Arthur Ochs Sulzberger and Russell T. Lewis write: "On Aug. 12, Ms. Miller received a subpoena in which she was required to provide information about conversations she might have had with a government official in which the identity and C.I.A. connection of Mr. Wilson's wife might have been mentioned. She received this subpoena even though she had never published anything concerning Mr. Wilson or his wife. This is not the only recent case in which the government has subpoenaed information concerning Ms. Miller's sources. On July 12, the same prosecutor sought to have Ms. Miller and another Times correspondent, Philip Shenon, identify another source. Curiously, this separate investigation concerns articles on Islamic charities and their possible financial support for terrorism that were published nearly three years ago... So, unless an appeals court reverses last week's contempt conviction, Judy Miller will soon be sent to prison."

WashPost: "A Washington Post reporter's confidential source has revealed his or her identity to the special prosecutor conducting the CIA leak inquiry, a development that provides investigators with a fact they have been pursuing in the nearly year-long probe. Post reporter Walter Pincus, who had been subpoenaed to testify to a grand jury in the case, instead gave a deposition yesterday in which he recounted his conversation with the source, whom he has previously identified as an 'administration official.' Pincus said he did not name the source and agreed to be questioned only with the source's approval. 'I understand that my source has already spoken to the special prosecutor about our conversation on July 12 [2003], and that the special prosecutor has dropped his demand that I reveal my source. Even so, I will not testify about his or her identity,' Pincus said in a prepared statement."

NY Times: "A federal district judge in Washington has ordered a reporter for The New York Times to testify before a grand jury investigating the disclosure of the identity of a covert C.I.A. officer. In a decision dated Sept. 9 and released yesterday, the judge, Thomas F. Hogan, said the reporter, Judith Miller, must describe any conversations she had with 'a specified executive branch official.' The judge said Ms. Miller had received subpoenas issued by a special prosecutor investigating 'the potentially illegal disclosure of the identity of C.I.A. official Valerie Plame.' "

John Dean writes, "Undoubtedly, those from the White House have been asked if they spoke with the president about the leak. It appears that one or more of them may indeed have done so. If so - and if the person revealed the leaker's identity to the President, or if the President decided he preferred not to know the leaker's identity. -- then this fact could conflict with Bush's remarkably broad public statements on the issue. He has said that he did not know of 'anybody in [his] administration who leaked classified information.' He has also said that he wanted 'to know the truth' about this leak. If Bush is called before the grand jury, it is likely because Fitzgerald believes that he knows much more about this leak than he has stated publicly. Perhaps Bush may have knowledge not only of the leaker, but also of efforts to make this issue go away - if indeed there have been any. It is remarkably easy to obstruct justice."

Capitol Hill Blue: "Witnesses told a federal grand jury President George W. Bush knew about, and took no action to stop, the release of a covert CIA operative's name to a journalist in an attempt to discredit her husband, a critic of administration policy in Iraq. Their damning testimony has prompted Bush to contact an outside lawyer for legal advice because evidence increasingly points to his involvement in the leak of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame's name to syndicated columnist Robert Novak."

"NBC News said Friday night that it would oppose a subpoena issued to Washington bureau chief Tim Russert by the federal grand jury investigating the leak of the identity of an undercover CIA operative last year. Russert, the moderator of NBC's 'Meet the Press,' is the first journalist known to have been subpoenaed in the investigation, which the Justice Department opened after syndicated columnist Robert Novak reported in July that Valerie Plame, the wife of a former ambassador who criticized Bush's justification for going to war in Iraq, worked for the agency... The Washington Post and the New York newspaper Newsday said this week that their reporters were asked to sit for questions in connection with the investigation but that they had not been formally subpoenaed." Hey Tim - you love asking tough questions, why are you so afraid to ANSWER them?

Joseph Wilson: "That was absolutely unexpected, that this government would take a national security asset off the table, working in an area that is of primordial importance to the national security of the United States -- the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction into the hands of rogue states and non-state actors. Yet for some reason, either because they wanted to discourage other people from stepping forward and telling the truth, or out of simple revenge, as was reported in the Washington Post, this government decided that it would go ahead and take that national security asset off the table. It was truly un-American. It was a betrayal of the country, irrespective of whether they can prosecute this through conviction. It was treasonous and clearly the act and the subsequent pushing of the story, and trying to sort of promote this lie, was un-American in every sense of the word."

David Corn was the journalist who first denounced Robert Novak's outing of Valerie Plame. Plame's husband Joseph Wilson now tells Corn, "I'm appalled that they haven't gotten to the bottom of it yet, and I have to conclude that the reason is because administration officials in the know are simply stonewalling. The president made it very clear in a public comment that he expected his senior officials to cooperate with the investigation because he wanted to get to the bottom of it. Now either the president was just not being serious when he made that statement, or else his senior staff is disobeying him, or else he doesn't have any authority over his senior staff. You take your pick." Impeach Bush Now!

"Cheney was aware of a meeting held by his staff that started a chain of events that ended with the 'effective betrayal of our country,' former U.S. diplomat Joseph Wilson charged Thursday in an interview with USA TODAY... Wilson did not accuse Cheney of leaking his wife's identity or of knowing about the leak before it was made. But he said Cheney had to have known that his staff was investigating Wilson in a probe that led to the discovery of his wife's job... 'The office of the vice president, either the vice president himself or more likely his chief of staff, chaired a meeting at which a decision was made to do a 'work-up' on me,' Wilson wrote in The Politics of Truth. Vanity Fair magazine reported in January that Cheney's office denied that any such meeting occurred." We demand the records of Cheney's meetings!

Boston Globe: "Dick Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, has been pegged as a possible leaker of the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame to a syndicated columnist, according to a book by former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, Plame's husband. In 'The Politics of Truth'... Wilson says Libby is 'quite possibly the person who exposed my wife's identity.' The other name that has most often been repeated to me in connection with the inquiry and disclosure into my background and Valerie's is that of Elliott Abrams, who gained infamy in the Iran-Contra scandal,' Another suspect named in Wilson's book: White House chief political adviser Karl Rove. 'The workup on me that turned up the information on Valerie was shared with Karl Rove, who then circulated it in administration and neoconservative circles,' Wilson writes."

The Bush administration is bracing itself for the latest memoir by a former insider. Joe Wilson, a former ambassador, will this week reveal the name of the government official who "outed" his wife - revealing her identity as a CIA operative in apparent revenge for his role in proving the White House made false claims about Iraq's efforts to develop nuclear weapons... His memoir, "The Politics of Truth: Inside the Lies that Led to War and Betrayed My Wife's CIA Identity", is published tomorrow.

"Prosecutors investigating whether someone in the Bush administration improperly disclosed the identity of a C.I.A. officer have expanded their inquiry to examine whether White House officials lied to investigators or mishandled classified information related to the case.. The expansion of the inquiry's scope comes at a time when prosecutors, after a hiatus of about a month, appear to be preparing to seek additional testimony before a federal grand jury, lawyers with clients in the case said. It is not clear whether the renewed grand jury activity represents a concluding session or a prelude to an indictment... Mr. Fitzgerald, who has been in charge of the case for three months, has said he is nearing completion of the inquiry... Should Mr. Fitzgerald bring the case to a close with no indictments and no public explanation of his decision not to prosecute, he would almost certainly be subject to intense criticism from Democrats."

Murray Waas writes: "Bush's chief political adviser, Karl Rove, told the FBI in an interview last October that he circulated and discussed damaging information regarding CIA operative Valerie Plame with others in the White House, outside political consultants, and journalists, according to a government official and an attorney familiar with the ongoing special counsel's investigation of the matter. But Rove also adamantly insisted to the FBI that he was not the administration official who leaked the information that Plame was a covert CIA operative to conservative columnist Robert Novak last July. Rather, Rove insisted, he had only circulated information about Plame after it had appeared in Novak's column. He also told the FBI, the same sources said, that circulating the information was a legitimate means to counter what he claimed was politically motivated criticism of the Bush administration by Plame's husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson."

Newsday reports: "A transcript subpoenaed in the CIA leak investigation reveals the White House media operation began efforts to personally discredit former Ambassador Joseph Wilson days before a columnist blew the cover of his CIA-officer wife... In the subpoenaed July 12 transcript of a briefing in Nigeria, then-press secretary Ari Fleischer called Wilson a 'lower-level official.' Meanwhile, many of the journalists on the subpoena's list have reported various attempts by the Bush administration last year to discredit Wilson by suggesting his wife arranged for the CIA to send him to Niger... One journalist, NBC reporter and Meet the Press host Andrea Mitchell, appears to have several connections of interest... On July 6, she interviewed Wilson about his trip to Niger, and two days later she reported officials tried to cast Wilson as a Democratic 'partisan.'"

Newsday: "The federal grand jury probing the leak of a covert CIA officer's identity has subpoenaed records of Air Force One telephone calls in the week before the officer's name was published in a column in July, according to documents obtained by Newsday. Also sought in the wide-ranging document requests contained in three grand jury subpoenas to the Executive Office of President George W. Bush are records created in July by the White House Iraq Group, a little-known internal task force established in August 2002 to create a strategy to publicize the threat posed by Saddam Hussein. And the subpoenas asked for a transcript of a White House spokesman's press briefing in Nigeria, a list of those attending a birthday reception for a former president, and, casting a much wider net than previously reported, records of White House contacts with more than two dozen journalists and news media outlets."

