I had forgotten the extra-special choadery that the Douchebag for Liberty had provided to us at the time:  he outed Plame’s front company as well, closing down an operation that the CIA had been using for a decade.

But, hey, it’s not like Plame’s work on loose nukes and WMDs was important or anything.  Not when compared to Halliburton’s and KBR’s profits.

Not to mention that any of the agents who were attached to Brewster Jennings, the CIA front company Plame used for cover, were also outed in the process. Or that any assets any of them had cultivated were jeopardized by Plame’s outing. One of the most amazing things the Bush disaster managed to do was to make liberals into defenders of CIA covert ops. Amazing.

I’m continually amazed that Novak remains outside of prison to this day. But what totally blows my mind is that the Chicago Sun-Times has kept the evil, disgusting rat on as a columnist.

Ah, Mnemosyne beat me to it.

Anytime Novak gets into the news I have the sudden urge to hurl things at the TV. In this case, shouting at my monitor.
He prolly thinks he didn’t hurt Plume because “silly women don’t need JOBS anyway, they should be in the kitchen”. Ugh…

[I] don’t think I hurt Valerie Plame whatsoever.

Perhaps you didn’t hurt Ms. Plame.  However, you also outed the name of the front company she worked for - Brewster-Jennings & Associates - and in so doing you endangered overseas informants who gave information to her.  As was noted in a Washington Post article from October, 2003:

The inadvertent disclosure of the name of a business affiliated with the CIA underscores the potential damage to the agency and its operatives caused by the leak of Plame’s identity. Intelligence officials have said that once Plame’s job as an undercover operative was revealed, other agency secrets could be unraveled and her sources might be compromised or endangered.

A former diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity said yesterday that every foreign intelligence service would run Plame’s name through its databases within hours of its publication to determine if she had visited their country and to reconstruct her activities.

Source article here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A40012-2003Oct3?language=printer

(Question: how do I post a link without the full url appearing?  As in a word or headline rather than all the html stuff?  Thanks in advance.)

Beaten to the punch by Mnemosyne & Theron.

This also just underscores the absurdity and evil of Bush’s remarks earlier this week that his big regret was the poor intelligence he got that didn’t allow him to make good policy decisions.

When the administration’s message to the whole intelligence community is “tell us what we want to hear, no more and no less, and don’t rock the boat no matter what lies we tell, or you, your career, your life, and the careers and lives of your family and everyone you work with are directly threatened” what kind of intelligence do you think you’re going to get.

Novak is clearly pushing for a Medal of Freedom.

I’d go full speed ahead

Uh, yeah, that always works out for you, Bob.

I’d go full speed ahead because of the hateful and beastly way in which my left-wing critics in the press and Congress tried to make a political affair out of it and tried to ruin me.

This is neoCon “truth-telling” at its finest. In this do-over scenario he has advance knowledge that he would have been criticised for publically blowing the cover of a NOC CIA agent (fair enough—a teenager could figure that one out in advance); and of course, only journalists and Congresspersons (the only two groups of Americans that exist in Novak’s narrow Beltway world) who are “left wing” would find such a treasonous action worthy of public criticism (again, fair enough—right-wing journalists and Congresspersons were more than happy with his action); and, finally, he doesn’t “think” he hurt Valerie Plame (which makes sense—actual facts are the concern of the “reality-based community”).

So, all technically “true,” if the speaker a completely unethical apologist for traitors with real power. The indulgence in false victimhood is like the rancid cherry on top of his shite sundae of a statement.

Any MSM outlet where Novak appears or writes should be ashamed if they portrayed him as anything other than what he is: a neoCon toady. I hope that reality-based historians of the Cheney administration (if not a truth and reconciliation commission) will give Novak the legacy he deserves.

Fastiller: It bears repeating. It should be shouted from every rooftop. It exposes perfectly what a deep lie the conservative claim to “national security” as justification for their ideology, their actions, their claim to power.

Dead soldiers because of faulty intelligence? No one is allowed to question that…......

His critics tried to make it political?  He outed a CIA agent and her front company for partisan political reasons.  And the partisan political reasons were to lie the country into a fucking war.  I can’t think of a pejorative term big enough for this douche bag.

