This goes again to the question of moral responsibility, since criminality seems at this point very remote. Consider if I happen to be a tourist in someplace like Calcutta and see, right there on the street, ol' Joe Blow, my classmate from Podunk U. "Why Joe Blow," I say, "haven't seen you since the toga party at Delta house." Joe Blow is, of course, actually Agent 008, under deep cover as Sam Smith, mild-mannered consular officer. I've blown his cover sky-high. Am I culpable or morally responsible? Of course not.

Same thing, if the White House staff is chiefly interested in pointing out that there's a nepotist in-group appointing each other to policy analyst positions re Iraqi weapons at the CIA, whether Plame is under cover (still absolutely no credible info on this) wouldn't have registered, and likely those mentioning her and Wilson's name wouldn't have known about it. This is also why they wouldn't have taken action -- if Plame isn't even undercover, which seems at least quite possible here, there's no blame to be assigned, the guys were doing their legitimate partisan jobs.

The only issue is why Tenet is still in his position, with odd folks like Plame making key recommendations in his area.

I talked this over with my wife yesterday, looking for the simplest explanation at each step, which resulted in a conclusion that the initial leak was most likely someone covering their rear, followed by a pile-on as others tried to exploit the leak for wildly disparate purposes.

This is speculation but it fits the known facts at least as well as anything I've seen so far. It goes as follows:

Wilson is sent to Niger to check out the yellowcake story knowing that he has no better chance of learning anything at all than our people already on the spot. There could be various motives for sending him.

But, when he wrote the NY Times story, whoever sent him leaked his wife's status, and in particular her WMD investigative background, to protect themselves against an anticpated investigation as to who sent this dude & why.

Once Plame's status was out there, lots of others piled on, including someone relatively high up in the Bush Administration trying to take credit for it "to encourage the others."

Um, dan, we have journalists saying that, at the very least, Karl Rove contacted them during the week after novak's column which doesn't necessarily make him guilty of a crime, but I think he qualifies as senior White House official.

This Sgt. Schulz defense is just weird.

You should read David Corn's latest.
http://www.thenation.com/capitalgames/index.mhtml?

Tom, if that's your family's idea of "simplest", I'd hate to see how you boil water.

You're idiots or worse. The question was asked at a White House press briefing. That's all that needs to be said. If you think this didn't bring it to the White House's attention, then please explain your rationale.

Give me a break. You Repubs are really grasping at straws. You act like this was some super state secret that Bushco would only have known about if alerted to it by George Tenet.

I think that when the most widely syndicated conservative columnist in the country, whose columns appear in over 300 newspapers every single day, puts something in one of his columns, we can safely assume that at least on eof the politicos in the Administration read it.

I went back to the July 22nd transcipt just to see if I was being unnecessarily harsh. Scott McClelland starts his answer by saying, "Thank you for bringing that up." He was preppped on the issue. Tinkerbell may exist and the White House might have been unaware of this issue in July, but I can't believe it and I don't know how any reasonable person can.

Actually, it's far simpler than this. Regardless of what the technical paper trail looks like between the CIA and the White House, the point is the whole thing was reported in the press. People were writing about the whole affair and not just wacky blogs. So, one has to ask whether anyone in the white house pays attention to the papers. If they do, then they would have known about it immediately. Then the question is what they, themselves did with the information. This is a seperate process from whatever the CIA and Justice themselves did.

Now, we have a bit of a pickle here, because the president has come right out and said that he, himself, doesn't read the papers or pay attention to the media. So he has effectively inoculated himself from the charge that he should have known because it was in the papers.

But his staff certainly knew, regardless of the paper trail from CIA to the White House. Unless they're going to claim that they also don't read the papers nor follow the media as well. And thus the question becomes "why didn't his staff bring this to his attention" and if so, "why didn't GW do anything about it if they did". If they didn't, it seems they were either trying to insulate him from a scandal or they are incompetent and don't take national security seriously.

Jesus H. Christ. I come slumming over here to the right wing of the blogoshpere because I heard that this guy Drezner was a rare conservative blogger with some integrity. And what do I find? He's blowing smoke wondering about whether Bushco knew about Traitorgate in July even though it was the subject of uber-conservative Robert Novak's column on July 14 and even though Carl Levin was asking for a special counsel a few days later and even though Scotty McLellan was being asked about it in White House press conferences. Gosh, I wonder if the Pope is Catholic?

I guess this is what passes for rightwing intellectual integrity. How disappointing.

Dear Fool,

Please excuse my adle-brained fellow Repubs. Even a bright boy like Daniel who keeps this blog can be distracted from the main point.

We may never know who knew when or who told what, but it's now up to the Admin to take responsibility for it and that they haven't done.

Irresponsibility is worse than malice, because at least malice is intentional and therefore potentially changeable. If the Admin managed to fumble themselves into this clusterfuck, then that is the most damning accusation that can be made of all.

Not that they are wrong, but that they are *weak* and *incompetent*.

Oldman says, "it's now up to the Admin to take responsibility for it. . ." What, exactly, is "it"? What evidence do we have for "it"? As far as I can tell, somebody said that Valerie Plame, a CIA employee, was married to Joseph Wilson, an ex-ambassador, and she was responsible for his being hired by the CIA to spend some time around a hotel pool in Niger and write a report. The CIA has many thousands of employees, almost none of whom are covert. We have no credible evidence that Plame was a covert employee. If she wasn't, then there's no crime, no "leak".

John Bruce:" We have no credible evidence that Plame was a covert employee."

We have evidence that she had cover as an energy analyst, at a firm. This was provided on the FEC form for her contribution to Gore.

It says, right there in the employer field.

If she wasn't covert, if she was an open CIA employee, there'd be no reason not to put CIA.

Sorry, you lose. Please keep up with the story.

Dear John Bruce:

Dude, that's so weak. There's that Republican intellectual integrity again.

Wait a moment. We have a public record listing her under her existing name as an employee of a CIA front firm? How, in that case, is the CIA taking active measures to conceal her identity (one of the requirements of the law)? If I wanted to conceal my identity, why would I list myself as an employee of a known CIA front under my own name?

Who do you think would be fooled by this?

Geeze, you're dumb.

It's only known to be a CIA front firm BECAUSE SHE WAS OUTED AS A CIA EMPLOYEE.

If not for that, there was no way of knowing. The name of the firm was not, though you might expect, "CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY, DBA VALERIE'S ENERGY CONSULTING".

The name of the firm was a name perfectly suitable for an energy firm.

What exactly do you think a cover is for? Do you think she should have another cover to cover her cover? Maybe another cover on top of that?

Dan,

Assuming you're correct that Bush lacked knowledge of the CIA notification of the leak --- I think your reasons for doubting that are pretty strong, given Tenet's personality --- it wasn't just the CIA that brought the matter up. (But wouldn't Ashcroft know of it? Why would he not have informed Bush of the notification and its implications?) Sen. Schumer also requested an FBI probe into the leak. Given the fanfare with which he tried to do it, I doubt it was missed by those in the administration with responsibility for following activity in Congress. So, there's a possible non-Tenet avenue through which the information could have made its was to Bush nonetheless.

Right now, I'm thinking 50% knew/50% did not know; about 70% should have known from information out there/30% no reason to know; and, if he did not know and had no reason to know, about 60% that this is so because his advisors are bundling him.

I believe the tenor of the statements in the Time article, for instance, is that the firm has generally, always, been understood to be a CIA front. Just like Amtorg was a front for USSR intellegence, and everyone knew it. If I'm Ivan and work for Amtorg, it may be assumed I'm a spy. If I change my name to Joe and get a job with Lawrence Livermore Lab, nobody's supposed to know I'm a spy. I get the impression Plame is case 1 here, not case 2, and she would not qualify under the law because the CIA hasn't changed her name to Jennifer.

Well there is still the original act of disclosure to Novak (and attempted disclosure to othere???). In regards to that 1) was that an intentionally hurtful act? 2) who was it planed by, if anyone? and 3) how did the original leaker know of Plame's identity?

This is my (amateur) legal perspective, for what that's worth (haha).

Those central questions are the most important. And considering Rove's behavior afterwards, it is difficult for me to believe that the original leak was unintentional.

John, I think you don't understand how undercover agents work. This is not a Robert Ludlum novel, and they don't all get plastic surgery and name changes. "Undercover" usually means simply that agents keep their employment secret and take normal precautions to keep it that way. However, they do continue to lead normal lives when not at work.

