RKMBs Forums .::Important::. Politics and Current Events Bushgate

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wannabuyamonkey said:


If you had acctually read my diatribe about Air America, i was primarily discussing thier willingness to discuss Roves guilt as though it were concusive. Wich as I recall WAS the topic at hand. I will try and go slower for you next time...... retard.

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1,200 points.

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the G-man said:
Now you're being silly. This is not the "doctored photo" forum.[/quote
But you do agree that it should be?

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If Rove turns out to be the leaker, meaning that he is named by the Grand Jury, or other competent authority, as the person who made the initial disclosure to Bob Novack, posting that pic might make sense. But right now, all you're doing is undercutting your own arguments on an issue that you could be proven correct on someday.

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brrrr
someone's being defensive. I'm not surprised with all this. I used to watch the Twilight Zone and people who sell their souls always end up with ironic endings.

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the G-man said:


Plame's undercover status at the time was and is a little questionable in any case. How undercover could she have been when her name was published at the time as part of Joseph Wilson's own biography online (see cpsag.com/our_team/wilson.html)?

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The CIA declined to discuss Plame's intelligence work, but an agency official disputed suggestions that she was a mere analyst whose public exposure would have little consequence. "If she was not undercover, we would have no reason to file a criminal referral," the CIA official said, insisting on anonymity because of the sensitivity of the investigation.

Justice launches probe into CIA leak

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Excerpt from George H Bush's Speech April 26th, 1999 at the dedication of George Bush Center for Intellegence Gathering.

"…we need more protection for methods we use to gather Intel. That means more protection for our sources particularly our human sources. These are people who are risking their lives for their country. Even though I am a tranquil guy at this stage of my life, I have nothing but contempt and anger for those you betray the trust by exposing the names of our sources. They are in my in my view the most insidious of traitors."

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the G-man said:
Jon Podhoretz has a pretty good column on why, as discussed previously, all of this may amount to nothing anyway:

[LIST]In the Cooper e-mails just surrendered by Time to the prosecutor looking into the Plame case, "Cooper wrote that Rove offered him a 'big warning' not to 'get too far out on Wilson.' Rove told Cooper that Wilson's trip had not been authorized by . . . CIA Director George Tenet . . . or Vice President Dick Cheney. Rather, 'it was, [Rove] said, Wilson's wife, who apparently works at the agency on WMD [weapons of mass destruction] issues who authorized the trip.' "

There's no mistaking the purpose of this conversation between Cooper and Rove. It wasn't intended to discredit, defame or injure Wilson's wife. It was intended to throw cold water on the import, seriousness and supposedly high level of Wilson's findings.

While some may differ on the fairness of discrediting Joseph Wilson, it sure isn't any kind of crime.

Rove was suggesting to Cooper that that folks lower down in the CIA than its own director commandeered the process so that the husband of one of their own could get the gig. And the husband in question then went and misrepresented his findings to various journalists

This Rove-Cooper conversation discredits Wilson, not Plame. In fact, nothing we know so far was done either with the purpose of exposing or even the knowledge that these remarks would be exposing an undercover CIA operative.

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Rove "was discouraging a reporter from writing a false story based on a false premise," said Mehlman. Cooper's e-mail says that Rove warned him away from the idea that Wilson's trip had been authorized by CIA Director George Tenet or Vice President Dick Cheney.
The argument, as elaborated by others, is that Rove was warning Cooper off Wilson's phoney story because it was about to be debunked by a soon-to-be-released statement by George Tenet.

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In February 2002, I was informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency that Vice President Dick Cheney's office had questions about a particular intelligence report. While I never saw the report, I was told that it referred to a memorandum of agreement that documented the sale of uranium yellowcake — a form of lightly processed ore — by Niger to Iraq in the late 1990's. The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president's office.
After consulting with the State Department's African Affairs Bureau (and through it with Barbro Owens-Kirkpatrick, the United States ambassador to Niger), I agreed to make the trip. The mission I undertook was discreet but by no means secret. While the C.I.A. paid my expenses (my time was offered pro bono), I made it abundantly clear to everyone I met that I was acting on behalf of the United States government.

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AP: "President Bush, at an Oval Office photo opportunity Tuesday, was asked directly whether he would fire Rove — in keeping with a pledge in June, 2004, to dismiss any leakers in the case. The president did not respond."

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the G-man said:
Paul, without getting into a point by point debate with you, I note that much of your most recent post seems predicated on the fact that Wilson's version of events differs from Rove's.

