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October 02, 2003 THE ORIGIN OF THE PLAME AFFAIR....Nick Confessore muses about how the Plame affair got started:
Nick is a very sharp guy and I'm loathe to disagree with him, but....I'm going to disagree with him on this. This is rank speculation, of course, but what the hell. Read no further if rank speculation raises your blood pressure. My guess is that after Wilson's op-ed came out, a few White House folks got together to decide how to react to it. Nothing unusual about that. And it was a pretty ruthless conversation. Nothing unusual about that either. That's how Washington works. And someone suggested that they play up the angle that Wilson did nothing more than sit around a hotel pool drinking mint tea. Check. And someone else remarked that no one in the White House had ever seen Wilson's trip report anyway. Check. And there was lots of other evidence for the Niger uranium connection that Wilson didn't know about. Check. And Wilson is just a partisan shill interested in bashing the Bush administration. Check. And then someone casually mentioned that, hell, did you know Wilson's wife works at the Agency? Some kind of analyst or something. They probably only sent him because she suggested it. And the response was: Check. When you're talking to reporters about Wilson, be sure to throw that in. Helps to show that he wasn't really qualified for the trip in the first place. Plus it sends the right message to anyone else thinking of ratting on us. Good work guys. Let's wrap this up. And I suspect that was all the thought they gave it. It didn't really occur to them that Plame was — or perhaps used to be — covert, and they didn't think to check on it. It was just one of several good talking points. In other words, there probably wasn't any intention to expose a covert agent, and therefore nobody's broken the law. And that makes it even worse. These guys probably didn't poke around and consciously decide that outing Plame wasn't likely to do any damage. They just didn't even think about it. And these are the people running our country. POSTSCRIPT: On the other hand, maybe I'm still being too generous toward these guys. Maybe they did know she was covert and deliberately decided to go ahead anyway. But you know what? Even after everything they've done, I still don't want to believe that about them. UPDATE: In comments below, Shermaclay makes a pretty compelling argument that I'm wrong. The fact that the leakers deliberately used her maiden name is, indeed, telling, and his other points are good too. Posted by Kevin Drum at October 2, 2003 05:09 PM | TrackBackComments
Hm. If they didn't know, then that would presumably give them an out under the law, and there'd be no reason not to give themselves up, resign, and accept a cushy sinecure at New Bridge helping to sell Iraq by the pound. If they're stalling, damaging Bush in the process, then they probably know full well that they'd qualify for the full weight of the law. Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 05:13 PM | PERMALINKIn addition, they would know full well that they'd have good chances of getting a pardon, and excellent employment prospects in the next GOP administration. Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 05:15 PM | PERMALINKEr, I guess they wouldn't need a pardon if they weren't convictable. Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 05:15 PM | PERMALINKYes, but it makes such a nice back-up, either way. The cover-up, IMHO, doesn't really indicate that they knew that they were breaking the law. It's the way that this administration has worked from before it took office - lie, lie again, and have the media lap it up. Posted by: Barry at October 2, 2003 05:22 PM | PERMALINKHard to see how they could have learned her name and connection to Wilson without also knowing she was covert. Posted by: rea at October 2, 2003 05:23 PM | PERMALINKBut do you think the CIA would have gone as nuclear over this if there wasn't the perception that this was a deliberate leak? Further, assuming the leaker is Libby, then you've got his own personal animosity with the CIA, from the days hanging out correcting analysts Iraq reports, that might suggest more personal vindictiveness than carelessness. If he was working with Plame on the Iraq info, he would be very aware of her status, and probably very cranky if she's as spunky as her husband is. Posted by: emptywheel at October 2, 2003 05:26 PM | PERMALINKThe main thing for this scenario is that somebody needs to fess up quick and take his or her medicine, because nobody's going to believe it if they keep stalling. Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 05:28 PM | PERMALINKThat might give them an out on the covert opertive law but not on the law regarding classified info. Whoever said 'did you know Wilson's wife works at the Agency?' to politicos would be criminally responsibile for the outing. Posted by: lloyd at October 2, 2003 05:29 PM | PERMALINKI disagree with Kevin's analysis. The choices are that things went pretty much like Kevin said or that they intentionally outed her covert status to get revenge and intimidate other whistle blowers. Here's why I think Option B is more likely. 1) The leaker used her maiden name. It is unusual to use her maiden name if you merely want to make Joe Wilson look like the beneficiary of nepotism. In that event, you merely have to say that his wife helped him get the assignment or Mrs. Wilson did so. It would be more natural to refer to her married name since that is what people would expect to see and what people in Washington know her by. Making a point of using her maiden name, which she used overseas, helps only to out her status as a covert agent, not to further the nepotism argument. 2) The leaker used the word operative. That is the magic word that means she’s undercover. The leaker would have no need to use the word operative to make the nepotism point. He could have said merely that she worked at the CIA or pressured her CIA colleagues or some such. And there is no way that I will believe that Novak, who has been in Washington for decades and is very interested in intelligence issues, isn’t keenly aware of the difference between an analyst and an operative. 3) Five out of six reporters turned the story down. If it was just a line about how Wilson got the job through nepotism, why not throw it into their long stories about Niger, the 16 words, etc.? They declined because this was explosive stuff that they didn’t want to be part of. 4) They told Joe Wilson what was coming. At least Andrea Mitchell
