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| 2005/7/18 [Politics/Domestic/911, Politics/Domestic/President/Bush] UID:38681 Activity:very high |
7/18 http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/09/29/novak.cia http://www.townhall.com/columnists/robertnovak/rn20031001.shtml Above is the original http://CNN.com story and Novak's follow-up column from two years ago. If we assume that Rove, Libby, et al. are all innocent, it would appear that the main people to blame are Novak and his unofficial CIA source. Novak said, "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 operators". This is technically not true -- Plame was a NOC. The view of Novak's unofficial CIA source was that Plame worked in the U.S. most of the time as an analyst, and that Plame was also well known in Washington (probably gossipped about on the "cocktail circuit" as Joe Wilson's hot wife the CIA agent), so she therefore wasn't covert. This was a mistake by Novak and his CIA source, even with all of Novak's excuses, since the CIA did erect an entire front company for Plame and the _official_ CIA source told him not to use her name. Novak considerably broadened the number of people who knew of Valerie Plame the CIA agent: from people on the DC cocktail circuit, to anyone interested in the WMD controversy in Iraq -- which means a whole lot of people on the left and right. Again, I am assuming Rove, Libby, et al. are all innocent. (I am purposely going to ignore the http://CNN.com story's lead sentence: "while [Novak] learned the identity of a CIA operative from administration officials, there was 'no great crime' and that he was not the recipient of a planned leak".) \_ The public ain't buying it: http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/PollVault/story?id=949950 \_ What does the poll have to do with the post? \_ Where is it proven that Plame was NOC at the time (or recently)? The Washington Times says that she was "outed" a decade ago: http://washingtontimes.com/national/20040722-115439-4033r.htm \_ The Washington Times is a mouthpiece for the GOP. \_ It can't be proven (by anyone here), but when the CIA asks the DoJ to launch a criminal investigation, I defer to their knowledge of the situation. And, really, washington times? \_ Oh shut the fuck up. \_ You think WT is a reputable news source? Leave now. \_ This is the same CIA that said there was WMD in Iraq? And did you defer to their knowledge then? \_ We don't know what the CIA said about Iraq's WMD. We know what the President said they said. And the inquiry into that transaction, which was supposed to happen, still hasn't. \_ I'm not the guy you're reponding to, but Duelfer's report pretty much says the CIA screwed it all up. There was also supposed to be an investigation into how the Administration used the CIA's screwed up intelligence, but that investigation didn't happen. \_ The President deferred to the CIA's judgment that WMDs were in Iraq, or at least, that's what the story is. \_ Please read the sentence, "Novak considerably broadened ..." \_ Which adds nothing. Where is it factually stated that Plame was NOC at any recent time before Novak's column? \_ It's likely not. It would be dangerous and possibly illegal to state that openly. See Blitzer's interview with Wilson. \_ No, it responds to the statement, "says that she was 'outed' a decade ago". As for "proven", it's not yet proven, but the preponderance of evidence is that it is so. This is addressed in my second post beginning, "The CIA's asking ..." later in this thread. \_ The Washington Times says Reverend Moon can cure teh gay. Ah, the joys of owning your own paper. \_ How do you know he can't? \_ It's likely not. It would be illegal to state that openly. See Blitzer's interview with Wilson. \_ 'Cos the first three mass weddings didn't stick. \_ sfchron response to this claim: "But the CIA didn't hesitate to forward the leak allegation to the Justice Department for possible prosecution. She operated a front company based in Boston and sometimes traveled overseas posing as a private energy analyst, yet she also had a desk at CIA's Langley headquarters. Some fellow agents who knew her as Val P. in training recall her proficiency with foreign languages and an AK-47, but she said her work as a spy was unknown to friends and neighbors." http://csua.org/u/cqu \_ Oh yeah, sfchron. That settles that argument. \_ Washington Times and NY Post have long, well-earned reputations for being rags. The SF Chron has a horrible writing style (and I hate it), but no one questions their journalistic integrity. \_ What? No one questions the SFComical's journalistic integrity? The other two have well-earned reputations as rags? I've barely read the NYP or WT but I've read the SFComical for years. Who exactly are these people that share this 'commonly accepted public perception' with you? Is there some web page I can find somewhere? thanks! \_ Yeah, uh, that's pretty funny. SF Chron is even worse than the LA "we only dig dirt on republican candidates" Times. -- ilyas \_ On what do you base this criticism of the L.A. Times? \_ LA Times went on record when Davis was running for governor saying they don't dig dirt on governor candidates. However, they sent most of their reporters to dig dirt on Arnold during the recall. This was a fairly big issue in LA at the time. -- ilyas \_ Can you find the URL? Even without the URL, I can tell you that what probably happened was that Davis's faults were all self-evident (look at the damn budget deficit), while Ahnold's escapades were all plausiably deniable ("oh, escapades were all plausibly deniable ("oh, it's all gossip and probably just happened when he was young and defining himself, and even if it were true, hey, it's Ahnold!"), so they sought to make his groping more evident to voters ("Yes, you are really electing someone who at the very least is a groper.") -L.A. resident and frequent L.A. Times reader who voted for Arnold anyway who voted for Arnold anyway, and will vote Ahnold out at the next opportunity since his performance has not been adequate (please don't ask me to compare to Davis -- it's like different varieties of "bad") \_ Does the blatant hypocrisy of that paper not bother you one bit, or do you just not believe me? -- ilyas \_ When the topic is Ahnold's groping, my opinion is that they did the right thing. Like I wrote before, Davis's faults were plain to all voters. Yes, I voted for someone I was pretty sure was a groper, and I knew that at the time I voted. I did so because Davis's failures could not be excused. When the topic is "blatant hypocrisy of that paper" in general, I dispute that there is a "blatant hypocrisy", but put the L.A. Times at the high-end of professional journalism. I consider myself a voracious consumer of all major Internet-accessible news outlets and referenced original sources (cia.gov) for