Rove was the source of the Plame leak... so it appears

parados wrote:

Ticomaya wrote:

I heard Victoria Toensing on Fox News this a.m. questioning Plame's status as a covert agent. Plame reportedly returned to Washington from her last overseas assignment in 1997. Is Plame a "covert agent"? I'm certainly not foolish enough to claim that I know one way or another based on the facts as I know them to be. I'll leave that to the libbies on this thread.

Isn't it lovely that GOP spin miesters are questioning the final decision of the CIA which actually employed and gave Plame her assignments...

Geez Tico.. why should we take the word of Toensing over the CIA? This is downright silly on your part.

Toensing made her analysis based on a set of articulated facts. I don't know what facts the CIA is using in making their determination, nor do I know who made that determination on behalf of the CIA, or whether it was in the context of Sec. 426. Do you?

Don't you think it's silly to make assumptions based on a set of unknown facts?

The letter CIA sent to Conyers pretty clearly states they found "possibleviolations of criminal law" concerning the disclosure of the identity of an employee operating under cover.

Quote:

The letter CIA sent to Conyers pretty clearly states they found "possibleviolations of criminal law" concerning the disclosure of the identity of an employee operating under cover.

Knee jerk response coming. Do I even need to tell you what it is?

Tico, whats the difference between an "undercover CIA employee" and a "covert agent"?

4) that Valerie Plame was actually a covert agent:

There is a need to produce evidence that Valerie Plame qualifies as a "covert agent" per § 426. There must be evidence that she served outside the US, a single official trip overseas might suffice. There are published reports that Plame served in London and Brussels in the early to mid 1990s.

In a October 1, 2003 Knight Ridder report entitled "Justice Launches Probe Into CIA Leak," an anonymous CIA official was quoted as saying, "If she was not undercover, we would have no reason to file a criminal referral," referring to the referral by the CIA to the Justice Department that a crime may have been committed.

If Plame's identity as a CIA employee was in fact classified, Rove's leak may also have violated other U.S. laws, including the Espionage Act. Failure to protect classified information, criminal or not, is often grounds for the revocation of one's security clearance. Finally, Rove has been interviewed by the FBI and has testified before a grand jury. Misrepresentations to either could be a crime.

So your only argument Tico is that Plame has not gone overseas for the CIA in any capacity since before 1997? A rather lame argument.

Any trip made by Plame overseas even if just to fly in and out of a country if authorized by CIA would classify her under 426.

nimh wrote:

Tico, whats the difference between an "undercover CIA employee" and a "covert agent"?

Sorry, nimh. I skipped your post earlier.

Relevant to this discussion, it appears to me that what distinguishes a "covert agent" is their present service outside of the US, or such service within the last 5 years.

parados wrote:

So your only argument Tico is that Plame has not gone overseas for the CIA in any capacity since before 1997? A rather lame argument.

No, that is not my only argument. It is, however, my main concern right now with regard to whether Ms. Plame satisfies the definition of "covert agent" under 50 U.S.C. 426.

Now, given that you consider that a "lame argument," are you prepared to explain why you believe it to be "lame"?

Quote:

Any trip made by Plame overseas even if just to fly in and out of a country if authorized by CIA would classify her under 426.

If she was serving in her official capacity, I would say so.

Ticomaya wrote:

nimh wrote:

Tico, whats the difference between an "undercover CIA employee" and a "covert agent"?

Sorry, nimh. I skipped your post earlier.

Relevant to this discussion, it appears to me that what distinguishes a "covert agent" is their present service outside of the US, or such service within the last 5 years.

That dog don't hunt. Tico and you know it.

Ticomaya wrote:

parados wrote:

So your only argument Tico is that Plame has not gone overseas for the CIA in any capacity since before 1997? A rather lame argument.

No, that is not my only argument. It is, however, my main concern right now with regard to whether Ms. Plame satisfies the definition of "covert agent" under 50 U.S.C. 426.

Now, given that you consider that a "lame argument," are you prepared to explain why you believe it to be "lame"?

