On Reliable Sources, Saunders repeated Plame leak distortions

On the October 21 edition of CNN's Reliable Sources, San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra J. Saunders asserted that former CIA operative Valerie Plame "was not outed as part of a vendetta," adding: "It was gossip. We know where this came from, from Richard Armitage. He was gossiping about the fact that this guy [former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV] went to Niger because of his wife." However, as Media Matters for America has noted, while then-deputy Secretary of State Armitage may have been the first Bush administration official known to have leaked Plame's identity, he was just one of several administration officials who disclosed her identity to the press. Additionally, Saunders' claim that Plame was outed by "gossip," and not "as part of a vendetta," has been refuted by special counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald, who, during his investigation into the leak, cited evidence of "a plan to discredit, punish, or seek revenge against Mr. Wilson."

Wilson was sent to Niger in 2002 by the CIA to investigate whether Iraq had attempted to purchase yellowcake uranium from the African country. Wilson's investigation, which was prompted by questions from Vice President Dick Cheney's office, turned up no evidence that any sale had taken place and found that "it would be exceedingly difficult for Niger to transfer uranium to Iraq." After President Bush referred to Iraq's purported attempt to obtain uranium from Africa in his 2003 State of the Union address as justification for invading Iraq (the notorious "16 words"), Wilson detailed the findings of his trip in a July 6, 2003, New York Times op-ed. Eight days later, in his July 14, 2003, column, Robert D. Novak identified Plame as "an Agency operative on weapons of mass destruction" and wrote: "Two senior administration officials told me Wilson's wife suggested sending him to Niger." Newsweek investigative correspondent Michael Isikoff and The Nation Washington editor David Corn later reported in their book Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War (Crown, September 2006) that Armitage was Novak's initial source, which Novak has confirmed. Plame's, book Fair Game: My Life as a Spy, My Betrayal by the White House (Simon & Schuster) was released on October 22.

Contrary to Saunders' suggestion on Reliable Sources, however, Armitage was not the only Bush administration official to leak Plame's identity. As Media Matters has noted, former vice presidential chief of staff I. Lewis Libby was a source of the information about Plame's CIA employment for at least two other journalists -- The New York Times' Judith Miller and Time magazine's Matthew Cooper. As journalist Murray Waas noted in his book The United States v. I. Lewis Libby (Union Square Press, June 2007), Miller testified on January 30 that Libby had disclosed Plame's CIA employment to her at a July 8, 2003, breakfast meeting at the St. Regis Hotel in Washington, D.C., six days before Novak publicly revealed it in his July 14, 2003, column, and the same day as Novak's meeting with Armitage. A Justice Department investigation into the leaks resulted in Libby's indictment and conviction on charges of perjury, obstruction of justice, and making false statements regarding whether he had leaked Plame's identity to reporters other than Novak. Libby's 30-month prison sentence was commuted by President Bush on July 2. Cooper, in his first-person account of his testimony before the grand jury in the leak investigation, identified former White House senior adviser Karl Rove as his original source for Plame's identity and Libby as his corroborating source.

Saunders is not the first media figure to claim that Armitage's role in the Plame affair somehow disproves the notion of a campaign by the Bush administration to undermine Plame and Wilson. In an April 6, 2006, court filing, Fitzgerald refuted allegations that there existed no plan to "discredit, punish, or seek revenge against Mr. Wilson":

Some documents produced to defendant could be characterized as reflecting a plan to discredit, punish, or seek revenge against Mr. Wilson. The government declined to produce documents relating solely to other subjects of the investigation, even if such documents could be so characterized as reflecting a possible attempt or plan to discredit or punish Mr. Wilson or Ms. Wilson. The government has no knowledge of the existence of any notes reflecting comments by former Secretary of State Powell regarding Ms. Wilson during a September 2003 meeting.

[...]

Defendant is not charged with knowingly disclosing classified information, nor is he charged with any conspiracy offense. Moreover, as a practical matter, there are no documents showing an absence of a plot, and it is unclear how any document custodian would set out to find documents showing an "absence of a plot." Indeed, there exist documents, some of which have been provided to defendant, and there were conversations in which defendant participated, that reveal a strong desire by many, including multiple people in the White House, to repudiate Mr. Wilson before and after July 14, 2003.

[...]

Defendant also asserts without elaboration that "documents that help establish that no White House-driven plot to punish Mr. Wilson caused the disclosure of Ms. Wilson's identity also constitute Brady material." Once again, defendant ignores the fact that he is not charged with participating in any conspiracy, much less one defined as a "White House-driven plot to punish Mr. Wilson." Thus, putative evidence that such a conspiracy did not exist is not Brady material. Moreover, given that there is evidence that other White House officials with whom defendant spoke prior to July14, 2003 discussed Wilson's wife's employment with the press both prior to, and after, July 14, 2003 -- which evidence has been shared with defendant -- it is hard to conceive of what evidence there could be that would disprove the existence of White House efforts to "punish" Wilson. Surely, defendant cannot claim that any document on its face that does not reflect a plot is exculpatory.

[...]