the last five or so years. I've also been paying attention to the left- and right-wing blogs and forums. I, like Bill O'Reilly says he does, call things as I see them, preferring to identify things as accurate or inaccurate portrayals of the truth of the matter rather than "left-wing" or "right-wing". Of course, I could be totally wrong about the L.A. Times, just like I think O'Reilly doesn't get it right in many fundamental ways, but at that point it's just a matter of how solid your argument and facts are versus the other person's. \_ I think there are multiple levels of hypocrisy here. That LA Times covered Arnold's faults but not Davis' at the time of the recall is one problem (that Davis' faults were 'plain to see' is not really an excuse for a paper). But LA Times also did not dig dirt on Davis when Davis himself was running for office! And more, they claimed it was a matter of policy for them not to. The violation of their own stated policy is also hypocritical. -- ilyas \_ My contention is that Davis's problems had been well publicized, which made them widely acknowledged. They already dumped a shitload on Davis -- they just hadn't done so on Ahnold yet. Anyways, can you find the URLs? I occasionally find myself blaming a news outlet for some apparent problem but later realize that I misread what was written. \_ They were never plain to me. What were they, in your eyes? --scotsman \_ $x billion budget deficit, I forgot whether x was 21 or 40. I assume that was why Davis was voted out in such a big way -- that other people saw this ... \_ The important person here is former LA Times reporter Jill Stewart. See for instance: http://www.jillstewart.net/php/issues/issue1014.php -- ilyas \_ Thanks. I was reading that exact URL between when you posted Jill's name and when you posted the URL. This sums up my argument though: The L.A. Times staff has a bias against gropers being elected governor of California. This bias is excusable in my book. (Also, I know this undercuts my position, but I had been pretty pissed about the groping articles coming out two weeks for the election, but I've since changed my mind.) \_ Your links says: "Mrs. Plame's identity as an undercover CIA officer was first disclosed to Russia in the mid-1990s by a Moscow spy" Umm... Russia intelligence may know about or have guesses about a great number of our secret operatives, as we likely have similar knowledge or guesses of theirs. Neither party knowing that information is the same as "public knowledge." \_ Please read the sentence, "Novak considerably broadened ..." \_ The CIA's asking the DoJ to conduct a criminal investigation is the strongest evidence that Plame was NOC at the time. C'mon -- you have a special prosecutor, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, bugging Dubya, Cheney, Rove, and Libby after all. Here is a non-anonymous column written by a former CIA agent: http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/7/13/04720/9340 "A few of my classmates, and Valerie was one of these, became a non-official cover officer. That meant she agreed to operate overseas without the protection of a diplomatic passport. If caught in that status she would have been executed." This is weaker than the fact there is an investigation going on now, but stronger than as if it had come from an anoymous author. \_ You know, Johnson was doing well until he started bashing Bush. \_ Let's ignore what Johnson wrote about Bush and focus on the topic at hand: What do you think about the truth of the claim (that Plame was NOC for a while and was still NOC when Novak published his column) itself? Do consider that there is an ongoing investigation with a grand jury and testimony from VIPs taking place right now. \_ Well, should I ignore what Johnson wrote about Plume's NOC status also? Are Johnson's claims re Plume credible after his partisan rant? Do I trust the CIA to know more about its employees than about Iraq? Is the CIA Justice referral more motivated by politics? My answers: yes, no, yes, don't know. \_ While you answered four questions you volunteered yourself, you forgot to answer the question that's the topic at hand in this particular thread: "What do you think about the truth of the claim (that Plame was NOC for a while and was still NOC when Novak published his column) itself? Do consider that there is an ongoing investigation with a grand jury and testimony from VIPs taking place right now." \_ What's the evidence that she was or wasn't a NOC at the time? \_ Search this thread for "strongest evidence". It's in the post right before you say, "You know, Johnson was doing well until he started bashing Bush." \_ And I asked "Is the CIA Justice referral more motivated by politics?". "Don't know," I answered. BTW, I see that you are abandoning Johnson whom you were originally touting as evidence. \_ Ah, but Novak called her an "operative" in his column two years ago. Now he claims he just knew she was an "analyst." If so, why did he call her an operative, when he good and well knows the difference. Novak is lying to try and cover for Rove. http://csua.org/u/cr2 |
| 5/25 |
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| www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/09/29/novak.cia -> www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/09/29/novak.cia/ WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Newspaper columnist and CNN co-host Robert Novak said Monday that while he learned the identity of a CIA operative from admin istration officials, there was "no great crime" and that he was not the recipient of a planned leak. Novak, a nationally syndicated columnist who writes for the Chicago Sun-T imes and co-host of CNN's "Crossfire," said he learned of Valerie Plame' s identity as he was preparing a column to be published July 14. That column looked at the role of Plame's husband, former Ambassador Joe Wilson, in investigating claims about Iraq's nuclear ambitions -- specif ically reports that Iraq had tried to buy uranium ore in Niger and elsew here in Africa. President Bush made the assertion in his 2003 State of the Union address as part of the rationale for going to war, attributing the report to Bri tish intelligence. The information was later discredited as being based at least in part on forged documents, and the White House has since back ed off the statement. Wilson, who was acting US ambassador to Iraq just before the Persian Gu lf War of 1991, alleges White House officials revealed his wife's identi ty to Novak in retaliation for his exposing flaws in prewar intelligence on Iraq. "Nobody in the Bush administration called me to leak this," Novak said on "Crossfire." Novak said Monday that he was working on the column when a senior adminis tration official told him the CIA asked Wilson to go to Niger in early 2 002 at the suggestion of his wife, whom