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Here's the problem with what Novak said on CNN today: First, he admitted that the CIA asked him not to use her name. Here's a link to the story at msnbc: http://msnbc.com/news/973047.asp?0cv=CA01 (snip) "Novak said that when he called the CIA to confirm the information, a CIA official asked him not to use the name. That official, however, did not say there would be any danger to Plame or her sources if her name were disclosed, Novak said. Then he started this business of this Plame woman being an analyst and not an operative. At first I thought this was a good thing, but then I reread what he actually wrote about her: http://www.townhall.com/columnists/robertnovak/rn20030714.shtml Mission to Niger Robert Novak July 14, 2003 Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the Italian report. The CIA says its counter-proliferation officials selected Wilson and asked his wife to contact him. "I will not answer any question about my wife," Wilson told me. He pretty clearly calls her an Agency Operative. So is she an operative or is she not? If she's not, no big deal. If she is, very big deal. I know one thing FOR SURE, there needs to be a quick and thorough investigation. This isn't the kind of story that goes away without one. It's better to get this over with ASAP then face questioning about it for weeks on end.

I think it's pretty clear that "agency operative" means "agency operative" not "agency covert operative," which is what the law applies to. Otherwise, the CIA would have been more forceful in telling Novak not to publish. It's possible that she was "covert" in the past and that's .what led to the gray area. Anyway this thing has Clintonian fingerprints, as in Clinton holdovers at CIA who are pissed at Bush. Wonder why it took Wilson almost a month to figure out a federal crime had been committed against his wife? Answer: because there was no crime, until some geek figured out it could be spun that way.