From Raw Story:
On Chris Matthews’ Hardball Monday evening, just moments ago, MSNBC correspondent David Shuster confirmed what RAW STORY first reported in February: that outed CIA officer Valerie Plame Wilson was working on Iran at the time she was outed.
[…]
According to current and former intelligence officials, Plame Wilson, who worked on the clandestine side of the CIA in the Directorate of Operations as a non-official cover (NOC) officer, was part of an operation tracking distribution and acquisition of weapons of mass destruction technology to and from Iran.
[…]
AND THE SOURCES ALLEGE THAT WHEN MRS. WILSON’S COVER WAS BLOWN, THE ADMINISTRATION’S ABILITY TO TRACK IRAN’S NUCLEAR AMBITIONS WAS DAMAGED AS WELL.â€Â
This is sure to get the leftwing sites atwitter, and indeed, some of the more credulous anti-war / anti-Bush sites have already begun gloating over what AJ Strata and others (see his comments section) have noted is not only ridiculous on its face. First of all, the idea that the “outing” of Valerie Plame damaged our ability to track information about Iran’s nuclear weapons program is dependent upon one believing that a) our intelligence agencies are not using redundant sourcing or multiple agents to collect vital national security data, and b) that Valerie Plame, who was working as an analyst from a desk in Langley, had exclusive insights into Iran’s nuclear weapons program and is in fact some sort of irreplaceable James Bond-type super spy—though to be fair, her Majesty’s Secret Service at least had 6 other super spies who could replace Bond, should some tragedy befall him in the midst of saving the world. And secondly, such a scenario ignores the potential that what we are witnessing could just as easily be a canary trap launched by the CIA meant to snare additional leakers—either that, or a very weak effort on the part of those rogue intel agents (active and retired) who have been working against the administration to grab a few headlines away from the McCarthy leak story, the full extent of which is still not known.
Naturally, none of Shuster’s sources are named; instead, we’re asked to trust in anonymous “current and former intelligence officials,” who (supposedly) believe that the release of Valerie Plame’s name (by members of the Administration, remember) damaged the Administration’s ability to track Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Or, put another way, we’re being asked to believe unnamed sources when they tell us that the Bushies sabotaged their own stewardship over Iranian nuclear intelligence gathering initiatives because they feared impotent former diplomat Joe Wilson—who was eventually quite thoroughly discredited by the Senate Intelligence Committee Report and by his own tangle of public lies and half truths.
Which, I suppose that’s possible. But color me skeptical.
****
related: Jed Babbin on rogue elements in the CIA and Seixon on Larry Johnson.
****
update: BRD offers some interesting observations that add additional layers to the story. I remain skeptical, but like BRD, I’d be interested in having certain questions cleared up before I’m comfortable enough to dismiss the story entirely.
What the hell do we need analysts for when the Iranians are giving us daily updates on what their accomplishments and plans are?
It’s not like groups like, oh, the IAEA are exactly refuting this.
Quick drive-by comment,
The whole question revolves around whether or not V. Plame was working Operations or Analysis at the time. One of the things that does muddy the water a wee bit is that in the way-back-when one could switch between shops relatively easily. Now, it is more difficult.
Aside from whether or not this whole episode has had any impact on intelligence about Iran, it is worth noting that among the cocktail circuit there aren’t a whole lot of folks who work for the Agency who don’t have friends who are perfectly aware of their affiliation. For crying out loud, there are signs on the parkway passing HQ that announce it’s location.
I am curious, however, if during her time under NOC, what qualifications she was bringing to bear that merited NOC status, especially if she were acting in this capacity while working in the States. Clearly such questions imply no smoking gun, but for the sake of reference, I am curious.
BRD
Totally. We could lose a bunch of those people
Off thread comment. My apologies, Jeff.
If you haven’t seen “United 93”, I urge you to do so.
Thank you.
You know, it is pretty damn hard to believe the competence of the CIA when that very agency gives a NOC’s spouse a green light to write a book, go on a speaking tour, and become a national celebrity. WTF on that one. That’s like developing the stealth bomber at LAX. Let’s do the Manhattan project in Time’s square. God, how about doing the very minimum for security, guys?
Is it possible that we can get a good, old-fashioned fascist black-boots-in-the-middle-of-the-night, overthrow-your-oriental-despot-for-kicks Syriana secret agency? For once? What a worthless bunch of incompetents; you cannot make this stuff up, I swear it.
