How Covert Was Valerie Plame (III)?

Joe Wilson, aka "Mr. Incredible" will be whining appearing on 60 Minutes about threats to his wife.  Uh huh.  Maybe, since Joe admitted to doing consulting work for the CIA in his NY Times op-ed (and the Senate revealed that he undertook a 1999 CIA mission), it is he that is imperiled.  Or maybe the baddies are excited about the prospect of a twofer.

Closer to reality is Joseph DiGenova, a Washington lawyer and former US attorney who spoke to the Christian Science Monitor:

DiGenova adds that if the trial judge allows the references to classified information to remain in the indictment, defense lawyers will probably attack the CIA itself for failing to take the necessary measures to protect its own agent.

It was the CIA that enlisted the agent's husband, Joseph Wilson, for the sensitive mission in Africa, and it was the CIA that permitted Mr. Wilson to publicly disclose his role and publicly criticize the White House in an op-ed piece in The New York Times, diGenova says. In effect, the CIA set the stage through sloppy tradecraft for the disclosure of one of its agents.

Indeed - as the Boston Globe noted, her Brewster-Jennings cover was not designed to withstand any scrutiny at all.

The Washington Post surveys the damage done by the Plame leak, and delivers this reassurance:

There is no indication, according to current and former intelligence officials, that the most dire of consequences -- the risk of anyone's life -- resulted from her outing.

Bob Woodward's leaked version was even more reassuring:

WOODWARD: ... They did a damage assessment within the CIA, looking at what this did that Joe Wilson's wife was outed. And turned out it was quite minimal damage. They did not have to pull anyone out undercover abroad. They didn't have to resettle anyone. There was no physical danger to anyone and there was just some embarrassment.

The WaPo also presents a garbled paragraph that is more compelling in the re-edited version picked up by Newsday:

The CIA will not conduct a formal damage assessment until legal proceedings are complete.

Is that how it works when our national security is threatened and lives are on the line - the CIA waits a few years until the trials are over, then assesses the damage?

Come on, we see through this - if the CIA prepared a formal report, it would be subpoenaed as evidence, and the jury would laugh out loud at the "no damage" assessment.  So the CIA filed a criminal referral in 2003, got the White House tied up in a two year investigation, and now they are laughing out loud.  Well played, especially if you like a spy service that shrugs off executive oversight by inventing crimes and playing dirty tricks. 

That said, Fitzgerald saw through their outing ploy, else, where are the indictments for the leaks to Novak and Pincus?  However, Fitzgerald did not see through their mysterious "Forgettery Mind Ray" that was trained on Lewis Libby.  Where is the justice?

FAIR AND BALANCED:  Joe Wilson calmly appraised the hypothetical consequences of his wife's outing for David Corn in the article that ignited this scandal:

Without acknowledging whether she is a deep-cover CIA employee, Wilson says, "Naming her this way would have compromised every operation, every relationship, every network with which she had been associated in her entire career. This is the stuff of Kim Philby and Aldrich Ames."

Mr. Incredible also helped Katie Couric grasp the enormity of our peril:

COURIC: How damaging would this be to your wife's work?

Mr. WILSON: Well, you know, what was left out of my interview with Andrea Mitchell was--was my comment that I would not answer any specific questions about my wife. But hypothetically speaking, as others have reported, including TODAY, it would be--it would be damaging not just to her career, since she's been married to me, but since they mentioned her by her maiden name, to her entire career. So it would be her entire network that she may have established, any operations, any programs or projects she was working on.

Interestingly, threats to her physical safety are not mentioned here.

UPDATE:  Let's add this, by Mr. Gerecht, a former CIA case officer and a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute:

Truth be told, however, the agency doesn't care much at all about cover. Inside the CIA, serious case officers have often looked with horror and mirth upon the pathetic operational camouflage that is usually given to both "inside" officers (operatives who carry official, usually diplomatic, cover) and nonofficial-cover officers (the "NOC" cadre), who most often masquerade as businessmen. Yet Langley tenaciously guards the cover myth--that camouflage for case officers is of paramount importance to its operations and the health of its operatives.

Know the truth about cover--that it is the Achilles' heel of the clandestine service--and you will begin to appreciate how deeply dysfunctional the operations directorate has been for years. Only a profoundly unserious Counter-Proliferation Division would have sent Mr. Wilson on an eight-day walkabout in Niger to uncover the truth about uranium sales to Saddam Hussein and then allowed him to give an oral report.

UPDATE 2:  From the Nov 15, 2003 WaPo, by Dana Priest:

Lives of lies shadow spies even when they leave CIA

...