No God, what a disgusting freak.

Didn’t he promise immediate retirement when he almost killed the cyclist?

Karma is a fickle judge, Caren. I’d rather not have to rely on it.

Unfortunately, Novak is getting a pass under the “it’s not fascism when we do it” rule. Fuck him. The editors of Pravda during Stalin’s reign had more journalistic and historical integrity than this assface.

This whole story is just a big DEMONcrap lie!  Mr. Novak couldn’t have said these things because he retired after running over the bicycle guy and then driving away.  Okay, so he hit Miss Plame and ran away from that too but she was just a CIA agent monitoring the movements of nuclear materials but that’s hardly anything of consequence, so just shut up and LEAVE ROBERT ALONE!!!

They didn’t just screw over Plame, they screwed over her cover, and they screwed over anybody who ever talked to her when she was working under that cover.

It’s a huge deal, even if it didn’t affect Plame at all.  It still fucked over lots of ours sources.  And that makes people in the future less likely to talk to the CIA.

I hoped his tumor wasn’t malignant, as it would then be the only non-malignant part of his brain.

I wonder if one of the Rosenberg children could be recruited to pull the switch?

To be fair, it turns out that Julius actually was guilty.  It was poor Ethel who got railroaded.

Maybe they could just pull it until Novak’s half-dead?

I’m sorry he’s dying

Why? I’m not. People die all the time. I’m sorry his family will have to go through the agony of losing a loved one, but we all have to go through that at some point.

I should clarify that I certainly won’t celebrate when he finally does die. But I won’t cry, shake my head in sadness, give the occasion a moment of silence, or generally acknowledge it in any significant way whatsoever - even though I do think a world without Robert Novak in it will be a better world than the one we have now.

—-I’m sorry he’s dying

—-Why? I’m not. People die all the time.

I’m sorry he’s dying, because before the earthly container is cold, we will have to fight the rehabbing of his reputation.

To steal from Ellen Goodman (on Nixon’s death), “Sorry, but my moral compass is not a clock. Time doesn’t make him a better person.”

I would do the same thing over again because I don’t think I hurt Valerie Plame whatsoever.

Repeating a comment from elsewhere:

Lessee...

“When I was outed on July 14th, 2003, I was, until that moment, covert,” Plame Wilson says.

Asked what that means, Plame Wilson tells Couric, “That means no one outside of a very small circle knew where I really worked.”
[...]

She says seeing her name in print was “horrifying, absolutely horrifying.”

Horrifying, because Plame Wilson was no glorified secretary. In fact, as it’s spelled out in her book, “Fair Game,” published by Simon & Schuster, which like CBS News and CBSNews.com is owned by CBS, she spent 20 years at the CIA, rising to top-level positions. Her assignments took her all over the world, where she gathered information, recruited spies, and worked for many years deep undercover. In 1998, she was working at headquarters, spying for the newest CIA division, counter-proliferation.
[...]

A week later, Valerie Plame’s name and CIA affiliation were printed in a newspaper by conservative columnist Robert Novak. Eighteen years of meticulously crafted cover were gone in an instant.

“I can tell you all the intelligence services in the world that morning were running my name through their databases to see, did anyone by this name come in the country? When? Do we know anything about it? Where did she stay? Who did she see?” Plame Wilson says.

It’s not just that it hindered the CIA’s ability to do their job or recruit people.

Oh, Christ. You people are aware of what the CIA actually does in reality as opposed to their press releases, right? Because damn, if they tell us she was working on loose nukes, WMD, and saving puppies and kittens from euthanasia, well, it must be true!

Out ‘em all and abolish the fucking agency. Jesus, never thought I’d see the day when American lefties would be so fucking whipped as to be defending one of the world’s biggest criminal organizations.

You know his fantasy is to get a call from the CIA Director saying

“No really, Robert…
we just have agents investigating all over the world as a joke. It really has nothing to do with national security or anything like that. Oh ho ho! You’re such a joker! It’s not a biggie! Happens every day!”

What, are all the good trolls growing up and moving out or something? Fugg Kew? Really? Is it Xmas break already for the frat boys?