I think Steve in Houston has it about right, but I question why any effort should be expended in analyzing anything presented on Hard Ball (or Times Select for that matter)?
I mean, absent secondhand discussion, no one (other than true and/or paying believers) would ever see or hear of these leftward opinions, right?
And exactly what was Valerie doing before the Novak article that she couldn’t do after the article. Are we to assume that there are Iranian hit squads in the U.S. (specifically Georgetown and Langley) prepared to kill any analyst they can identify as working on their program?
If true, Valerie’s and the CIA’s response to the outing was odd. Instead of rushing her to a safe house surrounded by armed agents, she and hubby hit the “talk show”, “Magazine spread”, “DC cocktail party” circuit.
So here’s reality. She was an analyst working on WMD’s with emphasis on Iran. The story breaks and she is “outed” on an unrelated matter (getting her husband work at her company). In the real word, she goes back to her desk at Langley the day after the article and does the same job she did the day before. Except, the real outing was her association with hubby who is a traitor. So she has to retire. Because there is a new sheriff in town (Porter Goss) and, being an overachiever, he’s trying to ease traitors and their associates out of the CIA. Her career ended the day she hooked up with Lying Joe Wilson, not the day Robert Novak reported that association. Too bad it took this long to formally end that career.
Hmmm… a blonde, white woman (whom I’m guessing doesn’t even speak farsi) doing non-official cover in Iran. Yeah. Totally plausible.
Especially seeing as how she was driving to Langley every day. And she was described as a “managerial type” in internal memos. And she was officially listed on embassy staff at one time- which blows all possible cover out of the water.
But other than those little nitpicks, I am totally buying this story.
And we know they care about getting darn good intelligence, and don’t want to make any mistakes based on it.
…and am I the only one who saw her on the National Press Dinner video?
You know, walking around in front of the cameras, laughing, like disseminating her face to the entire country on national television was no big deal. You’d almost think she didn’t think it mattered who recognized her face, or that it would make any difference to national security…
But then, we knew that after she had her photo spread in Vanity Fair, didn’t we?
If she was so important, then why was she and her husband endangering her cover to make cheap, dishonest, political attacks on President Bush in 2003?
Hmmmm.
Frankly if you consider how craptacular the CIA’s predictions have been concerning every damn thing in the fucking world, it’s a good thing she’s no longer employed there.
Let’s be serious here folks. The CIA is full of people who couldn’t predict when a Dominoes pizza guy would deliver even after they tell you “30 minutes or less”.
Dump the CIA
Bring back the OSS
Blow shit up
Whack people for even talking about attacking America
We’ve been trying for the “let’s be friends” thing for 30 years now and it hasn’t worked. I say fuck it, let’s be feared instead. Do terrorists talk about attacking China? No because if they did the Chinese would simply kill them and sell their organs on the black market.
Its not.
Did you guys hear a troll buzzing?
Geez guys,
14 posts and no one has said it?
Ignore Acthole!
Isn’t it Vercingetorix’s job to remind us?
Damn. A couple of months ago, when I was all tuned up on this stuff, nobody was talking about it much.
The story then, was that several Washington translators were passing along sensitive information.
The surprising part, to me at least, was that they were not canned or penalized as one would expect. They were allowed to continue on at their jobs.
At that point the accounts became more complex and less specific.
This overview came from respected sources and I was left with the impression that the translators may be fed dis-information or that there was more to be gained in other ways if they stayed on the job.
I was also left with the idea that some of these translators were very specialized and it was no simple matter to bounce them from the job.
Sorry, no links to back this up now. If memory comes up with a clue, I*ll provide a link when I find it.
My point here is, I was amazed they just didn*t promptly jail info-leakers. TG
If she was so very important to the US, why in the world would anyone that knew it be gossiping about her? Either she wasn’t that important or those that knew how important she was (CIA) didn’t protect her from the gossips.
Whoever Shuster’s source was should be fired, as Mary McCarthy was fired. The source should also be prosecuted, if that is possible. This is a disclosure—if it is even true, which I doubt—which could harm our ability to carry out intelligence right now in Iran.
To the Dems this is just a game. To some of us, though, national security is something much more serious. It’s easy to forget this, but THERE ARE PEOPLE OUT THERE WHO WANT TO KILL US. And I’m not just talking about Howard Dean and Ward Churchill. Islamofascists get their jollies beheading people. Let’s not make it easier for them to do that, even if it suits your policial purposes.
