For more good information on Valerie Plame's career at CIA and, in some respects, a counterweight to Nick Kristof's informative column in the today's Times, see Warren Strobel's new piece from Friday.

More to come this weekend on The Great Push-Back, the <$Ad$> White House's coordinated PR offensive (involving speeches by most of the foreign policy principals) aimed at knocking down criticism of the war, the failure to find WMD and the evidence of administration deceptions.

To me -- with only a touch of satire or irony -- the analogy is to the Battle of the Bulge -- a bold, but ultimately self-defeating counterstroke from a retreating army.

In truth, it's the White House's biggest exercise in up-is-downism yet. The question, I think, is how much the press and the Democrats will push back in response. The administration's great vulnerability now is its credibility -- whether it knows what it's doing or tells the truth about what it's doing. And on that count this new bundle of speeches offers a very target rich environment.

Nick Kristof has a nice backgrounder on the Plame scandal in Saturday’s Times. He gives the most extensive discussion I’ve seen so far of just what her role was at the CIA, and what the potential consequences of her exposure have and have not been.

One point of dissent: Kristof has a bit more of a ‘pox on both their houses’ attitude toward the Democrats and the Republicans on this than I think is warranted.

Some Democrats have hyped the potential danger to Plame’s personal well-being and/or that of her family. But this strikes me as a far more marginal exaggeration --- one weakly stated and much less commonly heard --- than that of Republicans who have tried to argue that the whole matter is one of little consequence. It also pales in comparison to the White House’s evident refusal to get to the bottom of what happened or discipline anyone involved.

But read the column and make your own judgments.

One new bit of news, or one now put in print for the first time: Plame’s relationship to the Aldrich Ames case.

Back on September 29th I wrote a post criticizing various points about an article by Cliff May in National Review Online, in which he suggested that the whole thing was a tempest in a teapot since Plame’s status as a CIA agent was already so widely known in Washington. Poor tradecraft, and so forth.

As I wrote on the 29th: “To this I would only say, Cliff, pursuing this line of inquiry/argument could lead to some really awkward surprises. Just heads up.”

Well, this is what I was talking about.

Plame was one of a group of spies that the CIA suspected, but wasn’t sure, might have been compromised by Aldrich Ames. Because of that, she was brought back stateside for her own protection, though she continued to work as a NOC.

So, yes, there were some potential problems with Plame’s cover: not because her status wasn’t a serious matter or a closely guarded secret, but because it had quite possibly already been a casualty of Ames’ treason.

In other words, you might say that Plame’s cover has been under attack for more than a decade. Those two ‘senior administration officials’ just finished the job that Rick Ames --- one of the arch-traitors of American history --- started.

Nice company.

Recently I told you that Scott McClellan's denial on behalf of Abrams, Libby and Rove might be a lot less airtight than a lot of reporters have been assuming.

The question is whether one or more of these three men was the source for Bob Novak's column disclosing Valerie Plame's identity as a clandestine employee of the CIA.

McClellan's 'denials' have hinged on a lawyerly and off-point claim that they were "not involved in leaking classified information."

Listen closely: He's not answering the question.

Why not press McClellan to answer the question straight-out?

Well, today at the briefing, someone did. And, as you might expect, it wasn't a reporter from one of the big prestige outlets.

Here's the exchange ...

QUESTION: Scott, earlier this week you told us that neither Karl Rove, Elliot Abrams nor Lewis Libby disclosed any classified information with regard to the leak. I wondered if you could tell us more specifically whether any of them told any reporter that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA?

MCCLELLAN: Those individuals -- I talked -- I spoke with those individuals, as I pointed out, and those individuals assured me they were not involved in this. And that's where it stands.

QUESTION: So none of them told any reporter that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA?

MCCLELLAN: They assured me that they were not involved in this.

QUESTION: Can I follow up on that?

QUESTION: They were not involved in what?

MCCLELLAN: The leaking of classified information.