Out ‘em all and abolish the fucking agency. Jesus, never thought I’d see the day when American lefties would be so fucking whipped as to be defending one of the world’s biggest criminal organizations.

Whether or not one approves of CIA activities, or believes that the CIA should even exist, the fact is that Novak’s actions not only destroyed years of work in controlling worldwide proliferation of WMDs, and ended Plame’s career, he also put an unknown amount of people worldwide in mortal danger. Plame’s informants from her entire career were now known, by the intelligence agencies of states worldwide, to be informants for the CIA.

It is quite likely that Novak’s disclosure killed more than one of Plame’s former associates. It undoubtedly degraded the effectiveness of the CIA to get information on global WMD proliferation. It is asinine to claim that Novak’s outing of Plame was unimportant.

But atheist, I’m not sure our new friend Fugg would even care about any of those unfortunate souls who met their demises in a windowless room with floors that sloped toward the drain in the center, since they were aiding and abetting the world’s biggest criminal organization. Perhaps he would argue that they got what they deserved.

I’d go full speed ahead because of the hateful and beastly way in which my left-wing critics in the press and Congress tried to make a political affair out of it and tried to ruin me. My response now is this: The hell with you. They didn’t ruin me. I have my faith, my family, and a good life. A lot of people love me — or like me. So they failed. I would do the same thing over again because I don’t think I hurt Valerie Plame whatsoever.

There are two factors at work here, both of which are valid and neither of which contradicts the other.  The first is that lefties don’t like Robert Novak, and the second is that Robert Novak belongs in jail.  The relationship between these two factors is casual at most, certainly not causal; yet Novak, for some unknowable reason, refuses or fails to recognize that he’s addressing two separate and only very loosely related issues in one breath.  So much for objectivity.  So much for method.  So much for journalistic sang-froid. 

My one comfort is that though Novak seems to be unable to realize that it’s not all about him personally, we for our part may still remain capable of realizing that it’s not all about us personally.  Novak’s remarks don’t find their target in me because I don’t confuse myself with the figure of straw they’re aimed at.  I don’t want to ruin Robert Novak, but I’d like to see him brought to justice (though I recognize that there are gobs of reasons why that probably won’t happen).  At the most I guess I could say that I don’t see the point in handing him a pass simply because he’s a crook, which is what he’s requiring me to do. 

No sale.

(Things have changed since I was a kid: the days when malefactors were accustomed to sue an offended social body for pardon are definitely over.  These days the bad guys demand that we hand over all the boodle or wiggleroom or credulity we’ve got and that we send ‘em fan mail, candy, flowers and kisses into the bargain.  It’s as though they expect us to be flattered that they think we’re still worth stealing from or lying to.  The usual explanation for this kind of behavior is that the people who engage in it suffer from ‘a sense of entitlement’; I’m beginning to wonder if the actual reason for this kind of conduct might not be something more exotic or pathological.)

Pissing off “teh libruls” is all coservatism has ever been about. And this juvenile crap seals it.

And mark my words: It may take years, it may be a chain reaction, but the blowing of Valerie Plame’s cover WILL result in someone getting killed. But Novak will never know, and if he does he will never admit it. No one will.

Novak is a world class asshole.

Fugg is obviously an amateur.

Out ‘em all and abolish the fucking agency. Jesus, never thought I’d see the day when American lefties would be so fucking whipped as to be defending one of the world’s biggest criminal organizations.

I’m not American, I’m a lefty, and at times I’m down right anti-American.  I am not, repeat not, a friend of the CIA or your foreign policy in general.  Indeed, I really wouldn’t mind too much if Iran got nukes - I think it needs them to protect itself against aggression from others such as, well, yourselves.

But the main job of the CIA is to gather intelligence (killing people, torture and overthrowing governments is just a sideline).  The only thing worse than a self-righteous nation of assholes waving their military dicks around is a self-righteous nation of assholes waving their military dicks around WHEN THEY DON’T KNOW WHAT IS HAPPENING.

The CIA needs to gather intelligence.  Without good intelligence, the rest of the world has to face blind stupidity from the US, as well as the usual motivations of criminal stupidity, greed, and arrogance.

