Outing Plame may not have been illegal. What is the prosecutor hunting? (the bigger picture!)

POST GAZETTE.COM ^ | JULY 17, 2005 | JACK KELLY

[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.

[Dog]

Thanks..

[mware]

Wow, now this is getting very interesting.

[mware]

JIm you going to call in???

[Dog]

No....why?

[mware]

Just thought you were going to bring up that part about Fitzgerald pulling those phone records.

[crazycat]

Exactly, it just doesn't make sense.

She must be protecting a Dem source.

[Lancey Howard]

I am liking more and more the theory that Plame is Miller's "source".
Everything fits.

1. They both had an interest in weapons of mass destruction (Miller wrote about them, Plame "worked on WMD" for the CIA) and it is very possible that their paths crossed. Maybe they crossed because Miller is a relentless, veteran reporter, or maybe they crossed somewhere along the Washington DC cocktail circuit.

2. It explains why Miller doesn't trust her source's waiver of confidentiality - - as an employee of the CIA, Plame could indeed have been "coerced", and it is likely that Miller figured this out. (By the way, I have no doubt that Fitzgerald KNOWS who Miller's source is - - he just needs her to testify to it.) In the same vein, it explains why the "source" has not stepped forward even after waiving confidentiality - - Plame's fellow travelers at the CIA, likely including those immediate superiors who signed off on the Wilson-to-Niger scheme - - have somehow let the NY Times know that they do not want Miller to name Plame.

3. If Miller tesifies that her source was Plame herself then that would completely exonerate Rove, and that is something that the New York Times and their Democrat Party cannot allow.

Everything fits.

[PilloryHillary]

The author sounds a lot like a Freeper! Bump & bookmark.

[Bob]

BINGO.......and the 3rd one from the original conspiracy is...........Judith Miller.

I have a strong suspicion that there's a fourth person involved - Matt Cooper's wife, aka dem operative Mandy Grunwald.

[HoneyBoo]

Apparently, if wacky MSNBC Larry O'Donnell is to be at least partially believed, there are 8 pages of "redacted" or classified material from the formal record. Has anyone been thinking about that?

[liberallarry]

If you look at my post #118 you'll see that I admit that I was wrong. It turns out there were two SISMI (Italian) documents - the first referring to 1999 contacts between Iraq and Niger, the second referring to the forgeries.

The origin of the forged documents is still a mystery although the French are currently designated as the most likely authors. What piece of good Intel about Iraq and Niger are you talking about? As far as I know there is none.

[liberallarry]

It turns out I was wrong (see my post #118) - there were two SISMI documents. Wilson was sent to investigate the first which concerned Iraqi contacts with Niger in 1999. The second referred to the forgeries and didn't surface until 10 months after Wilson's mission.

Not sure about the meaning of your post.

[Just mythoughts]

The meaning of my post is simply this. The CIA is not an entity unto its own, Congress has oversight responsibility and does get "intel" briefings anytime they so choose.

Somebody got particularly concerned after we the US responded to the 9/11/01 attack, and by 02/02/02 they had Joe Wilson performing what appears to be a COVER-UP for old Saddam and his attempts to continue to obtain 'yellowcake'.

Now there were specific members of Congress who made names for themselves trying to protect Saddam, the French/German/Russian oil deals and most of all the UN and their worldly oil for rotten food program.

The CIA appears to have been the TOOL used by liberals determined to SAVE Saddam and his worldly oil buddies. Might call this "OIL" consortium the real Haliburton the liberals keep itching and planting lies of deception about.

[liberallarry]

Somebody got particularly concerned after we the US responded to the 9/11/01 attack, and by 02/02/02 they had Joe Wilson performing what appears to be a COVER-UP for old Saddam and his attempts to continue to obtain 'yellowcake'.

I'm sorry but your analysis is all wrong. The Senate Intelligence committee makes clear that Vice-President Cheney's office requested a clarification of an Italian report of an Iraqi attempt to purchase yellowcake from Niger which caused the CIA to send Wilson to that country.

[Just mythoughts]

Yeah boy those sitting senators on that "intel" committee, didn't one of those upstanding liberal senators conjure up a MEMO to take down a president. (Rockefeller)

Didn't another worldly sitting senator, more intelligent than the rest, claim that we did not need to remove old Saddam. That one who loves the French and UN more than anything or anyone else in the whole of this planet.

There is another sitting senator who in a previous life was co-president and established "wall-builders" within the DOJ, to prevent homeland security.

Hasn't that old windbag Kennedy been claiming that President Bush made plans in Crawford, Tx. eons ago to remove old Saddam and accuses the President of lying about WMD's, and connected invisible pipelines for Haliburton.

The LIST is very, very, very, long of liberal anti-American first senators, whose sole purpose in this world is to "EQUALIZE ALL NATIONS". I have yet to hear any of these that seek the complete distortion of the Constitution have one negative word about the distortions of Joe Wilson and his attempt to cover up Saddam's trail.

WHY???? They all know darn well what the "INTEL" says.

[liberallarry]

I think ultimately Bush is right in his approach to the Muslim and Arab threats. But so what? That doesn't give him the right to overturn our government or deny citizens their right to challange his claims and beliefs.

[liberallarry]

WHY???? They all know darn well what the "INTEL" says.

Yes they do...and it doesn't say what Bush claims it says.

[Just mythoughts]

When the liberals with credibility can challenge claims made by this president then maybe I will take them as serious against the terrorist killers of this world.

Accusing with words of insanity and distortions, flooded with deception is not giving this bunch of naked birds any credibility.

[liberallarry]

When the liberals with credibility can challenge claims made by this president then maybe I will take them as serious against the terrorist killers of this world.

You're making a mistake here. The dumbest liberals are incapable of rational criticism. You're incapable of recognizing or hearing the smart liberals. AND Bush's critics are hardly limited to liberals. Remember gcochran? He used to post to Free Republic before he was banned for Bush hatred. He was as smart as they come, as conservative as they come, as patriotic as they come. There are plenty like him.

[Just mythoughts]

I am sorry I do not know of the Freeper you mentioned. The "conservative" division you speak of I think comes from a "religious" division rather than "political" division.

Old Saddam had plenty of opportunity from the reprieve given in the First Gulf War to become civilized and he refused. Appears that some of the supposed civilized nations of this world had no problem with old Saddam butchering his own and sending money, "OIL" money to the PLO families for payment of homicide bomber offspring. That action alone makes Saddam a terrorist regardless of who helped him hid his WMD's.