QUESTION: Did you undertake that of your own volition, or were you
instructed to go to these --

MCCLELLAN: I spoke to those individuals myself.

So, when McClellan was asked to be more clear, he opted for a meaninglessly vague statement and then fell back on the "leaking of classified information" dodge.

Can we all take note of this now? That denial wasn't what it seemed to be. In fact, I doubt it was a real denial at all.

There's more there. Why not find it?

I hear an intrepid reporter may have picked up the ball at the daily briefing today and walked it a few yards down field. More in a bit.

Meanwhile, back in <$NoAd$> wingerville, the search for the Holy Grail, or rather an innocent explanation of the Plame mess, continues.

We pick up the story in a note from Nick. Y ....

When was Wilson's wife last on a clandestine operation? As a 40 year old mother of 2 year old twins I would imagine it has been a long time ago. Don't you?

Did the CIA change her status? Is she now just an analyst as she has been working at in the CIA Langley Office?

Is there a pay scale difference among analysts and operatives? Could it be that she retained that title even though there was no intention of ever using her again in a clandestine operation? After all she is the wife of a former Ambassador and now has two small children.

The lady may have been an operative at one time but my bet is that she was still with the CIA and would have continued her career as an analyst until her retirement and that's why her role at the CIA was well known in Washington Circles.

The CIA needs to answer some questions about this woman.

Enough said.

The quest continues. Whose heart will be so pure as to find the Grail. And what of Excalibur? And the Lady in the Lake?

Oh, now that’s very interesting.

Let’s go back and do a little more Bob Novak exegesis.

As we’ve noted before, one of the best pieces of evidence that Novak (and thus his sources) knew Valerie Plame was a clandestine employee of the CIA was that he said as much in his original column. There he called her an “Agency operative.”

People who follow the intel world say that phrase is almost always meant to refer to a clandestine agent or someone in the field, rather than an analyst.

Now, since the story blew up a week and a half ago, Novak has been telling people that this reference was just some sort of slip-up, that in this case he meant ‘operative’ only in the generic sense of a ‘hack’ or a ‘fixer.’ On Meet the Press Novak said he uses “the word too much [and] if somebody did a Nexus search of my columns, they'd find an overuse of ‘operative.’”

Well, Novak does seem to use the word operative a lot. But as one of my readers pointed out to me this evening, ‘operative’ can mean all sorts of things in different contexts. The question is how Novak uses it in this particular context. Following up on my reader’s suggestion I did a Nexis search to see all the times Novak used the phrases “CIA operative” or “agency operative.”

This was a quick search. But I came up with six examples. And in each case Novak used the phrase to refer to someone working in a clandestine capacity.

Here they are …

On December 3rd 2001 Novak reported on the surprise and even outrage among CIA veterans that Mike Spann’s identity had been revealed even in death. Spann was the agent killed at the uprising at Mazar-i-Sharif Thus Novak: “Exposure of CIA operative Johnny (Mike) Spann's identity as the first American killed in Afghanistan is viewed by surprised intelligence insiders as an effort by Director George Tenet to boost the embattled CIA's prestige.”

On November 1st, 2001 Novak described the Agency’s handling of the late Afghan resistance commander Abdul Haq. Thus Novak: “the CIA was keeping in close touch with Haq's friends but providing more criticism than help. The Afghan freedom fighter who was honored by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher during the war against the Soviets became "Hollywood Haq" to the CIA. He was described by the agency's operatives as ‘unruly and immature.’”

This is the most ambiguous reference. But I think it’s pretty clear here that Novak is referring to people in the field, i.e., operatives, not analysts back at Langley.

On September 23rd, 2001, Novak discussed the long decline of the CIA, particularly its human intelligence (HUMINT) and operational capacities. He made particular reference to the tenure of Stansfield Turner as DCI. Thus Novak: “Appalled by the CIA's operatives in Central America, he issued the now-famous order against hiring unsavory local agents. There went any serious effort at espionage.” Again, that ain’t a reference to analysts.

