Eternal Plame
Pookie
BY JAMES TARANTO
Monday, August 28, 2006
Or at least it seemed that way. Three years after the Valerie Plame
kerfuffle began, it seems to be ending with a whimper--that whimper being
"Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq
War," by Michael Isikoff and David Corn. Corn is the writer for The Nation,
a left-wing magazine (or possibly a right-wing parody of a left-wing
magazine) who got the whole thing started by parroting Joe Wilson's claims
that his wife's "outing" violated the Intelligence Identities Protection
Act. Isikoff is a reporter for Newsweek. Their collaboration raises the
possibility of liberal bias in the mainstream media.
First of all, "Hubris"? This comes on the heels of Tom Ricks's "Fiasco."
Then there were "Slander," "Treason" and "Godless." It seems everyone wants
to be Ann Coulter these days.
But we digress--for which you can hardly blame us, as the Plame kerfuffle is
such a tedious affair. Nonetheless, out of an obligation to history, we
shall recount the revelations from the Isikoff-Corn book, which Isikoff
outlines in a story in Newsweek:
a.. The man who "leaked" Plame's identity and her involvement in her
husband's Niger junket to columnist Bob Novak and other reporters was not
Karl Rove, Scooter Libby or anyone else in the White House. It was Richard
Armitage, then deputy secretary of state.
b.. Armitage's motives were not malicious. He is "a well-known gossip who
loves to dish and receive juicy tidbits about Washington characters" and
"apparently hadn't thought through the possible implications of telling
Novak about Plame's identity."
c.. It was from a classified memo that Armitage learned Plame worked for
the CIA. But there was no violation of the Intelligence Identities
Protection Act; special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald "found no evidence
that Armitage knew of Plame's covert CIA status." (By all available
evidence, Plame's covert status had expired by the time of her "outing"
anyway.)
d.. In October 2003 Armitage confessed to his boss, Colin Powell, that he
was the "leaker." The State Department decided to withhold this information
from the White House, because "Powell and his aides feared the White House
would then leak that Armitage had been Novak's source--possibly to embarrass
State Department officials who had been unenthusiastic about Bush's Iraq
policy."
David Corn weighs in on the Puffington Host in which he hilariously tries to
downplay the extent to which these revelations discredit his initial
enthusiasm for the purported scandal:
The Plame leak in Novak's column has long been cited by Bush
administration critics as a deliberate act of payback, orchestrated to
punish and/or discredit Joe Wilson after he charged that the Bush
administration had misled the American public about the prewar intelligence.
The Armitage news does not fit neatly into that framework.
To say the least! As we observed on PBS 10 months ago, this was a "Seinfeld"
scandal--an investigation about nothing.
Of course, much as this seemed like a sitcom, it had consequences in real
life. Because Armitage did not come clean right away, many people suffered:
a.. Millions of taxpayer dollars were wasted investigating a nonexistent
crime.
b.. Innocent White House officials were distracted from serving the
country in order to participate in the investigation, which was in full
swing a year ago when Hurricane Katrina struck.
c.. Scooter Libby lost his job and was indicted for actions that never
would have occurred but for the investigation.
d.. The Democratic left, putting its faith in scandal to bring down the
Bush administration, became even more fatuous and ineffective.
The only winner in this whole deal is Joe Wilson's ego--and think of the
toll it's taken on his poor little superego.
Those who tried to turn the Plame kerfuffle into Watergate threw around
words like "treason" and "slander" (though, interestingly, not "godless").
Armitage appears to be guilty of nothing of the sort. But it does seem that
he was careless with secret information, eager to cover his own backside,
and heedless of the consequences his actions had for others. So let it never
be said that Richard Armitage is a profile in courage.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110008857
Slo
Pookie wrote:
> Eternal Plame
>
> BY JAMES TARANTO
> Monday, August 28, 2006
>
> Or at least it seemed that way. Three years after the Valerie Plame
> kerfuffle began,
Whenever a rightist uses the word "kerfuffle" I smell a big
steaming mound of bu(ll)shit. This right-wing shithead should
know that outting a covert CIA agent to settle a political
vendetta is *not* a "kerfuffle".
Sarge
D. Wells
Geez. Now we know why the handle 'Slo'.
Have you caught up enough to realize we aren't talking about Karl Rove
anymore???
Pookie
"Slo" <Slos...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1156800707.8...@75g2000cwc.googlegroups.com...
August 28, 2006
The CIA-Leak Fiasco
Back where it started, after three years of investigation.
By Byron York
On October 3, 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell talked to reporters
after meeting with Laszlo Kovacs, the foreign minister of Hungary. The
meeting went well, with nothing controversial to discuss. It went so well,
in fact, that a reporter said to Powell, "Mr. Secretary, things are so
smooth I thought I'd ask you about something else. The State Department is
offering to help in the search for the person who leaked the CIA official's
name. Can you say something about that situation? How might the State
Department help?"
"We have been asked by the Justice Department, those who are conducting this
investigation, to make ourselves available for any purpose that they have,"
Powell answered. Promising to cooperate fully, Powell added, "We are doing
our searches in response to the letter we received yesterday, and make
ourselves available. I'm not sure what they will be looking for or what they
wish to contact us about, but we are anxious to be of all assistance to the
inquiry."
