The Other Side of the Rove Story

[Reuben Gant]

I'd like to know who Judith Miller is hiding.  Not to play conspiracy theorist but if Wilson and Plame knew the truth was coming out about his trip, his "whistleblowing" column, and how he got his job (his wife abusing her job) - they might've both been in a lot of trouble.  Something to think about.  I still don't see reporters going to the mattresses for Karl Rove.

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Editor and Publisher on Miller:

 

What was Judith up to?

[Terry Tate]

Editor and Publisher on Miller:

 

What was Judith up to?

Now that was an interesting take on it; thanks for the link. It does reinforce an argument I posted about last week, that Judith Miller's case would not be helped if there were a federal shield law in place for reporters.

 

Wonder how many more new threads there will be on this topic during the months it takes for the actual truth to come out? It's becoming the Travis Henry trade of PPP.

[Mickey]

And your sources are bastions of impartiality?

The Nation

MSNBC

Newsweek

CNN

LA Times

 

Sure as hell aren't slanted to the right.

 

What don't you understand?

Her cover was blown by Ames in the 90s. She was an analyst behind a desk for about 10 years. The law states that he had to KNOWINGLY expose a covert agent  within 5 years of them not being covert any more. Mickey, I think you are a lawyer. Have you read the law?

Everybody in the DC social circles they were in knew she worked at the CIA, she would tell people that at cocktail parties. Rove warned the Newsweek guy that if he submitted the story he had, that the VP sent Wilson, it would blow up in his face and that it was likely his wife, Plame. who got him the assignment.  Rove did not break any laws. Period.

 

All this is a case of the lefties thinking they have something on the "Dr. Strangelove" of the Bush administration  and wanting to desperately win at anything. Anything!

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The sources are the people quoted in the stories, not the reporters themselves. Those sources included:

 

Ray McGovern, former CIA analyst

Larry Johnson, former CIA analyst

Mel Goodman, former CIA analyst

Jim Marcinkowski, former CIA case officer

Vincent Cannistraro, former CIA counterterrorism operations chief

Numerous anonymous intelligence officials

 

Now, if you have some reason to believe that they were misquoted by the media outlets you feel are biased, that the papers lied about what they said, share it with us.

 

I have no idea if Karl Rove broke the law, that is for the Special Prosecutor and the grand jury to figure out. Whether he did something despicable, regardless of whether it was a crime or not, is a different question. You and others on the right keep repeating the same list of excuses as to why this isn't a problem, most of which, like the notion that she was not a covert agent are easily disproved. Frankly, most of them came out and were abandoned in embarassment back when the story first broke in 2003.

 

"Everybody in the DC social circles they were in knew she worked at the CIA" I'd like to hear the proof on that one. The talking points being widely distributed by GOP spin central to fire up the noise machine don't even make that claim (see RNC Talking Points aka "Slime Script" Strange that Mel Goodman was at the CIA for 24 years and was also a friend of Wilson's and all that time he did not know she was a covert agent. I guess he just doesn't go to many cocktail parties.

 

In early 2002, Valerie Plame was an officer in the Directorate of Operations of the CIA task force on counter-proliferation, dealing with weapons of mass destruction, including Saddam's WMD programs. At that time, as she had been for almost two decades, she was an undercover operative. After training at "The Farm," the CIA's school for clandestine agents, she became what the agency considers among its most valuable and dangerous operatives -- a NOC, or someone who works under non-official cover. NOCs travel without diplomatic passports, so if they are captured as spies they have no immunity and can potentially be executed. As a NOC, Plame helped set up a front company, Brewster-Jennings, whose cover has now been blown and whose agents and contacts may be in danger still.

 

But it doesn't matter. Why is it so terribly inconceivable that the President's hatchet man and every President has one, would toast a team player for speaking out of turn with a leak figuring he would never, ever be revealed as the source?

[Reuben Gant]

Now that was an interesting take on it; thanks for the link. It does reinforce an argument I posted about last week, that Judith Miller's case would not be helped if there were a federal shield law in place for reporters.

 

Wonder how many more new threads there will be on this topic during the months it takes for the actual truth to come out? It's becoming the Travis Henry trade of PPP.

382149[/snapback]

It aint going away, but like any good story, it has all the

inbuilt tensions. Was it Revenge, Incompetence, Partisan,

Innocent, and is Miller a hero protecting the the rights of

a free press, or a coniving wench. Also, the CIA is mysterious

to many and it all is in the context of an election and a war.

This is sticking around a while.

[SilverNRed]

Editor and Publisher on Miller:

 

What was Judith up to?

