UCLA Prof of Policy Studies Mark A R Kleiman explains: "Franklin was indicted under the Espionage Act (specifically 18 U.S.C. 793 (d)) for giving classified information to those not eligible to receive it, including members of the media. No money involved, no inteligence identities. And Franklin is pleading out. Looks to me as if the Espionage Act is still alive, and as if it applies squarely to the facts of the Plame outing case." Oh yeh, and as Pontificator points out: "we still haven't seen the classified CIA Damage Assessment Report on the Plame leak. If the leak led to overseas WMD sources being outed and killed, then, under the Espionage Act, this could be a death penalty case." Dear GOP... Karma... it can be a bitch. |