No one in the press corps knew it at the time, but if a newly published
account of the CIA-leak case is accurate, Powell knew much, much more than
he let on during that session with the press. Two days earlier, according to
Hubris, the new book by the Nation's David Corn and Newsweek's Michael
Isikoff, Powell had been told by his top deputy and close friend Richard
Armitage that he, Armitage, leaked the identity of CIA employee Valerie
Plame to columnist Robert Novak. Armitage had, in other words, set off the
CIA-leak affair.
At the time, top administration officials, including President Bush, were
vowing to "get to the bottom" of the matter. But Armitage was already there,
and he told Powell, who told top State Department officials, who told the
Justice Department. From the first week of October 2003, then, investigators
knew who leaked Valerie Plame's identity - the ostensible purpose of an
investigation that still continues, a few months shy of three years after it
began.
Justice Department officials also knew who else had spoken to Novak. In that
same time period, October 2003, FBI investigators spoke to top White House
aide Karl Rove, and Rove told them of a brief conversation with Novak in
which Novak brought up learning of Plame's place of employment and Rove said
he had heard about that, too. So by October 2003 - more than two months
before the appointment of special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald - the
Justice Department knew who had told Novak about Plame.
ONE FRENZIED WEEK
Given the most recent revelation about Armitage - no surprise to anyone
watching the case - plus what was previously known about the leak, the
question now is, why did the investigation go on? Why was it expanded, and
why was Fitzgerald named, and why does it continue today? Some of the
answers can be found in the events of a single, frenzied week at the end of
September and beginning of October 2003.
Justice Department officials originally did not want to pursue the case. The
CIA first contacted the Department about the Wilson leak shortly after
Wilson's identity was revealed in Novak's column on July 14, 2003. Such
referrals are often handled quickly by the Department, but it appears the
Plame referral languished there for more than two months. And then, on
Saturday and Sunday, September 27-28, all hell broke loose, when news leaked
that George Tenet had written a letter to the Justice Department about the
matter.
On Monday, September 29, 2003, the Washington Post reported that "The
controversy erupted over the weekend, when administration officials reported
that Tenet sent the Justice Department a letter raising questions about
whether federal law was broken when the operative, Valerie Plame, was
exposed. She was named in a column by Robert D. Novak that ran July 14 in
The Post and other newspapers. CIA officials approached the Justice
Department about a possible investigation within a week of the column's
publication. Tenet's letter was delivered more recently."
After the Tenet leak, Democrats in Congress, led by New York Sen. Charles
Schumer, demanded an investigation. On September 30, 2003, the Post
published a front-page story, "Bush Vows Action if Aides Had Role in Leak,"
which reported that, "President Bush's chief spokesman said yesterday that
the allegation that administration officials leaked the name of a CIA
operative is "a very serious matter" and vowed that Bush would fire anybody
responsible for such actions."
The furor prompted Novak to write another column on the Plame matter.
"During a long conversation with a senior administration official, I asked
why [Joseph] Wilson was assigned the mission to Niger," Novak wrote. "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."
According to Hubris, Armitage had gone through the weekend of September
27-28, and then the continued furor on Monday and Tuesday - not to mention
the previous three months - without realizing he was Novak's source. It was
only upon reading Novak's "no partisan gunslinger" column, allegedly, that
Armitage knew he was the source and got in touch with Powell.
In any event, the Justice Department moved quickly. In the next two weeks,
DOJ investigators interviewed Armitage, Powell, Rove, Lewis Libby, and
others. According to Hubris, Armitage told investigators about his talk with
Novak, but did not tell them that he had also told the Washington Post's Bob
Woodward about Plame. It appears that Armitage did not tell Fitzgerald about
his Woodward conversation until November 2005, and then only after Woodward
initiated the process.
TRAITORS? NEVER MIND
Why did Armitage keep the information from Fitzgerald? In Hubris, Armitage's
allies hint at the same defense that Lewis Libby's lawyers use to explain
why he didn't tell investigators everything: that Plame was a relatively
inconsequential part of a big story and was not, as administration critics
say, the focus of a White House conspiracy. "My sense from Rich is that it
was just chitchat," State Department intelligence head told Corn and
Isikoff, saying that Armitage had simply "f--ked up."
Whatever Armitage's motives, the fact that he was the Novak leaker
undermines - destroys, actually - the conspiracy theory of the CIA-leak
case. According to Isikoff, in an excerpt of Hubris published in Newsweek:
"The disclosures about Armitage, gleaned from interviews with colleagues,
friends and lawyers directly involved in the case, underscore one of the
ironies of the Plame investigation: that the initial leak, seized on by
administration critics as evidence of how far the White House was willing to
go to smear an opponent, came from a man who had no apparent intention of
harming anyone."
It's an extraordinary admission coming from Isikoff's co-author Corn, one of
the leading conspiracy theorists of the CIA-leak case. "The Plame leak in
Novak's column has long been cited by Bush administration critics as a
deliberate act of payback, orchestrated to punish and/or discredit Joe
Wilson after he charged that the Bush administration had misled the American
public about the prewar intelligence," Corn and Isikoff write. "The Armitage
news does not fit neatly into that framework."
