NBC News has learned the CIA has asked the Justice Department to investigate allegations that the White House broke federal laws by revealing the identity of one of its undercover employees in retaliation against the woman’s husband, a former ambassador who publicly criticized President Bush’s since-discredited claim that Iraq had sought weapons-grade uranium from Africa.
More details on this story are being run in the Washington Post.
Anyone who cares about getting this abusive admin outta the White House should seize on this.
They still execute for treason, do they not?
If Bush retains White House in 04, this could be the only salvation.
So far, this administration has done far worse than Water-gate, Iran Contra,White-Water( as if..) every scandal rolled into one huge mess and nary a peep from the media, until now. This is on today’s front page Wash Post.
The person who made the claim just denied it when the justice department asked. If he know’s anything and is lying about it then he has just become an accomplise! By the way, You forgot to mention the fact that the Clintons sold all our secrets to the Chinese for a song.
Outing a member of the CIA clandestine service is not "treason", but a separate felony punishable by a maximum incarceration of 10 years not, er, death.
If it was already widely known that Plame was an agent, or if she was not in fact a member of the clandestine service but simply an analyst, the alleged statement would not meet the standard applied in the law.
With publicly aired allegations that a clandestine agent — NOT NOT NOT confirmed by the Agency — the Director would forward a DOJ referral (as has been reported) whether the purported agent is clandestine OR NOT.
And, by the way, there are dozens of incidents of such disclosures alleged each year (a truckload during the Clinton Administration), and they almost NEVER result in any prosecution whatsoever.
"Much ado about nothing". Don’t forget to note the "much" before the word "ado". Do the Democrats have anything else?
Scientific sophistication here … check.
Legal sophistication here … lacking.
…. check
Gullibility…. lacking
obscure at best …
Post comment in haste… repent at leisure.
New and less obscure (I hope) comment:
Common sense here—
(“here” meaning the the original article)
Check
Gullibility—
Lacking
I can’t argue the legal aspects of revealing an agent’s identity. I can observe that those so offended by what they consider questionable/unethical/illegal activity by the previous administration are curiously eager to use previous “offensive” activity to justify the practices of the current administration. Seems to me, if underhanded (or illegal, or immoral–) activity followed by covering one’s rear is despicable in one administration– and so offensive that it calls for independent investigation– then so should it be in the next.
Common sense begs for a look into this matter of whether an agent’s career was affected because of retaliation by anyone associated with this administration.
Gullibility begs for the country to believe that
this administration is any more scrupulous than the last; therefore, we have no cause to demand answers for very troubling questions.
(from today’s Borowitz Report)
White House Denies Leaking Denial
An unnamed White House source last night vigorously denied leaking classified information about a CIA operative, sending the White House scrambling to identify the source of the leaked denial.
The unnamed source leaked a strongly worded denial of the previous leak in phone conversations with over two hundred newspaper columnists across the country.
“We are not in the business of leaking information,” the unnamed source said.
Ben Trimble, a political columnist for the Canton (OH) Star-Ledger, attempted to STAR-69 the call in order to identify the source of the leaked denial, but to no avail.
“It wouldn’t disclose the phone number or the location,” Mr. Trimble said. “That kind of made me think it was Cheney.”
At the White House, spokesman Scott McClellan said that the Administration would launch a “full investigation” to determine the source of the leaked denials.
“If someone is out there denying leaks, that is very serious business,” Mr. McClellan said. “Denying leaks is my job.”
But moments after Mr. McClellan spoke, columnists received a new round of anonymous phone calls, this time denying that the White House had been the source of the earlier denials.
As the number of anonymous leaks from the White House mounts to a dozen or more a day, newspaper columnists are increasingly signing up for the Federal “do not call” list to keep unnamed White House sources from bothering them at home.
“The first couple of leaks I didn’t mind,” said the Star-Ledger’s Trimble. “But these guys keep calling me at dinnertime.”
A good dose of FUNNY always helps.
To the contrary, you are quite uninformed. This White House has a superlative record of avoiding leaks. The Clinton Administration by contrast had an attrocious record, not only of leaks related to all sort of policy matters, but of hemorraging national secrets. The media’s primary attention to Monica obscured the greater evils and misconduct of the Clinton White House.
I’m happy to be informed that the current White House has a superlative record in some area.
The irony is that this superlative record has possibly veiled its own “greater evils and misconduct.”
Bill Clinton is not Satan. George Bush, Jr., is not a Savior. They both fall somewhere near the bottom of the pit between your “great evil” and an elevated nobility we’d love to expect from our elected leaders.
Strange spinning, of my comments. No one was holding Bush up high on all measures, or Clinton low.
However, with regard to issues of national security and specifically state secrets, there is no comparison whatsoever. Clinton was a low point in US history.
One’s perspective depends upon which leg one is spinning– left or right. If we’re human, we all spin, IMO.
I appreciate your civilized discourse, at least.
You’re having a conversation with yourself, not at all responsive to my comments, off topic and irrelevent.
in this dialog. Your need for the final word is as amusing as your “off topic and irrelevant” comment. No, I don’t disagree with myself. I disagree with your defense of the current administration by a rehashing of the sins of the previous administration. That is MY PERSPECTIVE of YOUR comments, or, YOUR SPIN, to use your term.