Posted on 09/29/2003 9:46:58 PM PDT by kattracks
The wife of Bush-bashing former U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Joe Wilson is apparently not a covert CIA operative or an undercover agent, though she's been described that way repeatedly since the CIA asked for an investigation on how her identity was made public.
According to columnist Robert Novak, who revealed Mrs. Wilson's name in his July 14 column, sources at the CIA expressly told him she was not a spy.
"According to a confidential source at the CIA, Mrs. Wilson was an analyst, not a spy, not a covert operative, and not in charge of undercover operatives," Novak told his audience on CNN's "Crossfire."
"So what is the fuss about?" he asked, then wondered aloud, "Pure Bush-bashing?"
In fact, in a little-noticed line in the initial Washington Post report on the announcement of the CIA's request for an investigation, the paper noted that "the CIA has declined to confirm whether she was undercover."
Still, hours after Novak went public with a clarification of Mrs. Wilson's status, she was described as a "undercover agent" by former White House chief of staff David Gergen in an interview with Fox News Channel's Greta Van Susteren, and as a "covert agent" by MSNBC's Chris Matthews.
Read more on this subject in related Hot Topics:
Here's a pervious version
AMBASSADOR JOSEPH C. WILSON, IV
Ambassador Wilson is CEO of JCWilson International Ventures, Corp., a firm specializing in Strategic Management and International Business Development.
Ambassador Wilson served as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for African Affairs at the National Security Council from June 1997 until July 1998. In that capacity he was responsible for the coordination of U.S. policy to the 48 countries of sub-Saharan Africa. He was one of the principal architects of President Clinton’s historic trip to Africa in March 1998.
Ambassador Wilson was the Political Advisor to the Commander-in-Chief of United States Armed Forces, Europe, 1995-1997. He served as the U.S. Ambassador to the Gabonese Republic and to the Democratic Republic of Sao Tome and Principe from 1992 to 1995. From 1988 to 1991, Ambassador Wilson served in Baghdad, Iraq as Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy. During “Desert Shield” he was the acting Ambassador and was responsible for the negotiations that resulted in the release of several hundred American hostages. He was the last official American to meet with Saddam Hussein before the launching of “Desert Storm.”
Ambassador Wilson was a member of the U.S. Diplomatic Service from 1976 until 1998. His early assignments included Niamey, Niger, 1976-1978; Lome, Togo, 1978-79; the State Department Bureau of African Affairs, 1979-1981; and Pretoria, South Africa, 1981-1982.
In 1982, he was appointed Deputy Chief of Mission in Bujumbura, Burundi. In 1985-1986, he served in the offices of Senator Albert Gore and the House Majority Whip, Representative Thomas Foley, as an American Political Science Association Congressional Fellow. He was Deputy Chief of Mission in Brazzaville, Congo, 1986-88, prior to his assignment to Baghdad.
Ambassador Wilson was raised in California and graduated from the University of California at Santa Barbara in 1972. He is a graduate of the Senior Seminar (1992), the most advanced International Affairs training offered by the U.S. Government. He speaks fluent French.
Ambassador Wilson holds the Department of Defense Distinguished Service Award, the Department of State Superior and Meritorious Honor Awards, the University of California, Santa Barbara Distinguished Alumnus Award, and the American Foreign Service Association William R. Rivkin Award. Additionally, he has been decorated as a Commander in the Order of the Equatorial Star by the Government of Gabon and as an Admiral in the El Paso Navy by the El Paso County Commissioners.
He is married to the former Valerie Plame and has two sons and two daughters.
It seems to me we need to know if that is true, or if it is yet another example of his "excess of zeal" when discussing this story.
Interesting use of moral equivalence there. I've noticed that when the 'rats are caught dead to rights in some smarmy act or another, after they've exhausted all of their other attempts to deflect blame, when they finally own up to their culpability, they say, "Well, both sides do it."
Not a freudian slip.
BUMP
Actually, if you notice the placement of the quotation marks, you will see that the section that says that Novak said that his sources had come to him with the information is a characterization of what the reporter wants to believe. What the actual quote says is, "I didn't dig it out, it was given to me. They thought it was significant, they gave me the name and I used it."
That fits in with what Novak said yesterday, that they didn't call him, but rather he contacted them. It's certainly possible for Novak to have contacted them and for them to have thought that the info was significant and to offer it up to him in the course of the interview.
Wilson's claim was that the WH aggressively contacted journalists trying to get this story out. Novak debunks this by explaining that his source did give him this info, but it was not something that they sought him out specifically to discuss, but rather it came up during an interview which Novak instigated.
Novak won't release the tape willingly. And if it is released, it may or may not help Novak, but it won't hurt the White House, and it certainly won't hurt Rove. In fact, it will probably bolster the White House's case because it will be clear that Wilson's version of events is a lie.
Shame is what you feel when you've lost your honor. How can they feel shame when they have no honor?
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