Me too.
Posted on 10/16/2005 2:50:27 PM PDT by Laverne
'Hidden Scandal' in Miller Story, Charges Former CBS Newsman
By E&P Staff
Published: October 16, 2005 4:00 PM ET
NEW YORK Since the posting of The New York Times lengthy article on Judith Miller's involvement in the Plame scandal Saturday night, much Web buzzing has ensued concerning the revelation that she had some sort of special classified status while embedded with troops in Iraq at one point.
The issue came to the fore because Miller, in recounting her grand jury testimony, wrote about how her former classified status figured in her discussions with I. Lewis Libby. She was pressed by the prosecutor on this matter.
E&P columnist William E. Jackson, Jr., had first raised this issue last year. Today, former CBS national security correspondent Bill Lynch posted his views in a long letter about it at the Romenesko site at poynter.org. Here is the letter:
*
There is one enormous journalism scandal hidden in Judith Miller's Oct. 16th first person article about the (perhaps lesser) CIA leak scandal. And that is Ms. Miller's revelation that she was granted a DoD security clearance while embedded with the WMD search team in Iraq in 2003.
This is as close as one can get to government licensing of journalists and the New York Times (if it knew) should never have allowed her to become so compromised. It is all the more puzzling that a reporter who as a matter of principle would sacrifice 85 days of her freedom to protect a source would so willingly agree to be officially muzzled and thereby deny potentially valuable information to the readers whose right to be informed she claims to value so highly.
One must assume that Ms. Miller was required to sign a standard and legally binding agreement that she would never divulge classified information to which she became privy, without risk of criminal prosecution. And she apparently plans to adhere to the letter of that self-censorship deal; witness her dilemma at being unable to share classified information with her editors.
In an era where the Bush Administration seeks to conceal mountains of government activity under various levels of security classification, why would any self-respecting news organization or individual journalist agree to become part of such a system? Readers would be right to question whether a reporter is operating under a security clearance and, by definition, withholding critical information. Does a newspaper not have the obligation to disclose to its readers when a reporter is not only embedded with a military unit but also officially proscribed in what she may report without running afoul of espionage laws? Was that ever done in Ms. Miller's articles from Iraq?
It is not hard to imagine a defense lawyer being granted a security clearance to defend, say, an "enemy combatant." When the lawyer gets access to classified information in the case, he discovers it is full of false or exculpatory information. But, because he's signed the secrecy oath, there's not a damn thing he can do except whine on the courthouse steps that his client is innocent but he can't say why. A journalist should never be put in an equivalent position, but this is precisely what Ms. Miller has opened herself to.
There are other questions. Does she still have a clearance? Did she have it when talking to Scooter Libby? Is that why she never wrote the Wilson/Plame story?
I am a former White House and national security correspondent and have had plenty of access to classified information. When I divulged it, it was always with a common sense appraisal of the balance between any potential harm done and the public's right to know. If I had doubts, I would run it by officers whose judgement I trusted. In my experience, defense and intelligence officials routinely share secrets with reporters in the full expectation they will be reported. But if any official had ever offered me a security clearance, my instincts would have sent me running. I am gravely disappointed Ms. Miller did not do likewise.
It strikes me that Ms. Miller's situation is the flip side of the NYT's Jayson Blair coin. He and the Times were rightly disgraced for fabricating. In my opinion, Miller also violated her duty to report the truth by accepting a binding obligation to withhold key facts the government deems secret, even when that information might contradict the reportable "facts."
If Ms. Miller agreed to operate under a security clearance without the knowledge or approval of Times managers, she should be disciplined or even dismissed. If she had their approval, all involved should be ashamed.
This I can't remember thing means what? That she is protecting Rove or Scooter Libby? Yeah right.
She's probably protecting Joe Wilson. I wouldn't be surprised if she found out from Wilson about Valerie and then called the WH to verify the story.
That a CBS reporter, former or otherwise, would accuse anyone else of a "scandal" is humorous in itself.
This is a mess. It's obvious to me if any Bush Administration official were to blame, it would be out and this would be long over.
This whole "I spent 85 days in jail" to protect "I don't recall" is not believable. I hope she gets indicted on obstruction.
Very well something along these lines took place - The fact seems more and more clear that she had Valerie Plame's (flames) named written down prior to speaking with Liddy - (and she wrote the name down to ask Libby about it).
Furthermore Valerie Plame was not a "covert" agent by any means - It was well known around Washington that she worked for the CIA (J. Miller was probably well aware of this fact on her own).
It took her 85 days to remember the Hillary answer.
what's all this about? are you on top of it?
"I am a former White House and national security correspondent and have had plenty of access to classified information. When I divulged it, it was always with a common sense appraisal of the balance between any potential harm done and the public's right to know."
This is preposterous in so many ways.
1) He should have never had access. If he did, laws were broken.
2) If he divulged classified info, he broke the law.
3) How does he think he was in any position to judge the potential harm to be done? Odds are, he wouldn't have been.
Typical on so many levels.
exactly!
It depends on the meaning of "scandal."
It has been common over the past several decades for leftists in the CIA or other intelligence agencies to leak national secrets to their leftist contacts in the press. When this traitorous jerk says that he runs these state secret past his friends in the agency before publishing them, that means he runs them past some clintonoid or other, who has no more concern for the security of the United States than Bill Lynch has.
The real scandal for Miller's colleagues at the NY Times and in the leftist world of journalism was that she was more concerned to help her country and report on the facts than she was to betray her country for the good of the leftist agenda.
Ughh.
"In my experience, defense and intelligence officials routinely share secrets with reporters in the full expectation they will be reported. "
Herein lies the problem then. If officials "routinely" share classified info, then (1) they are breaking the law and (2) there is a much bigger problem than the name of some over-the-hill CIA agent who really ISN"T a CIA agent anymore.
To me..the original "leakers" who were actually lying about info are the ones who should be indicted...but then, this is a Republican administration...
Lynch is really reaching with this one.
There is no there there.
From Miller's own statement about her testimony it is clear that she is not protecting Libby and I don't believe that there has ever been any allegation that she ever spoke to Rove on this matter.
If she gets indicted on obstruction, it's likely that someone in the White House would get indicted too. So I don't share your "hope".
I get the sense the MSM is about to toss Miller under the bus..
But Miller is also "buds" with Hillary - and Hillary and Valerie are very tight - since the Wilsons are fund raisers for the Clintons. And .. what liberal democrat would go to jail for Scooter Libby or Rove ..??
Me too.
I'm not so sure on that Hal. I don't think her other source (and she admits she has other sources) is a White House source.....I agree with a previous poster -- its either Wilson or Plame herself. This is where I hope Fitz is focusing -- but I really don't have a clue. Perhaps we will see this week, and then again, perhaps not. Fitz may surprise us all and ask for a two year extension!
This whole Plame scandal will go away the moment there isn't any further political gain to be made by keeping it alive.
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