and, according to Wilson, some of the other reporters called him after
they were approached and told him they had been approached. I don’t
think they’d do that if it was just the minor story that the
administration was claiming he got the job through nepotism. That kind
of story is Politics 101. That the reporters took the unusual step of
calling him about a story they weren’t going to carry themselves
indicates that they were warning him that something big and 5) A senior administration official said so. According to Mike
Allen’s story,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11208-2003Sep27.html, Saying Wilson got his job through nepotism is not revenge. That’s trying to undercut the impact of his arguments. Outing his wife is revenge. Posted by: Shermaclay at October 2, 2003 05:29 PM | PERMALINKSaying Wilson got his job through nepotism is not revenge. That’s trying to undercut the impact of his arguments. Outing his wife is revenge. That's the MO of this administration. They don't just try to discredit you, they hurt you, and they hurt your family. They knew. Posted by: Boronx at October 2, 2003 05:36 PM | PERMALINKlloyd writes: "That might give them an out on the covert opertive law but not on the law regarding classified info" There ain't no such general law regarding classifed information. Which, unfortunately, is a good thing, considering how easy it is to classify stuff. Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 05:36 PM | PERMALINKI can follow all that, except this part: "Plus it sends the right message to anyone else thinking of ratting on us." If the leakers weren't aware that they were blowing Plame's cover, what sort of harm were they trying to inflict, that would send a "message"? Besides the implication that Wilson was riding his wife's coat-tails, so to speak. But that doesn't carry over to other administration critics. Either they deliberately ruined her career or they didn't. They can't have it both ways. And the "intimidation" angle doesn't really work for me; maybe it's an inside Washington thing. Posted by: Grumpy at October 2, 2003 05:41 PM | PERMALINKExcellent comment, Shermaclay. I found Kevin's analysis -- rank speculation though it may be -- reasonably compelling. But you've nicely shown why it is probably flawed. So what's worse? Ineptness and hubris that leads to the exposure of a CIA operative, or craven indifference to the consequences? Kevin suggests that he finds the former more comforting, but I don't. I find either option to be alarming. Posted by: Marsman at October 2, 2003 05:44 PM | PERMALINKOoh, shermaclay has some good points. 3 & 5 depend on the Sunday WaPo article, but I'm certainly crediting that pretty highly in this, ahem, information-starved environment. 1 & 2 are very reasonable speculation and 4 seems pretty tough to get around. Good stuff. Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 05:47 PM | PERMALINKWhether or not the guy who called the reporters knew she was covert or not doesn't matter (although I agree with all Sherman Clay's points). Someone with authorized access to her identity, who would have had to know she was covert, either released the information directly to the journalists or released it to the (unauthorized) political types who called the media. Either way someone broke the law. There's simply no other way it could have happenend. The CIA sure as hell didn't release the identity to anyone unauthorized. Posted by: flory at October 2, 2003 05:49 PM | PERMALINKWe are attaching a whole lot of significance to the word "operative." Novak says he's used it hundreds of times over the last 40 years. This can be easily confirmed. I found two examples after a quick search of the Chicago Sun-Times online archives alone. I'm sure there are countless others: http://www.suntimes.com/terror/stories/cst-edt-novak24.html http://www.townhall.com/columnists/robertnovak/rn20030807.shtml The archives on the Sun-Times website only appears to go back to 2001 or so. I'm sure that one could pull microfilms of Novak's old columns and find scores of other instances in which he's used the term "operative" to refer to non-CIA personnel. Posted by: Joe Schmoe at October 2, 2003 05:52 PM | PERMALINKSomebody who's a Flash whiz should do an online animated "Clue" game. Call it "Plue". Use little cartoon people with the heads of the "Senior Administration Officials" Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 05:52 PM | PERMALINKAnother thing to keep in mind: if this gets down to the nitty gritty, the WH's case that the CIA wasn't actively maintaining her covert status may hang on whether or not Novak really did tell the truth about his 'CIA source' -- ie, he might have to reveal this source, or lack thereof, in whatever legal proceedings happen. Flory -- it does seem conceivable that she might have been seen at Langley and somebody put 2 and 2 together. Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 05:54 PM | PERMALINKSchmoe, check this out, from the NY Daily News "Two former senior intelligence officials confirmed that Valerie Plame, 40, is an operations officer in the spy agency's directorate of operations - the clandestine service. Plame "ran intelligence operations overseas," said Vincent Cannistraro, former CIA counterterrorism operations chief. Her specialty in the agency's nonproliferation center was biological, chemical and nuclear weapons and "recruiting agents, sending them to areas where they could access information about proliferation matters, weapons of mass destruction," Cannistraro said. Cannistraro called Plame's outing a "dirty trick." "Her assets may be at risk," he said. "I think that's what justified the probe." (End quote) Note that Cannistraro was a supporter of the Iraq war. Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 05:57 PM | PERMALINKJoe Schmoe, but the kicker is that here he knew he was talking about a CIA employee, and he has to know what the word means in that context. Can't just throw it around. So Mr. Novak, you have a choice, idiot or liar? Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 05:57 PM | PERMALINKMaybe the reporters didn't run the story about Wilson's wife becuase they thought that it was uninteresting, rather than explosive. I still don't undestand the fuss about her maiden name. Wow, what a brilliant cover. This just shows how ingenious the CIA is. They tell married agents to use their maiden names, not their married names. The KGB was never able to penetrate this subterfuge. Now the White House has blown it for everyone. Those traitors! Maybe Ms. Plame used her maiden name in everyday life. Plenty of women with careers do. My own wife does. Giving her name to the reporters allows them to confirm her identiy with the CIA. You can't very well call CIA Human Resources and ask, "hey, does Joe Wilson's wife work for you?" To verify the employee's employment, you need to have the employee's name. Posted by: Joe Schmoe at October 2, 2003 05:57 PM | PERMALINKSchmoe writes: (GOING DOWN! MUST SWITCH TO TALKING POINT 4!) "I still don't undestand the fuss about her maiden name" Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 05:59 PM | PERMALINKJoe Schmoe, I don't think you've actually adressed the point he's made in #1. Nobody is arguing that her using her maiden name was cover in the sense of a 'disguise' or anything. Her cover was that she worked for an energy company. Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 06:01 PM | PERMALINKIn other words, there probably wasn't any intention to expose a covert agent, and therefore nobody's broken the law. Regardless of whether it was rooted in malice or ignorance, it is a crime nonetheless. Just under different (lesser) laws.. don't make me look it up (then again I may be thinking UCMJ..) Posted by: bubba at October 2, 2003 06:03 PM | PERMALINKBy the way I think your point: they thought that it was uninteresting, rather than explosive-- is a good one, but I think it's undercut by shermaclay's #4. Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 06:04 PM | PERMALINKAssuming that Valerie Plame was an undercover CIA operative, nobody without a sufficiently high clearance and a need to know should have known that she worked for the CIA at all. (I can imagine that an undercover agent might have a cover as a non-covert CIA analyst, but that wasn't the case here.) If anyone in the administration knew that she was with the CIA, but didn't know enough to keep his mouth firmly shut about it, that in itself would be a serious security leak. Novak, after he was given Valerie Plame's name, supposedly spoke to someone at the CIA. They asked him not to use her name, but (according to Novak) didn't imply that doing so would endanger any lives. What should his CIA contact have told him? If he had told Novak, "Yes, she's an undercover operative", wouldn't that have been a further leak? What do you do if the only way to prevent a leak is to leak more information (and trust Novak to keep it to himself)? Posted by: Keith Thompson at October 2, 2003 06:06 PM | PERMALINKThe answer to #4 could be that they wanted to check with both sides of the story before running it. Presumabaly you don't just run with whatever the White House tells you. This has got to be especially true in Washington, where elected officials routinely try to manipulate the press. Posted by: Joe Schmoe at October 2, 2003 06:08 PM | PERMALINKRafe Colburn proposes a theory that I think is pretty plausible: that the original leaker, whoever it was, was not attempting to get revenge against Wilson (which could have been done in any number of more direct ways), but was just attempting to substantiate the notion that Cheney's office hadn't requested or read Wilson's report. And somebody else, whose identity I do not remember now, proposed a theory that jibes with what Andrea Mitchell has been saying: that the six phone calls mentioned in the Washington Post actually occurred after Novak's column, and were by Rove or some minion of his, pushing the story. Put these two things together and you have a hypothetical timeline that makes sense to me. Libby and Cheney attempt to cover their butts and leak Plame's real occupation to Novak as substantiation for that. Novak prints the name, as he wasn't supposed to. Then Karl Rove sees this in the paper, smells an opportunity to smear Wilson (any illegal damage is already done, after all), and goes to town. Of course, I'm just spinning my fancy imaginings here... Posted by: Matt McIrvin at October 2, 2003 06:08 PM | PERMALINKRecall that there's a report that Plame was involved with consultations with the NSC over WMDs. It was said that she wasn't there personally, however. Nevertheless, this is where I believe someone in the White House became aware of her employment by the CIA. As much as I'd prefer the more sinister narration of the events in question (because I'd prefer that there was no question these folks broke the law), over the last two days I've become pretty convinced of a version much like Kevin's (only including the part I mention above). Mostly because it has the virtue of explaining some things that are otherwise apparently inexplicable. Like the utter stupidity of blowing the cover of a NOC operative who worked on WMD and ran agents in the field. It's possible that they could have been as recklessly malicious as so many suspect. But especially with this administration, it difficult to overestimate their capacity for incompetence coupled with an arrogant thoughtlessness. Posted by: Keith M Ellis at October 2, 2003 06:08 PM | PERMALINKI don't think they should have admitted that she works at the CIA at all. That said, I think there's good odds that Novak's CIA source is a convenient fiction. I guess we'll find out if the WH needs this source in trying to prove that the CIA wasn't actively maintaining her covert status. Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 06:09 PM | PERMALINKShe doesn't have to maintain the fiction of her cover at work, or when writing memos and giving briefings at the White House. Posted by: Joe Schmoe at October 2, 2003 06:10 PM | PERMALINKWilson's piece is innocuous. He says he went to Niger and talked to some knowledgeable people. He concludes that it wold be very difficult to divert a significant quantity of yellowcake and that Iraq didn't seriously try. Then he speculates that there was a pattern of misuse of data like his to promote the war. The most inflammatory word he used was "twist". But a reader is free to take it or leave it. And the Administration cold easily have pointed out that Niger is only one country, he only looked at part of the picture, they had a British source blah blah blah. If they bothered to respond at all. Some real airhead stuff appears on the Sunday NYT op-ed page, and probably very vew opinions were changed by Wilson's piece. What led to the ferocious response may have been that they perceived him as acting for the State Dept or CIA, and the NYT piece as an escalation in a bureaucratic war. Someone knew that his wife was CIA and figured she'd put him up to it. So they decided to send the CIA a message. Absent her covert status, the general public wouldn't care where she worked. It was just a bureaucratic dirty trick, and Novak garbled it with the nepotism accusation. Another interesting point is that the whole story had been sitting out in the open with no big media touching it for 11 weeks. Then last week someone leaked the story of multiple approaches to newsman. That made it blow up, and is probably why Bush is muttering about getting all the leaks. It would be interesting to know how long the Post sat on that story. Posted by: Roger Bigod at October 2, 2003 06:11 PM | PERMALINKThe answer to #4 could be that they wanted to check with both sides of the story before running it. Why would you check something that you were uninterested in? Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 06:11 PM | PERMALINKCan I just say as an aside how pissed off I am how many times the press has let members of this administration get off with the "I didn't read that" defense. They took us to war and they didn't read the Nat'l Intelligence Estimate, or Wilson's report, etc etc. Frankly I don't know which is worse, lying or not reading the damn thing in the first place. Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 06:18 PM | PERMALINKJoe, operative has a number of different meanings. When you're referring to CIA personnel (as compared to, say, "GOP operative"), it has a very specific meaning. I don't think Novak has claimed that he doesn't understand this. Accordingly, your counter-examples don't mean a thing. Posted by: PaulB at October 2, 2003 06:23 PM | PERMALINKI think Wilson said there were "two waves" of leaks. The Post story that made the whole thinkg blow up was of 6 reporters contacted before Novak's column, no? Then Wilson got some calls from repporters with the "fair game" line. Then on July 21 or 22 he complained in public and implied that his wife was covert. After that the calls stopped. Perhaps up until Wilson's complaint the leakers didn't think about her status. If that's true, it would be interesting to have seen the facial expressions when they realized they had um copulated with the immature canine. Posted by: Roger Bigod at October 2, 2003 06:24 PM | PERMALINKDoes the specific statute say "knowingly"? If not, what happened to "ignorance of the law is no excuse"? Posted by: nomad at October 2, 2003 06:24 PM | PERMALINKIssa: I'll grant you its conceivable, but the trail of coincidences is pretty long. Its not like Wilson and his wife were partying with the Bush crowd so how would anyone at the WH have known she was his wife then later seen her around CIA and made the connection? Keith M. Ellis: Under your scenario, the ones who would've become aware of her identity had authorized access. If they then passed it on to anyone unauthorized that's the crime. Full Stop. Posted by: Flory at October 2, 2003 06:25 PM | PERMALINKFlory writes: "I'll grant you its conceivable, but the trail of coincidences is pretty long. Its not like Wilson and his wife were partying with the Bush crowd so how would anyone at the WH have known she was his wife then later seen her around CIA and made the connection?" Functions at the Saudi embassy? Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 06:30 PM | PERMALINKIts not like Wilson and his wife were partying with the Bush crowd so how would anyone at the WH have known she was his wife then later seen her around CIA and made the connection? As someone pointed out somewhere else (credit where credit is due!), that $1,000 to the Bush campaign the Wilsons gave was almost certainly for attending a dinner. Just a thought. Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 06:30 PM | PERMALINKI found the analysis very plausible up to the point where they wrapped it up and didn't give it another thought. The actions taken after the fact were too willful, as Shermaclay points out. If the story only wound up in Novak's lap, then maybe the casual attitude Kevin implies was taken fits more neatly. But six reporters - that indicates some higher degree of deliberation; a campaign. Posted by: Freddy Vidal at October 2, 2003 06:32 PM | PERMALINKYes, a campaign to discredit Wilson by implying that he got his job through nepotism. Not a campaign to endanger the lives of CIA assets throughout the world. Posted by: Joe Schmoe at October 2, 2003 06:37 PM | PERMALINKYes, a campaign to discredit Wilson by implying that he got his job through nepotism. Not a campaign to endanger the lives of CIA assets throughout the world. Yep, that's just collateral damage. Posted by: DP at October 2, 2003 06:44 PM | PERMALINKHas anyone asked Novak if he would name his sources to DOJ if his president requested it of him? Posted by: Miller at October 2, 2003 06:48 PM | PERMALINKKevin, PaulB writes: Yes, Novak has pretty much explicitly claimed that he doesn't understand this. Here's what he said on CNN's "Crossfire" on September 30: I referred to Mrs. Wilson as a CIA operative. I use the word operative for cheap politicians, you know, like you and Klain. And I just use it indiscriminately. It doesn't have any meaning. And I certainly don't know what she did for the CIA. And neither does anybody at this table. This is a direct cut-and-paste from CNN's transcript. Of course, this is the day after he boasted that he was "a professional journalist with 46 years experience in Washington", so it's not unreasonable to think that he should have known what the word "operative" means in that context. Posted by: Keith Thompson at October 2, 2003 06:58 PM | PERMALINKYou know, the use of "Plame" did require some digging. If she was signing reports or giving briefings in the run-up to the NIE, it was almost certainly under the name Wilson, in order to preserve her non-official cover. The White House would then have had to pull her dosier to discover her maiden name. The also would have discovered her full role in the agency. So if the White House became aware of Plame from her briefing activity (which makes sense if Lewis Libby is involved) then whoever initiated the leak--that is, drew up the talking points and issued them to the people who called up the reporters--must therefore been intending to expose her as a covert agent. Insidious. Evil. Felonious. Posted by: jlw at October 2, 2003 07:02 PM | PERMALINKHas anyone asked Novak if he would name his sources to DOJ if his president requested it of him? That would be fun, wouldn't it? I hope someone asks Bush/McClellan to demand this of Novak. Posted by: bubba at October 2, 2003 07:15 PM | PERMALINKSomeone with Lexus/Nexus should check out Novak's "operative" tale. Dollars to doughnuts he's used the word consistently--as he did in Joe's two examples. Let's see where he called a speechwriter or a deputy director an "operative". Posted by: D. Case at October 2, 2003 07:19 PM | PERMALINKD. Case writes: "Someone with Lexus/Nexus should check out Novak's "operative" tale. Dollars to doughnuts he's used the word consistently--as he did in Joe's two examples. Let's see where he called a speechwriter or a deputy director an "operative"." It would be more instructive to see where he's used operative and CIA together, and if he's been more careful and distinguished analysts from operatives. Not that it matters. Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 07:23 PM | PERMALINKWe are forgetting the most important part of this story, this Plame dame is one hot piece of ass - are there any hot lesbo or other nude photos? I think I will invite her to ze Capitol to "blow my cover". Posted by: Conan the Molester at October 2, 2003 07:34 PM | PERMALINKNomad asks "Does the specific statute say 'knowingly'? If not, what happened to 'ignorance of the law is no excuse'? Different legal principle; the question here is whether or not the outers were ignorant of the *facts* (not the law), and the question of the accused's knowledge or ignorance of the facts often is essential to whether or not he is guilty of a particular crime. An accountant certifies a statement which is, in fact, false: he can't offer as a defense "I didn't know it was against the law to certify a false statement," but he can offer a defense "I didn't know the statement was false." Posted by: Jeffrey Kramer at October 2, 2003 08:03 PM | PERMALINK(Assuming the law in question is a law against "knowingly certifying a false statement," of course.) Posted by: Jeffrey Kramer at October 2, 2003 08:06 PM | PERMALINKJohn H and Issa: I still maintain, this scenario for outing Plame is (barely) plausible but not likely. Posted by: Flory at October 2, 2003 08:22 PM | PERMALINKI posted this earlier today at Billmon. This scenario still rings my bells. All leaks point to I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff. He interviewed Novak the same day Valerie Plame was outed. USA Today reported Cheney and Libby were briefed by her Langley office but not personally by her. Libby and Cheney couldn’t get the WMD analysis they wanted so they asked who was the hold up. She was identified by her maiden name as the Analyst that didn’t buy their view point by a CIA Contact but they were not told that she had been covert before her twins were born. There is no other way White House personnel would know the name of a specific mid-level CIA WMD Analyst. Then Yellowcake broke. Their Contact again ratted on Valerie Plame and said she was Joe Wilson’s wife. Libby put two and two together and came up with five and outed her to Novak to screw both of them and scare the crap out of any other Civil Servants thinking of going against the Bush II White House. Karl Rove read Novak’s column and thought “what a great idea” and called all of his contacts trying to smear Joe Wilson. A week later Joe Wilson mentioned that it was a felony to out a covert CIA agent. All calls stopped and the White House battened down the hatches. Today’s rumor is that the Vice President’s Office wants to shutter the CIA. So it is a life and death situation and CIA Civil Servants are in no holds barred war with the White House. Posted by: Jim S at October 2, 2003 08:23 PM | PERMALINKJim S., The other 5 or so journalists who were leaked to other than Novak... are these the people you have Rove calling after Novak's story hit? Because I think that's wrong. My understanding is that the calls to the 6 or so journalists (including Novak) were contemporaneous. Several honorable journalists passed on the story, Novak ran with it. That's the delicious irony of this whole sorry mess. Novak just wanted to carry water for his White House pals, like he always does. But this time it backfired. Big Time. Posted by: Drew Vogel at October 2, 2003 08:45 