From Publisher's Weekly: "The much-awaited May book from nuclear expert Joseph Wilson will disclose who in the White House he says leaked information that led to the outing of his wife as a CIA agent, PW has learned. Sources say the embargoed title, The Politics of Truth, from Carroll & Graf, will reveal who tipped off syndicated columnist Robert Novak in July that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, worked for the CIA--a felony punishable by as many as ten years in prison--and the larger circumstances around the leak. The matter is the subject of a grand-jury investigation that has seen Novak, Wilson and a number of high-profile administration members questioned." Let's hope the culprit is "frog-marched" out of the White House in handcuffs!!!

Jim Lobe writes that Clifford "May has not been coy about sharing his knowledge of Plame's CIA background. On Sept. 29... the National Review Online published a column by Mr. May claiming to be in the know long before Novak blew her cover. 'That wasn't news to me,' he wrote. 'I had been told that - but not by anyone working in the White House. Rather, I learned it from someone who formerly worked in the government and he mentioned it in an offhand manner, leading me to infer it was something that insiders were well aware of.' Mr. May later told Fox News the same day that Plame's identity was 'something of an open secret.' Mr. May's assertions raise some troubling questions. Exactly who were the 'insiders' for whom this was 'something of an open secret?' How did they obtain this information and why did they pass it on so readily to someone like him? Mr. May is, of course, a longtime Republican operative."

The Financial Times reports: "For months, the investigation into who leaked the name of a CIA operative to the press seemed to have been buried in White House process and Justice Department discretion... Phone records and e-mails were passed on through the office of the White House general counsel. Interviews were conducted, but not discussed. Over the last 10 days, however, senior staff to the president and Vice-President Dick Cheney have filed in to give testimony to the grand jury. They include: Scott McClellan, the press secretary, Mary Matalin, Mr Cheney's former press secretary and now adviser to the Bush-Cheney '04 campaign, Claire Buchan, a deputy press secretary, and Adam Levine, who previously worked in the White House communications site. There have also been 'tip-offs' that indictments are in the offing. The names are circulating of senior staff in Mr Cheney's office." Will there be indictments -- or a whitewash?

"Vice President Dick Cheney's political future was at stake yesterday in Washington, where a grand jury investigation was questioning administration officials about his office's role in leaking the name of a CIA operative for political motives. The inquiry has already questioned the president's spokesman and one of his media advisers over the identification of Valerie Plame, which is developing into one of the administration's main headaches in an election year. However, informed sources said last night that three of the five officials who are the real targets of the probe work or worked for Mr Cheney. Until recently, President Bush has insisted that Mr Cheney would be his vice-presidential candidate in the November elections, despite his history of heart trouble. But recent polls conducted by the White House have suggested that growing unpopularity of the taciturn ex-businessman and powerful administration hawk threatens to sink the president."

WashPost: "The logs indicate that several White House officials talked to columnist Robert D. Novak shortly before July 14, when he published a column quoting 'two senior administration officials' saying that Plame, 'an agency operative on weapons of mass destruction,' had suggested her husband for a mission to Niger to investigate whether Iraq tried to acquire uranium there as part of an effort to develop nuclear weapons. White House witnesses have been asked about cell phone calls and have been shown handwritten, diary-style notes from colleagues, as well as e-mails from reporters to administration officials. In at least a few cases, the FBI questioning was portrayed as very aggressive, with agents homing in on specific conversations with journalists. 'Even witnesses that they describe as being potentially helpful are being treated as adversaries,' a source close to the investigation said."

AP: "Bush's press secretary said Monday he had testified before a federal grand jury investigating the leak of a CIA undercover officer's identity. Scott McClellan told reporters that he appeared before the panel in Washington last week. 'I'm doing my part to cooperate, as the president directed all of us to do,' McClellan said aboard Air Force One during Bush's trip to Springfield, Mo. The Justice Department is trying to determine who leaked the name of CIA officer Valerie Plame to syndicated columnist Robert Novak in July."

Josh Marshall, describing the contents of a letter (sent to Rep. Conyers) detailing the CIA's contacts with Justice regarding TreasonGate: "The CIA first contacted Justice by phone on July 24th, 2003. They followed up on July 30th, 2003 with a letter advising them of a possible violation of criminal law and informing them that they had opened their own investigation. The folks at the CIA seem not to have gotten an altogether satisfactory response to the July 30th letter because they again sent the letter, by fax, on September 5th, 2003. Then on September 16 they contacted Justice yet again to inform them that they (i.e., CIA) had completed their investigation. They provided a memo summarizing their findings and requested that the FBI begin a criminal investigation of the matter. Finally on September 29th, Justice notified the CIA that they had in fact begun an investigation. Why did it take so long? Why did the CIA have to press so hard? Much more on this to come."

The Moonie UPI reports: "Federal law-enforcement officials said that they have developed hard evidence of possible criminal misconduct by two employees of Dick Cheney's office related to the unlawful exposure of a CIA officer's identity last year. The investigation, which is continuing, could lead to indictments, a Justice Department official said. According to these sources, John Hannah and Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, were the two Cheney employees. 'We believe that Hannah was the major player in this,' one federal law-enforcement officer said. Calls to the vice resident's office were not returned, nor did Hannah and Libby return calls. The strategy of the FBI is to make clear to Hannah 'that he faces a real possibility of doing jail time' as a way to pressure him to name superiors, one federal law-enforcement official said."

David Corn writes: "It seemed as if the Justice Department was finally--after months of delay--bowing to requests from Democrats calling for an independent inquiry aimed at discovering who in the Administration blew Valerie [Plame] Wilson's cover, possibly compromising national security. Not quite. In naming Fitzgerald a 'special counsel,' Comey violated (or disregarded) the department's own regulations. Those regulations state, 'The Special Counsel shall be selected from outside the United States Government.' Fitzgerald was a current Justice Department employee and thus ineligible to be a 'special counsel.' Comey could have chosen Fitzgerald to run the investigation without bestowing upon him the 'special counsel' title. But the point was to create the impression that the Administration had taken action to guarantee that this sensitive investigation would be free of political manipulation.'"

Symbolman writes: "Here's a taste of what we are going to post on our new Blog page for Take Back the Media -- this is my first hand account as a witness to the Assault on a Citizen by Robert Novak.. We will be adding hyperlinks to this account - film and links so that you get the whole picture -- In a few days I'll be posting the POLICE REPORT of the Man who was assaulted by Novak - should make for good reading. By the way, we have a pal in Washington that is going to get this story out far and wide. So Novak - Don't quit your day job. Unless you get fired and we ARE asking for his RESIGNATION. He's a Criminal, a Fraud, and a Traitor, just like that plucky citizen said - right before Novak attacked him."

"An assault complaint has been filed against CNN's Robert Novak, following an incident outside the Merrimac Restaurant in Manchester, New Hampshire. Take Back The Media's Mike Stinson was on the scene as Novak exited the restaurant this afternoon, heading for the CNN Campaign bus. Apparently, someone from the crowd got on Novak's case, calling him a traitor a few times. Novak went ballistic - Sym decribed it as a 'Lee Harvey Oswald moment' - and went over and shoved the guy, sending him sprawling. TBTM might - might - have gotten it on videotape. Stay tuned. "

"Sources... tell Time that... a grand jury began hearing testimony Wednesday in the investigation of who leaked the identity of CIA operative Valerie... A huge unanswered question in this case is whether the leaker or leakers knew that Plame was undercover when they gave her identity away. That is a necessary element for any indictment for leaking the name of a covert agent. However, charges could also be brought for making false statements to the FBI, if a guilty party has falsely claimed innocence in interviews with government agents. It's also possible that prosecutors will learn who perpetrated the leak but won't have enough to bring charges. But true to form, the Bush administration continues to be extremely tight-lipped about the investigation -- even internally. 'No one knows what the hell is going on,' says someone who could be a witness, 'because the administration people are all terrified and the lawyers aren't sharing anything with each other either.'"

A group of former CIA agents, fed up with White House stonewalling and furious with its condoning (or worse) of a major security breach, have petitioned Congress to launch its own investigation into who revealed that Valerie Plame was an undercover CIA officer. As the New York Times reports, "The unmasking of Ms. Plame is viewed within spy circles as an unforgivable breach of secrecy that must be exhaustively investigated and prosecuted, current and former intelligence officials say. Anger over the matter is especially acute because of the suspicion, under investigation by the Justice Department, that the disclosure may have been made by someone in the White House to punish Ms. Plame's husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, for opposing administration policy on Iraq." But will the Republican-controlled Congress be no less likely to provide a cover-up than John Ashcroft's Justice Department? It's past time for an independent counsel.

John Dean writes: "But as I will explain, I have a slightly different take on what has occurred and why. Here is what the latest positioning of the tea leaves tells me... When the lawyer -- diGenova, Toensing, or someone else -- went to the government seeking immunity for his or her client, Ashcroft would have heard that the middle-level person was offering to finger the high-level leaker. At that point, he would have realized he himself knew the high-level leaker; and decided to recuse himself from the case, and let Fitzgerald take over. After all, as Comey pointed out at the press conference announcing Fitzgerald's appointment, Fitzgerald -- as a U.S. Attorney -- would not have to consult with anyone at the Justice Department before making an immunity deal. Accordingly, Fitzgerald could 'flip' the middle-level person -- offering him or her immunity to testify against his or her superior -- without the permission, or even knowledge, of Comey, let alone Ashcroft."

"FBI investigators looking into the criminal leak of a CIA agent's identity have asked Bush Administration officials including senior political adviser Karl Rove to release reporters from any confidentiality agreements regarding conversations about the agent. If signed, the single-page requests made over the last week would give investigators new ammunition for questioning reporters who have so far, according to those familiar with the case, not disclosed the names of administration officials who divulged that Valerie Plame, wife of former ambassador Joe Wilson... Lucy Dalglish, executive director of the Reporters' Committee for Freedom of the Press, says asking people who are in the universe of possible suspects to sign such a document is unusual, though not unheard of... 'They can't refuse,' said one individual who's familiar with the case. 'The worst thing to be accused of here is not cooperating with the investigation.' But reporters are not likely to feel the same pressure."

