The leak was the crime. It was not a leak about a crime.
Writing with First Amendment lawyer Bruce Sanford in the Washington Post recently, former Assistant Deputy Attorney General Victoria Toensing explained that she helped draft the law in question, the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act.
Says Toensing, "The Novak column and the surrounding facts do not support evidence of criminal conduct."
For Plame's outing to have been illegal, the one-time deputy AG says, "her status as undercover must be classified." Also, Plame "must have been assigned to duty outside the United States currently or in the past five years."
Since in neither case does Plame qualify, Toensing says: "There is a serious legal question as to whether she qualifies as 'covert.'"
The law also requires that the celebrated non-spy's outing take place by someone who knew the government had taken "affirmative measures to conceal [the agent's] relationship" to the U.S., a prospect Toensing says is unlikely.
The whole thing was a liberal media witchhunt which Bush caved in to.