Isn't anyone curious about this?

[Tiger Al 0]

Although this story has been on the screen for a couple of months, the heat was really turned up on Friday. The usually news savvy posters here on 'All Things Considered' have somehow overlooked this story which is a potential powderkeg for the Bush administration. A senior White House official (Karl Rove?) alledgedly 'outs' a CIA operative as revenge for her husband having the unmitigated gall to disagree with the company line. And not a peep here. Hmm. If this turns out to be true then someone (Karl Rove?) committed a felony and will go to jail. I hope Dubya didn't know anything about this, or worse, authorize it, 'cause, if so, he won't be landing any more jets on aircraft carriers for a while!!! Of course, John Ashcroft and the justice department are 'investigating', so I doubt they will find ANY evidence of wrongdoing. I wonder if there's a conflict of interest there?

Robert Novak's article that started it all

Time article from 7/17/03

CNN 9/29/03

Some Dare Call It Treason

[DKW 86 7,410]

You know Big Bob Gibson's serves the best BBQ in the World. Right here in Decatur, AL.

[CarolinaTiger 0]

i hadn't heard anything about it until yesterday

as with anything else, if it has legs, it'll walk, and if it doesn't, CNN will report it through the end of november anyway.

on another note, while TigerAl is very entertaining, i miss CShine a little. does anyone know if he's found the new board yet?

ct

[Tiger Al 0]

I miss C-shine too. But, while his posts were on salary, I'm on a per-post pay scale, so maybe that's why I'm entertaining!!!

[Jenny AU-92 0]

I also had not heard anything abt it until yesterday, and I listen to nothing but news radio in the mornings, so obviously it was just not a story.

As for anyone thinking Karl Rove would be so stupid as to actually do something like that, well, they must not pay too much attention to his methods. The man is brilliant. Putting political spin on this (revenge for not toeing party line) is crap.

Proving who told Novak anything will be virtually impossible, as he will never name names to protect his "sources" and they can't make him tell. Plus, the fact that a former Foreign Service worker's wife was a CIA operative was most likely not a closely guarded secret in Washington - kind of everyone knows but no one talks about it kind of thing. Novak should have known better than to publish something like that - if anything, he should be held accountable in the interests of national security and her personal safety.

I actually put his on the same level as Hillary using the FBI to get personal information on White House staff - a big dustup in the news for a week or two and then zilch.

[Jenny AU-92 0]

New info - sounds like a non-issue to me now...

NOVAK RESPONDS: 'NOBODY IN THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION CALLED ME TO LEAK THIS'

Mon Sep 29 2003 16:44:51 ET

"Nobody in the Bush administration called me to leak this. In July I was interviewing a senior administration official on Ambassador Wilson's report when he told me the trip was inspired by his wife, a CIA employee working on weapons of mass destruction.

"Another senior official told me the same thing. As a professional journalist with 46 years experience in Washington I do not reveal confidential sources. When I called the CIA in July to confirm Mrs. Wilson's involvement in the mission for her husband -- he is a former Clinton administration official -- they asked me not to use her name, but never indicated it would endanger her or anybody else.

"According to a confidential source at the CIA, Mrs. Wilson was an analyst, not a spy, not a covert operator, and not in charge of undercover operatives."

[TitanTiger 20,464]

Not TigerAl's favorite magazine, but the guy makes some very good points.

Spy Games

Was it really a secret that Joe Wilson's wife worked for the CIA?

September 29, 2003, 10:22 a.m.

Clifford D. May for National Review

It's the top story in the Washington Post this morning as well as in many other media outlets. Who leaked the fact that the wife of Joseph C. Wilson IV worked for the CIA?