Do you recall that Senate Intelligence Committee found that Wilson was lying about his version of events?

You're trying to build a case against Rove based in no small part on a discredited individual, with a discredited version of events.

At this point, no one knows exactly what the facts are. And, as noted above, if more facts come out, it is possible that Rove's complicity may be established (though, even then, as noted above, it is very possible that the release of Plame's name by ANYONE was not a crime).

However, until those facts come out, trying to build a case on innuendo is rather pointless.

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PaulWellr said:

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the G-man said:
Paul, without getting into a point by point debate with you, I note that much of your most recent post seems predicated on the fact that Wilson's version of events differs from Rove's.

Do you recall that Senate Intelligence Committee found that Wilson was lying about his version of events?

You're trying to build a case against Rove based in no small part on a discredited individual, with a discredited version of events.

At this point, no one knows exactly what the facts are. And, as noted above, if more facts come out, it is possible that Rove's complicity may be established (though, even then, as noted above, it is very possible that the release of Plame's name by ANYONE was not a crime).

However, until those facts come out, trying to build a case on innuendo is rather pointless.

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Please explain why the issue of Wilson's credibility makes any difference at all.

Let's assume, just for the sake of argument, that Wilson was completely wrong.

1. Does that mean that Plame wasn't a CIA agent?
2. Does that mean that Plame was not outed?
3. Does that mean that Rove did not out Plame?
4. Does that mean that it is not a Federal crime to knowingly reveal the identity of a CIA agent?
5. Does that mean that McClellan did not say that Rove was not involved?
6. Does that mean that Bush did not say that if anybody in the White House was involved, they would be fired?

If not, what the hell difference does it make?

Once again we see a classic attempt to distract attention from the real issue. Expect to hear this nonsense parroted endlessly by wingers, Republican politicians, RNC members, Republican spokespersons, media shills and right-wing media outlets.

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PJP said:

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PaulWellr said:

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the G-man said:
Paul, without getting into a point by point debate with you, I note that much of your most recent post seems predicated on the fact that Wilson's version of events differs from Rove's.

Do you recall that Senate Intelligence Committee found that Wilson was lying about his version of events?

You're trying to build a case against Rove based in no small part on a discredited individual, with a discredited version of events.

At this point, no one knows exactly what the facts are. And, as noted above, if more facts come out, it is possible that Rove's complicity may be established (though, even then, as noted above, it is very possible that the release of Plame's name by ANYONE was not a crime).

However, until those facts come out, trying to build a case on innuendo is rather pointless.

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Please explain why the issue of Wilson's credibility makes any difference at all.

Let's assume, just for the sake of argument, that Wilson was completely wrong.

1. Does that mean that Plame wasn't a CIA agent?
2. Does that mean that Plame was not outed?
3. Does that mean that Rove did not out Plame?
4. Does that mean that it is not a Federal crime to knowingly reveal the identity of a CIA agent?
5. Does that mean that McClellan did not say that Rove was not involved?
6. Does that mean that Bush did not say that if anybody in the White House was involved, they would be fired?

If not, what the hell difference does it make?

Once again we see a classic attempt to distract attention from the real issue. Expect to hear this nonsense parroted endlessly by wingers, Republican politicians, RNC members, Republican spokespersons, media shills and right-wing media outlets.

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and G-Man!

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PaulWellr said:

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the G-man said:
Paul, without getting into a point by point debate with you, I note that much of your most recent post seems predicated on the fact that Wilson's version of events differs from Rove's.

Do you recall that Senate Intelligence Committee found that Wilson was lying about his version of events?

You're trying to build a case against Rove based in no small part on a discredited individual, with a discredited version of events.

At this point, no one knows exactly what the facts are. And, as noted above, if more facts come out, it is possible that Rove's complicity may be established (though, even then, as noted above, it is very possible that the release of Plame's name by ANYONE was not a crime).

However, until those facts come out, trying to build a case on innuendo is rather pointless.

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Please explain why the issue of Wilson's credibility makes any difference at all.

Let's assume, just for the sake of argument, that Wilson was completely wrong.

1. Does that mean that Plame wasn't a CIA agent?
2. Does that mean that Plame was not outed?
3. Does that mean that Rove did not out Plame?
4. Does that mean that it is not a Federal crime to knowingly reveal the identity of a CIA agent?
5. Does that mean that McClellan did not say that Rove was not involved?
6. Does that mean that Bush did not say that if anybody in the White House was involved, they would be fired?