Jeff,
Valerie Plame had her twins in 2000, just a little bit after we had ours. I can tell you with all honesty she was not working on much the first year and would not be traveling much for the first two years. She was on the analyst side for sure when she sent Joe to Niger in 2002. Her NOC status was when she was stationed in Greece at the Athens US Embassy in the mid 1990’s. She returned to the US i 1997 because Aldrich Ames had exposed her – possibly ruining her NOC status. The twins definitely pulled her from the front ranks.
C’mon folks. Use your imagination. Can’t you picture her in a one piece bathing suit, wearing a pair Joey’s 38/32 levis with one of his Washington power ties as a belt to hold them up under her pregnant out to Omaha belly, full with twin fetuses, while she strolls the mean streets of Tehran to infiltrate the inner workings of the Ayatollah’s WMD program. Now that’s DEEP cover.
Chris Matthews’
Hardball ?
an “outed” CIA officer Valerie Plame ?
a non-official cover (NOC) officer,
who was part of an operation tracking
1. distribution
2. acquisition of weapons of mass destruction technology
3. to and from Iran ? “Iran” ?
ask me if I care…
ask me if I ever carred
who gives a flying [ f…….. ]
how much more web resources and blog space
is this pathetic case going to consume
who cares and for that matter
Hardball…?
Chris Matthews ?
MSNBC …
you must be kidding…
How can someone that pulls into the Langley parking lot every day be considered “under cover”?
Doesn’t the CIA provide bleachers along that road for the foreign agents’ comfort?
Again, how can anyone ever not appreciate this Super-Agent Plame/Wilson thing? I mean, does something this special only come along once in a lifetime? From cracking the evil one’s lies about the peaceful Saddam, to unravelling the secret of Iran’s nuclear program–we are truly blessed to have been alive to witness this.
And I for one will be eternally grateful.
Nice ttile, Jeff. I can so totally see Joe and Valerie as Sonny and Cher.
Except that Sonny had, y’know, good sense (except when it came to avoiding trees on the ski slopes, which, I’ll never forgive him for that).
Shorter Jeff Goldstein:
Even if Plame was working on Iran-related issues, the leak was still OK because (a) the CIA has more than one person working on Iran, and (b) Plame wasn’t James Bond, anyway. Secondly, this story is just as likely a result of an elaborate sting operation to catch rogue Democrats in the CIA—or, if it’s not, it’s probably just those same rogue Democrats leaking in the vain hope that they can take the focus off of the burdgeoning McCarthy scandal, which implicates half of Democratic Washington in a plot to undermine the foreign policy of a democratically elected administration and is sure to be the silver bullet which saves the Republican majorities this fall.
Furthmore, we can’t trust these anonymous sources, because that wouldn require believing that the Bushes burned someone important to analyzing intelligence re Iran just to fend off Wilson’s charges—even though there is plenty of credible reporting indicating that (a) Wilson’s charges were viewed as a plausible threat to the President’s reelection; (b) the White House Iraq Group initiated a concerted action to discredit Wilson in the press; (c) and both Rove and Libby have testified that they didn’t know about Plame’s classified status or what job she performed within the CIA. So, yeah, it’s totally far-fetched that they would have burned Ms. Plame if she were actually working on Iran-related intelligence.
As TM points out over at Just One Minute, Shuster and the truth ain’t ezackly brokeback buddies…
shorter M.F.
I do too much glue.
great moniker “M.F.”
TW: student (from dartmouth no less)
This report, of course, contradicts what was said previously on Plame’s status in the Agency. If she was truly working as an analyst or manager from a desk at Langley, then I don’t see how she was under NOC at the time. Perhaps she was trained and eligible for a NOC position, but that’s not quite the same as being there.
In addition, we need some more explanation as to how the efforts to track Iran’s nuclear capability were diminished. Nothing that CIA does is a one-man shop, so my guess is that when she was exposed it probably diminished their capability for a short time while someone else got up to speed.
As they say in the intelligence community, this report is far from actionable intelligence, especially given the obvious political motives that probably inspired it.
MF,
What kind of idiot goes international superstar when their wife is deep cover? According to you, Joe Wilson does. The whole thing stinks to high heaven.
After a multi-year multimillion $ investigation, nobody is charged with ‘outing’ VP. Strike against you.
She was working at Langley, nowhere near Iran. Strike against you.
She is part of Joe Wilson’s story. She vouched for him. Strike against you.
Joe Wilson went on a trip that had no classification status. That is not SOP. Strike against you.
