John Tierney just went and got himself in heap of trouble with the left:
We are in the midst of a remarkable Washington scandal, and we still don’t have a name for it. Leakgate, Rovegate, Wilsongate – none of the suggestions have stuck because none capture what’s so special about the current frenzy to lock up reporters and public officials…
The White House felon So far Karl Rove appears guilty of telling reporters something he had heard, that Valerie Wilson, the wife of Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV, worked for the C.I.A. But because of several exceptions in the 1982 law forbidding disclosure of a covert operative’s identity, virtually no one thinks anymore that he violated it. The law doesn’t seem to apply to Ms. Wilson because she apparently hadn’t been posted abroad during the five previous years.
The endangered spies Ms. Wilson was compared to James Bond in the early days of the scandal, but it turns out she had been working for years at C.I.A. headquarters, not exactly a deep-cover position. Since being outed, she’s hardly been acting like a spy who’s worried that her former contacts are in danger.
At the time her name was printed, her face was still not that familiar even to most Washington veterans, but that soon changed. When her husband received a “truth-telling” award at a Nation magazine luncheon, he wept as he told of his sorrow at his wife’s loss of anonymity. Then he introduced her to the crowd…
For now, though, it looks as if this scandal is about a spy who was not endangered, a whistle-blower who did not blow the whistle and was not smeared, and a White House official who has not been fired for a felony that he did not commit. And so far the only victim is a reporter who did not write a story about it.
It would be logical to name it the Not-a-gate scandal, but I prefer a bilingual variation. It may someday make a good trivia question:
What do you call a scandal that’s not scandalous?
Nadagate.
I wonder how many ways his name will be taken in vain at dKos.
Oh, btw- can someone help me out with something. Can someone tell me the origin and meaning of ‘adoring the codpiece’ or ‘worshipping the codpiece?’ I have seen this several times in the past few days, and I was just curious what it all meant.
Glenn M.
Well all I can say about the codpiece is that it was kind of like a cup people wear today in sports, to make a man look uhm.. larger.. than he really is.
Popular around Medieval and post era fashion.
Adoring the fake? No clue. Speculation.
Jimmy Jazz
One of Bush’s nicknames, acquired following “Mission Accomplished” was “Captain Codpiece” since it appeared he was wearing a heavy duty athletic protector.
Is that standard equipment O chimperor, or are you just happy to see me?
Jack (CommonSenseDesk)
Tierney makes some good points whatever Rove did or didn’t do to Wilson and Plame who may or may not have been under deep cover. On the other hand, perhaps none of it happened the way it appears it did and we may never know whether it did or didn’t. Oh well.
andy gross
god, what bullshit…
you’d think one of the first thing the grand jury established was that she was covert – the CIA initiated this whole thing, remember. does tierney think that they’d even be able proceed if a crime hadn’t been committed. although the investigation seems to have widened in scope to perjury/obstruction, it couldn’t have proceeded this far if the initial charges were bogus.
Jon H
“. Since being outed, she’s hardly been acting like a spy who’s worried that her former contacts are in danger.”
What, exactly, is *she* supposed to do about it? Outed is outed. Was she supposed to have multiple layers of false identities and cover jobs?
It’d be nice if a Times op/ed columnist slot required more work than rewriting the GOP talking points fax.
Mike S
One side or the other is going to look spectacularly stupid when Fitz finishes his investigation. I’m thinking that it will be the defenders since the investigation is still going and some of the comments from the judge in the Miller priv case. Not to mention the massive spin machine from “Gold Bricks” Luskin.
My side may lose but my money’s on the defenders looking stupid.
ppgaz
I agree, MikeS, otherwise, why would Miller be in jail?
Fitzgerald is after somebody, and he has a case, otherwise this wouldn’t be on the radar.
Bruce Moomaw
Dammit, the CIA thought a significant crime had been committed, which is why they referred the case to the Justice department in the first place. Both of the judges who have taken a detailed look at Fitzgerald’s evidence so far — while remaining mum about its actual contents — have said flatly that it indicates the commission of “serious crimes”.
And, last but hardly least, consider Tierney’s mindblowing statement: “…[T]here’s always the chance that the prosecutor will turn up evidence of perjury or obstruction of justice during the investigation, which would just prove once again that the easiest way to uncover corruption in Washington is to create it yourself by investigating nonexistent crimes.” To which the retort obvious to anyone outside a padded cell is: why the hell would anyone commit “perjury or obstruction of justice” in this case if they weren’t trying to cover up a significant offense?
