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2003-09-30 Home Front

Mr. Pruittâs opinion on the Wilson/Plame Affair?

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Posted by Phil Fraering 2003-09-30 1:15:06 PM|| || Front Page|| [1 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 If Fred tells you, he'll have to kill you--so, Fred, please don't post your answer here! Think of the children! Oh, the humanity!

Posted by Dar 2003-9-30 1:20:18 PM|| 2003-9-30 1:20:18 PM|| Front Page Top

#2 Sorry to disappoint, but I have no opinion. If she's an operative, somebody should go to jail for divulging sources and methods. If she's an analyst -- closest I ever got to being a spook, and I wasn't with CIA -- it's a tempest in a teapot. Novak has said he wasn't tipped by the White House, and most of the other things I've read have been speculation or hyperbole.

Wilson sounds like a politically motivated weasel who got a politically motivated slap back. But it's not WoT, so I'm not very interested.

Posted by Fred 2003-9-30 1:42:43 PM|| 2003-9-30 1:42:43 PM|| Front Page Top

#3 Point opf order: She is not an operative as the Dems would like to believe. She is simply an employee of the CIA (A weapons analyst) but a civil servant. Mr. Novak has stated (at least twice by this time) that there 'WAS NO LEAK FROM THE WHITE HOUSE.' Since it was Mr Novak that published the name of Ms. Plame he would be in a position to know. This is another mole-hill/mountain conspiracy scenario made up by the left. Also Mr. Wilson has also stated that he (LIED) made up the Karl Rove connection. Can't anyone sue for slander anymore?

Posted by John F. Kerry (French looking Vietnam Vet) 2003-9-30 2:11:29 PM|| 2003-9-30 2:11:29 PM|| Front Page Top

#4 This blog speculates logically that Ms. Plame was a collections management officer. Apparantly, this role serves as a bridge between intelligence officers who run agents and the analysts who need to know stuff. It might explain the confusion regarding whether she was an analyst or field officer.

Interestingly Ambassador Wilson's bio from his Saudi funded think tank (an oxymoron if ever there was one) mentions his wife and family by name so it is doubtful that her maiden name was her cover name abroad (not that that would make much sense anyway).

I suspect that she worked her way up the ladder as a CMO and is now a higher ranking official who will never have to return to the field. That would explain why the leaker thought it was no big deal to release her name as she was just another CIA official to him/her and not some sort of undercover asset. It would also explain why the CIA did not lean to hard on Novak not to reveal her employer.

Even if no damage was done, we need to make an example out of somebody as such sloppiness is not acceptable in wartime. I am also concerned that a ranking CIA WMD expert would be married to a guy who is so outspokenly hostile to US policy. If I were a counterintel type, I would wonder what she told her hubby before he went to meet with his Saudi funded buddies.

Posted by JAB 2003-9-30 2:12:03 PM|| 2003-9-30 2:12:03 PM|| Front Page Top

#5 This is just another ploy by the Dems to attack the President on the WOT in the Iraqi theater. The dems need to be roundly defeated in the coming elections, both in Congress and in the Presidency. The Republicans need to grow a set of cojones and LEAD THE COUNTRY. The dems see what they perceive as a soft underbelly of weakness, and they are probing with a dagger.

Posted by Alaska Paul 2003-9-30 2:34:56 PM|| 2003-9-30 2:34:56 PM|| Front Page Top

#6 Thanks for the comments. You're right, that is an atypical cover.

Posted by Phil Fraering 2003-9-30 2:45:48 PM|| [http://thenostromo.com/pgf/weblog/] 2003-9-30 2:45:48 PM|| Front Page Top

#7 In case you want the link to Mr. Wilson's comments: http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2003/9/29/143328.shtml
"In one speech I gave out in Seattle not too long ago, I mentioned the name Karl Rove," Wilson told GMA. "I think I was probably carried away by the spirit of the moment."
So another 'Made for Democrats' conspiracy has been put to rest.

Posted by Cyber Sarge (VRWC CA Chapter) 2003-9-30 3:33:28 PM|| 2003-9-30 3:33:28 PM|| Front Page Top

#8 Mr, John F. Kerry (French Looking Vietnam Vet) I think you misread Novak's statements about NO LEAK FROM THE WHITE HOUSE. Novak said he was not phoned by the white house but a high ranking official dropped the info during an interview and a second high ranking official confirmed in a followup interview and the CIA confirmed in further followup.

That's not the blanket denial you're making it out to be. He doesn't say how high ranking the officials are or even if they are officials with the US or Niger government but he never said there was no leak.

Posted by Yank 2003-9-30 3:38:38 PM|| 2003-9-30 3:38:38 PM|| Front Page Top

#9 Atrios is reporting that a Guardian reporter says other reporters have named Rove as one of the leaks.

Not that any of this really matters. I don't think the American public as a whole will really give a rat's ass.

