What does the Franklin plea actually mean?

[shance]

When I read things like the Franklin verdict and his admission of giving away US secrets, I know it is significant and a crime has been committed, but I don't understand what the overall repercussions and or consquences are.

Can someone explain?

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

1. America loses the ability to blackmail it's world neighbors.

Same for today's White House spy. Incriminating documents are stolen on the Phillipine leader.

However, the shelf life of such intelligence can be very short.

[shance]

4. It seems every governmental crime that has been committed

has been due to lack of transparency in our governing, and secrecy. From our elections to our intelligence.

Seems to me that transparency in our governments policies should be a top priority. Of course that demands citizen involvement and investment in the governing process.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

2. tis not a verdict

Tis a guilty plea.

He avoids the worst of the penalties (life, death and things inbetween) for being a spy and traitor.
He probably has to provide testimony against AIPAC and at least two former members.
He probably has to point inside the VP's office and provide testimony against Feith, and other assholes who aided, abetted and supported his treason.
He will spend a L O N G time on an all expenses paid, federal vacation with tiny windows, outdoor privileges once a day, and ocassional shower visits from Big Luke, the well hung inspector and enforcer of just who gets to keep extra rations of the smooth, creamy peanut butter, without the crunchie bits.

Put it this way. He will never have constipation ever again.

[shance]

5. Thanks. I made the change.

n/t

[whosinpower]

3. It means that the US has been infiltrated

With Israeli espionage - founded on the doors of AIPAC - one of the most powerful lobbies in Washington.

Think it matters not because Israel is a friend, an ally? Then why the need for spying? And let us not forget that it is American blood that is being spilled in Iraq - not Israeli. And let us not forget that Israel has been pulling the strings of middle eastern US foreign policy....to the point of a illegitimate war waged on false pretenses.

Let us not forget that it was Israeli's who were caught taking photo's and dancing in NEW YORK the day of 911.

I am not suggesting that Israel is an enemy of America - and I do not consider myself anti-semitic in any sense.....but I DO feel that America has been hoodwinked into fighting Israel's wars.

[zippy890]

6. Thanks for asking this question

I'm having trouble putting this in the right perspective. Also thanks to above posts providing more information

[texpatriot2004]

7. I think you/we have to think big here. Put on your tinfoil hat for

a minute (mine is on :tinfoilhat: ) and remember it's not a conspiracy if it's true; we don't know yet if it's true or not but we will.

Franklin's crime involves AIPAC a Pro-Israel lobby group. He has pleaded guilty to giving classified info to those not authorized to receive it and also to having classified docs at his home (85 total seized by authorities) that he wasn't supposed to have at his home. What if Judy Miller is tied to Franklin in some way? And/or Israel? She's the mouthpiece/conduit for terra, terra, terra. What if the evil Dick knew needed people not to find out about his secret income sources and outed Plame not so much to get back at Wilson (which he loved doing and was a bonus) but mostly to stop the tracking of the WMD deals currently going on? He knew what he was doing when he outed Plame and it had to come from the top due to the nature of the classified info. THINK ABOUT HOW THIS ADMINISTRATION ALWAYS PLACES BLAME IN A DOWNWARD MOTION, NEVER UP.

It seems that Judy didn't decide to come forward until she knew Franklin had testified. Remember that journalist as heroine of freedom of the press is just noise...to distract from her real motives for what she did.

The long and short of the Franklin case, IMHO, is that of conspiracy and co-conspirators involving high ranking officials and more than one country.

Okay, so here's the kicker, take off the tinfoil hat and think about it...it makes sense. I have been reading about it alot and Franklin is a key piece.

[Catrina]

8. And wasn't Franklin involved in the Valerie Plame

affair, because (I'm not sure I'm remembering this correctly) he was in Italy when the forged documents were given to the Italian journalist? I could be mistaken about that ~

But he was very close to Douglas Feith, the neocon who pushed the 'terror' connection between Iraq and Al Queda, more lies. Douglas Feith quit in January.

[texpatriot2004]

10. I think you are correct on both counts. n/t

[texpatriot2004]

9. Franklin is a piece of the whole pie. n/t

[seemslikeadream]

11. wiretaps that won't be released - maybe Judy's on them

(Franklin) Plea May Affect Aipac Lobbyists' Cases
Plea May Affect Aipac Lobbyists' Cases<
By FORWARD STAFF AND JTA
October 7, 2005

...


Rosen was Aipac's chief strategist and political enforcer for more than two decades; Weissman was the committee's former Iran specialist. Both were charged with illegally receiving the information and then sharing it with foreign officials and with journalists.

...


"I am having a hard time, Mr. DiGregory, getting over the fact that the defendants can't hear their own statements, and whether that is so fundamental that if it doesn't happen, this case will have to be dismissed," Ellis said. "Have you ever heard of a case where a defendant couldn't have his own statements? I have been on the bench 18 years, with another 20 years before that, and it has never happened."

Prosecutors said the wiretap material was "owned" by various government intelligence agencies and that it was up to those agencies to share the material.

Thomas Reilly, a Justice Department lawyer, invoked the notorious secrecy of the three-judge panel that orders wiretaps under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. He suggested that the sensitivity lay not in what Rosen and Weissman had said but in the party with whom they were speaking.

"It involves FISA-derived electronic surveillance, your honor, of the defendants and third parties," Reilly said.

...

Lowell said in court that he had spoken to lawyers for the foreign officials — apparently the Israelis — and had little hope of calling them for the defense.

...

Aipac's bill for the pair's defense has topped $1 million.

Rosen and Weissman were charged with "conspiracy to communicate national defense information to people not entitled to receive it," which carries a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison. Rosen also is charged with actual communication of national defense information, also punishable by 10 years in prison.

The charges come under the Espionage Act but do not rise to the level of espionage.

The indictment lists charges involving incidents dating back to 1999, and is related to information on Iran and to terrorist attacks in Central Asia and in Saudi Arabia. For a period in 2004, Franklin worked covertly with the government and relayed allegedly classified information to Rosen and Weissman. One charge against the pair accuses them of relaying the information to a foreign official, widely reported to be an Israeli Embassy staffer.


more

http://www.forward.com/articles/4585