Novak helped degrade that ability for partisan reasons.  Not only is he a traitor to your country’s interests (*yawn*), he made the world just that little bit unsafer for a little political advantage.  he can go fuck himself with a cactus.

That’s true, the CIA does cause/contribute to a good portion of the horrible shit that happens worldwide. Regardless, I think what Robert Novak did is clear Treason, and his ass should be arrested. I’m also not in any way a fan of the CIA and the business interests it colludes with, but outing agents…. I don’t know, it just seems wrong. You’re choosing to put someone in a situation where they’re likely to be killed. I think that would have to be a very careful, serious choice, and clearly Robert Novak, being a giant douche nugget, is not a careful man. Or a careful driver for that matter.

Brought to justice?  For what crime?

For outing Valerie Plame, with all its attendant dangers to her sources, her associates, and to the ability of the CIA to function as a brake on WMD proliferation worldwide.

Ah, it’s Dana, mindlessly defending the usual conservative tropes. Maybe Fugg Kew can learn a few…Well, actually, there’s nothing left to learn: It’s Okay If You’re A Republican. Always. Forever. Even if you damage national security because your balls are teensy little dried-up raisins.

A little-remarked fact was just how intimated Bush must have found Joe Wilson. Plame’s husband. When Saddam Hussein threatened to hang Wilson for sheltering refugees in the American Embassy in Baghdad, Wilson famously held a press conference wearing a noose, and saying, “If Saddam Hussein wants to hang me, I’ll bring my own fuckin’ rope.” They didn’t dare strike at Wilson, so they went after his wife. Klassy all the way.  Undid decades’ of work protecting the US and other countries, all so a bunch of cowards could pretend to be grown up men.

Good for you Robert Novak!

Plame and Wilson have been exposed for the frauds and phoneys they are.

Dana - She wasn’t working in Iraq at the time so I don’t know how you can say that because she said that the CIA thought there were WMD that means they had evidence. They didn’t. They had the forged documents that her husband exposed as fake at her peril.

I did read the book, and I got the sense that she was very deeply wounded because being outed took her cover away. She loves this country and she was passionate about her service. Novak and others took that away from her and they should be ashamed. Not to mention the private security the Plame-Wilson family will need for the rest of their lives.

This latest verbal diarrhea from Novak just shows that he’s an arrogant, myopic waste of skin who has no concept that a world exists outside of his own. I would say he’s insignificant but the fact that he outed a CIA agent, exposed Brewster Jennings and put many people in danger means he will be a notorious footnote in history. I hope his descendants change their names in embarrassment.

Fugg is a rightard looking for an opening.

Dana, meanwhile, is as pathetic as ever, aiding and abetting a criminal.  Sorry, Dumbass Dana, but the facts don’t line up with your lies, so why don’t you shut the hell up again?

More class, Dana.  More class includes supporting treason, I guess.  And I assume that all that Republican class of yours means you’d gladly accept the punishment for your treason.

I’d like to amplify on what bekabot said. I’d have more respect for Novak if he said he’d do it again because he thought supporting his political party or even his cronies was more important than national security. But he’s saying he’d do it again because the junior villagers were disrespectful to him. That rises to Rove, Bush or even Cheney-level choadery.

And of course it’s a sign of just how debased Novak and his fellow republicans are that they can’t understand—or even imagine—people who would rather do a difficult, mediocre-paying job they consider important to their country than have a million-dollar book deal and get on talk shows.

We had an independent counsel investigate this, and he was unable to find such a crime.  Perhaps you’d like to make up a crime that fits, or pass an ex post facto law here?

If it is not illegal to do what Novak did, then it sure as fuck ought to be. In any case, his statements and actions reveal him to be a truly disgusting individual.

Dana appears to be arguing that any action which is not punished, must therefore be moral and legal.

Proof or shut the fuck up, Class Boy.

yet seemingly have no explanation as to why the person, with a multi-million dollar budget to pursue the issue, never actually charged anyone with any crime relating to the exposure of Mrs Wilson’s identity

Gues what. As Fitzgerald pointed out in his report, when witnesses destroy evidence, lie to investigators and refuse to answer questions, crimes that depend on that evidence or on witness testimony can’t be prosecuted.