On July 5th, 1999, Novak reviewed Bill Buckley’s new book on Joe McCarthy and in the course of that review he noted how Buckley had “honed his craft well in chronicling the fictional adventures of his CIA operative, Blackford Oakes.” Now, the Blackford Oakes spy novels are … well, spy novels. So this one’s pretty clear.

On September 22nd, 1997 Novak noted to the role of “Bob,” someone whom he referred to as an “undercover CIA agent” who got pulled into the Roger Tamraz phase of the campaign finance scandal. Later in the same column Novak referred to “Bob” as a “CIA operative.” Ergo, “undercover CIA agent” equals “CIA operative.”

On September 18th, 1997 Novak referred to this same “Bob” on CNN as an “an undercover CIA operative.”

I also did a quick search for Novak’s references to “CIA analyst” or “agency analyst” I found three --- each clearly referring to people who were in fact analysts. In an 1993 column, Novak used a precise phrasing to refer to "CIA briefer Brian Latell, a 30-year career officer." Again, no vague use of 'operative.'

I don’t think this requires too much commentary, does it?

Clearly, Novak knows the meaning of the phrase 'CIA operative' and he uses it advisedly. In the last decade he’s never used the phrase to mean anything but clandestine agents.

Let’s cut the mumbo-jumbo: past evidence suggests that Novak only uses this phrase to refer to clandestine agents. In this case, when he has every reason to run away from that meaning of the phrase, he suddenly runs away from that meaning. Especially with all the other evidence at hand, that just defies credibility. Everything points to the conclusion that Novak did know. That would mean, necessarily, that his sources knew too.

The ‘we didn’t know’ cover story just doesn’t wash. Novak's fellow reporters have never pressed him on this point. Maybe now would be a good time ...

Moveon.org has a way you can help President Bush narrow down the list of suspects in the Valerie Plame case. Take a look. Lend him a hand.

Fresh from the <$NoAd$>
Department of Damning Understatement, Dana Millbank in the Post on the president's PR blitz speeches in New Hampshire today ...

The speeches furthered the administration's shift in emphasis from former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein's possession of weapons of mass destruction to his desire for such weapons and the general evil he represented.

Meanwhile, more intel revelations from Condi Rice's speech yesterday in Chicago ...

We have no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved in the September 11th attacks. Yet the possibility remained that he might use his weapons of mass destruction or that terrorists might acquire such weapons from his regime, to mount a future attack far beyond the scale of 9/11.

The possibilities are truly endless ...

They truly know no limits.

Condi Rice says that if the facts revealed in the Kay Report had been known last winter, the UN Security Council would have backed President Bush in going to war.

The comments are noted in Bill Sammon’s article today in the Washington Times and the transcript is here at the White House website.

The full quotation is …

Had any one of these examples been discovered last winter, the Security Council would have had no choice but to take exactly the same course that President Bush followed: to declare Saddam Hussein in defiance of Resolution 1441, and enforce its serious consequences.

Really? Is that how it is? <$Ad$> Every administration fudges, conceals, or deceives in this way or that. But, at least in my memory, I cannot remember any administration or even any administration official that so routinely says things that are the polar opposite of reality --- when the facts to the contrary are sitting right out there in the open.

Set aside all the ridiculous efforts to spin the details of the Kay Report into some sort of vindication for the White House. The one thing the Report clearly shows is that Saddam was doing far less on the WMD front than even our staunchest international critics suggested. Given that they were unwilling to go to war when they thought he had some stocks of WMD, it’s awfully hard to figure why they would go to war once it confirmed that he had none.

It’s just more up-is-downism. The same ridiculous spin as a year ago.

As I’ve noted in earlier posts, many people think that where we’re heading on Wilson/Plame is that the White House will eventually say that whoever did the leaking didn’t know Valerie Plame was undercover. By some readings, that would get the culprits out of legal jeopardy since the relevant law requires intent. If they didn’t know she was undercover, then it wouldn’t be a crime. Outside the legal context it would move the whole incident out of the realm of execrable bad-act and into that of sloppy mistake.