Plame's case is different in that she was burned — not once, but twice. The first time was by Aldrich Ames, the CIA turncoat who is believed to have given the Russians the name of every covert operative in the Soviet/East European Division over 10 years beginning in about 1985.

Not knowing exactly whom he had outed, the CIA recalled hundreds of operatives, including Plame, for their safety. Still, her undercover status remained intact until July, when syndicated columnist Robert Novak identified her by name as a CIA "operative" in a column about her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV, whom the CIA had sent to Niger to check on allegations that Iraq was seeking to purchase uranium oxide there.

It is difficult to assess the damage to national security from the Plame case without knowing her specific assignments. Between July and October, when the story of Plame's outing took on a much higher profile, the CIA was not officially assessing the damage from Novak's column. Nor was the agency taking, or recommending that Plame take, any particular security precautions.

The CIA has not launched a damage assessment, but in matters that involve law enforcement, such as the Justice Department's investigation into who leaked Plame's name and occupation to Novak, the CIA typically waits until the case is wrapped up so that nothing it unearths is subject to discovery in court.

But FWIW, here is the WaPo from Sept 28, 2003:

After the column ran, the CIA began a damage assessment of whether any foreign contacts Plame had made over the years could be in danger. The assessment continues, sources said.

STILL MORE:  Andrea Mitchell got a minimal damage leak similar to Bob Woodward's.

And here is a Jan 30 2004 letter to John Conyers describing the criminal referral - the reference is to a leak of classified information, not a violation of the Intelligence Identities Protection Act.

Comments

[boris]

What if Libby has the tape or a court stenographer's notes from monitoring his conversations?

[clarice]

Thank, you cecil, we now have two members of the Court in agreement(I once made a dandy argument in a perjury case appeal that the question which began "Is it your testimony that...." could not be the basis of a perjury conviction because if the witness said that was his testimony and it was, it was literally true; and if he said it wasn't but it had been, it couldn't be material. I won on other grounds but I always loved that argument.

Perjury is a hard count to prove. It should be. And to get a conviction on it the witness is entitled to a clear unambiguous question.

Do you see one here which asked Libby..What was the first cource of your information that Plame was a CIA agent?

Why not?

All I see is a lot of dreckerie about what he said to whome when and what they said to him.

[topsecretk9]

Criminal defense attorneys all over America will love this reasoning. All anyone'd have to do to commit arson, embezzlement,

Please, I was speaking in terms of Kristoff and Wilson, and nothing more.

[clarice]

We don't have the full record before us, but if the FBI and SP wanted to know what they now claim they wanted to know where he first learned of Plame, why the devil didn't they just ask instead of going on this merry go round of what he told reporters?

As Tom observes he handed over his notes which revealed whatever notations he had of other sources of his information and he testified in March about his conversation with Cheney, the conversation most likely to have been considered reliable by him.

It sure looks to me like he thought(reasonably I'd say) what the FBI and SP wanted to know was whether he'd intentionally leaked this information to reporters, the question which he was tasked to determine.

[TM]

JayDee, I feel bad - no prize for you, today anyway.

If CaseyL would grace us with a return visit,I would love to hear his thinking on this:

The anti-Wilsonites only "proof" that Wilson lied is a discredited addendum to an intelligence report.

Casey, is that based on (a) your own reading of the Senate report, or (b) something you have picked up on reality-based blogs?

On the off-chance that actualy reading the report would be of interst to you, look on the right column of this blog, in the section titled "Wilson/Plame" (right under a useless Google search logo).

One of the links, helpfuly titled "Sen Intel Report (MIT) will take you to a searchable, copyable version of the Senate report.

Let us know what you learn.

Thanks.

And FWIW, on the subject of Joe Wilson, I don't recite the Rep talking points - I write them.

[clarice]

the question THE SP was tasked to determine..

[Rick Ballard]

TM,

I don't see how you can question Casey without a copy of the SCCI as it exists in the Alterman Reality in front of you. It's simply unfair.

Has any Democratic legislator who voted for the suthorization to use force come out and said that they were misled by false intelligence concerning WMD's?

[clarice]

Don't blame him, Fri I saw Holmes shocked when Gingrich told him the SSCI had discredited Wilson's story--He didn't believe it. Never heard of it. NRO Media Blog is started a campaign to remind the countless reporters and newsies who also seem to have total amnesia on the topic.

Susan Schmidt,the WaPo's girl hero, and her work was even ignored by Pincus until last week.

[billyfd]

Damn, I do apologize for the overt gloating - but it is fun as hell just watching you NeoCon/Wing Nuts squirming through these mental/ethical/legalistic calisthenics! It's going to be a tough 2+ years for you die hard cool-aid drinkers; your all eating your own now and the large majority of Americans knows it.