By Dana’s reasoning, a mob hit followed by arson and witness intimidation becomes perfectly legal, because investigators are never in a position to charge someone with a crime.

This is really embarassingly dishonest on Dana’s part.

What Mr Novak did was to mention in an article information he was given that he never thought was secret.

Dana, not even Mr. Novak is that stupid. Novak knew what he was doing… he was destroying Ms. Plame’s career as a form of revenge against her husband, because Wilson had published an editorial that said the official line from Bush’s white house was wrong. Wilson said that the proof of WMDs in Iraq which had been given, a supposed document from Niger, was a fake.

Even the editors of The Washington Post, not exactly the best of buds with the Bush Administration, concluded that the man most responsible for the exposure of Valerie Wilson’s identity was none other than her own husband, because he had been bandying it around Washington.

Dana, that’s idiotic. Someone in the Bush administration gave Plame’s name to Novak. Novak was pleased to engage in the destruction of her career, and was apparently unconcerned about any deaths, torture, or other damage done to her contacts, or any damage done to US intelligence. If you find Novak’s evil attractive, that’s certainly fine, but please don’t attempt to whitewash his motives.

What, you think that President Bush, surrounded by Secret Service protection, was afraid that Joe Wilson was going to come and beat him up?

God, you’re so fucking stupid. Bush is a moron, pretty much like you. Wilson stood up to Saddam Hussein himself: Bush put an Army between himself and the man, and then went after Wilson’s wife.  I’m surprised he doesn’t steal candy from babies. You’re defending, respectively, a coward and a traitor, but that’s par for the course.

Yes, Dana. I remember this article now. I must say, it has several problems. It includes statements whose reasoning appears to be nonsensical, reports statements from members of Bush’s white house uncritically, and makes unsupported allegations against Wilson. It is an altogether unconvincing article.

Unfortunately, Dana chooses to overlook the obvious:

On March 16, 2007, at these hearings about the disclosure, Waxman read a statement about Plame’s CIA career that had been cleared by CIA director Gen. Michael V. Hayden and the CIA, stating that <u>she was undercover and that her employment status with the CIA was classified information prohibited from disclosure under Executive Order 12958. Wilson served in senior management positions at the CIA, in which she oversaw the work of other CIA employees, and in her various positions at the CIA, had faced significant risks to her personal safety and her life</u>.[34]

and, from Fiztgeralds’ press conference when the Libby indictment was announced:

In this case, it’s a lot more serious than baseball. The damage wasn’t to one person. It wasn’t to Valerie Wilson, it was done to all of us. As you sit back, you want to learn why was this information going out? Why were people taking this information about
Valerie Wilson and giving it to reporters? Why did Mr. Libby say what he did? Why did he tell Judith Miller three times? Why did he tell a Press Secretary on Monday? Why
did he tell Mr. Cooper? And was this something where he intended to cause whatever damage was caused or did he intend to do something else? And where are the shades of gray?

And what we have when someone charges obstruction of justice is the umpire gets
sand thrown in his eyes. He’s trying to figure out what happened and somebody blocked their view. As you sit here now and if you’re asking me what his motives
were,  I can’t tell you, we haven’t charged it. So what you were saying is the harm in an obstruction investigation is that it prevents us from making the very fine judgments we want to make.

I also want to take away from the notion that somehow we should take an obstruction charge less seriously than a leak charge. This is a very serious matter
and compromising national security information is a very serious matter. But the need to get to the bottom of what happened and whether national security was compromised by inadvertence, by recklessness, by maliciousness, is extremely important. And we need to know the truth. And anyone who would go into a Grand jury and lie and obstruct and impede the investigation has committed a serious crime.

and, as you may or may not know, Armitage was never accused of leaking the information in order to damage Wilson, which is part of the law that covers the Plame case.

From the article:

Unaware that Ms. Plame’s identity was classified information, Mr. Armitage reportedly passed it along to columnist Robert D. Novak “in an offhand manner, virtually as gossip,” according to a story this week by the Post’s R. Jeffrey Smith, who quoted a former colleague of Mr. Armitage.

