Like others, I\u2019d really hoped we were done hearing about or commenting on Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame, but Mike at Uncorrelated has a round-up and some commentary<\/a> that really can\u2019t be ignored as he wonders -as many have wondered \u2013 why no one is talking about the apparent conspiracy that had a CIA agent and former ambassador working together (and hard) to file a report which \u2013 upon investigation \u2013 has proved false, false, false?<\/p>\n Wilson\/Plame conspired to create a false intelligence product\u2013that\u2019s not a MacGuffin. Wilson joined the Kerry campaign well before his notorious OpEd. How deep is this particular rabbit hole? Did the Democrat leadership conspire with the Wilson to mislead the American people about the nature of the Iraq war in order to obtain political advantage? Substitute two years worth of lefty rhetoric here to generate suitable outrage over \u201clying\u201d, \u201cmisleading to war\u201d, etc\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n I think Rove has pointed us in this direction and that Rich and the NYT editorial board is desperately calling for us to \u201cignore that man behind the curtain\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n You\u2019ll want to read the whole thing and also check out the roundup. Interesting stuff. I was amused that only Just One Minute<\/a> seemed to catch that Russert and Cooper were basically, \u201cA Couple of Implicated White Guys Sitting Around Talking\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n All of this via one little visit to Bogus Gold<\/a>.<\/p>\n UPDATE:<\/strong> Jack Kelly suggests that another shoe is about to drop<\/a><\/p>\n MORE:<\/strong> The hypocrisy, though, only starts there. It turns out that the media believe Plame was outed long before either Novak or Corn took pen to paper. And not by an ambiguous confirmation from Rove or a nod-and-a-wink from Ambassador Hubby. No, the media think Plame was previously compromised by a disclosure from the intelligence community itself \u2014 although it may be questionable whether there was anything of her covert status left to salvage at that point, for reasons that will become clear momentarily.<\/p>\n This CIA disclosure, moreover, is said to have been made not to Americans at large but to Fidel Castro\u2019s anti-American regime in Cuba, whose palpable incentive would have been to \u201ccompromise[] every operation, every relationship, every network with which [Plame] had been associated in her entire career\u201d \u2014 to borrow from the diatribe in which Wilson risibly compared his wife\u2019s straits to the national security catastrophes wrought by Aldrich Ames and Kim Philby. <\/p>\n Captain Ed: LA Times Still Can\u2019t Get Plame Facts Correct<\/a> \u2026and \u2026 Broder Can\u2019t Read, Either<\/a><\/p>\n Michael Barone Our Titus Oates<\/a> Wilson\u2019s article said George W. Bush lied in his 2003 State of the Union Address when he said that British intelligence reported that Iraq had sought to buy uranium in Africa. But Wilson\u2019s mission covered only one country, and the British government has stood by its report.<\/em><\/p>\n Moreover, the report that Wilson sent the CIA said that Iraq had sought to buy uranium in Niger in 1998, unsuccessfully; agency analysts concluded, not unreasonably, that this strengthened rather than weakened the case against Saddam<\/p>\n Christopher Hitchens: Rove Rage<\/a> James Lewis\/American Thinker: Spy Valerie and the Rogue CIA<\/a> Wilson promptly took his story to New York Times Op-Ed Editor Gail Collins, one of the great Bush-haters of all time. As Joseph DiGenova, former US Attorney for DC, recently said, \u201cThe CIA isn\u2019t stupid. They wanted this story out.<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n It was a publicity stunt from the get-go. Wilson\u2019s \u201cconfidential trip\u201d to Niger gave him the superficial credentials to publish his \u201cexpose\u201d in the Times. He\u2019d gone there, talked to the top officials face to face, and by gum, they told him it was all a lie! Not even Gail Collins could possibly believe this banana sauce, but Wilson\u2019s charges provided a useful stick with which to beat the White House. <\/p>\n Astute Blogger: One of the All-Time Great Roundups of the Year<\/a><\/p>\n
\nAndrew McCarthy: Did the CIA \u201cOut\u201d Valerie Plame?\u201d<\/a>
\nPlame was first outed to the general public as a result of a consciously loaded and slyly hypothetical piece by the journalist David Corn. Corn\u2019s source appears to have been none other than Plame\u2019s own husband, former ambassador and current Democratic-party operative Joseph Wilson \u2014 that same pillar of national security rectitude whose notion of discretion, upon being dispatched by the CIA for a sensitive mission to Niger, was to write a highly public op-ed about his trip in the New York Times. This isn\u2019t news to the media; they have simply chosen not to report it.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nThe third bogus element in Wilson\u2019s boastful story is the claim that Niger\u2019s \u201cyellowcake\u201d uranium was never a subject of any interest to Saddam Hussein\u2019s agents. The British intelligence report on this, which does not lack criticism of the Blair government, finds the Niger connection to be among the most credible of the assertions made about Saddam\u2019s double-dealing. If you care to consult the Financial Times of June 28, 2004, and see the front-page report by its national security correspondent Mark Huband, you will be able to review the evidence that Niger\u2014with whose ministers Mr. Wilson had such \u201cgood relations\u201d\u2014 trying to deal in yellowcake with North Korea and Libya as well as Iraq and Iran. This evidence is by no means refuted or contradicted by a forged or faked Italian document saying the same thing. It was a useful axiom of the late I.F. Stone that few people are so foolish as to counterfeit a bankrupt currency.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nValerie Plame\u2019s CIA bosses took care not to ask Mr. Wilson to sign a confidentiality agreement, routine in such cases, almost as if they wanted him to make a public fuss. They were not surprised, one might think, when Mr.<\/em><\/p>\n