I’m flying through the air, though not with the greatest of ease. But while I’m winging it through the air to the west coast today, check out Powerline’s “Dissecting the 60 Minutes Scandal“.

“We’ve written a couple of times about the 60 Minutes story last Sunday that claimed former Alabama governor Don Siegelman was the victim of a Republican conspiracy that sent him to prison for bribery and mail fraud. The story implicitly accused the career prosecutors who handled the case of complicity in the alleged conspiracy, but the real focus of CBS’s account was Karl Rove. The network’s star witness was a small-time Alabama lawyer named Jill Simpson, who claimed she was a life-long Republican, but had stepped forward to tell what she knew about events in 2001 and 2002.

The centerpiece of Simpson’s account, as presented on 60 Minutes, was her claim that she did “opposition research” for the Republican Party in Alabama at the request of Karl Rove. She said that in 2001, while Siegelman was still governor, Rove asked her to follow Siegelman around and try to get photos of the Governor in bed (”in a compromising sexual position”) with one of his female aides. Not only that: Simpson said that this request by Rove didn’t surprise her, because Rove had asked her to carry out other secret missions in the past.

Put aside for a moment the inherent stupidity of this account. CBS aired it without disclosing the fact that Simpson has told her story several times before–without mentioning that she had ever met or spoken to Karl Rove, let alone that he asked her to spy for him.”

There are even more problems with Simpson’s account and John handles them amply. Let’s also not forget that Siegelman’s problem wasn’t Karl Rove, but that he was a dirty politician. But don’t let that stop 60 Minutes, C-BS and the nutroots continue in their “Get Karl” hysteria.