Quote:

Any trip made by Plame overseas even if just to fly in and out of a country if authorized by CIA would classify her under 426.

If she was serving in her official capacity, I would say so.

Your argument seems to be Tico that the CIA wouldn't know if they sent her overseas or not. You aren't willing to take their word on it without proof. Hate to tell you this but you don't have the security clearance to be told. You will have to take their word on it.

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay told FOX News. "Karl Rove is a good man. He was doing his job ... I don't see that he has done anything wrong."

Incapable of reading Tico? Let me see if I can put it in terms you can understand.

Your argument is lame because it relies on the premise that the CIA wouldn't know where their employee has been the last 5 years.

Your argument is lame because it relies on the premise that the CIA wouldn't have lawyers capable of undertsanding when and how a law would have to be broken to make it a 'possible violation'.

The CIA investigated and decided that there was a possible violation. They can't know the 'intent' of the person that may have violated the law but they can know the classification of the employee and if that employee fits the definition that would make it a violation. Your argument is lame because you accuse the CIA of incompetence in their decision to follow Executive Order 12333.

Drafter of intel statute: Rove accusers ignorant
Lawyer who wrote law to protect agents says Plame charge doesn't meet standard
Posted: July 14, 2005
1:00 a.m. Eastern

By Art Moore
© 2005 WorldNetDaily.com


Valerie Plame appeared in Vanity Fair magazine with her husband Joseph Wilson in January 2004

Democrat leaders and editorialists accusing Karl Rove of treason for referring to CIA agent Valerie Plame in an off-the-record interview are ignorant of the law, according to the Washington attorney who spearheaded the legislation at the center of the controversy.

Plame's circumstances don't meet several of the criteria spelled out in a 1982 statute designed not only to protect the identity of intelligence agents but to maintain the media's ability to hold government accountable, Victoria Toensing told WorldNetDaily.

Toensing - who drafted the legislation in her role as chief counsel for the chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence - says the Beltway frenzy surrounding Plame's alleged "outing" as a covert agent is a story arising out of the capital's "silly season."

"The hurricane season started early and so did the August silly stories," Toensing said. "What is it that qualifies as a story here?"

Democrat leaders are accusing Rove of exposing Plame's identity as an act of retribution against her husband Joe Wilson, who returned from a CIA assignment to Niger with a report disputing the administration's suspicion that Iraq wanted to acquire uranium from the African nation.

Toensing, now a private attorney in Washington, says Plame most likely was not a covert agent when Rove referred to her in a 2003 interview with Time magazine's Matt Cooper.

The federal code says the agent must have operated outside the United States within the previous five years. But Plame gave up her role as a covert agent nine years before the Rove interview, according to New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof.

Kristof said the CIA brought Plame back to Washington in 1994 because the agency suspected her undercover security had been compromised by turncoat spy Aldrich Ames.

Moreover, asserts Toensing, for the law to be violated, Rove would have had to intentionally reveal Plame's identity with the knowledge that he was disclosing a covert agent.

Toensing believes Rove's waiver allowing reporters testifying before the grand jury to reveal him as a source - signed more than 18 months ago - shows the Bush strategist did not believe he was violating the law.

Rove, according to Cooper's notes, apparently was trying to warn the reporter not to give credence to Wilson's investigation, because he had no expertise in nuclear weapons and was sent to Africa on the recommendation of his wife. Wilson had claimed he was sent by Vice President Cheney.

Another element necessary for applying the law is that the government had to be taking affirmative measures to conceal the agent's identity.

Toensing says that on the contrary, the CIA gave Plame a desk job in which she publicly went to and from work, allowed her spouse to do a mission in Africa without signing a confidentiality agreement and didn't object to his writing an op-ed piece in the New York Times about his trip.

Columnist Robert Novak, who first published Plame's name, also apparently didn't think it was a big deal, Toensing said, or he would have put it in the first paragraph.

Novak's aim was to expose the incompetence of the CIA, she argued.

"These are the kinds of stories we wanted to still be put out there when we passed the law," she said. "We only wanted to stop the methodical exposing of CIA personnel for the purpose of assassination."