Redstate

Don't agree with everything, but this is a very useful summary of where the facts stand today.

I would first like to commend you for a well thought out and detailed analysis.  I don't have any major issues with your contentions but I do have a few quibbles.

8.  As I said yesterday the most reasonable reading of the events would suggest that Karl Rove was trying to discredit Wilson.  While he may have indeed thought that all of Wilson's report was bogus it seems more plausible that his main reasoning for implying Wilson was sent by his wife was to attack Wilson's credibility.  This is standard Betlway politics. I do agree that Rove had no intention and probably no knowledge that he may be breaking the law.
   
11.  I think it is still up in the air whether the law was broken, by Rove or anyone else.  While it does appear to be true that Plame returned state-side in 97 it is uncertain whether she was still acting in a covert manner.  If she continued to operate as a covert agent(ie go on trips under a NOC) then the law would still apply.

The point that you didn't address that I think is relevant is that the DoJ certainly thought that a crime had been committed.  The perjury and obstruction charges could only have occurred if a grand jury was appointed to investigate who committed a crime.  This is not to say that a crime DID occur.  I am simply pointing out that the DoJ believed there was enough evidence to warrant a grand jury.  

This is an excellent, "take a deep breath, add qualifiers, and see where we are", post. I would only add an item or two about what have Mr. and Mrs. Wilson said (i.e. for public consumption vs. under oath). This week has been a Rove feeding frenzy, and while the GOP talking points both defend and refocus generally, I wonder if the spotlight will swing to the other side of the "he said/he said/she said" equation.

Has anyone point blank asked Miller, the NYT, or Wilson/Plame what they have said, who they spoke with, have they been to the GJ, etc....? Most of Wilson's self incriminating revisions have been in friendly or unprompted settings. What happens if he's grilled by hostile press or counsel?

The direct evidence of Rove seems about 1/2 disclosed, but all else seems inference so far.

Ain't this fun!

"What is more in dispute is whether the British intelligence was factually correct."

Well, what is most in dispute is whether or not the Bush administration or the CIA thought or knew if the intelligence was factually correct or not.

I'd also say the Rove lawbreaking thing is certainly not "SOLID."

(a) We don't know if Plame may've gone overseas for a short period of time --let's say a week -- in the five years before the leak, so it seems premature to assume she wouldn't qualify as "covert." I haven't heard squeaks out of Wilson or anyone implying that she was a covert agent, so I have my doubts, but that could be for legal or CIA reasons I guess.

(b) More importantly: as with Bill Clinton's fiasco Rove may've committed a crime in the Grand Jury proceedings, or there may be a criminal obstruction of justice conspiracy. The blanket statement that Rove committed no crime and didn't "break the law," when what you mean to say is that it's doubtful he violated the IIPA, is a bit overreaching.

Sorry if any of those are talking points, I think they steer clear of that and are specific to your post. It's good to have some of the main points of contention laid out like this though, so thanks for that.

From flyerhawks post above I'm guessing the usage of "quibbles" was a talking point I didn't know about!

These are the words of Fitzgerald that put a stake through the moonbat arguments of law-breaking by Rove.

Further, would Rove be releasing anyone if he was a target of the investigation?

Further, if Rove had been fingered as a target by Fitzgerald, I have little doubt he would have resigned his post because that mere fact would have been in every debate adnauseum by the Kerry team.

As one of the token non-conservatives here, you frame it well, even if I take issue with parts of it.

One in particular -- when you claim that "[Rove] instructed Cooper to keep this as a "super secret", I don't believe that's what the email suggests.  "Double secret background", from my understanding of journalism, means "seriously, don't quote me on this, but you can use the information in guiding your reporting".

I've thought from the beginning that Cooper was just joking around with that line, that he was employing fake playful spy "lingo" to kid around with his editor about how secretive Rove was being. Could be wrong. Probably am.

That's in the main post.

Check it again.

(a) Fitzgerald told Rove that he wasn't a target a long time ago, right? I mean, there hasn't been  statement like that made by Fitz in the last few months or so, has there?

(b) Rove signed that waivers a long time ago at the general coercion of the White House. Cooper's lawyer only sought the specific waiver when he heard Luskin say that "if Cooper is protecting someone it isn't Karl." And so Cooper's lawyer went on the offensive using that statement as proof enough to "negotiate" a specific waiver -- really just a clarification of the old waiver -- with Rove's lawyer.

(c) I don't think he'd have resigned until it came out. Until that point, the man loves political campaigns and there wasn't much of a hint that this sort of thing was going to happen pre-11/04.

obstruction of justice could have resulted during the initial investigatory stage not neccessarily the grand jury phase.

Also, if it is established that Plame was a covert operative, the prosecution has to establish that the person who outed the operative was aware of it through access to classified documents, and that element may be difficult to prove, not to mention that the CIA has to prove that they went to lengths to conceal her identity, and the defense may be able to shoot holes all through this aspect of the crime given her employment with the CIA was well known.

Last, part of this investigation may have been as much about the politics of appearance as the initial crime, and the elements of the initial crime may have become moot from the begining, but evidence of other crime may have become the focus.  Hard to say, and Fitzgerald doesn't have to explain publically what he is doing at this point.

I honestly don't expect there to be any indictments handed down for the outing of Plame when all is said and done, I expect the indictments to in the end up being things like obstruction of justice, maybe perjury, lying to investigators etc.

I didn't say that Rove did or did not break the law.  I really have no idea and I suspect that few people other than the players themselves know.

Right, ok, I guess I didn't give that point enough weight. I'll just say that there's going to be justifiable accusations of hypocrisy for BOTH parties and I don't think it's going to be "amusing" for serious members of either.

The pundits will have their ad nauseaum say: Democrats are hypocrites for suddenly being outraged about perjury and Republicans are hypocrites for suddenly downplaying it.

Blech. Not looking forward to that back and forth...

And clearly Rove was trying to take Wilson's legs out. I'd add that Wilson deserved to be discredited.

Plame's role needs more evaluation. Hind sight is 20/20, but I don't think Rove should have even obliquely referenced her. On the other hand, the odor of nepotism is pretty apparent.

Burning Questions: How is it that a lying partisan hack--that would be Wilson--was sent on a matter of urgent national interest by the CIA at the behest of his wife, a CIA employee?

Can we taxpayers get a refund given that his work product was crap?

There are formalized levels of prosecutorial interest: Not a subject, a person of interest, or a target of the investigation.

Rove's lawyer says Rove is not target of Fitzgerald's investigation, and the lawyer has no reason to dissemble on that point. So, the prosecutor affirmatively believes that Rove did not break the law. He's not investigating further in order to get Rove (although if further evidence warranted, he might.)

Political reporters know these distinctions but have not let that knowledge get in the way of a "good" story.

1. Why did the CIA request a DOJ investigation? What  was their concern?
   
2. What damage to national security, if any, was done by Novaks exposure of V. Plame?

3. Did Wilson violate the law by leaking to Pincus and Kristof? (SHAKY) This is actually a question that is very seldom asked, because it is not seen as relevant to the investigation at hand. However, Matthew Continetti takes a long, hard look at the dubious activity of the "truth telling" Mr. Wilson, in leaking information that he had no truthful access to to Pincus and Kristof.

I hadn't much thought about it, but in the end Fitzgerald could also be looking into this for the CIA, and we just assume that the investigation is all about Plame and her outing.

Hard to know for sure, but it is definitely a burning question and worth looking into.

The DOJ has a statutory requirement to investigate referrals of alleged breaches of secrecy laws from the CIA. The CIA makes dozens of referrals every month. Once the CIA made the referral, DOJ had an obligation to launch a preliminary inquiry.

This case was elevated beyond the "inquiry" status because of the profile of the case.

Only one thing to add:

Did Karl Rove break the law? (SOLID) No

Aside from perjury charges (and the like), there's one other ground on which Rove could be prosecuted.  Mark Kleiman (a lefty law professor, but one who knows his stuff) makes a very credible case that the real problem for Rove may be the espionage act, not the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. (see http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/valerie_plame_/2005/07/the_plame_game
_no_its_not_all_about_the_intelligence_identities_protection_act.php).

Worth noodling about, though it, too, qualifies as pure speculation.

intentional leaking of Plame as an agent.

It is very plausible that her employer was well known, and that her status as a covert operator was not, and that in all this leaking and information sharing that nobody fully realized her status.

So this is mine:

Somewhere between 6 and 8 I would really like to know how the leaker/leakers learned that Plame suggested Wilson for the trip.  We haven't got a clue, but this is the step that is interesting.  This aspect probably wasn't classified, after all is Wilson's trip wasn't classified and he was free to share the information about with the world through the press, then how he got sent shouldn't have been either.

So somewhere in the CIA had to be somebody with the know who told somebody who told the press (or maybe they were actually the original press source, and all the admin folks were there to confirm, and help spread the love), somebody who knew Plame, and knew Wilson's trip was recommended to some degree by her.  It is very possible that it is really this leaker who blew Plames cover.

So my burning question is "who was this leaker?"

Now where are you going to put it?

Wilson's already been caught in some lies...

there are targets, subjects, and witnesses.

The targets should be sweating bullets.

The subjects more than likely don't need to sweat too many bullets, but they can't sit to comfortably.

The witnesses can get comfy and not worry.

Luskin said that Fitzgerald had defined the subjects pretty broadly, which makes me think that there are a lot of charges they are looking into, and not just the leaking one (in that case the subjects would be pretty limited in number more than likely)-they may be perjury, obstruction of justice, lying to investigators-all sorts of things.

I actually sort of suspect though from the way the WH is behaving on this that they are pretty confident that Rove and other WH people are going to come out of this okay, but am willing to leave about a 30% chance that they are just clueless and ignoring the facts.

#7  - Irrelevant tense.  Whether he is a partisan is irrelevant - anyone who wasn't after what was done to him (assuming only arguendo that it was, of course) would be a fool.  The slighly more relevant question is was he a partisan.  But at bottom even that is mostly irrelevant.

#11 - You seem to be only considering the one statute (and I think you overstate the case against that, but putting that aside)....what's your SOLID evidence that, say, he didn't violate the Espionage Act's looser standards?  But like I said last night I think it's more likely an investigation into later dissemination of classified information in the campaign to discredit Wilson now rather than the Plame leak itself. We'll see. This one should be in the BURNING QUESTION category.

#12. Solid "no".  Rove and his lawyer have known for many months - through two court battles and a Supreme Court appeal - that Cooper did not consider the general waiver to be valid.  They could've granted a specific one at any time. They didn't. Until the lawyer screwed up and ran his mouth too much on a TV interview and Cooper's grabbed a perceived loophole.

Although I don't think Rove is the only person that may get his, and he may not get hit at all, and it may be some other witness.  Maybe even Wilson or Plame.

Hard to say, but I strongly suspect that there is more being looked into than just the outing of Plame.

... who and what are Judith Miller and her bosses at the New York Times hiding?

I find it impossible to believe that any reporter at the New York Times (or the editorial board for that matter) would hesitate for a single second to burn a source, if the revelation of the source's identity would damage a Republican Administration. The source, quite frankly, is not Rove (or any other high-ranking Republican), else they would have burned him/her no matter how solemnly Miller had sworn to him/her to not reveal his/her identity.

It is extremely suspicious considering the current shrieking of the New York Times for Rove to be hung, drawn and quartered even while acknowledging that he broke no law, nor outed Valerie Plame and that the full facts are yet to be known. And this is all while they know precisely what it is that will put this story to rest.

I am beginning to lean in the somewhat tinfoil-hatted direction of the idea that the New York Times knows that this would all soon come out and it would damage both them and their precious Democrat Party. And so, it is taking advantage of the smoke and confusion in the brouhaha to at least try to take out a top Democrat target before the full story is out and the chickens come home to roost.

C'mon von, how can you take that crap as anything but crap. And dishonest crap to boot.

How can any sentient being say that Karl Rove, or even Dick Durbin, would be indicted under the Espionage Act. The element of proof information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation, is virtually impossible to meet under any circumstance than committing actually espionage.

It would be easier to indict under IIPA.

Wilson's partisanship, or lack there of, is entirely relevant.

If he was a lying partisan hack at the time of his appointment to go to Niger, one has to wonder about the CIA.

Moreover, at the time of Rove's unfortunate leak, Wilson clearly was a lying partisan hack out to undermine the President of the United Sates during an election. I find that relevant, too.

Does he feel justified in his lying partisan hackery? That I find irrelevant.

7  - Irrelevant tense.  Whether he is a partisan is irrelevant - anyone who wasn't after what was done to him (assuming only arguendo that it was, of course) would be a fool.  The slighly more relevant question is was he a partisan.  But at bottom even that is mostly irrelevant.

