NP: Aqualung, Strange & Beautiful

Lots and lots of scuttlebutt 'round the Net about the Valerie Plame case, to the point where the Huffington Post -- I site I never seem to be able to connect to -- raised the possibility that the Vice President himself might be a target in the investigation.

The left side of the blogosphere is engaged in an almost euphoric lock-stepped happy dance as they await the inevitable avalanche of indictments that could set the GOP back twenty years. If that sounded over the top, you should try reading some of this stuff. I'm not exaggerating all that much. I don't recall liberals being this excited since...since...

Since they thought they had won the 2004 election.

Remember that? At first it was cautious optimism, but all the signs were starting to point to a Kerry victory, to picking up seats in Congress, and then the wheels came off. There's something about the glimmer of real hope among the persecuted minority that gets reinforced through the blogosphere into some sort of alternate reality, and I'm trying hard not to get swept up in it again. Heck, I'm trying not to even take that first cautiously optimistic step, for fear of having those hopes dashed again.

Don't count your chickens, is all I'm saying.

Still, the sudden appearance of notes and recollections of the same hitherto unreported conversation from two (or three, if you count new details from Matt Cooper) different sources is curious. It could be a smoking gun, it could be that Judy Miller was stalling for time in prison to forge documents and vet alibis, or it could be one of the most incredible coincidences ever. And we may find out soon, one way or the other.