Peace Out,

Billy

“Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy”
~Sir Richard Dearlove, Director of the British foreign intelligence service, (MI6) discussing a July 23rd , 2002 cabinet meeting with the Bush White House

[topsecretk9]

huh?

Keep hope alive BillyD!

"“Most Americans believe Bush had nothing to do with the incidents that resulted in the indictment brought against Libby: 55 percent said the president was not at fault, while 12 percent said he probably did something illegal, and 21 percent said he did something ‘unethical but not illegal.’"

http://newsbusters.org/node/2572

[BurbankErnie]

Rick,

I believe John F'n Kerry renounced his decision to give the President authority to go to war in a speech last week at some bastion of Reality Thinking.

Please don't make me link to it. You can read a transcrfipt of his speech for yourself at JohnKerry.com.

[MJW]

CaseyL responseds to, "The best case scenario would be indictments for the underling crime "outing" or no indictments at all.":

Criminal defense attorneys all over America will love this reasoning. All anyone'd have to do to commit arson, embezzlement, murder is lie to the police, the GJ and the prosecutor. Because, by golly, if the police and GJ and prosecutor can't prove the underlying crime, they shouldn't bring any charges at all.

I suspect you'd have to look long and hard to find a case where someone was prosecuted for lying to investigators about a murder or arson where the crime itself wasn't prosecuted also. Criminals lie to investigators all the time -- I dare say most of the time -- but are rarely prosecuted for it.

[Rick Ballard]

BE,

OK - I should have written "Has any serious Democratic legislator who voted for the suthorization to use force come out and said that they were misled by false intelligence concerning WMD's?"

I don't think it's very fair to use Sen. Waffle as your example. "I was for it before I was against it before I was for it before I thought it over and changed my mind but then did what Uncle Ted told me to do anyway." doesn't exactly constitute saying you were misled.

[JayDee]

So, what are the opinions on whether or not this goes to trial?

If it goes to trial, we get to hear from Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, et. al. under oath. I'd pay to watch that; it would be the OJ trial times ten. I'm also 100% certain that the Dark Kingdom would never put itself in that position.

So if it doesn't go to trial, Libby has to plead. And he's still going to have to do jail time. So what can Libby give to Fitzgerald in order for him to cop a plea? It's pretty hard to imagine this little silver spooner doing time, no matter how diehard his neocon religion is.

I'm beginning to see what little Annie Coulter meant by this being the worst possible outcome.

[richard mcenroe]

Rick Ballard — You don't understand.

Not only are Bush, Rove and Cheney so evilly cunning that they completely foxed Fitzpatrick, they made a deal with Satan (professional courtesy counts for so much in these things) to travel back in time to 1998 and trick the Senate into passing an act calling for Saddam's removal two years before they even stole the White House!

[topsecretk9]

JayDee
I know it does not matter to you but I so totally disagree with you and Ann (if this what see was really talking about)

The only thing that will come from this is light shed on Wilson...the more light the more apparent it was a scam from the beginning. Cheney will literally have no big role. Judith Miller, Walter Pincus, Tim Russert and Matt Cooper on the other hand will. This is putting Washington DC business as usual on trail and for that I would pay money too.

I think it will only be a matter of time when the papers start op-ed'ing this all went awry.

[topsecretk9]

JayDee
I know it does not matter to you but I so totally disagree with you and Ann (if this what see was really talking about)

The only thing that will come from this is light shed on Wilson...the more light the more apparent it was a scam from the beginning. Cheney will literally have no big role. Judith Miller, Walter Pincus, Tim Russert and Matt Cooper on the other hand will. This is putting Washington DC business as usual on trail and for that I would pay money too.

I think it will only be a matter of time when the papers start op-ed'ing this all went awry.

[clarice]

You can say that again,ts..Whoops you did, didn't you.;)

[SteveMG]

JayDee:
Reportedly (yep, another one of those suckers) Cheney won't have to testify in court. He can give a deposition or testimony from the OEB or elsewhere.

My guess is, however, that that would not enable defense attorney to cross. So, the whole thing's up in the air.

My guess again is that at some point Libby will plead. Lot of guesses but at least I know what I don't know.

Or the evil neocons will off old Scooter. Just like they did on the Grassy Knoll.

And Ford's Theater too. They've got a long long history of nefarious deeds.

But you knew that, I'm sure.

Oh yeah, the Titanic too. Who the hell do you think put that friggin' iceberg there anyway?

Wolfy. He's older than he looks.