Wilson was an advisor to the Kerry Campaign as of May '03.

The article he wrote came out after that.  He did act as an anonymous source for Kristof and I think another reporter on the issue before May, but everything else happened after he was hired by the Kerry campaign.

#12. Solid "no".  Rove and his lawyer have known for many months - through two court battles and a Supreme Court appeal - that Cooper did not consider the general waiver to be valid.  They could've granted a specific one at any time. They didn't. Until the lawyer screwed up and ran his mouth too much on a TV interview and Cooper's grabbed a perceived loophole.

I have said this multiple times, but here goes again.

There were multiple sources at work here-we know for a fact that Novak had two admin sources, an intelligience source and a CIA one-that is four guys, and unless Rove is in reality a clone, he can only be one of them.  There are 5 other reporters involved, Cooper is the only one who is a confirmed contact of Rove's we do not know who else Rove contacted, but by the time the investigation came around, Rove would have been aware that he wasn't the only guy who had discussed this with reporters.

It is possible and plausible that Rove assumed Cooper was protecting a second source, therefore Cooper was going to go to jail for that source, not Rove.  Rove's lawyer seems to confirm this when he said "If Cooper is going to jail to protect somebody, it isn't Karl Rove."  It was that statement that prompted COoper's lawyer to contact Luskin to make arrangements for Cooper to testify.

also if the Miller thing was similar to the Cooper thing, she already would be talking.

I think Miller is protecting somebody else, and the "who" is very important, because we know that Rove and Libby have both signed waivers permitting the reporters to speak.

deep background.

"Double super secret background" is an intentionally humorous phrase, but it is jovial reporter lingo, not spy lingo. Most senior administration officials speak on "background" as a matter of routine, because there is a very elaborate procedure for getting clearance to speak on the record, for attribution. The procedure for getting permission to speak for attribution to "a senior administration official" is less rigorous, and at a certain level goes with the permission, with no further clearance of particular remarks necessary.

As the earlier poster pointed out, I think any reporter or public official would easily recognize this phrase to mean no fooling, don't attribute this, don't cite this, certainly don't quote this, but you can use it to dig for further leads as you develop your story. It's used for precisely the purposes Rove used it here... to try to get reporters to go in a particular direction when the official does not want to become part of that story himself. It's not exactly an uncommon practice in D.C., and there's nothing particularly wrong with it.

you've laid off the talking points for a day or so, why the relapse.

1-- actually he was a partisan before hand. He signed onto the Kerry campaign as an advisor in May '03.

2-- Wilson's op-ed ran in the July 6, '03 NYT

3-- Novak wrote his column in October '03

Read the Espionage Act. It is much more stringent than IIPA. You have to prove the individual knew the release of information would hurt national security.

So the New York Times is bad.  The administration is good.  Outing CIA agents is (sort of) bad.  Therefore, The New York Times is somehow at fault, because bad does bad.  

It makes perfect sense.  When Novak cited two administration officials, he was actually talking about the New York Times administration, because like many businesses the New York Times has some sort of administration.  Q.E.D.

I'll give you this much: at least, implicit in your 'argument,' outing CIA agents is still wrong.  That's not the case with a lot of folks these days.  According to the WSJ, Karl Rove is a hero for, uh, weakening the CIA.  Which he totally didn't do anyway.  Or something.  I'm a little behind on the latest talking points.  

I may be confused though.

you decide

but the NYTimes outed CIA business front that were doing work in the war on terror.

But I guess they were justified.

I don't know that it is so much the NYTimes is bad, but more what is the NYTimes hiding.  Why would Miller go to jail for a source that said she could talk?

May be the target...

etc etc.

The column ran on July 14, '03. But it doesn't change the point.

Wilson was a known and declared partisan and had made his attack on the Administration before the Novak column, so his partisanship could not have been in response to "what was done to him."

For being a snarky twit.

Let the countdown begin.

his next comment will put him on The Pile™

it can get confusing, and Novak posted a follow up in October.

Also, I think the employment of Wilson by the Kerry campaign is germaine in that it is probably through those contacts that he pulled off his trifecta-getting the column in both major papers and an appearance on Meet the PRess the same day.

seems very distorted.

In particular, I think Fox news is about as biased as we've seen in this country for a major media company, and even I wouldn't go as far as to credit Fox with the magnitude of partisanship you seem to attribute to the NYT.  Do you realize that about 12,000 people work at the NYT?  Do you really think they all fit one ideological agenda?

The espionage act is the best explanation I've seen so far for this statement by Judge Hogan re: Miller's (not Rove's) potential liability in this case:

"This is not a case of a whistle-blower" revealing secret information to Miller about "dangers at a nuclear power plant," Hogan said. "It's a case in which the information she was given and her potential use of it was a crime. . . . This is very different than a whistle-blower outing government misconduct."

SFAIK, there's no reasonable claim that Miller's use of Plame's name violated the IIPA.  Nor is this statement suggestive of a perjury or obstruction of justice charge.  It is, however, suggestive of an espionage act change.  If Miller's in jeopardy under the espoionage act, I have a hard time believe that Rove isn't.

As for meeting this element:

information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation

If Plame was running foreign agents (as has been asserted), it's possible to argue that her exposure put those agents at risk and thereby injured the United States and/or could be used "to the advantage of any foreign nation."

Finally:  I'm not endorsing Kleiman's reasoning or conclusion.  But he (1) knows more about this stuff than I do and (2) his assertions are at least consistent with the known facts and seem to explain at least one known fact (Hogan's statement) that is not explained by any other theory.  As I said, if we're going to noodle this case (something that, in general, I'm opposed to), Kleiman's assertion is worth noodling over.

you get a different version of the NYT than I get in DC.

against an argument that claims on average the NYT leans 'left/dem'.  There's even factual evidence that it does.  But to boldly claim that no ONE SINGLE REPORTER exists at the NYT who would put ethics above (hypothetical democratic) partisanship is a bit extreme, especially for redstate.  I might expect such a claim at Freerepublic and not even bat an eye, but this isn't Freerepublic.

I mean come on:

I find it impossible to believe that any reporter at the New York Times (or the editorial board for that matter) would hesitate for a single second to burn a source, if the revelation of the source's identity would damage a Republican Administration.

Not even 'strange' or 'unlikely' or 'improbable', but IMPOSSIBLE.

I realize I'm not a moderator here, so what I say has essentially no power, but does this kind of distorted belief really reflect a pro-republican agenda?

Rove would have to have known she was running foreign agents and disclosed her identity. Her simply running them unbeknownst to Rove is not sufficient under the Espionage Act.

And "seems to know" are the operative words. I'd be willing to bet we both have tried as many cases under the Espionage Act as he has.

But you lawyers are as entitled to your own conspiracy theories as anyone else.

And what Hogan says is consistent with the IIPA, IMO. You have to read a lot of tea leaves otherwise.

but I'd say the same about the WaPo, the Boston Globe, the LA Times, or the Chron, among major papers.

It's not our "official" position but it is mine.

". . .but the NYTimes outed CIA business front that were doing work in the war on terror."

"But I guess they were justified."

I'm not saying it was justified.  Yes, that article was bad.  Now what does that article have to do with the 'theory' under discussion?

What I'm saying is that I don't think it's appropriate to start throwing out nebulous, unsuported accusations despite a total dearth of evidence of any wrongdoing.  I don't think that's right, ethically or factually.

here's what's missing:

Your summary pretends that the potential issues end on the day Novak find out the info.  That is like saying the Monica Lewinski affair ended with the cigar was smoked, or that watergate ended when the burglary occurred.

Things have happened since then that could also be important and possibly also crimes regardless of whether or not the underlying event was a crime.

Lying to grand juries, lying to the American public, etc.

The coverup is always worse than the crime.  Always.

See point 11.

If Rove is guilty, it will be of perjury or obstruction of justice, if he happened to lie to investigators during the early stages of the investigation.

Do I think that all 12,000 NYT employees hold the same policital belief- no.  I would say no more than 11,123 would love to hand the President his hat and say "bye-bye."

Do I think Judith Miller, her editor, and the managing staff have it out for the President- that's a no-brainer.

Someone in classified adds may be a republican, there were if a few in NY in the last election, but there is no doubt that the vast majority of the relevant news staff are partisan.

looks beyond partisanship on this issue.  The one comment that I would make is about whether Karl Rove broke the law.  I don't think that this is something that we know for sure yet.  We may be able to say with some degree of certainty that a case against him under the secret identity statute will be difficult to make, the greater threat to him and others involved is a perjury, obstruction or conspiracy charge.  Given the fact that McLellan stated that Rove (or rather the three individuals) were not involved in disclosed her identity, it seems that at some level these players attempted to downplay or cover-up their role in the leak.  If that continued once the special prosecutor got involved, they could win one argument only to lose on another.

department might have one or two closeted Republicans.

I already addressed that, under point 11. But thanks for your input.

at his height of relevancy during 2003, well before the election.

He signed on the with the Kerry campaign in May '03.

mistake.  Sorry, I didn't read that far...too tired and too much left to do.

I doubt that it will drain the fever swamp, very much. However it gives us some good guide posts, and unlike the dem/msm/kos koolaid kids/wilson whining is based on actual events, actual evidence and standards that may actually be based on reality.

I realize that it's received wisdom that the New York Times is no more than 527 for the Democratic Party.  But you guys are now taking it to the absurd extreme.

Judith Miller has been a staunch advocate for the War in Iraq.  She was the official "leak" for stories about Iraq.  She is apparently a confidential journalist for Karl Rove.  Yet she is, apparently, dedicated to bringing down the President.  

You claim is incongruous with reality.

Fitzgerald will find what he finds. In the meantime, why don't we do like the old guys who've hung out together so long they know each other's jokes by heart & call them out by number. We could save a lot of time if we number our arguments & just write Number 6! Or number 8!?

Not meaning to be snarky; it's a controversial topic, but isn't this wearing everyone out?

up in arms over the "outing" of Plame who sat in an office somewhere near an airfield used by actual CIA operatives who fly into no-man's land who were also outed by the...NYT.  Rove defenders are saying he only did it to persuade a reporter into a more correct position.  NYT claims it nuked years of CIA work because it thought extraordinary rendition was a topic worth that price.  You can't say one is acceptable and the other contemptible.  Now my eyes glaze over and roll into the back of my head every time I see Rove/Plame/Novak and I don't particularly care who gets frogmarched but personally I'd take a single CIA pilot over a 100 CIA-WMD "experts"* any freaking day of the week.  

* I use scare quotes only because they've proven themselves extraordinarily inept in that area over the years.

Wilson should have postponed his attacks until after Labor Day 04, but then his masters on the Kerry campaign might not have liked that.

5/03 and 7/03 weren't the height of the campaign season by any stretch.  Besides, Wilson's partisanship really doesn't make a difference in the context of the revelation of his wife's identity.  

... and relax.  I'm not claiming special "lawyer knowledge"; I'm not endorsing Kleiman's work; and I'm not being snarky with you in the least.  I have said that Kleiman seems to have taken a more careful look at this than I'm willing to,* and that Judge Hogan's language certainly implies to me that more than the IIPA is in play.  (Without getting into perjury et al.)

With that, I'm ending.

von

*Though you don't mention it, let's get this out on the table:  For some reason, I had thought that Kleiman was a law professor.  He ain't.  This makes it more likely that you're reaction is the correct one.

You've got more experience and you can read.

I'm actually surprised. I was laboring under the same impression.

Wilson was a declared, anti-Bush partisan in May 03.

The allegation is that her name was revealed to discredit Wilson, so of course his partisanship makes a difference otherwise the underlying motive goes away.

What a great example of "noise" this thread is.

Allow me to boil it down to a nutshell:

This administration has potentially comprimised the nation's security for the sake of partisan gain.

has a link titled Curriculum Vitae.  And on CNN during the blog review they said he was a UCLA law prof.  

First of all, I think you've come up with a good way to try and frame the issue.

These would be my opinions on the topic based upon what I know (which as you say - learning a bunch in 2 days isn't easy, although I've been weakly following the general Plame name leak issue for years):

1. ok
   
   
2. solid no the way you phrased the title.  If you want to phrase it as "did the administration truly BELIEVE that blah blah" then I would put it as shaky.  Two years ago it would have been "burning question".
   
   
3. who cares? Its not relevant to the particular investigation.  It would only be relevant to a completely different investigation.  I realize from a public interest story its interesting.  But it means nothing in terms of the investigation.
   
