Oh, No! It's Plame Two!

Quick, subpoena Dana Priest of the WaPo - someone with a political axe to grind has leaked to her the name of a covert CIA officer!

Unlike Robert Novak, Dana Priest has not published the name, presumably at the request of the CIA (gee, why couldn't they have said that to Bob with a bit more vigor? [Note - folks who don't want to follow the previous link may also want to argue that the CIA press office's weak request to Novak should have been enough.  Please - I want more imaginative CIA apologists]). 

Never mind - surely it is the leak itself that matters, right?  The fact that the CIA did not intervene with Novak or his publisher to halt publication is not important to the Plame investigation, right? 

Via "Never Yet Melted", here is the full, ghastly expose:

The person most often in the middle of arguments over whether to dispatch a rendition team was a former Soviet analyst with spiked hair that matched her in-your-face personality who heads the CTC's al Qaeda unit, according to a half-dozen CIA veterans who know her. Her name is being withheld because she is under cover.

She earned a reputation for being aggressive and confident, just the right quality, some colleagues thought, for a commander in the CIA's global war on terrorism. Others criticized her for being overzealous and too quick to order paramilitary action.

Oh, my - and now some critics have leaked her name to the press.  And fellow CIA officers, no less!  I just know Chuck Schumer will be all over this.

Comments

[kim]

A description more specific than 'Wilson's wife' of which there were three to choose from. Probably more real world implications for this one, too.
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[maryrose]

Chuck Schumer should know all about leaks since he had his minions checking Steele's credit history and socialsecurity number.

[clarice]

I wouldn't add a thing to NYM's analysis.. It is right on point.

[Dwilkers]

OK then.

It shouldn't be too difficult to figure out who this is. How many female "former Soviet analyst(s) with spiked hair" can there be?

And if anyone really gives a tinker's damn about leaks then this, like the prisons, is a big one.

But nobody there really does care about that, this has been a big political game from the start, and this one, like the prisons leak, is an anti-Bush leak, so don't hold your breath.

[owl]

Dwilkers.. I consider the planes, secret prisons and the "outing" of the spiked hair to be deadly serious. This stuff going on at the WaPo and NYT fits my definition of treason.

[Gary Maxwell]

OT

I know our lefty trollers are stuck in the pharmacy line and cant return. Still wanted to do a little end zone strut, Rasmussen today has Bush at 47% approval rating. His rating is climbing by him defending his actions against craven Democrat attacks. Since Rasmussen lags a bit, ( he averages the last three days of polls ) his support today is likely even higher. This is the first day is some time since Bush has been this high. Since our lefty friends want to spout out recent polls I am sure they will point this out soon. Sure.

[kim]

Wouldn't happen without a free press, but thank God for that and thank God that there will always be traitors. What lovely moral examples they are.
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[danking]

Plame is fu#king Mickey Mouse compared to the other leaks cited regarding national security. (See the latest realease from the courts.)

The only reason Plamegate is getting investigated is because the MSM screamed bloody murder and Fitzgerald created a perjury trap.

Everything is in plain site but the MSM refuse to see it.

[kim]

Now, had the renditions mentioned in 2000 been dangerable, we really had something. C'mon, take credit.

Is dangerable rendering happening? If not, why not?
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[maryrose]

Danking,
Right you are! MSM will continue not to see it because it doesn't jive with their agenda which is anything to marginalize the current powers that be.

[DougJ]

I'm with you Danking. In a fair world, Schumer (who was surely Priest's source) would be facing treason charges. This is one of the most astounding breaches of classified information I've ever read about. It puts that demonized "spiky haired" woman at great risk, much greater than that Valerie Plame ever faced hanging around the Langley commissary.

[kim]

I know a good hairdresser. No, not for her, for the ones whose tresses are about to tumble off tumbrils.
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[kim]

Where's my knitting. I'm feeling particularly bloodthirsty today.
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[DougJ]

"His rating is climbing by him defending his actions against craven Democrat attacks. Since Rasmussen lags a bit, ( he averages the last three days of polls ) his support today is likely even higher."

I heard that Gallup is releasing a poll tomorrow that shows president Bush back over 50% approval rating. I think last week's speech really turned things around.

[maryrose]

Right you are Doug! The party af doom and gloom will not triumph.

[kim]

The Democrats were crazy to hang their collective hats on Joe Wilson's credibility and on failure in Iraq. I hope their pathology is not terminal.
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[clarice]

But Pelosi's embrace of the Murthacrap is making it very hard for Hillary.Brilliant! Even Kerry..his backstrokes are making backstrokes..

