First let's get this straight - according to all we know there isn't one shred of evidence - and in fact Newsweek's article so states that Karl Rove leaked Valerie Plame's name. Read that again. Not one shred.
"Nothing in the Cooper e-mail suggests that Rove used Plame's name or knew she was a covert operative."
That is the end of the story. Forget all the "Disney World" fantasy talk and wishful moonbat thinking after that.
Yet it hasn't stopped the presses....
Watching Hardball on MSNBC tonight. Chris Matthews (of course) was covering the latest on the "Rove" issue. On the panel: Michael Isokoff and "DNC talking points memo" Reporter *Dick Gregory.
What ensued was a breathless breakdown of Karl Rove and the Newsweek story, and how he will prove to be a political liabiilty; an embarrasment to the President, yada, yada......
Interestingly enough - but not suprising was the lack of mention of Joseph Wilson's out and out lies in the whole affair - but then what would you expect.
Of course there is always the truth of Valerie Plume's "Real" status at the CIA.
For instance...
1. She was not, maybe never had been a "covert operative", most think that she was a desk-jocky analyst at Langley. That would make her no more an operative than being a 911 Dispatcher makes you a cop!
2. Since, and if she was not a CIA operative under the definition of the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, no law was broken. Thus the entire investigation on it's face is a farse.
Yet, I believe there is a far greater story developing...
A story, which may ulitmately send two people to jail and none of them is Karl Rove. If we have been paying attention it is a story which has been in the press but ignored, that asks the real question:
"Did Valerie and Joseph conspire to undermine national security, by attempting to distort data leading up to the Iraq War?
If so, the word isn't 'leak", the word is Treason.
Howard Fineman in an article in Newsweek in 2003, walks this story for the first time, but it was largely ignored as the press and the Democrats largely focused on the "leak".
However, JustOneMinute.blog, has a breakdown on the Newsweek article, and again, there is evidence of motive here involving both Wilson and Plame in some type of conspiracy.
Here are excerpts, first from the Newsweek article by Fineman, then a take by JustOneMinute. Read carefully.
Fineman: "The CIA sends Wilson to check it [the Niger stories] out. On the surface, he would seem to be a logical choice: he’d spent years in Africa, knew French, knew the Saddam regime. But there were other things about him that Cheney’s office might not have liked. Wilson had close ties to the Democrats, having worked for them on the Hill and on Clinton’s national security staff; he was close to Democratic Sen. John Kerry and some other former NSC people who are now allies of the senator. Plus, he contributed to Al Gore’s campaign in 2000. Just as important, his wife was a CIA analyst who specialized in assessing WMD risks—and the CIA was not leading the charge to attack Iraq. In fact, the agency was doing just the opposite: In a report and testimony, CIA Director George Tenet argued that attacking Iraq would do more to create a generation of terrorists than eliminate one. What did Valerie Plame think of the seriousness of Saddam’s WMD capability? Sooner or later, we’ll find out—because it bears on what Wilson probably thought before he ever got to Niger to ask questions.
JustOneMinute: "So, despite his impressive and seemingly objective resume, Wilson was arguably in bed with a CIA faction that opposed the war. Novak, for one, insisted that he considered that to be relevant to the story."
As I asked before, "What were these two cooking up?"
Yes, there are many questions - important questions to ask. None of them I have a thing to do with Rove." In law enforcement when solving a crime you look for "motive and opportunity", I detect both.
In the coming days and weeks I will be looking into this angle on both Wilson and Plame's possible involvement in a case which is going to turn everything in an entirely different direction.
Stay tuned.
UPDATE - For more on *"DNC Dick" see Lori Byrd's post at Polipundit (Hat tip Michelle Malkin
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