No, it doesn't. Instead, Corn and Isikoff argue that after Armitage "got the
ball rolling," his actions "abetted" a White House that was already
attempting to "undermining" Joseph Wilson. That's a long way from the cries
of "Traitor!" that came from the administration's critics during the
CIA-leak investigation.
WHY LIBBY - AND NOT ARMITAGE?
Of course, investigators knew that all along. So why did the investigation
continue? And why was Libby ultimately indicted, and not Armitage?
It appears that Libby's early statements raised investigators' suspicions.
Early on, once the FBI started asking questions, Armitage told investigators
he talked to Novak. Rove told investigators he talked to Novak. The CIA's
Bill Harlow told investigators he talked to Novak. Their stories, along with
Novak's description of how he learned about Plame (Novak talked to
investigators at the same time, describing the process, but not naming
sources), all lined up pretty well.
And then came Libby. During that same October time period, Libby - who was
not Novak's source - told investigators he learned about Plame from Tim
Russert. According to the Libby indictment, Libby said that "Russert asked
Libby if Libby was aware that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA." Although
Libby wasn't one of Novak's sources, his story didn't fit with the others,
and that would most likely make investigators suspect that somebody wasn't
telling the truth. In this case, it probably appeared that person was Libby.
Ultimately, Libby was indicted on perjury and obstruction charges. But at
the time Fitzgerald indicted Libby, at the end of October 2005, he did not
know that Armitage had not told investigators about his, Armitage's,
conversation with Woodward. According to Hubris, Fitzgerald then
re-investigated Armitage, finally deciding not to charge him with any crime.
Why? Certainly it appears that no one committed any crimes by revealing
Plame's identity, and one could argue that the Justice Department should not
have gone forward with a wide-ranging investigation after it discovered
Novak's sources. But if Fitzgerald was going to indict Libby, then why not
Armitage, too?
The answer may lie in the bitter conflict inside the administration over the
war in Iraq that is the backdrop to the entire CIA-leak affair. Armitage's
allies have made it clear that they believe Armitage is a "good" leaker
while Rove, Libby, and others in the White House are "bad" leakers. We do
not know what CIA and State Department officials told Fitzgerald during the
investigation, but we do know that fevered imaginings about the terrible
acts of the neocon cabal were not the exclusive province of left-wing blogs;
they were also present inside the State Department and CIA. Fitzgerald may
have chosen the course that he did - appearing to premise his investigation
on the conspiracy theorists' accusations - because he was pointed in that
direction by the White House's enemies inside and outside the
administration.
But now, after all the investigating, all the work, and the setting of
terrible precedents for forcing reporters to testify in court or go to jail,
the CIA-leak case hasn't moved much beyond where it was in that frenzied
week in October 2003. And unlike the old independent counsels, who were
required by law to issue a report on their investigation, Fitzgerald has no
obligation to explain his actions to anyone. Some questions that are
unanswered now might well remain unanswered forever.
http://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q=NDMwMTNiM2QzNzI5MmI3YTFiZWRiOGUyMjU4NjIwMDc=
SamMar...@aol.com
She was a fuckin clerk, that's it. Big fuckin deal!
George Grapman
Rally? If that is the case why did the CIA request an investigation
into her outing and why did Ashcroft name a special prosecutor?
--
To reply via e-mail please delete 1 c from paccbell
Slo
And you're a fucking dork. You righties need to lie in
your attempts to make your arguments. Taranto's POS
was chock full of misrepresentation to try to spin this
scandal into a "kerfuffle". I won't even bother reading
York 'cause reading one right-wing liar is enough.
Of course she wasn't a "clerk" or she wouldn't be under
cover and her job wouldn't have been classified.
Sarge
She wasn't a clerk! She was a secretary
Jim E
A patronage desk job does not equal a covert agent.
The bimbo hadn't been assigned outside CONUS in over five years.
She was a paper shuffling overhead expense, nothing more.
Jim E
Jim E
"George Grapman" <sfge...@paccbell.net> wrote in message
news:0UKIg.3611$tU....@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com...
> SamMar...@aol.com wrote:
>>
>> She was a fuckin clerk, that's it. Big fuckin deal!
>>
>
> Rally? If that is the case why did the CIA request an investigation into
> her outing and why did Ashcroft name a special prosecutor?
>
>
purged raised a political stink.
There has been a bit of a kerfuffle at CIA as the leftists defeatists are
being weeded out.
Nothing more.
Jim E
George Grapman
never told us the first time.
Which Carter and Clinton people do you refer to? You, of course, have
some names,
Voter
> Eternal Plame
>
> BY JAMES TARANTO
> Monday, August 28, 2006
>
<snip>
It's amusing to see so much effort being put out by the righties in an
attempt to downplay the leaking of a CIA operative's name as a "kerfuffle",
when not so long ago they were burning out their word processors writing
articles demanding that the President of the United States be impeached for
the unbelievably, earth shattering crime of lying about a blowjob, which,
according to them, brought the country to the brink of disaster and the
near total collapse of the very essence of morality.
Ah, priorities.
Slo
Jim E wrote:
>
> A patronage desk job does not equal a covert agent.
> The bimbo hadn't been assigned outside CONUS in over five years.
> She was a paper shuffling overhead expense, nothing more.