Dan: I assume this was an honest mistake, but since Plame was brought up in a press briefing on (I think) July 21, and McClellan was clearly expecting the questions, I think it's safe to say that the White House was paying attention two months ago.

And decided to hope that it just went away.

The question is not whether we now have evidence that Plame was covert. The question is what the leaker knew at the time. Andrea Mitchell said on Friday's Capital Report that is was "widely known" among those that follow the intelligence community that Plame was a CIA employ. Mitchell implied that she knew, but explictly said that she didn't know Plame was covert. Likewise, Rita Cosby said last night on Fox that her sources said that it was known in D.C. that Plame worked at the agency.

It is very plausible that the leaker new she was a CIA employee, but not that she was covert. Thus, no crime. It is also plausible that the WH generally knew the same. Therefore, the WH very well may have just decided to let the process play itself out -- i.e., if Plame was outed, then the CIA would refer it to justice, and they would get to the bottom of it. They probably just decided to wait and see how it plays out.

John Bruce writes:"I believe the tenor of the statements in the Time article, for instance, is that the firm has generally, always, been understood to be a CIA front."

The Time article says: "Plame had worked with Brewster Jennings & Associates, an obscure energy firm that may have been a CIA front company"

That doesn't sound even remotely as certain as you make it sound. It certainly doesn't sound like the firm has "generally, always, been understood to be a CIA front". Note the "may have been" part.

Embassyies "generally, always, have been understood to be a CIA front". That definitely isn't the case here, and the Time story doesn't imply it. Nobody is brought forward to say "Oh, yeah. The old Brewster-Jennings front."

Also, citing what a Time article says about her covert status
doesn't do much for your credibility when just a few posts ago you were saying she wasn't covert at all.

KK writes: " Mitchell implied that she knew, but explictly said that she didn't know Plame was covert. Likewise, Rita Cosby said last night on Fox that her sources said that it was known in D.C. that Plame worked at the agency."

Cosby, and possibly Mitchell, might be going off of what Clifford May said, when he revealed that someone had leaked to him that she worked for CIA.

Of course, May's leak occurred just after Wilson's op/ed was run, and before Novak's column. So it's not clear if it was genuine or an attempt to spread the same leak that Novak picked up on.

Dan,

On top of what everyone else has mentioned . . . how could you bring up this issue again without mentioning the White House's non-answer to the question of when Bush knew (which I posted as a comment to your Friday post?

If no one (including Dubya, apparently) knows when Bush learned or what his reaction was, it's obvious that he didn't give a crap about the outing of a covert CIA employee.

And if they do know but are refusing to tell us (which is likely the case), then the answer is clearly bad news.

Can anyone tell me where the smart conservative blog is? Cause this ain't it.

it seems reasonable to believe that the dirty tricksters who outed her didn't know they were blowing someone under NOC. not to offend, but I shall not cry for them when they go to jail. 'I didn't know' is an argument that only works in old Steve Martin routines.

"I shall not cry for them when they go to jail."

I'd love to see the server logs for Slate's article on prison rape. Lotsa hits from whitehouse.gov, I bet.

sorry to sound like a 1970s feminist, but that's not funny. prison rape is an unconscionable evil. I suddenly wish I were on the opposite side of this argument, with friends like you and all.

OT, but it needs to be said.

wcw - I wasn't trying to suggest that prison rape was funny.

The idea of a bunch of website hits from the White House to an article *about* prison rape, I find somewhat amusing. The funny part being the *sudden interest*, due to the current investigation.

That doesn't mean I wish it on anyone. And I don't.

Re: Kevin Drum’s posting above. The press conference was on July 22. Asked about the Novak column and its implications, McClellan thanked the reporter for bringing that up. So, yes, the White House expected this question and had an answer prepared. The answer was almost identical to last Monday’s press conference answer except this time, the Justice Department launched a full scale investigation since they knew it would not bear up under the media pressure. Until that time, they were in “preliminary” investigation mode since the C.I.A. had answered their 11 questions several weeks prior.

Who sat on it? Let’s let facts unfold and try to stay on the same side here. The side of truth.

Let's keep in mind that the elements of the law are (1) Plame had to have worked overseas sometime in the past 5 years, (2) The CIA had to be taking active measures to conceal her identity; (3) the "leak" had to have been with the deliberate intent of blowing her cover.

We still don't have information that would prove (1), and in fact her courtship, marriage, and children during the period suggest otherwise. If there was a general feeling in Washington, as posted above, that she worked for the CIA, then we don't have (2). And you probably can't prove (3), especially if you can't identify the leaker.

In fact, a couple of witnesses saying "we knew she worked for the CIA, but didn't know she was covert" would probably either disgust the jury or cause the judge to dismiss the case, it seems to me (assuming it got to trial).

So, John, you're saying that in the best case scenario for Bush, there are 2 senior administration officials who are technically not traitors. Talk about the soft bigotry of low expectations...

So do you Republican dudes get away with this kind of sorry-ass arguing all the time? No wonder so few of you can make it in academia.

Dear Fool,

Let's keep things mildly civil. There have been plenty of reasonable-minded posts on this blog. Bruce is acting like some sort of partisan shill for the RNC. However, not all conservatives are like that.

Bill Kristol in a Weekly Standard Editoral while soft-stepping the issue of concluding that a crime has been committed clearly calls on the President to fire the aides involved barring an extraordinary explanation - like I suppose the Veep made me do it. This he calls for on top of a personal apology to Ms. Plame.

Now as far as I can tell, nobody has been accusing Kristol recently of being a Democratic hack or the Weekly Standard of being Liberal Media.

So this illusion of this issue being a partisan fight is exactly that. Plenty of Republicans, including myself, and Dan's gut instinct here have been outraged by what occurred.

As for John Bruce, considering the amount of effort he's put into trying to flood this blog with his spin on things, I really wouldn't be suprised if he wasn't a shill being used to try to act as a whip on the troops.

Either that or what is more likely, he's so deeply into denial that he's gone into the realm of dishonesty - as in intellectual dishonesty.

If 'there was a general feeling in Washington ... that she worked for the CIA', as John Bruce suggests, how come a couple of people had to tell Bob Novak?

lol, the fool, give them hell. thay dont have a fricken clue.

Given:

1. Novak's original July 14th article
2. Questions by reporters to Scott McLellan
3. Whatever discussion of the "Plame Game" that occured in Congress
4. Anything else I'm forgetting to mention now.

...it seems absurd that Bush, or at least the relevant White House officials, would not know of the leak and, soon after, find out exactly who had been involved in it, assuming that the leak came from the WH. If it turns out that the leak didn't come from the WH, you can ignore that last part.

And if they somehow were not aware of the leak, how can anyone honestly think that this is an acceptable allibi? An administration that is so completely inept that it isn't even aware of a serious leak that is -reported widely- is certainly NOT competant enough to be put in charge of the national security.

Hear Hear Jon H and K. Drum,

You're making perfect sense. A while back RatherWorried was worried that this might all get dumped with a sacrificial lamb or two and go away quickly. While it still might, there is a factor that may isn't being focused on in the Media that might prevent it and might explain why the Bush Man hasn't fed some scapegoats to the wolves.

What if quite simply GW doesn't want to have to look his dad in the eye? Not that his dad would turn on him, but the silent hurt lack of comment on the topic is apparently the single greatest personal bugaboo the Commander in Chief fears.

Think about. Why didn't Clinton just say "Yes, I have been spending time with that woman. Now please, respect her privacy." It would have killed all legal action on the story. Many people have speculated on why, but there is one simple over-riding explanation that most have neglected.

The one thing Clinton feared worse than Impeachment was getting on the wrong side of Hillary - again. Sounds trite, but everyone just about has a personal relationship that while they may fall short of they feel it desperately necessary for whatever reason to maintain.

For our President, it is his relationship with his father. Remember, Mr. former President "those who reveal sources are among the most insidious of traitors" Father of the current President?

This family dynamic may be driving him to act irrationally, and the lack of the ability to communicate between the two men may be feeding it. This is the most important relationship in GW's life. Now he's on the wrong side of it.

That being the case, he may not be able to acknowledge it openly.

(1) Plame had to have worked overseas sometime in the past 5 years,

"Plame was an NOC, meaning she did her job overseas under nonofficial cover and not out of an embassy or government office." - The same Time magazine article you cite above.

(2) The CIA had to be taking active measures to conceal her identity;

"The CIA official asked me not to use her name, saying that she probably never again would be given a foreign assignment but that exposure of her name might cause "difficulties" if she were to travel abroad." Novak himself

(3) the "leak" had to have been with the deliberate intent of blowing her cover.