To the extent that defendant would hang his hat on the argument that another person or persons outside the White House may have discussed Wilson's wife's employment with the press prior to July 14, 2003 (for whatever reason), any such evidence would not negate evidence that multiple officials in the White House discussed her employment with reporters prior to (and after) July 14. But again the existence vel non of concerted action by White House officials is not dispositive of whether defendant committed perjury in describing what he did.

In his Nation blog, Corn rebutted claims by conservatives that Armitage's role disproved claims of a concerted effort by the Bush administration, writing "that Armitage "abetted a White House campaign under way to undermine Wilson" and that whether he deliberately leaked Plame's identity, "the public record is without question: senior White House aides wanted to use Valerie Wilson's CIA employment against her husband." Corn wrote further:

Rove confirmed the classified information to Novak and then leaked it himself as part of an effort to undermine a White House critic. Afterward, the White House falsely insisted that neither Rove nor Libby had been involved in the leak and vowed that anyone who had participated in it would be bounced from the administration. Yet when Isikoff and Newsweek in July 2005 revealed a Matt Cooper email showing that Rove had leaked to Cooper, the White House refused to acknowledge this damning evidence, declined to comment on the case, and did not dismiss Rove.

From the October 21 edition of CNN's Reliable Sources:

KURTZ: All right. Valerie Plame, this is a big TV week for the -- the former CIA operative who was outed by Bush administration officials. She is on 60 Minutes tonight in an interview with Katie Couric. She's on the Today show tomorrow morning with Meredith Vieira. She's on Larry King Live tomorrow night.

Here is an advance clip from the 60 Minutes interview in which Katie Couric asks Valerie Plame about a secret intelligence plan against Iran that came out in the press.

[begin video clip]

COURIC: Were you surprised to read about Operation Merlin in the press?

PLAME: Indeed. Mm-hmm.

COURIC: Is that problematic for the CIA?

PLAME: Leaks are always bad news.

[end video clip]

KURTZ: John Aravosis, let me read something from Valerie Plame's book. She writes, "It was the Pentagon Papers or Watergate turned on its head. These reporters were allowing themselves to be exploited by the administration and were obstructing the investigation." What do you make of that?

JOHN ARAVOSIS (AMERICAblog.com): Well, I tend to side with Valerie Plame. So I make it of it as she's correct just in the sense that we did have a lot of reporters in town who knew the story, who knew who had leaked, et cetera, who hadn't leaked. Yet, they were reporting the news, saying, "The White House today denies that so and so leaked." But they knew from the person directly that the person was basically giving the story, or didn't give the story. I just -- I think you get in a very weird situation as a reporter when you know something off the record, which is totally fair. You have to have things off the record and on the record, otherwise sources won't talk to you. But what do you do when you know the truth for real; yet, you're reporting to the public, "So and so says no." But you know it's true. I'm not sure what you do.

KURTZ: But that's precisely the point, Debra Saunders. And by the way, the reporters who were covering it as a political story, they didn't necessarily know what even their colleagues in the same newsroom knew.

ARAVOSIS: But some of the reporters did, though, who did report.

KURTZ: Well, I didn't know. But look, they were -- these reporters who didn't testify and ultimately were forced to testify -- in one case Judith Miller went to jail -- they were keeping a promise, maybe an ill-considered promise, but a promise to confidential sources that "we'll protect you."

SAUNDERS: Yeah. And somehow -- you know, it's funny, when Valerie Plame says that leaks are always bad news, I guess her husband shouldn't have been talking to Nick Kristof from The New York Times.

KURTZ: Yes, and that's a good point. Let me just take a second to explain. Before Joe Wilson, the former ambassador, decided to go public with his criticism about the Bush administration's hunt for WMDs, he talked to Nick Kristof of The New York Times without having his name be used. He was just being identified as a former ambassador, so he was getting that same protection that she would now wave away.

ARAVOSIS: But there is a difference between leaks being bad. And right, she shouldn't have made the statement that leaks are bad news. Our town, our business in journalism, works with leaks. We know that. Some leaks are actual threats to national security such as -- oh, I don't know -- outing a CIA agent because you've got a vendetta against her. You don't destroy a CIA -- I worked in the government. I had a security clearance. The one thing I knew was, CIA agents, you didn't talk about who they were; you didn't talk about what they told you. Everybody in this town knows you don't out CIA agents. It's a serious thing.

I mean, that gets into the whole other issue, but it's a serious problem.

SAUNDERS: You know, it is a serious thing. And the Bushies were incredibly immature to decide that they -- by the way, she was not outed as part of a vendetta. It was gossip. We know where this came from, from Richard Armitage. He was gossiping about the fact that this guy went to Niger because of his wife. Now, if they had been more mature, they would have thought about the consequences, and they should not have done what they did. But this whole "leaks are always bad" that Valerie Plame is talking about, let's just remember how this all started. It started from a leak from people who were out to discredit George Bush. And of course, we have this double standard where it is OK for people to leak on that side, but when the Bushies do it, there's something nefarious about it.

ARAVOSIS: Well, it started with George Bush's 16 famous words that we had nuclear weapons being built in Iraq, because they were coming from Niger or whatever it was. I mean, we can get into that issue.

KURTZ: I thought we heard the end of this story, but obviously, with Valerie Plame's book coming out and all those TV interviews lined up, we'll be arguing about this for a little while longer.