If Valerie was classified...like Novak said, he would have gotten a call from Tenet. Novak apologized for using the word operative...saying that around DC it was a common term. It did not say she was a "Secret Agent, a former spy or anything else except that it looks like BOTH Joe and Valerie were in on the Niger Tea Party.
The CIA has been Jekyll & Hyde on the Plame case, and I expect the NSA will be too, on the domestic surveillance charge.
On the one hand, when Novak contacted the CIA regarding Plame, the CIA didn't express any concern about publication of her association with the company. But after her association with the Niger mission was published, the CIA forwarded a referral for criminal investigation to the DoJ.
With regard to NSA surveillance, the only prudent approach is to assume that surveillance is occurring - the propriety/legality/constitutionality of the surveillance will be settled only after the fact, in the context of litigation or Congressional hearings. And regardless of the outcome of the litigation or hearings, the surveillance will continue; unabated. Scan these, balancing sureveillance, technology and the 4th amendment is an old issue.
Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Activities : Oct 29, 1975 ...
http://cryptome.org/nsa-4th.htm
Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Activities : Nov 6, 1975 ...
http://cryptome.org/nsa-4th-p2.htm
Here is a snippet ...
HEARINGS
BEFORE THE
SELECT COMMITTEE TO STUDY
GOVERNMENTAL OPERATIONS WITH
RESPECT TO INTELLIGENCE ACTIVITIES
OF THE
UNITED STATES SENATE
NINETY-FOUR CONGRESS
FIRST SESSIONVOLUME 5
THE NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY AND FOURTH
AMENDMENT RIGHTSOCTOBER 29 AND NOVEMBER 6, 1975
TESTIMONY OF LT. GEN. LEW ALLEN, JR., DIRECTOR, NATIONAL SECURITY
AGENCY, ACCOMPANIED BY BENSON BUFFHAM, DEPUTY DIRECTOR, NSA; AND
ROY BANNER, GENERAL COUNSEL, NSA... Between 1967 and 1973 there was a cumulative total of about 450 U.S. names on the narcotics list, and about 1,200 U.S. names on all other lists combined. What that amounted to was that at the height of the watch list activity, there were about 800 U.S. names on the watch list and about one-third of these 800 were from the narcotics list.
We estimate that over this 6-year period, 1967-1973, about 2,000 reports were issued by the NSA on international narcotics trafficking and about 1,900 reports were issued covering the three areas of terrorism, Executive protection and foreign influence over U.S. groups. This would average about two reports per day. These reports included some messages between U.S. citizens with one foreign communicant, but over 90 percent had at least one foreign communicant and all messages had at least one foreign terminal. Using agencies did periodically review, and were asked by the NSA to review, their watch lists to insure inappropriate or unnecessary entries were promptly removed.
I am not the proper person to ask concerning the value of the product from these four special efforts. We are aware that a major terrorist act in the United States was prevented. In addition, some large drug shipments were prevented from entering the United States because of our efforts on international narcotics trafficking. We have statements from the requesting agencies in which they have expressed appreciation for the value of the information which they had received from us. Nonetheless, in my own judgment, the controls which were placed on the handling of the intelligence were so restrictive that the value was significantly diminished. ...
Novak apologized for using the word operative..
Seems to me that the US Government has never clarified her status...I think Joe Wilson was going to be in deep doo doo, until the Dems saw the word "Operative" and ran with it.
Bush's staff of course were hiding in the bunker.