ds, I agree; he didn't look drunk to me either.  I think he was totally stressed and simply couldn't take any more pressure.  Carville's ribbing could have been a lot tougher.  I don't think it was that; he used Carville's remark as an excuse to walk out, because he did not want to face the Plame questions from Henry.  

Regarding the drunk vs. not-drunk debate--  I'll be honest, I've not heard the man speak on TV in a year or two at the earliest.  All I can say is that when I began watching that clip, the first thought that crossed my mind was, "Why is he slurring his words?  And he looks like he can't even keep his eyes open."

If he wasn't drunk, at the least I still feel he was badly impaired in some way. 

Two theories I haven't seen anywhere.

First, his lawyers are probably having fits about him doing TV when there are prosecutors listening who have the right to use anything he says against him in a court of law. His legal team may have instructed him that if he gets into a situation where he is going to have choose between lying and hurting himself legally, then simply get up and walk away. The BS comment is just a distraction.

Another similar possibility is that he had an understanding with CNN bosses that he would not be hassled over this. One of the main mysteries is how he has not been forced to explain himself on the air. The only reason I can think of is that CNN management wanted to get his full story when the legal issues were resolved in return for keeping the attack poodles at bay and allowing him to stay on the air. When Novak saw that the moderator was going to hit him on the Who's Who question, he saw that the deal was over and walked downstairs to complain.

When you are between a rock and a hard place, your best move may be to get off TV. 

It can be found here:

http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2677390

What's up with this thread that they can't provide a simple link to the footage?

Josh Marshall--

At some point could you take a simple poll with regards to how many of your posters are Inside-the-Beltway, versus the rest of us outsiders?

Sometimes I feel like I wandered into the wrong club!

Novak is primarily an entertainer anxious to create additional buzz around himself.  The motivation for the walkout is the same as Tom Cruise's when he jumps up and down on a couch on a TV show.

I will look for the post that discussed the importance of the book lying on the desk.  Maybe I heard it on Air America Radio.  There is a tie in to the book on the desk.

Here is a copy I found in the blogs on http://www.therandirhodesshow.com

If you are going to be in Atlanta today go check this out.
http://www.keepthevotealive.org/

I am poor and in Iowa so no go for me.

Concerned about Voting Machines? You should be.

Thats all for me.

How about Rove and Novak conspiring on the walkout to turn the public conversation to the trivial made-for-tv drama, and away from the important issue of WH officials outing a CIA operative?

If you haven't gone to NYTimes yet this Saturday morning suggest you read Elizabeth Bumiller on long time lrelationship  between Rove and Novak.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/06/politics/06novak.html?pagewante
d=1 

In the CNN context, Novak was a guest on two shows, Captial Gang and Crossfire. Both shows have been cancelled. Maybe he was getting the hint...

Seconds before he stood up, both the commentator and Carville were shouting him down. Maybe the truth was seeping into his head that he was getting pushed out, literally.

I think you have to consider that there are at least two leak investigations going on in Washington at present, and they may overlap. THe AIPAC investigation has resulted in three indictments, but two major administration figures, and possibly several reporters, are still suspect and could be indicted. The same two administration figures may be involved in the Plame leak as well. We don't know how the two connect. For all we know, Novak may be the one who revealed Larry Franklin was leaking to AIPAC, or perhaps he received classified information. At this point, it seems likely that Novak thinks he had better keep his mouth shut, and that probably means he thinks he could possibly be indicted.

I don't think we can get to Treason in Time of War, because we are not technically at war. But I am thinking that someone who learned of the existence of the OSS in World War Two and published it in the Chicago Sun-Times would have spent the rest of his short life in Leavenworth waiting for the hangman.

But perjury and obstruction of justice are not out of reach.

> So am I missing something?

Mark Kleiman believes that the Intelligence Act of 1917 could be construed to cover third parties such as Miller and Novak.  There is also the Atomic Energy Act of 1952, which is binding on everyone regardless of who they work for, how they got the information, and even whether or not they invented the information themselves (e.g design an atomic bomb and the design is automatically classified whether or not you are in any way working for the government).  

Not being a lawyer I can't comment on whether either of these acts would apply to Novak, but given that he seems to be clearing every word on Plame with his lawyer there would seem to be some possibility they do.

sPh 

I don't understand why everyone is so down on Robert Novak.  It's hard work being a supercilious grump.  It takes a lot of energy to maintain a snobby demeanor.  Have some compassion, for god's sake. 

Robert just had a fit because after all his years of hard work cultivating an air of perpetual condescension and "inside" gravitas, people weren't buying it anymore. 

I understand. I know.  As a young guru I used to punch holes in walls when (like Valerie Plame's) my cover was blown. Maybe Robert did too.  He looks like a man who might have a secret history of serial drywall repair: the turned down mouth, his chronic peevishness --these are things a gypsum-breathing career sheetrocker can sympathize with. But now he's a smooth, sophisticated, grown-up; an anti-democratic, talking head who gets to storm out of real national tv interviews in a huff instead. Look how far he's come. 

Novak's blow-out was nothing but a pent-up ego exit, and hauling an ego that big off-stage on the spur of the moment is no easy task. Cut the guy a break. Be big. At least be bigger than Bob. 

One of my old teachers used to say, "If you're not getting your way by staying, you might as well not get your way by leaving."
Maybe he was Mr. Novak's teacher too.

I agree with most observations suggesting that Novak was looking for a way to get off camera before the host hit him with a Plame question yet again. Besides the embarrassment of having one lie after another exposed almost as soon as he squirts them out, Novak must be fearing that he is sailing close to legal jeopardy. After all, you only cooperate with grand jury by telling them SOMETHING. That's fine until they find out your something was a lie. Then you figure you could have just skipped that part and gone straight to jail, ala Ms. Miller.  It may be dawning on Novak that he doesn't really have a free pass to generate lie after lie. That may finally be cramping his style.  Besides making him he feel less talkative, it proably really makes him MAD.  Caution, after all, is for losers.  It shouldn't be something that the great N has to bother himself about.
It is a bit intriguing that the point on which Novak was Katherine Harris.  It makes me think that in addition to feeling defensive about everything else that was going to happen in the program, there may be something about the Harris candidacy that makes him feel especially defensive.
I saw opinions mixed in here earlier about journalists and jail, especially respecting Miss Miller. Protection of sources, I believe, was a value evolved to protect those who would risk their livelihoods or their lives in order to bring to the public information that is in the public interest.  None of that applies to Judith Miller's source(s). This is a woman who wanted to ride on the power train, but hang out the window that says "Journalist" over the frame. She is a first class power and glamor wraith who could not care less about journalistic values, and cares less than less about the agony she has helped set loose.  It is more than possible that she was defying the jury not to protect her source, but to protect herself from exposure of his own execrable and quite possibly illegal behaviors in the Plame case. She could go to jail for a hundred years, and journalism would be nothing but improved.

Is there any way to verify the veracity of Mr. Flocco's article?