Hobson's Choice: "Niger is.. one of the very poorest nations on earth, is heavily dependent on US aid, including defense assistance from the territorial ambitions of Libya, is a handy foe in a pinch. It's totally helpless and can be slandered at will. The slanders made by Bush, to wit, that Iraq had sought U-235 from Niger, was something that could have been immediately refuted by consulting with minerals industry experts. Niger produces almost 3,000 tons of uranium per year, which it sells mainly to France and Japan." About the same time Bush slandered Niger, he was slandering the French - did he hope that Niger would boot out the French mining groups to keep the US happy?Also, Joseph Wilson, who investigated the alleged yellowcake sales by Niger, concluded "that controls on Niger's uranium mining were far too strict for any deal with Iraq to be credible," Shortly after pointing this out, Wilson's CIA agent wife was maliciously outed by the Bush administration.

"Two of the Pentagon's top officials, Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Stephen Cambone and Army intelligence chief Lieut. Gen. Keith Alexander, misled the Senate Armed Services Committee about their complicity in interrogations of Iraqi prisoners, as national security investigative reporter Jason Vest reports in an exclusive Nation Online article posted on May 14. Vest cites an internal Pentagon memorandum as well as contradictions between Cambone's and Alexander's testimony to the Senate last week and earlier, previously unreported comments at an April 7 hearing of the Armed Services Committee. Remarks made by the two officials in the April 7 hearing--unreported elsewhere--revealed much more knowledge and coordination on intelligence and interrogation matters than the two indicated on May 11. " Cambone is Rumsfeld's protege from PNAC - a key player in what Joseph Wilson calls the PNAC "coup d'etat."

Joseph Wilson writes, "Bush could fundamentally change the direction of his administration by firing fewer than fifteen senior officials, beginning with those signatories of the Project for the New American Century who signed a 1998 letter that urged President Clinton to wage war on Iraq. They are clustered at the National Security Council (NSC), in the Defense and State Departments, and within Vice President Cheney's own parallel national security office. That particular little-known organization -- not accountable to Congress and virtually unknown to the American people -- should be completely dismantled. Never in the history of our democracy has there been established such an influential and pervasive center of power with the ability to circumvent longstanding and accepted reporting structures and to skew decisionmaking practices. It has been described to me chillingly by a former senior government official as a coup d'etat within the State."

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."

Paul Krugman writes, "It's important, when you read the inevitable attempts to impugn the character of the latest whistle-blower, to realize just how risky it is to reveal awkward truths about the Bush administration. When Gen. Eric Shinseki told Congress that postwar Iraq would require a large occupation force, that was the end of his military career. When Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV revealed that the 2003 State of the Union speech contained information known to be false, someone in the White House destroyed his wife's career by revealing that she was a C.I.A. operative. And we now know that Richard Foster, the Medicare system's chief actuary, was threatened with dismissal if he revealed to Congress the likely cost of the administration's prescription drug plan. The latest insider to come forth, of course, is Richard Clarke, George Bush's former counterterrorism czar and the author of the just-published 'Against All Enemies.' "

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.'"

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!!!

Ted Kahl and Bob Fertik write: "On Tuesday, George W. Bush plans to obliterate coverage of the Democratic winner of the Iowa Caucus by giving his State of the Union speech a week earlier than usual. In the speech, Bush will lay out his major plans for 2004, thus effectively launching his campaign to get four more years in the White House - by getting more votes (if $200 million in fat-cat contributions makes that possible) or simply rigging the results (if all else fails). But before the nation looks ahead, we want to take one last glance at 2003, to highlight the 5 biggest scandals of the White House since his last State of the Union. Each of these scandals is huge. Indeed, each of these scandals completely eclipses the biggest scandal of President Clinton's eight years in office, Monicagate. If Democracy still existed in America, each of these 5 scandals would be headline news, and the news media would be demanding answers every single day."

Paul Krugman writes: "So far administration officials have attacked Mr. O'Neill's character but haven't refuted any of his facts. They have, however, already opened an investigation into how a picture of a possibly classified document appeared during Mr. O'Neill's TV interview. This alacrity stands in sharp contrast with their evident lack of concern when a senior administration official, still unknown, blew the cover of a C.I.A. operative [Valerie Plame] because her husband had revealed some politically inconvenient facts." But there is a consistency here -- both O'Neill and Joseph Wilson -- Valerie Plame's husband -- have dared to challenge the Emperor and his Court. And they are now both targets of this vindictive regime.