Novak has anticipated this line, saying that he didn’t know Plame was undercover. And he’s implied that his sources didn’t know either.

Maybe.

But I think there are at least a few clues pointing to the conclusion that Novak and his sources knew precisely what her status was. Again, not proof, but clues.

Let me walk you through them.

First, in his original column Novak referred to Plame as an “operative.” In recent interviews Novak has tried to pass this off as an oversight, explaining that he meant it in the colloquial sense in which one might refer to a political hack, an operative, etc.

Last week he told Tim Russert …

The one thing I regret I wrote, I used the word "operative," and I think Mr. Broder will agree that I use the word too much. I use it about hat politicians. I use it about people on the Hill. And if somebody did a Nexus search of my columns, they'd find an overuse of "operative." I did not mean it. I don't know what she did. But the indication given to me by this senior official and another senior official I checked with was not that she was deep undercover.

Frankly, no one buys this. As we’ve seen in the last couple weeks there are various phrasings which get used to describe CIA employees whom we would, in colloquial language, call ‘undercover agents.’ But ‘operative’ is pretty much always used to distinguish people from ‘analysts.’ It’s hard to believe that someone like Novak, who’s been doing this for almost half a century, would make such a silly mistake. Really hard to believe.

Then there’s something Joe Wilson mentioned when I interviewed him in mid-September. “If I recall the article correctly,” he said, “[Novak] flatly asserts my wife is a CIA operative. And then he quotes senior administration officials as saying that she was somehow responsible for sending me out there.” I’d noticed that too. Novak wrote:

Wilson never worked for the CIA, but his wife, Valerie Plame, is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger to investigate the Italian report.

It’s been treated as a given that the two ‘senior administration officials’ were Novak’s source both for Plame’s being at the Agency and for her alleged role in choosing Wilson for the Niger mission. In fact, Novak has basically said so in repeated interviews.

If that’s true, why is her status as an Agency operative stated as an un-sourced assertion? Why is the sourcing noted only for the claim that she suggested sending her husband to Niger? I’d want to source both points. Agreed: I’m reading tealeaves here. But one pretty plausible explanation for this circuitous sourcing is that Novak realized that he didn’t want the line to read: “Two senior administration officials told me Valerie Plame is an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction.”

Then there’s one more thing.

A week after Novak wrote his column, Newsday reporters Timothy M. Phelps and Knut Royce wrote the first newspaper article about Novak’s disclosure. The whole point of the Phelps/Royce piece was that the article had disclosed the identity of a clandestine employee of the CIA. The authors interviewed Novak for the article. Yet the article gives not a clue that Novak ever disputed this point or mentioned that there was any confusion about Plame’s status. His response, according to the article, was: “I didn't dig it out, it was given to me. They thought it was significant, they gave me the name and I used it.”

Novak only started telling people there was any confusion about Plame's status after the Justice Department got involved and things began to heat up dramatically.

Taken together, I think these clues point pretty directly to the conclusion --- which frankly is pretty obvious on the face of it --- that Novak knew Plame’s status, and thus that his sources knew Plame’s status. If that’s true, then the ‘honest mistake’ excuse goes right down the drain.

Following up on last night’s post, I’ve now heard more information that makes me think that the denials from Libby and Abrams --- filtered through McClellan --- are really just placeholders, disposable non-denial denials.

The Libby-Abrams line --- that neither was “involved in leaking classified information” --- is, I suspect, technically true in some sense that has not yet been made clear. Or, rather, I suspect that the players involved have come up with some theory under which they feel they can say this is true.

It’s certainly possible of course that this is just a flat denial. And there’s no need for parsing. But it’s awfully hard to figure why the ‘denial’ is being couched in this very precise fashion which doesn’t even address the substance of the question --- i.e., did they disclose to a reporter that Plame was CIA?