If not, what the hell difference does it make?

Once again we see a classic attempt to distract attention from the real issue. Expect to hear this nonsense parroted endlessly by wingers, Republican politicians, RNC members, Republican spokespersons, media shills and right-wing media outlets.

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Pariah said:
Whomod--Er...I mean, Paul. You don't even live in this country. What would a fedral crime involving American affairs matter to you?

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Cooper to Disclose Grand Jury Testimony in 'Time'

Matthew Cooper


By E&P Staff

Published: July 13, 2005 3:15 PM ET

NEW YORK Time's magazine's Matt Cooper today testified to a grand jury that White House aide Karl Rove was a source for a story about a CIA operative that has investigators deciding whether any laws were broken by the leak of the agent's identity.

Cooper told E&P late today, "I'm allowed to talk about what happened in the Grand Jury and plan to write about it." When asked when it might appear, he said, "soon, but I don't know when."

After more than two hours of testimony, Cooper addressed reporters outside the courtroom. "It is my hope to get back to being a normal journalist on the other side of the microphones," Cooper said. "I hope to go back to Time magazine and write up an account of what took place here today and my story."

When Cooper was pressed, he responded, "But I'm not going to do it here, right now. ... I'm not going to scoop myself today."

Cooper said he hoped his testimony would speed up the grand jury's investigation, which would allow The New York Times' Judith Miller to be released from jail.

He confirmed that his source on the leak was Deputy Chief of Staff Rove, one of President Bush's most trusted advisers and the man credited with Bush's four consecutive campaign victories.

The waiver that freed Cooper to cooperate with the grand jury was signed by Rove's attorney, Robert Luskin. Cooper's attorney, Richard Sauber, was on hand Wednesday to pass out photocopies of the waiver to reporters.

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also...


Joseph Wilson Calls on Bush to Fire Rove

As for Pariah...

1 word:

IRAQ.

Which is what all this dishonesty, hubris, and hypocrisy is all about anyways.


All that was really needed after your post though (to make it truly pointless and irrelevent) was an off the cuff insult directed at me and for Mr JLA to pop up and start giving out points for it.

In the abscense of actually intelligently defending your position (and G-Man's daily RNC talking points) that is.


Bush Honest? No Say The American People

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honesty rating drops to lowest point
NBC/WSJ poll: Iraq replaces jobs as most important American priority

Furthermore, only 41 percent give Bush good marks for being "honest and straightforward" -- his lowest ranking on this question since he became president. That's a drop of nine percentage points since January, when a majority (50 percent to 36 percent) indicated that he was honest and straightforward. This finding comes at a time when the Bush administration is battling the perception that its rhetoric doesn't match the realities in Iraq, and also allegations that chief political adviser Karl Rove leaked sensitive information about a CIA agent to a reporter. (The survey, however, was taken just before these allegations about Rove exploded into the current controversy.)

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the G-man said:

Do you recall that Senate Intelligence Committee found that Wilson was lying about his version of events?

You're trying to build a case against Rove based in no small part on a discredited individual, with a discredited version of events.

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Wilson's Iraq Assertions Hold Up Under Fire From Rove Backers

July 14 (Bloomberg) -- Two-year old assertions by former ambassador Joseph Wilson regarding Iraq and uranium, which lie at the heart of the controversy over who at the White House identified a covert U.S. operative, have held up in the face of attacks by supporters of presidential adviser Karl Rove.

Rove is a subject of a special prosecutor's investigation into how the name of the agent, who is Wilson's wife, was leaked to journalists. There has been no evidence made public that Rove identified the agent to reporters. Rove's allies are arguing that he was in fact trying to steer journalists away from taking too seriously Wilson's criticism of President George W. Bush's reasons for going to war in Iraq in 2003.

The agent, Valerie Plame, was publicly identified July 14, 2003, a week after Wilson wrote an article for the New York Times about an investigative trip he took in 2002 at the behest of the Central Intelligence Agency. Wilson wrote that the administration's claim that Saddam Hussein's regime tried to buy uranium in Africa for nuclear weapons was wrong.

The main points of Wilson's article have largely been substantiated by a Senate committee as well as U.S. and United Nations weapons inspectors. A day after Wilson's piece was published, the White House acknowledged that a claim Bush made in his January 2003 state of the union address that Iraq tried to buy ``significant quantities of uranium from Africa'' could not be verified and shouldn't have been included in the speech.

