(Title courtesy of Michelle Malkin. Thanks Michelle!)

Is it just me, or does anyone else see the hyprocisy – or, at the very least, the lack of consistency – in the Democrats’ relentless howl over the news that columnist Robert Novak used Karl Rove as a confirming source in the Valerie Plame CIA leak, with nary a whimper over the recent N.Y. Times / L.A. Times outing of the government’s SWIFT (financial transactions monitoring) program used to track the funding of global terrorism?

I think we can all agree that leaks of any kind involving our intelligence agencies and programs (BTW, the war being waged against the Bush Administration from Clinton partisans within the CIA, NSA, and the State Department is, sadly, yet another example of “blind-eye journalism” on the part of the mainstream dino-media) are wrong, and, in certain cases perhaps, something that should be subject to government prosection. Nevertheless, the difference between the hysteria shown over poor Valerie Plame and the relative silence following the leak of the SWIFT program (and, I might add, the NSA’s overseas phone-call monitoring program outed earlier this year) is mind-boggling, to say the least.

On one hand you have the unintended release of a single CIA field office agent’s identity; on the other the deliberate (and, some would say, unnecessary), outing of a secret, comprehensive (and legal!) counter-terrorism program used to monitor financial activities between identified and suspected terrorist groups – you know, the kind that could, oh, I don’t know, financially support the families of suicide bombers sent onto, say, crowded commuter trains? Not that something like that would ever happen, of course…

The fact that the Democrats and their all-too-willing mouthpieces in the mainstream dino-media would focus so much attention and effort on the leak of Valerie Plame’s identity – look at all the attention her civil lawsuit is spawning today! – and so little to those that clearly make our country more vulnerable to terrorist attacks is revealing, and just the latest example of why this country cannot risk putting the Democrats in charge of Congress this November, and the White House come 2008.

Serious times demand serious attention to our nation’s security, and if Democrats are truly serious about how our nation goes about protecting itself against those who wish to do it great harm, they need to move beyond partisan politics, which is, in the end, all the Plame case was about. I just don’t think they have it in them.

UPDATE 7/15/06: Just when you think the Joe-and-Valerie show couldn’t get any more absurd, now comes word that (thanks Raven!) they have lowered themselves to shilling for donations to cover the legal costs of their case. Memo to Joe and Valerie: Listen sleazeballs, if you couldn’t afford the lawsuit in the first place (which, BTW, I have no doubt you could) why file? The answer, is, of course, as Raven so accurately points out, these two are nothing but partisan Democrat media whores who can’t stand the thought of losing their place in the limelight. What a joke.

BTW, To make matters worse, if Joe & Val were hoping for a sympathetic comrade behind the bench, they’re in for a rude surprise, as Captain Ed is quick to point out .