the source described as "a CIA e mployee working on weapons of mass destruction." Another senior administration official gave him the same information, Nov ak said, and the CIA confirmed her involvement in her husband's mission. In his column, Novak attributed the information about Plame's involvement in Wilson's trip to Africa to two unnamed senior administration officia ls. "They asked me not to use her name, but never indicated it would endanger her or anybody else. Wilson was an analyst, not a spy, not a covert operative and not in ch arge of undercover operators," Novak said. The Washington Post quoted a "senior administration official" in a story Sunday as saying that two top White House officials disclosed the identi ty of Wilson's wife in calls to at least six Washington journalists. Nov ak was the only recipient of the information who published it, the Post reported. Wilson at one point suggested that senior Bush adviser Karl Rove could ha ve been behind the leak, which the White House denied. He backed off tha t assertion somewhat Monday, accusing Rove of at least condoning it. Wilson described the leak as a punitive move, noting that Novak's column appeared one week after he had written an op-ed article in The New York Times that was critical of the administration's handling of intelligence on Iraq. "I think it comes out of the White House political office," Wilson said. Novak said Monday that he will not reveal the names of his sources. Novak also contacted Wilson for the column and was told, "I will not answ er any question about my wife," according to a quotation Novak used in t he column. Wilson disputed that in an interview Monday night on CNN's "Paula Zahn No w" "Bob Novak called me before he went to print with the report and he said a CIA source had told him that my wife was an operative," Wilson said. Wilson said he called Novak after the article appeared citing sources in the Bush administration. The Wh ite House has said it will cooperate with the investigation. According to the Intelligence Iden tities Protection Act of 1982, a federal employee with access to classif ied information who is convicted of making an unauthorized disclosure ab out a covert agent faces up to 10 years in prison and as much as $50,000 in fines. |
| www.townhall.com/columnists/robertnovak/rn20031001.shtml My role and the role of the Bush White House have been distorted and need explanation. The leak now under Justice Department investigation is described by former Ambassador Wilson and critics of President Bushs Iraq policy as a reprehensible effort to silence them. To protect my own integrity and credibility, I would like to stress three points. Second, the CIA never warned me that the disclosure of Wilsons wife working at the agency would endanger her or anybody else. The current Justice investigation stems from a routine, mandated probe of all CIA leaks, but follows weeks of agitation. Wilson, after telling me in July that he would say nothing about his wife, has made investigation of the leak his lifes work - aided by the relentless Sen. These efforts cannot be separated from the massive political assault on President Bush. This story began July 6 when Wilson went public and identified himself as the retired diplomat who had reported negatively to the CIA in 2002 on alleged Iraq efforts to buy uranium yellowcake from Niger. I was curious why a high-ranking official in President Bill Clintons National Security Council NSC was given this assignment. Wilson had become a vocal opponent of President Bushs policies in Iraq after contributing to Al Gore in the last election cycle and John Kerry in this one. During a long conversation with a senior administration official, I asked why Wilson was assigned the mission to Niger. He said Wilson had been sent by the CIAs counterproliferation section at the suggestion of one of its employees, his wife. It was an offhand revelation from this official, who is no partisan gunslinger. When I called another official for confirmation, he said: Oh, you know about it. 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. At the CIA, the official designated to talk to me denied that Wilsons wife had inspired his selection but said she was delegated to request his help. He asked me not to use her name, saying she probably never again will be given a foreign assignment but that exposure of her name might cause difficulties if she travels abroad. He never suggested to me that Wilsons wife or anybody else would be endangered. 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. It was well known around Washington that Wilsons wife worked for the CIA. Republican activist Clifford May wrote Monday , in National Review Online, that he had been told of her identity by a non-government source before my column appeared and that it was common knowledge. Her name, Valerie Plame, was no secret either, appearing in Wilsons Whos Who in America entry. I regret that I referred to her in my column as an operative, a word I have lavished on hack politicians for more than 40 years. While the CIA refuses to publicly define her status, the official contact says she is covered - working under the guise of another agency. However, an unofficial source at the Agency says she has been an analyst, not in covert operations. The Justice Department investigation was not requested by CIA Director George Tenet. Any leak of classified information is routinely passed by the Agency to Justice, averaging one a week. This investigative request was made in July shortly after the column was published. |
| abcnews.go.com/Politics/PollVault/story?id=949950 July 18, 2005 Just a quarter of Americans think the White House is fully cooperating i n the federal investigation of the leak of a CIA operative's identity, a number that's declined sharply since the investigation began. And three -quarters say that if presidential adviser Karl Rove was responsible for leaking classified information, it should cost him his job. Skepticism about the administration's cooperation has jumped. As the init ial investigation began in September 2003, nearly half the public, 47 pe rcent, believed the White House was fully cooperating. That fell to 39 p ercent a few weeks later, and it's lower still, 25 percent, in this new ABC News poll. The Note: When the Dog Bites This view is highly partisan; barely over a tenth of Democrats and just a quarter of independents think the White House is fully cooperating. Tha t grows to 47 percent of Republicans much higher, but still under half in the president's own party. And doubt about the administration's coop eration has grown as much among Republicans by 22 points since Septemb er 2003 as it has among others. There's less division on consequences: 75 percent say Rove should lose hi s job if the investigation finds he leaked classified information. That includes sizable