While the administration was justified at the time in being concerned that Hussein was trying to build nuclear weapons, ``on the specifics of this I think Joe Wilson was right,'' said Michael O'Hanlon, a scholar of foreign policy studies at the Brookings Institution in Washington.

Criticism of Wilson

Republicans are attempting to defend Rove by discrediting Wilson, saying the former ambassador misled the public about why he was sent to Niger and what he found there.

Bush supporters such as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich contend that Wilson lied in claiming that Vice President Dick Cheney dispatched him on the mission to Niger. That echoes a Republican National Committee talking-points memo sent to party officials.

Wilson never said that Cheney sent him, only that the vice president's office had questions about an intelligence report that referred to the sale of uranium yellowcake to Iraq from Niger. Wilson, in his New York Times article, said CIA officials were informed of Cheney's questions.

``The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president's office,'' Wilson wrote.

Senate Report

The ``Wilson/Rove Research & Talking Points'' memo distributed by RNC Director of Television Carolyn Weyforth contends, ``Both the Senate Committee on Intelligence and the CIA found assessments Wilson made in his report were wrong.''

Yet the Senate panel conclusions didn't discredit Wilson. The committee concluded that the Niger intelligence information wasn't solid enough to be included in the State of the Union speech. It added that Wilson's report didn't change the minds of analysts on either side of the issue, while also concluding that an October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate ``overstated what the Intelligence Community knew about Iraq's possible procurement attempts.''

Vulnerable

Wilson is vulnerable to some criticisms. The Republican talking points say Wilson has lied about the role his wife played in his trip. In his memoir, ``The Politics of Truth,'' Wilson asserted his wife was not involved in the decision to send him to Niger. ``Valerie had nothing to do with the matter,'' he wrote. ``She definitely had not proposed that I make the trip.''

The Senate Intelligence Committee report states that a CIA official told the panel that Plame ``offered up'' Wilson's name for the Niger trip and later sent a memo to a CIA official saying her husband had good relations with leaders in Niger.

Republicans also dismiss Wilson as a partisan because of his ties to the 2004 presidential campaign of Democrat John Kerry, the four-term U.S. senator from Massachusetts. He advised the Kerry campaign for several months on foreign policy and donated money to his race.

The crux of Wilson's argument in his New York Times article was that some of the intelligence related to Iraq's nuclear weapons program -- a central part of the Bush administration's justification for invading Iraq -- ``was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat.''

Backing Away

Well before Wilson's article was published -- though after Bush's State of the Union address -- administration officials were backing off the contention that Iraq sought nuclear material from Africa.

On Feb. 4, 2003, State Department officials gave the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency information it requested about Iraq's attempts to obtain uranium from Niger. It told the agency that it could not confirm the reports and had questions about specific claims.

The next day, Secretary of State Colin Powell presented evidence, based on U.S. intelligence, about Iraq's prohibited weapons program to the UN Security Council. He didn't mention Iraqi attempts to obtain uranium from Africa.

On March 7, IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei told the UN Security Council that the documents that detailed uranium transactions between Iraq and Niger were ``not authentic'' and ``these specific allegations are unfounded.'' On March 9, Powell acknowledged that the documents were false. The U.S. launched the invasion of Iraq on March 19.

A White House Concession

Finally, in July 2003, after Wilson's piece was published, the White House conceded that the uranium assertion should not have been included in the president's speech. Several administration officials have accepted responsibility for allowing it into the speech, including Condoleezza Rice, then the national security adviser and now secretary of state; Stephen Hadley, then Rice's deputy and now the national security adviser; and then-CIA Director George Tenet.

In October 2002, as the White House was reviewing drafts of a speech Bush would give in Cincinnati on Oct. 7, the allegation that Iraq sought ``substantial amounts of uranium oxide'' from Africa was removed after Tenet called Hadley to raise doubts about the information. On Oct. 5 and 6, the CIA sent memorandums to the White House expressing concerns about the Niger intelligence and differences on it between the U.S. and British spy agencies.

Novak's Column

Plame's identity was first revealed July 14, 2003, by syndicated columnist Robert Novak, who cited two unidentified administration officials as his sources for the information.

Knowingly disclosing the identity of a covert agent is a federal crime, and that is the subject of special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's investigation. Part of that probe is seeking information about confidential sources from reporters.