Josh Marshall writes, "The issue... is whether the resident accepts such behavior and what the standard operating procedure in the Bush White House is: Do you punish a political opponent by attacking his family if it means exposing one of the country's covert intelligence operatives and breaking the law? That's a pretty straightforward standard. And by all the available evidence this White House considers it acceptable behavior... The White House has made pretty clear where they stand from the beginning. They're going to see if they can brazen it out. But where does the press stand? Do the big papers put heavy investigative resources on to this? Who's working this story at the Times. Does Mike Allen have to break all the stories? Do the editorial pages care? Does David Broder care? Tim Russert? George? They're the ones on the line here. The issue of criminal prosecution is almost secondary. What do they think is important? What do they care about? It's been that way from the word go."

Former CIA Analyst Ray McGovern writes: "Past experience strongly suggests that if Fitzgerald is told to string the [Plame Leak] investigation out until after the November election, he may well oblige. If he is told to pin the blame on White House small fry willing to take the fall, he may do it. Besides, Fitzgerald arrives on the scene months after the Ollie North memorial shredder has done its work. Recall that when it was announced that the Justice department would investigate it was made clear that the formal order requiring administration officials to save all relevant documents would come a day or two later. Imagine the heat rising from the shredder machines that weekend. And recall how the White House counsel then insisted on reviewing all documents before they could be given to the Justice department."

"The public will not likely trust the results of an investigation headed by a political appointee, especially when the special counsel is constrained by Department of Justice regulations that severely curtail the prosecutor's autonomy," said Joe Lieberman. Howard Dean said "Whether it is a special counsel or the Justice Department inspector general, the American people deserve a person whose honesty, objectivity and fairness are guaranteed to investigate this serious matter," Dean said. John Edwards... said Ashcroft's decision "comes far too late. Bush knows how to get what he wants inside his White House, yet for months, his administration has somehow failed to find the person responsible for this dangerous and destructive leak." John Kerry called Fitzgerald's appointment "a half measure and nowhere good enough to restore public confidence in this tarnished agency." He said Comey and Fitzgerald "are both Bush political appointees and carry the same baggage as John Ashcroft."

"John Ashcroft will remove himself from an investigation into who gave the name of a Central Intelligence Agency officer [Valerie Plame] to a newspaper columnist and turn over the inquiry to a special counsel... Democrats have insisted that Mr. Ashcroft remove himself from the case because he has close ties to some of the people who may have been involved in the disclosure to the syndicated columnist Robert Novak. Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the United States attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, has been appointed special counsel to head the investigation and will be given complete authority to take the inquiry wherever it leads." Worth noting -- Fitzgerald testified in favor of the Patriot Act before the Senate Judiciary Committee -- and he also opposed Chicago's anti-Patriot Act resolution. He also debated the Patriot Act before the rightwing Federalist Society. Is he a Federalist Society member, like Ashcroft and so many of the attorneys within the Bush Administration?

"On July 14, 2003, 'journalist' Robert Novak revealed the name of undercover CIA agent Valerie Plame in print after speaking to a White House official... While causing consternation among some CIA and Administration officials... it has not yet caused a change of conscience among the leaker -- or the man who endangered US national security assets by publishing the name, one Robert Novak. We don't need to wait for John Ashcroft and George Bush to find the leaker who is on the loose. One man knows. And he should come clean. He is not a journalist. He is an ideologue. And most of all, he is a traitor." Excerpt of letter to Novak's bosses at the Sun-Times: "Nearly five months after betraying our national security, Bob Novak is unapologetic and still on the job. I'm asking that Mr. Novak come clean and identify the leaker for the sake of our national security, or be fired." Send the letter!

PentaPost reports: "The Justice Dept. has added a fourth prosecutor to the team investigating the leak of an undercover CIA officer's identity, while the FBI has said a grand jury may be called to take testimony from administration officials, sources said. Administration and CIA officials said they have seen signs in the past few weeks that the investigation continues intensively behind closed doors, even though little about the investigation has been publicly said or seen for months... The agents appear to have a great deal of information and have constructed detailed chronologies of various officials' possible tie to the leak... Agents investigating the matter have been increasingly apparent at CIA headquarters in Langley over the past three weeks, officials said. 'They are still active,' a senior official said. But sources said the CIA believes that people in the administration continue to release classified information to damage the figures at the center of the controversy."

Bernard Weiner writes: "The investigatory action in this case has been absolutely underwhelming, and, for all intents and purposes, nothing is expected to come out of the FBI's probe -- at least not before the November 2004 balloting. 'We have let the earth-movers roll in over this one (i.e. the Plame investigation),' a 'senior White House official' was quoted by the Financial Times two weeks ago...Not even Novak believes the long-honored journalistic tradition is absolute. In 2001, he himself named a source that he'd kept secret for years; he revealed the source, he said, because the situation, was 'extraordinary'... The situation is so dire, so extraordinary, that it is quite proper -- indeed morally, legally and politically necessary -- to out the rats who have endangered American national security."

From the Daily Kos: "Howard Kurtz's piece on Vanity Fair's take on Valerie Plame has sparked a little roar in the blogworld. The scrupulously ludicrous Glenn Reynolds argues : 'Serious people don't do self-promoting spreads in Vanity Fair where important questions of national security are involved. Self-promoters (Wilson is trying to pitch a book, the article reports) do. Not knowing the underlying facts, I have to make my judgment by the behavior of the parties. And judging from that, the scandal is bogus, and Wilson is a self-promoter who can't be trusted. That's my judgment on this matter. Yours, of course, may vary. But if you see Wilson as anything other than a cheesy opportunist, well, then yours really varies.'" Since most of the Media (including Kurtz's Washington Post) is burying Treason-gate -- we say more power to the Wilsons for any media attention they get to keep this scandal alive. The culprits in the Bush White House should be prosecuted for Treason!

Boston Globe reports, "Despite Bush's repeated pledges of full cooperation, administration officials yesterday refused to rule out invoking executive privilege to shield some documents from Justice Department investigators looking into whether someone in the White House illegally leaked the name of a CIA operative. Democrats who have complained that the investigation should be handled by a special counsel instead of the Justice Department because of its connections to the White House said the prospect of executive privilege being used shows that more independence is needed. 'Asserting executive privilege would make a farce of the investigation,' said Senator Edward M. Kennedy. 'That's why we need a special prosecutor, so that we can challenge any coverup.' The very words 'executive privilege' evoke memories of scandal-plagued presidents trying to use the power of their office to hide from public view politically damaging information.'" Impeach Bush Now!

NY Times: "Justice Department and F.B.I. officials have imposed tighter secrecy restrictions over the inquiry into the leak of the identity of a C.I.A. operative, government officials said on Tuesday. In an unusual step, they have removed the director of the F.B.I's Washington office from the list of officials with access to the case. The official, Michael A. Mason, one of the Federal Bureau of Investigation's most senior managers, was taken off the list in an effort to restrict information about the case, the officials said. Customarily, a senior official like Mr. Mason would have full access to details of the case, which is being investigated mainly by agents from his office, although it is being supervised by F.B.I. headquarters. One bureau official said Mr. Mason had asked to be removed, although others said the decision was based on whether the officials had 'a need to know.'" Ashcroft doesn't want ANYBODY whispering about Rovian treason!

"The Justice Department and FBI have broadened their criminal investigation of who leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame to include subsequent Bush administration efforts to discredit her and her diplomat husband, according to two administration officials familiar with the probe. Of particular interest, the two sources said, were contacts between White House officials and the Republican National Committee during the burgeoning scandal. Probers are interested in how the Bush administration and party officials strategized to stymie negative press and to counter public criticism by former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV of the leak of his wife's status as a CIA officer. The administration sources said, however, that they don't think the investigators are probing the efforts to discredit Wilson and Plame as potential criminal conduct but rather as a way of determining who leaked her identity to conservative columnist Robert Novak."

Sam Dash writes, when "top White House aides leaked the identity of an American undercover agent, they may have committed an act of domestic terrorism as defined by the dragnet language of the Patriot Act [Bush] wanted so much to help him catch terrorists. Section 802 of the act defines, in part, domestic terrorism as 'acts dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the US or of any state' that 'appear to be intended to intimidate or coerce a civilian population.' Clearly, disclosing the identity of a CIA undercover agent is an act dangerous to life - the lives of the agent and her contacts abroad whom terrorists groups can now trace - and a violation of the criminal laws of the US... Will [Ashcroft] place sweeping and roving wiretaps on White House aides? Will they engage in sneak, secret searches of their offices, computers and homes? Will they arrest and detain incommunicado, without access to counsel, some White House aides as material witnesses?"

Historian Andrew Schocket writes, "This summer, apparently out of political motives, high Bush administration officials exposed the name of a CIA agent to columnist Robert Novak. For more than two months, the resident did nothing to investigate or even denounce this serious breach of national security. In the long list of p/residential misdeeds and scandals, this one stands out. It's the first time a p/resident has possibly connived at what was essentially an act of treason. Not that there's been a shortage of past Oval Office shenanigans. Presidents and their underlings have committed numerous immoral, illegal or dodgy acts. They've defied the Supreme Court, lied to Congress and spied on their political enemies. Rascals they may have been, but no former administration betrayed national security and put the lives of American agents in danger for the sake of politics. Bush set the tone for his staff by keeping silent until the Justice Department began its investigation."