Joe Wilson gave an oral report. Not a written report, an oral report. That is not SOP. Strike against you.
Wilson confirmed suspicions of Iraq’s nuclear shopping. Strike against you.
Wilson lied about it. Strike against you.
The Brits back up the claim. Give me MI5 any day of the week over the Christians-in-action. Strike against you.
Add up the columns, tough guy. They ain’t looking so good for your side. Your sainted Wilson is fishy. Your Plame 00XX super agent wasn’t.
PS. ignore actus,
for Jay
Yet another addition to the lexicon of the blogosphere:
shuster: v. to lie outrageously. e.g. Are you shustering me?
n. an outrageous lie. e.g. That’s a steaming load of shuster.
Well, if’n ya ask me, you could fertilize your roses with this “scoop.”
No, that’s not a compliment.
SB: george
dubya!
Possibly 7, if you count 000…not to mention pi and e, which fall in the same range.
And exactly what was Valerie doing before the Novak article that she couldn’t do after the article. Are we to assume that there are Iranian hit squads in the U.S. (specifically Georgetown and Langley) prepared to kill any analyst they can identify as working on their program?
And if so, why isn’t she dead yet?
Plame had already been blown to the Russians, and there is no reason to believe that the Russians are helping the US keep secrets from the Iranians given their cooperation with Iran on nuclear technology.
No one in their right mind in Langley thought that Plame was usable to “run a network”, the idea is beyond laughable.
All I know is that if a Dem had outed anyone even remotely associated with the CIA you all would have demanded blood. You know it, too.
Whoa, Roman, hold it right there. Keep your assumptions off of my body.
The CIA is a complete joke. They are a national disgrace. I’ll bet you a Coke/soda/pop that they DID believe Plame was A-Okay to run a network. The fact that they are wrong is just an indictment of their effectiveness.
I have great respect for their field teams. We need efficient field operators blacker than Shaka Zulu. But Langely’s fully-assed attempts to play cloak and dagger are demonstrably failures.
The first assumption for the CIA is incompetence, then evil.
logic man,
Chances are quite good that a Dem did out Plame, a Dem reporter.
But you’re wrong about the blood part. I’d prefer a long prison sentence. Think of the great first person tell all that might result.
Brokeback Reporter: So That’s Why They Call It Leaking
logic man, having a “top-secret” agent’s sugar-daddy go on the talk circuit is pure incompetence. Having a “top-secret” agent work at Langley of all places is pure incompetence. Sending some bum on a nonclassified mission of some national importance is dubious at best. Having said bum lie on the record about his findings is infuriating.
These weren’t noble civil servants here, but publicity-seekers. This isn’t rocket science, folks. Guess what, they got it.
Logic man,
Senator Patrick Leahy was executed by lethal injection on the orders of the Right Wing cabal for his outing a CIA agent.
I don’t think Aldrich Ames belonged to any American political party in any meaningful sense of the word. But I—and I’d venture to guess everyone else here—would be more than happy to join you in requesting the death penalty for Ames. Just start the petition.
I got into a huge argument with my brother-in-law over this, among many others, subject. He managed to dig up an interview with someone at the CIA, I don’t remember whom, if it was official or off-the-record, or when it was. In this article, it was stated that Plame was, in fact, doing some overseas work sometime in the 2002-2003 timeframe. If I can dig this article up, I’ll post it. If this is true, and not some sort of smoke screen, doesn’t that change her status slightly? The claim in the article was that this made her NOC status legitimate, and that her cover was blown.
Like I said, heat of the moment. I don’t have the original source, but it did seem to modify the situation.
Any thoughts?
Is it so hard to believe a CIA WMD analyst was working on Iran issues in 2003? What else would she have been doing? Shuster doesn’t report she was parachuting into Iran and single-handedly disarming the country. His report seems entirely plausible.
We had already made up our minds on Iraq’s WMD, so Iran it was.
What cover? She was working out of Langley. The person she was sleeping with wrote a bestselling book and did the talk circuit. Either of those two points together violate good Operation Security for an undercover agent.
It’s a red herring.