Rove's name surfaced in a July 11, 2003, e-mail from a Time magazine reporter to his editor that was disclosed this week by Newsweek magazine. The memo says Rove gave a ``big warning'' about pursuing Wilson's claims and said it was ``Wilson's wife, who apparently works at the agency on WMD issues who authorized'' Wilson's trip to Niger, according to Newsweek.

Rove's lawyer, Robert Luskin, said yesterday that Rove has done ``nothing to expose him to any legal liability.''

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However, until those facts come out, trying to build a case on innuendo is rather pointless.

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PaulWellr said:

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the G-man said:
Paul, without getting into a point by point debate with you, I note that much of your most recent post seems predicated on the fact that Wilson's version of events differs from Rove's.

Do you recall that Senate Intelligence Committee found that Wilson was lying about his version of events?

You're trying to build a case against Rove based in no small part on a discredited individual, with a discredited version of events.

At this point, no one knows exactly what the facts are. And, as noted above, if more facts come out, it is possible that Rove's complicity may be established (though, even then, as noted above, it is very possible that the release of Plame's name by ANYONE was not a crime).

However, until those facts come out, trying to build a case on innuendo is rather pointless.

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Please explain why the issue of Wilson's credibility makes any difference at all.

Let's assume, just for the sake of argument, that Wilson was completely wrong.

1. Does that mean that Plame wasn't a CIA agent?
2. Does that mean that Plame was not outed?
3. Does that mean that Rove did not out Plame?
4. Does that mean that it is not a Federal crime to knowingly reveal the identity of a CIA agent?
5. Does that mean that McClellan did not say that Rove was not involved?
6. Does that mean that Bush did not say that if anybody in the White House was involved, they would be fired?

If not, what the hell difference does it make?

Once again we see a classic attempt to distract attention from the real issue. Expect to hear this nonsense parroted endlessly by wingers, Republican politicians, RNC members, Republican spokespersons, media shills and right-wing media outlets.

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Captain Sammitch said:
Is it me, or are the 'scandals' being unearthed by lefties these days getting kinda weak?

Karlgate.

Brilliant.

Poor desperate bastards.

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Home Boy said:

Raise enough smoke, and you don't have to prove there's a fire. People will just believe it's there.

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Hey! That sounds like something Karl Rove would say! Are you his Evil Twin?

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unrestrained id said:
G-Man refuses to admit that Plame was a NOC.

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Robert Novak's original column, July 14:
Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction.

David Corn in the Nation, July 16:
....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....a woman known to friends as an energy analyst for a private firm.

Newsday, July 21:
Intelligence officials confirmed to Newsday Monday that Valerie Plame, wife of retired Ambassador Joseph Wilson, works at the agency on weapons of mass destruction issues in an undercover capacity -- at least she was undercover until last week when she was named by columnist Robert Novak.

....A senior intelligence official confirmed that Plame was a Directorate of Operations undercover officer who worked "alongside" the operations officers who asked her husband to travel to Niger.

Washington Post, September 29:
She is a case officer in the CIA's clandestine service and works as an analyst on weapons of mass destruction. Novak published her maiden name, Plame, which she had used overseas and has not been using publicly. Intelligence sources said top officials at the agency were very concerned about the disclosure because it could allow foreign intelligence services to track down some of her former contacts and lead to the exposure of agents.

MSNBC, September 30:
CIA lawyers answered a series of 11 questions "affirming that the woman's identity was classified, that whoever released it was not authorized to do so and that the news media would not have been able to guess her identity without the leak."

Ray McGovern, former CIA analyst, September 30:
I know Joseph Wilson well enough to know that his wife was in fact a deep cover operative running a network of informants on what is supposedly this administration’s first-priority issue: Weapons of mass destruction.

Larry Johnson, former CIA analyst on NewsHour, September 30:
I worked with this woman. She started training with me. She has been undercover for three decades....she works in an area where people she meets with overseas could be compromised.... she's a woman of great integrity....This is a woman who is very solid, very low key and not about show boating.

CNN, October 1:
Sources told CNN that Plame works in the CIA's Directorate of Operations -- the part of the agency in charge of spying -- and worked in the field for many years as an undercover officer. "If she were only an analyst, not an operative, we would not have filed a crimes report" with the Justice Department, a senior intelligence official said.

(An earlier version of this story quoted CNN reporter David Ensor saying, "This is a person who did run agents. This is a person who was out there in the world collecting information.")