Bob Fertik and Ted Kahl write, "As the 2004 election year begins, we are astonished to discover that a handful of Americans actually believe George W. Bush should be given four more years in the White House. Obviously this is the result of too much holiday eggnog. So in the spirit of all those year-ending 'top' lists of 2003, here is a quick refresher list of the Top Bush Scandals of 2003. We hope you will send this and future lists to any friends who think they might vote for Bush in 2004. Because there are so MANY scandals, we will publish our list in two parts, the first part being devoted strictly to the Mother of All Scandals - Iraq. Bush's invasion of Iraq may be the single greatest scandal in American history, thoroughly eclipsing such major scandals as Watergate and Teapot Dome, not to mention the utterly insignificant Lewinsky affair. Sometime in the future, historians will judge whether it marked the end of American Democracy and the start of a totalitarian American Empire."

"After his wife was exposed as a CIA agent, embattled former US Ambassador Joseph Wilson 'leaked' an explosive document to the US media. The report by Air Force Colonel Sam Gardiner (Ret) identifies 50 'stories of strategic influence' that were allegedly manufactured by the White House to 'market' the war on Iraq. The-Edge has obtained a copy of the 56-page Gardiner Report. We hope that the publication of this overview of Gardiner's findings will help to break through the 'Paper Curtain' and prompt extensive media coverage, public debate and a congressional investigation." Read the four-part series, 'Around the Bend: America's Ministry of Propaganda. At the bottom of part one is a link to Gardiner's Report in pdf.

FOX's Sean Hannity has a mild blood pressure problem. Unfortunately he lost control of his blood pressure after a Republican staffer gave him a STOLEN copy of a draft Democratic memo. Somehow Hannity concluded that the DEMOCRATS are politicizing Iraq War "intelligence" - ROTFL!!! Apparently Hannity hasn't learned that there WERE NO WMD's IN IRAQ, and the administration POLITICIZED intelligence findings in order to SCARE Americans into war. When the intelligence community objected to Bush's POLITICIZED intelligence, Dick Cheney POLITICIZED the CIA by visiting Langley to threaten and intimidate the truthtellers. And when someone in the intelligence community - Joseph Wilson - had the guts to expose Bush's POLITICIZED Niger uranium lies, the White House outed his wife as payback, threatening her life and the lives of her covert sources. That's not just "repugnant" - that's TREASON. Hey Sean - you'd better get back on your meds, or your blood pressure might explode on the air!

"The Bush administration lied to Congress to pave the way for war with Iraq, alleged... Ray McGovern, 64, who was a CIA analyst from 1964 to 1990. The Bush administration's deception of the American people began a year ago, according to McGovern. It was then that former Ambassador Joseph Wilson made a trip to Africa to investigate claims that Iraq was seeking uranium to build nuclear weapons. Wilson reported to the Bush administration that the allegations were false. But the Bush administration reported to Congress that intelligence indicated Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction. Resident Bush also gave 'many' speeches linking Iraq to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, McGovern said. 'Never have I seen such a cynically orchestrated campaign over a year and a half,' he said. 'Only a few weeks ago did Bush admit that Iraq was not involved in any way with 9/11.'"

"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."

"Just as former Ambassador Joseph Wilson's story that Bushies blew his CIA wife's cover to get back at his criticism of the war in Iraq was getting old, he has stumbled on new ammo to hit the administration's credibility. Wilson tells us he plans to circulate the text of a briefing by analyst Sam Gardiner that suggests the White House and Pentagon made up or distorted over 50 war stories. You know some tall tales, like the Pvt. Jessica Lynch story. But there's more, says Gardiner, a war gamer who has taught at the National War College... He says Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Richard Myers gave bad or deliberately incomplete info on several topics. Sure, propaganda has always been used in war to deceive and demoralize the enemy. But these guys went way overboard, Gardiner says. 'Never before have so many stories been created to sell a war,' he insists. 'And they probably didn't need it.'"

The scandal started with a Niger lie
About nuke matter Saddam never did buy.
But Dubya would not let that falsehood die.
It's Traitorgate, it's Traitorgate.

Then Joseph Wilson loudly whistle blew. He told the public that the story's untrue,
That based on lies Bush had a war pushed through.
It's Traitorgate, it's Traitorgate."

Read the rest of Mad Kane's song parody!

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.

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, 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.

With Karl Rove under attack, the Daily Enron has compiled Rove's most insidious political work into one great column, such as: "While on assignment, Esquire reporter Ron Suskind famously overheard Rove screaming into a White House phone, 'Tell him we'll f*** him. We'll f*** him like nobody ever has." Do we need any more proof that Rove is behind the vicious attacks on Valerie Plame and Joseph Wilson?