majorities of Republicans, independents and Democrats a like 71, 74 and 83 percent, respectively. At the same time, in September 2003 more Americans 91 percent said so meone who leaked classified information should be fired. The question at that time did not identify Rove, the White House deputy chief of staff and one of George W Bush's closest advisers, as the possible source of the information. Should Karl Rove Be Fired If He Leaked Classified Information? Yes No All 75% 15% Republicans 71 17 Independents 74 17 Democrats 83 12 A Time magazine reporter, Matthew Cooper, said this weekend that Rove tol d him that the wife of a former ambassador was a CIA officer, without gi ving her name. Cooper testified last week before the grand jury investig ating the matter, saying his source had released him to do so. Bush today appeared to raise the bar on a dismissable offense, saying he' d fire anyone who committed a crime. Previously the administration said anyone who'd disclosed the CIA agent's identify would be removed, withou t specifying a criminal act. Miller This poll finds majority support for another reporter, Judith Miller of T he New York Times, who's gone to jail rather than disclose her confident ial source in the case. Sixty percent say she's done the right thing, ra nging from 49 percent of Republicans to about two-thirds of Democrats an d independents. That view comports with an ABC News/Washington Post poll in May that foun d majority support for the use of confidential sources by news reporters 53 percent in general, rising to 65 percent if it's the only way to g et an important story. Serious The leak investigation is seen as a meaningful issue: About three-quarter s call it a serious matter, and just over four in 10 see it as "very" se rious. These are down slightly, however, by five and six points respecti vely, from their level in September 2003. Fifty-three percent are following the issue closely a fairly broad leve l of attention. Those paying close attention (who include about as many Republicans as Democrats) are more likely than others to call it very se rious, to say the White House is not cooperating, to say Rove should be fired if he leaked, and to say Miller is doing the right thing. Methodology This ABC News poll was conducted by telephone July 13-17, 2005, among a r andom national sample of 1,008 adults. Sampling, data collection and tabulation by ICR-Internationa l Communications Research of Media, Pa. |
| washingtontimes.com/national/20040722-115439-4033r.htm The identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame was compromised twice before he r name appeared in a news column that triggered a federal illegal-disclo sure investigation, US officials say. Mrs Plame's identity as an undercover CIA officer was first disclose d to Russia in the mid-1990s by a Moscow spy, said officials who spoke o n the condition of anonymity. In a second compromise, officials said a more recent inadvertent disc losure resulted in references to Mrs Plame in confidential documents se nt by the CIA to the US Interests Section of the Swiss Embassy in Hava na. The documents were supposed to be sealed from the Cuban government, b ut intelligence officials said the Cubans read the classified material a nd learned the secrets contained in them, the officials said. The investigation into who revealed Mrs Plame's identity publicly ha s reached the highest levels of the US government. Mrs Plame is the wife of former US Ambassador Joseph C Wilson IV, a critic of the Bush administration who has accused the president of mi susing intelligence to go to war in Iraq. Mr Wilson also accuses White House officials of deliberately revealing Mrs Plame's name in an effort to discredit him. In 2003, Mr Wilson publicly debunked reports that Iraq was seeking u ranium ore from Niger. Mr Wilson also said his report ruling out the at tempted purchase was ignored. However, recent reports by the Senate Intelligence Committee and the British government have undermined Mr Wilson's charges. The Senate says Mr Wilson's report, contrary to his charges, actually bolstered their view that Iraq was seeking uranium ore from Niger. The British government said it believes intelligence reports obtained by the Joint Intelligence Committee that point to attempts by Saddam Hu ssein's government to buy uranium from Niger. The White House announced last year that it erred in including a stat ement on the attempted ore purchase in Mr Bush's State of the Union spe ech about the Niger-Iraq connection. Mrs Plame's identity first was revealed publicly by Chicago Sun-Time s columnist Robert Novak in a July 14, 2003, column about Mr Wilson's t rip to Niger to investigate reports that Iraq was trying to buy uranium ore for a nuclear-arms program. The Justice Department then began an investigation of the disclosure under the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act, which makes it a crime to knowingly disclose the name of a covert agent. However, officials said the disclosure that Mrs Plame's cover was bl own before the news column undermines the prosecution of the government official who might have revealed the name, officials said. "The law says that to be covered by the act the intelligence communit y has to take steps to affirmatively protect someone's cover," one offic ial said. A second official, however, said the compromises before the news colu mn were not publicized and thus should not affect the investigation of t he Plame matter. |
| csua.org/u/cqu -> www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/07/17/ING17DNJT81.DTL Sunday Insight Renegade ex-CIA agent Philip Agee spent years ripping the masks off fello w secret spies -- hundreds of them. Troubled by US covert activities in Latin America, in the 1970s he wrot e an expose and launched the bimonthly "Covert Action Information Bullet in, " a Who's Who of CIA operatives with detailed biographies. By Agee's estimate, the Agency had 5,000 officers experienced in clandestine oper ations, and he gleefully predicted "it should be possible to identify al most all of those who have worked under diplomatic cover." The CIA was flabbergasted to discover no law against this. But it had a p owerful friend in the next US vice president, a former CIA director. G eorge H W Bush made it his mission to get legislation making it a felo ny to out a covert agent. "I don't care how long I live, I will never fo rgive Philip Agee and those like him who wantonly sacrificed the lives o f intelligence officers, " he said. Its drafters describe it as difficult to violate -- a "dart gun" law nicknamed the "G et Agee Act." It's a safe bet the Bushes never envisioned the law they championed would one day threaten their son's political consigliere -- the man President George W Bush refers to as "Turd Blossom" but the public knows as Karl Rove. A federal grand