"In a rare hearing called by Senate Democratic leaders... Vince Cannistraro, former CIA operations chief, [testified that Valerie Plame]: 'was outed as a vindictive act because the agency was not providing support for policy statements that Saddam Hussein was reviving his nuclear programme.' The leak was a way to 'demonstrate an underlying contempt for the intelligence community, the CIA in particular'. He said that in the run-up to the Iraq war, the White House had exerted unprecedented pressure on the CIA and other intelligence agencies to find evidence that Iraq had links to Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda and that Baghdad was trying to build a nuclear bomb... [He testified that] Dick Cheney and his top aide Lewis Libby went to CIA headquarters to press mid-level analysts to provide support for the claim... Mr Cannistraro said his information came from current agency analysts." Impeach Bush for Treason!

Boston Globe opines, "At a time when Bush ought to be doing everything he can to show that he is an engaged commander in chief, he is acting as though there is nothing he can or should do to discover and punish the officials who leaked to columnist Robert Novak the identity of the CIA's Valerie Plame Wilson. Bush's passivity in response to a political dirty trick that harms US intelligence operations and demoralizes intelligence officers is an abdication of responsibility... Wilson's wife and the CIA, it seems clear, were being punished by highly placed leakers who resented the agency's resistance to having its gathering and analysis of intelligence politicized. If Bush continues refusing to root out and punish those leakers, he will undermine the nation's defense and his own claim to leadership." He will also be aiding and abetting in treason - for which he should be IMPEACHED.

Knight-Ridder: "Concerned about the appearance of disarray and feuding within his administration as well as growing resistance to his policies in Iraq, Resident Bush - living up to his recent declaration that he's in charge - told his top officials to 'stop the leaks' to the media, or else. News of Bush's order leaked almost immediately." Wow! The Boy King is willy, willy in charge! "Bush told his senior aides on Tuesday that he 'didn't want to see any stories' quoting unnamed administration officials in the media anymore, and if he did, there would be consequences, a senior administration official who asked that his name not be used told Knight Ridder." This is rich! First, Bush tells them not to leak anymore, and then his order to not leak is -- leaked! Second, the leaks Bush really wants to stop -- are the whistleblowing leaks on his gang's thuggery! Good Luck Bushbaby -- you got a lot of people po'ed at you -- there are gonna be leaks from now 'til election day!

NY Times: "Several senior criminal prosecutors at the Justice Department and top F.B.I. officials have privately criticized Attorney General John Ashcroft for failing to recuse himself or appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the leak of a C.I.A. operative's identity... The attorney general must decide whether to convene a grand jury, which could compel White House officials to testify... The officials said they feared Mr. Ashcroft could be damaged by continuing accusations that as an attorney general with a long career in Republican partisan politics, he could not credibly lead a criminal investigation that centered on the aides to a Republican resident... Several alternative approaches have been suggested... In one approach, Mr. Ashcroft would recuse himself from the case once James B. Comey, the federal prosecutor in Manhattan, took over as deputy attorney general in either an acting or permanent basis." Cut the Crap! We demand a Special Prosecutor!

"The conservative columnist, it seems, receives different treatment from the CIA than yours truly... After I learned from reliable sources the identity of a current National Security Council staffer who once worked with Valerie Wilson at the CIA in weapons counterproliferation, I wondered whether I should make the name of this person public, and I contacted the CIA. This NSC staffer might--I emphasize, might--play a role in the Wilson leak scandal. I know of no reason to suspect he or she is one of the leakers. (A recent Newsweek story referred to this NSCer, but it did not name the staffer.) But perhaps this individual--whom I was told is a CIA officer assigned to the NSC--mentioned Valerie Wilson's CIA connection to one or more White House colleagues during the period in which Joseph Wilson was causing the White House discomfort."

AFP: "The senior Democrat in the US Senate, Tom Daschle, said he would ask CIA director George Tenet to assess the potential damage from the controversy over the leaked name of an agent. 'I will be sending a letter to George Tenet today asking him to give us a formal assessment of the damages done by this leak...and what precautions we might expect as a result of a reckless action taken by somebody,' Daschle said. 'We think it's important for the CIA to give us their evaluation, their assessment of the impact this had and what if anything we may now have to to do to rectify the situation'... The leak identified [Joseph] Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, as a Central Intelligence Agency operative, and the investigation centers on whether a US law barring the release of an undercover operative's name was violated."

Evan Thomas and Michael Isikoff write: "If the trail of the leaker does lead back into Cheney's office, the irony will be too delicious for the press to ignore. Cheney has been the most outspoken foe of leaks in the administration. The vice resident's office is known for its secretiveness. Cheney has said on many occasions that he thinks Congress encroached on the power of the executive branch after Watergate in the mid-'70s (Cheney was President Gerald Ford's chief of staff at the time). He has resisted turning over information, like the private deliberations of his energy task force, to congressional committees. Cheney has been an ardent fan of leak investigations. After 9/11, when CNN revealed transcripts of ominous warnings from Al Qaeda made on Sept. 10, 2001, that were picked up (but not translated) by the supersecret National Security Agency, Cheney called the chairmen of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees and chewed them out."

Josh Marshall writes: "The [Washington] Post story begins with a map of the Justice Department investigation. The initial focus of the inquiry, it seems, is not so much on who leaked to Novak as just how the information --- Plame's status and her relationship to Joe Wilson --- made its way to and then around the White House... There's been a lot of chatter over the last week about whether that Post piece from September 28th --- in which a 'senior administration official' pointed the finger at two 'top White House officials' --- may have gotten some key points wrong... The point here is clear. The reporters --- one would assume Mike Allen, since he has a byline on both pieces --- went back to the source with all the new information we know now. And the source stuck to his story on every key point. Note too that we're back to 'top White House officials.'"

Josh Marshall: "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.'... 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..." Click below for more.

From MoveOn: "Today we're giving you a chance to clear your name. We're asking you and tens of thousands of other MoveOn members to sign an affidavit affirming that you didn't leak the identity of an undercover CIA agent to the press last July. Here's why: P/resident Bush told the press on Tuesday that he doesn't 'have any idea' whether the senior administration officials who blew a CIA operative's cover will ever be found. But if he just asked his staff to sign a legally binding affidavit confirming that they weren't involved, and referred anyone who wouldn't to the FBI, it's possible he could flush out the perpetrators in a day. To date, the P/resident hasn't even discussed this matter with his staff. We've already done the P/resident's homework for him by writing the affidavit. Now let's show him how easy it is for innocent people to legally declare their innocence. You can sign the affidavit and send it to the P/resident in under a minute by clicking below."

W. David Jenkins III writes: "Can you believe this? The gang that promised to restore honesty and integrity to the White House is, once again, going to 'slime' the opposition for shedding light on the corruption which has bloomed and flourished under George W. Bush. There will be no apologies and no explanation because, after all, why should this little problem be any different from all the others? That is why I refuse to get my hopes up this time. So I hear there's going to be an 'investigation.' Big hairy deal. So what? Two 'senior White House officials' name a CIA operative in response to her husband's NY Times editorial on the subject of another Bush lie. That particular lie has cost us billions of dollars (and the meter is still running), hundreds of American lives and uncounted thousands of innocent Iraqi lives. That meter is still running as well. The Bushies and their supporters obviously don't care that a federal law was broken within their camp."

James C. Moore, Co-author of "Bush's Brain: How Karl Rove Made George W.Bush Presidential," writes:"Dear Mr. Novak, In your numerous interviews last week, you were quoted as saying, 'If I gave up my sources, I would get out of journalism.' I would like to suggest to you that it is time you do both. Kindly inform the CIA or the FBI who tipped you on the identity of Ambassador Joseph Wilson's wife, and then leave journalism in steadier, less mercenary hands. There is a higher ethic than source protection, Mr. Novak. You ought to be more concerned about the security of your country, and the safety of millions of your fellow citizens. As a result of your gratuitous insertion of Valerie Plame's name into your column, you have exposed her family, and our nation to unnecessary risk." If Novak doesn't quit voluntarily, it's time to boycott his employers.

From the Daily Kos: "Memo to Bush apologists who argued that the Plame leak was no big deal. Bush himself has finally copped to reality: 'This is a serious charge, by the way. We're talking about a criminal action.' Of course, Bush threw in a 'we expect other leaks to stop as well' which is laughable. As we all know, Bush had no problem leaking 'intelligence' when it appeared to support his case for war. He only expects leaks critical of his administration to stop. But hey, this is progress. That's one less argument the wingnuts can wield. The Plame Affair is serious, the malicious leak is a criminal act. So what's left? That Wilson is a Democrat?"

Joe Wilson in Feb. '03: "A year ago [the beginning of 2002] I spent a lot of time talking to people who I fought the Gulf War with,... the people around the p/resident's father, about this phenomenon of a fringe part of the policy debate, i.e. regime change as a rationale for military intervention, suddenly moving to occupy the center of the debate, and I was told then not to worry, that they just weren't going to get there, it was going to fizzle out. In June or July some people that I have a lot of respect for got nervous themselves about this...and started writing their op-eds. I wrote a piece that did not get published but that got circulated broadly within the administration." CalPundit: "So he was basically a Bush Sr. foreign policy realist. He thought military intervention was a bad idea, but he was just beginning to be concerned about it in early 2002 and didn't say anything publicly until mid-year. He was not an opponent of the resident at the time the CIA sent him to Niger."

Joseph "Wilson said he and his wife [Valerie Plame], a specialist in unconventional weapons who worked overseas, were increasingly concerned she might be a target due to the disclosure and 'as a consequence of that, have begun to rethink our own security posture.' The U.S. government had not offered any security measures, said Wilson, adding that a leading former CIA official had said his wife 'was probably the single highest target of any possible terrorist organization or hostile intelligence service that might want to do damage.'... Jim Marcinkowski, an ex-CIA officer who called Plame the best shot in their class with an AK-47 rifle, told Time magazine her career as an undercover operative was over. 'She will no longer be safe traveling overseas,' said Marcinkowski... 'I liken that to the knee-capping of an athlete.'" Why hasn't Bush ordered full protection for Plame and Wilson? Does he want harm to come to them? And why hasn't he confronted his staff to get the truth?

