Confidential Disinformation

The other day, I included a reference to an '80s TV show, "Yes, Prime Minister," A Sacred Homage, which has a eerie resemblance to the situation with George Bush, as Leaker-in-Chief.

You can watch a clip of the episode in which the Prime Minister is exposed as the leaker, at OneGoodMove, Good Leak, Bad Leak. As OGM says, "the application of the Secrets Act is reminiscent of recent Bush Administration leakgate shenanigans and the dialogue about when its okay to release and when it is not is classic."

One of the OGM Commenters included the following quotes from the Show that are very apt:

Sir Arnold: "Are you suggesting that I give confidential information to the press?"
Sir Humphrey: "Certainly not, Arnold. This is confidential disinformation."
Sir Arnold: "Ah, that is different."

Sir Humphrey: "So I gather, you denied that Mr. Halifax's phone had been bugged?"
Jim Hacker: "Well obviously, it was the one question today to which I could give a clear, simple, straightforward, honest answer."
Sir Humphrey: "Yes, unfortunately although the answer was indeed clear, simple and straightforward, there is some difficulty in justifiably assigning to it the fourth of the epithets you applied to the statement, inasmuch as the precise correlation between the information you communicated and the facts insofar as they can be determined and demonstrated is such as to cause epistemological problems of sufficient magnitude to lay upon the logical and semantic resources of the English language a heavier burden than they can reasonably be expected to bear."
Jim Hacker: "Epistemological? What are you talking about?"
Sir Humphrey: "You told a lie."
Jim Hacker: "A lie??"
Sir Humphrey: "A lie."
Jim Hacker: "What do you mean a lie?"
Sir Humphrey: "I mean you ... lied. Yes I know, this is a difficult concept to get across to a politician. You ..... ah yes, you did not tell the truth."

After watching this clip, you almost feel like you are watching what's happening in the White House as we speak. Life follows Art for sure with this one. You should definitely check it out!