Posted on 07/17/2005 8:37:17 PM PDT by CHARLITE
Why is special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald pursuing so zealously the outing of CIA officer Valerie Plame, since it is all but impossible to prove that the leaker or leakers committed a crime?
So why is Fitzgerald acting like Inspector Javert in "Les Miserables"? The answer may lie in a sentence Walter Pincus of The Washington Post wrote on June 12, 2003.
President Bush mentioned the British findings in his State of the Union address in January 2003. In his leaks to Pincus, and earlier to New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof, Wilson claimed Bush knew this was false. The key sentence in Pincus' story is this:
"Among the envoy's conclusions was that the documents may have been forged because 'the dates were wrong and the names were wrong,' the former U.S. government official said."
Wilson outed himself in an op-ed in the New York Times on July 6, 2003, "What I Didn't Find in Africa," which described his CIA-sponsored trip to Niger in 2002. On July 14, 2003, columnist Robert Novak wondered why Wilson, who had no intelligence background and strong anti-Bush views, had been selected for the Niger mission. "Two senior administration officials told me Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the Italian report," he wrote. That set off the Plame name game.
Maybe Fitzgerald is investigating a different crime.
What if someone in the CIA was leaking classified information to influence the 2004 election? Uncovering a crime like that would be worthy of Inspector Javert's doggedness.
I suspect the biggest shoe in this case has yet to drop, and liberal journalists won't be happy when it does.
(Excerpt) Read more at post-gazette.com ...
Char :)
From your lips to God's ear.
Good post.
The tip of the iceburg must hardly be showing as of yet. Hopefully heads will roll. And as the the L/MSM try to keep it low, we shall get the real stories and expose them.
[ snip ]
At Plame's suggestion, the CIA sent her husband, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, to Niger in February 2002 to investigate a report by a foreign intelligence service that Saddam Hussein was trying to buy uranium. In his report to the CIA (as documented by the Senate Intelligence Committee), Wilson said Iraqis had approached Nigerien officials. In 1999, an Iraqi delegation met with the prime minister in the interest of "expanding commercial relations" -- which the prime minister interpreted to mean uranium sales -- but no deal had been made.
In September 2002, the British government published a white paper in which it made public British intelligence's belief that Saddam had tried to buy uranium in Africa. A month later, the CIA received from an Italian source documents purporting to show that Niger and Iraq had done a deal. These turned out to be forgeries....
.
Wilson's official role ended when he returned from Niger in March. The CIA didn't get the Italian forgeries until October. Wilson had no access to them. He either was making up what he told Kristof and Pincus, or he had received an unauthorized leak of classified information.
.
What if someone in the CIA was leaking classified information to influence the 2004 election? Uncovering a crime like that would be worthy of (prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's) doggedness.
.
Jack Kelly is national security writer for the Post-Gazette and The Blade of Toledo, Ohio (jkelly@post-gazette.com, 412-263-1476).
Amen to your sentiment. I'm so sick of the MSM!
Be halarious if Fitz did uncover this (suggested in article) and wet on to publicly laud the NYT etc. for making his success possibile?
Thank you.
The forged documents were commissioned by the French and produced by the Niger embassy, and then passed to the US. When Bush mentioned African uranium, they were exposed in an attempt to embarrass Bush and his case for war.
At the same time, Wilson made his trip to Niger in which he did no investigating at all, and returned to accuse Bush of lying about the same subject.
The catch is that France knew of Niger's uranium smuggling, because they are involved, and the same French intel which commissioned the forged documents had real ones in their possession which they declined to mention.
Wilson, despite trying hard not to investigate anything, nevertheless found out that Bush was telling the truth, that Iraq had come calling, looking for uranium. But he didn't let that stop him from publicly accusing Bush of lying.
He also mentions having seen the supposedly forged documents, which he ought not to have seen, since they were classified. How did he have access to them? Did his wife bring her work home with her from the office?
Wilson and Plame cooperated to cover up the big story in Niger. France and Niger were deeply involved in uranium smuggling. CIA's WMD experts faked a mission in order to help cover up French smuggling. French intel forged documents in order to help cover it up, and passed them to CIA, meaning, Plame.
Thats the real story here. Is Plame a French agent? Is Wilson? Since Wilson is swimming in Saudi money, is he a Saudi agent? Is Plame? Or is she a victim of Wilson's gamesmanship? Did he use her for his ends? Or are they in on this together?
You go girl! you do great work.
YIKES!! I had forgotten about those CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS that Joey Boy make mention of!! How DID he have access to them, indeed????
Double YIKES!! Thanks for reminding everyone of the Saudi money. Isn't Wilson tied somehow to Alamoudi who is in prison? Something about sharing Rock Creek International offices and other things?
WHere did the Wilsons get all their money? New home expensive car, Rolex watch etc. etc. (and he has 2 Xwives who no doubt took their share)
Wow! Are you saying Fitzgerald might actually uncover dirty tricks to influence the 2004 election, and might actually hold some Dems accountable? That would make him kind of a vastrightwing fanatic, and hell kind of frozen over, wouldn't it?