In July 2003, Capitol Hill Blue's Doug Thompson broke a hot story headlined "White House admits Bush wrong about Iraqi nukes." Thompson's source, "Terry Wilkinson", was a man Thompson relied on for 20 years. "For the first time, Wilkinson said he was willing to go on the record and told a story about being present, as a CIA contract consultant, at two briefings with Bush. He said he was retired now and was fed up and wanted to go public. 'He (Bush) said that if the current operatives working for the CIA couldn't prove the story was true, then the agency had better find some who could,' Wilkinson said in our story." After the story was attacked, he went looking for "Terry Wilkinson" - and could not find any trace of him. He retracted the story, but never bothered to ask who the mystery man really was. For a complete investigation of Plame-Gate, "Terry Wilkinson" needs to be found and asked what he really knew about Bush.

William Rivers Pitt writes, "The wives of Bush administration critics are fair game. CIA operatives are likewise fair game... Also, front companies used to protect the identities of CIA operatives working to defend our national security, and by proxy all of the agents whose lives are protected by that cover, are fair game as well. Seeing as how this is the case, that the barest standards and principles no longer have a place within this administration, that the national security of the United States can be sacrificed for low-rent political retribution, that George W. Bush and his people have been exposed as the rankest and bloodiest hypocrites in the history of American government, that everything is now fair game, I say let's have at it. If politics is now nothing more than a WWF cage match, I want in. I have a fighter in my corner who also believes in the idea that everything is fair game. My fighter is an independent counsel."

Rep. John Conyers writes, "Sorely missing in the myriad of public debate concerning the need for a special counsel to investigate the leaked name of a CIA operative is one simple fact: It's required by the law. Although the independent counsel law expired in 1999, the Justice Department promulgated regulations that require the appointment of a special counsel... when (1) a 'criminal investigation of a person or matter is warranted,' (2) the investigation 'would present a conflict of interest for the Department' and (3) 'it would be in the public interest to appoint an outside special counsel to assume responsibility.' All three factors are present here... When charges were made concerning President Bill Clinton's involvement in the Whitewater land deal in 1993, he asked Attorney General Janet Reno to appoint a special prosecutor, and she complied. Here the charge - outing a CIA operative - is far more serious. The law mandates no less."

Joseph Wilson, husband of outed CIA agent Valerie Plame says he has been told that his wife's life may be in danger. "There have been a number of other people who've come out and suggested that perhaps this does make her a target," Joseph Wilson said. However, despite the White House's responsibility for Plame's situation, she has been given no protection. Even conservative Repug Chuck Hagel believes Plame is owed protection: "If there is the least possibility, most remote possibility, of her life being in danger, then the government owes that person protection and security," said Hagel.

Cheryl Seal knocks holes in Bob Novak's story: "Novak claims he won't reveal his source because it's his prerogative as a journalist. HOLE IN THE STORY: Prerogative usually involves sources who made the journalist promise not to reveal the source at the time of the revelation. And, journalistic prerogative usually involves PRIVATE CITIZENS. The protection of White House officials is overstretching prerogative. Why? The press is supposed to be in the business of PROTECTING the public from unethical officials, not protecting the unethical officials! In any case, Novak claimed that the comment about Plame was 'an offhand remark' made at the end of a regular conversation. So since when does an 'offhand remark' at the end of an 'ordinary conversation' involve swearing the listener to secrecy? C'mon, Novak. It was either leak and you KNEW it, or it was a casual conversation and needn't be kept secret."

27-year CIA analyst Ray McGovern: "So far the intimidation [of intelligence officials, fueled by the Plame leak,] has worked. But a test case is waiting in the wings. Alan Foley, the CIA official in charge of analysis on weapons of mass destruction, has announced his retirement. His name hit the news recently when it was learned that Foley tried, unsuccessfully, to prevent the bogus report on Iraq-Niger from finding its way into the state-of-the-union speech. Foley's credibility was immediately attacked by the White House - which may come to regret having done so. I have worked with Alan Foley. He is cut of the same cloth as Ambassador Wilson. I am betting that the White House's latest preemptive strike will not deter Foley and other intelligence officials able to put conscience and integrity before career from following Wilson's example. Things are likely to get even more interesting."

"FBI agents yesterday began attempts to interview journalists who may have had conversations with government sources about Plame and Wilson. It was not clear how many journalists had been contacted. The FBI has interviewed Plame, ABC News reported. Wilson and his wife have hired Washington lawyer Christopher Wolf to represent them in the matter. The couple has directed him to take a preliminary look at claims they might be able to make against people they believe have impugned their character, a source said." (First excerpt from WashPost article, "Leak of Agent's name...")

"The name of the CIA front company was broadcast yesterday by Novak, the syndicated journalist who originally identified Plame. Novak, highlighting Wilson's ties to Democrats, said on CNN that Wilson's 'wife, the CIA employee, gave $1,000 to Gore and she listed herself as an employee of Brewster-Jennings & Associates.' 'There is no such firm, I'm convinced... CIA people are not supposed to list themselves with fictitious firms if they're under a deep cover -- they're supposed to be real firms, or so I'm told. Sort of adds to the little mystery.' In fact, it appears the firm did exist, at least on paper. The Dun & Bradstreet database of company names lists a firm that is called both Brewster Jennings & Associates and Jennings Brewster & Associates. The phone number in the listing is not in service, and the property manager at the address listed said there is no such company at the property, although records from 2000 were not available." (Second excerpt from WashPost article)

"The leak of a CIA operative's name has also exposed the identity of a CIA front company, potentially expanding the damage caused by the original disclosure... The company's identity, Brewster-Jennings & Associates, became public because it appeared in Federal Election Commission records on a form filled out in 1999 by Valerie Plame, the case officer at the center of the controversy, when she contributed $1,000 to Al Gore's presidential primary campaign. After the name of the company was broadcast yesterday, administration officials confirmed that it was a CIA front. They said the obscure and possibly defunct firm was listed as Plame's employer on her W-2 tax forms in 1999 when she was working undercover for the CIA... The inadvertent disclosure of the name of a business affiliated with the CIA underscores the potential damage to the agency and its operatives caused by the leak of Plame's identity."

Tim Dunlop writes of one of "Robert Novak's other recent brushes with secret information. From a Novak column: 'Former international weapons inspector David Kay, now seeking Iraqi weapons of mass destruction for the Pentagon, has privately reported successes that are planned to be revealed to the public in mid-September. Kay has told his superiors he has found substantial evidence of biological weapons in Iraq, plus considerable missile development. He has been less successful in locating chemical weapons, and has not yet begun a substantial effort to locate progress toward nuclear arms.' From a report after the closed hearing where, today, Kay reported to Congress: 'The CIA official in charge of the search for WMDs in Iraq has said no such weapons have so far been found.'... Never let it be said that Bob Novak is being strung along by his sources."

"From top advisers to junior staff, nearly 2,000 White House employees were ordered to come forward by Tuesday with any documents that might help the criminal investigation into the leak of an undercover CIA officer's identity. A memo Friday cautioned the staff not to seek advice from Resident Bush's attorneys. The White House counsel's office works solely for the resident in his official capacity and is not a private attorney for anyone, the memo warned, meaning that staff members should hire their own lawyers if they think they need counsel... Friday's document brought home the gravity of the investigation to all of Bush's staff and touched every corner of the White House... Each employee was required to sign a memo certifying either that they have produced relevant documents or have no such documents. The deadline is 5 p.m. Tuesday. The order covers materials such as electronic records, telephone logs, correspondence, computer records, notes and calendar entries."

"Rove's ties to Attorney General John Ashcroft have led some lawmakers, including one senior Republican, to say he should consider recusing himself from the investigation. Rove was a political adviser during Ashcroft's gubernatorial and Senate campaigns in Missouri. Asked whether Rove's relationship with Ashcroft would present a conflict of interest, senior Republican Sen. Arlen Specter, Pennsylvania, said Ashcroft should consider stepping aside. Specter noted that the investigation is not directly controlled by Ashcroft, but by career prosecutors reporting to FBI Director Robert Mueller. Mueller's 10-year tenure insulates him from White House pressure... [Sen. Charles] Schumer's press secretary said Justice Department rules hold that a federal prosecutor cannot issue subpoenas of news media phone records without the express written consent of the attorney general. Since media phone records may end up being subpoenaed, Schumer believes Ashcroft should step aside."

"BILL PRESS: Today at the White House gaggle they call it, press secretary Scott McClellan was pushed about have-you know ' have you talked to people, are the White House staff cooperating? And remember the other day he said he talked to Karl Rove, and Karl Rove said I had nothing to do with it. So a reporter said have you talked to Scooter Libby the same-in the same fashion, and are you willing to say right now, ready to say right now that Scooter Libby had nothing to do with this? Scott McClellan closed the briefing, didn't answer the question, and walked away. What does that tell you? Former CIA Agent LARRY JOHNSON: That's very telling. I think if I'm the FBI, I start by having a discussion with Mr. Libby."