What also might be worth asking: "Who didn't know?"...

http://www.nationalreview.com/may/may200309291022.asp

[WarTiger 3,896]

:boring: :boring:

[Tiger Al 0]

Karl Rove

[Tiger Al 0]

Hey, Jenny...do you think Novak was wagging his finger as he was denying White House involvement? I'm curious why he keeps referring to her as "Mrs. Wilson" when her name is "Valerie Plame," as he correctly referred to her in his article. Also, regular, run-of-the-mill CIA employees don't do this:

Officials are barred by law from disclosing the identities of Americans who work undercover for the C.I.A. That provision is intended to protect the security of operatives whose lives might be jeopardized if their identities are known. Until Mr. Novak's column, Ms. Plame was known to friends as an energy industry analyst.

Undercover operatives do, however.

You said getting Novak to talk would be virtually impossible and that he can't be made to talk. I would disagree. I would surely think that if someone has released classified information about a CIA operative to the media that it would most certainly fall under the jurisdiction of the USA PATRIOT Act, wouldn't it? Take Novak down to Gitmo and let him rot in a cell, uncharged with anything and without access to an attorney until he talks. I'll bet he gives up a name (Karl Rove?) pretty soon!

Are 'foreign service workers' the same thing as U.S. Ambassadors? Seems like there would be a difference to me.

About Rove, brilliance, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder, but are you on record as saying that he would never and has never resorted to 'dirty tricks?'

And, maybe, the reason 'Filegate' was a big dust up in the news for a week or two and then zilch was because:

In the FBI files matter, Ray’s statement said he had determined “there was no substantial and credible evidence that any senior White House official, or first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, was involved in seeking confidential Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) background reports of former White House staff from the prior administrations of President Bush and President Reagan.”

I think this is going to be a little more than a 'dust up.'

[CCTAU 3,287]

Once again....just another grasp for gasp.

[Jenny AU-92 0]

Foreign services officers are career civil servants - Ambassadors are political appointees.

The PATRIOT Act does not apply in this case. The applicable law is the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982 (50 U.S.C. 421 et seq.), which governs disclosures that could expose confidential Government agents, and under which jounalists are EXEMPT - probably some pinko added that in so the media could out anyone they saw fit. And there is further question about whether this law would even apply in this case, as Mrs. Wilson is NOT a covert operative, but an analyst, and had not been anywhere remotely connected to covert stuff for more than five years, which is the statute of limitations under the act. This is such a non-issue. Her identity and career was WELL-KNOWN in Washington - Wilson the Clinton lover/Bush hater even named her himself in his "Who's Who" biography. No one even gave a rat's patootie about this issue, which first arose in JULY, until the Demonrats saw a chance to get some political mileage out of it at the President's expense by trying to point fingers at one of his TOP CAMPAIGN people in (surprise, surprise) an ELECTION YEAR. If the media weren't so partisan liberal, this would never have even been mentioned at all, because there is nothing to investigate or see or discover. If this were Clinton in office, the media would have totally dropped it, if they had ever picked it up to begin with.

Read Novak's article today:

Novak Article 10-01-03

"Administration official" does NOT mean White House - it could be ANYONE working in or for the Executive Branch. A connection to Karl Rove is just a wet dream for the Demonrats - a happy thought. Once again, desperate times call for desperate measures, and the libs are DESPERATE.

[Tiger Al 0]

If this were Clinton in office, the media would have totally dropped it, if they had ever picked it up to begin with.

Although this entire post is extremely amusing, this has to be the singlemost delusional thing I have ever seen you write.

[Jenny AU-92 0]

Amusing post? Huh? What is so amusing about my post? The FACTS that I included? Like the details about the LAW? Well, here are some more amusing details for you then. Granted, I copied this off Boortz, but he isn't putting spin or anything on it - he just sums up what is currently known and makes a valid point:

The law in question is the Intelligence Identities Protection Act.  The law imposes a 10-year, $50,000 fine for those who transgress.  Here are the three elements that must be satisfied for a crime to have taken place:

-  The accused party must have made an intentional disclosure of the identity of the agent.

-  They must know that the person they identified was actually an undercover agent

-  The government (the CIA) must be taking measures to conceal this agent's relationship to the United States.

