This post is from the Free Republic Site, by a poster by the name of "Wolfstar" in 2003. I don't know the author, but it was their take on this that started me looking into to it.
It shows, as I have pointed out the amazing colusion between journalists Walter Pincus of the Washington Post and David Corn of The Nation. Here is an excerpt:
"In a July 6 Washington Post piece titled, "Ex-Envoy: Nuclear Report Ignored," Richard Leiby and Walter Pincus help Wilson get up a head of steam on this story.
(A couple of curiosities: What is the connection between Pincus and Wilson? How is it that Leiby and Pincus have this article all ready to go—complete with harsh quotes from Wilson—ON THE SAME DAY Wilson's article appears in the New York Times?)
The Leiby-Pincus article begins: "Joseph C. Wilson, the retired United States ambassador whose CIA-directed mission to Niger in early 2002 helped debunk claims that Iraq had tried to obtain uranium there for nuclear weapons, has said for the first time publicly that U.S. And British officials ignored his findings and exaggerated the public case for invading Iraq...'It really comes down to the administration misrepresenting the facts on an issue that was a fundamental justification for going to war,' Wilson said yesterday. 'It begs the question, what else are they lying about?' "
Again note the ratcheting up of tone—in his own NYT article on the same day, Wilson says IF his report was deemed inaccurate; IF it was ignored then a legitimate argument can be made. In contrast, here it's a declarative statement that the administration misrepresented the facts, and Wilson introduces the entirely unsupported notion that the administration is "lying."
Leiby and Pincus also put this nugget in their piece: "After Bush's speech, Wilson said he contacted the State Department, noted that the Niger story had been debunked and said, 'You might want to make sure the facts are straight.' " Note the similarity and—more importantly—the difference in what Wilson wrote in his own NYT piece:
"The next day, I reminded a friend at the State Department of my trip and suggested that if the president had been referring to Niger, then his conclusion was not borne out by the facts as I understood them."
In concluding their article, Leiby and Pincus write, "Last week, Wilson said of Hussein: 'I'm glad the tyrant is gone.' But he does not believe the war was ever about eliminating Hussein's weapons of mass destruction. It was, he said, a political push to 'redraw the map of the Middle East.' While his family prepared for a Fourth of July dinner, he proudly showed a reporter photos of himself with Bush's parents."
So at least one reporter knew Mrs. Plame-Wilson personally—not only knew her, but shared Fourth of July dinner with her and the Wilson family BEFORE THE NOVAK PIECE. Who in their right mind would take bets at this point that the reporter in question was NOT Pincus?! In fact, the dual statements about the State Department phone call clearly demonstrate that Leiby and Pincus had an advance copy of Wilson's NYT article."
Now to Corn, of which I said before and as Cliff May, of National Review noted had amazing insight to Ms. Plame, facts no one else but Joe Wilson or Ms. Plame knew.
"The first charge that the Bush administration "outed" Wilson's wife in order to "punish" him comes in a piece by David Corn in The Nation on July 16—a scant two days after Novak's piece appeared. Titled, "A White House Smear," the piece begins with a suitably inflammatory Leftist spin:
"Did senior Bush officials blow the cover of a US intelligence officer working covertly in a field of vital importance to national security-and break the law-in order to strike at a Bush administration critic and intimidate others?...It sure looks that way, if conservative journalist Bob Novak can be trusted."
Of course, Novak neither said nor implied any such thing, but pointing that out wouldn't suit Corn's purpose. Instead, without a shred of evidence, Corn claims, "Wilson caused problems for the White House, and his wife was outed as an undercover CIA officer." Corn then takes the Wilson statement about it "not being about me," and turns it into, "I will not answer questions about my wife. This is not about me and less so about my wife. It has always been about the facts underpinning the President's statement in the state of the union speech." In quotes, no less. So was this a new quote directly from Wilson to Corn, or did Corn deliberately rephrase the original quote in Novak's piece to make it stronger from Corn's point of view? In other words, is Wilson embellishing his tale, or is Corn lying?
In a presumed attempt to write sympathetically of Mrs. Plame-Wilson, Corn then goes on to add insult to a presumed injury by bringing the couple's children into the story: "So he will neither confirm nor deny that his wife—who is the mother of three-year-old twins—works for the CIA. But let's assume she does. That would seem to mean that the Bush administration has screwed one of its own top-secret operatives in order to punish Wilson or to send a message to others who might challenge it."
(How does Corn know they have three-year-old twins, by the way?)
Corn goes on to say, "The sources for Novak's assertion about Wilson's wife appear to be 'two senior administration officials.' If so, a pair of top Bush officials told a reporter the name of a CIA operative who apparently has worked under what's known as "nonofficial cover" and who has had the dicey and difficult mission of tracking parties trying to buy or sell weapons of mass destruction or WMD material. If Wilson's wife is such a person—and the CIA is unlikely to have many employees like her—her career has been destroyed by the Bush administration. (Assuming she did not tell friends and family about her real job, these Bush officials have also damaged her personal life.) Without acknowledging whether she is a deep-cover CIA employee, Wilson says, 'Naming her this way would have compromised every operation, every relationship, every network with which she had been associated in her entire career. This is the stuff of...Aldrich Ames.' If she is not a CIA employee and Novak is reporting accurately, then the White House has wrongly branded a woman known to friends as an energy analyst for a private firm as a CIA officer."
Corn "assumes" that she did not tell friends and family about her real job, so how does Corn know that she worked under "nonofficial cover?" How does he know what mission she had been assigned? If even the mention of her name and employment with the CIA is so damaging, why did Corn go further than Novak and reveal her cover type and mission? And good heavens, but he now has Wilson saying this is the stuff of Aldrich Ames!"
Indeed - how does Corn know?
Just from an objective view of a friend who is frankly not political, nor uniquely interested in this story, but brought up the point in conversation, - "There sure are some amazing coincidences in this story." I agreed.
From the outside one might matter that among the priciple story tellers, specifically those who see only Rove and Libby in shackles, there are stiking similarities. For instance, we have Washingon Post writer, Walter Pincus who is married to a former Clinton offical. Time Magazine's Matt Cooper married to Mandy Grunwald - a DNC operative, and The Nation's David Corn (need I say more of his political bent?).
Besides that, the point guy is Joe Wilson, whom as Novak said was "a high-ranking official in President Bill Clinton's National Security Council (NSC) was given this assignment. Wilson had become a vocal opponent of President Bush's policies in Iraq after contributing to Al Gore in the last election cycle and John Kerry in this one."
If this were a movie, I would have figured it out half way through and left the theater.
UPDATE: Perhaps not so not expected the NY Times posts yet another "timeline" of events in the Plame Game. Conspicously absent, the SSCI Report - that pesky report, that proves 1) That Joe Wilson is a liar. 2) That his report from his 'tea party' disproved nothing.
Again, it's not suprising. You won't find that report mentioned in the MSM or on lefty blogs except where it can be parsed out of context.
Meanwhile, we have Matt Cooper who hasn't written squat for Time since his July "coming out party", possibly resigning, or at least "job hunting", the Editor and Chief of Time is now jumping ship, and the aforementioned NY Times on the verge of what seems like mutiny or murder,which ever comes first.
Meanwhile, at the Washington Post...I wonder how long until before the 'rats' start to give up Mr.Pincus. I think not too long as I sense the "suicide squeeze" is coming.
And this was going to be a week of stress for the White House.
Filed under: judith miller valerie plame karl rove Valerie Plame PlameGate
Subscribe by Email
Follow Updates Articles from This Blog via Email
No Comments