Doug
So, what? Tierney’s o.k. that Rove was discussing Wilson’s undercover wife in an effort to get back at Wilson for saying that Bush was wrong, and should have known he was wrong, when he told the nation in the State of the Union address that Iraq tried to get yellowcake from Niger for its nonexistent nuclear program?
The presence or absence of a crime is a little bit beside the point as far as whether Rove should keep his job.
Joe Albanese
I think the non-scandal that Tierney talks about may be a tad more serious. I just read the Appeal’s Court Opinion that ruled on the Cooper / Miller matter and I found something rather interesting. Judge Tatel stated in his/her? opinion:
The plot against Wilson. Interesting phrase. The manner in which it is mentioned in the opinion is rather matter of fact – as if it is an established part of the case. I really thinks this gives an insight into what the Special Prosecutor is pursuing. I don’t know what that means to the legal case but I have a feeling that that is going to be dynamite politically.
If the Special Prosecutor can demonstrate that there was an orchestrated effort by a number of high ranking White House officials against Wilson which included the leaking of his wife’s covert status, mix in the State Department Memo that included Ms. Wilson’s CIA status, and I think we have all the makings of a full fledged Watergate sized scandal.
The only question remaining is how high up does it go? Remember that both Cheney and Bush were interviewed by the Special Prosecutor at length and both had their personal lawyers at their side. Did they have knowledge of the plot? Hmmmmmm… the mind does wander.
Andrew J. Lazarus
Jon H makes a good point: once her cover was blown, what possible good would it have done Valerie Plame to pretend to hide from the media? For any purpose that matters (e.g., the safety of her contacts) the game was already totally over.
When you see an argument like this one of Tierney’s, that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever, it colors those arguments that are at least in the ballpark, like the five-year posting rule. It’s the sort of thing that might motivate one to reflect that (a) the Espionage Act doesn’t have that rule and (b) while Plame wasn’t posted overseas during that time, there isn’t any evidence that she didn’t go temporarily overseas (to see a source?), and that looks like all the law requires.
Indictments are coming, and I’m thinking that Fitzgerald is using some of these leaks as Fear Up Harsh for recalcitrant witnesses.
p.lukasiak
while Plame wasn’t posted overseas during that time, there isn’t any evidence that she didn’t go temporarily overseas (to see a source?), and that looks like all the law requires.
This is a key point. We really don’t have any idea when Plame’s last overseas assignment was — we think we know, but consider this…
Plame married a diplomat, and her NOC cover was reportedly changed to a “State Department” cover (possibly, as the wife of a diplomat.) That’s still considered “covert.” If Plame left the country at any point within five years, and her passport gave her diplomatic status, she had fulfilled the minimal requirements of the law.
There is another possibility. If Plames identity as an NOC agent was disclosed to someone else (like Judy Miller) within the five-year period, a “conspiracy” charge related to the “covert agent” act might include those who used Miller’s information even though the “five year” limit had passed.
Bottom line is, as every sane person constantly mentions, is that its extremely unlikely that Fitzgerald would be pursuing this unless he had evidence that a serious crime had been committed — and its even less likely that a court would have have said what it did unless a serious crime had been committed. We know that Rove has lied about his role — we know that Rove confirmed to one journalist, and volunteered to another journalist, that Plame worked for the CIA — and that Rove said Plame was “fair game” right after Plame was outed.
At the very least, I suspect that Rove is going to be listed as an unindicted co-conspirator….and he may have company from the oval office.
carpeicthus
Tierney is the Lynnde England of logic.
Jimmy Jazz
Yup.
CaseyL
The wingers have been “confidently predicting” that this would all go away ever since the news first broke.
Now the wingers are “confidently stating”:
1) That Plame wasn’t covert at all (based on their expertise re covert operations, probably gleaned from Clancy novels and GOP talking points).
2) That, even if she was covert, outing her was necessary in order to:
2a) reveal that Wilson’s Niger trip was a “boondoggle” engineered by Plame.
3) And, thus, protect the US from Wilson’s “lies” about whether SH “recently” tried to buy yellowcake from Niger –
4) Because Bush was telling the truth about WMDs and nukes! Really! And we did have to go to war in Iraq! Really!