Mel Goodman, former CIA analyst, Washington Post online Q&A, October 1:
....I've worked in Washington for the past 38 years, including 24 years at the CIA...and I know Ambassador Wilson....and I did not know that his wife was an agency employee. Let's face it....this was targetted information as part of a political vendetta....a pure act of revenge.

Jim Marcinkowski, former CIA case officer, LA Times, Ocotber 1:
The exposure of Valerie Plame — who I have reason to believe operated undercover — apparently by a senior administration official, is nothing less than a despicable act for which someone should be held accountable. This case is especially upsetting to me because she was my agency classmate as well as my friend.

New York Times, October 2:
Valerie Plame was among the small subset of Central Intelligence Agency officers who could not disguise their profession by telling friends that they worked for the United States government.

That cover story, standard for American operatives who pretend to be diplomats or other federal employees, was not an option for Ms. Plame, people who knew her said on Wednesday. As a covert operative who specialized in nonconventional weapons and sometimes worked abroad, she passed herself off as a private energy expert, what the agency calls nonofficial cover.

New York Daily News, October 2:
Two former senior intelligence officials confirmed that Valerie Plame, 40, is an operations officer in the spy agency's directorate of operations - the clandestine service.

Plame "ran intelligence operations overseas," said Vincent Cannistraro, former CIA counterterrorism operations chief.

Her specialty in the agency's nonproliferation center was biological, chemical and nuclear weapons and "recruiting agents, sending them to areas where they could access information about proliferation matters, weapons of mass destruction," Cannistraro said.

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Captain Sammitch said:
Is it me, or are the 'scandals' being unearthed by lefties these days getting kinda weak?

Karlgate.

Brilliant.

Poor desperate bastards.

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Matter-eater Man said:
Aw cmon WBAM, name calling isn't your style.

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It wasn't just Plame who was compromised. It was every foreign source who was known to spend time with her. It was Brewster-Jennings, a CIA front constructed over many years at great expense.

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Vital assets to American national security were destroyed.

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1 + 1 + 1 = Treason.

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wannabuyamonkey said:

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It wasn't just Plame who was compromised. It was every foreign source who was known to spend time with her. It was Brewster-Jennings, a CIA front constructed over many years at great expense.

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sourse please.

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Vital assets to American national security were destroyed.

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Such as?

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1 + 1 + 1 = Treason.

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The punishment for treason under the law is execution. Do you think that Rove should be executed for his crimes against our soverignty as a nation?

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PaulWellr said:...wasn't the fact that the CIA asked for an investigation in the 1st place enough to tell you they thought a crime had been committed?

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the G-man said:
....

So why do you insist, when everyone from the Wall St. Journal to USA Today, is now quoting legal experts who say the same thing I've been telling you for months now? That even if Rove was the leaker, it may not have been a crime at all?

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But, Toensing said, "reading between the lines, I'd say he's got a 'Martha Stewart case' " involving perjury or obstruction of justice. In other words, though a crime may not have been committed at the start, one may have occurred during the investigation when someone lied to Fitzgerald or to a federal grand jury.

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Democrat leaders and editorialists accusing Karl Rove of treason for referring to CIA agent Valerie Plame in an off-the-record interview are ignorant of the law, according to the Washington attorney who spearheaded the legislation at the center of the controversy.

Plame's circumstances don't meet several of the criteria spelled out in a 1982 statute designed not only to protect the identity of intelligence agents but to maintain the media's ability to hold government accountable, Victoria Toensing told WorldNetDaily.

Toensing – who drafted the legislation in her role as chief counsel for the chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence – says the Beltway frenzy surrounding Plame's alleged "outing" as a covert agent is a story arising out of the capital's "silly season."

Toensing, now a private attorney in Washington, says Plame most likely was not a covert agent when Rove referred to her in a 2003 interview with Time magazine's Matt Cooper.

The federal code says the agent must have operated outside the United States within the previous five years. But Plame gave up her role as a covert agent nine years before the Rove interview, according to New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof.

Kristof said the CIA brought Plame back to Washington in 1994 because the agency suspected her undercover security had been compromised by turncoat spy Aldrich Ames.

Moreover, asserts Toensing, for the law to be violated, Rove would have had to intentionally reveal Plame's identity with the knowledge that he was disclosing a covert agent.

Toensing believes Rove's waiver allowing reporters testifying before the grand jury to reveal him as a source – signed more than 18 months ago – shows the Bush strategist did not believe he was violating the law.