   
4. What do you mean by 'truthful'?  If 95 percent of what he said was truthful and 5 percent was not, does that make it a 'solid no'?  Once again, its irrelevant to the particular investigation but related to the public story.
   
   
5. Once again irrelevant.  I don't disagree with what you wrote, its just not relevant to the investigation.
   
   
6.  ok, except Wilson says she acted as a 'conduit' to have him sent.  Maybe he didn't acknowledge this at some earlier point.  What Wilson claimed is irrelevant.  Whether Valerie actually DID authorize him IS relevant.
   
   
7.  Ok.  Not relevant to the investigation though. Its worth pointing out that he DID contribute to the Bush-Cheney campaign in '00. "Wilson gave $1000 to Gore in
   

1999, but also $1000 to the Bush campaign".  I think he was just being a smart diplomat, but I won't deny that by 2002 he wasn't probably friendly to the Bush cause.

8.  BURNING QUESTION
   
   
9.  ok
   
   
10. ok - but not just WHERE but WHEN.
    
    
11. I would say SHAKY, because of the perjury/obstruction charge.  You compare it to Clinton by inference, but remember Clinton lied about a personal matter, Rove (if found guilty) would have lied about a potentially criminal or even treason matter.  
    
    
12.  Shaky because I'd say its SOLID that cooper didn't consider the release to be valid.  Then it becomes SHAKY whether Rove knew Cooper was still trying to protect him or not.  Since Rove only gave him approval 'in a dramatic fashion' after Time already released all of Cooper's information (about Rove), Rove had nothing to lose at that point.  In fact, by releasing Cooper, but not Miller in such a 'dramatic' fashion, one wonders whether Rove is trying to keep the issue confused (by letting everyone think that Miller's source is someone else) or whether he simply isn't Miller's source.

To be solid, Rove should publicly/dramatically in an uncoerced fashion, release Miller from protecting him, even if he isn't the source.  If she then starts talking, then Rove has to have been her source.  If she doesn't talk, then he's (probably) not the source.

13. Ok.  If only because I never expect bush to condemn the actions of anyone in his admin whether they're unethical criminals or not.  He's extremely consistent on the loyalty issue, I will acknowledge that.  And Rove has been a Bush loyalist since he first saw the dreamy-eyed cowboy strut into the saloon 20 years ago...

And yes, Whitehouse press secretary is one of the most difficult jobs in the world, especially for this administration.  ;)

Let's pretend we're detectives.

We know at the time of Rove's telecon with Cooper, that Wilson is a lying partisan hack out to discredit the President. He's working for Kerry's campaign for crissakes. He's using "information" that he gleaned while working for the CIA to campaign against the President. His wife happens to work for the CIA. His wife happened to lobby for him to get the Niger gig. How is that not relevant to the investigation?

I'm not arguing that Rove was justified in referencing Plame, only that Plame's role in the mess is relevant to the investigation.

From that link:

HARVARD UNIVERSITY, JOHN F. KENNEDY SCHOOL OF GOVERNMENT, CAMBRIDGE, MA

PH.D. IN PUBLIC POLICY, June 1985.

MASTER OF PUBLIC POLICY, June 1977.

HAVERFORD COLLEGE, HAVERFORD, PA

BACHELOR OF ARTS, magna cum laude, June 1972.

Major fields: Economics (honors), Philosophy (honors), Political Science (high honors). Phi Beta Kappa.

Yes - this seems to be the current sticking point. Why is J. Miller in jail, and who and what is she protecting. The wholly unsupported inferences seem to involve the source (V. Plame, J. Wilson, C. Powell, random CIA staff contacts, misc. democratic party "operatives", members of the DC "cocktail" circuit, etc.????), and the nature of the info/disclosures involved (classified info from CIA files, foreign intelligence reports, stolen WH memos????). This is as imaginatively bizarre as possible.

Meanwhile, though many infer Rove must NOT be her source since his release presumably covered her in the same fashion as Cooper, he or his counsel Luskin has not defied Miller on this, i.e. "if she's covering for me, she hasn't told me that", in such a way as to bait her out. Not that he has to do that, but it would be a stark way of eliminating the inference with fact.

Also, Rove may be one, of many, of her sources, which leads to some obvious legal questions.

Can a subpoenaed party refuse to testify about one source, and testify as to multiple others, or is it all or none (I think the Star chamber fear of grand juries is that once your in, all topics are open - i.e. about your 1984 tax return Ms. Miller???)? How did Fitzgerald hit on Miller, since she wrote no story - someone must have said, "hey, she's got loads of scoop"? Who sent him to her?

Finally, what is the speculation (tin foil double layered) as to the info she possesses which may lead out of IIPA into espionage - classified data/reports from State, CIA, etc... which she received from a non-adminstration source. Is this veering into S. Berger territory of "it must of dropped into my briefcase by accident"?

Foil removed.

What does J. Miller know?

This poster has posted something incredibly stupid, for the sole purpose of aiming to leave us.

I agree to many of your conclusion but what I dont understand is what did Wilson exactly lie about.  In reading these 2 articles written by Joseph Wilson,  it looks consistent to what is

known.

I link this 2 articles written specifically by Joseph Wilson:

This is Wilson's Jul 6 2003 article:

http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0706-02.htm

This is Joseph Wilson's response to 911 Panel:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/07/16/wilson_letter/index.html

I agree with the stuff at the end, up front I am not convinced.

Long, detailed response here

http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/313

Good work though.  Congrats.

By all means, let's not examine the facts. Throw Rove under the bus! It's a Known Fact he's guilty already.

Are you trying to get ejected? Because you were doing okay up until this point.

It's not our "official" position but it is mine.

I'll remember that.

If the papers you mention cannot be believed at all to do anything except slam republicans, then they cannot be used to source any evidence for anything.  I guess that invalidates Leon's number 4.

It has not, and someone else has. Thus - blog freely!

Leon, my point is this: All this endless debate over  second-tier issues does a disservice to our nation.

This is a moral issue. All Karl Rove has to do is call a press conference and lay it out for us. He is free to do so.

Leon, my point is this: All this endless debate over  second-tier issues does a disservice to our nation.

I'm not the one spending three consecutive days at the WH press conferences literally screaming at Scott McClellan. I didn't create this issue, I'm just doing my humble best to respond to it.

This is a moral issue. All Karl Rove has to do is call a press conference and lay it out for us. He is free to do so.

You really think that this course of action should be taken during the middle of an investigation by a special prosecutor? Has it occurred to you that it's entirely possible that Rove has been ordered specifically not to speak about certain aspects of this case by the prosecutor or the court?

My position has been Plame and Wilson are in the hotseat.  It is interesting Plame is only now coming back to work after a year's absence.  The only sources for classified material on Saddam's nuclear intentions are primarily Plame, and Wilson regarding the results of his trip.

So you have found the gem of data I have been looking for - the statement that the classified information being leaked was related to national security.  With a hint it was about nuclear weapons as the topic.

My guess is Plame may have barely dodged the bullet because Miller is sitting in jail covering for her.  If Miller doesn't crack Plame may not come up on charges of passing material to Miller or her husband.  Maybe....

By this time Wilson had returned and opened up on the Bush administration in the press.  Orders came down to Tenent and company to find out who this fool was and what this trip he was on was all about.  That is why when Cooper talked to Rove they have learned, up the chain, they had a rogue element in the CIA off doing their own PR, their own diplomacy and their own policy debates in the media.

I know you won't respect the source, but you can read the entire article here.

http://digbig.com/4dysk

I always try to read both sources that I consider liberal and conservative - then draw my own conclusions. Here are some excerpts.

Attributing Wilson's trip to his wife's supposed authority became the predicate for a smear campaign against his credibility. Seven months after the appointment of the special counsel, in July 2004, the Republican-dominated Senate Select Committee on Intelligence issued its report on flawed intelligence leading to the Iraq war. The blame for failure was squarely put on the CIA for "groupthink." (The Republicans quashed a promised second report on political pressure on the intelligence process.) The three-page addendum by the ranking Republicans followed the now well-worn attack lines: "The plan to send the former ambassador to Niger was suggested by the former ambassador's wife, a CIA employee."

The CIA subsequently issued a statement, as reported by New York Newsday and CNN, that the Republican senators' conclusion about Plame's role was wholly inaccurate. But the Washington Post's Susan Schmidt reported only the Republican senators' version, writing that Wilson was "specifically recommended for the mission by his wife, a CIA employee, contrary to what he has said publicly," in a memo she wrote. Schmidt quoted a CIA official in the senators' account saying that Plame had "offered up" Wilson's name. Plame's memo, in fact, was written at the express directive of her superiors two days before Wilson was to come to Langley for his meeting to describe his qualifications in a standard protocol to receive "country clearance." Unfortunately, Schmidt's article did not reflect this understanding of routine CIA procedure. The CIA officer who wrote the memo that originally recommended Wilson for the mission -- who was cited anonymously by the senators as the only source who said that Plame was responsible -- was deeply upset at the twisting of his testimony, which was not public, and told Plame he had said no such thing. CIA spokesman Bill Harlow told Wilson that the Republican Senate staff never contacted him for the agency's information on the matter.

Curiously, the only document cited as the basis for Plame's role was a State Department memo that was later debunked by the CIA. The Washington Post, on Dec. 26, 2003, reported: "CIA officials have challenged the accuracy of the ... document, the official said, because the agency officer identified as talking about Plame's alleged role in arranging Wilson's trip could not have attended the meeting. 'It has been circulated around,' one official said." Even more curious, one of the outlets where the document was circulated was Talon News Service and its star correspondent, Jeff Gannon (aka Guckert). (Talon was revealed to be a partisan front for a Texas-based operation called GOPUSA and Gannon was exposed as a male prostitute, without previous journalistic credentials yet with easy and unexplained access to the White House.) According to the Post, "the CIA believes that people in the administration continue to release classified information to damage the figures at the center of the controversy."

I'm not the one spending three consecutive days at the WH press conferences literally screaming at Scott McClellan

Exactly my point!

Has it occurred to you that it's entirely possible that Rove has been ordered specifically not to speak about certain aspects of this case by the prosecutor or the court?

Finally, Luskin conceded that Rove is legally free to publicly discuss his actions, including his grand-jury testimony. Rove has not spoken publicly, Luskin says, because Fitzgerald specifically asked him not to.

National Review

My message to Karl Rove: Put the interests of your country before yourself and your party. You can end this now.

But the WAPO article has a lot of inaccuracies such as it claims Wilson said that his conclusion is based on Niger Documents when his July 2003 article detailedly enumerated all the steps he took to investigate the matter,  the people he saw, etc.  Wilson  even concluded the first article with:

"The question now is how that answer was or was not used by our political leadership. If my information was deemed inaccurate, I understand (though I would be very interested to know why)...."

I suggest read the article written by Wilson and enumerate the "lies" directly from Wilson's articles not secondhand.

For not obeying the wishes of the special prosecutor?

I gotta say it, I'd do the same thing. If, after the investigation is over and Fitzgerald releases the request and he still isn't talking, I'll join your bandwagon.

....that makes reading here so interesting for us lefties is that it's just fascinating how starkly different and alien (used descriptively, not perjoratively) the world views and sets of "known facts" brought to the table are.  Perfect example:

Do I think Judith Miller, her editor, and the managing staff have it out for the President- that's a no-brainer.

See, most of us on this side would agree it's a no-brainer. But the other way.  Until this week, Miller's whole claim to fame in our paradigm was as a spear-carrier for the Bush administration in the run up to war. It was her byline on story after story (since shown to be false almost without exception) anonymously (and mostly single-) sourced by the neocons favorite ex-Iraqi and Bush's official State Of The Union guest, Mr. Chalabi.  The idea that Miller or the Times have

it out for Bush would just be stunningly unthinkable to most of us who do have it out for Bush. It would simply never occur to us.

And maybe it should, I dunno.

Fascinating.  And I mean that in a good way - no snark intended.  So may I ask.....is there anything specific in Miller's past work that leads you to to your belief about her?

Even though the source you cite is deep blue, it seems to jive with Leon's conclusion in #6 - Plame didn't authorize it, but she was clearly involved, and maybe "instrumental". If you're quibbling with Leon's emphasis, I understand your "not so sure" comment. Otherwise, what is distinguishing here other than where the bias comes from?

Thanks.

Wilson says, in an interview at rawstory.com, it was Novak who outed Plame's front company.

I'd link to it, but html may as well be greek as far as I'm concerned.

If, after the investigation is over and Fitzgerald releases the request and he still isn't talking, I'll join your bandwagon.

