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September 30, 2003
Another line of speculation...
ABC's "The Note" suggests reading this section of today's Washington Post article on the Plame scandal "very s-l-o-w-l-y"
Another journalist yesterday confirmed receiving a call from an administration official providing the same information about Wilson's wife before the Novak column appeared on July 14 in The Post and other newspapers.The Note's analysis:The journalist, who asked not to be identified because of possible legal ramifications, said that the information was provided as part of an effort to discredit Wilson, but that the CIA information was not treated as especially sensitive. "The official I spoke with thought this was a part of Wilson's story that wasn't known and cast doubt on his whole mission," the person said, declining to identify the official he spoke with. "They thought Wilson was having a good ride and this was part of Wilson's story."
In addition to Novak's column, an administration official told The Washington Post on Saturday that two White House officials leaked the information to several journalists in an effort to discredit Wilson.
An article that appeared on the Time magazine Web site the same week Novak's column was published said that "some government officials have noted to Time in interviews . . . that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, is a CIA official who monitors the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction." The same article quoted from an interview with I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, saying that Cheney did not know about Wilson's mission "until this year when it became public in the last month or so."
One obvious implication of this is that the oft-press shy Libby was taking journalists' calls during the period when [Wilson's wife]'s name was named, but, of course, that doesn't mean that Libby had anything to do with it.I'm not entirely sure what to make of it, but I thought it was interesting enough to at least make note of. There may be nothing to it - right now, any discussion of who may or may not be the leakers is entirely speculative - but it's interesting to see where some of the speculation is heading.Of course, the Post printing that pretty much non-sequitarial paragraph COULD suggest two things:
A. The Post has its suspicions … .
B. Maybe Mr. Libby should have played nicer with the intel boys during the run-up to the Iraq war … .
The Note also quotes the question from at least one Democrat earlier today, regarding the fact that the DOJ notified Alberto Gonzales at 8:30pm last night but told him he didn't need to notify the White House or tell them to preserve documents and other evidence until this morning:
"There's absolutely no basis for that kind of heads-up. (Imagine if that was the Clinton White House.) Unprecedented, completely out of line and over the top. DOJ should not have given any direction to the target of an investigation about when they should preserve documents."And they also remind us - in a quote from The Wall Street Journal (no link provided) of John Ascroft's recent comments about the leaking of classified information:
"The problem may be especially acute for Mr. Ashcroft, who earlier this year created a task force to review sanctions governing leaks of classified information. 'Leaks of classified information do substantial damage to the security interests of the nation,' he said at the time. 'As a government, we must try to find more effective measures to deal with this damaging practice, including measures to prevent it.'"
Posted by thorswitch at September 30, 2003 10:41 PM
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