[kim]

I hope I do not extend to MSM. They have outlived their usefullness, and won't realoze it until they are a joke. The punchline was a while ago, laughs soon, one hopes.

It is yet to be shown that the Democrats have outworn their usefulness. Certainly a two-party system has been good for the U. S. of A. Will it be conservative Republicans versus moderates, or a three party model, with moderate Republicans governing with the alternating consent of conservative Republicans, and Democrats, like in Kansas.
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[maryrose]

Pelosi is a sad case,symptomatic of what is wrong with the democrat party. Soft on terrorism and trying to stay relevant.

[clarice]

For almost 2 decades at least, it has been obvious the party is really a collective of special interests not necessarily coherent. Clinto was so smooth he could triangulate the difference--but now they are in sharp relief..What does a Catholic member of a large labor union living in Pennsylvania have in common with NOW? A Teamster in Chicago with Move On? Etc., etc.

[Lew Clark]

Bush can instruct the CIA Director to investigate the leaks in the CIA, Secretary of State to investigate State, etc.
But the real action should be in the Congress. But don't hold your breath for the spineless Republican majority to start the long overdue investigation of the widespread criminal release of classified information.

[clarice]

Re Pelosi--it's a pity Botox doesn't stiffen the spine..

[kim]

It's a muscle paralytic. That's what happened.
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[kim]

Many of the members of the parties of collection of special interests are basically unwilling members. As you point out, they have little in common with many of the members of other interest groups within the Party. The only really willing ones are the radical fringe, source of money, energy, but, alas, not of ideas. Populist? Hah!
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[DougJ]

"Re Pelosi--it's a pity Botox doesn't stiffen the spine.."

ROFLMAO

[maryrose]

Does Pelosi really think her San Francisco constituents typify red state America where most of the real world live?

[maryrose]

Does Pelosi really think her San Francisco constituents typify red state America where most of the real world live?

[kim]

Nobody she knows voted for Arnold.
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[DougJ]

Maryrose, I think they really represent "pink state" America.

[kim]

There's there, there. Out there.
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[TP]

Gary. Even more interesting was the Time poll which showed Bush down by 1% to Kerry if the race was to be run again. Not much real change since the election.

[DougJ]

"Even more interesting was the Time poll which showed Bush down by 1% to Kerry if the race was to be run again."

And that was before the post-speech approval surge we've seen the past few days in rasmussen. I have a feeling that if the election were held today, Bush would win even more handily than he did last year. That would shut up the poll-mongering moonbats.

[kim]

Kerry, run Swiftly.
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[clarice]

Doug, Glad you liked that..I'm feeling a bit*verklempt* David Duke doesn't like me much: http://www.davidduke.com/?p=466

[maryrose]

Kim
You really have agreat sense of humor!
Kerry run swiftly, indeed.

[rob]

you said:
Unlike Robert Novak, Dana Priest has not published the name, presumably at the request of the CIA (gee, why couldn't they have said that to Bob?).
------

But the CIA did ask Novak not to publish the name. It took about 1 min. on google.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,164407,00.html

--snip--
In his syndicated column, Novak did not dispute that former CIA spokesman Bill Harlow (search) told him he should not print the covert officer's name, Valerie Plame (search), during conversations they had prior to Novak's July 14, 2003 column.

[richard mcenroe]

"I hope their pathology is not terminal."

Kim — I kind of hope it is. It's time the party of slavery, secession, segregation and surrender made way for a modern political movement.

[Dwilkers]

I think we need the competition the 2 party system has provided. I'd really like to see the Dems become serious about national security and be a viable party.

[maryrose]

Dwilkers.
The only way the Dems will be a viable party is if and when they become serious about national security and stop being soft on terrorism. It's why they lost the last election.

[Tom Maguire]

But the CIA did ask Novak not to publish the name. It took about 1 min. on google.

Thanks, Rob.

As I have said a million times, the CIA has an extra special procedure they employ when they don't want someone to publish - they have the DCI or an immediate underling call either the reporter (in this case, Novak), or the reporter's editor or publisher.

Put another way, the problem gets bounced up from the CIA press office to the top of the pyramid.

Maybe you can google for another minute and tell me why that did not happen with Novak and Plame.