PM | PERMALINKAnother thing to keep in mind: if this gets down to the nitty gritty, the WH's case that the CIA wasn't actively maintaining her covert status may hang on whether or not Novak really did tell the truth about his 'CIA source' -- ie, he might have to reveal this source, or lack thereof, in whatever legal proceedings happen. I doubt he'll name is CIA source to anyone - if he did, then he'd have a very hard time continuing to refuse to name his "senior administration" sources as well, and while I don't consider Novak to be the brightest light there is, I think he's a bit smarter than that. Besides, if he DID make up the "CIA source" idea, then refusing to identify who the source is keeps him from having to admit the source doesn't exist. Posted by: kriselda jarnsaxa at October 2, 2003 08:56 PM | PERMALINKI think Kevin's scenario is very reasonable, but let me make a slight addendum: Unless the Cliff May theory that "everyone knew Plame was an operative" is true, it doesn't seem logical that the Bush operatives would just "casually" know that Joseph Wilson's wife was a CIA agent. As Josh Marshall pointed out, it's not like this guy Wilson was Henry Kissinger and everyone gossiped about his love life. Before the editorial came out, I doubt Rove, May, or anyone else would have recognized Wilson's name. It could be the word just started to spread after Wilson's editorial. (If May's story about learning in July about Plame is true, this makes sense). But just as reasonable an explanation to me is this: Rove or some similar strategizer called for a profile or dossier about Wilson, and Plame's occupation was included as a footnote. In that case, whoever acted on the information would have violated the law, because the information he drew up would no doubt have been complete. Or maybe (I'm getting into advanced conspiracy mode here) Rove or some higher-up saw the dossier, crossed out "agent" and put "analyst," and then passed it down the channels, knowing what his team would do with it, but also knowing that they wouldn't be held culpable under the law. Would such a report be the "smoking gun" necessary for convictions? Posted by: Ulex at October 2, 2003 09:16 PM | PERMALINKAlong that line, here's an interesting twist to the story: During a long conversation with a senior administration official, I asked why Wilson was assigned the mission to Niger. He said Wilson had been sent by the CIA's counterproliferation section at the suggestion of one of its employees, his wife. It was an offhand revelation from this official, who is no partisan gunslinger. When I called another official for confirmation, he said: "Oh, you know about it." The published report that somebody in the White House failed to plant this story with six reporters and finally found me as a willing pawn is simply untrue. Novak: The CIA Leak, emphasis added Novak's in an interview, gets the scoop, calls another official who says, "Oh, you know about it." My first thought on this statement was what Novak means us to get: that the official is recognizing that Novak knows about the CIA agent. I'd considered that to be a possible defense against the felony charge on this leak - the official ensuring that Novak's not getting this information from him or her. Why, then, wouldn't the official say, "Oh, you know about her?" Why wouldn't the official say "her" anyway, since Novak is asking about a person? But what if Novak wasn't one of the six reporters that the leak was being fed to? Then the second official's statement makes sense; you know about it - the leak. I'm betting Novak wandered into this information, creating the distinct possiblity that three White House officials are involved in this scandal, one who called the six, one who recieved all confirmation calls, and the one that gave Novak the scoop. Scooter Davis is the likely candidate for the first one, the Rove office is the area to look in the second, and Novak's source? How about Ari, a day or two before his last day, giving one last sweetheart interview for Novak? Posted by: boloboffin at October 2, 2003 09:18 PM | PERMALINKWell, remember, Ihave been stating for a few days, that in the end, the Bushies will come forward with admission of leak, but a deniel that the leak was criminal. A lot of it is going to center around the fact that they knew who Plame was. In other words, it was the CIA's fault for not making her more secret. And as abhorant as that may be, it will be a good defense (for the crime). I think Kevin's analysis is very accurate, and I do not really buy the counter aruguments--and I am a guy who really looks at Bush as a willing cheater and bully. I think using her maiden name was not that big of a deal, if that was the name you knew, and using the term operative, again, I do not believe that is code for undercover. Lastly, and most important, I think some of the commentators fail to realize how much gets said on background, in off-record briefings and through idle-chit-chat. Most of what reporters learn never makes it into stories. I think the other reporters just filed the comments away as info to use when needed. The calls to Wilson served the same purpose. Only Novak, who is a highly partisan columnist thought to use it, and he thought to use in a partisan way. Related to that is the whole idea that the media gets "spun". Call it PR or media management, but companies do it, politicans do it, atheletes do it. Read Kurt Anderson's book. A lot of what the leakers were doing was not so much planting a story but carrying a theme. Posted by: Vital Information at October 2, 2003 09:18 PM | PERMALINKboloboffin: my take on "Oh, you know about it" is that the person Novak called for confirmation was in on "it", the ongoing effort to smear Wilson by outing his wife. Whoever was leaking had to know that reporters would want confirmation from a second source, so it'd be convenient to prepare someone, say, Rove, to provide such confirmations. Posted by: Jon H at October 2, 2003 09:22 PM | PERMALINKDamn, I was going to make the maiden name point. Also, I doubt those