On Glen Greenwald’s Unclaimed Territory, there’s an excellent desconsruction of memes used by apologists, including Jeff himself, to disregard this bit news that makes the Bush Administration appear not only duplicitous, but also just plain stupid and myopic:
“It is a frenzied effort to defend the administration that is composed of every standard weapon in the Bush apologist arsenal—attacks on the motives of those who disclose the information, threats of criminal prosecution against those responsible, an insistence that the Leader’s Goodness precludes the truth of the accusations, and when all else fails, a simple fact-free refusal to believe that it’s true. There’s not yet any coordination or coherence to it because it’s driven by emotional instinct – the instinct to simply deny any fact that undermines the pro-Bush world-view. It’s just an undifferentiated outburst of denial and attack, all fueled by the overarching desire to defend the President.”
Well said… just read the comments (above), if you don’t believe me.
Why does her husband’s publicity matter? Its not a secret that she exists. Just that she supposedly was an agent.
Man, it’s sad to see people playing party games instead of dealing with the truth.
Stick to the basics: the administration sold out a CIA employee. If it had been a Democrat in office, you would not let it slide. Why the double standard?
If you were a real supporter of American security, this would never ever be okay.
Okay, Ames was much worse than anybody involved with this stuff. I don’t care if you’re on the left—and think Rove is a traitor—or on the right—and think Wilson is—but let’s not carried away with the comparisons here. Ames was above and beyond.
One problem, logic man. Here we are about two years deep into an intense investigation, and there has been no evidence that anyone in the administration outed Plame.
Got evidence? Turn it over to the Special Prosecutor.
Whaaa waaa…
Charlie,
No evidence that she was outed by anyone in the administration, *except* for the fact that she *was* outed—initially in an article by Bob Novak (whose source we now know to be Rove)… right? I mean, who else do you imagine might have done it—and for what purpose? Elves tryin’ desperately to save Christmas from the secular Liberals?
No, you stick to the basics, logic dude. You’ve got a lying, publicity-seeking hairdo who got sent to Niger by his wife who lied about his findings and has been thoroughly discredited by at least two bi-partisan panels and you and others keep distorting the plain facts. If Plame was “sold out”, why hasn’t Fitzy charged anyone with that crime? Here’s a hint: she wasn’t.
AMAZING! SIMPLY FUCKING AMAZING!
You guys can’t even be consistent. You bitch and moan and demand McCarthy’s head for supposedly leaking the info about Secret Prisons (which she and the CIA both categorically deny), but we find out Karl Rove not only outed Plame, he also may have successfully sabotaged her mission, and all you can do is bitch and moan about how incompetent the CIA is and how the source for this information should be brought up on charges!
A BIGGER BUNCH OF WHINY-ASSED TITTY BABIES CANNOT BE FOUND! TAKE SOME FUCKING RESPONSIBILITY FOR FUCK’S SAKE!
Jeff and others keep focusing on the “bipartisan” Senate Intelligence Committee report as the “silver bullet” that they feel kills any further discussion of what happened in the run up to war.
But y’all must know, at this point, that Senator Pat Roberts still owes the country the *second* part of his report. After all, the first report/investigation did not touch on whether the Bush Administration cherry-picked intelligence to support it’s case to invade Iraq. From Wikipedia: “A second phase of the investigation, which was to have addressed the way senior policymakers used the intelligence, has not yet been completed.”
Of course, with the GOP in charge, I’m doubtful we’ll ever see this part of the investigation completed… part (tho’ by no means all!) of the reason the GOP is so fearful that they’ll lose the House and/or Senate in the upcoming election.
Q.E.D. per my comment above: http://www.hillnews.com/thehill/export/TheHill/News/Frontpage/042506/news4.html
“Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), who chairs the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said he wants to divide his panel’s inquiry into the Bush administration’s handling of Iraq-related intelligence into two parts, a move that would push off its most politically controversial elements to a later time.”
Easy there, georgie. You might bust out of your corset. Lie down, dearie. You’ve got the vapors!
Oh, and Kelly and all the rest of you apologists for the criminal cartel which calls itself “The Bush Adminsitration:”
IT IS PUBLIC RECORD THAT KARL ROVE ADMITTED TO FITZGERALD THAT HE SPOKE TO NOVAK AND COOPER ABOUT VALERIE PLAME! THAT IS NOT OPINION. IT IS WHAT ROVE HIMSELF HAS STATED.
The reason Fitzgerald hasn’t brought an indictment against the traitor Rove is that the Law goerning the Espionage Act is very strict, making it difficult to prove that someone broke it with Malice Aforethought.