Sorry ... no crime.  Consider, please, that the CIA actually confirmed Plame's employment to columnist Robert Novak.  Has it occurred to you that the CIA doesn't routinely confirm the employment status of undercover agents or spies? How can you say that the CIA was making an effort to conceal this agent's relationship to the U.S. when they verified here employment to a reporter?  Now ... if she actually had been an undercover agent, that relationship would never have been disclosed.

If it was such a hot story, why not get all over it in July????????? Why now????? Here's one reason - and explains how Karl Rove's name got dragged into this whole thing. NOOOOOOOO, Mr. Wilson has NO political agenda of his own here, now does he? NOOOO, the Democrats have ALWAYS been big fans of independent counsels, especially the Hildabeast - she is just enamoured with the WHOLE idea. SOmeone call Ken Starr.

Link to Article

"Neo-conservatives and religious conservatives have hijacked this administration, and I consider myself on a personal mission to destroy both." Those are the words of Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who will certainly be a household name for weeks to come.

    Chances are very good that we will never know who from the White House leaked the information about Mr. Wilson and his wife to members of the press. For one thing, that's the nature of leak investigations. Journalists don't reveal their sources, and sources have a way of disappearing into the mahogany paneling in the halls of power here in Washington. Most of such investigations end inconclusively.

    What we do know is that damage is being done to the reputation of the Bush White House by the controversy over the leak. President Bush came into office with the promise to bring honor and integrity to the office of the presidency after the Clinton impeachment trial, and here we are now with calls for independent prosecutors coming fast and furious from Democrats, who hated the idea when Bill Clinton was the target.

     In a politically sound move, and as soon as the CIA reported that "two senior administration officials" had given the name of an agent (i.e. Mr. Wilson's wife) to journalists, the White House lost no time facilitating the leak investigation. It was referred to the Justice Department on Sept. 27. So far, we have seen none of the Clinton-era, Janet Reno-style stone-walling in evidence.

     Still, looking at the main players in this case and their statements, there is a sliding scale of truth, which, in the end, will prevent us from knowing what actually happened. Statements shift from moment to moment, and each has his interests to protect. Administration officials obviously do. So do members of the media, especially, columnist Robert Novak, whose article on July 14 caused the initial furor.

    Take Mr. Wilson himself, who has been much in evidence on national television screens since this weekend. Could he have an agenda beyond demanding justice?

     Well, what would you think of someone who tells people around Washington — as Mr. Wilson did last week — "Neo-conservatives and religious conservatives have hijacked this administration, and I consider myself on a personal mission to destroy both."

     That sounds pretty ugly, doesn't it? It is in fact quite a bit at odds with the reasonable image that Mr. Wilson has been projecting on our television screens in recent days. Mr. Wilson also saw fit back in August to accuse presidential adviser Karl Rove of having orchestrated the White House leak. He swore he would see Mr. Rove led out of there "in handcuffs." Now, he says he got carried away by passion and is in possession of no evidence that Mr. Rove was involved.

     That Mr. Wilson holds such views in no way excuses the injustice that was done him and his wife Valerie Plame, when a leak to the media identified her as a CIA officer involved in analysis of information regarding weapons of mass destruction. Mr. Wilson — who had been sent to the African country of Niger by the CIA to investigate claims that uranium "yellowcake" had been sold to Iraqi agents — emerged last summer as a severe critic of the Bush administration. He accused the White House of "misrepresenting facts on an issue that was a fundamental justification for going to war."

    It is for this criticism that Mr. Wilson claims he and his family are being punished. Which may well be true. That would be both illegal and unethical. As Mr. Wilson stated at the time, "Whoever leaked that comment about my wife did it very clearly to smear my good name and my wife's good name." He has not himself, however, had any compunction about smearing Mr. Rove's good name without any evidence.

    Now, Mr. Bush might well be able to get this whole affair behind him by finding a scapegoat to fire — had it not been that revealing the identity of a CIA officer is a federal crime, punishable by up to 10 years in prison. A simple dismissal would not put an end to the matter.