"An administration official said the leaks were "simply for revenge" for the trouble Wilson had caused Bush." - Post's initial article

WRT (1) I have seen reporters cite sources confirming that she's been abroad in the past 5 years, but can't find anything online in the 30 seconds on Google it took me to find these articles.

But I bet these points still won't snap you out of your unshakeable belief that the commission of such a crims is unthinkable by anyone in this administration.

Yeah sure I'm all for presumption of innocence, but can we at least stipulate that a crime was committed?

I just checked in here from a link at Eschaton. As I read the piece, the defenses of the White House' failure to address internal criminal activity boils down to one of two possibilities: they were really incompetent, or they were malicious, with a few mavericks trying to spin the accusation into something other than a crime, even if the CIA says it was. Hey, the CIA couldn't possibly know as much about its agents and the law as some websurfer, right?

Most Republicans seem to be lining up on the side of incompetence, one of the few accusations NOT leveled at Bill Clinton. I guess it's all you have left, but I fail to see how that claim is of any comfort to you.

RR

Oldman: Sorry. I just lose all my civility when confronted with assholes defending traitors.

Maybe I remember wrong, but didn't Republicans used to be, like, anti-traitor?

Dear Yermum,

Alas not everything wrong is illegal and not everything illegal is wrong. Whether or not a crime has been committed is yet to be finally decided. However what any reasonable person can stipulate is that something wrong and seriously fucked up has happened. That in and of itself is more important in this case than whether or not it is a crime. Good enough?

Oldman:

You have single-handedly raised my opinion of the right-wing side of the political spectrum. The other comments, including Dan Drezner's, have confirmed my previous low opinion. This cognitive dissonance (conservatives are intellectually dishonest power-hungry villains vs. conservatives have a legitimate viewpoint that should be heard) nevertheless gives me hope. There is at least one self-proclaimed conservative out there who is not objectively delusional! It's like discovering a new continent.

I think an under-commented-on aspect of the Plame affair is the fact of how worthless it makes the CIA look. The NY Times described Plame as NOC, someone with a non-official cover, which they also described as “the holiest of holiest”, working on WMD, but seriously, how valuable could she have been? She almost perfectly represents why the CIA rarely does anything worthwhile - most CIA officers spend their time going to embassy cocktail parties rather than going deep undercover. CIA never penetrated Al Queda and it seems like we didn’t have particularly good pre-war intelligence on Iraq (a country presumably we had been watching closely for a dozen years), but we probably have five CIA agents that can tell us which cheese French Foreign Minster Dominic de Villepan preferred at the last French state dinner. Ms. Plame was the wife of a US diplomat; does the CIA really consider that a great cover story for an agent? Most people would assume anything interesting they told her, she’d at least tell her husband… and he works for (or has close contacts with) the US government. Really, how useful could an upper-middle class white woman living (undercover or not) in Washington D.C. be in determining whether terrorists in Karachi are plotting to steal Pakistani nukes or whether North Korea is building nukes in a bunker west of Pyongyang? The CIA is mindless bureaucracy and Plame is a symptom of that mindlessness.

wcw: "It seems reasonable to believe that the dirty tricksters who outed her didn't know they were blowing someone under NOC."

On what basis, then, did they tell Novak she was a "CIA operative"?

Cheers.

The Fool: "Maybe I remember wrong, but didn't Republicans used to be, like, anti-traitor?"

Those were old-style Republicans.

Bush, on the other hand, is a compassionate conservative.

I am surprised that the nepotism charge is still be used as the justification for all this with any seriousness. According to Wilson (see Marshall's interview at TPM - I know you don't believe him but it is the only credible info)his wife could not have done it as charged. But really, what was in it for him. 10 days pro bono in Niger doing the administration a favor? Get real.

Oldman: Yup good enough for me. I wonder if Bruce is up to speed yet though?

The Fool: what Oldman said. Democrats already own this issue and Daniel deserves a lot of respect for taking it seriously so quit already.

MiguelS: the fact that you're confusing handlers with assets makes your assessment of Plame's potential value somewhat suspect...

Radish:

Daniel is apparently not taking it seriously enough. I'm real proud that he's not with the total crazies, but that's too a low a standard for me.

> Ms. Plame was the wife of a US diplomat; does the CIA really consider that a great cover story for an agent?

The Wilsons haven't been married for most of their separate careers. I believe this is his third marriage, in fact.

I'm a bit confused with this statement:

"Given Tenet's behavior cited above, I'm inclined to think he [this is president Bush] didn't know. "

Well, maybe he didn't then, but he sure does now, and I think we can be sure that he did know prior to his expressed concern about the matter.

I find it rather amazing that the party that decries the "soft bigotry of low expectations" theory for its less vaulted citizens, would embrace that concept regarding the current president.

He is, after all, the president of the United States.

The fact that he hears his news through the obviously partisan filters of his staff is scary enough, but, that aside, if his staff didn't inform him as of July 15th, then they misserved him, and since he should be well aware of the situation by now, he, as a proper CEO should rid himself of an ill-serving staff.

He has not done so. He, thereby shows himself, not only to be surrounded by an incompetent staff, none of whom he has fired or censured; he therefore conclusively illustrates that he is an unfit CEO.

That you could in any way support him is mind-boggling.

Look, the Administration was clearly on notice of Plame's outing as of Novak's column, or very shortly thereafter.

For the Administration to be ignorant about the outing of a covert CIA agent until weeks after the public knew about it would be negligence and incompetance on an unimaginable scale. Unimaginable.

Whether or not bush knew or didn't is farnkly irrelevant. The administration plays the "bush as village idiot" or "bush as masterful leader in control of all details" spin when convenient. Either way, it's irrelevant. the buck stops here.

Dear Mindkiller,

Thanks for the compliment but a careful look will reveal that there are allot of "reasonable Republicans" around.

Let's not forget former governor Christine Todd Whitman who got cut off at the knees for being *too* environmental at the EPA. Or Olympia Snowe who got attacked for being too French and too fiscally conservative. Or John Mcain who lost the Carolina primary because of racist attack politics. Or Brent Scowcroft who publicly defied the Admin and national Republican line to oppose a unilateral invasion of Iraq. Or Colin Powell who despite some embaressing flip-flops is the only reason why the White House hasn't imploded yet. Or the head Republican on the House committee who signed a letter stating that the intelligence going into the Iraq war wasn't adequate for the case that was being made.

The simple fact is that all these Reasonable Republicans are in the periphery of power. We have an eclipse of the most radical elements of the party controlling the agenda, party mechanisms, and loyalty of the grassroots membership.

The Reasonable Republicans, or Republicans for Reason as it were, as just as dismayed by the last few years that have transpired as anyone else.

Atrios, you say:

"The administration plays the 'bush as village idiot' or 'bush as masterful leader in control of all details' spin when convenient."

I would add, so do his critics.

Yes Oldman, and I'm sure there were some Nazis who were very troubled by what was going on in their party too. But if you didn't leave the party, I'm afraid you were part of the problem, however guilty you may have felt about associating with known assholes.

Dear Fool,

Where is that civil tongue again? Your comparison with the Nazis is uncalled for and just wrong.

As far as taking direct action you misjudge what you do not understand. First to establish some background. I voted for Bush Senior over Clinton. I supported Dole over Clinton.

However, when it came time for the 2000 elections my conscience was troubled. My Republican friends and family were all set to vote mostly for Bush even if some had preferred Mcain. However, the more I dug into the record of the man the more I felt tormented about supporting GW Bush.

He was making all the right noises, but the character of his underlings and the history of his campaigns stunk to high heaven. In addition, his policy history was atrocious and his qualifications meager.

So after much agonizing, hand wringing, and internal debate I performed an act so shameful that to this day I have not been able to justify it to my family. In 2000, I voted Democratic. It is put that way, because in no terms could I conceive of voting *for* Al Gore.

However, despite my many disagreements with the Clinton Administration an objective review of their tenure was that on the whole it wasn't really that bad. And to replace not really that bad with potentially disasterous would have been civically irresposible. So I voted against Bush.

It is a decision that quite frankly troubles me to this day. However on the whole, I think I called it right. If it had been any Republican Candidate besides Bush - including Perot or Buchanan or Mcain it would never have been an issue. But everything inside of me from years of analysis and experience told me that this one was going to be a bad apple. And my duty as a citizen of this Republic demanded from me that I do the distasteful.

*sigh* So I did. A decision that haunts me to this day.