Another right-wing jackass parades his ignorance.
You don't know shit about what she did as that
was classified info.
Jim E
Continue pretending, it feeds your faith.
The religion of liberalism.
Jim E
Jim E
Hey stoopid!
The CIA said she had not been assigned outside CONUS in over five years.
The law that defines a covert agent says that five years in CONUS equals a
non covert agent.
Live with it loon.
Jim E
George Grapman
> "George Grapman" <sfge...@paccbell.net> wrote in message
> news:yrLIg.3615$tU....@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com...
>> Jim E wrote:
>>> "George Grapman" <sfge...@paccbell.net> wrote in message
>>> news:0UKIg.3611$tU....@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com...
>>>> SamMar...@aol.com wrote:
>>>>> She was a fuckin clerk, that's it. Big fuckin deal!
>>>>>
>>>> Rally? If that is the case why did the CIA request an investigation
>>>> into her outing and why did Ashcroft name a special prosecutor?
>>>>
>>>>
>>> Because the remaining Carter and Clintoon believers who had not yet been
>>> purged raised a political stink.
>>> There has been a bit of a kerfuffle at CIA as the leftists defeatists are
>>> being weeded out.
>>> Nothing more.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Jim E
>> Tell us again why Ashcroft named a special prosecutor. Oh, wait, you
>> never told us the first time.
>> Which Carter and Clinton people do you refer to? You, of course, have
>> some names,
>
>
> Continue pretending, it feeds your faith.
> The religion of liberalism.
>
>
> Jim E
>
>
George Grapman
>
>
> Hey stoopid!
> The CIA said she had not been assigned outside CONUS in over five years.
> The law that defines a covert agent says that five years in CONUS equals a
> non covert agent.
> Live with it loon.
>
>
> Jim E
>
>
Aschroft name a special prosecutor.
Your most recent explanation was that Crrter and Clinton people at
the CIA had not yet been purged. When to asked to name some of them your
reply was:
"Continue pretending, it feeds your faith.
The religion of liberalism."
--
Jim E
Your welcome.
Jim E
The purge continues.
LOL
Jim E
George Grapman
Culture of Corruption
<USAsaves...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> She wasn't a clerk! She was a secretary
>
>
>
>
The CIA Leak: Plame Was Still Covert
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11179719/site/newsweek/
--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com
Pookie
Pookie
"Culture of Corruption" <CultureOf...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:pvh7f2hithilqn7gr...@4ax.com...
> On Mon, 28 Aug 2006 19:42:09 -0400, "Sarge"
> <USAsaves...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>>
>> She wasn't a clerk! She was a secretary
>>
>>
>>
>>
> The CIA Leak: Plame Was Still Covert
>
> http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11179719/site/newsweek/
Plamegate, RIP
By Ben Johnson
FrontPageMagazine.com | August 28, 2006
Unfortunately for her vanity lawsuit, the "leaker" in the Valerie Plame
"scandal" is the one Bush administration official she didn't sue.
According to an article written by Newsweek's Michael Isikoff's entitled
"The Man Who Said Too Much," the first person to tell the press that Valerie
Plame sent her husband, Ambassador Joe Wilson, on his preposterous trip to
Niger was then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage.
The article was designed to promote Hubris, the new book Isikoff co-wrote
with David Corn, Washington editor of the far-Left Nation magazine - a fact
which in itself ought to speak volumes about Newsweek's "unbiased
reporting." The book relates that, upon reading Bob Novak's description of
the original source as "no partisan gunslinger," Armitage told others in
State he was "the one that f-cked up."
Appearing on yesterday's "Meet the Press," Novak would neither "confirm nor
deny" the story by Isikoff but offered that Isikoff is "a very good
investigative reporter." Reiterating his policy not to name sources without
their permission, he concluded, "I believe it is way past time for my source
to come forward."
At this stage, permission is perfunctory. Records show Armitage met with Bob
Woodward on June 13, 2003, weeks before his discussion with Novak. Bloggers
have speculated for months that Armitage was the Bush league Deep Throat,
and Washington Post Editor Ben Bradlee named him a "likely source."
The revelation discredits the Left's conspiracy theory that the Bush
administration leaked Plame's name to Novak in retaliation for Wilson's
op-ed, "What I Didn't Find in Niger." Corn admits, "Colleagues of Armitage
told us that Armitage - who is known to be an inveterate gossip - was only
conveying a hot tidbit, not aiming to do Joe Wilson harm." This confirms
Woodward's description of his source's "outing" as "casual and offhand," as
well as Novak's calling it "an offhand revelation."
For once, under the weight of evidence, Corn backs down - a bit. Note the
use of the passive voice here:
The Plame leak in Novak's column has long been cited by Bush administration
critics as a deliberate act of payback, orchestrated to punish and/or
discredit Joe Wilson after he charged that the Bush administration had
misled the American public about the prewar intelligence. The Armitage news
does not fit neatly into that framework.
Corn is less bashful later in the piece:
I happened to be the first journalist to report that the leak in the Novak
column might be evidence of a White House crime - a violation of the
little-known Intelligence Identities Protection Act, which makes it a crime
for a government official to disclose information about an undercover CIA
officer.