It follows that one of the most sensational charges leveled against the Bush White House—that it orchestrated the leak of Ms. Plame’s identity to ruin her career and thus punish Mr. Wilson—is untrue.

This reasoning only makes sense if you uncritically believe the statements of “a former colleague of Armitage”.

Nevertheless, it now appears that the person most responsible for the end of Ms. Plame’s CIA career is Mr. Wilson. Mr. Wilson chose to go public with an explosive charge, claiming—falsely, as it turned out—that he had debunked reports of Iraqi uranium-shopping in Niger and that his report had circulated to senior administration officials. He ought to have expected that both those officials and journalists such as Mr. Novak would ask why a retired ambassador would have been sent on such a mission and that the answer would point to his wife. He diverted responsibility from himself and his false charges by claiming that President Bush’s closest aides had engaged in an illegal conspiracy. It’s unfortunate that so many people took him seriously.

These statements are nonsensical. If Armitage divulged Plame’s name to Novak, and Libby also disclosed her name to unnamed reporters, and then lied about it, how can one blame Wilson for going public with charges while being married to Plame? It makes no sense whatsoever.

If you mine my driveway, and then my wife tries to drive to town and is blown up by a mine, then am I to blame for her death? The reasoning in the article makes no sense. In addition, the writers make other assertions about Wilson which are simply untrue.

However, I’d like to address something you stated earlier:

Even the editors of The Washington Post, not exactly the best of buds with the Bush Administration, concluded that the man most responsible for the exposure of Valerie Wilson’s identity was none other than her own husband, because he had been bandying it around Washington.

Your statement is not supported by the information in the article, which simply accuses Wilson of bringing ruin upon his wife because he should have known—somehow—that Armitage had told Novak of his wife’s identity. This reasoning is bizzarre, but it also does not support your assertion.

Finally, let’s look at the big picture here, a timeline:

1. The Bush administration makes a statement about WMD in Iraq which points to a supposed document from Niger.

2. Wilson writes an editorial which says that this document is a fake.

3. Novak publishes an editorial which reveals the identity of Wilson’s wife, effectively ending her career.

4. It later comes out that individuals within the Bush administration had told Novak Valerie Plame’s identity.

Just looking at the sequence of events, it seems to me that not to suspect the Bush administration of revealing Plame’s identity as revenge, is extremely naive. And, remember, this was an administration which took secretiveness and revenge to new hights, which even Nixon had not achieved.

Just because someone says something to a journalist in “an offhand manner”, as light gossip, doesn’t mean they don’t want the journalist to pick up on it. And if the journalist does pick up on it, the journalist then has the responsibility of figuring out whether that’s information that should be passed on to the public.

If it weren’t so maddening, I’d probably find Dana’s unsullied innocence about the way Washington politics actually works kinda sweet. His complete unwillingness to even consider the possibility that the Plame leak might not have happened totally by accident is almost endearing. Sad, yes, but endearing nonetheless.

As usual, y’all wanmt to believe just so badly that there was a Great Crime here that you ignore the facts. Richard Armitage disclosed Mrs Wilson’s identity to Bob Woodward (not Bob Novak) a month before Mr Wilson’s article was published.  He told Mr Woodward that Mr Wilson was blabbing it to anyone (in government, I suppose) who’d listen.  It’s clear that Mrs Wilson’s CIA connection was gossip status, and was treated so by her own husband, a month before his famous article appeared.

I find this assertion to be very unconvincing. First, according to the article you linked to last night, Armitage did indeed pass Plame’s identity to Robert Novak:

Unaware that Ms. Plame’s identity was classified information, Mr. Armitage reportedly passed it along to columnist Robert D. Novak “in an offhand manner, virtually as gossip,” according to a story this week by the Post’s R. Jeffrey

Second, if Armitage did indeed tell Woodward that Wilson was blabbing his wife’s identity around Washington, what does that really prove? If Armitage did indeed tell Novak Plame’s identity as a form of revenge against her, then it makes sense that Armitage would then try to attack Wilson with more innuendo. A man who wished to attack Wilson through his wife might certainly then try to assassinate Wilson’s character. Actually, why is this even surprising?