No matter what chunk of the spectrum you come from, you should at least, according to most philosophers, remember where you came from and why you are there(there being what you have achieved so far...)I do not profess to have any real answers to the problems predicated herein, but I do know that allaying myself with the richest of the rich won't help anyone except those rich people. Let America know that while there might be Republicans who aren't so blindsided by their politics that they can't induce social change, there is a great opportunity to try and free ourselves from a caustic system that denigrates everyone in the community. Let America know that every vote counts, and that a New Tammany Hall is NOT what we wanted. Let America know that our individual beauty can morph towards the collective, and the collective is not happy with a Houston-based oligarchy calling the shots. I am a patriot. Let that sink in. I am a patriot that still somehow believes in the United States of America. Our Constitution is sacred, and I will not watch it get trampled. I am not saying this to further a company's acquisitions, or a country's arms, I say this out of love for a true democracy. America: vote your conscience.

Oldman: I was using the generic "you" I didn't mean you, i.e. oldman. My Nazi example is ok because I am not saying that the Republicans are as bad as the Nazis (at least not yet). I'm using the Nazis as examples precisely because they are more extreme to make it easier to understand why simply lamenting that your fellow partisans are assholes is not always enough. At some point you just have to let go of your original identification and take up a new one.

Radish: I don't think I mentioned either "handlers" or "assets" in my post which makes your criticism of my post, shall we say, somewhat suspect...

But you do illustrate a problem with this whole Plame thing, no one really knows what she did or was doing and whether it was useful or valuable or worthless. And the same thing can be said about the CIA in general.

Its all secret, so people who dislike George Bush make it out that she was a Bond-like superagent one step away from destroying SPECTRE's secret lair until Karl Rove leaked her name. People (like me, I admit) who like GWB can downplay her significance.

That said, I think an honest evaluation of what we do know about her suggests she wasn't currently particularly valuable. Most likely she was in semi-retirement (due to her fairly recent marriage and kids) and the CIA was just keeping her around because they don't like to can "agents" or "officers".

I say agents or officers because I don't know which is correct in your Tom Clancy-derived nomenclature system, Radish.

John Bruce continues to set an unrealistic, ridiculous standards for things like "covert". For example, spy agencies don't send Podunk (or even Ivy League) graduates overseas under false names precisely because it's likely that they'll run into their classmates and their cover is toast. I don't know what crappy TV movie he got that from. Instead, they send them under false pretenses. Moe Berg went as a spy to Japan pre-WW2 in his role as a major league baseball catcher! Klaus Fuchs, Alger Hiss, and Julius Rosenberg all worked under their true names. Maybe they weren't really spies, I guess. I do admit, their Soviet handlers used pseudonyms, but there was very little likelihood of accidental recognition.

Sometimes the pretense is pretty transparent, like military attaché at the embassy. In Plame's case the cover was deep. She had a day job. She didn't say she worked at the CIA (as various OPEN employees can). That's covert employment, by definition.

Why don't you tell us, Mr Bruce, what steps you think are needed to make an employee covert. Before you answer, consider that it will be EASIER to spot the spies if the bad guys know to look for Americans with their fingerprints erased with acid. Not to mention the recruitment problems.

And to answer the rest of your first post: No, outing covert agents is not a legal, moral, and responsible way of dealing with not liking the intelligence they bring back, any more than revealing the Army's Order of Battle because you don't like soldiers' grumbling about conditions. Especially, I would add, in this case, where Wilson's report was true, and the White House's various terrifying scenarios of Saddam a year away from nukes he could send as far as London were utterly, totally bogus.

[Do you even read your RNC talking points before parroting them, Mr Bruce? You could save yourself no small amount of embarrassment. Or, irony of ironies, perhaps you post under a pseudonym!]

Dear Fool,

First of all get real. Any comparison to the Nazis is bound to be inflammatory or at least be perceived that way! Admit it.

Second of all, where exactly would one go? Republicans/Conservatives hold the majority of the state governorships, Congress, a majority of the Supremes, the Presidency, the loyalty of most of the military, and most rich people tend toward being Republican as well. An exile into the Libertarian party doesn't suit me. As for becoming a Democrat, well things aren't that desperate yet though I can sympathize with Mr. Clark.

Third of all, this country needs viable political parties. That means the Democrats have got to start getting some backbone, and the Republicans have got to start seeing some sense. The only that is going to happen is change from within in both parties.

Call me sentimental, but I'd like to see the day when the "Grand" get's put back into the GOP. The grassroots conservatives aren't wedded to the current political hierarchy. If there was a reasonable alternative, they could be persuaded to change allegiance.

That's one of the reasons why I've watched Danny boy here with some interest. He's not that alternative - yet. But he's got some potential. He's got a ways to go though. One more reason to root for him.

Supporting argument with illustrative historical precedent is a well-heeled and respected construct in discourse. However, should one choose to do so, it helps to have a sufficiently broad historical knowledge from which to mine one’s gems of fact.

Comparison of the current Republican party to the Nazi’s is so ludicrous as to force only one conclusion – The Fool needs to wade out from the shallow waters of History and learn stronger strokes, roam wider and delve deeper to discover the length and breadth of his subject. Then potentially valid premises can be supported by relevant fact that fits the scope of the argument and appears, well, less foolish.

MiguelS: We don't know how valuable she is or may have been because then we would have to know what she did do all those years which would compromise all her work and incidently all her "assets". We know she was an undercover CIA operative, whose cover is blown, who's probably (and this is pure speculation on my part)trying to contain the damage this will do to her network(past or present). The more we Know about her, the greater the damage. It should suffice to say, whatever value she may have been, however little she may have contributed, it's been pretty much voided by this leak.

Dear Miguel,

At the very least one woman's career was destroyed politically for something her husband said. Is that a matter of such little weight as to be dismissed? Is the integrity of GWB too great to condescend to give justice to one American who served her country faithfully? Since when did being Republican come to mean to dismiss without punishment dishonorable behavior? Any way one adds this up, it's wrong.

Truly amazing to find "debate" here about whether or not the administration and/or GWB knew at some point before September. You've got a seriously swaying house of cards, GOP, and it might be good for the country (remember the rest of us, oh uniters-not-dividers?) to take a little weight off the top of it soon by rolling a few of your denser heads. The taste of Trent Lott's blood is but a vague memory, and Limbaugh's will certainly be sweet (toxic though) but how much longer can we wait for the likes of Condi, Rummy, Rove, Wolfie, et al. to make for the showers? Or will the whole neocon mis-adventure just implode and take us all down with it in one big shit-storm?

We need more Republicans like Oldman.

I have a few questions to whomever is a legal scholar out there. First, as to Fourth Amendment rights, if Robert Novak leaked the name of a CIA operative during wartime, isn't he criminally responsible? Can he not be indicted for a felony? Secondly, the other reporters who were leaked the story but never printed it: do they have any responsibility to withhold the name of their source?

I would like to see this matter get cleared up as soon as possible and see the administrators, whoever they were and however high their rank, receive the maximum sentence for their treason. Let's stop politicizing this terrible event and deal with it as what it actually is: an act of TREASON.

My two cents:

Oldman, you give me hope! As a (transplanted to Tokyo) Mainer, I know and love the "Rational Republican" as exemplified by the GOP from New England - Snowe, Collins, Chafee, Jeffords, Weicker...they are, if too starched for my taste, good folks with good hearts trying their best to represent the people they serve. It's a New England thing.

Myself, I am as Left as they get, and yet, in my heart of hearts, I hope for the Nation AND for the GOP, that you, and the people you mentioned, can take back your party, and help those of us on the left trying to take back OUR party (or make a new one) ... take back our Country.

Arguing (with vitriol) about tax cuts, health care plans, spending, environmental policy...that is one thing...

But the events of recent months are seriously, deeply, agonizingly disturbing to me, an American on the Left...and to my Japanese, Chinese, Korean, French, German, British, Aussie, Kiwi, and etc...colleagues.

What has America become, they ask. Why is your country being led by such shallow fools, they ask...what will your people do to change this, to protect your country and the world from zealots with great power, no morals, and no compunctions, they ask...

And, they are right.

Thanks.

IMO, Bush must be shamed, his allies and supporters must be devastated so thoroughly, so publicly, and their humiliation and culpability must be made so public, so clear, and so degrading that their aftertaste will forever tarnish their brand of politics.

While they are not Nazis, nor are they (yet) fascists, they are the closest our Nation has ever come...in many methods, tactics, and outlooks, they approach fascism...while they do not objectively (yet) cross the line.

I think that the best thing that could happen to the GOP, and to the Nation is a Jimmy Swaggart Moment, presided over by Porter Goss, Chuck Hagel, Chuck Schumer, and Robert Byrd.