[opine6]

Found this in Captain's Quarters comments. Seems Iraqi intelligence was in Africa as early as 1996, looking for uranium

Saddam's Shadow-The Clinton Adminitration knew about Iraq Uranium

Africa Energy & Mining | June 18, 1997 | Indigo Publications

SECTION: MINING; DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO; N. 207 LENGTH: 787 words
HEADLINE: Saddam's Shadow

BODY: It's not only diamonds and base metals that interest big mining companies and the latter are not alone in being interested in Katanga. In the delegation that the United States sent to Kinshasa on June 2 under its ambassador to the United Nations, Bill Richardson, the state department's African affairs department was represented by Marc Baas, director for Central Africa. (Susan Rice, director for African Affairs at the National Security Council, has just been appointed under secretary of state for African affairs in succession to George Moose). Baas was accompanied by a representative of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and several Defense Department officials. The mission also visited Lubumbashi and met with officials from Gecamines and provincial authorities.
AEM's sources claim it wasn't the small research reactor that General Electric installed in 1977 at the university of Kinshasa, and which ceased operating in 1990, that interested the NRC and the military men, but rather the Shinkolobwe uranium deposit. Its resources are negligible from a commercial viewpoint when weighed against those in Namibia and Niger and new discoveries like France's Cogema has just made in western Canada. They weren't negligible from the security standpoint, however. The Americans are concerned over a visit to Katanga by the head of the Iraqi Baath party's international relations section, Shabi Al Maliki, around a year ago. He, too, showed an interest in Katanga's uranium, and last February another high-ranking Iraqi official reportedly held talks in Kinshasa with the mines minister in the last government of the Mobutu era, Banza Mukalay. The uranium is thought to have also figured in Libya's proposals in 1995 to supply oil to Zaire in exchange for ore.

Richardson said on June 7 that president Laurent Kabila had given permission for a UN mission to come to the country to investigate the plight of Hutu refugees starting from July 7. Richardson qualified the green light as "a breakthrough on the human rights and humanitarian front." For his part, Brian Atwood, director of U.S.AID, announced in Brussels on June 11 that potential donors would shortly meet for talks on aiding the Democratic Republic of Congo. But such assistance would be conditional on Congo respecting human rights, Atwood indicated. He added that Washington wanted the Kabila government to succeed because if it did not this could result in violence spreading to other countries. He issued an appeal to all governments to use their influence to halt atrocities which various reports indicate are occurring in the eastern part of the country. He said that "organized groups and independent groups" were attempting to strengthen their positions in the eastern regions.

South Africa, for its part, is putting together a team to advise Kabila on reconstructing the country and reorganizing its finances (AEM 205). Deputy president Thabo Mbeki said last week the team would be ready to leave within days and that its members would be chosen in agreement with the Congo government "to discuss a variety of matters that impact on the socioeconomic situation."

He added that Congo's leaders had asked that it consist of officials from South Africa's "Reserve Bank, the economic ministries and people dealing with infrastructure, public administration and so on." Officials said south Africa's foreign minister, Alfred Nzo, discussed Kinshasa's needs with Congo foreign minister Bizima Karaha at the recent Organization of African Unity summit in Harare. The South African mission will be headed by deputy foreign minister Aziz Pahad.

LOAD-DATE: June 20, 1997

[Tom Maguire]

Or, rather than googling, you might have just followed the "say that to Bob" link I included in my original post.

There is other tedious stuff, but eventually I get to links and excerpts describing CIA press officer Harlow's account.

[clarice]

About the redacted pages in the Cooper case--Is it more likely than not that there were representations made there about Plame's status and national security which were deliberately false--representations from the CIA which tracked the referral?

If so(a) Did Goss correct the record?(b) when?

[richard mcenroe]

Dwilkers — I agree we need a two-party system. But the assumption that the Democratic Party must be one of them is one of the impediments to reforming the party.

[r flanagan]

Ok now I understand .When TM writes "the CIA did not intervene with Novak to halt
publication" he doesn't mean "the CIA did not intervene with Novak to halt publication". Got it.

[kim]

Well, they did and they didn't. Surely you can understand that. If not, let me know.
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[kim]

Oh, and try to bear in mind just who and what it was that provoked all the curiosity about Plame, insatiable curiosity. Was it her spiky hairdo? Her demure eyeshades? Her twins?
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[kim]

This sojourn en el ciudad angelico is more Okie than '49er; more fleeing a desperate past than embracing a fantasy future.
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[r flanagan]

Kim, Got it. I wondered "What part of TM's statement [the CIA did not intervene with Bob Novak to halt publication] didn't I understand " ?

I foolishly thought TM meant the CIA did not
intervene with Bob Novak to halt publication.

Now I understand.

[kim]

Do you understand that they both did and did not?
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