To which I say:
1) I think the CIA knows who its covert agents are, and whether laws against disclosing their identities apply. I also think Fitzgerald knows the law, being a Federal Prosecutor and all. I think the CIA and Fitzgerald know more about this than RW bloggers and commentators.
2) Revealing a covert agent’s identity is illegal. Period. If a covert agent has been turned, or was a mole, or otherwise acted against US interests, you don’t leak their identity via a newspaper columnist. You try turning them back, or you leave them in place and feed them disinformation, or you bring criminal charges against them.
2a) Plame recommended Wilson (or suggested him, or whatever) because he had the experience, expertise and contacts. The CIA, or Cheney, or whoever requested someone go to Niger, was perfectly free to say “Sorry, no; let’s send someone else.” Instead, they looked around and realized no one else was as qualified to go. Who should they have sent instead? Someone with no experience, no expertise, and no contacts?
3) What lies? I’ve been all over the blogosphere, I’ve even checked RW sites (ugh!) that trumpeted the “Wilson Lied!” story… and none of them actually say what those lies are. The Butler report “confirming” the yellowcake claim relied on forged documents. The “other” sources allegedly also supporting the yellowcake claim have not, SFAIK, been described, much less verified. That much-quoted “Senate Committee Investigation Report” which accuses Wilson of lying isn’t actually the Senate Committee Investigation Report. It’s an addendum, inserted at the insistence of Bush partisans over the objections of the rest of the Committee: All spin, in other words, no facts.
Wilson lied? About what, exactly? Direct quotes, please, and complete quotes; not some second-hand interpretation of artfully selected excerpts.
4) Get over it. There were no WMDs.
jcricket
This makes at least four former colleagues of Valerie Plame/Wilson’s to come out solidy on her side and against Bush/Rove, etc.
The Republicans have been trying to shove this scandal back into the ground since the day the originally peddled the lies that Joe Wilson subsequently wrote about in his Op-Ed.
I might advise you righties not to get to “far out” on this one. This is just the tip of the iceberg.
kenB
I might advise you righties not to get to “far out” on this one
I think the same applies to both sides. There’s a lot of info that hasn’t been made public yet, and it’s fairly ridiculous that so many people on both sides are declaring victory already.
Jon H
“Plame married a diplomat, and her NOC cover was reportedly changed to a “State Department” cover (possibly, as the wife of a diplomat.)”
She married a retired diplomat.
And I think her cover was in the process of changing at the time of the leak.
The LA Times has a story about varieties of CIA cover, and estimates that there are only ‘dozens’ of NOC agents. Naturally, the CIA ain’t telling.
If there are only dozens, in such a huge organization, the CIA probably knows very well the cover status of Valerie Plame.
Harley
I can’t imagine anyone on ‘the Left’ or among Democrats, or whatever left of center group you care to describe cares a fig, whit, or tiny little bit about anything Tierny has to say. He’s merely followed 72 hours of Rove-gang leaks with a few cute rhetorical devices written in a factless vacuum of little or not import.
You can spin the media, you can spin the party, you can spin Bill Keller, you can even spin yourself.
You can’t spin a Special Prosecutor.
SamAm
Harley, that was beautiful.
I really do wonder what the rightosphere will say when (and is it really anything but when) Fitzgerald hands down his indictments.
And I mean that. I really have no idea what their reaction will be, especially after declaring the scandal “over” so many times. Should be interesting to watch.
I’ll go on record predicting an Enron type defense, “the system worked, the White House wants to get to the bottom of it” with muffled regrets the issue ever went to a special prosecutor. Wilson will continue to be bashed, the the House GOP will propose dumb, Schiavo style legislation aimed at helping the WH and Rove or hurting Democrats, Sandy Berger will be invoked, the left will be criticized for thinking there would be Charge X when only Charge Y is handed down, the issue will be treated as a media critique and otherwise ignored.
Jimmy Jazz
OT, but when you really want to stay on the cutting edge of science and tech news, you just can’t do better than Al Jazeera. Heh.
mac Buckets
Funny, I Googled “Joseph Wilson lied” and the toplisted sites seemed to be referenced. Give it a shot.
Nope, wrong.
“Both the Butler report and the Senate Intelligence Committee report make clear that Bush’s 16 words weren’t based on the fake documents. The British didn’t even see them until after issuing the reports — based on other sources — that Bush quoted in his 16 words. “
searp
Someone should actually read the Butler report and Wilson’s editorial, I have. They CONFIRM each other. Wilson says in his editorial that no yellowcake purchase was made. The Butler report confirms that.