jury continues probing whether anyone broke the law by le aking, to discredit Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson, that Wilso n's wife was a CIA agent. Despite earlier White House denials, an e-mail from Time magazine reporter Matt Cooper to his bureau chief suggests th at on July 11, 2003, Rove outed Valerie Plame Wilson. Here's the key exc erpt, which Cooper said Rove gave him on super secret background: "it wa s, KR said, wilson's wife, who apparently works at the agency on wmd iss ues who authorized the trip." The trip refers to Wilson's journey to Nig er to see if Iraq was trying to purchase yellowcake uranium. The testimony of others remains secret, so our looking glass is opaque. L egal analysts, including those who drafted the law, said the e-mail isn' t enough to convict Rove. The e-mail doesn't make that clear, although Ro ve himself earlier told reporters that he didn't know her name and didn' t name her. If this sound like Rove is lying, that would depend on what your definition of "is" is. But the CIA didn't hesitate to f orward the leak allegation to the Justice Department for possible prosec ution. She operated a front company based in Boston and sometimes travel ed overseas posing as a private energy analyst, yet she also had a desk at CIA's Langley headquarters. Some fellow agents who knew her as Val P in training recall her proficiency with foreign languages and an AK-47, but she said her work as a spy was unknown to friends and neighbors. Rove didn't know she was a covert agent and thus had no intent to out her . Note that Cooper's e-mail quotes Rove saying she "apparently" works for the agency. Prosecutors would have to prove that Rove knew her status. It's not even clear where Rove learned about her - - from classified material or from another reporter. What evidence lies in eight blank pages cont ained in an earlier ruling in the case, a ruling in which judges decided the alleged crime was sufficiently serious to jail reporters who refuse d to testify about it? It's starting to look like Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald could be pursuing something more than a violation of the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. Political inquiries often lead to wrongs that occurred after the impetus -- perjury, say, or obstruction of justice. |
| www.jillstewart.net/php/issues/issue1014.php Award-winning journalist Jill Stewart is a print, radio and TV political commentator. She launched Capitol Punishment, in January, 2003 following a successful six-year stint with New Times Los Angeles where her talked -about weekly columns examined the power elite of California. In January of 2005 she joined KCAL 9 television in Los Angeles as a political anal yst. com How the Los Angeles Times Really Decided to Publish its Accounts of Women Who Said They Were Groped (Oct 14, 2003) By Jill Stewart Now that the California gubernatorial recall election is over, one debate is still raging--the question of how much bias the Los Angeles Times al lowed into its coverage and polls. I am offering three items below, not my normal "Capitol Punishment" column, exploring this issue. The first item is my response to John Carroll, executive editor of the Lo s Angeles Times. Carroll used his Opinion section t o attack me, Los Angeles Weekly political commentator Bill Bradley, and other commentators who criticized the way the Times has handled itself-- but Carroll did so without actually naming any of us. The second item is an illuminating interview I conducted last week with a longtime, well-respected Timesian who was involved in the Schwarzenegge r probe. This source contacted me after hearing me discuss the Times bia s against Schwarzenegger, and its longtime protection of Davis, on a cab le network. My description of Times bias, this inside source says, "is e xactly how it's been, except it's been three times as bad." The third item is commentary on this controversy which I sought from Dr. Paul Fick, author of the best selling "The Dysfunctional President: Insi de the Mind of Bill Clinton." Fick is an expert on why powerful people b ehave the way they do. He comments on Schwarzenegger's possible mindset and the motives of Carroll and the Los Angeles Times. Item One: My Response to Times Executive Editor John Carroll Carroll's attack on me was partly over my contention that the story could have been published two weeks beforehand, which I was told by employees at the Times who called me out of frustration over how the story was ha ndled. Carroll denies this and says the story was published as soon as i t was done. However, my sources insist that Carroll made conscious decisions that del ayed the story---decisions which a sophisticated journalist such as Carr oll would realize could easily create publication delays that would make it too late for the Schwarzenegger camp to have time to credibly respon d According to two of my sources, the huge team of reporters that Carroll e ventually tapped to dig dirt on Schwarzenegger had plenty of examples to publish their story when they got a tip, late in the game, about a woma n who was allegedly groped. My sources say the woman repeatedly refused to talk to the Times. A lead reporter on the Arnold swat team was assigned to cajole and call the wom an over many days. The story could easily have run without this anonymou s tale, which resembled the stories of other women. But Carroll, obsesse d with piling on more stories even as the clock ran out, pushed onward. The reporter repeatedly pressured the woman for her story. This woman fi nally relented in order to make the journalist stop harassing her, and h er story was added to the pile. Despite the obvious need to get the sex harassment story in the paper wel l before the election so that it would not act as a last-minute and unfa ir smear, another source says that Carroll then made a very conscious de cision to hold back the article while a story about Schwarzenegger's ste roid use was edited (see interview below). The steroids investigative pi ece was a disappointment to editors, this source says, because it did no t portray Schwarzenegger in nearly the horrific light that they had hope d The editor handling both pieces, Joel Sappell, put aside his work on the sex harassment story to edit the steroids article. Only when that piece was edited could Sa ppell turn his full attention to editing the sex harassment story, which ran the Thursday before the election. Carroll's decision to push the st eroids story ahead of the groping story seriously delayed publishing of the bombshell, this source says. Carroll claims that the groping story was published as soon as it was don e In fact, in journalism, a story is done when the boss says turn it in . Carroll himself saw to it that the story was strung out until the last . That is why some staffers continue