382136[/snapback]

Slightly slanted article ("neo-conservative gossip"?) but pretty good overall.

 

I like this part:

A novel theme emerging in some press coverage of the Plame case raises the possibility of unnamed journalists being participants in a potential crime, and not just witnesses. Carol Leonnig of The Washington Post wrote on July 6: "Sources close to the investigation say there is evidence in some instances that some reporters may have told government officials -- not the other way around --that Wilson was married to Plame, a CIA employee."

 

Richard Schmitt wrote in the Los Angeles Times of July 9: "It appears clear that one possibility pursued by Fitzgerald is whether a journalist started a chain of conversations about Plame between reporters and White House officials."

 

This idea was first raised by me in an E&P column of April 7, based on conversations with legal sources, in which I suggested, among other scenarios, that Miller basically was a "carrier," around Washington, of the rumor about Plame's real identity, but not a reporter actively covering a story. She was "both a source for, and a witness to, disclosure by sources of Plame's identity."

If there are 'carriers' then it's just not that much of a secret, sadly.

 

And this part is nothing short of hilarious:

This was just one of her error-ridden contributions to the cause of invasion. Demonstrating a singular lack of propriety, one of the most insensitive comments of the past week came from Miller herself when she told the judge after he sentenced her to jail: if U.S. troops could risk death in Iraq, "surely, I can face prison to defend a free press."

Yeah, reporters aren't narcissistic.

[blzrul]

It aint going away, but like any good story, it has all the

inbuilt tensions. Was it Revenge, Incompetence, Partisan,

Innocent, and is Miller a hero protecting the the rights of

a free press, or a coniving wench. Also, the CIA is mysterious

to many and it all is in the context of an election and a war.

This is sticking around a while.

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And the CIA has been thrown under the bus by the administration over 9/11...maybe deservedly, but they are an entity unto themselves...

[SilverNRed]

It aint going away, but like any good story, it has all the

inbuilt tensions. Was it Revenge, Incompetence, Partisan,

Innocent, and is Miller a hero protecting the the rights of

a free press, or a coniving wench. Also, the CIA is mysterious

to many and it all is in the context of an election and a war.

This is sticking around a while.

382155[/snapback]

I can't decide if it's a better or worse story than the missing blonde girl in Aruba (who wouldn't be a story if she was overweight).

 

At least it gives Chris Matthews something to yell at people about.....

[Wacka]

I keep repeating this because some of you don't seem to get this simple point:

 

Even if she WAS this super spy, she hasn't been one for about 10 years. It is not against the law to KNOWINGLY disclose that someone was a covert agent after 5 years after they were no longer a covert agent. Did anyone read the e-mail from the reporter to his boss. It shows that Rove did nothing wrong.

 

 

It is so funny watching the left flop around like a fish out of water.

[Kelly the Dog]

I keep repeating this because some of you don't seem to get this simple point:

 

Even if she WAS this super spy, she hasn't been one for about 10 years. It is not against the law to KNOWINGLY disclose that someone was a covert agent  after 5 years after they were no longer a covert agent. Did anyone read the e-mail from the reporter to his boss. It shows that Rove did nothing wrong.

It is so funny watching the left flop around like a fish out of water.

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NBC and other news sources have been reporting tonight that yes, indeed, she was most definitely a covert agent in the last five years. The argument is whether she was in fact stationed overseas during any of the last five years. She was definitely stationed overseas as an covert agent six years before the leak came out (1997). They are also discussing whether or not the law would cover agents that were not living overseas but were still agents there, which is apparently the case here.

 

Some of the people responsible for making the law itself in the 80s are saying no, this should not count, this is not what we meant (meaning the agents had to be living overseas). But that, apparently, is not really the arbitor or final say. It is how a prosecutor or judge would interupt how the law reads.

 

As funny as it seems to you that the left is flopping around, is easily surpassed by how ridiculous you look acting like you know whether or not Valerie Plame was a covert agent or not. You have no idea. Nor do I. You have no idea if a crime was committed, nor do I. I don't think a crime was committed, just a sleazeball move. But I don't know. It is fun to discuss and make conjectures about it, but your posts on this have been acting as if this is all facts, and it's simply not. We will soon find out.

[Wacka]

Look what I found:

 

Drafter of intel statute: Rove accusers ignorant

 

Also check out the CNN transcripts. Wolf Blitzer interviewed Wilson today.

 

 

Flop, flop.