Rove, according to Cooper's notes, apparently was trying to warn the reporter not to give credence to Wilson's investigation, because he had no expertise in nuclear weapons and was sent to Africa on the recommendation of his wife. Wilson had claimed he was sent by Vice President Cheney.

Another element necessary for applying the law is that the government had to be taking affirmative measures to conceal the agent's identity.

Toensing says that on the contrary, the CIA gave Plame a desk job in which she publicly went to and from work, allowed her spouse to do a mission in Africa without signing a confidentiality agreement and didn't object to his writing an op-ed piece in the New York Times about his trip.

Columnist Robert Novak, who first published Plame's name, also apparently didn't think it was a big deal, Toensing said, or he would have put it in the first paragraph.

Novak's aim was to expose the incompetence of the CIA, she argued.

"These are the kinds of stories we wanted to still be put out there when we passed the law," she said. "We only wanted to stop the methodical exposing of CIA personnel for the purpose of assassination."

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Rove Learned CIA Agent's Name From Novak
By JOHN SOLOMON, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - Chief presidential adviser Karl Rove testified to a grand jury that he talked with two journalists before they divulged the identity of an undercover
CIA officer but that he originally learned about the operative from the news media and not government sources, according to a person briefed on the testimony.

The person, who works in the legal profession and spoke only on condition of anonymity because of grand jury secrecy, told The Associated Press that Rove testified last year that he remembers specifically being told by columnist Robert Novak that Valerie Plame, the wife of a harsh
Iraq war critic, worked for the CIA.

Rove testified that Novak originally called him the Tuesday before Plame's identity was revealed in July 2003 to discuss another story.

The conversation eventually turned to Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson, a former ambassador who was strongly criticizing the Bush administration's use of faulty intelligence to justify the war in Iraq, the person said.

Rove testified that Novak told him he planned to report in a weekend column that Plame had worked for the CIA, and the circumstances on how her husband traveled to Africa to check bogus claims that Iraq was trying to buy nuclear materials in Niger, according to the source.

Novak's column, citing two Bush administration officials, appeared six days later, touching off a political firestorm and leading to a federal criminal investigation into who leaked Plame's undercover identity. That probe has ensnared presidential aides and reporters in a two-year legal battle.

Rove told the grand jury that by the time Novak had called him, he believes he had similar information about Wilson's wife from another member of the news media but he could not recall which reporter had told him about it first, the person said.

When Novak inquired about Wilson's wife working for the CIA, Rove indicated he had heard something like that, according to the source's recounting of the grand jury testimony.

Rove told the grand jury that three days later, he had a phone conversation with Time magazine reporter Matt Cooper and — in an effort to discredit some of Wilson's allegations — informally told Cooper that he believed Wilson's wife worked for the CIA, though he never used her name, the source said.

An e-mail Cooper recently provided the grand jury shows Cooper reported to his magazine bosses that Rove had described Wilson's wife in a confidential conversation as someone who "apparently works" at the CIA.

Robert Luskin, Rove's attorney, said Thursday his client truthfully testified to the grand jury and expected to be exonerated.

"Karl provided all pertinent information to prosecutors a long time ago," Luskin said. "And prosecutors confirmed when he testified most recently in October 2004 that he is not a target of the investigation."

In an interview on CNN earlier Thursday before the latest revelation, Wilson kept up his criticism of the White House, saying Rove's conduct was an "outrageous abuse of power ... certainly worthy of frog-marching out of the White House."

But at the same time, Wilson acknowledged his wife was no longer in an undercover job at the time Novak's column first identified her. "My wife was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity," he said.

Federal law prohibits government officials from divulging the identity of an undercover intelligence officer. But in order to bring charges, prosecutors must prove the official knew the officer was covert and nonetheless knowingly outed his or her identity.

Rove's conversations with Novak and Cooper took place just days after Wilson suggested in a New York Times opinion piece that some of the intelligence related to Iraq's nuclear weapons program was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat.

Democrats continued this week to sharpen their attacks, accusing Rove of compromising a CIA operative's identity just to discredit the political criticism of her husband.

On Thursday, Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada pressed for legislation to strip Rove of his clearance for classified information, which he said
President Bush should have done already. Instead, Reid said, the Bush administration has attacked its critics: "This is what is known as a cover-up. This is an abuse of power."

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said Democrats were resorting to "partisan war chants."

Across the Capitol, Rep. Rush Holt (news, bio, voting record), D-N.J., introduced legislation for an investigation that would compel senior administration officials to turn over records relating to the Plame disclosure.