SMG

[Sue]

SMG,

They can take Cheney's deposition and use it in court. Which is probably what would happen. Keep in mind, if there is a trial, it is specific to the charges. All Cheney will be asked is if he told Scooter about Wilson on such and such a date. And possibly if he has an opinion on whether or not it was a conversation that Scooter would remember. Beyond that, no questions. Which is why the left is waking up and smelling the coffee. There will not be a huge trial with WH officials being paraded in front of a jury on whether or not we were misled into war. The trial will be over whether Scooter Libby committed perjury, told false statements and obstructed justice. ;)

[MJW]

If I were Libby, before deciding whether to go to go to trial or plead, I'd try to get as much of the indictment dismissed or amended as possible. I think it's possible several counts might be dropped, along with all the classified-information-was-leaked language at the beginning of the obstruction count. That would seem to me to put Libby in a better position to bargain or to win at trial.

[Gary Maxwell]

Sue:

You are obviously operating under a false set of understandings. You must think that using etablished procedures, guidelines, law, facts and plain common sense will be enough to convince the lefties that their jihad has failed again. Coming as it does so close on the cigar blowing up in their faces on DeLay, it must sting quite a bit. But they are never going to give up their frog marching dream its all they got.

[millco88]

Quick question for everyone. Did Fitzgerald have the authority to really get into when Libby knew about classified information? Wouldn't he and, by extension, the grand jury, need the same sort of security clearance that Libby had to ask those kinds of questions?? Especially since the underlying charge is LEAKING classified information not KNOWING classified information.

[2CAVTrooper]

"If you REALLY think that conservatives are a shrinking minority, you better check those polls again."

JFH,

I think what Chuck is referring to is the efforts of the DNC to make sure that all the dead people are registered to vote in national elections

[Sue]

Gary,

Some of them have realized that unless Fitzgerald has another banana up his sleeve, the trial they were hoping for isn't going to happen. :) Some of them have no clue and think Bush and Cheney will be put on the witness stand discussing why went to war in Iraq. :) And those who still have dreams of that are going to be really pissed when it doesn't happen the way they want it to.

[John]

JayDee, probably the most eloquent proof that most military people vote Republican is the fact that Gore's lawyers did all they good to suppress the military absentee vote in 2000.

[sbrs]

They've certainly come a long way from the days when they happily facilitated killing CIA agents by way of Phillip Agee

I was living in Athens at the time Welch was killed, and later wrote my master's on his killing. It had nothing whatsoever to do with Agee.

When Barbara Bush made the same claim you just made, she was sued by Agee and lost, forced to remove the claim from her book and write an apology to Agee (I am not sideing with Agee he is apetty traitor, but it had nothing to do with him).

The Identites Act also had nothing to do with Agee, Marchetti, Marks or Mader (who did not pen his own books), it could not legally affect them.

What was going on was in the early 80's Three CIA former CIA officers were writing memiors on Vietnam. Frank snepp, who's book is a vry good and illuminating read was targeted and every aempt was made to chill the publication of his book, the identities act came about as part of various efforts to chill these books.

for any of you who have an interest in the entire episode, I spent a lot fo time debriefing the actual author of the Mader books ("who's who in the CIA), who was a Colonel in Czech Intel. He was head of their disinformation Dept. that op was not counter espionage but a disinfo/prog effor becsue the intentionally named NON CIA as CIA personnel in order to make hard for US opinion leaders/gatekeeprers/reporters etc overseas

[R FLANAGAN]

Isn't the CIA "DAMAGE ASSESSMENT" irrelevant
as a defense of Scooter's Plame outing ?
Clearly at the time he did it Scooter
couldn't have known what the damage would be.

[roger dier]

I'm sure glad Mr. Bush and the right wing cleaned up the horrible Clinton aftermess and replaced it with one of its own.

Tsk. Tsk. Exposing the identity of a CIA agent who spent 18 years of her life gathering intelligence to keep America safe. Bush, Rove, Uncle Dick, et al, are world class hyprocrites and threats to the security of our United States.

I know we all look forward to other fallout that may come from Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation and the Libby Trial.

Hope the GOP Bush apologists keep spinning that Mr. Libby was a rogue member of the administration, who allegedly did what he did without the knowledge of Bush, Rove and Cheney. It's hilarious to hear because it shows the depth of Bush Administration desparation and asks the American people to suspend belief and trust them. The American people now spell trust I-r-a-q.

A few years ago, Senator John McCain, reflecting on the personal problems of President Bill Clinton, called his tenure in the White House "a terrific waste." Glad that label is transferable.

[Cecil Turner]

Isn't the CIA "DAMAGE ASSESSMENT" irrelevant as a defense of Scooter's Plame outing ?