I'll be glad to have ya' on board :)

Regarding Cheney sending him or not, you wrote:

<div class="blockquote">

Now, in going back and looking at the actual transcripts, I realize that's not exactly what he said. However, I leave it to you to determine whether he deliberately created the impression that Cheney sent him on the trip.</div&gt

Okay, well, we Democrats are perfectly happy to give you that one if y'all in the G.O.P. can now admit that it is possible to purposefully create an impression that Saddam was responsible for 9/11 without actually saying so.

This is a very nice summary, BTW. But I am having trouble relating Wilson's flakiness to the relevance of the case. Either Plame was covert or she wasn't. Even if she wasn't anymore, it either had potential ramifications for those who still were or it didn't. It seems to me that the first thing the administration would have done when Novak published, had Plame not been covert, would have been to find that out for sure and say so. That they didn't for all this time suggests that she was.

My other impression of the case is that if Rove did not do this, then two other "highly placed" people did, if Novak is to be believed. Also, didn't Rove deny any involvement in this whatsoever? It is that which has so many reporters' undies in bunches.

Streiff,

I am afraid I disagree with your interpretation.  The only requisite knowledge Rove had to have for his telling Cooper to be a violation was the lawful knowledge that Plame's employment by the CIA was classified.

Intentionally [snipping] but trying not to change meaning or interpreting, 18 USC 793(d) says:

"Whoever, lawfully having possession of, access to, control over, or being entrusted with any [variations on information types] or information relating to the national defense which information the possessor has reason to believe could be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation, willfully communicates, [variations on communicates] the same to any person not entitled to receive it, or willfully retains the same and fails to deliver it on demand to the officer or employee of the United States entitled to receive it ;"

[continuation to conclusion clause]

"Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both."

I'm actually surprised. I was laboring under the same impression

Well, that gives me some comfort.  

Oh, and "your" not "you're" in the prior response to Streiff.  (I'm tempted to call mistakes like that "Yglesisms," after their most famous blogospheric victim.  Or is it "there" most famous ....)

Thank you for making that point.  It really is interesting how another side views reality, isn't it.  I often get the lefty 'derision' thrown my way, but I actually follow much of a quasi libertarian/conservative philosophy with a bit of lefty philosophy.  In other words, I'm an independent (who has come to be ardently opposed to bush).

The idea that Miller or the Times have it out for Bush would just be stunningly unthinkable to most of us who do have it out for Bush

A perfect way to phrase my own feelings.   :)

Judith Miller is NOT a friend or ally of the anti-bush crowd.  I guess the republicans don't think she's their ally either, but I don't really understand why based upon what she's written (or NOT written).  

http://newyorkmetro.com/nymetro/news/media/features/9226/

"It was precisely her unpleasant aggressiveness that helped force the story--the marriage of WMD and global jihadists--closer to the top of the agenda."

We don't know if Plame may've gone overseas for a short period of time --let's say a week -- in the five years before the leak, so it seems premature to assume she wouldn't qualify as 'covert.'

USATODAY Article - CIA 'outing' might fall short of crime

Quoted from article:

In The Politics of Truth, former ambassador Joseph Wilson writes that he and his future wife both returned from overseas assignments in June 1997. Neither spouse, a reading of the book indicates, was again stationed overseas. They appear to have remained in Washington, D.C., where they married and became parents of twins.

Six years later, in July 2003, the name of the CIA officer -- Valerie Plame -- was revealed by columnist Robert Novak.

The column's date is important because the law against unmasking the identities of U.S. spies says a 'covert agent' must have been on an overseas assignment 'within the last five years.'  The assignment also must be long-term, not a short trip or temporary post, two experts on the law say. Wilson's book makes numerous references to the couple's life in Washington over the six years up to July 2003.

-----

According to USATODAY it is NOT premature.

I hope this helps you.

Well, I think the reason no one is going to give you  support that Bush implied Saddam was involved with 9-11 is because he didn't.  What the left myopically fails to see is the use of the term 9-11 in narrow and broad senses.  Which is why you get poll numbers that link Saddam to 9-11 (the example of Islamic Terrorism agains the west) vs any specific ties to 9-11.

But the thing the left misses most is not that Saddam was involved directly in 9-11, but that he was the most likely source of instigating, supplying, resourcing future 9-11s once he saw how well AQ did with 9-11.  His connections with terrorist, his WMD technology (teaching is more powerful and lasting than giving) and his maniacal brutality were obvious indicators he was a top risk to us.

So it is not a tie to 9-11 that brought support to the war, it was a tie to future 9-11s.

You can go in circles forever arguing did he or

didn't he know she was a NOC which determines the

applicability (or not) of the IIPA.   But he most

probably did violoate his security clearance

by speaking in the detail he did to a noncleared

individual.  At the least you must leave this

possiblity as open.

I'll just admit up front I loath this story so I haven't kept up with all the intrigue.  That stated if this point is idiotic just call me an "idiot" and I'll go back to my rock.

A few quotes first:

Bush's famous/infamous 16 words:

The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.

Joe Wilson's 7/6/03 article:

In short, there's simply too much oversight over too small an industry for a sale to have transpired.

Wilson's 7/19/04 letter to the Senate:

My mission was to look into whether such a transaction took place or could take place. It had not and could not. By definition, that makes the documents bogus.

British white paper, page 122(PDF formatting):

In early 1999, Iraqi officials visited a number of African countries, including Niger. The

visit2 was detected by intelligence, and some details were subsequently confirmed by

Iraq. The purpose of the visit was not immediately known....the JIC

judged that Iraqi purchase of uranium ore could have been the subject of discussions and

noted in an assessment in December 2000 that:

. . . unconfirmed intelligence indicates Iraqi interest in acquiring uranium.

[JIC, 1 December 2000]

British white paper, page 122(PDF formatting):

During 2002, the UK received further intelligence from additional sources which identified

the purpose of the visit to Niger as having been to negotiate the purchase of uranium ore,

though there was disagreement as to whether a sale had been agreed and uranium

shipped.

British white paper, page 123(PDF formatting):

We conclude that, on the basis of the intelligence assessments at the time, covering both

Niger and the Democratic Republic of Congo, the statements on Iraqi attempts to buy

uranium from Africa in the Government's dossier, and by the Prime Minister in the House

of Commons, were well-founded. By extension, we conclude also that the statement in

President Bush's State of the Union Address of 28 January 2003 that:

The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought

significant quantities of uranium from Africa.

was well-founded.

British white paper, page 123(PDF formatting):

We also note that, because the intelligence evidence was inconclusive, neither the

Government's dossier nor the Prime Minister went on to say that a deal between the

Governments of Iraq and Niger for the supply of uranium had been signed, or uranium

shipped.

British white paper, page 125(PDF formatting):

c. The evidence was not conclusive that Iraq actually purchased, as

opposed to having sought, uranium and the British Government

did not claim this.

d. The forged documents were not available to the British

Government at the time its assessment was made, and so the fact

of the forgery does not undermine it.

Now color me stupid but we have a bunch of government claims that Iraq sought(not bought) uranium from Niger.  And Wilson saying Iraq had not bought uranium from Niger but made no judgement and could not make any judgement about whether Iraq had sought uranium Niger.  Now what is the big fuss again?  Why should I care about Wilson's trip to Niger when it's sole purpose was to apparently debunk a claim that was not made?  I just don't get it.  Wilson and the Brits/Bush can be 100% correct.  

truthfully, I was just being a little snarky there, though I disagree with you completely. That of course is not what the thread is about, and it's to be argued in a different place.

I really am more concerned here with my other questions.

There are so many conclusions base on second hand information.  So here are links to Joseph Wilson's articles he actually wrote.  Because I still dont understand why you think he lied.  

1. October 2002 article that Wilson claims Pres. Bush Sr wrote him agreeing to it.

http://www.politicsoftruth.com/editorials/saddam.html

2. July 6 2003 article

http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0706-02.htm

Published on Sunday, July 6, 2003 by the New York Times  

What I Didn't Find in Africa  

by Joseph C. Wilson 4th

3. Joseph Wilson's response to the 911 Panel

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/07/16/wilson_letter/index.html

4. Trancript of a Joe Wilson interview

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Interview_Ambassador_Wilson_husband_of_outed_
CIA_agent_sees_larger_Administration_ro_0713.html

Thanks a lot, I missed that and you're absolutely right: it negates my quibble.

That is, what perjury do you know about?

...as to what was said by the "who."

Well, I think the reason no one is going to give you  support that Bush implied Saddam was involved with 9-11 is because he didn't.

The single most official comment on the topic Bush ever made was this:

 In a letter to

  Congress on March 19, 2003 -- the day the war

  in Iraq began -- Bush said that the war was permitted under legislation

  authorizing force against those who ''planned, authorized,

  committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on

   September 11, 2001.''

    - http://www.usatoday.com/usaton line/20040617/6294563s.htm

That's not only an implication...it's an official statement to Congress that it was his reason for war. Isn't it?

Thanks for the good work!

Did he say more than, "his wife is CIA"?

Would it have been better if he'd said, "His wife recommended him for the job, and her word carried some weight because she works for the agency that sent him"?

Maybe Judith Miller is the one who told Rove. Maybe he read it in the Wash Post. Maybe he read Novak's column.

Even Wilson is essentially admitting no crime was committed.  In his public statement today, it sounded like he said, "Even if he didn't commit a crime, he should resign because he's a Republican."

The whole furor is pure politics. It's nothing close to selling technical secrets to the ChiComs.

we are dealing more with some other crime that was discovered or developed as a course of the initial investigation.

Or maybe the prosecutor is working with a looser definition of what covert is, but that doesn't make sense, since he at some point would have to convict.

So back to Leon's number (3 I think I am not going back, but the one about whether or not Wilson's leaks to the press before he wrote his own piece) were criminal in some way.  It is possible that when the CIA investigated the Plame outing issue internally, they realized there was something else that may have been criminal.

Are there any statutes on the release of classified information that could apply here either to Wilson, Rove or some other player?

learned of her employment.

Just being an employee of the CIA is not classified.

You have to prove that Rove knew she was a covert operative and would have had access to that information (it isn't even clear what kind and how much of a security clearance Rove had, and what he had access to-just having the security clearance doesn't mean you have a need to know on everything).  Her covert days apparantly ended in 1997 about 4 years before Bush took office.  If he thought all she was was an analyst with a desk job, then he didn't reveal anything intentionally.

Although when it comes to violations of security clearances-I have to wonder if Wilson wasn't doing that, when he started his leak fest to the press.

There are players in this other than Rove, and we have to keep that in mind.

I think if we get too caught up in the partisan part we could miss other motives. If we know for sure that he was lying, we don't need to know his motives (sure it is interesting).

I thought I saw a quote from the President that Wilson was a great guy. And he worked for Republican  Presidents as well, didn't he? Seems he was a closet hack.

People are already up here in New Hampshire now, feeling out the population as to the viability of a bid.

Kerry was running his hindend off for almost all of '03 up here, and they were already polling here on the Kerry and Dean thing.  At that point Kerry was polling here really badly (Dean was polling well).

So while May of '03 may not have been big nationally campaign wise, the guys who knew a big win was needed in Iowa and New Hampshire come Jan. were well aware that the race was on.

HT to Hugh Hewitt My wife was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity.

From CNN, this afternoon:

"Wolf Blitzer:  The other argument that has been made against you is that you sought to capitalize on this extravaganza, having that photo shoot with your wife, who was a clandestine officer of the CIA, and that you tried to enrich yourself writing this book and all of that.  What do you make of those accusations, again, which are serious accusations as you knw that have been leveled against you?

Joe Wilson: My wife was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity.

Wolf Blitzer: But she hadn't been a clandestine officer for some time before that.

Joe Wilson:  That's not anything that I can talk about.  And indeed I will go back to what I had said earlier.  The CIA believed that a possible crimne had been committed and that's why they referred it to the Justice Department. She was not a clandestine officer at the time that that article in Vanity Fair appeared, and I have every right to have the American public know who I am, and not to have myself defined by those who would write the sorts of things that are coming out being spewed out of the mouths  of the RNC.

Wolf Blitzer: Who did you vote for in 2000?

Joe Wilson: In 2000? I voted for Al Gore. In 1992 I voted for George Bush."

This is an interesting exchange not because of Wilson's answers, which are insipid and defensive, but because Blitzer begins to ask a coupole of questions that haven't been asked to date.

In asking them, Blitzer is protecting CNN against a surprise from the Special Prosecutor if there is a crime charged to Wilson's account, against the possibility of no charges --"she hadn't been a clandestine officer for some time," Blitzer correctly notes-- and against the realization by the public that this is just a partisan hack attack on Rove, led by a hack partisan who supported Gore and who maniupulated his "service" in Niger to undermine the president with whom he disagreed.