If any of you read anything other than the latest Republican Agitprop, you might have a clue.
kelly and charlie,
wasn’t scooter libby in the administration? i believe that is an indisputable fact, right?
even if he acted on his own, he was in the administration—he was the VP’s right hand man. doesn’t it upset you that someone that high up would betray the country? does your party mean more to you than protecting someone serving your country in good faith, regardless of the spouse’s politics?
and what happens if karl rove is indicted? what if he is convicted?
why would you stand behind these people? no one should blindly support a cause like this. it’s unamerican.
I have never apologized for this or any other adminsitration.
OMG GEORGEORWELL HAS DISCOVERED THE CAP LOCK, HE MUST BE RIGHT.
B MOE,
Another attempt at humor. You must be getting tired of no one ever laughing.
I snickered…
I’m hoping for a show on Comedy Central.
Get any funnier and you can headline at the White House Correspondent’s Dinner.
Sorry. I know that was low.
citation please?
oh, wait, wait, wait, i’m a little slow today. talking about and being the source are the same thing?
maggie,
He’s using the CAPS LOCK key … isn’t that enough?!! What more could you want?!!
My bullshit detector is going off–this doesn’t make sense, even by CIA standards. Plame supposedly is a NOC agent, and her NOC is as a CIA analyst working at CIA headquarters?
What is this, an XK-Red-27 technique?
Your right, Martin, my bad. No wait, maybe i’m waiting for a conviction of some sort? I’d also like my husband home, but them’s the breaks.
“Spoke to” does not by definition mean “told.” There is at least one source that quotes the conversation which Rove had with Novak where Novak already had the information about Plame and Rove merely confirmed it. And then another source reconfirmed by stating: “Oh. You already know about that.”
I think the condemnation of Rove seems premature. At least until the chain of events and conversations are clarified a little more. I’m not standing here ready to defend Rove to the end, but I don’t think his guilt is quite as apparent as some would have us believe.
shhhhhh, it’s sooper sekrit.
It was the perfect cover.
Jim in KC. See my post above about her being ‘overseas’ sometime in 2002/2003. Again, I don’t have the source for this. I’ve looked. I did read part of it during the big dust-up with my b-in-l. The claim is that her being overseas automatically qualifies her for NOC status under CIA rules.
Don’t know the reality around it, and it may be nothing more than an attempt to move the goal posts by a sympathizer at the CIA. I would like to better understand the reality behind the claims, though.
Point of clarification: by ‘overseas’ it wasn’t implied that she was being sent to a conference in London. She apparently was doing some investigative work, I think in Africa.
Jeez, georgie, calm down and ease off the caps lock key.
Now explain to us the left’s new-found tender concern for anyone in the CIA. Pop quiz: who are Frank Church and Jamie Gorelick? Time’s up, pencils down. Why don’t you just admit that you don’t really give a shit about Plame and at least be honest. Otherwise you appear to be just another poseur faking concern about national security to bolster your already considerable derangement with Bushco.
But that doesn’t make sense either, neither in this case nor as a general rule. It seems to imply a certain recklessness that seems likely to get people killed, or at least discovered, if they can bop in and out of Langley one day and “go undercover” the next.
Or am I just smoking crack to think that for a non-official cover to have even the slightest chance of success the person must have no discernible connection to the CIA?
Is Plame’s status at the time of the leak the issue the right is hung up on? She wasn’t NOC on that day? Isn’t it an important part of this discussion that at one time Valerie Plame worked overseas in countries where americans are watched and kept track of. Her movements and contacts were tracked. Even if this was 10 years ago its still significant to the security services of those countries that as it turns out Valerie Plame was a C.I.A. agent (try not to imagine Keanu Reeves in Point Break while reading that). Isn’t it also up to the CIA to decide if there was damage done by the revelation? Possibly damaging current projects with assets she recruited back then. What about the agents ‘working’ in the front company she used to ‘work’ in?
Ignore your political party and stifle your emotion and think about the issue objectively. It isn’t about her being outed when she was no longer NOC. Its about the fact that she was at one time NOC and THAT shouldn’t have been revealed. There is plenty of damage to be caused by outing former undercover agents.
-The Libturds are obsessively going to keep kicking this can down the road until it blows up in their faces like a Taco bell burrito thats been left in the car trunk for 5 weeks in the middle of august.
– The story just keeps getting more and more laden with unhinged bullshit “possibilities”. When it all turns out that some asshat ideolog Democrap cabal is behind all this, most of which is comically fabricated, then the tin-foil morons will be saying, “Well the story may be faked, but the facts are true anyway, because…. well you know thats what that MF ChimpyMcBush and his eeeevil sorcerer Rove WOULD do if they could have.” As Bugs Bunny would say. What a bunch of Maroons.