I too am encouraged by both Oldman and Dan. D. My question: when will a courageous Republican stand up and take Bush on in the primaries? It's time.

3) the "leak" had to have been with the deliberate intent of blowing her cover.

"An administration official said the leaks were "simply for revenge" for the trouble Wilson had caused Bush." - Post's initial article

There is only one, anonymous source on that. And, as has been debated ad nauseum, "administration official" could mean damn near anything. This is the nub of the whole thing, and the most contentious part of the whole matter at this point. This would be such malicious, hamhanded, overkill, there's now way it could have been authorized at a high-level.

It was most likely a mistake. (I'm willing to concede points 1 and 2 of that post if anyone cares)

For Andrew Lazarus, one thing you'd have to prove, either legally or morally, was that the CIA was in fact taking measures to protect Plame's identity at the time she was "outed". Many folks here have pointed to very vague circumstances -- she was a "NOC" (at what point in her career?), she was listed as working for a front company, etc.

But this is like when you report your car stolen, the first thing the cop asks is "did you tell anyone they could use your car?" This may not happen often, but if someone says, "well, come to think of it, I did. . .", and that person is the one who has it, you don't have a crime. Or if there's been a long history of you allowing people to walk across your property, you can't claim trespassing. You have to take active measures to let people know they can't cross your property.

If Andrea Mitchell apparently said that it was general knowledge in DC that Plame worked for the CIA (Mitchell, being married to Alan Greenspan, is probably an authority on this), then you simply don't have a covert agent. Sorry.

If I were an attorney charged with defending someone in this case, I would try to find witnesses who would testify that Plame herself had lunched many times on the basis that she was a romantic spook. I'll bet you could find them, too.

If you out yourself, there's no crime. If the CIA let things get out of hand in the DC social whirl (which is where we are here) such that Plame was generally thought to be a CIA employee, there's no crime. Nor is there moral culpability, it seems to me.

Mr. Bruce, you continue to baffle me (and, I'd guess, most of your interlocutors from both sides of the political fence).

there is not a scintilla of evidence to support your position. no hard document, no public statement, not even a not-for-attribution report. oh, wait -- there are some highly partisan columnists repeating talking points. ok, score one for your team, though I'd suggest it looks a lot like a penalty kick awarded by a bent referee.

arrayed against your position, on top of the not-for-attribution information we had two months ago, we now have the CIA and the DOJ launching formal investigations, a CIA front company blown, Plame's ex-CIA recruiting classmates backing her up on CNN, her husband's direct statements contradicting your assertions, just to mention a few pieces of evidence. there has been further not-for-attribution information reported, and there have been penalties awarded for blatant handballs, my analogy for the principled commentators who support the administration, but not this particularly ugly retributive act.

why in the name of all that is holy are you working so hard to deny the plain facts? I hate to tar entire groups of people, but I keep running into you (again on both sides of the political fence, though on the left we call you folks 'stalinists') and you really, really bug me.

the sky is blue. up is up. peace is peace. get back to us when you can argue your positions without arguing that down is up.

thanks Eric for going on the record as objectively-pro-treason. John OTOH is apparently pro-treason-if-you-can-get-away-with-it.
Nice to have that cleared, now will the conservatives/Republicans against treason please stand up?
Thanks to all of you.

Humm, let's go through what we know, what we may know, and what we don't.

1. Apparently Plame was a Non Official Cover employee, at least at some point in her career. We don't know how long she's been with the agency (someone with good info, please say). However, it appears that she's been in DC for some considerable part of the past 5 years. Nobody to my knowledge has said she hasn't. Fellow trainees from n years ago don't really go to this question. If she hasn't been overseas in the past 5 years, the law doesn't apply to her, whatever her job title. I'm entitled to be skeptical here until I hear otherwise. I don't generally deny plain facts, but I'm not aware of pertinent info here other than that she was courted, married, and had kids in DC in the recent past.

2. I'm still entitled to be skeptical that the CIA was taking active measures to keep her identity confidential, if someone like Andrea Mitchell can say she was generally regarded as a CIA employee. One motive Wilson, her husband, has to go on TV and speculate that now Osama bin Laden is gonna croak his wife is simply self-serving publicity. I'm entitled to a personal estimate of folks in the public eye, and I find Wilson, who likely became a diplomat through personal connections and strikes me as a somewhat useless fellow with a lot of inherited money at his disposal, and his trophy wife not entirely sympathetic people. They clearly live lives of privilege, and for them suddenly to be claiming victim status is a dissonance. As a result, I'm not inclined to give them, or those who might defend them simply on grounds of being "people like us" a lot of credence.

3. Finally, I just don't see a case for a theory that she was deliberately "outed", especially if it appears that she probably outed herself as a member of DC society.

I think this is reasonable skepticism.

"At the very least one woman's career was destroyed politically for something her husband said."

Interesting statement. The woman's husband decides to tell the world that he was "paid only expenses" by her employer to go to Niger on what can best be described as an ambiguous "mission". He returns from this potentially sensitive mission with...NO INFORMATION and proceeds to scream from the rooftops that, since he found NOTHING, the administration is filled with fools.
Central to his credibility and of great interest to the entire story is his claim he was sent by the CIA.
And he never imagines anyone asking how the CIA came to "assign" him to this unpaid task? He never imagines that his wife's occupation with the CIA could be revealed either inadvertently or illicitly BECAUSE of the nature of the very public comments he makes upon his return?
Yes, it is possible a CIA agent's "cover" was blown in this affair. Why is it that no one can imagine Mr. Wilson apparently didn't much care about his wife's security in the first place?
He jeopardized his wife's life and career, for what? To expose what "important" information?
Oh, he HAD to say in the NY Times that since HE found nothing in Niger this PROVED the administration and Blair were lying. Expressing that OPINION, using his CIA work as context, was worth risking his wife's life and career?
Makes sense to me.

Mr. Bruce -

a real skeptic is not a nouveau Bishop Berkeley who presents an unprovable ontological challenge to any putative fact. a real skeptic is one who searches for knowledge (look up the etymology -- please). based on the evidence to date, we can have a good idea of what's actually going on, and I fully expect that my fearless predictions will turn out to be close to the truth:

1. Plame was NOC until she was blown. she was posted overseas within the last three years if not more recently. it seems likely she's been with the CIA somewhere on the order of 15 years.

2. Plame's name will have gotten into ciculation among those with security clearances and, perhaps, those associated with the blabbermouth among them -- and no more. this will have been because of her work on WMD, to which her name's attached. any breaches will have occurred at the executive level, not at the CIA.

3. while establishing motive is going to be the hardest item for which to find documentary proof, to the extent we find any I expect that it shall be of an explicitly retributive we're-going-to-fuck-then-like-they've-never-been-fucked, nature.

wcw, what's your source for Plame being posted overseas within the last 3 years, if not more recently?

Out of curiosity, I decided to Google "Brewster-Jennings", and oddly enough got a fair number of hits dealing with the Illuminati and UFOs. I kid you not. Brewster Jennings appears to be the name of one or more individuals associated with the Standard Oil fortune, and I found a reference to a Brewster Jennings who worked for Aramco in the late 1940s telling James Forrestal the Marshall Plan couldn't succeed without Middle Eastern oil.

I suspect there have been weird vibes connected with any "Brewster-Jennings and Associates" for many years, and it would not be a stretch for anyone to suspect a CIA connection.

The WaPo in an article on this at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40012-2003Oct3.html
says the company may be defunct, and that "administration" officials immediately confirmed it was a CIA front.

I don't suspect there's much actual secrecy here. To answer the question of what the CIA SHOULD do to protect an agent's identity, I would suggest that it should do the things that don't get the agent blown, such as, for instance

-- the agent being married to Joseph Wilson IV, an apparent international playboy type and publicity hound.

yes, I knew who Brester Jennings was.

I would call ad hominem on you, but if I did I'd have to enumerate your other rhetorical tricks, which exercise does not appeal to me currently.

as I said, I am through arguing with you. if you're not just playing Berkeley to my Descartes, put up: what truth have you discovered, oh searcher?

But wcw, I'm puzzled -- I didn't ask you if you knew who Brewster Jennings was, I asked what your source was for your claim that Plame had been overseas within the past 3 years. I hope you'll excuse my rhetorical trick of pointing out that you haven't answered a key question. If you do have the answer, I'm as interested as anyone and will certainly change my opinion based on good info like that.