A gold star for Blitzer, who may be the first MSM figure to get ahead of the left's media offensive.

much space between the SOTU address and his report, it would have looked suspect had he sat on it that long.

But you are right that he did his attack too soon-for the most part this story was over as a major press story by November of '03.

I would also add that outing of the aiplane cover put CIA operatives actually working overseas at more of a risk than Valarie Plame was.

Although if your (or the Kossites) next argument is that the could have made the Brewster Jennings connection with Plame to get to other operatives, and my answer is that those same people can go through the same legwork to get access to the guys who were flying the planes.

From everything I read on the Brewster Jennings thing, Plame was outed because she used Brewster Jenning as her employer, when she signed a check of $1000 to Al Gore's campaign.

So that isn't neccessarily a leak-I am pretty sure that came from a freedom of information act request-since political organizations have to turn in the info on their donors.

<blockquote>quoted text</blockquote>

or quotation marks

Otherwise to someone who doesn't follow your link it appears as though the commentary is your's when it's actually Hewitt's.  

so don't take it as the gospel truth, but with a grain of salt and tongue in cheek.

Wondering here a bit if someone who has a Lexus/Nexus account, or access to one, has done a search on Ms. Plame?  Google does not show anything, but I have not tried any real trick searches there, so who knows.

If her name appeared in print, or was attributed in any open news story, and was indexed by a search engine, then this is the usual Democrat crud making up an issue out of whole cloth.  

IMHO if she openly presented herself as a CIA officer in public prior to all this dreck, then this is much to do about nothing. I also wonder if her name appeared in the unclassified, but restricted to employee email directory for the CIA, I would not think that undercover officers are listed there under their real names, maybe work names, but not real names.

Researchers in Pajamas, start your engines.

This is an excellent summary.  Thank you for putting this together.  I have a comment regarding point #5 and I disagree with your conclusions regarding point #12.

On #5.  I have now read the article Mr. Wilson published on July 6, 2003 and the transcript of this interview with Meet the Press on the same day.  I have also showed them to quite a few other people who are native speakers of English.  I can find nothing to imply that Mr. Cheney sent him on the trip.  When you speak of Wolf Blitzer, I assume you are referring to his interview with Ms. Rice on July 13, 2003.  This was during the period in which it is alleged that at least six journalists were contacted and provided with information similar to that provided to Mr. Cooper.  According to an article published in Newsweek, dated July 18, 2005, Mr. Cooper's notes from July 11 indicate that Rove told Cooper that Wilson's trip had not been authorized by "DCIA"--CIA Director George Tenet--or Vice President Dick Cheney. Rather, "it was, KR said, wilson's wife, who apparently works at the agency on wmd [weapons of mass destruction] issues who authorized the trip."  Perhaps such conversations were where the idea came from that Cheney or Tenet had sent Mr. Wilson to Niger.  As I have made no secret, based on the information currently availabIe, I believe these conversations regarding Mr. Wilson's wife have had an unfortunate effect.

On #12. Editor and Publisher has put up a transcript of a news conference Mr. Cooper and his lawyer gave after Mr. Cooper made the statement about the dramatic personal release.  In that transcript, Mr. Cooper and his lawyer indicate that the release came via Mr. Rove's lawyer following a request for such a release by Mr. Cooper's lawyer.  There was no direct communication between Mr. Rove and Mr. Cooper concerning this release.

Until Mr. Rove's lawyer made the public statement that Mr. Cooper would not be going to jail to protect Mr. Rove, neither Mr. Cooper nor his lawyer were able to ask Mr. Rove or his lawyer about the waiver.  It would have been a breach of confidentiality for Mr. Cooper and a breach of ethics for Mr. Cooper's lawyer.  You can say that Mr. Rove and his lawyer did not realize that, but I've talked with some very smart (conservative) lawyers who were shaking their heads and telling me that Mr. Rove's lawyer would definitely understand this and that he (Mr. Rove's lawyer) blew it by the WSJ statement that gave Mr. Cooper's lawyer the opening.

According to the transcript.  Mr. Cooper's lawyer noted that any conversations he had with Mr. Rove or with Mr. Rove's lawyer would not be covered under lawyer-client confidentiality.  That means Mr. Cooper's lawyer could be asked to testify about whether he had asked for a personal waiver from Mr. Rove.  Mr. Cooper's lawyer also said he'd told Mr. Rove's lawyer that he wasn't going to go public if Mr. Rove didn't want to sign the letter affirming that the blanket waiver could be considered as a personal release.  But talking with Mr. Fitzgerald and testifying before the grand jury would not be considered "going public."  So Mr. Cooper's lawyer may have been telling Mr. Rove's lawyer that they could either make it clear that Mr. Cooper had a personal release or have the grand jury hear that they were not willing to do that.

***

Thank you again for your most helpful summary.

testify in part and not in others.

I am sure you can take the fifth, and you also do not have any counsel present, it is you, the prosecutor and the jury.

So I am guessing that Miller didn't testify to anything.

I may be wrong and somebody more in the know may feel free to correct me.

After the Novak article was published, Joe Wilson immediately fingered Carl Rove as the leaker, and hoped that Rove would be "frog marched out of the White House in handcuffs." Why would Wilson finger Rove specifically on in August of 2003?

Granted, Rove is the Democrats white whale, but a general accusation against the White House would have been more logical. It would have cast suspicion on all Administration officials, including those better known to the general public like Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Rice. Also, it would have protected Wilson from embarrassment should the alleged leaker turn out to be someone other than Rove. After all, how could he know for sure? Unless...

My point is that the specificity and heat of Wilson's accusation of Rove gives the impression that someone had told him of Rove's conversation with Cooper. If this is the case, how important is protecting ones sources after all? Is telling Wilson okay, but telling Fitzgerald not okay? Was it just a wink and a nod between two political allies?

This started out as just another political exercise, which it still is.  Liberals, eager to get Robert Novak, demanded an investigation to find out his source, and in the process to embarrass Novak.

The Administration, afraid of being called obstructionist, eventually set up a Special Prosecutor, Fitzgerald, to investigate.  Fitzgerald uncovered Miller and Cooper, who wouldn't reveal sources.  Miller hadn't even published the information, whatever her information was, and it's unclear whether Cooper published his or not.

Somehow, the Liberal heirarchy determined that Karl Rove was at least "a" source.  (How could that have come to their knowledge when Fitzgerald couldn't pry it from Miller's or Cooper's lips?)  They were so sure about Rove that they continued to press for the "truth" to come out, so our poor CIA agents would be safe again.

The press, never before a fan of the CIA was now sending its own reporters to jail to protect them--no, wait a minute, the reporters were going to jail to protect a source who supposedly had put an agent at risk.  How does that protect the agent?  Good question, but it's not important to the press to be logically consistent.

I don't want to belabor this further, except to point out that there was a good reason the law was written as it was.  The intent was to keep a rogue agent from revealing covert agents' names, while they were overseas where they might be murdered. It was also written so that unintentional, incidental revelation would not be a crime, and so that intentional revelation for the purpose of exposing misbehavior would also be OK.  The idea was to not have a chilling effect upon a whistleblower, etc.  The Press was very concerned that Time Magazine's decision to turn over Cooper's notes would have that "chilling" effect on potential anonymous sources, but they don't seem at all concerned that punishment for Rove might do the same thng.  Again, it's not important to the Press to be logically consistent.  As long as a Republican goes down, it's a good day.

We'll see if Rove's statement falls under "OK" or "Not OK" when the investigation is completed.  In the mentime, I think we should take Howard Dean's advice.  Let's give Karl Rove the benefit of the doubt until it's proved that he did something bad.  Wait a minute, that was Osama bin Laden that Dean was talking about.

Today, Democrats are quoting the Red Queen, "Sentence first--verdict afterwards."

really saying that Rove should ignore the wishes of the special prosecutor and discuss all?

If you were in a similar situation, and the prosecutor asked you to keep quiet-would you talk?

I agree with Leon, if Rove isn't talking, when all is said and done, then I will join you in your attack, but to demand somebody disregard a request by a prosecutor, even if it isn't a legal one is pretty low.

Not to mention that I am not sure there is anything to be gained from Rove talking now, rather than waiting until Fitzgerald is done with his investigation.

who cares? Its not relevant to the particular investigation.  It would only be relevant to a completely different investigation.  I realize from a public interest story its interesting.  But it means nothing in terms of the investigation.

It is very likely that this information is being investigated.

We do not know everything the CIA requested be looked into, and there is lots and lots of blacked out stuff in the court documents.

We will have to wait until the indictments-if there are any-come down.

We're talking about potential Dems and Reps opinion on perjury in the future, and how the hypocrisy -- because of the stances during the Clinton thing -- would play out on both sides. I don't understand your question.

Liberals, eager to get Robert Novak, demanded an investigation to find out his source, and in the process to embarrass Novak.

It was the CIA that demanded an investigation.

I believe more recent information has arisen which would require a different conclusion.

hammer that point as well.  Just to preempt I'll point out a significant difference.  The NYT knew it was exposing front companies.  None of the Plame principals knew that as far as I've seen(which isn't very far).  The one thing in common with both though is the seemingly blithe responses by the CIA.  For the Plame inquiry they said using the name could cause her problems if she traveled abroad; nothing about blowing a cover.  For the flights the CIA simply said "no comment."  Even the NYT seemed surprised by the reaction.

The thing in the NYT article that really peeved me was the "here's a patriotic American who lended his name for use in the front's management" "oh! and here's where he lives!"  The CIA people can probably be protected well enough but this poor schlub will likely get discarded like a used tissue.  The guy was like 85 years old for pete's sake.  I'd be surprised if he isn't already dead from a heart attack.  But the Times got its story so all is well.

When you get a security clearance, you essentially agree that revealing any information you know to be classified will do injury to the United States.  The standards are different if you do not have a security clearance.  I believe Mr. Rove has a security clearance, since I have seen calls that it be revoked.  

I believe there are currently no grounds for revoking Mr. Rov's security clearance.  However, if Mr. Rove could reasonably be expected to know that the information he passed along about Mrs. Wilson was classified, then I think Mr. Rove will be in trouble.  It will not matter what source Mr. Rove got the information from if he could reasonably be expected to know it was classified.  Also, if Mr. Rove knew it was classified information that "Valerie Plame" worked for the CIA, it will not matter if he said "Wilson's wife" if it can be established that Mr. Rove could reasonably be expected to know that "Valerie Plame" and "Wilson's wife" refer to the same person.

Without knowing what I'm talking about legally and just basing my thoughts on the language used, it seems to me that a prosecutor wouldn't use the word TARGET until they were absolutely ready to go after someone and felt they had the evidence to support their actions.

Is it possible that Rove is on a list of POTENTIAL TARGETS but until the evidence is there will be refered to as a SUBJECT? It seems like the prosecutor is casting a pretty wide net and may not want to tip his hand until he's ready.  Don't know, just askin'...

some democrats on congress that wrote the CIA asking for an investigation and the CIA responded.

I will see if I can find it, since it may have been speculation somewhere rather than a fact.

That someone is an employee of the CIA can be classified information, even if that person is not a covert operative.  If you have a security clearance and you see someone identified as an employee of the CIA in a classified document, you need to assume that the information IS classified until you know affirmatively that it is not.  Learing the same information from someone who does not have a security clearance does not remove this obligation.  In fact, it creates a new obligation.

An interesting question is whether Mr. Wilson has a security clearance.  I don't know if he does.  The rules are different if you do not have a security clearance.

If Rove was merely trying to correct Wilson's claim that Cheney personally sent him to Africa (which we now no he never said), why couldn't he just say, "Cheney never personally sent Wilson to Africa."?

Timothy Noah says it better than I can:

"Let's suppose that Wilson did indeed claim, falsely, that Cheney personally selected him to go to Niger (Go get 'em, tiger!). To blow the whistle on this lie, Rove still would have no logical need to expose Wilson's wife as a CIA employee. He could merely tell Time's Cooper, "Cheney did not select Wilson for the trip. Cheney has never met or spoken to Wilson in his life. Some faceless bureaucrat at the CIA picked Wilson."

....What Rove told Cooper was that Joe Wilson was married to a woman who worked for the CIA. He said this apparently without checking -- as any minimally responsible person would do -- whether this was information that needed to be kept secret....Rove behaved in a way that was unacceptably heedless of national security concerns. He revealed a secret not to expose the truth, but to smear a political enemy. And, if Cooper's e-mail is precisely accurate, the smear wasn't even true. Some whistle-blower.

