How many times over the past two years have we seen attacks on Bush, the administration, and the war in the media, based on classified information "obtained" by the press from "anonymous officials?"

There is no way to tell what the information actually was, what the context is, or, in the extreme, whether or not the paper made the whole damn thing up. How could anyone prove otherwise?

What's wrong with declassifying some of the information if it shows the original stories were wrong, or misrepresented the truth?

This was true for the famous August 8th memo, and in almost all cases (most not involving classified information) where I have the opportunity to compare the media take with original documents, I can see how the spin has been put on it.

Certainly you can't claim that this official release would damage national security, unless you also concede that the original leak of the information did so as well.

You can't bitch about the releases being "political," when attacks based on leaks are highly pollitical.

The NIE was released to show that the media was wrong. Unless you prefer the false information over the truth, what's the problem?

This wasn't hypocrisy. It's self-defense.