few who knew her ID had any reason to throw it around until the Wilson piece broke. Who gave a s**t about the Wilsons? So Kevin, your player who casually throws her name out is a logically impossible person IMO. This was a deliberate felony. Posted by: John Isbell at October 2, 2003 09:30 PM | PERMALINKThen there's the supposed "Your wife is fair game" call that Wilson has said he got from Karl Rove. Posted by: Rook at October 2, 2003 10:17 PM | PERMALINKBeyond the other reasons to believe that the leakers deliberately sought to out Plame, there is the striking lameness of the "nepotism" smear. If Wilson's wife had something to do with him getting the task to go to Africa, how exactly is that supposed to undercut what he had to say? I can see the point of accusing him of being partisan in this context -- that works, to a degree. Yet many people, even on the right, such as Sullivan, don't see why it's such a damning thing to say that Wilson was pushed for the job by his wife who is a WMD expert at the CIA? I have to say that I too never understood the bite of that supposed smear. (There was actually an article in yesterday's WaPost that discussed how indirect and ineffective it seemed to be as an ad hominem attack. link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A31086-2003Oct1.html ). What was effective as a very personal attack was the outing of Plame as an operative. It had zero political significance that she was an operative -- the ONLY impact was on Plame and her husband personally. And that was, obviously, the point. Posted by: frankly0 at October 2, 2003 10:23 PM | PERMALINKThe problem I have with "accidental" discovery of Plame's CIA connections, and its impromptu use is: Why wouldn't senior administration officials cooking up such a scheme dig deeper? If the Wilson-CIA connection is the story, why wouldn't you use that information as your starting point, instead of handing it straight to Bob Novak, who just happens to use "operative", his favorite generic noun? The Post's source said the motive was revenge. I think they gathered all the ingredients before they turned on the gas. Posted by: D. Case at October 2, 2003 10:36 PM | PERMALINKThe "deliberate smear" makes most sense to me, except, as everyone keeps saying, they couldn't be that stupid, could they? Posted by: alias at October 2, 2003 10:39 PM | PERMALINKSome folks were curious about Novak's use of "operative" and "analyst" in the CIA context. There's a column he wrote in 1997 in which someone is described both as an "undercover CIA agent" and an "anonymous CIA operative." The word "analyst" does not appear in that column. In December 2001, Novak wrote about "Exposure of CIA operative Johnny (Mike) Spann's identity." The word "analyst" does not occur in the column. Last year he wrote: "Bolton asked the intelligence community for an assessment of Cuba and bioweapons. CIA analysts produced a brief summary." The word "operative" does not appear in this column. A month ago: "Less than a month after the Cole disaster, CIA analysts had concluded ..." No "operatives" in that column, either. Based on just these cases, and in the glaring absence of counter-examples, I would say the bastard understands quite well what the difference is between "analyst" and "operative." But then ... we knew that.
Spann was an operative. If Novak uses language so precisely, then he should have referred to Spann as such, no? Posted by: Joe Schmoe at October 2, 2003 10:53 PM | PERMALINKJoe writes: "Spann was an operative. If Novak uses language so precisely, then he should have referred to Spann as such, no?" Yes. And that's just what he did. (See above.)
How is it nepotism when Wilson paid his own way? He undertook this mission as a service to his country, as he put it, without recompense. Posted by: aw at October 2, 2003 11:02 PM | PERMALINKWell, to put it another way, "nepotism" here really means "wacko leftie couple conspiring to hide the undeniable truth of Saddam's WMD arsenal". When you look at it that way, it makes sense. Posted by: Issa at October 2, 2003 11:21 PM | PERMALINKJoe Schmoe: Presumabaly you don't just run with whatever the White House tells you. Good lord, Joe. How have you managed to post comments, when you obviously have been asleep since 9/11/01?? --Kynn Posted by: Kynn at October 3, 2003 12:46 AM | PERMALINKfastback writes: Just an add-on. http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A13536-2003Jul5¬Found=true "A senior administration official said yesterday that Wilson's mission originated within the CIA's clandestine service after Cheney aides raised questions during a briefing." Detlef Posted by: Detlef at October 3, 2003 02:11 AM | PERMALINKOuting Plame under her maiden name was a piece of incredible stupidity in this day and age. Someone above pointed out that maiden name/married name wouldn't be much of a cover against, say, the KGB. But we aren't trying to fool the KGB here. The interested parties are the much less well equipped and briefed counterintelligence personnel of various Central Asian nations, plus whoever does that sort of thing for bin Laden and his ilk. The Internet means instant delivery of information like this. If it had been "Mrs. Wilson = CIA" rather than "Plame = CIA" I don't think any low-resource outfits in the Third World would have been able to connect the dots. Bush's leakers just did bin Laden's job for him. Posted by: sagesource at October 3, 2003 07:28 AM | PERMALINKRook — Then there's the supposed "Your wife is fair game" call that Wilson has said he got from Karl Rove. Wilson never claimed he got any calls from Rove directly. He has said that reporters called him, saying that they had been told (I can't remember if it was by Rove or someone else) that Wilson's wife was fair game. Seems like nit-picking, I know, but we should try to stick to what's been reported as much as possible. As we've seen, the Bush loyalists will seize on any inaccuracy or contradiction to "prove" there's really no felony here, or that there's no link to the White House, or that Democrats are poopyheads