When Mr. Wilson made his trip in February of 2002, no ppublic statements had been made about Iraq trying to acquire uranium.  The Brittish intelligence report that President Bush referenced in Januauary 2003 did not yet exist.  The current war in Iraq did not yet exist.  Tenet's statement of July 11, 2003 makes it clear that Wilson's trip in early 2002 and the report based on it were part of approved CIA activities to investigate claims that Iraq had purchased or had tried to purchase uranium from Niger.

Mr. Wilson did not do independent diplomacy in Niger.  The people in the CIA who authorized Mr. Wilson's trip in Februaray of 2002 had no way of knowing what Mr. Wilson would be doing or saying a year later.  They could only know what Mr. Wilson had done in the past.

it wasn't to the CIA the request was sent, but the FBI.

In a July 24 letter to FBI Director William Mueller, Senator Charles Schumer (D -NY) demanded a criminal investigation of the leak. Schumer's letter stated, "If the facts that have been reported publicly are true, it is clear that a crime was committed. The only questions remaining to be answered are who committed the crime and why?"

http://www.yuricareport.com/Impeachment/DeanOnWilsonLeakWorseThanNixon.html

If a statement is true, can it also be a smear? Wouldn't they be mutually exclusive?

were not a target, but a subject, when in reality they were a target, they could get in some trouble, since you can't be compelled to testify against yourself, and you aren't allowed to have your attorney with you in the grand jury room.

I will do some checking.

now than he was in '03.  He may not have had the same security clearance that he does now, but calls to revoke it now may still be legitimate-on the "he can't be trusted" issue.

I can't even remember what his job was, some kind of liason or something-he may not have had clearance then.

You get an "advice of rights" if you are a target or a subject (but not if you are a witness).  I have been told that the advice and the rights are the same for targets and subjects.

but it sounds like they can try to get you to testify voluntarily, but if you are a target or a subject they have to notify you before hand.  From this it doesn't sound like they have to differentiate, when you get your letter.

http://www.lawyers.com/lawyers/A~1001633~LDS/FAQ+CRIME+FEDERAL.html#one

Have you seen this? Seems that some "CIA Official" who knows a whole bunch of details about Wilson's trip was talking to the BBC three days after Wilson's Media Extravaganza in the U.S.

What would you say if I told you that Walter Pincus had dinner with Wilson and Plame, at their house, two days before the Media Extravaganza? And that he most likely had Wilson's still-to-be-published NYT op-ed when he wrote his own piece for the WaPo?

Here's an interesting question: who else was there? Wouldn't it be something if there was a little reporter-fest at the Wilsons' home just before the op-ed and the Pincus story and the MTP interview came out?

We need a guest list for that dinner. If Serpenthead was there I'll have an orgasm.

The only thing we know for sure is that she provided his name and wrote a note summarizing his qualifications.  She could have provided his name in reponse to being asked if she knew of anyone with certain qualifications. She could have provided the note in response to a request that she provide his bona fides and information that would be required for his country clearance.  Or she could have been lobbying for him to go.  Let's suppose she was lobbying.  I am listing all the reasons I can think of why she might want him to go to Niger:

1.  Because she thought he was qualified.  Could be.  He had government contacts in Niger (which not many people would have), and status as a former Ambassador,  He was available and wasn't asking to be paid for his time.

2.  To further his career.  Could be.  She probably would not say that, even to Mr. Wilson.  This motive could coexist with #1 above.

3.  To get him out of the house.  Unlikely, given the risk of malaria in Niger -- unless she really doesn't like him.

4.  So he could have a good time.  See #3 above.

5.  So he could come back and make partisan attacks on the Bush administration based on what he learned.  But wouldn't she have to be able to see more than a year into the future?

When Mr. Wilson made his trip in February of 2002, no ppublic statements had been made about Iraq trying to acquire uranium

Saying "NO public statements" is not strictly true. In fact Saddam had purchased uranium from Niger, and everybody knew it. The IAEA had documented this long before. In fact one of the arguments tending to cast doubt on the story that he was trying to buy more was that most people figured he had plenty.

This is a big deal, because non-serious clowns on the left would have us believe that if Saddam hadn't purchased this particular batch of yellowcake, well then he couldn't possibly be a nuclear threat. Bzzzt. Wrong answer. He had 500 tons of yellowcake stored at the al Tuwaitha nuclear weapons research laboratory near Baghdad. That's enough to make about 150 nuclear weapons. This stuff was supposedly under the watchful eye of the IAEA, but so was Dear Leader Kim's, and we all saw how that turned out.

Doesn't take a FOIA request.

http://opensecrets.org/indivs/search.asp?NumOfThou=0&txtName=Wilson%2C+
Valerie&txtState=%28all+states%29&txtZip=&txtEmploy=&txtCan
d=Gore&txt2000=Y&Order=N>

"no" should have a "k" at the front and a "w" at the end.

jeez.

Color me confused, but I think it's based on Dean Wormer's "double secret probation" from Animal House.  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077975/

Whether he was lying is important, but maybe not the most important thing. It seems he didn't get to see the report that was written based on the information he provided.  That is what would happen if he did not have a security clearance and the report needed to be classified.  In that case, he would not actually know what was in the report.  He probably would assume that the report stated the same conclusions as he drew. Perhaps it did not.  That would pretty much explain his behavior, I think, without making him a liar.

I think the most important thing is whether his conclusions were correct.  The way he looks at it, there were some documents everyone now agrees were forged.  Mr. Wilson thinks if his findings had been used properly some mistakes could have been avoided.

I would like to know where those forged documents came from.  Seems like somebody set us up on those.  France?  Iran?

As to the larger claim that Iraq was trying to acquire uranium, it seems clear that someone from Iraq was trying to do that in 1999.  But what is the significance of that?  I've talked with physicists who've told me it's very difficult to get from the kind of uranium available from Africa to something that can be used as a weapon.  Anyone know anything more about that?

here.

Also a link to Novak's first mention of the front.

Now why did you say public statements?  Wilson claims VP Cheney made an inquiry on the subject of Saddam trying to purchase yellow-cake from Africa.  My assumption was that was in response to some intel from outside the CIA because there would be no reason to ask the CIA its opinion on its own intel.  

Wilson learned that Saddam had tried to acquire yellow cake in 1998, and my guess (note my wording) was this was British intel - which ended up in the report your referring to.

I point out here why there was no reason for Wilson to go to Niger for the CIA to answer Cheney's query.

http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/313

I was alluding to intent on Wilson's part, not the CIA's knowledge of his intent.

Just kidding.

You are beginning to sound like me.  Stop before you go too far.

Yep, I think they 'tripped' over the fact Wilson knew more than he should (recall the row over the forged memo and its timing with his statements) and talked more than he should have.

And Wilson does/did have clearances as an Ambassador and State employee.

If we knew that Iraq sought to buy uranium from Africa, but hadn't been able to get any and weren't going to be able to get any, would this be an urgent reason to attack Iraq?

I would say it is becoming clearer that Plame and Wilson talked a lot, possibly too much to the press. Any bets your CIA agent talking to the BBC was Plame?  It could be others.  There were a whole cadre of senior, liberal leaning people in the CIA pushing back on Bush on Iraq

Do you have links to these details?

And I apologize for being a bit thick, who is serpenthead....?

hats, apparantly I may have just purchased one.

Although what kinds of information would his clearances have given him access to.  Since he was retired, did his clearances continue?  Those are a few more burning questions.

Those are all you thought of, I thought of one other.

Geez, everybody says, including the Downing Street Memos, Bush was worried about Iraq minute one into 9-11.

With good reason.  The combination of his WMD technology, his terrorist ties and his maniacal brutality made him most likely to push the next 9-11.

Cheers.

I have seen some speculation that she had been trying to get him on with the CIA, so maybe this was a way to give him an in for a more permanent job.

Can't remember where I saw it, but it sort of goes with your motive list.

only makes a difference if it is the reason that the WH tried to reveal/discredit him.  The WH didn't try to discredit Wilson because he worked for the Kerry campaign, they tried to discredit him because he was saying something that harmed their agenda (whether it was true or not).

And I think you will find he is echoing back the wording of the congressional authorization for war to notify Congress which authorization he is using for the actions he was taking.

Nice try though.

Wilson claimed his report showed Bush and Blair were wrong and lying to the people or filtering the information.

Take it up with Wilson.

Serpenthead is Carville. I found another place he might have been. This from the Vanity Fair profile:

In early May, Wilson and Plame attended a conference sponsored by the Senate Democratic Policy Committee, at which Wilson spoke about Iraq; one of the other panelists was the New York Times journalist Nicholas Kristof. Over breakfast the next morning with Kristof and his wife, Wilson told about his trip to Niger and said Kristof could write about it, but not name him.

My bet is that this is where they found the "juice" to set up the media trifecta, and where Wilson & Plame got "politicized." The got in bed with the Democrats right there, and the Democrats set up the media show.

The Pincus and Leiby article in the WaPo on July 6 closes with

Last week, Wilson said of Hussein: "I'm glad the tyrant is gone." But he does not believe the war was ever about eliminating Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. It was, he said, a political push to "redraw the map of the Middle East."

While his family prepared for a Fourth of July dinner, he proudly showed a reporter photos of himself with Bush's parents. On a den wall was a framed cable to him in Baghdad, from the first President Bush, dated Nov. 20, 1990...

A hat tip to The Lefties for keeping that on line.

are you talking about...Fitzgerald's?  If so, that has absolutely no bearing on his investigation.  The investigation is about the revelation of a covert CIA operative's identity.  While the intent to reveal the identity is important, the reasons underlying that intent are not really all that important.  Whoever leaked could have leaked because they thought Joe Wilson was a partisan hack or looked like a fruit loop or had his advances on Wilson's wife at a cocktail party rebuffed...it wouldn't matter so long as he had the requisite intent to reveal the identity.

New York Times Imbudsman Admits NYT is a Lib Newspaper

Is The New York Times a Liberal Newspaper?

By DANIEL OKRENT

Published: July 25, 2004

OF course it is.

and given Plame's job for the CIA she would have been well aware of this regarding Iraq.  She had access to information and where/how the admin was focusing that average Joe on the streets wouldn't have known.

And there was talk of war with Iraq among the media talking heads before we even invaded Afghanistan.

his partisanship... only makes a difference if it is the reason that the WH tried to reveal/discredit him.

Whoa! Look at the hidden assumption in that one: Wilson is a fine, upstanding citizen, and those Wascally Wepublicans tried to discredit him!

Not so fast. Wilson was a Kerry campaign operative who presented himself to the public as a "whistleblower" for the purpose of discredting the President.

That's just so we remain clear on who was discrediting whom when all this started.

motivated how and when and why he spoke.

Also, remember that he spent a couple of months as an anonymous source to other journalists, before outing himself in his own story.

People with political axes to grind talk all the time, we generally call them "anonymous sources in X" and what they generally say is not good.

The investigation is about the revelation of a covert CIA operative's identity.

Show me where it says that. That seems to be the Mother Of All Hidden Assumptions in this deal... the one you donks hang your hats on.

I don't think you know what it's about. I think you're assuming you know, and for that reason are open to being quite surprised.

that it was unlikely there would be any charges regarding the outing of Plame?

I don't think Fitzgerals is required to limit himself solely to that charge, and nobody knows exactly what the CIA requested be investigated, it may have been a laundry list, and the benefit Fitzgerald would have is that everyone would assume the only thing being investigated was the Plame leak-that would make some of the subjects he was looking at feel comfortable.

Also, I think there are probably some leaks at the CIA whose heads are going to role when this is over, apparantly there were too many CIA folk talking to the press through all this, and they were talking about classified stuff.

NYTimes just came out with a story exhonorating Rove.  They won't admit it, but it does

The paper of record?

http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/316

tinfoil hats aren't going to be needed.

I honestly think that Novak got his info on Plame and her involvement from a CIA leak, not from the WH.  And that belief doesn't feel so tinfoilhattish anymore.

and the white paper saying British sources pre-dated the recanted documents.  The SotU initially had a reference to the documents but was retracted after the CIA voiced its concerns.  Later the vague reference was included because of what the white paper cites--British sources were separate.  Regardless, the documents showed only that Niger and Iraq agreed to the sale of 500 tons of uranium.  Here's the quote from the '02 NIE:

As of early 2001, Niger and Iraq reportedly were still working out arrangements for this deal, which could be for up to 500 tons of yellowcake. We do not know the status of this arrangement.

So Wilson going to Niger and proving that no sale was completed or could be completed changes absolutely nothing.  Neither the Brits or U.S. intelligence were claiming a sale had been completed.  Debunking the documents changes nothing because, again, the British claim their sources are independent from them.