to insist to me that the story was sufficiently nailed and should have run two weeks beforehand. Carroll also takes issue with my claims that the paper has had chances ov er the years to dig up glaring dirt on Davis' violent fits and attacks u pon his staff. I claim that the Times digs just so deep before backing o ff and abandoning these touchy stories. First, Carroll made a phony claim on Sunday so he could knock it down, wr iting, "it was written that the paper failed to follow up on reports tha t Davis had mistreated women in his office." I clearly wrote, in a special column for the Dai ly News of Los Angeles, Long Beach Press-Telegram and Ventura County Rep orter, that the Times did follow-up on the alleged mistreatment, and tha t I crossed paths with their reporters while I too investigated the stor y But the Times never published any articles---while I did publish my f indings about Davis' secret personality, in New Times Los Angeles in 199 7 and 1998. Here's the full, phony, Carroll paragraph: "It was written that the paper failed to follow up on reports that Davis had mistreated women in his o ffice. Fact: Virginia Ellis, a recent Pulitzer Prize finalist, and other Times reporters investigated this twice. Their finding both times: The discernible facts didn't support a story." Besides his gross inaccuracy, check out that last sentence about discerni ble facts. A California state bureaucrat m ight as well have written it. Maybe this is why he fai ls to mention the reason one of the reporters gave me, when I called in the late 1990s to find out why the story on Davis' bizarre dual personal ity never ran. The reporter told me Times editors dropped further pursui t of Davis' office violence because the Times editors were opposed to at tacking major political figures using anonymous sources. Moreover, Carroll focuses only on attacks by Davis reported in New Times Los Angeles in the late 1990s. Why didn't the Times do a Schwarzenegger- style probe of earlier Davis bad behavior and much more recent Davis bad behavior? For example: how about the widely rumored violent fit Davis t hrew on election night in November, 2002 at the Century Plaza Hotel, whi ch got a lot of airtime in the Bay Area this year when a radio talk show in San Francisco went public with it? A Times editor based in Washington, DC insisted t he Los Angeles office checked out the story---that Gray Davis destroyed a TV set---and found nothing. Naturally, they'll forgive me at the Times for doubting that they did a Schwarzenegger-level scouring. But maybe t he discernible facts didn't support a story. More on this is discussed in the interview, in Item Two, below. In addition to Carroll's criticism of me, Carroll misreported what Bill B radley's stunning story said last week in the LA Weekly. Bradley told me he has left messages for Carroll, pointing out the factual error Carrol l made. Bradley dropped a real bombshell last week when he reported in the Weekly that somebody at the Times, who was tied in closely to the paper's Arno ld hit team, leaked key details of the Schwarzenegger groping piece to D emocratic Party insiders before the Times published its story. Leaking by a journalist to help a political campaign would be a firing of fense at most newspapers. Yet Carroll appears to be utterly dismissive o f Bradley's story. Bill Bradley and I both specialize in writing about t he Sacramento power elite, but we have almost never seen eye-to-eye on p olitics or politicians. We do not socialize, and at times our relations have been poor. However, both of us can clearly see that something went wrong at the Los Angeles Times. Item Two: A View Inside ... |
| www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/7/13/04720/9340 TPMCafe Special Guests The misinformation being spread in the media about the Plame affair is al arming and damaging to the longterm security interests of the United Sta tes. Republicans' talking points are trying to savage Joe Wilson and, b y implication, his wife, Valerie Plame as liars. For starters, Valerie Plame was an undercover operations officer until ou ted in the press by Robert Novak. It was in fact part of a coordinated, orchestrated smear that we now know includes at least Karl Rove. Valerie Plame was a classmate of mine from the day she started with the C IA. All of my classmat es were undercover--in other words, we told our family and friends that we were working for other overt US Government agencies. That means we had a black passport--ie, a diplomatic passpo rt. If we were caught overseas engaged in espionage activity the black passport was a get out of jail free card. Jul 13, 2005 -- 12:47:20 AM EST A few of my classmates, and Valerie was one of these, became a non-offici al cover officer. That meant she agreed to operate overseas without the protection of a diplomatic passport. The lies by people like Victoria Toensing, Representative Peter King, and P J O'Rourke insist that Valerie was nothing, just a desk jockey. Ye t, until Robert Novak betrayed her she was still undercover and the comp any that was her front was still a secret to the world. When Novak oute d Valerie he also compromised her company and every individual overseas who had been in contact with that company and with her. The Republicans now want to hide behind the legalism that "no laws were b roken". I don't know if a man made law was broken but an ethical and mo ral code was breached. For the first time a group of partisan political operatives publically identified a CIA NOC. They have set a precendent that the next group of political hacks may feel free to violate. They try to hide behind the specious claim that Joe Wilson "lied". Altho ugh Joe did not lie let's follow that reasoning to the logical conclusio n Let's use the same standard for the Bush Administration. Bush's lies have resulted in the deaths of almost 1800 Americ an soldiers and the mutilation of 12,000. He tried to prevent the needless death of Americans and the loss o f American prestige in the world. But don't take my word for it, read the biased Senate intelligence commit tee report. Even though it was slanted to try to portray Joe in the wor st possible light this fact emerges on page 52 of the report: According to the US Ambassador to Niger (who was commenting on Joe's visit in Feb ruary 2002), "Ambassador Wilson reached the same conclusion that the Emb assy has reached that it was highly unlikely that anything between Iraq and Niger was going on." Joe's findings were consistent with those of t he Deputy Commander of the European Command, Major General Fulford. The Republicans insist on the lie that Val got her husband the job. She was not a division director, instead she was the equivalen t of an Army major. Yes it is true she recommended her husband to do th e job that needed to be done but the decision to send Joe Wilson on