– But I really hope they dig their political burial hole deep before they and this crapola story blows up on them. Their all so unhinged they don’t have enough sense to get out of the way of that oncoming Mac truck, even when it hits the air horn loud and clear:
“Choooooot…McCarthy….. Chhooooot…..
McCarthy…..HuuuuWheeeep….. HuuuuWheeeep”
Jim in KC:
But that doesn’t make sense either, neither in this case nor as a general rule. It seems to imply a certain recklessness that seems likely to get people killed, or at least discovered, if they can bop in and out of Langley one day and “go undercover†the next.
Or am I just smoking crack to think that for a non-official cover to have even the slightest chance of success the person must have no discernible connection to the CIA?
Won’t argue with you there, but the issue seems to be a legal distinction. If the CIA’s rules say she’s a NOC under those circumstances then, as screwed up as that is, it might not be a moot point.
jg:
It isn’t about her being outed when she was no longer NOC. Its about the fact that she was at one time NOC and THAT shouldn’t have been revealed. There is plenty of damage to be caused by outing former undercover agents.
No, that’s not correct. If she hadn’t been under NOC designation for at least the previous 5 years, then revealing her status is not a crime. However, if she was NOC during the time frame that I address above, it could be an issue. Otherwise, she hadn’t been NOC since … 1997, I believe, which takes her outside of the protective envelope. The CIA considers the five year time frame to be enough to disassociate any assets tied to former agents. This was a big part of the argument when the Plame story first broke, because everyone was assuming, at the time, that her NOC status had expired more than 5 years previously.
– The whole thing IS a moot point. I can’t sight the link, but I remember one of her own case officers stated openly and clearly she was an analyst, not an operative, and that its just not possible that she was ever NOC, nor was she ever in NY in an official CIA cover slot. Unless he was lying for some unfathonable reason, I’d say he would probably know a little better than the partisan hacks at the NYTrash. But keep on truckin moonies. Judgement day is on the horizon.
wordy gurdy: The new Liberal paradigm is you no longer need any evidence, just a good rumor campaign will do the job.
’The CIA considers the five year time frame to be enough to disassociate any assets tied to former agents. ‘
Yet it was the CIA that asked for the investigation. Maybe we’re getting all hung up on her status when that’s not the real issue, or what was damaged. Maybe there is real damage done, classified damage we don’t know about that prompted the CIA to get this investigated. We don’t know but since there is an investigation I don’t understand how the right can just act like this is all just lefty bullshit in action.
Like I said above she had worked overseas in countries where americans are tracked. Previously those countries had a record of a Valerie Plame and all they had was that she was a worker in a consulting company, completely legit. Now they know she was CIA. How can there not be repercussion from that?
Big Bang:
I’d love to see that. I would agree with you there, if that’s the claim.
jg:
But given how screwed up the CIA is, I don’t know that that is necessarily a ringing endorsement of her status (former or current). And in answer to your last question, it seems pretty obvious that the maybe you pose earlier also leans the other way. Maybe there wasn’t damage. Maybe, in fact, there is no repercussion whatsoever. It’s very easy to conceive of the possibility that all of her contacts are now completely dry and of no use to anyone, on either side. I think you are trying to assert as fact what can only be guessed at.
”…[I] don’t understand how the right can just act like this is all just lefty bullshit in action.
– Because this entire pile of crap has been gone over ad nausea, and shown to be nothing but another Liberal “Get Bush” AnythingGate, pissed because the Pres only had to legally declassify the NEI report, and that plus the 9/11 commission findings exposed Wilson for the lying partisan hack he is. But thats just not enough for the eternally obsessed. All it takes is yet another Liberal talking head to dump some more rumor, unsubtantiated, un-sourced, doesn’t matter, and the moonbat brigade spins after it like a heliocopter with one rotor missing.
Something to add to the mix.
jg,
If she ever was an operative her cover was blown as soon as she started reporting to Langley as an analyst.
From wiki. First, under “Reactions of former CIA officers”:
Next, under “Regarding Plame’s status as covert”:
Given what they say about how “It is not clear how Mr. Rustmann, who left the Agency in 1990, would know this [that she wasn’t shy about sharing her status], since Plame is said to have gone undercover after 1990”, I think the same could be said about Larry Johnson: since he left in ‘93, how does he know what her status was in 2001, 2002, 2003?