     So, here is another suggestion to get to the bottom of this mess before our policy in Iraq becomes a victim of Washington's politics of long knives. Let's polygraph the whole bunch —White House officials, media types, CIA officials. At the CIA, they at least allow agents who have been accused an "exculpatory polygraph test." In the Washington political jungle, that may be the only way of getting at the facts.

[Ranger12 46]

If this were Clinton in office, the media would have totally dropped it, if they had ever picked it up to begin with.

Although this entire post is extremely amusing, this has to be the singlemost delusional thing I have ever seen you write.

Have to agree with TigerAl for a change on this one. Exposing an undercover CIA agent has nothing to do with party lines. I doubt Bush authorized this. One of the most important missions he has as President is to find WMDs. Would not make sense to hurt his own cause by exposing and undercover agent that is trying to accomplish that mission. Obviously, it had to be somebody "in the know". I don't care who it was, be it Cheney, Powell, Rumsfield, Rice, or somebody lower, but their head needs need to roll!!! I also really question the integrity of any reporter that would openly expose and agent, regardless of the leak. I really have to question their patriotism. Just more proof that "right and wrong" has almost disappeared from the minds of men. BTW, TigerAl, I have thought about posting this topic quite a few times when I heard about it over the weekend, but been to busy. To me, there is no justification for something like this and somebody is going to pay for this. If by some remote possibilty that Bush authorized it, I will be one of the first to call for his a$$. I vote and support a man for his ideals and how much I agree with them, not the party he represents. I am a conservative, but not a card carrying member of the Republican party. Just happens to be that most Republican candidates stand for the same beliefs I have. However, I have voted for some Democrats that I would not consider really liberal (ie Bud Cramer). Anybody that puts another's life in danger for political gain is a low life scumbag in my book!

[Jenny AU-92 0]

Ranger, I would agree with you if this woman had been some kind of Mata Hari type, working in a burkha, behind enemy lines. But she WASN'T. The scandal behind this is the whole reason Wilson was involved to begin with - HIS WIFE GOT HIM THE NIGER JOB!!!!!

The WSJ Editorial about this. Link to WSJ

An avowed opponent of war with Iraq, Mr. Wilson was somehow hired as a consultant by the CIA to investigate a claim made by British intelligence about yellowcake uranium sought in Niger by Iraqi agents. Though we assume he signed the routine CIA confidentiality agreement, Mr. Wilson blew his own cover to denounce the war and attack the Bush Administration for lying. Never mind that the British still stand by their intelligence, and that the CIA's own October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq, since partly declassified, lent some credence to the evidence.

This is the context in which Mr. Novak was told that Mr. Wilson had been hired at the recommendation of his wife, a CIA employee. This is hardly blowing a state secret but is something the public had a right to know. When an intelligence operative essentially claims that a U.S. President sent American soldiers off to die for a lie, certainly that operative's own motives and history ought to be on the table. In any event, Mrs. Wilson was not an agent in the field but is ensconced at Langley headquarters. It remains far from clear that any law was violated.

The real intelligence scandal is how an open opponent of the U.S. war on terror such as Mr. Wilson was allowed to become one of that policy's investigators. That egregious CIA decision echoes what has obviously been a long-running attempt by anonymous "intelligence sources" quoted in the media to undermine the Bush policy toward Iraq. Mr. Bush's policies of prevention and pursuing state sponsors of terror overturned more than 30 years of CIA anti-terror dogma, and some of the bureaucrats are hoping to defeat him in 2004.

[Ranger12 46]

Jenny,

You are missing my point. You don't expose and agent for any reason, whatsoever. Regardless of their current assignment or exposure. You don't do it because somebody said something wrong about you or the person you work for. You just don't do it. It is classless as it comes. We are talking about lives here. Even if she was not undercover, but by exposing her past missions as an agent can put current undercover agents in danger. I could go on all day how this goes much deeper then just her exposure as an agent. It goes much deeper then you can imagine, trust me. Bottom line is, you keep your mouth shut about and agent's identity, wheter it is already known or not, and you sure the hell don't expose their past assignments. More then likely there are agents undercover still working on missions linked to her past assignments.