In an earlier column, Corn earned his reputation as the man willing to ask
the questions balanced journalists would not, querying:
Did senior Bush officials blow the cover of a US intelligence officer
working covertly in a field of vital importance to national security - and
break the law - in order to strike at a Bush administration critic and
intimidate others?
Now there is evidence Bushies used classified information and put the
nation's counter-proliferation efforts at risk merely to settle a score.
Now he acknowledges, "The Armitage leak was not directly a part of the White
House's fierce anti-Wilson crusade."
Trying to breathe life into a dying "scandal," he writes, "as Hubris notes,
it was, in a way, linked to the White House effort." How so? Because
Armitage got his information from a memo drawn up when I. Lewis "Scooter"
Libby investigated the Wilson trip. And - gasp! - Karl Rove verified the
information when asked.
So it is connected. In a way. Sorta.
Grasping for outrage, Corn writes:
Yet when Isikoff and Newsweek in July 2005 revealed a Matt Cooper email
showing that Rove had leaked to Cooper, the White House refused to
acknowledge this damning evidence, declined to comment on the case, and did
not dismiss Rove. To date, the president has not addressed Rove's role in
the leak. It remains a story of ugly and unethical politics, stonewalling,
and lies.
Corn omits the fact that Wilson was a nepotistic liar and that Bush promised
only to fire those who had broken the law, something Rove has apparently not
done. The decision by Libby - and ultimately Cheney - to investigate the
Niger trip is the reasonable reaction of a White House trying to understand
how an unqualified man conducted an inept investigation, then publicly
contradicted his previous report to the CIA and called the
commander-in-chief a liar in the midst of a war. Had the president not
investigated the trip, he would be accused of "refusing to explore his
mistakes." When the evidence exculpates him, the Left castigates him for
noticing.
The most delicious irony of the Isikoff/Corn piece is that throughout the
Bush administration the Left hailed Armitage and Powell, relying on the
steady stream of leaks emanating from their offices to undermine Bush's
foreign policy. After September 11, the Left hailed Powell and Armitage as
sensible "moderates" in an unbalanced administration. Before Operation Iraqi
Freedom, Armitage convinced Powell to try to sell the president on a
multilateral UN force in Iraq. He testified there might be such a force
"under UN leadership" after Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld ruled out that
particular encroachment on national sovereignty. Isikoff's piece records the
Vietnam vet's contempt for Cheney, Rove, and other "neocons," as well as his
reticence over Iraq. While in office, Armitage overtly muzzled John Bolton.
The Bill Moyers/George Soros-funded The American Prospect stated correctly,
"it was Armitage who supplied the steel fist inside Powell's velvet glove -
and that fist often swung at the administration's neoconservatives."
That collective fist swung through a flood of off-the-record press
statements to Washington's prestige media. Aside from his boss, few were as
accomplished at the art of the leak as Armitage. The American Prospect again
notes, "Michael Rubin, a former Middle East analyst in the Pentagon's policy
directorate (an outpost of neoconservatism), paid tribute to Armitage's
infighting skills in a September e-mail to friends in which he speculated
that a prominent journalist 'regularly reports Armitage's line in exchange
for weekly backgrounders.'"
Since leaving State, he has teamed with Powell in an under-the-radar media
campaign to spike Bolton's nomination to the UN and become a vocal critic of
Bush's policies in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The Left likewise hailed him during the Valerie Plame investigation. Noting
leaks that seemed to originate at State pointing the finger at
Cheney/Libby/Rove, the left-wing blog NeedleNose placed "Powell and/or
Armitage.in the ranks of those who are helping to fight back."
Knowing that it was not the hawkish wing of the White House but one of the
most outspoken (quasi-)doves - who fought the Left's preferred neocon demons
and whose leaks the Left cherished - who revealed Valerie Plame's name
should sweep aside the vacuous accusations that "pro-war ideologues" did her
in.
In gratitude, Valerie Plame threatened to sue Armitage last week.
Meanwhile, the leftist site Buzzflash charges its readers: "Beware of the
Armitage Red Herring."
Yeah. Blaming Richard Armitage for their leak is just what they would do..
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=24098
SamMar...@aol.com
Because it's fuckin politics!
SamMar...@aol.com
Keep trying robot. Anything Move On tells you just keep doing it!
Amanda Williams
news:BeJIg.715$UE5...@newsfe11.lga:
> Eternal Plame
>
> BY JAMES TARANTO
> Monday, August 28, 2006
>
[.. usual tedious Taranto illiterate drool zapped ..]
>
>
> http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110008857
One thing is obvious ... given all the screeching and hysteria from the
great gibbering mass of illiterate rightards shills, they do NOT want to
see Rove/Cheney etc under oath answering questions.
The sheer volume of the hysteria is amazing for a lawsuit that they ALL
CLAIM is "without merit", "going nowhere" and "falling apart"...
"Methinks they doth protest too much"
<snicker>
--
AW
<small but dangerous>
Pookie
"Amanda Williams" <p...@fu.com> wrote in message
news:Xns982E56D...@63.218.45.254...
August 29, 2006
Plame and the 'Bush Lied' Meme
By Jack Kelly
A new book by Michael Isikoff, an investigative reporter for Newsweek, and
David Corn, who writes for the far left wing magazine The Nation, casts many
powerful people in Washington in an unflattering light -- but not the people
who Mr. Isikoff and Mr. Corn wish to besmirch.