Yes. (Especially since outing wasn't charged.) However, as the comment above illustrates, the political dimension in this case is significant. And the non damage to national security from the outing is very relevant to that issue.

[drjohn]

If Wilson did not have a secrecy agreement, why not? Why did they allow Wilson to write a piece in the NY Times if not by design? It makes plausible the possibility that the Wilson trip was a plot against the President of the United States concocted by the CIA and using Wilson as the willing accomplice. Once Wilson wrote his piece, questions were going to arise about how his trip came to be. There needs to be a real investigation as to who was involved in this plot.
It's time for Republicans to strike back.

[CaseyL]

"On the off-chance that actualy reading the report would be of interst to you, look on the right column of this blog, in the section titled "Wilson/Plame" (right under a useless Google search logo)."

Very handy, TM, and I thank you. I had previously read linked parts of the report, since I frankly wasn't interested in plowing through all 521 pages of it. Nor have I read all 521 pages this time, but I did read the entire part dealing with the Niger issue.

I presume your "Wilson lied!" claim arises from this section:

"Committee staff asked how the former ambassador could have come to the conclusion that the "dates were wrong and the names were wrong" when he had never seen the CIA reports and had no knowledge of what names and dates were in the reports. The former ambassador said that he may have "misspoken" to the reporter when he said he concluded the documents were "forged." He also said he may have become confused about his own recollection after the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported in March 2003 that the names and dates on the documents were not correct and may have thought he had seen the names himself. The former ambassador reiterated that he had been able to collect the names of the government officials which should have been on the documents."

(emphases mine)

Well, well, well. Ol' Joe is surely caught with his pants down, eh? Because obviously, no one could possibly confuse what he heard or saw months previously with something he heard or saw since then. People never make those kinds of mistakes by mistake; they're always LYING!

Hmmmmm. Then I wonder who the liar is in this exchange:

" The WINPAC Director and the NSC Special Assistant disagreed, however, about the content of their conversation in some important respects. First, when the WINPAC Director first spoke to Committee staff and testified at a Committee hearing, he said that he had told the NSC Special Assistant to remove the words "Niger" and "500 tons" from the speech because of concerns about sources and methods. The NSC Special Assistant told Committee staff that there never was a discussion about removing "Niger" and "500 tons" from the State of the Union and said that the drafts of the speech show that neither "Niger" nor "500 tons" were ever in any of the drafts at all. He believed that the WINPAC Director had confused the State of the Union conversation with a conversation they had previously had in preparation for the Negroponte speech in which they did discuss removing "Niger" from the speech because of the WINPAC Director's concerns about revealing sources and methods."

Hah! If Joe Wilson couldn't possibly confuse what he saw or heard months before with something he saw or heard since then, then it follows as the night the day that WINPAC's Director and the NSC Special Assistant couldn't possibly remember different versions of a conversation they had both had only days or weeks previously!

Which one of them is lying?? WINPAC's Director? Or the NSC Special Assistant?

Oh, and get a load of this one:

"On March 25, 2002, the DO issued a third and final intelligence report from the same "[foreign] government service. The report said that the 2000 agreement by Niger to provide uranium to Iraq specified that 500 tons of uranium per year would be delivered in [redacted]."

As in the two previous reports, the government service was not identified as the foreign government service. The foreign government service did not provide the DO with information about its source and the DO, to date, remains uncertain as to how the foreign government service collected the information in the three intelligence reports. There were no obvious inconsistencies in the names of officials mentioned or the dates of the transactions in any of the three reports. Of the seven names mentioned in the reporting, two were former high ranking officials who were the individuals in the positions described in the reports at the time described and five were lower ranking officials. Of the five lower ranking, two were not the individuals in the positions described in the reports, however, these do not appear to be names or positions with which intelligence analysts would have been familiar. For example, an INR analyst who had recently returned from a position as Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Niger told Committee staff that he did not notice any inconsistencies with the names of the officials mentioned. The only mistake in any of the reports regarding dates, is that one date, July 7, 2000, is said to be a Wednesday in the report, but was actually a Friday."

(emphases mine)

Perfidious swine! Do they really expect us to believe that getting individuals' names and titles wrong is an innocent mistake? Or that getting wrong an easily-checked fact, like what day of the week "July 7, 200" is a minor error? It's obviously code! They're all obviously liars!!

Thank you for introducing me to this amazing new definition of "lie," a definition that says, basically, any departure from photographic memory or total recall cannot possibly be a mistake, cannot possibly be confusion, but has to be a lie.

[Cecil Turner]

Well, well, well. Ol' Joe is surely caught with his pants down, eh? Because obviously, no one could possibly confuse what he heard or saw months previously with something he heard or saw since then.

