Posted on 07/17/2005 12:41:48 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Accusations obscuring facts in Washington leak
Scandal circles around Karl Rove, Joseph Wilson, and who said what
WASHINGTON - The escalating calls by Democrats and some liberal commentators for Karl Rove to resign, and the countercharges by conservatives that Rove is the victim of a political witch hunt, have obscured many of the facts in a tangled Washington story.
President Bush unwittingly touched off the controversy during his State of the Union address in January 2003, when, in making the case for war with Iraq, he said, "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
Those 16 words became the target of a New York Times op-ed piece in July of that year, after the United States had invaded Iraq, written by an obscure career foreign service officer named Joseph Wilson who had worked for both Bush's father and President Clinton.
Claims of uranium
Wilson described going to Niger to check into the claim that Saddam was seeking yellowcake uranium from Niger or other African countries in early 2002 — almost a year before Bush's speech.
Wilson described himself as a whistle-blower whose findings contradicted the notion Saddam was seeking uranium in Africa. He said Bush's claim "was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat."
But Wilson's version of events turned out to be off the mark.
His article implied he had been dispatched to Africa at least indirectly by Vice President Dick Cheney.
What actually happened is that Wilson had gotten the job to go to Africa after his wife, Valerie Plame, a CIA official, suggested he be sent.
Nor did any of Wilson's findings directly influence the administration's position on whether Saddam was trying to buy African uranium, according to a detailed Senate report.
In a line buried deep in his New York Times article, Wilson conceded, "I did not file a written report" on the African trip. Instead he theorizes that his findings would have bubbled up from oral briefings he gave to intelligence officials.
That was a groundless assumption, Senate investigators said.
Still, Wilson's charges became a rallying cry for anti-war groups and for Democrats opposed to Bush. Wilson later went to work for Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry.
Wilson seemed to be at least partially vindicated when top Bush officials, including Condoleezza Rice, said in the summer of 2003 that Bush's staff should have edited the words from his speech because the CIA had not been able to independently confirm British findings.
But since then, Wilson's original assertions have been severely tested.
Finding 'well-founded'
One year after Wilson's article, in July 2004, the Butler commission in Britain found that Bush's original claim that Saddam was seeking African uranium was "well-founded."
That report said, "It is accepted by all parties that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999. The British government had intelligence from several different sources indicating that this visit was for the purpose of acquiring uranium."
Wilson's credibility took a more serious blow when a bipartisan Senate panel released its massive report that same month. The Senate Intelligence Committee reviewed the Iraq-Niger uranium matter exhaustively, and found many of Wilson's assumptions and claims in error.
The Senate report concluded that Cheney had never been briefed on Wilson's findings because the CIA considered them of marginal value. The official CIA assessment of Wilson's trip was that it "did not provide substantial new information."
Wilson had made one finding that intrigued the CIA but it was not in his New York Times article. Wilson described a meeting with a Nigerian official during his visit who told him that an Iraqi delegation had visited Nigeria and Niger in the late 1990s. In Nigeria at least, the Iraqis had made inquiries about buying uranium, Wilson was told.
The Senate Intelligence Committee stated, "The report (based on Wilson's information) did not change any analyst's assessment of the Iraq-Niger uranium deal." For most CIA analysts, in fact, Wilson's findings "lent more credibility" to the idea that Saddam sought African uranium, according to intelligence officials who testified to Senate investigators.
A dramatic turn
Whatever the merits of Wilson's original article, the dispute between him and the Bush White House took a radically different direction when syndicated columnist Robert Novak identified Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, as a CIA employee just days after Wilson's New York Times piece.
In an online story three days later, Time Magazine reporter Matthew Cooper also suggested that the Bush administration had declared war on Wilson and noted that government officials had said that his wife was a CIA official.
The reports drew criticism from Wilson, who fingered Rove as the leaker and said he wanted to see "whether or not we can get Karl Rove frog-marched out of the White House in handcuffs."
The CIA also raised objections, noting that federal law prohibited officials from intentionally disclosing the identity of a covert agent.
The CIA referred its complaint to the Justice Department, where the FBI commenced an investigation that included interviewing more than three dozen administration officials, including Bush's top political adviser, Rove.
At the time, White House spokesman Scott McClellan, stressing that he had spoken with Rove, denied that the political adviser or other top administration officials were involved in the leak.
In a CNN interview last year during the GOP convention, Rove said, "I don't know her name and didn't leak her name."
Under pressure from Democrats to appoint an independent investigator, the Justice Department in December of 2003 named Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney for Northern Illinois, as a special counsel.
Fitzgerald mounted an aggressive probe that included issuing subpoenas to journalists to testify about the possible leak.
The White House, meanwhile, directed officials to sign waivers releasing journalists from any confidentiality pledge they had made in conversations concerning Plame.
Novak, along with Tim Russert, the host of NBC's Meet the Press, and Walter Pincus and Glenn Kessler of the Washington Post, worked out agreements to provide limited testimony.
However, Cooper and New York Times reporter Judith Miller, who had investigated the Plame issue but had never written a story, balked at revealing their sources and appealed their case to the Supreme Court, which in June refused to quash the subpoenas.
Cooper, saying his source had given him a last-minute reprieve from his confidentiality pledge, agreed to testify before a grand jury last week. Rove's lawyer, Robert Luskin, has disputed Cooper's account, saying he merely reiterated the confidentiality waiver that Rove signed at the outset of the investigation. Miller refused to cooperate and was ordered to jail by U.S. District Court judge Thomas Hogan.
Meanwhile, the source for Cooper's story was revealed by rival Newsweek magazine, which obtained a copy of an e-mail sent by Cooper to his bureau chief that said he had spoken to Rove about Plame "on double super secret background."