A brief review for those of you who have lives, and who consequently haven't
been following closely the details of the Plame Name Game: In his 2003 State
of the Union address, President Bush said: "The British government has
learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of
uranium from Africa."
First in leaks to reporters, and then in his own op-ed in the New York
Times, a retired diplomat, Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, said the
president was lying. His claim to speak with authority was that in the
spring of 2002, the CIA had sent him to Niger to see if Saddam had tried to
buy uranium there.
Mr. Wilson's charge was important because it marked the beginning of the
"Bush lied" meme about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. But
investigations by the Senate Intelligence Committee; the Robb-Silberman
Commission on prewar intelligence, and the British Butler Commission all
concluded it was Mr. Wilson who was not telling the truth. Saddam had indeed
tried to buy uranium in Africa, as even Mr. Wilson himself had acknowledged
to the CIA officers who debriefed him after his Niger trip.
One of the false claims Mr. Wilson made was that he had been sent to Niger
at the request of Vice President Dick Cheney. In his July 14, 2003 column,
Robert Novak disclosed that he had been sent instead at the insistence of
his wife, Valerie Plame, who worked at the CIA.
Ms. Plame had once been an undercover operative. Concern was expressed that
the leaker had violated the Intelligence Identities Protection Act.
Mr. Wilson blamed the leak on White House political guru Karl Rove, claiming
it was payback for his "whistle-blowing." A special prosecutor, Patrick
Fitzgerald, was appointed to investigate the charge. Mr. Fitzgerald
eventually indicted I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, then the chief of staff to the
vice president, on a charge of having lied to a grand jury about from whom
he had learned of Ms. Plame's occupation. He is awaiting trial.
No indictments have been brought on the charge Mr. Fitzgerald was appointed
to investigate, because it is clear there was no violation of the
Intelligence Identities Protection Act. The act applies only to those who
are operating under cover overseas, or who have done so within five years of
the disclosure of their identities. Ms. Plame had been manning a desk at CIA
headquarters in Langley, Va. for longer than that.
Mr. Isikoff and Mr. Corn disclose that it was then Deputy Secretary of State
Richard Armitage who disclosed Ms. Plame's identity to Bob Novak, which is
not exactly news to those who have been following the case. But Mr. Isikoff
and Mr. Corn provide details which reflect poorly on Mr. Armitage, Mr.
Fitzgerald, and the journalists who knew the truth at the time.
Mr. Armitage disclosed to his boss, Secretary of State Colin Powell, and to
Justice Department officials his role in the case in October, 2003, after a
second Novak column, Mr. Isikoff and Mr. Corn say.
For more than three years, Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby have been accused,
falsely, of being the source of the leak. Mr. Armitage, Mr. Powell, and
Justice department officials knew the truth, but said nothing. Clarice
Feldman, a Washington, D.C. lawyer, described Mr. Armitage's silence as
"inexplicable and perfidious."
"Had he spoken out publicly immediately, could there have been a reason for
the press to have demanded the appointment of the feckless special
prosecutor?" she asked.
Mr. Fitzgerald knew in his first few days on the job that Mr. Armitage was
the leaker; that the leak was inadvertent, and that the Intelligence
Identities Act hadn't been violated. Yet he has persisted in a sham
prosecution.
Mr. Isikoff and Mr. Corn write that: "the Plame leak in Novak's column has
long been cited by Bush administration critics as a deliberate act of
payback, orchestrated to punish and/or discredit Joe Wilson after he charged
that the Bush administration had misled the American public about prewar
intelligence."
They add, lamely, that: "The Armitage news does not fit neatly into that
framework."
They don't mention that Mr. Isikoff and (especially) Mr. Corn have been
among the journalists flogging this meme, and the time that it takes to
research and write a book indicates they've known for quite some time that
it isn't true. They're only willing to tell the truth, now, for money.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2006/08/plame_and_the_bush_lied_meme.html
Amanda Williams
>
> "Amanda Williams" <p...@fu.com> wrote in message
> news:Xns982E56D...@63.218.45.254...
>> "Pookie" <pooki...@optonline.net> allegedly said in
>> news:BeJIg.715$UE5...@newsfe11.lga:
>>
>>> Eternal Plame
>>>
>>> BY JAMES TARANTO
>>> Monday, August 28, 2006
>>>
>>
>> [.. usual tedious Taranto illiterate drool zapped ..]
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110008857
>>
>>
>> One thing is obvious ... given all the screeching and hysteria from
>> the great gibbering mass of illiterate rightards shills, they do NOT
>> want to see Rove/Cheney etc under oath answering questions.
>>
>> The sheer volume of the hysteria is amazing for a lawsuit that they
>> ALL CLAIM is "without merit", "going nowhere" and "falling apart"...
>>
>> "Methinks they doth protest too much"
>>
>> <snicker>
>>
>> --
>> AW
>>
>> <small but dangerous>
>
> August 29, 2006
> Plame and the 'Bush Lied' Meme
> By Jack Kelly
>
[... even MORE rightard hysteria zapped ...]
>
> http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2006/08/plame_and_the_bush_l
i
> ed_meme.html
>
Geez Pukie, you just keep on proving my point...