The White House press corps gets two chances a day to put this question to Scott McClellan. To ask him to really answer the question. Why not press this point?

Somehow I think if CNN did this Fox would be giving them grief ...

The second-in-command at the information ministry [under Saddam], who spent his days reading the reports the minders wrote about visiting foreign journalists, has been employed by Fox News.

From an article in today's Guardian.

Scott McClellan flummoxed a lot of people when he announced that Scooter Libby and Eliot Abrams were not involved in disclosing Valerie Plame’s name. I say flummoxed because there was a lot of chatter, and good bit of circumstantial evidence pointing in Libby’s direction, and at least some pointing in Abrams’. But once McClellan issued flat denials on their behalf it really made people wonder.

But, as you’ll remember, I’ve been making quite a point of late of the administration’s extremely disciplined use of the phrase “leaks of classified information” when referring to anything about Plame. They never mention Plame’s name --- which is perhaps understandable. But they don’t even make any mention of exposing a CIA operative. It's always "leaks of classified information" this and "leaks of classified information" that.

That makes me wonder just how air-tight McClellan’s statement is. What he said was that “They [i.e., Libby and Abrams] were not involved in leaking classified information, nor did they condone it.”

Now presumably Plame’s identity was classified information. But why frame this denial in such a precise, lawyerly and frankly off-point fashion? Why not just say they told no one about Plame’s identity. Or even just, they did not disclose the identity of any agent from the Directorate of Operations?

Something’s up here ...

Why isn't this getting more attention?

A few days ago I <$Ad$>heard from several readers that anti-tax activist Grover Norquist, who is a close advisor to President Bush and Karl Rove, compared the Estate Tax to Nazi persecution of the Jews during the Holocaust. Not kinda sorta. He really did.

When NPR host Terry Gross did a double-take and asked him if he really meant to equate the two, Norquist responded he didn't say they were the same but that ...

the morality that says it's okay to do something to a group because they're a small percentage of the population is the morality that says that the Holocaust is okay because they didn't target everybody. "It's just a small percentage, what are you worried about? It's not you. It's not you. It's them." And arguing that it's okay to loot some group because it's them, or kill some group because it's them -- and because it's a small number -- has no place in a democratic society that treats people equally.

That sounds to me like he is equating the two, or at least the 'morality' behind them.

That's outrageous.

See yesterday's New Dem Daily for more.

A very good <$NoAd$>run-down on the context and repercussions of the Plame disclosure from a former undercover CIA case officer, Jim Marcinkowski.

The following is from last night's Paula Zahn show on CNN ...

ZAHN: Mr. Marcinkowski, help us understand what this means to an agent in the field, particularly a covert one. Do they now view their government as a threat?

MARCINKOWSKI: Certainly, the act itself has been an unprecedented act. This is not the leak, as usual from Washington, of classified information. And that should not be condoned. However, this is the leak of an identification of an intelligence agent of the United States. So the fact that it's unprecedented sends a ripple effect throughout the intelligence community and drastically affects national security throughout -- throughout the world, and the United States in particular.

As an operations officer on scene in a country, the effects of this are that anyone who knows you or did know you now will look at your mosaic. They will look at the people you've come in contact with. They will suspect those people, be they official contacts or innocent contacts. They will suspect those persons of being intelligence agents. They could be subject to interrogation, imprisonment and even death, depending on the regime that you may be operating under.

There's also ramifications for CIA morale. I'm not naive enough to say this is having a huge impact, but certainly, it contributes to a decline in morale when you know that your own government can identify you as a clandestine operator. Certainly, there's going to be a reluctance on the part of foreign nationals that may want to help the United States in these trying times. They're going to be reluctant to serve and help us with information, based on the fact that their identification may be revealed by the government.

Obviously, in this particular case, there's further problems with looking at the ambassador's wife. Obviously, now all intelligence services across the world will be looking at ambassadors' wives and suspecting them. They may subject them now to surveillance and added security measures.

