I wonder if all those who’ve spent the last month wringing their hands over the Valerie Plame “leak”—in particular, those thousands upon thousands of progressives suddenly so concerned with protecting “covert” CIA agents and enforcing the Espionage Act that they’re willing to do so at the expense of the free flow of information inside the beltway—are going to express their outrage over this.
BECAUSEOFTHEHYPOCRISY!
Sure, it’s thinly sourced story—and the conclusion is at best highly speculative—but really, what’s a little conjectural leap when ROGUE ELEMENTS INSIDE THE GOVERNMENT MAY BE PUTTING OUR NATIONAL SECURITY AT RISK?
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(h/t John Cole); see also, Cole and company’s further examination of the letter Josh Marshall is using to trumpet the importance of the Plame “leak.” Turns out the signatories are a fairly unreliable crew—in the same camp as noted conspiracy theorist Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski.
Jesus. Does anybody have a tougher job than Porter Goss?
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update: Here’s letter signatory Larry Johnson, writing in the NYT several years back: “The Declining Terrorist Threat.” In his piece, Mr. Johnson takes particular care to note the declining threat of Islamic terrorism. Note the date: July 10 2001. This of course doesn’t mean Johnson has been wrong in his analysis since 911, but it does give you some indication of his ideological starting point as pertains to matters military (h/t Nick Danger at Red State)
Preface: I am pretty sure that Rove is not guilty of any charges in relation to the outing of Valerie Plame. This will brand me an arch-conservative to the conspiracy-minded Kossacks, but it’s a fact, I simply don’t believe he is.
However, I’m still fishing for one serious fact in the middle of all of this hyperbole from both from left and right. The correct legal name for the wife of Joesph Wilson is “Valerie Wilson”. The name with attached convert status is “Valerie Plame”. If somebody was simply trying to explain who sent Wilson to the Niger, and they used his wife’s name, who happens to work at the Pentagon, wouldn’t they have used “Valerie Wilson” (a non-restricted name and the same name that appears in the State Dept. memo) and not Valerie Plame? How does it even affect Joseph directly that his wife is outed? Obviously, it does ruin her future use for covert activities in the CIA, and has a direct effect on her CIA career.
The only thing I can figure is that she must have pissed off somebody in her agency or at the pentagon, who really did out her and who really did have revenge motives towards her, and not simply her husband.
Irony: Turing word is central as in…
“Does anybody have a tougher job than Porter Goss?”
Yes. Laura Bush. Think about it.
Hmmm.
1. Wilson mentioned “Valerie Plame” on his bio as in “ the former Valerie Plame” to describe his wife. If you know one, then you know the other.
Well as long as you have fingers and know how to use Google before Wilson amended his bio.
2. I’d be curious to know if that assertion was true. That the CPD is responsible for the Chinese Embassy bombing.
If you read the SCCI report you see that the CPD pretty much sent Wilson to Niger on the same basis. A sort of bureaucratic “what hell, why not”.
What really amazes me is that the mob coming after Rove & Libby with torches & pitchforks are the people who, during the Clinton administration, liked to spin stories about conservative factions of the CIA undermining their beloved president. Go back, and look at movies like “Three Days of the Condor” and “Seven Days in May” and you’ll see examples of their thinking that conservatives in the CIA could penetrate any institution, exercise their will, and cover up their actions perfectly.
Now that we’re confronted with an apparent rogue group in the CIA that like to throw darts at a map and call it “analysis”, that same mob is silent because this group hates the same president that is hated by the mob.
TW -“example” – an example in selective outrage.
I assume that this bio preexisted her “outing”?
It also begs the question of why would Novak use her maiden name in his article?
Peter Goss got some major CIA dudes to resign not long after he took over. I hope he fumigated their offices to remove any leftist taint.
Remind me again … this would be the Larry Johnson who just did the Democrats’ weekly radio address?
Yes, even though this appears to be the best kept secret in the world since Al Capone’s vault, Valerie Plame’s name and relationship to her husband were posted on Wilson’s bio at the Middle East institute in 2002 and was still posted in 2003 at the time of Wilson’s op ed.
I am amazed that the MSM has ignored and continues to ignore this.
This is the link that absolutely documents this.
http://web.archive.org/web/20030720060539/http://www.mideasti.org/ html/bio-wilson.html
Note: Copyright date:2002
Archival date is part of the link: 2003/07/20
The real issues about outing a cover agent are 1) knowledge of the covert
status and most importantly, 2) intent of blowing the cover. The questions
then are:
1) If Ms. Plame’s cover was so deep, and outing her identity so dangerous,
why did Wilson allow her maiden name to be posted on his internet bio at the
Middle East Institute in 2002 where it was available in July 2003 at the
time of his Op-Ed in the NYT?
http://eyeontheworld.typepad.com/home/2005/07/wilson_was_the_.html
2) Given the established public nature of her maiden name documented above,
why didn’t Wilson think that writing an Op-ed about the CIA and her subject
matter expertise in the NYT and then giving public interviews about it could
plausibly increase the risk (even if it was only marginally) to her job, her
cover and potentially her life?
3) Given that he was so casual about making very public statements related
to his wife’s field of expertise and place of employment, it would be
logical for any rational observer to conclude that Wilson had a
lackadaisical attitude to protecting any subjects related to her wife’s job.
Therefore one would ask, would any rational husband in the world do anything
public that would create ANY risk, even minimal risk, to his wife’s job and
potentially her life? Would anyone even think that a husband would be so
reckless?
4) Thus, knowing this information, why would any other rational person,
regardless of position, when learning about her place of employment would
even think or speculate that her CIA employment was of a covert nature or
that there would be any sort of risk associated with mentioning it?
Sorry, archived link of Middle East Institute did not work.
Trying again
Link
http://web.archive.org/web/20030720060539/http://www.mideasti.org/html/bio-wilson.html
I’m not only waiting to hear what the prosecutor has found but also to hear if anyone has died as a result of this leak.
If people have died following a spasm of partisan revenge headed by officials in the White House, heads will roll—and should in my opinion.
Don’t you think if you were actually trying to keep someone covert you wouldn’t have them work at headquarters? Wouldn’t that risk that person’s covert status if he or she was seen going in and out of headquarters?
I always thought the idea of “covert” was that the person wasn’t to be known as being an operative, and having that person seen associating with Spy Central would kind of make that difficult.