Also, remember the timeline here.  Congress passed the resolution granting power to go to war in 2002.  This whole Niger BS occurred AFTER not before.

And Powell's error-laden UN speech made no mention of the documents.  I just checked to make sure.  You can fact check me if you want.  This also took place AFTER the Congressional resolution but before the SotU.

3 days ago I thought the Wilson/Plame possibility of criminal activity was at the edge of tin foil hat land. But, as Shakespeare teaches, beware those who "doth protest too much".

The activity today and yesterday, and the CNN interview today have got Amb. Wilson way too far out there. The volume and loudness of the left's noise is so loud as to raise suspicions. Couple that with the BBC and strategy meeting speculations you note, and it's approaching overhandling.

It seems Amb. Wilson has essentially conceded his wife was not covert when the Novak column appeared, and wouldn't that knock out the major prop for a "legal" complaint? So now he's reduced to simply complaining about abuse of power and discretion issues? Those are almost wholly political points, and with the Dems moving for hearings, they're moving away from legal proceedings. Interesting that the WH is clamming up on grounds of letting the legal process take its course.

At least the GOP talking points are transparent and logical, if inconsistently delivered. Is a clamor for Miller info coming next? I think that's where the GOP and Fitzgerald's interests dovetail.

And I wouldn't be surprised if Fitzgerald has reached the penultimate stage, and simply waits for Miller to cave. Note that very little of the democrat clamor is about delay or stall or whitewash. Even Wilson still professes faith in him. I think that may be a mistake on his part.

Finally, I like Novak almost all the time, and if I were on the left I'd be very concerned about the dangerous smirking silence he's maintaining.

I read the Times piece.

Seems like they make a valiant effort to leave the reader under the impression that no matter what the article might say Rove is really guilty. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, Rove did it. And if he didn't then Cheney/Halliburton did. And if they didn't then Rumsfled/Gonzalez did :-)

I don't think either side is finding anything of real note -- despite the allegedly juicy tidbits -- in that horribly written, torturedly sourced, disaster of a story.

Basically Novak knew before he called Rove -- he called to confirum -- so Novak had another source for the info.

Rove knew before Novak called him (he said "I've heard that too" in response to the Plame mention), so he too had another source for the info.

Second down and ten.

being from the CIA.

...that's the whole point. Congress gave him authorization for war under certain conditions. He officially wrote to Congress saying he was excercising the authority they granted him because this specific condition was met.  Ergo, Bush officially claimed there was a connection between 9-11 and Iraq  and gave that as (one of) his official  reasons

for invading.

here.  And I was just being sarcastic!  Ahahahaha.

Then what if what Rove did check and know (even if by "cocktail standards") she wasn't covert, and that Wilson was making stuff up, then he's completely legal, completely accurate and completely political?!?

The only gripe there is the political part, fair enough, but I think Leon's point #8 is that we're really speculating on the minimal evidence of the "legal" issue so far - i.e. "shaky".

I don't know that Rove was security cleared at all in 2003 (I think that's been answered asap given the senate debate today) and if so, aren't there degrees of clearence, and isn't trying to get him on a "duty to know" rap pretty difficult, even with far more evidence than exists so far?

Thus, politics ain't beanbag, but a smear charge seems premature given the two elements Rove mentioned as we know so far - 1 - Plame works at the CIA, 2 - Wilson's claims about Cheney are questionable.

that doesn't mean that harm wasn't done to our CIA operations.  Plame was assigned as an undercover agent overseas until 1997. Now that she is outed, people that had contacts with her in her undercover role have had their eyes opened. They now have reason to suspect anyone who they knew was involved with Plame in the "business" that was apparently part of her cover story. There are people who continued to work undercover after Plame left. Now they are possibly exposed. (Source was Andrea Mitchell-interviewed on Hardball tonight)

By the way...Thanks for the well written post. Like most liberals, I would disagree over some points, but it was well written and respectful. I can listen to that.

outing several CIA business covers?  They were are all active and doing business in the war on terror.

Do you think the guys flying the planes for the fake airline were in more or less danger than Plame?

I wouldn't try to argue against an argument that claims on average the NYT leans 'left/dem'.  There's even factual evidence that it does.

There IS evidence that NYT is slightly 'more liberal' than the general population, and possibly even 'more liberal' than the general media.  But to posit the belief that every single one of the NYT reporters and editors not only has no journalistic ethics, but has a sole overriding goal to slam republicans and the bush admin is simply not realistic.  As stated in the parallel subthread here, such an idea is ludicrous to people who really DO have a goal to slam the bush admin.  For example, if the premise is true, why did the NYT barely cover the Downing Street Memo topic?

 "Did Karl Rove intend to out Valerie Plame? (SHAKY) As best as I can tell from the Cooper email, the answer is no. It seems clear that he instructed Cooper to keep this as a "super secret""

  I haven't read all the comments, so apologies if this has been addressed. Forget all the junk about whether Cooper's reference was to Animal House or not, or whether the phrase "double super secret background" was Cooper's or Rove's. Let's be clear: if you're talking to a reporter, it's not secret. When you talk to a reporter, everything you say is by definition something you want the public to know. You may not want to be associated with it (background) or have your exact words quoted, but if something's actually a secret, you keep it to yourself.

Does the Rove defense come down to, "Sure, I might have mentioned that Valerie Plame was a CIA agent to a Newsweek reporter that I hardly knew when he called me about welfare reform, but I told him to keep it secret -- even double super secret"? Do you really want to be associated with that?

hardly knew Cooper on?

I suspect that Rove gets calls frequently from reporters, but also generally inpolitics, when you want to release stuff, you go with the reporters you know and can trust (and yes there is an element of trust-politicians won't give the dirt, if a reporter burns them, and reporters don't call back if their source burns them).  

providing the evidence flyerhawk requested.  

Don't ask me why others posit the belief that every single one of the NYT reporters and editors not only has no journalistic ethics, but has a sole overriding goal to slam republicans and the bush admin.  I did not make or comment on that part.  However, I agree NYT is slightly 'more liberal' than the general population, and possibly even 'more liberal' than the general media.

why did the NYT barely cover the Downing Street Memo topic?  Just a guess, There was NO there there!  

Both sides of the fence need to stop finding a bogeyman under every rock and behind every tree.  

I can sign on to that becaus as much as I can't stand Carl Rove, it looks to me like his main goal was to cast doubt on Wilson's trip by pointing out that his wife was involved in sending him, not the VP.

But all he needed to do was say that Cheney had nothing to do with it. Instead he tried to say that AND score political points. Unfortunately her identity was classified so, had he done the right thing, he would have denied Cheney's involvement in sending Wilson to Africa and then, even though it would be tempting to explain Plame and Wilson's relationship, shrugged his sholders and walked away from the story.  But he couldn't leave well enough alone.

That is NOT what her Hubby, Mr Wilson says

Read it and weep

From CNN, this afternoon:

"Wolf Blitzer:  The other argument that has been made against you is that you sought to capitalize on this extravaganza, having that photo shoot with your wife, who was a clandestine officer of the CIA, and that you tried to enrich yourself writing this book and all of that.  What do you make of those accusations, again, which are serious accusations as you knw that have been leveled against you?

Joe Wilson: My wife was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity.

Wolf Blitzer: But she hadn't been a clandestine officer for some time before that.

Joe Wilson:  That's not anything that I can talk about.  And indeed I will go back to what I had said earlier.  The CIA believed that a possible crimne had been committed and that's why they referred it to the Justice Department. She was not a clandestine officer at the time that that article in Vanity Fair appeared, and I have every right to have the American public know who I am, and not to have myself defined by those who would write the sorts of things that are coming out being spewed out of the mouths  of the RNC.

No ... I don't think that all 12,000 of them believe the same thing. Some are on the Center-Left, others are on the Far-Left and others are yet on the Extremist-Left. I also believe that while there may be a few New York Times reporters who would honor a vow of nondisclosure given to a Republican, I have no doubt that no member of the editorial board would support his/her in honoring such a promise, especially if it would damage a GOP administration.

I mean, they're screaming about Karl Rove talking about Valerie Plame and possibly endangering the future of the Free World (while at the same time, in the brief they filed to the SCOTUS appealing Judith Miller's jailing they clearly assert their belief that Valerie Plame was not covert, it was common knowledge that she worked at the CIA, and that the CIA doing nothing to protect her identity). Yet, they are the same people who published an article blowing the cover off an ongoing CIA operation the CIA was going through a lot of trouble to keep covert, and published names and addresses.

I admit though that there are probably some people who lean Right. Maybe about 102 (Classifieds, Janitors and Layout) out of the 12,000, maybe more, but more likely, less.

I understand how you can see the New York Times as a totally objective newspaper as they simply print what you are already inclined to believe is the truth i.e. nothing good has happened in Iraq, the infrastructure was better under Saddam Hussein, nobody ever believed Saddam had WMD before the commencement of the War, etc.

I'm not saying that I agree ... but I understand. :)

You'd have to ask Leon about the validity of his points. I think he just grabbed the easiest, non-subscription sources. I don't see anything that hasn't been independently reported elsewhere.

This is the head scratching quote. More and more it looks like Rove is 100% political, which seems to be his job description, and for which he seems fairly apt.

If the papers you mention cannot be believed at all to do anything except slam republicans, then they cannot be used to source any evidence for anything.

Not so. They are highly useful for determining what the Democratic Party line is on any given issue. Whatever tack is being taken by the New York Times and the Washington Post (and to some degree the Los Angeles Times) is what Democratic political strategists have come up with as their PR strategy for whatever issue is being talked about.

Viewed this way, these papers make much more sense. They are the propaganda arm of the Democratic Party. That's fine... the Democrats need a propaganda arm, and we don't dispute their right to have one. It's only when the claim is made that these are some kind of non-partisan truth-seekers that we begin to laugh.

The one empirical fact that you guys just can't seem to get your heads around is the remarkable business success of Fox News. It is almost unheard of — in any market — for a challenger to come out of nowhere to unseat a twenty-year incumbent unless the newcomer has some dramatic new breakthrough technology.

The only "new thing" Fox News brought to the table was that they put their thumb on the conservative side of the scale instead of the liberal side. The rest is history; literally millions of people deserted CNN to go hear something else... once given the opportunity to do so.

Whether you like it or not, the public recognizes this liberal bias in the so-called "mainstream media." We know that because Fox News now out-scores CNN almost 3-to-1. Even liberals can see the "conservative bias" in Fox News. So you know what bias looks like when you see it. What liberals can't see is the liberal bias in the rest of the news. But we can. It jumps off the page at us... every day.

Dear Mr. Speaker: (Dear Mr. President:)

On March 18, 2003, I made available to you, consistent with section 3(b) of the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 (Public Law 107-243), my determination that further diplomatic and other peaceful means alone will neither adequately protect the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq, nor lead to enforcement of all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq.

I have reluctantly concluded, along with other coalition leaders, that only the use of armed force will accomplish these objectives and restore international peace and security in the area. I have also determined that the use of armed force against Iraq is consistent with the United States and other countries continuing to take the necessary actions against international terrorists and terrorist organizations, including those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001. United States objectives also support a transition to democracy in Iraq, as contemplated by the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998 (Public Law 105-338).

Consistent with the War Powers Resolution (Public Law 93-148), I now inform you that pursuant to my authority as Commander in Chief and consistent with the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution (Public Law 102-1) and the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 (Public Law 107-243), I directed U.S. Armed Forces, operating with other coalition forces, to commence combat operations on March 19, 2003, against Iraq.

These military operations have been carefully planned to accomplish our goals with the minimum loss of life among coalition military forces and to innocent civilians. It is not possible to know at this time either the duration of active combat operations or the scope or duration of the deployment of U.S. Armed Forces necessary to accomplish our goals fully.

As we continue our united efforts to disarm Iraq in pursuit of peace, stability, and security both in the Gulf region and in the United States, I look forward to our continued consultation and cooperation.

Sincerely,

GEORGE W. BUSH

Wow ... but you and USA Today sure do know how to stretch. Bush does not cite legislation authorizing him to use force against the perpetrators of 9/11 as his authority to oust Saddam at all. He specifically cites the following  legislation: Iraq Liberation Act of 1998 (Public Law 105-338), Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution (Public Law 102-1) and the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 (Public Law 107-243) which I have no doubt (considering the names of the pieces of legislation) pertained to Iraq specifically.

Secondly, the quote USA Today dowdified out of context is clear in its meaning: ousting Saddam Hussein is consistent with the United States taking action against terrorists and terrorist organizations, which includes (also meaning: is not exclusive of) "those nations, organizations, or persons who planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001."

mean something else.

Good find.