You have the insider newspaper saying that this was all blown out of proportion.  You have an independent counsel, specifically charged with finding and prosecuting any crimes that were committed in the exposure of Mrs Wilson’s CIA connection, and he charges absolutely no one with such a crime.

See, this is exactly the problem. When it comes to crimes committed by people in positions of power, the “insiders” are not trustworthy sources.

Dana, could you look at my post at 11:16 PM last night, and tell me if there are specific events on my mini-timeline which you dispute?

That does it.

Ban Dana and any other treason-supporter.  Dana’s nothing more than a misogynistic, homophbic, traitorous drain on this site anyhow.

Dana, just die.  Take a knife to your wrists.  You’re a leech on society and your death would be a benefit.

Shorter Dana: If a Republican says it, it’s true, lalalalala.

But the main job of the CIA is to gather intelligence

Sorry, Phoenician, their main job is to act as the Oval Office’s private army, to do the shit that he doesn’t want to inform his fellow Muricans about so as to harsh their American Exceptionalist buzz. (Goodness, what would Digby and Greenwald do if they had to come to grips with the fact that the CIA has been torturing people since Dubya was just a kid blowing up frogs with firecrackers?) Intelligence gathering is the sideline activity. I mean, really, when an “intelligence” organization is caught by surprise by the collapse of the USSR…is that because of agents being outed? Or is it because they’re a little too busy starting civil wars in Third World countries and assassinating leftists?

This Damian creature is amusing…it takes a real cult member to claim that a typical leftist position is somehow that of a “rightard”. I suppose there is the One True Party, and then there are all the evil enemies who oppose it, plain and simple. But then I see he also is eager to encourage those who argue with him to go kill themselves before he does it himself to avenge this terrible TREASON!!!!! Good to see that even such a pathetic, milquetoast entity as today’s Democratic party is capable of inspiring such loyal foot soldiers.

barking cats

Umm, Amanda? You might want to revise that list a little bit.

I’m not sure our new friend Fugg would even care about any of those unfortunate souls who met their demises in a windowless room with floors that sloped toward the drain in the center, since they were aiding and abetting the world’s biggest criminal organization. Perhaps he would argue that they got what they deserve.

Oh, for the love of Osiris. When you get done sniffling into your hankie for all those fallen heroes, put down your copy of Syriana and go pick up some basic history.

Armitage: Everybody knows it.

Woodward: Everyone knows?

Armitage: Yeah. And they know ’cause Joe Wilson’s been calling everybody. He’s pissed off ’cause he was designated as a low level guy went out to look at it. So he’s all pissed off.

Dana, do you have any clue as to whom guys Armitage and Woodward are referring when they talk about “everybody”? Hint: it isn’t the entire circulation of the Bob Novak’s column, and it isn’t you or me, either. It isn’t even the population of people who work inside the Beltway, although that starts to narrow things down.

Armitage’s mistake in this case was assuming that Novak was as trustworthy and discreet as Woodward (not only a journalist who known for respecting his source’s wishes, but also is a former ONI officer) instead of a Bush administration toady who was happy to break that kind of confidence in the political service of his masters.

Or do you think that exposing a NOC CIA agent (and in turn her network and cover organisation) is something that should take place in mainstream media outlets? Whatever we maythink of Fugg’s opinion of the CIA, there’s no doubt that he’d give a straighter answer to that question than you would.

Dana-

Why should anyone believe Armitage was telling the truth when he said Wilson was bragging about his wife being a NOC?

Sorry to be such a tardy follower-up, but:

Paul, when the independent prosecutor had confessions from two men that they had disclosed Mrs Wilson’s identity—meaning: if it was a crime, he already had all the proof he needed—and he still did not charge either of them with the crime of disclosing Mrs Wilson’s identity, it’s hard to (reasonably) hold that a crime was committed.

One question, Dana: did either or both of those two men choose to disclose Ms. Plame’s/Mrs. Wilson’s identity to millions and millions of people by advertising it in the papers?  Because it seems to me that that was the real faux pas.

Dana:

So, you accept the timeline but wish to add a new point between 1 and 2, Richard Armitage telling Bob Woodward about Valerie Plame.

