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CAGiversary!
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http://p233.news.mud.yahoo.com/s/nypost/roveragehe39snotthevillain
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A gleeful mob of Democrats and their news-media allies is demanding that
President Bush immediately fire Karl Rove, his trusted adviser.
ADVERTISEMENT
What's next? Torches and pitch forks?
Let's be clear: Clamoring for the president to abandon Rove, for the ostensible crime of publicly disclosing a
CIA operative's identity, conveniently distracts from the real story here — and it's a tale that shows the Bush-bashers at their most disingenuous.
First, a recap.
In 2003, career diplomat and former Clinton national-security official Joseph Wilson, a CIA consultant, wrote a scathing commentary for The New York Times, charging that he had been sent to Africa at Vice President
Dick Cheney's request before the war in
Iraq to check out allegations from British intelligence that
Saddam Hussein had tried to buy uranium in Niger.
Wilson said he quickly concluded that the reports were unfounded — and that he so informed his superiors. Nevertheless, he continued, Bush included the allegation in his 2003 State of the Union Address and used it to justify making war on Iraq — knowing full well it was false.
Days later, columnist Robert Novak reported that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, was a CIA operative and likely played a role in selecting him for the Africa mission — a charge Wilson swiftly denied, but which later was unequivocally substantiated in a bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report.
The disclosure of Plame's name led to accusations that someone at the White House — in an effort to discredit Wilson — had maliciously disclosed his wife's CIA status, which might endanger her while violating the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act.
Democrats demanded, and got, a special prosecutor to investigate.
Now, two years later, it's been revealed that, despite his earlier denials, Rove did in fact disclose to at least one journalist, Time magazine's Matt Cooper, that Wilson's wife (whom he did not cite by name) worked for the CIA.
That's all the wolves were waiting for: Now they want Rove indicted, convicted, flayed and filleted — and then locked up on Devil's Island.
And fired, too.
For starters.
But what really happened?
Did Karl Rove commit a crime?
We'll reserve final judgment, pending the outcome of the grand jury probe.
But it appears not.
Every news media organization that filed briefs against the prosecutor's attempt to compel reporters' grand-jury testimony admits that "it is far from clear — at least on the public record — that a crime took place."
That's because disclosing an agent's identity is a crime only if it's done maliciously with full knowledge of covert status obtained in an official capacity.
That's a very high threshold.
And, in the event, it's far from clear who told Rove that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA — Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis Libby, after all, has testified that he learned it from a journalist.
(An interesting aside: Many of those now clamoring for Rove's head voted against the 1982 bill when it was first enacted. The New York Times, called it "dangerous" and "reckless.")
And the evidence now being disclosed suggests that Rove was merely trying to warn Cooper away from Wilson's allegations — a self-serving tip from the administration's point of view, but also a gesture made in service of the truth.
For Wilson's claims have been wholly discredited on numerous occasions and in many ways by the Senate Intelligence Committee and the British government, among others.
In fact, it turns out that Rove was right to warn him — because just about ev erything that Wilson (who, by the way, quickly signed up with the
John Kerry campaign) alleged in the article turned out to be false:
* Contrary to Wilson's claims, his presence on the mission was not authorized by CIA Director George Tenet or Vice President Cheney.
* Despite his insistence that Plame "had nothing to do with the trip," the Senate committee concluded that she had, indeed, "suggested his name" for the Africa mission.
* Wilson's original findings — far from discrediting evidence that Saddam was seeking uranium in Niger — actually "lent more credibility to the original CIA reports on the . . . deal," according to the Senate report.
* The official British investigation into prewar intelligence concluded that "it is accepted that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999" and that "the British government has intelligence from several different sources indicating that this visit was for the purpose of acquiring uranium." (French intelligence separately confirmed this information.)
Which is precisely what President Bush told the nation.
Which is why the British report declared conclusively that "the [uranium] statement in President Bush's State of the Union Address . . . was well-founded."
Joseph Wilson, in other words, lied thoroughly and repeatedly.
Karl Rove knew that — and tried to warn Matt Cooper off those lies.
That's how administrations — espe cially those that regularly have to contend with a rabidly hostile press corps — defend themselves.
And the Bush administration needed defending from Joseph Wilson — who shopped his lies and found a willing buyer in The New York Times.
Frankly, we wish Karl Rove had explained all this long ago.
After all, he had done the right thing.
But by denying any involvement, Rove undercut himself and the administration — not the first tactical error this White House has made.
Still, the bottom line here is that Karl Rove acted to protect the president against a partisan, blatantly false smear on a matter with grave national security implications.
Again, for the record, Rove did the right thing.