this mission was made by her bosses. It was the Bush Administration that pushed that lie and because of that lie Americans are dying. Shame on those who co ntinue to slander Joe Wilson while giving Bush and his pack of liars a p ass. And about how many "contacts" did they have in the course of their "work"? And how many whos outside the US who don't necessarily wish us well hav e been walking back the trail over the past couple of years? And about how many "contacts" did they have in the course of their "work"? And how many whos outside the US who don't necessarily wish us well hav e been walking back the trail over the past couple of years? I'l l bet somebody there knows, but the right "opportunity" to make politica l hay just hasn't presented itself yet for such "outings". The fact that Wilson's assessment of the Niger documents was correct is well established at this point. For the media to now claim Wilson was th e one misrepresenting the evidence would require journalists to be willi ng co-conspirators in the disinformation campaign. In 1990, while sheltering more than a hundred Americans at the US Embas sy and diplomatic residences, he (Wilson) briefed reporters while wearin g a hangman's noose instead of a necktie -- a symbol of defiance after H ussein threatened to execute anyone who didn't turn over foreigners. This toughness impressed President George HW Bush, who called Wilson a "truly inspiring" diplomat who exhibited "courageous leadership" by faci ng down Hussein and helping to gain freedom for the Americans before the 1991 war began. The worst-case consequence of exposing Plame is certainly the murder of informants, but even if she were doing nothing more exciting than building a network reporting on s uspicious orders for equipment and supplies used in virology labs, the l oss of that information would be extremely damaging. Wilson is right you could google up the old subcontractors of Niger's ura nium and see it was a loe. Germany and France provided the subcontractor s and they had one plant running 20% capacity at the time such a claim w as made. Iraq's stock of cake was under lock and key by the UN inspectors. Cake itself was irrelevant and not weapons grade or logistically feasable to use under sanctions/inspections without being caught. Oversetim ates creat a false negative scenario that is never entirely proveable as a pretext for action. Ritter was very hawkish about such at one time, it apepars he talked so t o placate neocons and never saw actionable amounts. It is rather ironic to see COndolezza Rice use the language of such estim eates in her defense of 9-11 hair on fire warningsw. It helped cloud the talk about WMD intentionally in its specifics, and gave a general compa rison for percieved threat. Such wording contents intent to commit fraud for an NSA privy to conclusi ve proof to her assertions. She was su pposed to be there talking about the law itself which Rove may have viol ated. Of course she made sure to get her GOP spin in, about how this was really no big deal. And that idiot Neal Conant just sat there and swallowed it all whole. I kept waiting for him to ask even one critical question of the bitch and the crap she was selling. He has to be an uninformed idiot not to know that she's part of the spin team on this; She was just there to talk about the law she helped author. but how could Conant just sit there and listen to that malarkey, and not ask one single criti cal or probing question? I wrote TOTN a pretty blistering email, and included the link to this col umn plus the quote from Johnson related to Toensing and King (in case th e show producers are too fucking lazy to follow the link). Plamegate could blow up into something bigg er than Watergate, but please! don't disturb the host, he's sleepwalking through another day at the office. conant asked "you mean dick clarke" no, insisted the caller, Cheny's ta sk force. you know the one that never met after Clarke was taken off the job? neither conant nor the "expert" on the show had heard of such a th ing. Conan showed his true stripes during the run-up to the war. And unfortunately Ray Suarez's move to PBS didn't help the years-long pab lumization of the NewsHour; it continues to become more and more cautiou s and bland, except for an occasional spark of life from Mark Shields. For a while I could be thankful for NOW, but that has been all but neutra lized. For the time being I can say thank god for Frontline and POV, tho ugh I wonder for how long with Tomlinson and Harrison at the helm. At le ast I can still feel unqualified gratitude for the internet, CSpan and I ndie media. In the name of "balance" Ken Tomlinson has started to book all of the guests for NPR. Today on Talk of the Nation, a non-partisan analysis of the Supreme Cour t confirmation process will be provided by some DC Circuit Federal App eals Judge named Robert Bork. Even if some of it is conjec ture, he (or she) presents it in a straightforward and honest manner tha t makes it entirely convincing.... |
| csua.org/u/cr2 -> www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2003_10_05.php#002066 The Great Push-Back, the Advertisement White House's coordinated PR offensive (involving speeches by most of t he foreign policy principals) aimed at knocking down criticism of the wa r, the failure to find WMD and the evidence of administration deceptions . Battle of the Bulge -- a bold, but ultimately self-defeating counterst roke from a retreating army. In truth, it's the White House's biggest exercise in up-is-downism yet. T he question, I think, is how much the press and the Democrats will push back in response. The administration's great vulnerability now is its cr edibility -- whether it knows what it's doing or tells the truth about w hat it's doing. And on that count this new bundle of speeches offers a v ery target rich environment. He gives the most extensive discussion Ive seen so far of just what her role was at the CIA, Advertisement and what the potential consequences of her exposure have and have not b een. One point of dissent: Kristof has a bit more of a pox on both their house s attitude toward the Democrats and the Republicans on this than I think is warranted. Some Democrats have hyped the potential danger to Plames personal well-be ing and/or that of her family. But this strikes me as a far more margina l exaggeration --- one weakly stated and much less commonly heard --- th an that of Republicans who have tried to argue that the whole matter is one of little consequence. It also pales in comparison to the White Hous es evident refusal to get to the bottom of what happened or discipline a nyone involved. article by Cliff May in National Review Online, in which he sug gested that the whole thing was a tempest in a teapot since Plames statu s as a CIA agent was already so widely known in Washington. As