[Live&DieBillsFootball]

Look what I found:

 

Drafter of intel statute: Rove accusers ignorant

 

Also check out the CNN transcripts. Wolf Blitzer interviewed Wilson today.

Flop, flop.

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Did you see what else www.worldnetdaily.com had articles about today? Here's one from the same page:

 

Bigfoot spotted in Yukon

 

Maybe tomorrow they can tell us the truth about the Easter Bunny or Tooth Fairy.

[Wacka]

More truth:

 

AP Story

 

Flop, flop...water!

[SilverNRed]

More truth:

 

AP Story

 

Flop, flop...water!

382229[/snapback]

From that link:

 

In an interview on CNN Thursday before the latest revelation, Wilson kept up his criticism of the White House, saying Rove's conduct was an "outrageous abuse of power ... certainly worthy of frog-marching out of the White House."

 

But at the same time, Wilson acknowledged his wife was no longer in an undercover job at the time Novak's column first identified her. "My wife was not a clandestine officer the day that Bob Novak blew her identity," he said.

Joe Wilson is such a piece of crap. If he really cared about his wife's "identity," maybe he wouldn't have her getting him jobs he wasn't qualified for so that he could turn in fradulent reports from Niger that he would later "blow the whistle on."

 

EDIT: Is Valerie Plame using her job to send Joey Boy on that trip also considered "outrageous abuse of power" by the Wilsons, or is that OK?

[SilverNRed]

Look what I found:

 

Drafter of intel statute: Rove accusers ignorant

 

Also check out the CNN transcripts. Wolf Blitzer interviewed Wilson today.

Flop, flop.

382217[/snapback]

BTW, I never get sick of seeing Wilson and Plame posing for photos in Vanity Fair.

[Live&DieBillsFootball]

The person, who works in the legal profession and spoke only on condition of anonymity because of grand jury secrecy, told The Associated Press that Rove testified last year that he remembers specifically being told by columnist Robert Novak that Valerie Plame, the wife of a harsh Iraq war critic, worked for the CIA.

 

Isn't it a crime to divulge grand jury testimony? The Associated Press may be forced to disclose who leaked it or go to jail. Boy, this thing may go on forever.

[SilverNRed]

From today's Washington Times:

 

Link

 

A former CIA covert agent who supervised Mrs. Plame early in her career yesterday took issue with her identification as an "undercover agent," saying that she worked for more than five years at the agency's headquarters in Langley and that most of her neighbors and friends knew that she was a CIA employee.

    "She made no bones about the fact that she was an agency employee and her husband was a diplomat," Fred Rustmann, a covert agent from 1966 to 1990, told The Washington Times.

    "Her neighbors knew this, her friends knew this, his friends knew this. A lot of blame could be put on to central cover staff and the agency because they weren't minding the store here. ... The agency never changed her cover status."

    Mr. Rustmann, who spent 20 of his 24 years in the agency under "nonofficial cover" -- also known as a NOC, the same status as the wife of Mr. Wilson -- also said that she worked under extremely light cover.

[RI Bills Fan]

Just when I think this story cannot possibly become any more convoluted or inane, Karl Rove's attourney releases a statement - confirming what many on the right have long suspected but couldn't prove, Washington's version of truth is indeed stranger than any possible Liberal Fiction - saying that Robert Novak was Rove's Source for information about Valerie Plame.

 

We all had it backwards. Gov't insiders don't blab to reporters. Reporters balb to Gov't insiders!

[Reuben Gant]

Just when I think this story cannot possibly become any more convoluted or inane, Karl Rove's attourney releases a statement - confirming what many on the right have long suspected but couldn't prove, Washington's version of truth is indeed stranger than any possible Liberal Fiction - saying that Robert Novak was Rove's Source for information about Valerie Plame.

 

We all had it backwards. Gov't insiders don't blab to reporters. Reporters balb to Gov't insiders!     

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It would be truly weird if they cite each other as sources.

Novak said his sources were two "high level" administration officials.

Maybe they played chinese whispers until they came up with her name.

[Crap Throwing Monkey]

It would be truly weird if they cite each other as sources.

382596[/snapback]

 

Scary thing is...I could totally believe that happened.

 

And then, of course, we'd have Judith Miller sitting in jail asking herself "Well, then, if these two knuckleheads cited each other, just who the !@#$ am I protecting?"

[Reuben Gant]

Scary thing is...I could totally believe that happened.

 

And then, of course, we'd have Judith Miller sitting in jail asking herself "Well, then, if these two knuckleheads cited each other, just who the !@#$ am I protecting?" 

382698[/snapback]

stranger than fiction.