At least you've stopped claiming it's part of an addendum to the SSCI report, rather than in the report itself. We'll obviously have to agree to disagree as to the believability of Wilson claiming he might have mistaken the signatures on documents he'd never seen, but this is substantial progress.

[Neo]

On the bottom of page 39 of the Senate Intelligence Committee report, it states ..

The former ambassador had traveled previously to Niger on the CIA's behalf redacted. The former ambassador was selected for the 1999 trip after his wife mentioned to her supervisors that her husband was planning a business trip to Niger in the near future and might be willing to use his contacts in the region redacted. Because the former ambassador did not uncover any information about redacted during this visit to Niger, CPD did not distribute an intelligence report on the visit.

.. it apparently was a repeat. Just how did this get seemingly overlooked for so long.

[clarice]

Heh! The Weekly STandard quotes from the brief filed by most of the MSM when they objected to the subpoenas to reporters--detailing their factual argument about why Plame was not covert. http://www.weeklystandard.com/Utilities/printer_preview.asp?idArticle=6279&R=C7562F3E9

[EricH]

So the New and Improved!© defense of Wilson's false statements is that other officials also got the names and dates on documents wrong.

By this measure Libby walks home free.

But the same people positing the above absurd defense would never accept it if Libby employs it.

Moreoever, this ignores a whole series of statements by Wilson that are not dependent on photographic memories. Such as his statement that he had actually seen the Niger documents. Or that Cheney had read his report. And that Cheney had ignored his report.

One presumes that the defense of the above is that his not-so-photographic memory failed him again. He just forgot.

Funny how his forgetfulness always benefits him and never works against his charges of fixed pre-war intelligence. Just a coincidence.

Ain't life funny like that?

Absurd.

[clarice]

Ed Morrisey takes after Wolf Blitzer who like most of the press corps seems either not to have read the SSCI or developed amnesia about it.http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/archives/005699.php

(Just as they keep arguing that Valerie was covert when their lawyers argued she wasn't.)

[clarice]

Wilson's various assertions about when and how he saw the forged documents are damning and that's why he's been backpedaling ever since the SSCI called him on it.

The SSCI never unsealed the transcript of his testimony so we cannot say for certain which of the two documents he was describing, but it's clear that (a)if he saw the ones the CIA did, someone slipped him classified material 8 months after his mission, so any claims he warned the Agency when he made his report the documents were false is--well-false:(b) His walk back position is the early statements to Pincus and Kristof , repeated to the SSCI, were a mistake, that he really was referring to the documents the IAEA rejected. We don't know because we don't have his testimony which documents his testimony is consistent with. In any event if he is referring to the IAEA documents, he still was lying when he said he warned the Agency or anyone else--they knew before he did.

Even more sinister is the possibility that the documents he saw were consistent with those the IAEA rejected and he did see them before the CIA received them.
In any version of the events, his statements about when he saw them and how and what he did after seeing them are trouble for him.

[Harry Arthur]

Talk about substantial progress ... I believe Casey has actually consulted a dictionary on the mean of the word "lie." I can't help but wonder, though, does the dictionary definition also apply to Bush or only to his critics?

[clarice]

sbrs, what an interesting post.

[vincenzo]

"Well, what is happening here exactly? You can always count on a partisan rightwing extremist to TELL you what is happening,..."

... as JayDee proceeds to "TELL [us] what is happening".

funny, JayDee, now I'm convinced: partisan rightwing extremists like you really are as full of shit as all the piss 'n moan lefties say you are!!!

[R M Flanagan]

Just as the CIA DAMAGE ASSESSMENT is irrelevant to Fitz's charges against Scooter (as well as to the cntral issue of Plame's outing)aren't Joe Wilson's various transgressions similarly irrelevant ? If Scooter's guilty , he's guilty whatever's true about Wilson. Why don't we talk about that?

[TM]

Oh, Casey, that was a breakthrough. Should we move on to the question of his wife's involvement, or just take for granted that his non-photographic memory failed to register her presence in the room (at roughly the same time that his non-IPod ears failed to record her voice introducing him)?

For Rick Ballard, this may be the opposite of what you want -

[Neo]

As you can see here,">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valerie_Plame">here, Valerie Plame is perfectly safe.

[Brad]

Through all of this, the one thing that has always struck me is the fact that the liberals firmly believe a POLITICIAN (Bush), would lie about something that he absolutely had to know he was going to get caught on. No politician of any stripe, would ever lie about something so easily found out. It's just not in their nature, unless their name is Bill Clinton, lol, sorry had to do it. Honestly though folks (you lefties that is). If you believe that Bush knew for a fact that Saddam had no WMD's, but purposefully lied about it just so he could go to war, win, let inspectors run wild looking for em, and then when they did not find them, reap a political shit storm from it?!?!?!? You folks definition of rational thought needs some redefining. I think that pretty much sums everything up in a nutshell. He was 100% sure they were there, he expected the inspectors to find them, but for whatever reason they did not. Deal with it, and move the hell on for Christs sake.