Paul Krugman writes, "Now that the C.I.A. has demanded a Justice Department inquiry, the White House's strategy isn't just to stonewall, Nixon-style; as one Republican aide told The NY Times, it will 'slime and defend.' The right-wing media slime machine, which tries to assassinate the character of anyone who opposes the right's goals - hey, I know all about it - has already swung into action. For example, The Wall Street Journal's editorial page calls Mr. Wilson an 'open opponent of the U.S. war on terror.' ... Mr. Wilson's views and character are irrelevant. Someone high in the administration committed a felony and, in the view of the elder Mr. Bush, treason. End of story... This episode is a test for Mr. Bush and his inner circle: a true patriot wouldn't hesitate about doing the right thing in the Plame affair, whatever the political costs. Mr. Bush is failing that test."

John Dean writes, "Regardless of whether or not a special prosecutor is selected, I believe that Ambassador Wilson and his wife -- like the DNC official once did -- should file a civil lawsuit, both to address the harm inflicted on them, and, equally important, to obtain the necessary tools (subpoena power and sworn testimony) to get to the bottom of this matter. This will not only enable them to make sure they don't merely become yesterday's news; it will give them some control over the situation."

Lying GOP hacks "are accusing [Joseph] Wilson of being either a left-wing fanatic or a partisan attack-dog. A look at Wilson's political giving records shows that he's pretty much a Democrat... On the other hand, he did give a grand to Bush in 1999. And he served as an appointee under [his] father. So that cuts against a monochromatic picture of him as a down-the-line Democratic loyalist. More to the point, contrary to what some Republicans seem to think, Democrats still are allowed to serve in the national security bureaucracy... But let's cut to the chase. None of this matters. It's all irrelevant... If Wilson were a rabid political attack dog would it change the seriousness of blowing his wife's cover at the CIA to get back at him? Of course, not. Are we relying on Wilson to tell us what his wife's status is? Not in the least. The fact that the CIA made the referral to Justice tells us all we really need to know about that."

"[Scooter] Libby's involvement [in Plame-Gate] would mean much more than a rapid escalation in his attorneys' billable hours. Much more. The backdrop to this whole scandal is the war that's been going on between the Bush administration and the CIA for 2 years. Another reporter who's knowledgeable about these issues and not at all averse to this perspective, told me that 'there are people in this administration who think that the CIA was criminally negligent for 9/11 and that the whole place should be shuttered.'... That war with the CIA centers on the vice president's office. If it turns out that Plame's exposure originated there too, it will inject this legal controversy...right into that broader policy controversy, the whole issue of the war against the CIA, the questions over politicized intelligence, all of it. The mixing of the two would be explosive because the press scrutiny and a criminal inquiry would tear open stuff that otherwise never would have seen the light of day."

NY Times: "Deep political ties between top White House aides and Attorney General John Ashcroft have put him into a delicate position as the Justice Department begins a full investigation into whether administration officials illegally disclosed the name of an undercover C.I.A. officer. Karl Rove, Mr. Bush's top political adviser, whose possible role in the case has raised questions, was a paid consultant to three of Mr. Ashcroft's campaigns in Missouri, twice for governor and for United States senator, in the 1980's and 1990's, an associate of Mr. Rove said on Wednesday. Karl Rove, Resident Bush's top political adviser, whose possible role in the case has raised questions, was a paid consultant to three of Mr. Ashcroft's campaigns in Missouri, twice for governor and for United States senator, in the 1980's and 1990's, an associate of Mr. Rove said on Wednesday."

"In Daschle's Wednesday letter, the Senate minority leader and three other senators outlined four demands. As long as Ashcroft does not appoint an independent counsel, Sens. Daschle, John Rockefeller, D-W. Va., Carl Levin, D-Mich., and Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., ask the White House to do these things: Produce a list of all officials with access to the identity of CIA operatives; Insist every senior staffer sign a statement saying he or she did not leak the name of the CIA agent; Assign a senior White House attorney to compile documents to accelerate the investigation; Determine whether any documents or records related to the matter have been destroyed." These demands are completely reasonable - what ridiculous excuse will Bush concoct to get out of acting on them?

The 'full cooperation" of the White House was brought sharply into doubt when Scott McLellan refused to answer a key question: "The FBI, which can use grand jury subpoenas to compel disclosure of any evidence, has regularly used polygraph tests in investigations involving classified information. Asked if White House staff members would submit to lie detector tests if requested, spokesman Scott McClellan called the question 'hypothetical.'" Yet he had the nerve to add: "We will cooperate fully with the investigation and make sure that we preserve the integrity of the investigation." McClellan's refusal to answer the question is a strong indication of just what the "integrity of the investigation" is gonna be!

Even as Karl Rove is accused of treason, he is still in charge of the White House attack strategy. "The White House [i.e. Karl Rove] encouraged Republicans to portray the former diplomat at the center of the case, Joseph C. Wilson IV, as a partisan Democrat with an agenda and the Democratic Party as scandalmongering. At the same time, the administration and the Republican leadership on Capitol Hill worked to ensure that no Republicans in Congress break ranks and call for an independent inquiry outside the direct control of the Justice Department. 'It's slime and defend,' said one Republican aide on Capitol Hill, describing the White House's effort to raise questions about Mr. Wilson's motivations and its simultaneous effort to shore up support in the Republican ranks." We demand a Special Prosecutor - and the immediate firing of Karl Rove!

"MSNBC'S Buchanan & Press scored a major scoop on Wednesday, all but unmasking the high government official who 'outed' [Valerie Plame]. Larry Johnson, a former CIA analyst who worked with Plame...all but identified 'Scooter' Libby as the government official who outed her - and at least one other in the Vice President's office. Who is 'Scooter' Libby? He's the nexus of the neocon network in Washington, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, and assistant to the President, whose office is the operational nerve center of the War Party. It is Libby and Cheney who made repeated trips to the CIA, pressuring them to accept tall tales of Al Qaeda connections and assorted 'weapons of mass destruction' supposedly lurking in Baghdad... Pressed by Pat Buchanan to name the leaker, Johnson refused to deny it was Libby; he furthermore stated that the perpetrator was no stranger to 'scandal.'"

"Joseph Wilson, said he plans to give the names of the reporters to the FBI, which is conducting a full-blown investigation of the possible leak. 'I will be revealing the names of everybody who called me and cited White House sources or cited people specifically,' Wilson said in an interview with Nightline's Ted Koppel... Wilson maintains that Washington reporters told him they spoke with Rove on the telephone after the Novak column came out. 'What I have confidence in - based upon what respectable press people in this town have told me - is that a week after the Novak article came out, Karl Rove was still calling around and talking to press people, saying Wilson's wife is fair game,' Wilson said. 'The gist of the message, as it was reported back to me right after the phone call, was 'I just got off the phone with Karl Rove. He tells me your wife is fair game.''"

Former CIA agent Larry Johnson worked with Valerie Plame, and he is furious about her "outing." On PBS, he declared: "I say this as a registered Republican. I'm on record giving contributions to the George Bush campaign. This is not about partisan politics. This is about a betrayal, a political smear of an individual with no relevance to the story. Publishing her name in that story added nothing to it. His entire intent was correctly as Ambassador Wilson noted: to intimidate, to suggest that there was some impropriety that somehow his wife was in a decision making position to influence his ability to go over and savage a stupid policy, an erroneous policy and frankly, what was a false policy of suggesting that there were nuclear material in Iraq that required this war. This was about a political attack. To pretend that it's something else and to get into this parsing of words, I tell you, it sickens me to be a Republican to see this."

James Moore, Co-Author of "Bush's Brain": "Rove's temper has always been his weak spot. He cannot seem to control his anger. When Joseph Wilson wrote in the NY Times that there was no truth to the allegations that Iraq had tried to purchase yellowcake uranium from Niger, Rove is said to have gone 'ballistic.' No one who has known Rove for any period of time doubts that Rove was the one who orchestrated the leak, which 'outed' Ambassador Wilson's wife as a CIA agent. Rove has always made sure that his enemies knew he will strike back, and swing with deadly power. Rove wasn't just trying to intimidate Ambassador Wilson. If, as many believe, he is responsible for the leak, Rove wanted to send a message to everyone in the intelligence community that they all needed to keep their mouths shut... The circumstantial evidence is already in. And it points at Karl Rove... if Rove committed this treasonous act, he needs to be prosecuted under the Patriot Act he has so ardently supported."

Daily Brew writes, "Bush would have us believe that he does not know the identity of Robert Novak's source. In Chicago, Bush said ' I want to know who the leakers are.' These and other statements allow the White House to pretend they are the innocent victims of a rogue element within their ranks. This, in turn, creates a veneer of cooperation on the part of the White House as the investigation moves forward. The fundamental premise, however, is most assuredly false. Even a moment's reflection makes it obvious that Bush already knows the identity of Novak's source. Consider the alternative. If Bush really didn't know the identity of the source, he could find out in less than ten minutes. If Bush really wanted to get to the bottom of the story, all he need do is summon Robert Novak to his office, look him in the eye" and demand the name of the leaker.

"The Post-ABC poll found a high degree of suspicion directed toward the administration over the allegations. 72% thought it likely that someone in the White House leaked the operative's name. And, in what could be a politically significant finding, only 29% said the investigation should be handled by the Justice Department, while 69% favored a special counsel with autonomy from the administration... The view that this is a serious matter transcended party lines. 72% of Republicans and 83% of independents joined the 90% of Democrats who said it was at least somewhat serious. In addition, 56% of Republicans found it likely that White House officials leaked the name, and Republicans, by 52% to 42%, favored a special counsel. Americans exhibited little tolerance of the classified leaks and those responsible. If a White House official is the culprit, 91% believe that person should be fired and 82% believe that person should face criminal charges."