MiguelS: sorry. let me clarify...

briefly, Plame was almost certainly either the person who meets with, accepts envelopes from, provides moral support for, etc - in a word, handles - the person who knows whether or not the terrorists are trying to buy nukes, or else she was surreptitiously collecting intelligence during travels in her guise as a non-governmental official. or both...

those roles are often called handler or operative respectively, but the terminology is not the important part - the roles are important and they do exist. the person who knows whether or not the terrorists are trying to buy nukes or has the plans for the new missile and is probably not supposed to tell us about it is generally called an asset, but again, the role played is more significant than the term used. one person playing both or all three roles at the same time is common in movies and books but very rare in real life.

no, we don't know the details. my assertions are speculative but reasonably well informed. Plame would have been useful as either a handler or an operative, particularly in Eastern Europe, but probably not as an asset.

your apparent assertion that the CIA was just keeping her around ONLY because they don't like to can "agents" or "officers" is equally speculative, but overlooks the fact that a) human intelligence networks take (quite literally) years or decades to build, and b) that the network to which Plame was attached is an anti-proliferation network - exactly the kind that our leaders claim we need right now, c) that the entire network is now shot to shit.

maybe that network was important and maybe it wasn't, but to think that your uncertainty is an indictment rather than a substantiation of the effectiveness of professional human-intelligence gathering seems exactly backwards to me.

"I don't suspect there's much actual secrecy here. To answer the question of what the CIA SHOULD do to protect an agent's identity, I would suggest that it should do the things that don't get the agent blown, such as, for instance

-- the agent being married to Joseph Wilson IV, an apparent international playboy type and publicity hound."

This line of argument continues to mystify me. If a relationship with an "international playboy type and publicity hound" makes one a spy, there are some pretty curvaceous spooks at Hef's Playboy Mansion. And Barbara Bush is married to a former Director of Central Intelligence -- now there's a dead giveaway.

Once again, it wasn't a secret that Valerie Plame was married to Joseph Wilson. But it apparently was a secret that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA. So long as Valerie Plame's true occupation was a secret, it didn't matter what name she worked under. Indeed, given her cover, it would have raised suspicion if she traveled under an assumed name. ("Hey, Amir, why did that energy consultant, Valerie Plame, just register under the name, 'Mata Hari?'"

How can a disinterested skeptic overlook such an obvious point?

I'm puzzled here. On one hand, many of the posters whom I'd characterize as "angry left" here are upset that putative classified information has been released by administration staffers. Yet at the same time we have radish asserting "the network to which Plame was attached is an anti-proliferation network - exactly the kind that our leaders claim we need right now". This must be information of the most sensitive sort, indeed, far beyond anything the administration's alleged leakers are accused of releasing. How does radish have this info? Why is radish making it public here? What sources can radish cite that would remotely lead to these conclusions?

My own sense is that Plame kept her position because, I suspect, the CIA is an old-boy or old-girl institution with lots of also-rans, has-beens, and wannabes all over the place. Given the discussion that took place after 9/11 regarding the ill-suitedness and reluctance of CIA operatives to infiltrate groups like al Quaida, I suspect that many "NOC"s and their ilk are coasting, retired on the job, and my guess is that Plame is among them. If Bush has erred in any particular area, it's in not cleaning house here.

I doubt Plame had any covert career left after she married Wilson. He was just too high-profile after Iraq in 1990, and then he became an ambassador.

IMO James Taranto at Opinion Journal got it right with his time-frame analysis last week. Plame would not have had any covert overseas postings once their children were born. They met in D.C. when both were posted there, and all of Wilson's assignments after their marriage were in D.C., save for earlier this year when he briefly went to Niger. The only time window during which she could have had a covert overseas posting after marriage would been in the period right after marriage, which would have required that they be separated then as Wilson stayed in D.C.. This is most unlikely.

Those who persist in believing a violation of 50 USC 421, et. seq., occurred have avoided this point.

There's another issue that interests me here, which is that if we take Wilson's and his supporters' view, then Plame (and presumably Wilson) are in serious danger. Plame has been working a very dangerous job, risking her life at every turn. All her networks are gonna be rolled up now, for sure.

Humm. In those circumstances, wouldn't I go to my CIA superiors and say, gee, wow, guys, you gotta get me some plastic surgery in a hurry and set me up with a dry cleaning business in Spearfish, SD under a new name. Would I really want my husband on the news giving the terrorists ideas on what they can do? If I were in any real danger, I sure wouldn't want my family acting out in the media.

By the same token, all the DC players would, if there were real compromise of intelligence info, be clamming up, no comment, we can neither confirm nor deny, etc. etc. Instead, it's media carnival city. Something's not right here.

Tom Holsinger writes :" The only time window during which she could have had a covert overseas posting after marriage would been in the period right after marriage, which would have required that they be separated then as Wilson stayed in D.C.. This is most unlikely."

Your analysis is wrong.

There was about a year after July of 1998 in which she could have made the trip before getting pregnant.

Anything else is speculation on your part.

It's entirely logical that she'd make one last trip before ending her overseas work.

We know they met in 1997. We don't know when they married. It's entirely possible they married in late 1998 or 1999, after Plame returned from a covert trip overseas.

The children were born in 2000, so she wouldn't be pregnant before March of 1999 at the earliest.

No matter how furiously you spin it, there's no reason to assume she didn't travel overseas in that year.

James Taranto is just a twat.

Bruce et al seem at this point to be arguing that a married woman with children couldn't really be a covert agent, so please go easy on their buds in the Administration.

Mr Bruce, I notice you have in two different threads declined to specify what steps are necessary to keep an agent's name covert. That's rhetorical cheating, to make these demands of us without specifying the standards (and seeing if they could possibly be satisfied by anyone, even the deepest cover agents we have).

This liberal smear job is already off the front page. Why is this the case? That's easy to answer: the liberal media know that Mrs. Wilson is merely an analyst---and probably hasn't been a secret agent in years. Thus, this silliness was a fraud from the very beginning.

I am convinced that the liberal media would have ignored this so-called story if Bill Clinton were still in office. However, these same folks are committed to destroying the presidency of George W. Bush.

"No matter how furiously you spin it, there's no reason to assume she didn't travel overseas in that year."

Who cares about the past? All that matters is her current position. We can be fairly sure Mrs. Wilson is now merely an analyst---or the media would still keep this story on the front burner. They are subtly, but most assuredly, backing away from this nonsense.

The law is very specific: one must deliberately desire to blow the cover of an active secret agent. Heck, just about everybody in Washington D.C. knew about her CIA employment status. A casual slip of the tongue does not warrant a jail sentence.

Jon H.,

There is a world of difference between an overseas trip and an overseas assignment. Furthermore the various government agencies which post people overseas go to great lengths to foster their employees' personal lives, notably including courtship and marriage. They have to in order to keep good people. They're not like the military.

You really, really, want to believe there is a pony in that pile of ****. "Conclusion First & Reason Afterwards" is not an effective argument.

Feel free to ignore the obvious, but don't expect the rest of us to go there with you.

"Instead, it's media carnival city. Something's not right here. "

Yup, and that's why this story is already disappearing. By next week, the liberal media will mention it somewhere on page 38A, next to the grocery ads.

The liberal media are corrupt. That explains everything. Look at what’s happening to Arnold Schwarzenegger. The same folks who defended Bill Clinton’s vile behavior are acting self righteously toward the Republican candidate. What more do you need to know?

Dear Mr. Thomson,

For the record the story first emerged in July when it was broken by Novak a conservative columnist who did the original leak. Then some two months later it was brought back by investigation by the WaPo, a conservative newspaper. Finally, Bill Kristol the editor of the Weekly Standard which is NOT liberal media has already called for the President to fire the aides involved and apologize to Valeria Plame.

I'm not exactly sure where the Liberal Media comes into this. It's been Conservatives breaking ground on this issue all the way the whole way.

John Bruce wrote: I find Wilson, who likely became a diplomat through personal connections and strikes me as a somewhat useless fellow with a lot of inherited money at his disposal

Evidently all you know about Joseph Wilson is neocon slanders.

In 1990, while sheltering more than a hundred Americans at the U.S. Embassy and diplomatic residences, [Wilson] briefed reporters while wearing a hangman's noose instead of a necktie -- a symbol of defiance after Hussein threatened to execute anyone who didn't turn over foreigners.

The message, Wilson said: "If you want to execute me, I'll bring my own [expletive] rope."