[!]

"You folks definition of rational thought needs some redefining. I think that pretty much sums everything up in a nutshell. He was 100% sure they were there, he expected the inspectors to find them, but for whatever reason they did not. Deal with it, and move the hell on for Christs sake."

He's a mighty fine leader, isn't he?

Are you 100% sure that he was 100% sure?

Sorry. I'm just highly skeptical of any politician being completely certain of anything beyond what makes him or her look best.

[Rick Ballard]

TM,

The indictment states on page 4: "[Libby] was advised by the CIA officer that Wilson's wife worked at the CIA and was believed to be responsible for sending Wilson on the trip."

and then on page 12:

"[Libby] was informed by a senior CIA officer that Wilson's wife was employed by the CIA and that the idea of sending him to Niger originated with her."

via The American Spectator which provides additional evidence of Wilson's flights of fancy.

So, Casey can decide if Wilson is lying or Fitz is lying. Or was it different in the Alterman Reality?

[demosthenes]

tm:

why isn't Joe Wilson being prosecuted for lying to Congress?

isn't there a horrible double standard at work here?

[Syl]

roger dier

"Tsk. Tsk. Exposing the identity of a CIA agent who spent 18 years of her life gathering intelligence to keep America safe. Bush, Rove, Uncle Dick, et al, are world class hyprocrites and threats to the security of our United States."

There is a grave danger to national security by distracting an administration during time of war through making false accusations and criminalizing their effort to respond. If a CIA agent was indeed outed by someone in the administration, that should be punished, but the uproar over this is more harmful than the actual outing itself.

The amount of time, attention, and effort necessary to counteract
the faux outrage takes away from the ability to focus on things that matter tremendously in keeping our country safe and can thereby contribute to the deaths of American citizens fighting for us in Iraq and around the world.

The outing of a CIA agent, one among thousands, is not trivial, but the uproar over this is as much, if not more, of a threat to our national security.

Keep this in mind while you go around Tsk Tsk'ing. There is also a finger that is wagging right back at you.

[JM Hanes]

How covert was Plame? Everyone seems to have forgotten that Novak called the CIA to ask about her before he published his article. It seems pretty hard to claim the CIA was pro-actively protecting her identity, when they, themselves, confirmed her employment to a reporter!

[roger dier]

Hi Syl,

Thanks for your comment. I'll never buy the notion (always advanced by the party in power) that in a time of war, that those in power cannot be questioned about their motives and actions. You suggest that we should not do so because it will distract the leader of the party in power, in this case Bush, from his worldly duties where all of his decisions are beyond question has never flown in this democracy.

Dissent is the lifeblood of democracy. If he can't stand the heat of a democracy, Harry Truman had a suggestion on what he should do.

[kim]

Dissent is one thing; aid and comfort another. But the line between them is not marked.
================================================

[JM Hanes]

Christopher Hitchens makes the same point I mentioned above about the CIA "outing" Plame -- among an assortment of other observations worth reading. For example:

Mr. Fitzgerald, therefore, seems to have decided to act "as if." He conducts himself as if Ms. Plame's identity was not widely known, as if she were working under "non official cover" (NOC), as if national security had been compromised, and as if one or even two catch-all laws had been broken. By this merely hypothetical standard, he has performed exceedingly well, even if rather long-windedly, before pulling up his essentially empty net.

[kim]

Another way, RD, to make my point about dissent might be to ask you whether or not dissent should be based on a lie. You might argue the 'greater truth' of Joe's message(you can't 'cuz it isn't known, yet), but it is clear(to even the left) that Joe did lie repeatedly, and his dissent was based on that.

Now where are you? Traditionally, in real(isn't this?) war, you're in the crowd watching Joe hang.

I see him, there, now, twisting, slowly, slowly, in the wind.
=================================================

[kim]

Hmm. Let's see: Wartime. On official business for the executive branch. Derelict in his Duty.

Ten, Hut!
===================================================

[SteveMG]

Should we move on to the question of his wife's involvement, or just take for granted that his non-photographic memory failed to register her presence in the room (at roughly the same time that his non-IPod ears failed to record her voice introducing him)?

C'mon, TM, Wilson has acknowledged that he's had too many wives and taken too many drugs to run for office.

How was he supposed to keep track of what Valerie was doing among all those other spouses he's had?