BuzzFlash writes, "Unless the outcry from Americans who have had their national security compromised by betrayers in the White House rises to a boiling point, the Bush Cartel is going to try - as it is already doing - to brazenly push forward, cover-up the act of treason, and find a suitable diversion to get the incident off the front pages. After all, Karl Rove is still calling the shots. He believes that he and other members of the Bush Cartel are above the rule of law. And unless a miracle happens, they will prove, once again, that the national security of the United States is secondary to the vendettas of the Bush Cartel - and they will once again not be subject to the rule of law. Remember Iran-Contra. Bush has a few of the convicted Bush loyalists pardoned by his father on his staff, like Elliot Abrams and the infamous Admiral Poindexter (he hasn't left yet). The Bushes take care of their own."

"Keeping WMD out of the wrong hands is, or was, Plame's job... Now Plame's name has been splashed across papers all over the world... Once you know Plame is CIA, and what she looks like and so forth, you unravel most if not everything. And now every bad-actor and bad-acting government knows that anything that Plame was involved with, any operation, any company she was supposed to be working for, any people she worked closely with, are probably also CIA or at least work with CIA. WMD bad-guys now know to steer clear of them. Let's say there's some operation Plame hasn't been involved with for a decade -- but it's still on-going. People will remember she used to be in on that operation and thus it's tagged as an Agency operation and it's useless... [I]t gives you a sense of the sort of work she was involved in and the potential collateral damage of exposing her cover. And consider what her work was: protecting Americans from weapons of mass destruction. Chew on that irony."

Josh Marshall writes, "Another big problem with Novak's comments on Crossfire today. Today he said: 'Nobody in the Bush administration called me to leak this. In July I was interviewing a senior administration official on Ambassador Wilson's report when he told me the trip was inspired by his wife, a CIA employee working on weapons of mass destruction.' But then there's this passage in a July 22nd article in Newsday: 'Novak, in an interview, said his sources had come to him with the information. 'I didn't dig it out, it was given to me,' he said. 'They thought it was significant, they gave me the name and I used it.'' I'd say the story's changed." Does the phrase "triple back flip" come to mind?

"If you look at [Bush comments about Plame in Chicago], you can see immediately what talking points he was given. There's no mention of blowing the cover of a CIA covert operative, no mention of Wilson, the issue of retaliation, or anything like that. His repeated mantra is his opposition to 'leaks of classified information.' That of course is a much broader issue and, not coincidentally, a charge that the White House has previously leveled at Congress. They're trying to move the subject on to much more comfortable ground and push the whole controversy over into the long and muddled history of leaks of classified information. The law which seems to have been violated, of course, is a different one. And this allows the resident to sidestep entirely the issue of his staffers retaliating against a critic by ruining his wife's career. All of which is to say that the resident is still looking for a way to get around discussing the seriousness of what actually happened."

From the DNC's official blog: "Returning to the DNC's downtown headquarters around 1 p.m. this afternoon, I bumped into the man in the eye of the storm: Robert Novak. Attired in a grey three-piece suit, the veteran journalist was walking with a sense of purpose at the corner of 17th and I Streets NW. If you looked at the direction he was heading, he appeared to be going straight to the White House! Makes you wonder..." Like all guilty criminals, Novak can't help returning to the scene of the crime!

"First rule of scandal is that the cover-up is worse than the crime. With that in mind, we ought to be looking to see if any effort was made to prevent the CIA from requesting a Justice Dept. investigation [for 2 months]. And we ought to find out who warned the White House Counsel that something was up, so that Alberto Gonzalez could warn the WH staff in his now famous e-mail... A similar 'Heads-Up Gate' cost Roger Altman his job during the Whitewater scandal. 'Testifying before the Senate banking committee in February 1994, then-deputy Treasury Secretary Roger Altman...conceded he had given top White House officials, including then-White House counsel Bernard Nussbaum, a 'heads-up' on nine RTC criminal referrals that in one instance targeted Clinton's 1985 gubernatorial campaign, and named the Clintons as witnesses in others' (From CNN's History of Whitewater). Six months later, Altman was back before the Senate Banking Committee. Three weeks after that, he resigned in disgrace."

From MSNBC's Hardball: "CHRIS MATTHEWS: Don't you think it's more serious than Watergate, when you think about it? RNC CHAIRMAN ED GILLESPIE: I think if the allegation is true, to reveal the identity of an undercover CIA operative -- it's abhorrent, and it should be a crime, and it is a crime. CHRIS MATTHEWS: It'd be worse than Watergate, wouldn't it? GILLESPIE: It's -- Yeah, I suppose in terms of the real world implications of it. It's not just politics." The Daily Kos writes: "This is serious sh*t. Only the most blindly partisans will continue defending the administration. I remember writing, way back, that Republicans always overreached when they got power. I made the rather obvious prediction that hubris would bring the administration down. I just wish that hubris wasn't endangering our national security."

Billmon writes, "I swear this is almost as good as playing Clue: 'White House: Resident Knows Rove Not Involved in Revealing Identity' ... 'He wasn't involved,' White House press secretary Scott McClellan said of Rove. 'The Resident knows he wasn't involved. ... It's simply not true.' Of course, the only way Shrub could know that Rove was not involved is if he already knows who was involved - which would make him (at a minimum) an accessory after the fact. These chowderheads can't seem to get it through their tiny brains that they're dealing with a legal problem now, not a PR problem. This time, they're the ones who need to 'watch what they do, watch what they say.'... [Here are some] excerpts from today's White House press briefing posted on his site. My favorite bit so far: 'McCLELLAN: He wasn't involved. The Resident knows he wasn't involved. QUESTION: How does he know that? McCLELLAN: The Resident knows. QUESTION: What, is he clairvoyant? How does he know?'"

"The FBI began a full-scale criminal investigation Tuesday into whether White House officials illegally leaked the identity of an undercover CIA officer, and Bush ordered his staff to cooperate with the first major probe of his administration. Democrats demanded the appointment of a special outside counsel but Bush resisted. 'I'm absolutely confident that the Justice Department can do a good job [of scrubbing all the evidence, that is],' he said on a re-election fund-raising stop in Chicago... House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said, 'If there ever was a case for the appointment of a special counsel, this is it.' With pressure building, the Justice Department alerted the White House late Monday of the decision to move from a preliminary inquiry into a full investigation, a step rarely taken with complaints involving leaks of classified information."

From TomDispatch.com: "Howard Kurtz, in his Post media column, actually had some breaking news: 'Now it turns out that Time.com published the same leak around the same time as the Novak column, titled 'A War on Wilson': Some government officials have noted to TIME in interviews, (as well as to syndicated columnist Robert Novak) that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, is a CIA official who monitors the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction...' This seems proof positive that Novak didn't, as he now seems to be lamely claiming, simply stumble across the information while talking to senior administration officials in preparing a Wilson story. This looks more like, as reported in the Post over the weekend, media contact across the board. Of course, I have no idea who outed Plame, but rumors are evidently swirling that reporters who received calls are claiming privately that Karl Rove was involved."

"The Associated Press is reporting that the Justice Department has opened a full investigation into the White House's alleged leak of undercover CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity. Do you trust John Ashcroft to conduct this investigation in a thorough and nonpartisan manner? 'The [Justice] department notified the counsel's office about 8:30 p.m. Monday that it was launching an investigation but said the White House could wait until the next morning to notify staff and direct them to preserve relevant material, McClellan said.' Since when does the Justice Department give people a several-hours head start to destroy evidence before an investigation begins?"

"The Washington Post on Sunday quoted an unidentified senior administration official as saying two top White House officials called at least a half-dozen journalists and revealed the identity and occupation of Wilson's wife. Disclosing the name of an undercover CIA agent could violate federal law." (ABC 9/29). Could violate federal law? Could? Outing a CIA agent involved in activities such as Plame's is tantamount to attempted MURDER. The biggest spin emanating from the White House right now is the idea that outing Plame "may or may not be" criminal. The biggest joke emanating from the Bush administration is a "criminal investigation" by the Ashcroft justice department.

In a January 2003 feature for Esquire, Ron Suskind wrote: "Sources close to [George Bush Sr.] say Karl Rove was fired from the 1992 Bush presidential campaign after he planted a negative story with columnist Robert Novak about dissatisfaction with campaign fundraising chief and Bush loyalist Robert Mosbacher Jr. It was smoked out, and he was summarily ousted." Bob Novak is Karl Rove's "go-to" guy in Washington - which is a dead giveaway that Karl Rove "outed" Valerie Plame and should spend 10 years in prison. We demand the phone logs from Karl Rove's office! (Thanks to talkingpointsmemo.com)

An administration aide told The Washington Post on Saturday that the two White House officials had cold-called at least six Washington journalists and identified Joseph Wilson's wife, CIA agent Valerie Plame, in order to punish Wilson for exposing Yellowcake-gate. We know that Bob Novak was the reporter who jumped at publishing the story, and Andrea Mitchell of NBC has admitted receiving a call. But who were the other 4 right-wing media whores that Karl Rove called in his criminal conspiracy? Play the "Plame Game"! (Registration required)

"The Bush officials who 'outed' Plame committed a major felony - violating the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982 - which can result in 10 years in prison. They also threatened the security of the United States, because they undermined the important covert work of Plame, who is an expert on weapons of mass destruction. Who are these top Bush administration officials? Wilson suggested senior advisor Karl Rove is responsible. George W. Bush could find out in 5 minutes if he simply asked his staff - but Bush refuses to ask. CIA director George Tenet asked Attorney General John Ashcroft to investigate this crime. But John Ashcroft is a right-wing political appointee of George W. Bush, who puts loyalty to Bush ahead of the law. He is incapable of conducting an objective and thorough investigation of 'Plame-gate.' We, the undersigned, demand that Ashcroft appoint an objective and independent Special Prosecutor to investigate the serious crime of 'Plame-Gate.'" Sign the petition!