It is simply outrageous that he is cast as the villain in this episode — while Joseph Wilson, a disgraceful liar, skates.
http://p233.news.mud.yahoo.com/s/nypost/roveragehe39snotthevillain
-----
A gleeful mob of Democrats and their news-media allies is demanding that
President Bush immediately fire Karl Rove, his trusted adviser.
ADVERTISEMENT
What's next? Torches and pitch forks?
Let's be clear: Clamoring for the president to abandon Rove, for the ostensible crime of publicly disclosing a
CIA operative's identity, conveniently distracts from the real story here — and it's a tale that shows the Bush-bashers at their most disingenuous.
First, a recap.
In 2003, career diplomat and former Clinton national-security official Joseph Wilson, a CIA consultant, wrote a scathing commentary for The New York Times, charging that he had been sent to Africa at Vice President
Dick Cheney's request before the war in
Iraq to check out allegations from British intelligence that
Saddam Hussein had tried to buy uranium in Niger.
Wilson said he quickly concluded that the reports were unfounded — and that he so informed his superiors. Nevertheless, he continued, Bush included the allegation in his 2003 State of the Union Address and used it to justify making war on Iraq — knowing full well it was false.
Days later, columnist Robert Novak reported that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, was a CIA operative and likely played a role in selecting him for the Africa mission — a charge Wilson swiftly denied, but which later was unequivocally substantiated in a bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report.
The disclosure of Plame's name led to accusations that someone at the White House — in an effort to discredit Wilson — had maliciously disclosed his wife's CIA status, which might endanger her while violating the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act.
Democrats demanded, and got, a special prosecutor to investigate.
Now, two years later, it's been revealed that, despite his earlier denials, Rove did in fact disclose to at least one journalist, Time magazine's Matt Cooper, that Wilson's wife (whom he did not cite by name) worked for the CIA.
That's all the wolves were waiting for: Now they want Rove indicted, convicted, flayed and filleted — and then locked up on Devil's Island.
And fired, too.
For starters.
But what really happened?
Did Karl Rove commit a crime?
We'll reserve final judgment, pending the outcome of the grand jury probe.
But it appears not.
Every news media organization that filed briefs against the prosecutor's attempt to compel reporters' grand-jury testimony admits that "it is far from clear — at least on the public record — that a crime took place."
That's because disclosing an agent's identity is a crime only if it's done maliciously with full knowledge of covert status obtained in an official capacity.
That's a very high threshold.
And, in the event, it's far from clear who told Rove that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA — Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis Libby, after all, has testified that he learned it from a journalist.
(An interesting aside: Many of those now clamoring for Rove's head voted against the 1982 bill when it was first enacted. The New York Times, called it "dangerous" and "reckless.")
And the evidence now being disclosed suggests that Rove was merely trying to warn Cooper away from Wilson's allegations — a self-serving tip from the administration's point of view, but also a gesture made in service of the truth.
For Wilson's claims have been wholly discredited on numerous occasions and in many ways by the Senate Intelligence Committee and the British government, among others.
In fact, it turns out that Rove was right to warn him — because just about ev erything that Wilson (who, by the way, quickly signed up with the
John Kerry campaign) alleged in the article turned out to be false:
* Contrary to Wilson's claims, his presence on the mission was not authorized by CIA Director George Tenet or Vice President Cheney.
* Despite his insistence that Plame "had nothing to do with the trip," the Senate committee concluded that she had, indeed, "suggested his name" for the Africa mission.
* Wilson's original findings — far from discrediting evidence that Saddam was seeking uranium in Niger — actually "lent more credibility to the original CIA reports on the . . . deal," according to the Senate report.
* The official British investigation into prewar intelligence concluded that "it is accepted that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999" and that "the British government has intelligence from several different sources indicating that this visit was for the purpose of acquiring uranium." (French intelligence separately confirmed this information.)
Which is precisely what President Bush told the nation.
Which is why the British report declared conclusively that "the [uranium] statement in President Bush's State of the Union Address . . . was well-founded."
Joseph Wilson, in other words, lied thoroughly and repeatedly.
Karl Rove knew that — and tried to warn Matt Cooper off those lies.
That's how administrations — espe cially those that regularly have to contend with a rabidly hostile press corps — defend themselves.
And the Bush administration needed defending from Joseph Wilson — who shopped his lies and found a willing buyer in The New York Times.
Frankly, we wish Karl Rove had explained all this long ago.
After all, he had done the right thing.
But by denying any involvement, Rove undercut himself and the administration — not the first tactical error this White House has made.
Still, the bottom line here is that Karl Rove acted to protect the president against a partisan, blatantly false smear on a matter with grave national security implications.
Again, for the record, Rove did the right thing.
It is simply outrageous that he is cast as the villain in this episode — while Joseph Wilson, a disgraceful liar, skates.