The continued revelations by Bob Novak of purported front companies also subjects the traveling businessman to added...

One thing that is palpable in this whole situation is the disgust -- even more off-the-record than on -- toward this disclosure from the ex-CIA fraternity. Not surprising, I guess. But notable for its intensity -- which of course grows from a deeper antagonism.

I've spoken to a number <$NoAd$>of lawyers over the last 24 hours about what would be standard and appropriate practice for the White House in turning over documents to the Justice Department investigators, particularly the degree to which the counsel's office gets to review the documents for issues of privilege and/or relevance.

This from this morning's gaggle ...

Q Democrats are raising questions about the fact that the Counsel is going to be screening the material before, for relevance, as you said, before turning it over. They say that the past practice, in fact, is that the Counsel's Office didn't do that, that that's up to the prosecutors to decide what's relevant and what's not.

McCLELLAN: Yes, it's --

Q Past practice is simply send it all over for --

McCLELLAN: Well, one, I disagree at the way you characterize it and the premise of what you're saying. It is standard practice for the Counsel's Office to be the point of contact to get the information to the Department of Justice that they requested. And that's exactly what -- keep in mind, we are here to assist the Department of Justice get to the bottom of this, because no one wants to get to the bottom of it more than we do. And the sooner the better, as far as we're concerned. And that's why we -- the Counsel's Office will be moving as quickly as they can to get the information to the Justice Department that they requested.

Q Well, they don't dispute that the Counsel's Office is typically the point of contact -- what they say is, though, is that in the past, the Counsel's Office's doesn't filter for relevancy, the Counsel's Office's has sent everything over to Justice that's responsive to -- that fits --

McCLELLAN: That's right, exactly, that's responsive to the request.

Q Well, they say that --

McCLELLAN: And I said -- and, remember, I said yesterday they're welcome to look at other materials if they want. I mean, the President made it very clear that we will be cooperating fully.

More to come on this ...

As you may have noticed, we've redesigned the site. On the surface it looks almost identical. But on the back-end, it's completely different. It's now entirely automated, which makes it much easier to update and add new features to, and so forth. One of several new features is the printer-friendly function right there next to the permalinks.

At the moment, it's taking me a bit of time to get used to the new interface, which is of course different from the one I've been using for the last three years. I'm not sure if it'll affect the way I write or not; but I'll let you be the judge.

In any case, if something doesn't look right on the site, please drop us a line, letting us know what the problem is and what browser you're using.

So Donnie Fowler is out as sorta kinda campaign manager of the Clark campaign.

I'd been getting hints and allegations of this for several days from various fronts. The first round of coverage last night had it that this was a dispute between the Internet-savvy draft Clark types and the professionals from the Clinton-Gore scene. This morning there's more of a focus on Fowler getting demoted to a "lesser role but still an important role" and deciding instead to quit.

Really, I'm not sure quite what to make of these various interpretations of what happened. It's not like Fowler is some sort of grass-roots activist. His CV, even his ancestry, is very much from Clinton/Gore-land. On the other hand, he saw first hand in Gore 2000 what can happen to a top-heavy, insidery operation.

My sense is that there are just no clear lines of authority in that operation. That leads not only to chaotic management but also to everyone having a different sense of what 'the problem' is.

Based on things I hear from various folks who are in the mix, I think that it's much less clear-cut than this Internet types versus the insiders line we're hearing.

What surprises me and, to an extent, impresses me is that Clark has managed to do as well as he has, even with this sort of chaotic management at the home office.

The thing about campaigns is that they end up telling us something about the candidate. Getting a campaign up to speed in a few weeks is no simple task. If Clark is someone who will make a good president, he'll get this situation in hand.

The big picture here is that there's a vacuum of authority in the campaign operation. Because of that, all the various currents in the Dem party -- out-of-power Clinton-Gore types, new-fangled Internet types, etc. -- are trying to fill that vacuum. Bottom line: Clark has to assert himself over his campaign back office.