I WOULD thank you, but I know that you are way too retarded to
understand what you are doing... <snicker>
But keep up the GOOD work...
rotfl...
Pookie
My pleasure!
> I WOULD thank you, but I know that you are way too retarded to
> understand what you are doing... <snicker>
>
> But keep up the GOOD work...
>
> rotfl...
>
> --
> AW
>
> <small but dangerous>
August 29, 2006 8:24 AM
Rove and Libby: Hubris Authors Never Contacted Us
The CIA-leak investigation book - without two key figures
By Byron York
Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq
War, the new book by the Nation's David Corn and Newsweek's Michael Isikoff,
is the most in-depth single account yet of the CIA-leak investigation. But
representatives of two central figures in the case, former Cheney chief of
staff Lewis Libby and top White House aide Karl Rove, say the authors never
got in touch with them, much less interviewed them, for the book.
"Neither Isikoff nor Corn ever contacted us to discuss anything about
the book," says Barbara Comstock, a spokeswoman for the Libby defense team.
"We were never contacted," says Mark Corallo, a spokesman for Rove.
Hubris was rushed into release before its scheduled October
publication date, and copies of the book are not yet available publicly. But
throughout the CIA-leak affair, Corn's reporting has relied heavily on
former ambassador Joseph Wilson, the husband of CIA employee Valerie Plame
Wilson. Corn was, in fact, the first person to publish a story explicitly
raising the possibility that Mrs. Wilson was a "deep-cover" CIA officer.
Based on an interview with Wilson (who Corn said did not talk about his wife's
status), Corn wrote on July 16, 2003 - just two days after the original
Robert Novak column that started the CIA leak controversy - that "a pair of
top Bush officials told a reporter the name of a CIA operative who
apparently has worked under what's known as 'nonofficial cover' and who has
had the dicey and difficult mission of tracking parties trying to buy or
sell weapons of mass destruction or WMD material."
"The Wilson smear was a thuggish act," Corn, who is also the author of
The Lies of George W. Bush: Mastering the Politics of Deception, concluded.
Today, Corn is posting updates about Hubris at his website, bushlies.com.
In response to an e-mail asking whether he and Isikoff had contacted
Rove and Libby, Corn responded:
Your impression is wrong - as you will see when you read the book
and the source note. Mike - who also got your note - will reply to you with
some more details about his dealings with the Rove and Libby camps. At one
of the Libby hearings, as Wells was walking into the courtroom, I asked if
he was talking to reporters, he said no. Mike, I believe, also tried to
reach him and/or Jeffress and got nothing. Ask him about that. And we did
put a request into the White House that covered a host of matters and got
nothing from it. So it's simply not true we did not talk to - or try to talk
to - the Rove and Libby sides. You might want to wonder about whoever told
you that.
In an excerpt of Hubris published in Newsweek, Isikoff writes that
Novak "caused a huge stir when he revealed that Valerie Plame, wife of
Iraq-war critic Joseph Wilson, was a CIA officer." But when it was
originally published, Novak's column caused virtually no stir at all - until
Corn published an article claiming that Mrs. Wilson worked under
"nonofficial cover" for the CIA. And even then, there wasn't much notice
until New York Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer picked up on Corn's article
and demanded an investigation. Those demands, combined with a leaked letter
to the Justice Department from then-CIA Director George Tenet calling for an
investigation, eventually created the political pressure that caused the
Justice Department to begin a formal probe, which continues today under
special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald.
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZDcyMDRjOGRkNTk5M2ZiYThhZjIyZjQ4ZDM5MGMwYzE=
BC
One good all-purpose tip for dealing with any article
written by a right-winger is to simply take just one
the comments or claims made and see how valid it
is -- or isn't, as is usually the case.
So let's take this little bit, shall we:
"One of the false claims Mr. Wilson made was that
he had been sent to Niger at the request of Vice
President Dick Cheney. In his July 14, 2003 column,
Robert Novak disclosed that he had been sent
instead at the insistence of his wife, Valerie Plame,
who worked at the CIA."
True or not true?
For for all the talk about how Valerie got her
husband the Niger assignement, how many of you
had heard anything at all about how that was
actually the 2nd time Wilson did work for the CIA
in Niger? Anyone? Puts a different spin on things,
eh? And the actual truth is that Wilson indeed sent
again to Niger that second time as a result of a
request by Cheney for some more info about the
"yellowcake" rumors. Cheney obviously didn't
request Wilson in particular to be sent -- that was
a CIA decision to how best fulfill the request -- but
nevertheless it was Cheney's request that caused
Wilson to be sent to Niger. As far as Valerie Plame
being responsilbe for the CIA picking Wilson as the
guy to fulfill Cheney's request, she was simply not
authorized to do something like that again bear in
mind that the CIA had already used Wilon for a still
classified earlier mission to Niger so he would have
been a consideration for the 2nd trip regardless
of Plame.