'nuff said. I'm not gonna convince you. But it's right there in plain English.

but it's a fair assumption given its genesis.  What do you think/assume the investigation is about?

If I'm right that the investigation is about the revelation of Plame's identity, then Wilson's partisanship is irrelevant.

And believe me, I'm always open to being quite surprised...the one thing I've learned being around politics and the law is that as intelligent or well-founded as speculation may be, it can be turned on its head at the drop of a hat.

This is your one bite. Run this crap out again and you are gone in all your generations.

to the assumption that the investigation is about the outing of Plame is the fact that Fitzgerald pressed Cooper and Miller to the point that it resulted in a Supreme Court opinion last month.  As far as I know, the only thing they had in common in this matter is the knowledge regarding Plame.  If Fitzgerald is playing a sleight of hand, he's going to extraordinary lengths to keep people off balance.

I've stated time and again that if anyone is indicted, it will not be revealing Plame's identity, but for perjury or obstruction.  As the judge I worked for used to say: "the federal prisons are filled with people who wouldn't have been there if they'd just told the truth."

I never said anything about whether Wilson was an upstanding citizen or not...and I never said anything about "Wascally Wepublicans."  You're the one that read those into what I wrote.

Interestingly, you go on to make the exact same point that I did: the WH tried to discredit Wilson.  

I have all but bought one at this juncture.

I think we may be looking not so much at the outing of Plame, but at the sharing of CIA classified information-Wilson, Plame, other administration people may be on the hotseat with that one.

I also wonder about perjury or obstruction of justice-those types of crimes can still apply, even if the original crime being investigated turns out to not be a crime.

I seem to recall a few months ago Fitzgerald saying that an indictment on the CIA officer outing was unlikely-makes me think his Grand Jury is a totally different area-we just assume we know what is being investigated.

how that makes a difference?  It has no relevance to the outing of his wife or are you suggesting that he asked for it or had it coming because he was a partisan?

You guys may have plenty of good arguments to make, but you're getting so stuck on one that really doesn't make a different to the outing of his wife.  Whether Wilson was a partisan or not has no bearing on the issue of the revelation of his wife's identity.

classified information to the press, the reporters involved would still have information, the targets are simply a bit different.

Also, Grand Juries always are grand fishing expeditions-the prosecutor doesn't have any limits on him, other than being required to notify the subjects and targets that they have rights, and can leave the room to talk to their lawyer between questions.

I just think at this point the "outing of a CIA officer" is a dead in the water charge, and there isn't anyone who will be charged with that one.

other than Plame's identity?  I'm not disputing, I'm just asking.  Maybe there's something I'm missing in all this, but if Fitzgerald was tasked with investigating leaks of classified information based on the revelation of Plame's identity (which was the genesis of his investigation) and that investigation led to a SCT case over two reporters who had Plame's identity disclosed to them, I just don't see how you can say that the "outing of a CIA officer" is dead in the water.  Maybe an actual charge arising from the action of revealing her identity is dead in the water, but IMHO it's been unlikely from the start that any charges would be brought for that specific action.

your other response and posts and see where you're coming from.  I may be wrong, but I tend to think that the speculation that this investigation may turn around on Wilson/Plame is wishful thinking.  The reason I think this is the focus that has been given to Cooper/Miller.  Unless they have information on issues other than the revelation of Plame's identity, their central role in this leads me to believe that the relevation of Plame is still the central focus.

Obviously, it would be a huge coup if Fitzgerald handed down indictments of Wilson/Plame or others unrelated to the revelation of Plame's identity.  I have a hard time seeing that happen though.

you can start with Wilson's trip-was that trip classified, was the information he found classified.

Did Wilson's wife share classified information with him?

Another interesting piece-Corn wrote piece a day or so after Novak's was printed.  Corn provided details regarding Plame's spy past.  Was that a leak (good op-ed at NRO I believe that discusses the likelyhood that Wilson was Corn's source).

And while this probably isn't germaine to this case there are also leaks like this one:

http://auto_sol.tao.ca/node/view/1397

Basically there were a lot of people involved who were loose with more than likely classified information, and apparantly our CIA leaks like a sieve the Plame stuff being only a part of the problem.

turning on Wilson and Plame.

I am fairly convinced the leak/primary leak at least for Novak came from the CIA-not the WH.  I think that is why Miller and COoper, but more so Miller now are important-there is another unknown source out there, and we know it isn't Rove.

I can't help but think that the investigation is as much about the leaky sieve at the CIA as it is about Rove and Plame.

You're the guys who are interpreting the fact that the following bolded words (in the quote below) were used in the same paragraph of a speech to mean that the President said that Iraq was an "imminent threat."

Some have said we must not act until the threat is imminent. Since when have terrorists and tyrants announced their intentions, politely putting us on notice before they strike? If this threat is permitted to fully and suddenly emerge, all actions, all words, and all recriminations would come too late. Trusting in the sanity and restraint of Saddam Hussein is not a strategy, and it is not an option.

You're also the same guys who are interpreting the fact that the following bolded words (in the quote below) were used in the same sentence in a speech to mean that the President actually did say (maybe through some hitherto unknown Jedi power) that Saddam was involved in the 9/11 attacks.

We have no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved with the 11 September attacks ...

Given all that, for you to talk about us not comprehending plain English is a little bit rich, isn't it?

and has said that he did not know Rove well.

Generally it's true that you release something to reporters you trust, but in this case, they obviously wanted the information that would discredit Wilson to get out as quickly as possible to every outlet possible. That's different circumstances. All Rove wanted was for his fingerprints not to be on the story -- he plainly did not want the information itself to be "secret."

Let's assume for the sake of argument that the NYTimes are Stalinite commies out to destroy the nation.  How does that in any way bear upon the actions of Rove and whoever else in the administration compromised CIA operations?

If I may enlarge the scope of this reply past your comments, into the larger sphere of other justifications and excuses for the administration's actions in outing a CIA agent: how does hating Joe Wilson in any way impact the sheer immorality of at least one administration official?

Frankly, the rush to justify, change the subject, make all sorts of borderline libelous accusations with no supporting evidence against Joe Wilson, the NYTimes, Judith Miller etc etc, in an attempt to impose some false dichotomy, to turn this into just another partisan fight -- is disgusting.  

A CIA agent was compromised, all her actions all her life were compromised, all the locals she recruited and all their work was compromised, to get back at. .  .her husband?  Does anybody have a problem with that?  Is anybody willing to stand up and say "I think that is a bad thing?"

Welp, ban away!

Unless Tenet counts as an administration official, I don't see how your theory fits Novak's column.

So are you saying Novak lied to cover for people?

The facts of what was in Novak's original column, the facts of what has been investigated so far, the facts of what Karl Rove's own lawyer has admitted -- none of these things jive with any of the blame-shifting theories.  The administration is pretty well fingered.  Rove too.  We can all argue from way on the outside based on what few facts we have whether or not Rove committed a crime, but what is certain at this point -- by Rove's lawyer's own admissions -- is that Rove was involved.  

Novak and the NYT both exposed CIA assets.  Both had reasons for doing it.  Both vetted their stories with the CIA.  Both times the CIA let the stories be published.  Someone pointing out the apparent duplicity is noting more than someone pointing out the apparent duplicity.  It doesn't require "Stalinite commies" or "hate" only the ability to read.

article is in line with what has been independently reported elsewhere, how can you believe that 100% of its journalists are biased against republicans?  Remember, Leon used the article because it makes points in SUPPORT of the republican view.  Therefore the article Leon referenced is at least one example of a WaPo article that didn't have it in for the republicans.

I suspect you think that the sources you mention are biased and therefore you're always skeptical of them (which is fine), but that's a far cry from believing its IMPOSSIBLE to get an unbiased article from them from ANY reporter or ANY story.  Granted, I'm paraphrasing what has been said, but that's the gist of the claim.

I, for example, am always skeptical of Fox News, but they don't 100% of the time promote the republican viewpoint.  High-90's maybe, but not 100%.  ;)

I think I resemble that remark...

I see you notice the only one out there spinning like a top is Wilson - and his wife just recently returned to work after a year off.

They were the target's I would bet.

That tin foil is mutating into something else it seems.

Cheers.

In their lame attempt to keep Rove in the picture.

How pathetic.

You make some good points. And in 99% of similar situations I would agree with you.

But we're talking about a man whose office is next door to the oval one.

A weak or damaged presidency affects all of us. I see no problem with Rove helping clear the air.

The question, "What perjury?" refers to your comment in the preceding post and to the posts above.

I didn't realize you were merely hypothesizing about what might happen if Rove were accused of perjury.  I thought you meant that he actually had committed perjury, and that it had or would come out, creating your scenario.

I can't see anything good coming out of this investigation if there isn't more there than we already know.  In the meantime, the only thing left is idle speculation.

Meantime, I think it's funny that all of a sudden the news folks have decided that it's just "technicalities" that Valerie Wilson (she now prefers that over "Plame") had been back for five years; that Rove didn't know her name, and therefore didn't reveal it; that his intention was to discredit Joe, not to "out" Valerie; that she wasn't a covert agent; and that the CIA didn't attempt to stop publication of Novak's story about them.  That's sort of like saying, "What Rove said doesn't fit any of the criteria for violation of the law, but he's guilty anyway."

They also overlook that the law was written specifically to (a) protect agents in the field, and (b) protect whistleblowers who weren't aiming at jeopardizing agents' safety, which is why it doesn't apply to Rove, or ANYBODY ELSE who identified Valerie Plame Wilson as both Wilson's wife and an employee of the CIA. As near as I can tell, there was also nothing ethically or morally wrong with Rove's comment, "I've heard that, too,"

I greatly doubt there will be a "perjury" contROVErsy.  Calm your fears until it happens.

Your not helping my already tarnished reputation.  Clearances are 'need to know'.  State department clearances are different from CIA - all are topical to your work.  My guess is he would have had one reactivated for the trip so the CIA could coordinate, prepare and debreif him on HIS findings.  Outside his information he should still be barred.  Once retired his clearances can be deactivated.  After 1-5 years they without use they can be lost.  There are ways to keep them open.

For someone in the CIA to know.

Still wondering who -but there are factions in the CIA who might not have taken kindly to the Plame/Wilson game.

Strictly speaking, she was just an employee of the CIA, not a covert agent.  When Novak contacted the CIA before printing his story, they didn't try to dissuade him from publishing.  That means they didn't think her identity needed protection.

Look at it this way:  The law regarding disclosure of an agent's identity had very specific requirements for violation.  One of the reasons for the specificity was to protect potential whistleblowers from prosecution if they were to identify a CIA employee in the process of reporting misbehavior within the government.

Flash forward to the Novak-Rove, Cooper-Rove conversations.  The implication is clearly, as you say, to discredit Wilson.  To merely deny that Cheney or the "White House" sent Wilson would be insufficient.  Much more convincing to confirm that his wife pushed him for the job.

Next step:  Plame sponsored her own husband for a hatchet job against the Administration.  This is certainly a misuse of her government position, especially if she had reason to think her recommendation would be followed.  We have no reason to believe she didn't know that Wilson would go public with anti-Bush (mis)information about his eventual report, no matter what he found.  

She, as a CIA employee, was attempting to unethically and perhaps illegally use her position to influence government policy.  Whoever turned her over to Novak, Cooper, and Miller was certainly doing the public's business by reporting her malfeasance.  I submit that, even if she had been clandestine, the statute would not have applied, because the purpose was to reveal her unethical behavior, not to reveal a covert CIA operation and endanger agents.  Otherwise, an "agent" could do just about anything contrary to public good and cover it up by hiding behind his or her former "secret agant" status.  (Her former CIA supervisor publicly stated today that her identification as a CIA employee did not have any harmful effect on any CIA operation.)

Her husband's partisanship is at the core of what makes her behavior "reportable."  So it's not just that HE had it coming; even more, SHE had it coming.  And since she wasn't a covert agent anyway, what difference does it make that ANYBODY mentioned her employment by the CIA?

I'm of the opinion that this move toward deconstrunctionism in the present political climate represents a sea-change in conservative thought.   I think I first saw this put to words in a link from Andrew Sullivan, but I had had the same thoughts.   Essentially the Right is making an epistemological claim: you can't know the truth, because the truth is filtered through a liberal media where writers like Miller "have it [in] for the President."   Therefore there's no real need to back up any of your beliefs with facts, unless we count "facts" recognized by only one ideological camp.   Facts are just going to be spun by the liberals anyway, so believe whatever you like.  All information is biased anyway.

I haven't thought through the implications of such deconstructionism from the Right (it's less shocking from the Left), but they're really fascinating.