The Butler report goes on to add that they have intelligence that an attempt to purchase yellowcake was made. The report notes that the IAEA disagrees with this assessment, and Wilson is silent on this point.
witless troll
Well Clinton got a blow job, so there! You anti-american scum
Rick
Good chronology here: http://fatsteve.blogspot.com/2005/07/linkfest-plamewilson-spins_112148930159092049.html
Not hard to find, since Instapundit linked to it. And Baby Wilson wept.
John, I’d guess “adoring the codpiece” has something to do with admiring (artificial) manhood. Like booming Kerry’s war record.
Cordially…
Doug
Sort of a side note, but for those who want to argue it was o.k. for Bush to include the yellowcake reference in his State of the Union speech, recall that a similar claim was taken out of Bush’s Cincinnati speech a couple of months earlier.
DougJ
This one will go away because Americans don’t care. In the end, any reasonable person cares more about the REAL LIFE disappearance of FLESH AND BLOOD Natalee Holloway and the legal steps we should be taking to find her (sending the suspects to Gitmo being one option) than about some imaginary complicated yarn about Karl Rove and Wilson that took place TWO YEARS AGO.
Americans’ reaction to Rove/Plame: YAWN……
CaseyL
macBuckets:
Thank you for attempting to answer my request for a link to something that confirms what Wilson “lied” about and what, exactly, his “lies” were.
However, as my post noted:
1) the Butler report sources were forgeries; and
2) the Senate Committee “Report” was actually an addendum, inserted by partisans over the objections of the rest of the Committee, and it contained no verifiable facts.
Your link is to an opinion piece on a RW site that references both the discredited Butler Report and the all-spin Senate Committee addendum.
Try to find something else, ‘kay?
Bob
Ah, “the plot against Wilson.” When the charges come down, I hope someone lines up all the rightwing talking heads, and those ID’ed as left-wing who keep poo-pooing this, and replay all the crap they’ve dished out over the last week or so.
I remember getting off duty back in 1973 at Fort Devens and going back to my barracks and listening to the Rethug liars spin the latest revelation on Watergate and why Nixon was innocent and the Dems were making a mountain out of a molehill. Same now as it ever was.
The game is on.
Phil Smith
Casey, I think you’re confusing the Butler report with the original British white paper.
Go here and start reading on p. 36 (46 of the pdf). Or go here and read the thread. Oh, hell, I’ll save you some time. The highlights:
It’s on page 45 of the report, page 55 of the pdf.
This is on p. 125. In other words, Wilson never saw the forged documents. He had no way of stating that he knew they were forgeries, and in fact, he went to Niger several months before anyone in our intelligence community ever even saw the damn things.
P. 43. That one is key — Wilson met with Mayaki, Mayaki told him that Iraq tried to buy uranium. Wilson said that in his debrief. Wilson said that in his testimony to the SSCI. Wilson didn’t say that in his public writings and statements. Does that make Wilson a “liar”? YMMV.
Factcheck has it pretty much right.
None of this, of course, has any bearing on outing Plame. I wanna know one thing, which still isn’t adequately answered in my view: Who told Rove? He didn’t have “need-to-know” on the ID of undercover CIA assets. If he found out where she worked through open-source, then I’m sorry, but nothing comes of it. If he was in possession of classified info on this matter, then somebody broke security protocols, and I want Rove’s head and the source’s head as well.
Aaron
“Why else is Judith in jail?”
I thought she was in there on the PRINCIPLE.
Are you saying that she wouldn’t do this for a republican leaker?
Andrew J. Lazarus
I think Phil Smith is doing a pretty judicious job here. I do have some additions.
Snitrocket
My favorite part of all of this is that the family values contingent is so busy defending destroying someone’s wife as just business as usual. Never even mind the NATSEC angle for a second: when did this sort of behaviour become part of The Culture Of Life?
Floyd McWilliams
Would someone please explain to me how those nasty Republicans did any injury whatsoever to Valerie Plame?
We know that she’s not endangered by this identification, unless the normal reaction to one’s secret identity being exposed is to pose for a pictorial in Vanity Fair.
And we know that being identified as a CIA agent cannot possibly be insulting or derogatory, given that the Democratic Party has made the sanctity of such agents their top concern for, oh, a good three or four weeks now.