Despite the furor over the "outing" of CIA agent Valerie Plame by 2 top administration officials, "Bush has no plans to ask his staff members whether they played a role in revealing" her name. Richard A. Gephardt (Mo.) called it "a natural conflict of interest" for Justice Department appointees to investigate their superiors, and said congressional committees should step in to try to determine what happened. Howard Dean said Attorney General John D. Ashcroft should play no role in the investigation and should turn it over to the Justice Department's inspector general, who operates independently of political appointees. "Bush came into office promising to bring honor and integrity to the White House," Dean said. "It's time for accountability." Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.) said the investigation "must be conducted by an independent, nonpartisan counsel."

"At CIA Director George Tenet's request, the Justice Department is looking into an allegation that an administration official leaked the name of an undercover CIA officer [Valerie Plame] to a journalist [Bob Novak]... The intentional disclosure of a covert operative's identity can violate federal law. A senior administration official said TWO top White House officials called AT LEAST SIX Washington journalists and revealed the identity and occupation of Joseph Wilson's wife. That was shortly after Wilson revealed in July that the CIA had sent him to Niger last year to look into the uranium claim and that he had found no evidence to back up the charge... [Wilson] believes Bush's senior adviser, Karl C. Rove, broke her cover. He said Aug. 21 at a public forum in Seattle that it is of keen interest to him 'to see whether or not we can get Karl Rove frog-marched out of the White House in handcuffs.'" John Ashcroft investigating Karl Rove? That's absurd. We demand a Special Prosecutor!

Josh Marshall writes: "Whammo! NBC has a late report that the CIA has asked the Justice Department to investigate whether the White House broke federal law by exposing the identity of one of its undercover employees, Valerie Plame, to retaliate against her husband, Ambassador Joe Wilson. Wilson of course is the former foreign service officer who made the trip to Niger to investigate those claims of uranium sales to Iraq... On it's face, this news tonight almost certainly means that the CIA's internal investigation concluded that laws were broken or that there was sufficient evidence of wrong-doing for a criminal investigation to be undertaken. The decision on whether to task the FBI with investigating the White House is now in hands of John Ashcroft." Only a part of the CIA is under the control of the Bush Crime Family -- but the rest that is p'od will find justice one way or another -- whether Ashcroft cooperates or not. Meanwhile, Karl Rove is sweating bullets.

Timothy Noah writes: "But on another level, it's pretty unsettling that [WH spokesman Scott] McClellan refuses to answer the question at all... McClellan could have said something like, 'I have a very hard time imagining that to be true, but if you like I'll ask him.' But McClellan didn't say that. Maybe he finds all speculation about wacky national-security skullduggery repellant in light of his father's embarrassing new book alleging that Lyndon Johnson murdered John F. Kennedy. Or maybe--just maybe--McClellan wonders himself whether Rove got a little overzealous. Wilson, for his part, denied today that he ever accused Rove. He told Chatterbox 'Karl Rove' was simply a handy metonym for whatever two 'senior administration officials' fingered Plame (correctly or falsely, Wilson still won't say). But Wilson's 'I measure my words' comment at the Inslee forum suggests to Chatterbox that Wilson is now being coy about what he knows, or at least suspects, regarding Rove."

"Ambassador Joseph Wilson dropped a bombshell at a forum organized by Rep. Jay Inslee of Washington. Wilson was asked whether he trusted the FBI to investigate the case. He started by saying that he had to speak hypothetically, since whether a crime was committed or not depended on his wife's status, about which he will not comment.... He then opened up: 'At the end of the day, it's of keen interest to me to see whether or not we can get Karl Rove frog-marched out of the White House in handcuffs. And trust me, when I use that name, I measure my words.' Josh Marshall had already noted his belief that Wilson had a suspect in mind. But having someone in mind is one thing, and making what is virtually a public accusation of a an aggravated felony is something else... Now that Rove has been accused, it's for him to respond. It's a simple yes or no: Did he talk to Novak about Plame, or instruct anyone else to do so? I hope that some [solid] journalists will be asking him that question."

John Dean writes: "Bits and pieces of information have emerged, but the story is far from complete. Nonetheless, what has surfaced is repulsive. If I thought I had seen dirty political tricks as nasty and vile as they could get at the Nixon White House, I was wrong. The American Prospect's observation that 'we are very much into Nixon territory here' with this story is an understatement. Indeed, this is arguably worse. Nixon never set up a hit on one of his enemies' wives... Frankly, I am astounded that the Resident of the United States - whose father was once Director of the CIA - did not see fit to have his Press Secretary address this story with hard facts. Nor has he apparently called for an investigation - or even given Ambassador and Mrs. Wilson a Secret Service detail, to let the world know they will be protected. This is the most vicious leak I have seen in over 40 years of government-watching. Failure to act to address it will reek of a cover-up."

David Corn writes, "Will Tenet dare ask Ashcroft to unleash the FBI's gumshoes upon the White House? Would Ashcroft and the FBI mount an unfettered, let-the-chips-fall inquiry? And if either the CIA or the Justice Department declines to pursue this issue, can the public be confident that the decision was based on legitimate--not political--grounds? No official... has yet publicly broached the possibility of a special counsel. The independent counsel law no longer exists. But the Bush administration could still on its own appoint a special counsel to examine the Wilson leak. The Bush White House, though, has shown little interest in determining if vindictive administration officials did disclose classified information to harm Wilson and his family. Once Congress returns to Washington, several Democratic legislators--including Schumer--are expected to ask if an appropriate investigation is under way. If one is not, they might have no recourse other than to call for a special counsel."

"Two officials revealed national security information to embarrass or scare critics of the administration's mishandling of Iraqi intelligence. Columnist Robert Novak wrote recently that the wife of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson -- the man who blew the whistle on the Niger uranium fraud -- is a Central Intelligence Agency operative, specializing in weapons of mass destruction. Novak attributed his information to two senior administration officials. Time magazine has said officials provided similar information. It's illegal for government officials to reveal the identities of CIA operatives who have worked overseas within the preceding five years... But the administration must try to identify, fire and, possibly, prosecute those responsible. Abuse of national security for political aims is wrong. Until Congress and the public know that there has been an unfettered inquiry into the handling of intelligence, the administration will face growing distrust."

Douglas Jehl writes: "Joseph Wilson, a retired ambassador, National Security Council official and secret Bush administration envoy to Africa, is the most prominent person to step forward and say that the doubts he cast about an alleged Iraqi weapons program were set aside by a White House that did not want to hear them. Now Wilson says he has become the target of a campaign to discourage others like him from going public... His wife was identified by name in a column by a conservative Washington columnist, Robert Novak, as a covert operative for the Central Intelligence Agency, a disclosure that Novak attributed to senior administration officials. Among those who have cried foul are several Democratic senators, including Charles Schumer of New York. They have said that if the statement is true, and if senior administration officials were indeed its source, then Novak's sources violated laws prohibiting such disclosures."

"Sen. Charles Schumer urged the FBI on Thursday to investigate government leaks that he said may have unmasked a CIA covert operative amid the political fight over prewar intelligence on Iraq. Schumer, D-N.Y., said administration officials may have broken federal law in unmasking an operative who had been gathering information on weapons of mass destruction. The senator sent a letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller asking him to order an immediate criminal investigation... A week after Wilson went public with his criticism, syndicated columnist Robert Novak quoted anonymous government sources as telling him that Wilson's wife [Victoria Plame] was a CIA operative... Schumer contended the leak effectively 'burned' the wife's cover, if she was in fact a covert intelligence agent, and said that could be a violation of the Intelligence Identities and Protection Act. The law bars anyone from revealing the identity of a covert CIA operative who has worked overseas in the past five years."

"In a White House that is notoriously protective of those things it considers official secrets, there has been not a word of reprimand for the officials involved in the growing scandal over former ambassador Joseph Wilson IV... It is appalling, at best, that the resident should allow anyone on his staff to reveal the identity of a covert CIA agent. Even worse, some speculate that Wilson's wife was 'outed' because the former ambassador had recently [exposed Yellowcake-gate]... This is an issue that cries out for investigation... A White House concerned with keeping even minor issues under wraps should have no difficulty understanding the far more dire implications of disclosing the identity of someone who may have been playing a key role in tracking weapons of mass destruction for the CIA. resident Bush owes the American people a clear explanation."

Newsday reports, "White House press secretary Scott McClellan heatedly denied that anyone in the White House had been authorized to leak Plame's undercover status, saying, 'That is not the way this White House operates.' [That's a LIE - the Bush White House leaks secret 'intelligence' to advance its agenda practically daily.] Asked if he were flatly ruling out any administration involvement, McClellan said: 'I'm saying no one was certainly given any authority to do anything of that nature [That's a LIE - if the leak was unauthorized, then Bush would have ordered an immediate investigation and prosecution], and I've seen no evidence to suggest there's any truth to it.' [That's a DENY, because no one has asked for any evidence. Novak will obviously not volunteer the identity of his sources, so the only way to find them is if Bush orders an investigation.]"

Robert Novak's "outing" of CIA agent Valerie Plame is clearly a major crime - not by Novak, but by the 2 government officials who gave her name to Novak in an obvious act of retaliation against her husband, Joseph Wilson, who exposed the Yellowcake-Gate scandal. But as blogger Steve Perry points out, "The Valerie Plame scandal is, like Watergate, rapidly increasing in importance as the White House goes into full damage control." Karl Rove's evil schemes include placing an attack article against Durbin in The Hill - and persuading the rest of the corporate media to "disappear" the story. Only Newsday has published a follow-up so far, but the bloggers (including Democrats.com) are all over this one. "As with the Trent Lott imbroglio a while back, bloggers should get some credit on this story, but the Pulitzers will go to the major media players who play dice with their careers and start speaking out."