This toughness impressed President George H.W. Bush, who called Wilson a "truly inspiring" diplomat who exhibited "courageous leadership" by facing down Hussein and helping to gain freedom for the Americans before the 1991 war began. [source]

You know, George H. W. Bush was never one of my heroes, to say the least. But it's interesting to see the neocons so savagely dismissing someone who was respected and honored by their beloved President's father. Evidently courage and independence of mind are not qualities approved of by the Bush II administration.

Yup, Wilson was not a low-profile diplomat, at least not after Iraq invaded Kuwait.

Dear Bruce,

All of this tendacious arguing about whether or not she was a "real secret agent" misses the point. For that let's go to the source.

The White House is now being investigated by the Justice Department. Bush himself has come out and called the leak as being wrong and that he wants to get down to the bottom of it.

Are you now saying that our Commander and Chief is incorrect on the issue when he says the leak was wrong and that whoever did it ought to be smoked out?

;-)

Dear fellow Republicans,

You all ought to be ashamed of yourselves when you suggest that Valerie Plame had no meaningful career left because she'd had kids. Hasn't anyone ever heard of a woman going back to work after having kids? These assumptions are not only sexist they're ignorant.

Spying isn't sneaking around in foreign countries black ninja suits taking photographs. That only happens on TV. "Contacts" may mean having lunch with someone, a telephone call, an email, a package passed through a third party carrier, and not to mention meeting people who come to the United States for diplomatic or business reasons. Once you have a network of sources established you can pretty much keep it going.

I blame it on movies and TV. Addled the minds of people when it comes to spying. Most espionage is done by perception and quick thinking as well as thorough planning. Not cloak and dagger antics.

"Bush himself has come out and called the leak as being wrong and that he wants to get down to the bottom of it."

"Finally, Bill Kristol the editor of the Weekly Standard which is NOT liberal media has already called for the President to fire the aides involved and apologize to Valeria Plame."

Both of these gentlemen premised their remarks upon the possibility that this was a real scandal. Now it seems that Mrs. Wilson is merely an analyst--and not a secret agent. They were not the only Americans initially deceived by the liberal media.

Once again, please notice how rapidly this story is going away. That should tell all you need to know.

"Bush himself has come out and called the leak as being wrong and that he wants to get down to the bottom of it."

"Finally, Bill Kristol the editor of the Weekly Standard which is NOT liberal media has already called for the President to fire the aides involved and apologize to Valeria Plame."

Both of these gentlemen premised their remarks upon the possibility that this was a real scandal. Now it seems that Mrs. Wilson is merely an analyst--and not a secret agent. They were not the only Americans initially deceived by the liberal media.

Once again, please notice how rapidly this story is going away. That should tell all you need to know.

Dear Dan (not Drezner),

Thanks for the thumbs up but things are looking grim. While there are still a large group of reasonable conservatives out there, including the New Englanders and others previously mentioned, the center of gravity in party power has shifted toward those within the Right who are Not-Rational.

By Not-Rational I mean that they are in blatant denial of objective reality. Like poor Tomson who's arguing that it's Liberal Media when it was the WaPo that revived the story. The fact that the WaPo is a liberal newspaper sure ought to come as news to them! ;-)

The problem is that nobody cares what your opinion is on where you think the trip ought to go when the car is broken down by the side of the road. There has got to be some sort of minimal reality-checking going on.

My party has majorities in Congress, the Supreme Court, the state governorships, and we have the Presidency as well as the majority of both the rich people and the military as being Republicans.

If things aren't going so well, then who exactly do we have to blame it on?

I'd like to be part of a "revolt" within my own Party, that's for sure. With all the power we have we really ought to be able to do more for this country. The problem though is that we have no real vision for America's future, and the people we got in power are basically fanatics who don't cotton with little things like reality.

On the other hand, if the Democratic party had the slightest degree of backbone we wouldn't be in this position either. Come on! Our guy Bush is stumbling all over the place, he's got excepting Powell and Armitage a bunch of pie-in-the-sky wishful thinkers running his Admin, and you Lefties can't crack a higher re-elect rate over him for nothing.

What does that tell me? That Democrats are weak. Real weak right now. You guys gotta fix that too. Democrats have to get over being this party of radical feminists, gays, and big city elite type liberals. Like for crying out loud, that guy Nader you Lefties out to drag out on the street and beat yourselves. No difference betweeen Dems and Repubs my ass! He still won't admit that he screwed the pooch in 2000. If not for him it'd be President Gore right now.

Both parties are in serious trouble. I'll work on fixing mine if you give me some hope and take a crack at yours!

Dear Mr. Thomson,

Let me congratulate you on being so short-sighted you don't see the big picture. This is the big picture. If the spooks don't get their blood, it's going to be payback time. The CIA up and down the line and the rest of the intel community is watching this very carefully. Maybe you're used to dealing with some wimpy Lefties who cry foul when someone disses them. Intel people have more interesting and creative ways of creating trouble. I repeat what I said before. This better go all the way, or things are going to get messy.

Oldman,

Plame's overseas covert career did not die because she had kids. It died because she married Joe Wilson. He's not a covert kind of guy.

Having several young children makes covert overseas postings of a CIA employee mother too much of a hassle for everyone concerned, in addition to other issues.

That problem didn't arise for a year or so after marriage for Valerie Plame, but her husband's conspicuousness had already ended the overseas covert phase of her career. The CIA has lots and lots of not so covert positions, mostly in the U.S., for qualified mothers of young children.

Andrew Lazarus asks, "Mr Bruce, I notice you have in two different threads declined to specify what steps are necessary to keep an agent's name covert. That's rhetorical cheating, to make these demands of us without specifying the standards (and seeing if they could possibly be satisfied by anyone, even the deepest cover agents we have)."

I'm not an intelligence professional, though I've done industrial-grade security work now and then. I would be inclined to say that from what I've seen, ordinary people working in secret industrial projects do in fact do things to conceal their employer's identity. This includes having misleading parking stickers on their cars and employee IDs that don't display the name of the employer in any obvious way. Such a person would probably get in trouble for saying "I'm working on the XYZ program for Bigbucks Industries." If Valerie Plame was generally regarded as a CIA employee, according to Andrea Mitchell, this would be evidence that she, the CIA, or both, were taking no serious effort to protect her identity.

As someone who's served jury duty, the prosecution would need to convince me that serious, effective, consistent, and credible efforts were being made by the CIA (and cooperated with by Plame) to conceal her identity. I don't know enough about them to say what they should be, but in the context of what I've seen, they don't look serious or effective to me.

And in the end, if it's a crime, this needs to be convincing to a jury.

The proof is in the pudding. Why is this story being buried? And yes, the Washington Post is a liberal newspaper. Who told you otherwise? Please don't buy a Bridge located in Brooklyn from this individual.

The liberal media is embarrassed to talk about the matter. This is yesterday's news and now considered of minor importance.

"Like poor Tomson who's arguing that it's Liberal Media when it was the WaPo that revived the story. The fact that the WaPo is a liberal newspaper sure ought to come as news to them! ;-)"

The proof is in the pudding. Why is this story being buried? And yes, the Washington Post is a liberal newspaper. Who told you otherwise? Please don't buy a Bridge located in Brooklyn from this individual.

The liberal media is embarrassed to talk about the matter. This is yesterday's news and now considered of minor importance.

John Bruce: How does radish have this info?

geez John, aren't you a little embarassed to be posting on the same thread with people who actually read the papers? here's a super secret spy trick from WWII: first you read the train schedule, then you go down to the railyard and watch the trains, and only then do you talk to the stationmaster.

credible efforts were being made by the CIA (and cooperated with by Plame) to conceal her identity

you mean like telling Novak not to use her name? or was that a top secret Democrat plan to trip him up? c'mon, dude, you're just making The Fool's point for him.

I suspect that many "NOC"s and their ilk are coasting, retired on the job

as above, so below. no, seriously, that may have been true before the USSR collapsed, but I would hate to be be in charge of a covert network nowadays.

I followed radish's link, and it's to the original Novak story that says, "Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction". But this is all Novak says, and it appears that his use of the term "operative" is loose and non-technical. Our friend radish interprets all this to mean accepting envelopes, running agents, all kinds of stuff, which, it seems to me is a leap. In fact, much of what we read about this affair has been a leap all along.

I suspect that for some years Plame's chief activity at the CIA has been to occupy a cube, squabble over her share of the coffee fund, attend useless meetings, and go to lunch with hangers-on and wannabes in the DC social scene, a process driven by the roman numeral "IV" attached to her husband's name. This is MY leap of logic. I submit that it is as valid as radish's assumption that this lady is some reincarnation of Agent 007. We know, however, that she and I-V fantasize about who'll play them when the film is made of their exploits (I'd go for Lily Tomlin to play Plame, anyhow).