I wrote on the 29th: To this I would only say, Cliff, pursuing this li ne of inquiry/argument could lead to some really awkward surprises. Plame was one of a group of spies that the CIA suspected, but wasnt sure, might have been compromised by Aldrich Ames. Because of that, she was b rought back stateside for her own protection, though she continued to wo rk as a NOC. So, yes, there were some potential problems with Plames cover: not becaus e her status wasnt a serious matter or a closely guarded secret, but bec ause it had quite possibly already been a casualty of Ames treason. In other words, you might say that Plames cover has been under attack for more than a decade. Those two senior administration officials just fini shed the job that Rick Ames --- one of the arch-traitors of American his tory --- started. Advertisement The question is whether one or more of these three men was the source for Bob Novak's column disclosing Valerie Plame's identity as a clandestine employee of the CIA. off-point claim t hat they were "not involved in leaking classified information." Why not press McClellan to answer the question straight-out? And, as you might expect, it wa sn't a reporter from one of the big prestige outlets. QUESTION: Scott, earlier this week you told us that neither Karl Rove, E lliot Abrams nor Lewis Libby disclosed any classified information with regard to the leak. I wondered if you could tell us more specifically w hether any of them told any reporter that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA? MCCLELLAN: Those individuals -- I talked -- I spoke with those individua ls, as I pointed out, and those individuals assured me they were not in volved in this. QUESTION: So none of them told any reporter that Valerie Plame worked fo r the CIA? MCCLELLAN: They assured me that they were not involved in this. QUESTION: Did you undertake that of your own volition, or were you instructed to go to these -- MCCLELLAN: I spoke to those individuals myself. So, when McClellan was asked to be more clear, he opted for a meaningless ly vague statement and then fell back on the "leaking of classified info rmation" dodge. print) Meanwhile, back in wingerville, the search for the Holy Grail, or rather an innocent explanation of the Plame mess, continues. As a 40 year old mother of 2 year old twins I would imagine it has been a long time ago . Is she now just an analyst as she has bee n working at in the CIA Langley Office? Is there a pay scale difference among analysts and operatives? Could it be that she retained that title even though there was no intention of e ver using her again in a clandestine operation? After all she is the wi fe of a former Ambassador and now has two small children. The lady may have been an operative at one time but my bet is that she w as still with the CIA and would have continued her career as an analyst until her retirement and that's why her role at the CIA was well known in Washington Circles. The CIA needs to answer some questions about this woman. As weve noted before, one of the best pieces of evidence that Novak (and thus his sources) knew Valerie Plame was a clandestine employee of the Advertisement CIA was that he said as much in his original column. People who follow the intel world say that phrase is almost always meant to refer to a clandestine agent or someone in the field, rather than an analyst. Now, since the story blew up a week and a half ago, Novak has been tellin g people that this reference was just some sort of slip-up, that in this case he meant operative only in the generic sense of a hack or a fixer. if somebod y did a Nexus search of my columns, they'd find an overuse of operative. But as one of my r eaders pointed out to me this evening, operative can mean all sorts of t hings in different contexts. The question is how Novak uses it in this p articular context. Following up on my readers suggestion I did a Nexis s earch to see all the times Novak used the phrases CIA operative or agenc y operative. And in each cas e Novak used the phrase to refer to someone working in a clandestine cap acity. Here they are On December 3rd 2001 Novak reported on the surprise and even outrage amon g CIA veterans that Mike Spanns identity had been revealed even in death . Spann was the agent killed at the uprising at Mazar-i-Sharif Thus Nova k: Exposure of CIA operative Johnny (Mike) Spann's identity as the first American killed in Afghanistan is viewed by surprised intelligence insi ders as an effort by Director George Tenet to boost the embattled CIA's prestige. On November 1st, 2001 Novak described the Agencys handling of the late Af ghan resistance commander Abdul Haq. Thus Novak: the CIA was keeping in close touch with Haq's friends but providing more criticism than help. T he Afghan freedom fighter who was honored by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher during the war against the Soviets became "Hollywood Haq" to th e CIA. He was described by the agency's operatives as unruly and immatur e This is the most ambiguous reference. But I think its pretty clear here t hat Novak is referring to people in the field, ie, operatives, not ana lysts back at Langley. On September 23rd, 2001, Novak discussed the long decline of the CIA, par ticularly its human intelligence (HUMINT) and operational capacities. He made particular reference to the tenure of Stansfield Turner as DCI. Th us Novak: Appalled by the CIA's operatives in Central America, he issued the now-famous order against hiring unsavory local agents. On July 5th, 1999, Novak reviewed Bill Buckleys new book on Joe McCarthy and in the course of that review he noted how Buckley had honed his craf t well in chronicling the fictional adventures of his CIA operative, Bla ckford Oakes. Now, the Blackford Oakes spy novels are well, spy novels. On September 22nd, 1997 Novak noted to the role of Bob, someone whom he r eferred to as an undercover CIA agent who got pulled into the Roger Tamr az phase of the campaign finance scandal. Later in the same column Novak referred to Bob as a CIA operative. On September 18th, 1997 Novak referred to this same Bob on CNN as an an u ndercover CIA operative. I also did a quick search for Novaks references to CIA analyst or agency analyst I found three --- each clearly referring to people who were in f act analysts. In an 1993 column, Novak used a precise phrasing to refer to "CIA briefer Brian Latell, a 30-year career of... |
| CNN.com -> www.cnn.com/ About 250 prisoners freed from Abu Ghraib The United States today freed about 250 detainees from Abu Ghraib prison, site of alleged abuses that prompted global outrage and led to days of hearings on Capitol Hill. Today marks the first mass prisoner release since the abuse scandal broke several weeks ago. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld had visited the prison Thursday. |