BINGO.......and the 3rd one from the original conspiracy is...........Judith Miller. She's sitting in a jail cell because she has no other choice. She can't very well say, "Well, my inside contact of many years at the CIA, Valerie Plame, let me in on a deal she and her husband had cooked up to blow President Bush out of the water..."
...and, marron, you've put your finger on the crux of the matter. This is what Fitzgerald is delving into - the Plame-Wilson/Niger-France WMD smuggling cover-up connections. That's the "big picture." Clearly, it has nothing whatsoever to do with Rove or even Novak, but it does have to do with Miller & Cooper, although in this 3 ring circus, ole Cooper is "odd man out."
Thanks for your GREAT comments and very educated analysis!
Char :)
I think that someone has been reading FreeRepublic.
France runs the yellowcake operations in Niger.
Could minor Ambassador Joe Wilson himself have been the source in blowing his own Wife's "cover" (even if she had not been a covert CIA agent at the time of the alleged "leaks")?
It is distinctly possible, (though it may be unlikely that Joe Wilson himself directly was NY Times Judith Miller's source), since Joe Wilson himself evidently routinely bragged openly to strangers about her CIA employment, prior to such "cover" being "blown" in the press.
Here's an example of Joe's apparently routine and open bragging about Valerie being a "CIA agent," which became known directly to me over a year ago:
He certainly bragged about it per a famous and highly reliable source's (named below) account of his own face-to-face encounter with Amb. Joe Wilson prior to Valerie Plame's "outing" as a CIA agent/employee.
Based upon a personal conversation (we were in a small group eating; it was NOT an "off the record") I had with eminent historian Victor Davis Hanson (we were at a luncheon table together during a trip to Europe), it appeared entirely possible that Joe Wilson himself was the (or one source, if not the original one) possible source in revealing his own wife's status as a CIA agent or employee.
Victor Davis Hanson (Wilson presumably knew Victor Davis Hanson wrote regularly for NRO (National Review Online), had done OpEds for the Wall street Journal, and other publications, and had his own Website with a widespread following) said he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were both in the same "Green Room" before a televised debate-discussion on Iraq, etc. and Joe first warned the TV make-up person not to get powder on his $14,000 Rolex watch, then he bragged to Victor about several things (possessions and trips to Aspen, etc.), like his expensive car (I think it was a Mercedes), and then bragged about his beautiful ("hot") wife who, Joe Wilson said (braggingly) was a CIA operative.
I asked Victor Davis Hanson Why he didn't write up this account.(?) He replied that Joe Wilson would probably simply deny it, since only he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were in the Green Room together before the broadcast.
However, it is now easy to surmise that Joe Wilson is a crass, materialistic, self-promoting, vain, egotistical, bragaddocio-opportunist, so this account is perfectly consistent with Valerie Plame's TWO photo shoots in Vanity Fair.
Could minor Ambassador Joe Wilson himself have been the source in blowing his own Wife's "cover" (even if she had not been a covert CIA agent at the time of the alleged "leaks")?
It is distinctly possible, (though it may be unlikely that Joe Wilson himself directly was NY Times Judith Miller's source), since Joe Wilson himself evidently routinely bragged openly to strangers about her CIA employment, prior to such "cover" being "blown" in the press.
Here's an example of Joe's apparently routine and open bragging about Valerie being a "CIA agent," which became known directly to me over a year ago:
He certainly bragged about it per a famous and highly reliable source's (named below) account of his own face-to-face encounter with Amb. Joe Wilson prior to Valerie Plame's "outing" as a CIA agent/employee.
Based upon a personal conversation (we were in a small group eating; it was NOT an "off the record") I had with eminent historian Victor Davis Hanson (we were at a luncheon table together during a trip to Europe), it appeared entirely possible that Joe Wilson himself was the (or one source, if not the original one) possible source in revealing his own wife's status as a CIA agent or employee.
Victor Davis Hanson (Wilson presumably knew Victor Davis Hanson wrote regularly for NRO (National Review Online), had done OpEds for the Wall street Journal, and other publications, and had his own Website with a widespread following) said he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were both in the same "Green Room" before a televised debate-discussion on Iraq, etc. and Joe first warned the TV make-up person not to get powder on his $14,000 Rolex watch, then he bragged to Victor about several things (possessions and trips to Aspen, etc.), like his expensive car (I think it was a Mercedes), and then bragged about his beautiful ("hot") wife who, Joe Wilson said (braggingly) was a CIA operative.
I asked Victor Davis Hanson Why he didn't write up this account.(?) He replied that Joe Wilson would probably simply deny it, since only he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were in the Green Room together before the broadcast.
However, it is now easy to surmise that Joe Wilson is a crass, materialistic, self-promoting, vain, egotistical, bragaddocio-opportunist, so this account is perfectly consistent with Valerie Plame's TWO photo shoots in Vanity Fair.
If the UN can be bought...why not Americans?
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