Novak, in an interview, said his sources had come to him with the information. "I didn't dig it out, it was given to me," he said. "They thought it was significant, they gave me the name and I used it."
You can also check the CNN transcript of Crossfire from Monday, as well as his columns. He says and the columns cite "senior administration official" and "senior official."
Are you trying to say that Novak is lying?
"First, I did not receive a planned leak. Second, the CIA never warned me that the disclosure of Wilson's wife working at the agency would endanger her or anybody else. Third, it was not much of a secret."
"The published report that somebody in the White House failed to plant this story with six reporters and finally found me as a willing pawn is simply untrue."
"He never suggested to me that Wilson's wife or anybody else would be endangered. If he had, I would not have used her name. I used it in the sixth paragraph of my column because it looked like the missing explanation of an otherwise incredible choice by the CIA for its mission."
"How big a secret was it? It was well known around Washington that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA."
I'm beginning to think that there may be no crime here, just an effort by mid-level CIA and maybe State staffers to create an intellegence "mission" to come up with some "evidence" (or lack thereof) to weaken the Bush case on Iraq.
Even if Plume worked in a classified or covert position, if it was already public knowledge that she worked for the CIA, is there a crime there?