The e-mail regarding the conversation, which occurred before Novak had published his column, did not indicate that Rove used Plame's name or suggest she was a covert agent.
Not under investigation
On Friday, published reports indicated that Rove was one of two senior administration officials who had spoken with Novak about Plame.
The reports said that Rove had told investigators that he did not supply Novak with Plame's name, but he confirmed that he had heard that she worked for the CIA.
Rove's lawyer has repeatedly said that the political strategist has not broken the law and noted that Rove has not been told that he is the "target" of an investigation. Prosecutors generally warn individuals if they may be facing prosecution.
Analysts have said that it will be difficult for Fitzgerald to prosecute any official for violating the 1982 law regarding disclosure of covert agents.
The law requires the prosecutor to prove that the disclosure was made by someone with access to classified information and who intentionally revealed the name of a covert agent who has served outside the United States in the last five years.
However, even if Rove is not prosecuted under that law, it is not clear whether Fitzgerald is looking at other charges such as perjury or obstruction of justice. Questions remain as to who the other senior administration official was who spoke to Novak or who Miller's sources were.
michael.hedges@chron.com
bennett.roth@chron.com
Back later. I need to start breakfast.
Paging Norm Coleman...Paging Norm Coleman...
Wilson (evidently) retired from 22 years with State in 1998, around the time they bought the house.
Unless they had family money, it's unclear how a married federal-employee couple could afford an $800K/$900K house.
And/or explain the expensive cars in the driveway.
And I can honestly say that I've never seen another white man sweat as much as he does except, of course, for Al Gore. Disgusting!
This seems like a good summary of the facts.
That sweating was something new. When this first broke, I don't recall him being so sweaty.
Just about admits that there is no there there. The chronic just can't admit that the msm is being caught in another manaufactured story.
The evil genius, Karl Rove, strikes again with another ROVIAN plot to get the msm.
But Joe Wilson gets a pass. No questions about the expensive life-style, no looking into his consulting firm and clients, no questions about the propriety of the husband of a WMD analyst dealing with a uranium-producing country, no questions about why HE was sent on the trip instead of someone competent...NOTHING!
| even if Rove is not prosecuted under that law, it is not clear whether Fitzgerald is looking at other charges such as perjury or obstruction of justice. Questions remain as to who the other senior administration official was who spoke to Novak or who Miller's sources were.
What if it's not? What if other classified material was leaked? For example:
And then there's this:
Not exactly. According the puff piece in Vanity Fair, Wilson started working for the Kerry campaign in May 2003. In other words, at the time he wrote his damning op-ed in the New York Times and appeared on Meet the Press, Wilson was a Kerry campaign operative. Do you remember the media telling us that? Did they know? Did Timmy Russert know that he was passing off a Kerry campaign operative as some sort of career civil servant "whistleblower"? This is more and more starting to sound like Rathergate, with the media conspiring with Democrats to foist fake material (later shown to be all lies) on an unsuspecting public for the purpose of throwing spears at Bush. |
Collected a huge bounty from the DNC.
Tom
I'd like to know which incompetent, partisan spook at the CIA raised these objections considering Plane had not been a covert agent for six years. This stinks to high heaven.
Excellent analysis. Excellent!
Maybe he was waiting for all those reporters to do the story for him and when it didn't work out that way, he came forward and praised himself.
It would be interesting to hear what his former wives have to say about him.
Unless they had family money, it's unclear how a married federal-employee couple could afford an $800K/$900K house.
It is possible for a number of reasons. First, they were a two earner family. Assuming that Wilson was a member of the Senior Foreign Service prior to his retirement, he would have been earning around $125K a year. If his wife was either an SES or GS15 or 16 she would be earning over 100K as well. This works out to $225K a year minimum.
Second, one or both of them could have owned property in the DC area. It is common for foreign service employees to own houses in the area and then rent them out while overseas. The USG provides housing abroad or an allowance to rent/own it. There are also other overseas allowances to compensate employess for increased living costs, etc. You can save money from reduced living costs and make money from your rental property. Property appreciation in the DC area has been significant, even in the 90s. The Wilsons could have sold appreciated property to buy up. They also may have invested in stocks, bonds, etc., which increased dramatically during the 90s.
Third, when you retire from the Foreign Service you receive a lump sum payment for unused leave, which could amount to $80 to $90K.
Finally, they could have inherited or borrowed money from a relative.
What I find curious is why Wilson retired with only 22 years service, especially at a time when he was in his peak earning years and his career should have been in its ascendency. I suspect that his career was at a dead end either due to the role he played in the April Glaspie affair or his subsequent performance on the NSC. There must have been a cloud over his head, which "forced" him to get out. With his collossal ego, I doubt if finishing his career out as a bureaucrat stuffed into some cubicle was not acceptable.
I estimate that Wilson's initial retirement salary was around $50K using a high three of $125K times 44% (22 years times 2%) minus 5K for a survivor benefit for his wife. Each year this is increased by the CPI-W, the same as SS. Odd.
Sounds like the typical "we got this moron on the payroll what the hell we gonna do with him". I know, lets send him to Gabon or Sao Tome, wherever the heck those places are..........
Good catch. I also read that somewhere else. Wilson was already in discussions with the Kerry campaign as an unpaid advisor. It would be instructive to look at Kerry's Iraq statements prior to Wilson's July 6th Op-Ed. I bet you would find similar verbiage.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
There is an amazing hidden assumption in all this media coverage which no one seems to question. The assumption is that Fitzgerald is investigating who "outed" Valerie Plame.