lalalalalalala I'm not listening lalalalalala what do I say now Karl? Posted by: nina at October 3, 2003 07:54 AM | PERMALINKThis was a very deliberate attempt not to smear Wilson, how do you smear him by adding his wife's obvious credentials to his obvious credentials, but to try and silence critics. In Washington you hurt people by hurting their careers. Plame's career (she appears to have invested 15 or so years in it) is done. By the way, it would not be done if she were a CIA analyst, it would actually be enhanced. The fact that important people disagreed with you so much that they felt the need to point you out to the public is always a good thing for an analyst. A little more logical reasoning why 'they' knew she was not an analyst when 'they' leaked her name. Once you acknowledge that piece of logic, you have to wonder who 'they' wanted to silence. Not Ambassador Wilson, he was already talking to anybody who would listen to him. There has to be someone else who needs to be silenced. A message was sent, "See what happens to our critics." Therefore, I'm waiting not for the name of the leaker, but for some other war critic to come forward with something more damaging than the '16 words' in the SOTU which in reality were phrased well enough not to really be that damaging (thank you MI-6). Whatever 'they' are trying to silence (got to be in the CIA) has to be so volatile that this risk of disclosure (the commision of a felony) is somehow worth it. As to the impact on Bush, still probably minimal. The media is in a tizzy, the public is only temporarily in a tizzy, and Bush has positioned himself to minimize the damage. Unless something else comes out, the election is not going to be about this issue but about the Economy...stupid...and that appears to be improving. And I do find it funny that so many liberals are now very protective of the CIA...and that so many conservatives think our national security is no big deal...ah politics. Posted by: Ratherworried at October 3, 2003 08:44 AM | PERMALINKNovak: I use the word operative for cheap politicians... So the leaker is "no partisan gunslinger" but Valerie Plame is a "cheap politician"? Posted by: xian at October 3, 2003 09:15 AM | PERMALINKI tend to agree with Shermaclay and Roger Bigod and their defenders. People with a lot invested in the WMD story, people who pushed yellowcake onto the SOTU, were behind this because they had to discredit the idea that Iraq wasn't really trying to build nuclear weapons. And let's not forget here--that was mid-July and guess what--those folks at the CIA and Non-Proliferation Center may have been onto something. No. WMD"s. Got that? Posted by: Mimikatz at October 3, 2003 10:25 AM | PERMALINKI've been wondering if Valerie Plame herself has said anything publicly about any of this. I would guess that as a CIA, er, employee, she wouldn't ... but how long can that last if the right keeps smearing her as a partisan shill? Posted by: Temperance at October 3, 2003 12:51 PM | PERMALINKAs to Navak's CIA source, one of them was a CIA spokesman who also chatted with TIME magazine in July (a few days after Novak published), and recently to the WaPO. And did the spokesman tell the WaPo that he warned Novak off, or used the magic words Novak was looking for, "her life wil be endangered if you publish"? No: "When Novak told a CIA spokesman he was going to write a column about Wilson's wife, the spokesman urged him not to print her name "for security reasons," according to one CIA official. Intelligence officials said they believed Novak understood there were reasons other than Plame's personal security not to use her name, even though the CIA has declined to confirm whether she was undercover. Novak said in an interview last night that the request came at the end of a conversation about Wilson's trip to Niger and his wife's role in it. "They said it's doubtful she'll ever again have a foreign assignment," he said. "They said if her name was printed, it might be difficult if she was traveling abroad, and they said they would prefer I didn't use her name. It was a very weak request. If it was put on a stronger basis, I would have considered it." ...The CIA occasionally asks news organizations to withhold the names of undercover agents, and news organizations usually comply. An intelligence official told The Post yesterday [October] that no further harm would come from repeating Plame's name. " Look, Novak checked with the CIA, whose current statement is "we thought he understood". That is weak - if they had said she was in danger (and why not say it, if it will keep him from publishing?), why didn't they tell the WaPo that they said just that? This is not some"gotcha" game, where if they tell Novak more, they get in deeper trouble. If they don't tell him something forceful, he WILL publish - everyone knew that, they didn't tell him, he published. If they had said no with any conviction, he wouldn't have. SO, if the CIA was that wrong about her status in July, maybe the WH was wrong too - bad info everywhere. Posted by: Tom Maguire at October 3, 2003 03:28 PM | PERMALINKSorry, WaPo link: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11208-2003Sep27.html And Howard Fineman has perspective and insight. I find myself in near total agreement, but I think the "other power" in the WH is Cheney's office, which is where this problem developed. He points toRove, which is sooo yesterday. I say Libby. http://www.msnbc.com/news/974997.asp?0cv=KB10 Posted by: Tom Maguire at October 3, 2003 03:32 PM | PERMALINK"So Mr. Novak, you have a choice, idiot or liar?" I often find myself offering up the same choice to Bush (or Rumsfeld, Cheney,Rice, etc) whenever they're on TV. Re Novak's absurd claim about his use of the word "operative" (and his citation to his uses of it to refer to non-CIA personnel). I did a quick NEXIS search on Novak's use of the phrase "CIA operative" and found a half-dozen examples over the past 10 years or so. Every single one appears to refer to covert CIA agents. 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