[Jenny AU-92 0]

Then she should have stayed OUT of a political decision - if the CIA was going to hire someone to do a job with serious political sensitivity, KNOWING that that person's credibility and objectivity might come into play, as it rightly should, then they should have thought twice about hiring him ON HER RECOMMENDATION!!! That would be like hiring Terry McAuliffe to do an investigation of the Republican National Convention's fundraising - gee, I wonder if he might find some "Impropriety"? This guy is an avowed, publicly stated Bush hater who opposed the war in Iraq, but yet is hired to do a job that has political implications for the Bush administration, and you don't think that someone somewhere might wonder HOW this man got this job? THIS is information I personally would like to know. And from many accounts, her job was no real secret in Washington. It has nothing to do with simply "getting revenge" on Wilson - Novak has no reason to do that. Wilson is trying to play the innocent victim here, but it doesn't hold water with me. It was NOT public knowledge that Wilson was the one who wrote the Niger report. He ANNOUNCED IT HIMSELF - HE wrote the first op-ed piece HIMSELF on July 6th, naming HIMSELF as the source of the Niger report that said there was no attempt by Hussein to buy the yellow cake. If he had not written that piece and "outed" himself, Novak would never have written an article wondering how he got the job! SO Wilson is as much to blame as anyone, and he is using this as an opportunity to try and mess with GWB's credibility and take down Karl Rove.

Look, I totally agree with you that protecting the identity of our intelligence resources is critical. But when they interject themselves into public and political situations, they lose that protection, in my mind. Inteligence is supposed to be objective, right? She obviously put herself above that objectivity.

[Ranger12 46]

Sure, she should keep her nose out of where it does not belong. No argument there. But you can't endanger others that have nothing to do with her bad judgement just because you do not like her political motivations. Whoever "leaked" this info should have thought about that. They didn't because they leaked it for selfish reasons, which IMO, makes them just as bad as her.

[Tiger Al 0]

Valerie Plame worked in the "Operations Directorate" of the CIA, according to a Newsday story from July 22:

"Intelligence officials confirmed to Newsday Monday that Valerie Plame, wife of retired Ambassador Joseph Wilson, works at the agency on weapons of mass destruction issues in an undercover capacity -- at least she was undercover until last week when she was named by columnist Robert Novak.

****

A senior intelligence official confirmed that Plame was a Directorate of Operations undercover officer who worked 'alongside' the operations officers who asked her husband to travel to Niger."

Note the date of the article. Contrary to popular Limbaugh/Boortz/Murdoch opinion, this story has been on the screen since Novak wrote his article and Wilson wrote his op-ed piece in the N.Y. Times.

The problem is not whether Novak has the axe to grind, but, that someone in the White House leaked this info to him and six other writers.

[Ranger12 46]

And remember, like I said, the writers that went with this story have some integrity issues themselves, but it seems the media does not want criticize the compatriots, but they sure are quick to make accusations about Bush's administration.

[tigerlifer3 0]

I hope the Bush Adminstration has better luck at finding the "leakers" than he has at finding 1) weapons of mass destruction. 2) Saddam Huessin, and 3) Osama Bin Laden.

This was meant to be funny. I do no care about Politics and I don't even know what consertative (sp) and liberals mean nor do I care. I just vote for a president when the time comes.

[Tiger Al 0]

I hope the Bush Adminstration has better luck at finding the "leakers" than he has at finding 1) weapons of mass destruction. 2) Saddam Huessin, and 3) Osama Bin Laden.

This was meant to be funny. I do no care about Politics and I don't even know what consertative (sp) and liberals mean nor do I care. I just vote for a president when the time comes.

Vote for Howard Dean!!!

[Jenny AU-92 0]

Here is another article - I am not even going to add commentary, since this one seems to lay the whole thing out pretty evenly for all parties.

Washington Times Article

The only thing I will say is that if you take the information in this article at face value, the whole idea of this being some huge "Scandal" seems to disintegrate into "partisanship" and "politics as usual" - ON BOTH SIDES.