Plame-Out?

Opinion Journal.com/WSJ ^ | 9-30-03 | James Taranto

[Steve_Seattle]

"Don't be surprised, though, if this purported scandal ends up amounting to nothing."

But the Dems know that the controversy in itself - regardless of the outcome - will cause a sense of scandal to linger in the minds of many swing voters, and these swing voters will remember all the accusations, and those THOSE FALSE ACCUSATIONS WILL NEVER BE DENOUNCED AS "IRRESPONSIBLE" BY THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA. The Dems know that lies will linger in the public's mind just as easily as truth, and the public's mind will eventually forget the difference.

[Peach]

I've pinged you to another thread to see if you can provide some of the info you had yesterday on Rove in the early 90's.

[PhiKapMom]

My guess is one of the Clintonites who is either foreign service or civil service that were political appointees but became permanent before Clinton left office!

[veronica]

There were so many faux scandals hurled Bush's way during the 2000 election period. He overcame those and he'll overcome this.

[MizSterious]

"...my guess is that the person is either high level Foreign Service from the State Department of Civil Service from CIA or State."

My pet theory is that it was one of the Wilsons.

[Arrowhead1952]

Chum in the water for the bait fish, then come the sharks.

[Revolting cat!]

Plame's to blame!

[marron]

The story here is that he says he was hired by the CIA to check out the story. But he wasn't paid by the CIA, he went at his wife's suggestion, and he didn't submit a written report. His only written account of his trip is the op-ed piece he wrote.

The op-ed piece he wrote is an extended falsehood on several levels. The first falsehood is that he says he investigated uranium sales in Niger. That he most assuredly did not do. He asked the Niger government for their answer, and he parroted their answer. He did not investigate anything, he did not monitor shipments, he did not tap communications, he did not interview plant workers, he did not break into company files. There was no investigation.

So when he attacks the president based on his "investigation", he is lying.

His attack on the president is itself a sleight of hand, in which he refutes a charge the president did not make. Iraq's trade mission to Niger is public information. There was no need for a trip to Niger to verify a trade mission that was not a secret. His op-ed claims the president lied, because there was no sale. But the president made no such charge. So Wilson's "denial" is a non-denial, it is a propagandist's bait-and-switch tactic that would never work if we didn't collectively agree not to notice it. The press, of course, has collectively agreed not to notice.

Another lie is the lie of omission, in which he fails even to mention the trade mission, because of course to even mention it would blow a hole right through the middle of his case. The president did not lie, his charge was based on public information that Wilson does not deny because he can't deny it. So he ignores it.

He lied again when he claimed that a sale couldn't have taken place because the IAEA monitors the mines so closely that it would be impossible. But the IAEA says that they don't have the personnel to monitor the mines, and furthermore they don't have the legal basis for monitoring them. So, in other words, they aren't monitoring them in any effective sense at all.

So Wilson lied again.

And he apparently engaged in this pantomime charade at his wife's instigation. If the CIA is going to lend itself to backing this charade, then they should have to answer some questions themselves.

1. First, since when did the CIA appoint itself to engaging publicly in policy debates?
2. Why did they have to send a non-employee to investigate something that should have been a high priority?
3. What happened to their African assets? Have they none?
4.Why did that non-employee sent to investigate, not investigate?
5. And finally, why are they lending their aid and support to this charade?

The trade mission is not a secret, which means that the president's statement is not even controversial. The CIA is engaging in partisan politics, and their tactics are openly dishonest.

[Redcoat LI]

Was this chick a covert agent or what?Novak seems to be saying she was a desk jockey in Langly,every thing I hear or read seems to say something differant.Anybody know?

[Steve_Seattle]

Even though the Dems are using shamelessly extreme and outlandish rhetoric to pump this up, I think it's quite possible this thing had very innocent beginings. Based on numerous posts on several threads, I think it may simply have been a case of Novak asking for background about Wilson's trip and being told that his wife - a CIA employee - had a role in it. Since it was apparently widely known that his wife worked for the CIA, and widely believed she was NOT a covert operator, revealing such information would have been legal and no big deal. But perhaps Wilson - who clearly detests Bush - or some other Democrats, began to stir the sh*t and got the media interested in hyping this as a scandal.

[Sabertooth]

But it's not clear if there's anything to this at all.

It's clear that there probably isn't.

[Steve_Seattle]

You raise excellent questions, and they point to the "murkiness" and "swirling agendas" Andrew Sullivan referred to in deciding to refrain from comment until more facts come out. There IS something peculiar in the way the CIA handled this, and it has nothing to do with Bush trying to "get" anyone. .

[NonValueAdded]

Marron! Nailed it!

[PhiKapMom]

Or a very close friend of Wilson's at the State Department! I would bet that it is either them or someone very close to them that is a Clintonite and decided that the Bush Administration needed a scandal. Smells like Hillary is pulling the puppet strings on this one!

[NotQuiteCricket]

Your questions:
1. First, since when did the CIA appoint itself to engaging publicly in policy debates?
2. Why did they have to send a non-employee to investigate something that should have been a high priority?
3. What happened to their African assets? Have they none?
4.Why did that non-employee sent to investigate, not investigate?
5. And finally, why are they lending their aid and support to this charade?

I would like to add:
6. Who signed off in the CIA on sending Wilson?
7. Who authorized his reimbursement for expenses?
8. To whom did he report on his return?
9. What is his wife's job title?

I think that what is going on is that the wilsons are being set up (or are setting themselves up)as rosenburgs. "Those mean investigators are going after us because of what we said, not what we did - oh woe are we the innocent victims." And whatever the charges are that are filed will be met with - leftits response of - "They didn't do anything wrong, you are just going after them because of their political beliefs. McCarthyism! Witch hunt! Red scare!"

[Cobra64]

Ever use a comma? one of these thingies: ","

[aristeides]

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."

That last sentence is the key: If Novak's source is telling the truth, then there's no crime, and the "scandal" is utterly phony.

If Novak's CIA informant spoke in the present tense -- and I suspect he or she did -- then the source could have spoken the truth, and whoever revealed her status would nevertheless have committed a felony and -- what is more important -- endangered lives. Because Plame could have been a former undercover operative running agents.

Which is precisely what Vincent Cannistraro said she was on this morning's Sam Donaldson radio show.

[NotQuiteCricket]

"Don't be surprised, though, if this purported scandal ends up amounting to nothing."
Yeah, when it turns out to be all democrats all the time, suddenly the media will lose interest and the story will go away. (enron, global crossing, worldcom)

[MizSterious]

Here's another interesting article, with some equally interesting questions raised by Freepers: In July Time Magazine Interview, Joe Wilson Said His Wife Had Nothing To Do With Niger Trip. For instance, this was published very close to the same date that Novak's column came out. Who published first, some wonder--Time or Novak? The mystery deepens...

[cyncooper]

Clifford May writes in National Review Online that Plame's CIA connection "wasn't news to me. I had been told that--but not by anyone working in the White House. Rather, I learned it from someone who formerly worked in the government and he mentioned it in an offhand manner, leading me to infer it was something that insiders were well aware of."

May went on to say today that it was a democrat who told him Plame's employer in order to convince him that Wilson isn't as far left as May thought. May said this democrat told him before Novak's column was written.

The Corner September 30, 2003

Scroll down for May's comments.