Not buying it

Yesterday I heard Rep. Jane Harmon (D-CA) on NPR trying to defend herself against allegations, stemming from leaked wiretaps, that she was working with Isreali agents in a covered up in exchange for political favors. It was one of the most evasive and disingenuous interviews I have heard in a while.

As for the details of the current story, first reported by CQ and then the New York Times, Harman was decidedly vague. She refused to say if a call took place in which she promised to get espionage-related charges against AIPAC officials dropped in exchange for help in her campaign for the chair of the House Intelligence Committee. And she repeated a call for the Attorney General's office to release the transcript of any phone calls of hers that may have been picked up by the NSA.

"I can't recall with any specificity a conversation I may have had four years ago," she told NPR. "That is why I have asked Attorney General Holder to release any transcripts that he has that involve wiretaps of me."

Later, however, Harman seemed to slip, saying that, "the person I was talking to was an American citizen." Pressed by host Robert Segal how she could know the nationality of the person she was talking to but not remember the conversation itself, the congresswoman replied: "Anyone I would have talked to about the AIPAC prosecution would have been an American citizen."

I may be completely wrong and Harmon may be totally innocent but thusfar I can only conclude that she is full of shit, trying to cover her ass by playing victim and crying foul over a government spying policy that she supported.