Pressed to explain its statements of two years ago that Rove wasn't involved in the leak, the White House refused to do so this week.

"If I were to get into discussing this, I would be getting into discussing an investigation that continues and could be prejudging the outcome of the investigation," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.

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the G-man said:
That's pretty close to an "expert opinion," wouldn't you say?

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r3x29yz4a said:
shut the fuck up.
you know if this was happening in England or Russia or France you'd be sure to put your 1cent in.

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PaulWellr said:

As for Pariah...

1 word:

IRAQ.

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PaulWellr said:

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Captain Sammitch said:
Is it me, or are the 'scandals' being unearthed by lefties these days getting kinda weak?

Karlgate.

Brilliant.

Poor desperate bastards.

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...and Watergate of course was just a 3rd rate burglury.

I seem to recall once reading that you were impartial.

I hope no one bought it.

By the way, this scandal is not being unearthed by "lefties". It's being unearthed by a special prosecutor, a federal criminal investigation, and a Grand Jury. Nice dodge and nice way to try to minimalize this story though.


Now if it wasn't glaringly obvious that you excuse any and all malfeasance just so long as it's being done by Republicans, here's something more to consider: It wasn't just Plame who was compromised. It was every foreign source who was known to spend time with her. It was Brewster-Jennings, a CIA front constructed over many years at great expense.

Rove's own lawyer has admitted publicly he was involved. Vital assets to American national security were destroyed. And the reason it was done was to try to discredit a critic of the administration.

1 + 1 + 1 = Treason. Period. If some Democrat apparatchik in the Clinton White House had done exactly the same thing, you people would be screaming bloody murder, demanding his summary execution. You know it, I know it, and a growing body of the American people knows it too. The utter hypocricy and amoral ambition of this administration is finally being exposed, and your desperate attempts to spin your idols out of trouble are failing miserably.

Other than that, have a nice day.

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the G-man said:
That's pretty close to an "expert opinion," wouldn't you say?

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r3x29yz4a said:
I wonder what you were saying during the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
Because that wasn't technically illegal, it was just viewed as immoral

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Captain Sammitch said:


Whoa, check out Paulmod.

First of all, moderate and impartial are two very different things. I'm not one of 'you people', and Republican politicians aren't my 'idols'. I never claimed to be thoroughly impartial. However, there are things I have very little patience for - least of all seeing comparative nonissues blown out of proportion by armchair politicians who are such pussies that they have to spout their nonsense hiding behind alt ids. I'm not going to give equal consideration to all ideas, because whether or not you feel enough attention is given to 'dissenting views', some of those 'dissenting views' are just plain half-assed no matter how you look at it. Quit trivializing your freedom of speech by wasting your breath (and our time) trying to gain some sort of twisted moral superiority.

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Mr. Rove has told investigators that he learned from the columnist the name of the C.I.A. officer, who was referred to by her maiden name, Valerie Plame, and the circumstances in which her husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, traveled to Africa to investigate possible uranium sales to Iraq, the person said.

After hearing Mr. Novak's account, the person who has been briefed on the matter said, Mr. Rove told the columnist: "I heard that, too." . . .

On Oct. 1, 2003, Mr. Novak wrote another column in which he described calling two officials who were his sources for the earlier column. The first source, whose identity has not been revealed, provided the outlines of the story and was described by Mr. Novak as "no partisan gunslinger." Mr. Novak wrote that when he called a second official for confirmation, the source said, "Oh, you know about it."

That second source was Mr. Rove, the person briefed on the matter said.

A former CIA covert agent who supervised Mrs. Plame early in her career yesterday took issue with her identification as an "undercover agent," saying that she worked for more than five years at the agency's headquarters in Langley and that most of her neighbors and friends knew that she was a CIA employee.

"She made no bones about the fact that she was an agency employee and her husband was a diplomat," Fred Rustmann, a covert agent from 1966 to 1990, told The Washington Times.

"Her neighbors knew this, her friends knew this, his friends knew this. A lot of blame could be put on to central cover staff and the agency because they weren't minding the store here. . . . The agency never changed her cover status."

Mr. Rustmann, who spent 20 of his 24 years in the agency under "nonofficial cover"--also known as a NOC, the same status as the wife of Mr. Wilson--also said that she worked under extremely light cover.

In addition, Mrs. Plame hadn't been out as an NOC since 1997, when she returned from her last assignment, married Mr. Wilson and had twins, USA Today reported yesterday.