John Bruce: This is MY leap of logic.

logic doesn't require leaps. espionage does. the point of espionage (as in most kinds of research) is to figure out which leaps connect the dots most effectively.

John Bruce: I submit that it is as valid as radish's assumption that this lady is some reincarnation of Agent 007.

radish: one person playing both or all three roles at the same time is common in movies and books but very rare in real life.

sheesh. I'd hate to actually be trying to teach you something.

Well, radish, humm. You say, "the point of espionage (as in most kinds of research) is to figure out which leaps connect the dots most effectively." This makes me (I'm sorry, but it's one of the things I picked up along the way) think of Occam's Razor, which can be expressed in various ways, but it could be expressed as saying the simplest line that connects the dots is the most effective one.

All these assumptions about one person playing both or all three roles, or something like that, goes against Occam's Razor, it seems to me, if other assumptions based on the known facts are simpler.

There have been many folks who've tried to "teach" me very complicated things, so you certainly have company, radish, and you shouldn't feel bad at all.

From the USA TODAY profile of Willson and Plame:

"In Washington, Plame was assigned to the CIA's Non-Proliferation Center, an organization of analysts, technical experts and former field operatives who work on detecting and, if possible, preventing foreign proliferation of weapons of mass destruction."

Read that passage carefully and this arguement ends right now.

She was working at the Non-Proliferation Center.
...analysts, tech experts and former field operatives...

Let me translate that into Spy Jargon for Radish.

At most she was retired, an ex-spy, a has-been.

The Non-Proliferation Center might as well have a sign on the door reading "Assisted-living for the retired spy".

Best,
MiguelS

John Bruce, if you can show me that Valerie Plame has a CIA parking permit on her car, I will retract publically everything I said and agree that she was not a covert agent. I think that's a very reasonable test, and I thank you for finally supplying it.

Of course, I expect you to agree that if she didn't have any such parking sticker, you'll stop defending the Bush Administration on the grounds that she wasn't a covert agent.

I am also willing (nay, eager) to make a very large cash side bet on the parking permits.

My confidence is based on your apparent misreading of her employment status. She didn't have a cube at the CIA, just as Aldrich Ames didn't use an email address aldrich.ames@kgb.su. She had a cover job as an energy analyst in a company whose cover is also blown now. I'd guess she made a point of avoiding being seen at CIA HQ.

By the way, there's a strong undertone of misogny (girls can't be spies and play in our treehouse) running through your posts, which probably also leads you into mistaken conclusions.

JB: Wow... that was an amazingly boneheaded fumble of what could have been a really good argument...

apparently you didn't actually read what I wrote. my point (to MiguelS) was that ordinarily (in real life) different people fulfill different roles. you seem to be invoking Occam to support what I said, apparently thinking that I had said the opposite.

the really funny part is that this is one of those situations where the original Occam's razor and the somewhat more generic notion of "the simplest explanation being the most likely" are somewhat at odds.

so you could have used the original principle (which states that for any phenomenon the explanation which requires the fewest unobserved entities is the most likely) to mount a clever rhetorical offense against the idea which I was actually proposing (namely that Plame was unlikely to be anything remotely resembling a 007 type) because that would require additional unobserved entities in the form of other spooks.

thanks for the laugh...

MiguelS: I think you need to get with the new talking points dude. the White House could have cleared this up in ten minutes at any time by going on record that she wasn't covert...

anyway, doesn't it strike you as little hypocritical for the WH to interfere with the work of a anti-WMD group at a time like this?

From Tom Holsinger:

"Plame's overseas covert career did not die because she had kids. It died because she married Joe Wilson. He's not a covert kind of guy."

Before marrying Joe Wilson, Valerie Plame was known as an energy consultant. After marrying Joe Wilson, she was perhaps better known as an energy consultant. But marrying Joe Wilson didn't expose her secret occupation.

For the nth time, it wouldn't have mattered if she had married Ben Affleck. The point wasn't that no one knew who she was, but that no one knew what she really did. As she appeared to the world to be an energy consultant, it didn't matter that she worked under her own name, and it didn't matter that she married Joe Wilson. Even if Plame and Wilson had exchanged vows on Al-Jazeera it wouldn't have revealed that Valerie Plame, energy consultant, was really Valerie Plame, CIA operative.

It seems pretty clear that Plame was not an active field operative. And it is probable that she hadn't been active in the last 4-5 years as she has been living in DC. Sure she might be still be maintaining her cover, but this could for any number of reasons. She might be keeping her cover story going to keep the option of future reactivation open, but being married to Joe Wilson, high-profile US diplomat, would limit her usefulness as a NOC. She probably kept her cover going because being a NOC has as a intra-agency cache. Granted she might have been keeping covered to protect valuable networks and sources, but this probably is the least likely reason. I say that because the CIA has in general shown itself incompetent in gathering human intelligence, so why would she be the glittering exception? The real secret of the CIA is that most agents, do little if anything of value. Someone mentioned Aldrich Ames in a post. Think about this: drunken, lazy, incompetent Aldrich Ames seemed to fit right in at Langley, no one thought him unsual.

Radish: Why would I bother to move on to new talking points when you seem to have be having so much trouble addressing the old ones?

I'm trying very hard to see why being married to an ambassador would make life harder for a covert operative, and failing. It can't be because she's stationed at the embassy; so are our diplomatic-cover spies. It can't be because of the kids; on the contrary that would be great cover for assignations, especially with assets who are mothers. It can't be because of the fame; we've had lots of spies who were famous as something else.

I keep picking up this feeling it has something to do with chromosomes.

...and hormones. You know how these chick spies are. Jeez, they're betrayed and outed and their networks are rolled up and people they worked with die and their own lives are in danger....and they go get *upset* about it.

What is it with women,anyway?

Just two things that may clarify some of the conversation. First, the text of the law on covert agents. I apologize if this repeats previously posted material, but I didn't want to forget about it while reading the thread. The second will be in a following post, due to length of this one.

US CODE COLLECTION
TITLE 50 > CHAPTER 15 > Sec. 421.

Sec. 421. - Protection of identities of certain United States undercover intelligence officers, agents, informants, and sources
(a) Disclosure of information by persons having or having had access to classified information that identifies covert agent
Whoever, having or having had authorized access to classified information that identifies a covert agent, intentionally discloses any information identifying such covert agent to any individual not authorized to receive classified information, knowing that the information disclosed so identifies such covert agent and that the United States is taking affirmative measures to conceal such covert agent's intelligence relationship to the United States, shall be fined under title 18 or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.
(b) Disclosure of information by persons who learn identity of covert agents as result of having access to classified information
Whoever, as a result of having authorized access to classified information, learns the identify of a covert agent and intentionally discloses any information identifying such covert agent to any individual not authorized to receive classified information, knowing that the information disclosed so identifies such covert agent and that the United States is taking affirmative measures to conceal such covert agent's intelligence relationship to the United States, shall be fined under title 18 or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.
(c) Disclosure of information by persons in course of pattern of activities intended to identify and expose covert agents
Whoever, in the course of a pattern of activities intended to identify and expose covert agents and with reason to believe that such activities would impair or impede the foreign intelligence activities of the United States, discloses any information that identifies an individual as a covert agent to any individual not authorized to receive classified information, knowing that the information disclosed so identifies such individual and that the United States is taking affirmative measures to conceal such individual's classified intelligence relationship to the United States, shall be fined under title 18 or imprisoned not more than three years, or both.
(d) Imposition of consecutive sentences
A term of imprisonment imposed under this section shall be consecutive to any other sentence of imprisonment

http://www4.law.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/htm_hl?DB=uscode&STEMMER=en&WORDS=covert+disclosur+&COLOUR=Red&STYLE=s&URL=/uscode/50/421.html#muscat_highlighter_first_match

Second, I think it has been admitted by the administration that Plame was a covert agent. President Bush said "This is a serious charge, by the way. We're talking about a criminal action."

Which brings me to Kos's Plame Primer:

For those who argue it is complicated.

Plame is an undercover CIA agent.

She was outed by senior administration officials in the White House.

Outing a CIA agent is a felony.
Hmm, not so complicated, after all...

What was the motive? Her husband, Ambassador Wilson, criticized the administration for Yellowcake lies.

But wasn't he a partisan Democrat? No. He donated money to Bush's presidential campaign in 2000. But even if he was James Carville, see numbers 1 and 2 above.

Period. Everything else is chaff.

http://www.dailykos.com/archives/004454.html#004454