The claim that Plame got her Wilson the Niger
comes from a bogus GOP talking point (surprise,
friggin, surprise) that got wide circulation in the
right wing media and blogosphere. Media Matters
covered this rather thoroughly here:
http://mediamatters.org/items/200507140001
The Senate Intelligence Committee, despite
blatent attempts by three Republicans on it, Pat
Roberts, Orrin Hatch, and Christopher Bond, to
smear Wilson, closely examined the issue but did
not reach a conclusion about how the CIA made
the decision to hire Wilson, noting only some
"interviews and documents" indicating that Plame
"suggested his name for the trip."
See:
http://intelligence.senate.gov/iraqreport2.pdf
The section in the main report dealing with Wilson's
assignment to Niger begins on page 49 (by Adobe's
count; 39 in the report itself.) Be warned that this
is a 20+ Mb PDF file.
And even if Plame did "suggest" her husband, she
could not have "authorized" it; only the heads of
CPD could do that. The Senate report describes
"a memorandum to the deputy chief of CPD, from
the former ambassador's wife" [p. 39] touting her
husband's credentials. But if Plame herself had the
power to "authorize" Wilson's trip, such a memo
would hardly have been necessary.
Further, several news reports have quoted
unnamed intelligence officials who refuted the
notion that Plame authorized, or even suggested,
Wilson's trip. A July 22, 2003, Newsday article
quoted an unidentified senior intelligence
official who said: "They [the officers asking
Wilson to check the uranium story] were aware
of who she [Plame] was married to, which is not
surprising. ... There are people elsewhere in
government who are trying to make her look like
she was the one who was cooking this up, for
some reason."
A full reprint of that article is here:
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0722-04.htm
And that Media Matters link I posted shows that
the Los Angeles Times reported on July 15, 2004,
that an unnamed CIA official confirmed that Plame
was not responsible for the CIA's decision to send
Wilson to Niger, saying: "Her bosses say she did
not initiate the idea of her husband going. ... They
asked her if he'd be willing to go, and she said yes."
Ipso facto --if Mr. Jack Kelly can be so wrong and/
or deliberately deceitful on this key point, then why
take anything else he says seriously? The best
evidence is that he's just another typical, fact-free,
poo-poo headed right-wing columnist with absolutely
no journalistic integrity whatsoever.
Exactly the sort of guy that Pookie loves to reprint.
-BC
Pookie
"BC" <call...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1156865046.6...@m79g2000cwm.googlegroups.com...
August 29, 2006 8:24 AM
Slo
BC wrote:
> ...As far as Valerie Plame
> being responsilbe for the CIA picking Wilson as the
> guy to fulfill Cheney's request, she was simply not
> authorized to do something like that again bear in
Right-wingers are funny. They're either calling Plame
a "clerk" or a "secretary" or they're saying she sent
Wilson to Niger.
BC
right-wing "journalist".
Again take one of York's claim and see how valid
it is. In this case, I'll take this:
"In an excerpt of Hubris published in Newsweek,
Isikoff writes that Novak "caused a huge stir when
he revealed that Valerie Plame, wife of Iraq-war critic
Joseph Wilson, was a CIA officer." But when it was
originally published, Novak's column caused virtually
no stir at all - until Corn published an article claiming
that Mrs. Wilson worked under "nonofficial cover" for
the CIA. And even then, there wasn't much notice
until New York Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer
picked up on Corn's article and demanded an
investigation. Those demands, combined with a leaked
letter to the Justice Department from then-CIA Director
George Tenet calling for an investigation, eventually
created the political pressure that caused the Justice
Department to begin a formal probe, which continues
today under special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald."
True or not true?
Well, check this timeline at FactCheck.org:
http://www.factcheck.org/article337.html
Start with July 14, 2003, the day when Novak's
column appeared and follow how that info spread
through the other media outlets andhow the CIA
reacted. Some excerpts:
July 16 -- A mention in David Corn's blog:
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/capitalgames?bid=3&pid=823
July 17 -- Coverage on Time Magazine's site:
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,465270,00.html
July 22 -- A printed Newsday article:
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/ny-phelps0722,0,2044545.story
July 30 -- The CIA sends a letter to the Criminal
Division of the Justice Department noting "a possible
violation of criminal law concerning the unauthorized
disclosure of classified information":
http://www.house.gov/judiciary_democrats/cialeakinforesp13004.pdf
Sept 16 -- The CIA sends another letter to Justice
requesting that the FBI undertake a criminal investigation.
Sept 26 -- The Department of Justice authorizes the
FBI to investigate the unauthorized disclosure of Valerie
Wilson's name with a Grand Jury sworn in on Oct 31st:
http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/iln/osc/documents/libby_indictment_28102005.pdf
Yeah, blame Corn and Schumer for all the fuss. Corn
gets mentioned once for his blog entry and Schumer
not at all.
Ipso facto -- Byron York is yet just another deceitful, fact-
free, right-wing poopy head.
-BC
Well Done
>Because the remaining Carter and Clintoon believers who had not yet been
>purged raised a political stink.
>
Fiasco. Millions of dollars was spent on a rabbit hole.
>There has been a bit of a kerfuffle at CIA as the leftists defeatists are
>being weeded out. >Nothing more.
>
GW Bush tends to trust folks to do their job honestly. This may have
kept him from purging ALL Clintonistas within a few months of taking
office in 2001. It's probably his main weakness.
--
): "I may make you feel, but I can't make you think" :(
(: Off the monitor, through the modem, nothing but net :)