You wingnuts expect the impossible.

SMG

[SteveMG]

Should we move on to the question of his wife's involvement, or just take for granted that his non-photographic memory failed to register her presence in the room (at roughly the same time that his non-IPod ears failed to record her voice introducing him)?

C'mon, TM, Wilson has acknowledged that he's had too many wives and taken too many drugs to run for office.

How was he supposed to keep track of what Valerie was doing among all those other spouses he's had?

You wingnuts expect the impossible.

SMG

[Kate]

On the Valerie Plame/Valerie Wilson political contribution from her CIA cover firm, is that legal? Can any citizen make up a name or a firm for making political contributions? Just wondering.

[kim]

Marrying and hanging go by fate.
================================

[Gabriel Chapman]

They stovepipe, cherrypick, forge, manipulate, suppress, propagandize - and god knows what else - legitimate intelligence to phony up a cause for war that their focus groupers have told them can be sold to the American public.

This is what you get when you trust Sy Hersh.

[BumperStickerist]

AAAAAUUUUUUUUUGGGGggggggggghhhhHHHHHHHHHH!!!

There. I said it.

Libby's lying to the Grand Jury will be hashed out in court. However, the 'leak' of classified information from Libby will turn out to be stupefyingly small and highly technical.

In 1999, Valerie Plame worked at the CIA - NOT Classified.

In 1999, Valerie Plame worked at the CIA in the Counter-Proliferation Division - Classified.

No one in the Administration made any mention of Plame's FORMER status as a NOC with regard to Joseph Wilson or the Niger trip. Joe did that.

The leak was along the lines of "Valerie Plame works at the CIA in the Counter Proliferation (note: only the latter part of that sentence deals with classified info) and she suggested her husband, Joe Wilson, could help by travelling to Niger"

The NOC/Secret Agent Revealed! angle is a red herring.

[Dan Hamilton]

All should remember that before the war there was NO ONE, NOT ONE PERSON, No INTEL Agency, IN THE WHOLE (*00((*^%% World who believed that Saddam DID NOT HAVE WMD.

NO ONE.

Please - Point to ANY Agency ANYWHERE anyone would have listened to that said Saddam had no WMD!!!!

Unless you can do this you have NO basis to call Bush a lier. You can say he was WRONG and EVERYBODY will agree with you, even George Bush but lying not hardly.

Again PLEASE point out the people or the agencies BEFORE the war who said that Saddam had no WMD!!!

YOU CAN'T. NOBODY CAN BECAUSE THERE WERE NONE!!!!

This is the most important, most forgotten, point in the whole "Bush LIED" BIG LIE. He didn't lie. He was wrong. Everybody in the world was WRONG about Saddam's WMD. But Bush did not LIE.

The Left must push their BIG LIE what else are they to do. They can't argue from facts, only from lies. Lies that they believe they can get away with if they just keep saying them long enough. Unhappily with the MSN's help they may be right.

BUT NOT YET!!!!!

[2CAVTrooper]

"Thanks for your comment. I'll never buy the notion (always advanced by the party in power) that in a time of war, that those in power cannot be questioned about their motives and actions. You suggest that we should not do so because it will distract the leader of the party in power, in this case Bush, from his worldly duties where all of his decisions are beyond question has never flown in this democracy.

Dissent is the lifeblood of democracy. If he can't stand the heat of a democracy, Harry Truman had a suggestion on what he should do."

Why is it that when clinton the pants dropper was in office we couldn't question his motives or actions and anyone who did were investigated by the FBI, audited by the IRS, and labeled by the clinton attack minions as practicing "politics of personal destruction"?

So I guess that questioning or voicing dissent against a democratic president is bad BUT questioning, voicing dissent, or outright smearing a Republican President is A OK to you?

[DerekFlint]

I agree the descriptive "lie" is a little strong; How about "exaggerated" the intelligence in order to convince the country to undertake this costly and unnecessary war...

[clarice]

How about Butler report and Silberman/Robb report or does the left think that everytime an investigation is made and the reprort debunks their fantasy, everyone should just ignore it?

*smacking palm to forehead* What am I thinking? Of course, they do.

[Sue]

Ahh...I can see the headlines now...go with me, back in time, to a place called pre-war America...

"Bush Ignored Another PDB"

...Saddam passes WMDs to Al Qaeda...

...bi-partisan panel to investigate why Bush ignored intelligence that Saddam had WMDs...

[kim]

Joe has just the biggest goddamned 'I told you so' and it would be effective if it were true. It's not, the lying oh never mind, I doubt it's his mother's fault.
=====================================

[kim]

He's a lying son of a bitch even if she ain't.
================================================

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