Posted by growler 2003-9-30 3:39:35 PM|| 2003-9-30 3:39:35 PM|| Front Page Top

#10 Yank, Novak said that it was the CIA that named Wilson's wife as a CIA EMPLOYEE (Not a SPY, a civil servant). Also it was Mr Wilson who admitted he lied about the accusation (vis-a-vis Karl Rove). Points to take home: 1) far from a 'conspiracy' there were no laws broken and 2) the Dems (Sad Sad Tom) have overblown this. They really need a new playbook the old one is too well worn.

Posted by Cyber Sarge (VRWC CA Chapter) 2003-9-30 5:16:18 PM|| 2003-9-30 5:16:18 PM|| Front Page Top

#11 CNN contradicts Novak on Plame's role:

But sources told CNN that Plame works in the CIA's Directorate of Operations -- the part of the agency that spies on others -- and was in the field for many years as an undercover officer.

"If she were only an analyst, not an operative, we would not have filed a crimes report" with the Justice Department," a senior intelligence official said.

I still think the CMO theory I mentioned in a previous comment best fits the fact pattern, since CMO's apparantly are in the DO and are often female.

Still, this might be getting ugly in that it looks like disenchanted CIA types are taking advantage of this incident to weaken the Bush administration politically.

It's no secret that many in the agency object to the aggressive approach to the WOT we favor here at Rantburg. I suppose our (and essentially Bush's) approach makes it tougher for them to get cooperation from various intelligence agencies in the Middle East. Some jackass in the Bush admin just gave these guys an opening to tarnish our WOT policies. Hope I'm wrong.

Posted by JAB 2003-9-30 5:57:45 PM|| 2003-9-30 5:57:45 PM|| Front Page Top

#12 "A Guardian reporter said that other reporters have named...." Cheezus k. Reist - so this is how news is generated? Sounds more like a playground on an all-girls school.

Posted by Rex Mundi 2003-9-30 6:58:21 PM|| 2003-9-30 6:58:21 PM|| Front Page Top

#13 Been a collections manager, so I can make some pretty informed comments on this. Basically, there are two jobs a collections manager performs: determining what collections are possible, and how to schedule them most economically, and verifying that a particular collection requirement has been met. It takes a knowledge of how various types of intelligence is collected, and what constitutes a successful collection. I dealt with imagery. A friend of mine dealt with humint. Another acquaintance used to work with sigint. Collections management was the same in each case, just the type of intelligence varied.

The only "sensitive" portion of the job is that you're dealing not only with collections means, but also are determining which collection has priority. The latter can give a counter-intel guy a lot of information on what your government considers to be its biggest threats, and also give you an indication of when counter-intelligence activities have failed. It's a hard job, and it often drives people to drink, which is why the Air Force doesn't keep anyone in collections managerment more than a couple of years before moving them.

Posted by Old Patriot 2003-9-30 8:07:28 PM|| [http://users.codenet.net/mweather/default.htm] 2003-9-30 8:07:28 PM|| Front Page Top

#14 Old Patriot

I saw Daschle and Pelosi on the news saying that this was the most appropriate case they had ever seen for an independent cousel. While I am not against the appointment of an independent counsel in this case, I always felt that Filegate was one of the more serious breeches of security I had ever seen short of what seems to happen routinely at Los Alamos. Do you think that this is as serious as Filegate?

I would like to see an independent counsel only if establishing one will allow FBI assets to remain focussed on teerorism.

Posted by Super Hose 2003-9-30 8:43:14 PM|| 2003-9-30 8:43:14 PM|| Front Page Top

#15 A republican sits in the White House and the Independent Counsel comes back in vogue among Democrats. How surprising. Someone should get Ken Starr on the phone...

Posted by eLarson 2003-9-30 9:14:12 PM|| 2003-9-30 9:14:12 PM|| Front Page Top

#16 Independent counsel for what? What security has been breeched? What laws have been broken? The CIA publishes a Fact Book every year that lists all its Washington/McLean staff, by job title. Seems to me someone is trying to make a criminal charge here, but doesn't have the necessary criminal acts being committed. If there's been no crime (and certainly, there doesn't SEEM to have been one), then all of this is political maneuvering to try to 'score points'. It's stupidity at its lowest. The person that is pushing this should get an axehandle across the bottom and told to grow up and stop whining.

When I was in Germany the second time, someone got a list of US operatives in East Germany and sold it to one of the major European papers. They were smart enough to return the list to the US government, and the guy that sold it was "imposed upon". Otherwise, it could have been the death of up to sixty people. No one is going to kill the Ambassador's wife because she's a collections manager for the CIA. It's not a state secret. It's not anyone's life on the line. The Ambassador is probably perturbed because there could be some indication of impropriety on HIS part. The whole thing is overblown and way, way over-reported.

Posted by Old Patriot 2003-9-30 11:15:37 PM|| [http://users.codenet.net/mweather/default.htm] 2003-9-30 11:15:37 PM|| Front Page Top

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