Finally, let’s look at the big picture here, a timeline:

1. The Bush administration makes a statement about WMD in Iraq which points to a supposed document from Niger.

More accurately, President Bush referred to what British intyelligence thought.  Our own CIA dismissed the document as false.

At this point we need to add a timeline point: Richard Armitage tells Bob Woodward that Joe Wilson was sent to Niger, and that Mr Wilson’s wife works for the CIA.  This is about a month before Mr Wilson’s article is published.

2. Wilson writes an editorial which says that this document is a fake.

3. Novak publishes an editorial which reveals the identity of Wilson’s wife, effectively ending her career.

4. It later comes out that individuals within the Bush administration had told Novak Valerie Plame’s identity.

But frankly, this doesn’t mean much. First of all, unless Woodward gave the information to Novak right after getting it from Armitage, then this event was not the source of Novak’s info anyway. Second, who says that this event actually happened when Armitage and Woodward say it did? Armitage would undoubtedly lie to protect Bush’s administration, and Woodward might lie, or just as easily be tricked.

From the article you linked to the night before last:

He [Armitage] was a political rival of the White House and Pentagon officials who championed the war and whom Mr. Wilson accused of twisting intelligence about Iraq and then plotting to destroy him. Unaware that Ms. Plame’s identity was classified information, Mr. Armitage reportedly passed it along to columnist Robert D. Novak “in an offhand manner, virtually as gossip,” according to a story this week by the Post’s R. Jeffrey

The article gets the first part wrong… Armitage is actually a neoconservative true believer, who is no stranger to conspiracies, lying to the public, and political retribution. The source of the second part of that paragraph is sourced by “R. Jeffrey”, but who did Jeffrey get the info from? Probably Armitage or Woodward, the people I don’t trust in the first place.

You have to ask: how did Mr Cheney or his staff know that Valerie Wilson was the wife of Joseph Wilson, if her cover was maintained so secretly by the CIA?

The only thing I can say is, c’mon dude.

More accurately, President Bush referred to what British intyelligence thought.  Our own CIA dismissed the document as false.

The idea that Bush cared about intelligence from the CIA, MI5, or any other agency is completely absurd. Bush had already decided to attack Iraq in July 2002, and probably earlier. Furthermore, Bush’s administration had created a new governmental agency whose only purpose was to propagandize for attacking Iraq. Bush’s recent statements about ‘intelligence’ are just a dishonest and truly disgusting way of holding himself blameless for his own actions.

Mr Novak stated that he had no idea that Mrs Wilson’s CIA employment was supposed to be a secret

A NOC agent? Are you kidding me? Teenagers who read Tom Clancy thrillers understand that one. And please, don’t insult our intelligence by blaming it on the brain tumour.

Mr Armitage made the same claim.

Again, I refer you to my definition of “everybody” in Armitage’s world.

You might be able to blame Mr Armitage for spreading gossip without checking

I blame Armitage for trusting Novak, a known toady of people Armitage apparently has no respect for (at least when it comes to national security matters).

Mr Novak and Mr Woodward are journalists, and pretty much expects that information they’re given by officials can be used.

I was a journalist, too, and know the rules when it comes to working with and cultivating sources. Do you realyl think Woodward sat on the revelation simply because he wasn’t up for yet another dramatic “scoop”?

Armitage assumed both Novak and Woodward were trustworthy members of his “everybody” club and would A) treat it as personal “access journalist” gossip, not for publication and B) understand that exposing NOC agents costs lives.

And since (as predicted) you weren’t willing to give a straight answer to my question, the closest I can guess from the rest of your response is “yes—as long as she’s a political opponent of the GOP.”

I blame Armitage for trusting Novak, a known toady of people Armitage apparently has no respect for (at least when it comes to national security matters).

This assertion, that Armitage was opposed to the national security policies of the Bush administration, is apparently quite false as well:

Armitage was a member of the “Project for the New American Century”, an influential Neoconservative think tank. PNAC had been calling for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein since at least 1998.

Armitage helped tutor Bush on foreign policy 1998-1999.

Armitage helped argue for attacking Iraq, because of the wealth of oil available there.