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Plame epilogue - Plain truth is letdown for Bush critics
The San Diego Union-Tribune ^ | July 14, 2006 | Editorial

Posted on 07/14/2006 7:00:17 AM PDT by new yorker 77

For nearly three years the Bush White House has been dogged by allegations that it outed a covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame, to discredit her husband, Joe Wilson, a harsh critic of the administration's handling of the war in Iraq.

Syndicated columnist Robert D. Novak first reported that Plame, in her official capacity at the CIA, helped initiate Wilson's 2002 trip to Niger to investigate whether Saddam Hussein had tried to obtain uranium there for use in developing nuclear weapons. Novak's disclosure in July 2003 prompted a flurry of accusations that the White House orchestrated the leak of Plame's identity in response to an opinion piece Wilson wrote a week earlier in The New York Times attacking the administration's claim that Iraq had sought uranium in Africa.

A 1982 law, the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, makes it a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison to knowingly reveal the identity of an undercover CIA agent. Amid an outcry from Democrats on Capitol Hill, the Justice Department named Patrick Fitzgerald as a special prosecutor to probe whether the law had been violated.

After spending more than two years and millions of dollars, Fitzgerald charged no one with the crime of outing Plame. He did persuade a judge to throw New York Times reporter Judith Miller in jail for 85 days for refusing to identify her confidential sources. Miller later relented and testified before the federal grand jury convened by Fitzgerald, as did Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper and Novak.

In the end, the only count issued by the grand jury focused on Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, who is accused of committing perjury during his grand jury testimony and is awaiting trial.

This week, after years of Fitzgerald's exhaustive probing into journalists' confidential sources, the truth finally has come out about who told Novak the name of Wilson's wife. According to Novak's account, no one told him Valerie Plame's name. He learned it from her husband's entry in “Who's Who in America.”

Plame's role in Wilson's Africa trip “was revealed to me in the middle of a long interview with an official who ... was not a political gunslinger,” Novak wrote. “After the federal investigation was announced, he told me through a third party that the disclosure was inadvertent on his part.” Significantly, however, the official never revealed Plame's name to Novak.

So, the plain truth is that, at least as far as Novak's disclosure was concerned, it was not an orchestrated attempt by the White House to out Valerie Plame. Administration officials may have sought to exploit Novak's revelation after the fact by discussing it with other reporters, such as Miller and Cooper. But Novak's report clearly was the product of solid journalistic digging, not a conspiracy hatched in the White House.

Conspiracy advocates will never accept this straightforward account of the facts, but the facts demonstrate that the accusations leveled against the White House for the last three years were groundless.


TOPICS: Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: cialeak
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To: sportutegrl

The MSM signed an amicus brief:

36 major news organizations and professional reporters' groups (including CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, Reuters, The Associated Press, The Tribune Company, The Washington Post, The New York Press Club and The White House Corespondents) insisted that "no crime" had been committed in the "Plame Leak" case because, among other things, Valerie Plame's identity had previously been disclosed to both the Russians and the Cubans!

Read their brief here:


http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1665581/posts?page=12#12











41 posted on 07/14/2006 7:43:48 AM PDT by Peach (Prayers for our dear friends in Israel.)
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To: I_like_good_things_too

That IS the $64M question, isn't it?

IMO, they don't believe in nations, think they are privileged citizens of the world and seem convinced that there are no security risks, to them, except, of course, the threats from Republicans.

I think the hiring is done on a *who you know and what is your background* basis, or , at least it was. Membership in one or more elites trumps anything meaningful, like loyalty to the USA. Not sure if anything has changed, either.


42 posted on 07/14/2006 7:43:52 AM PDT by reformedliberal ("Eliminate the mullahs and Islam shall disappear in fifty years." Ayatollah Khomeini)
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To: new yorker 77
According to Novak's account, no one told him Valerie Plame's name. He learned it from her husband's entry in “Who's Who in America.”

Will the Left now apply this law on Joe Wilson?

I won't hold my breath for them to be consistent.

43 posted on 07/14/2006 7:47:02 AM PDT by Teacher317
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To: Peach

Please add this article to you list...It is from a media open house at the Plame residence a week before the Novak story hit.

"While his family prepared for a Fourth of July dinner, he proudly showed a reporter photos of himself with Bush's parents. On a den wall was a framed cable to him in Baghdad, from the first President Bush, dated Nov. 20, 1990:"

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0706-05.htm


44 posted on 07/14/2006 7:47:23 AM PDT by Wristpin ("The Yankees announce plan to buy every player in Baseball....")
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To: Wristpin

WIlson, in an effort to show he was non-partisan, kept saying he voted for Bush. But records show he gave money to Gore. And in '04, money to Kerry. Quite the non-partisan, don't you think? LOL


45 posted on 07/14/2006 7:50:01 AM PDT by Peach (Prayers for our dear friends in Israel.)
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To: Peach

Yes...Part of the disinformation campaign. My point though, was that the Wilson's actually had the media in their home before the so called "outing". It just shows that were not taking any precautions to keep her Phony status protected.


