Novak Leaks on the Leak

Game Over. It turns out that the leak of CIA overt WMD analyst Valerie Plame’s name came from the CIA itself. All of the ‘outrage’ shown by Democrats in their first ever defense of the CIA vs. the media was blatantly contrived. And still lost in the whole affair is the story of political hack Joe Wilson, who used his wife’s position at the CIA to procure a trip to Niger so that he could work a hatchet job on President Bush in the run up to the 2004 presidential election.

Ex-CIA official's remark is wrong

In response to my question about Valerie Plame Wilson's role in former ambassador Wilson's trip to Niger, Harlow told me she "had not authorized the mission." Harlow was quoted as later saying to me "the story Novak had related to him was wrong.

My column of July 14, 2003, asked why the CIA in 2002 sent Wilson, a critic of President Bush, to Niger to investigate an Italian intelligence report of attempted Iraqi uranium purchases. All the subsequent furor was caused by three sentences in the sixth paragraph:

"Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me that Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the Italian report. The CIA [Harlow] says its counter-proliferation officials selected Wilson and asked his wife to contact him."

Novak is a partisan. He is not a liar. It seems pretty obvious what has happened here. As a conservative thinker, Novak must have wondered why in the world the CIA would send Joseph Wilson, of all people, to investigate a topic as hot on the political circuit as Iraqi WMD was at the time. In his investigation, Harlow dropped the goods and Novak printed them. In any case, Harlow would be the source of the information, combined with an un-named State Department analyst. As it turns out, this whole affair is a dispute between Harlow and Novak.

Absent is the name ‘Karl Rove’.

According to CIA sources, she was brought home from foreign assignments in 1997, when agency officials feared she had been "outed" by the traitor Aldrich Ames.

So now we know another leaker. Aldrich Ames. Ames is rotting in prison as we speak. The name Valerie Plame was leaked at least six years before Wilson went to Niger. Once again, no Rove. So Harlow was the original source, but Ames had broken Plame’s cover so long ago that the notion that an ‘undercover operative’ had been identified was wholly absurd. So let’s see how this goes…Ames to the Soviets (I assume, as that is who he was working for), Harlow and some State Department analyst to Novak, Novak to Rove, Rove to Cooper (in attempt to help him not make a fool of himself). It seems everyone in DC knew who Valerie Plame was. The fact that she commuted to work at Langley should have been enough to convince anyone that she was not some sort of covert operative, not to mention the spread in Vanity Fair.

Joseph Wilson was discarded a year ago by the Kerry presidential campaign after the Senate committee reported much of what he said "had no basis in fact."

This was subsequently ignored by rabid partisans who thought they had Karl Rove against the ropes. When that didn’t pan out just right, they moved on to Scooter Libby. What frustrates me so much is how Democrats are somehow given a pass whenever they stick their feet in their mouths, or other various places. First Wilson is allowed to make his outrageous claims unfettered in a New York Times hatchet piece. It took the Senate Intelligence Committee to discredit him, but by that time Dems had moved on. The truth is not what mattered; they had gotten their jab in and dodged away. Once exposed, Democrats feigned outrage at the outing of Plame, not because they give a hoot about our national security, but they needed to change the topic from Wilson’s idiotic report to something else. For a second time, the subject got dropped by the media. That is, until the Rove connection popped up via Cooper. The Democrats and the media went back into their frenzied dance.

In the mean time, Wilson goes back on television and spews the same lies that he put forth in his original report. How can a man so thoroughly discredited go back on television in such a manner? Because he knows his audience on the left does not care one bit about the truth of the matter. Even when they are slapped in the face with facts, they eat it up the version that they want to hear. Democrats have been looking to get even ever since the Clinton impeachment. This is the sad state of the Democratic Party today, and defines just about every contrived outrage that they can come up with.

Only one question really remains. Who is Judith Miller protecting?

I have at least one honest Democrat that visits this site. But that is rare. I used to actually attempt to reason with them, but it is like talking to a robot that is only programmed to understand a specific language and can only regurgitate what it has been programmed to think. Anything else can’t be processed. For some unknown reason, I have paid close attention to this entire case since it began to evolve in 2003. So it was easy to stand my ground in the face of the many who were convinced that ‘Rove is going down’. Well, Rove is still here. I’m still right. The Italian report was correct, as was the British report. Wilson is still a lying political hack. Valerie Plame is still overt. And Democrats don’t care one bit now that their outrage has been exposed for what it is. Time to move on.

I stick by my prediction that Joe Wilson will be coming out with a book, once again pedaling his lies, but for a profit. Go forth my liberal friends and enrich the man further.

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