Phil Smith
Thanks, Andrew. On your points:
1. Even less plausible is the notion that a businessman whose name needed to be redacted from the SSCI report would be pressuring the Nigerien PM to meet with an Iraqi about chickpeas, onions, or livestock. Less plausible than that is the notion that Wilson wouldn’t know that, given his resume.
2. According to the SSCI, the Italian documents didn’t come into our hands until October. Cheney didn’t have them in February, QED.
3. Judy Miller’s role in all this makes no sense to me whatever.
Again, though, the only question that matters (to me) at this point is “Who told Rove?”
mac Buckets
Look, Casey, if you’re not interested in learning the facts, and just want to assert out of thin air despite evidence to the contrary, go ahead. Just don’t pretend you are being honest.
But just to make you happy, let’s just all agree for your edification: All the official government reports that agree with me are spin, lies, and red herrings, and your unsupported assertions are the God’s-honest truth.
Feel better?
CaseyL
macBuckets, Phil Smith was able to come up with source quotes, complete with names, dates, and attributions, in answer to my question. Moreover, he was polite about it. You might want to try that some time.
Phil – thanks much for the info. I went to Wilson’s original Op-Ed, the one that caused the uproar. Here are some pertinent excerpts:
“The next morning, I met with Ambassador Owens-Kirkpatrick at the embassy. For reasons that are understandable, the embassy staff has always kept a close eye on Niger’s uranium business. I was not surprised, then, when the ambassador told me that she knew about the allegations of uranium sales to Iraq
Phil Smith
As far as I can tell, Casey, the documents that precipitated Wilson’s trip are not the same as the later, Italian-sourced documents to which Wilson refers. In order to answer that question, I’d have to have access to an unredacted copy of the SSCI report, and I might not know even then. However, what is relatively certain is that US intelligence did not have a copy of the forged Italian document prior to October.
The problem with Wilson’s editorial isn’t what he says, it’s what he leaves out. He is correct in asserting that he was able to establish that no uranium purchase was likely — not at all likely, in fact — to have occurred. But that is most emphatically not what the administration claimed. The administration stated that Saddam attempted to buy uranium in Africa. There are, upon reading the SSCI report, several quite good reasons to believe that Saddam tried in Niger and elsewhere. And Saddam’s attempt to buy uranium in Niger is what Wilson knew quite well did, in fact, happen. Wilson appears to be the sole source for the knowledge that Iraq approached the PM of Niger (Mayaki) in 1999.
Is Wilson a liar? The SSCI was unwilling to put it bluntly, but they chided him for his inconsistency. The following are from pp. 44-45 (the full report, not the addenda):
Translation: somebody lied to us. . .
As we have seen, that is unsupported, and Wilson knew better. Perhaps his memory failed him. To wit:
Which is what Wilson failed to mention.
Translation: we call bullshit.
There weren’t any documents for him to see or even discuss.
The committee goes on to say that
Okay, now I call bullshit. He “thought he had seen the names himself”? He knew damn good and well he hadn’t seen them. Unless, of course, the documents were leaked to him. I refuse to speculate that that occurred. My take is that he overplayed his hand from the start, and he’s been covering his ass with bluff and bluster ever since. None of which, I reiterate, excuses outing his wife and burning a CIA front company.
All emphases in the above blockquotes are mine.
Ben Regenspan
As far as I know, Tierney started out in trouble with the left.
Andrew J. Lazarus
Would someone please explain to me how those nasty Republicans did any injury whatsoever to Valerie Plame?
Let’s see. People in bad countries known to have associated with her might be in dungeons right now. I suppose that isn’t an injury to Plame but it sure does impact the security of the United States. Of course, she might be personally endangered (either legally as a spy or illegally through violence) if she ever returned to places she used to live and enjoy. Oh, and other American agents who work for her front company, they’re all outed too. Is that enough for you?
Now let me ask you a question, dimwit. Even supposing Plame was our very best most secret spy in the whole world, once her name had been published, what the hell difference did it make if she appeared in Vanity Fair or even stark naked in Playboy? For her and her contacts it was Game Over.
OK, type in GOP talking points, but can you skip the ones that make absolutely no sense!?
CaseyL
Phil, thank you again for arguing civilly and with real cites.
Based on the references you’ve provided, I concede that Wilson either misstated or fibbed about how he knew the signatures on the forged documents were forged.