At least we have some quotes to play with now. Not sure how reliable Wiki’s judgements are about this, though.
– After reading that piece Jeff, added to what we already know, in particular Fitzgeralds sudden reticence to produce the records he loudly proclaimed made it “neccessary to continue this investigation”, it becomes even more evident that Miller and the Eds at the NYT probably saw thier vulnerability in this early on and decided to just “read it into the public discourse” in such a way that it could be esily mis-interpreted by a power starved party that would leap tall buildings with a single bound if they thought they could get something on Bushco. If this plays out the way its looking it will, Fitzy is toast, and the NYT et al may still be called to account.
I still think theres a connection between this scam and McCartys involvment, or possibly others acting in concert with her. We know from her own words she talked to Priest more than a dozen times, what about Miller or other reporters, or cable/TV news people?
Wow. That was interesting. I’d love to see a timeline with all of this new stuff inserted. Seems pretty damning to Fitzgerald’s case. I love the idea that it might have been Wilson who actually ‘outted’ Plame.
No Fitzmas for the Kossacks!
’Maybe there wasn’t damage. Maybe, in fact, there is no repercussion whatsoever. ‘
That’s true. Maybe there wasn’t but then why did the CIA ask for an investigation?
‘If she ever was an operative her cover was blown as soon as she started reporting to Langley as an analyst.
‘
I don’t get this line of thought. Are there people watching the CIA entrance to see if anyone who works there was once overseas pretending not to work for the CIA?
Maybe she wasn’t a ‘spy’, maybe she had a simple clerical role in Brewster Jennings. Her outing hasn’t burned any assets she recruited or jeopardized any ops she once worked on. Her role was minor enough CIA didn’t feel her working at Langley would be an issue, she’s unlikely to be recognized by a foreign agent who would blow Brewster Jennings cover. She was such a minor figure she could work openly as an analyst back in the States. That is unless someone causes a front page headline in major international newspapers declaring that the Valerie Plame of Brewster Jennings was a CIA agent.
As far as this being a wet dream of the anti-Bush left I can’t really say. It seems to me though that whether she was covert or wore a badge doesn’t matter as far as how I view Bush in this issue. His administration still did this in response to Wilson speaking out and thats just petty. How can the administration ever look good here?
– You’re going to look pretty much the ass jg, if this ends in the way most people that have looked at the whole case realistically think it will, with the backdrop of the other 22 “AnythingGate” breathless outrages that have chrashed and burned leading up to it. But hey. Knock yourself out.
– Even if the Right was unaware that this is all the left has, lacking even the most rudementary party plan, substituted liberally with the “We’re not Bush” prang, even in those circustances you’d have to be a door stop not to see through this.
jg,
Because “[Bush’s] administration still did this in response to Wilson speaking out and thats just petty” is a stinking, bald-faced lie. It was a lie when it was invented and it’s a lie every time it’s repeated.
You’re just indulging in frantic handwaving, having had the “you’re another” sneer blow back in your face. Even if your assertions were true, if the Administration deserves censure for exposing Valerie, Mary McCarthy belongs in jail or worse, as do a fair number of reporters. You want a double standard. We’re not inclined to grant it to you.
Regards,
Ric
So it had nothing to do with discrediting his assertion that Cheney sent him?
Are you confusing me with someone else you had an argument with? I never mentioned McCarthy. And my assertion is that they exposed a heck of a lot more than Plame. It doesn’t look like she was covert but that doesn’t mean there wouldn’t be repercussions from broadcasting her info to the world.
BTW what does this mean?
Your question would be a very good one if it were not rhetorical, and directed at people who have no way of answering it. Only the idiots at CIA who requested the referral can answer it.
And since they never even bothered to do a damage assessment from Planme’s “outing,” there would seem to be a rather embarrassingly large number of $64,000 questions being posed only rhetorically, when they ought to be posed for the purpose of getting answers.
Logic Man  Been there, done that, buried the agent, Leahy’s still in the Senate. Next point?
<a href=”http://www.firedoglake.com/” target=”_blank”>
A timeline for all of you who believe Rove is not a traitor. You don’t have to believe the site it’s on, just follow the links.
But I doubt that will happen, as then you won’t be able to continue your mental masturbation.
And, because a few of you really have comprehension problems, once again, both the CIA and McCarthy have denied that she leaked to the press information about secret prisons. So those of you who keep harping on that point are just out and out liars! But that seems to go with this site, for its obvious that Jeffy-boy has a high regard for truthiness.
enough said