46 posted on 07/14/2006 7:55:26 AM PDT by Wristpin ("The Yankees announce plan to buy every player in Baseball....")
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To: new yorker 77

Beyond Novak's "digging" it was Joe Joe and well, Joe who thoughtlessly put the CIA connection in his pumped up bio.

Of course he really had nothing to worry about in terms of 10 years of prosecution since Valerie was NOT covert then. Wilson should either the charged for breaking covert cover or countersued for bringing a frivilous law suit.


47 posted on 07/14/2006 7:59:08 AM PDT by rod1
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To: new yorker 77
Her identity was not classified, not secret, and she had not been assigned to duty outside the United States in the last five years, revealing her mundane desk job with the CIA was simply not a crime.

This entire affair is nothing more than Bravo Sierra and a colossal waste of taxpayer money!!! The waste of money is what SHOULD have every one in a tizzy, not some asinine woman's NON-COVERT status "leak."

48 posted on 07/14/2006 7:59:35 AM PDT by Just A Nobody (NEVER AGAIN..Support our Troops! www.irey.com and www.vets4Irey.com - Now more than Ever!)
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To: Wristpin

Fitzgerald was appointed to investigate this matter in December of '03; Wilson had the media into his home in July '03.

I don't remember when Novak wrote his original column. Or for that matter, when Corn wrote HIS first column which outted the non-covert Valerie.


49 posted on 07/14/2006 8:07:09 AM PDT by Peach (Prayers for our dear friends in Israel.)
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To: Peach

The original Novak colummn was published on July 14th. The media open house took place a week earlier on the 4th. Wreckless tradecraft for even a phony spook.


50 posted on 07/14/2006 8:12:09 AM PDT by Wristpin ("The Yankees announce plan to buy every player in Baseball....")
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To: Just A Nobody

Why didn't the crackerjack Bush PR team set the record straight about her status?


51 posted on 07/14/2006 8:15:44 AM PDT by Wristpin ("The Yankees announce plan to buy every player in Baseball....")
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To: Dr. Frank fan
don't all 'covert' cia agents arrive on the red carpet to throngs of paparazzi?
52 posted on 07/14/2006 8:19:27 AM PDT by edzo4
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To: new yorker 77

Excellent article.


53 posted on 07/14/2006 8:21:24 AM PDT by ConservativeMind
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To: Clintonfatigued; AliVeritas; holdonnow

FYI


54 posted on 07/14/2006 8:22:20 AM PDT by new yorker 77 (FAKE POLLS DO NOT TRANSLATE INTO REAL VOTERS!)
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To: new yorker 77

good article full of fact which is why the looney left and their mouthpieces in the criminal liberal media have no use for it....(though the SD Trib is to the left)


55 posted on 07/14/2006 8:39:10 AM PDT by God luvs America (When the silent majority speaks the earth trembles!)
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To: new yorker 77
Wilson Plame are going to hold a whiny press conference at 10 a.m. today.

10am eastern, or pacific?

56 posted on 07/14/2006 8:53:39 AM PDT by Christian4Bush (To exercise your first amendment rights, go to college. To defend them, join the military.)
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To: Wristpin
Why didn't the crackerjack Bush PR team set the record straight about her status?

Because there was an investigation in progress and unlike the ENEMEDIA and the anti-American leakers in our government, the Bush administration follows the rules...no commenting on matters that are under investigation!

IMO, this entire outrage was a set up to discredit President's administration. Think about it:


57 posted on 07/14/2006 9:16:56 AM PDT by Just A Nobody (NEVER AGAIN..Support our Troops! www.irey.com and www.vets4Irey.com - Now more than Ever!)
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To: lugsoul

Ok. So much for that idea.


58 posted on 07/14/2006 9:19:52 AM PDT by Just Lori (To everything, there is a season.........Ecclesiastes, 3:1-8)
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To: new yorker 77; A Citizen Reporter; AliVeritas; alnick; AmeriBrit; AmericaUnited; arasina; ...
Scooter Ping!

**Credit martin_fierro for graphic.**

59 posted on 07/14/2006 9:22:04 AM PDT by Howlin (Pres.Bush ought to be ashamed of himself for allowing foreign countries right on our borders!!~~Zook)
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To: Yo-Yo

Still claiming she was covert, I see. Love her "achievement".


60 posted on 07/14/2006 9:29:58 AM PDT by jennyjenny
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