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."

"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.''"

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."

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)

"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!

As the hurricane blows into DC, Josh Marshall posts part one of his long interview with Joseph Wilson: "So, setting aside why we're in Iraq, [where are we now?] WILSON: Well, I think we're f-cked. I think the--we should have learned from the bombing of the United Nations building that there was all sorts of anti--not just American but anti-international presence--pressure building within Iraq... It was a question of managing the risk, and we did not manage the risk of this enterprise very well in a strategic sense. We've alienated the international community... and I think that was precisely the wrong thing to do. Concretely, I think that we had to have as our first principal objective--after having taken Baghdad--making a good first impression. In other words, establishing firmly in the minds of the Iraqis that this was in fact a liberation/reconstruction activity and not an occupation activity." Read it and weep.

Joseph Wilson, who helped expose the Niger Uranium lies, writes: "During the gulf war in 1991, when I was in charge of the American Embassy in Baghdad, I placed a copy of Lewis Carroll's 'Alice in Wonderland' on my office coffee table. I thought it conveyed far better than words ever could the weird world that was Iraq at that time, a world in which nothing was what it seemed: The several hundred Western hostages Saddam Hussein took during Desert Shield were not really hostages but 'guests.' Kuwait was not invaded, but 'liberated.' It is clearly time to dust the book off and again display it prominently, only this time because our own government has dragged the country down a rabbit hole, all the while trying to convince the American people that life in newly liberated Iraq is not as distorted as it seems."

"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."

"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."

"Former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, a key figure in the Iraq -Niger uranium controversy, accused the Bush administration on Monday of using intimidation tactics to stifle criticism about its handling of prewar intelligence on Iraq... Wilson, on a panel of speakers at the National Press Club, said there had been several attempts to discredit him, but mainly through an article by Chicago columnist Robert Novak... [Wilson] said if Novak's column was true, then the Bush administration had breached national security by revealing the name [of his wife]. '... Wilson said. 'The reason was to intimidate others from coming forward.' ... Wilson said that analysts seeing stories about him and his wife and about Kelly would question whether to talk to lawmakers who might hold investigations on the Iraq war... 'So that's what it was designed to do, it was clearly designed to intimidate,' Wilson said." Impeach Bush Now!

"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."

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."

"What troubles me is not that single episode, but the broader pattern of dishonesty and delusion that helped get us into the Iraq mess -- and that created the false expectations undermining our occupation today. Some in the administration are trying to make George Tenet the scapegoat for the affair. But Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, a group of retired spooks, issued an open letter to Bush yesterday reflecting the view of many in the intel community that the central culprit is Vice Resident Dick Cheney. The open letter called for Mr. Cheney's resignation. Condi Rice says she first learned of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson's fact-finding trip to Niger during a TV interview, presumably when George Stephanopoulos asked her on 'This Week' on June 8 about a column by me describing the trip. (Condi, you're breaking my heart -- you didn't read that column itself? How about if I fax you copies of everything I write, so you don't miss any, and you fax me everything you write?)"

David Corn writes, "Did senior Bush officials blow the cover of a US intelligence officer working covertly in a field of vital importance to national security--and break the law--in order to strike at a Bush administration critic and intimidate others? ... Two weeks ago, [former Ambassador Joseph] Wilson went public, writing in The New York Times and telling The Washington Post about the trip he took to Niger in February 2002--at the request of the CIA--to check out allegations that Saddam Hussein had tried to purchase uranium... Wilson caused problems for the White House, and his wife was outed as an undercover CIA officer... Under the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982, it is a crime for anyone who has access to classified information to disclose intentionally information identifying a covert agent. The punishment for such an offense is a fine of up to $50,000 and/or up to ten years in prison." We demand prosecution!

Eleanor Clift writes: "Claiming that Iraq tried to buy uranium from the African country of Niger wasn't a judgment call. By the White House's own admission, it was a fraud, a lie. The envoy sent to investigate the intelligence in February 2002, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, sought out the information and informed the administration. The only question is how high up the food chain his report got. Did it stop at low-level officials as the White House claims, or did it go all the way to the resident and vice resident? Wilson is not some wild-eyed lefty. He had experience in Iraq and North Africa, and completely understood his mission. He only revealed his identity a week ago in the face of continued insistence by the White House that it had no idea the documents were forged. CIA director George Tenet sent Wilson to Niger after Vice Resident Cheney asked for an investigation. Wilson asks why Cheney's office would demand this inquiry and not want to know the result."

"George Tenet gave Congress and the White House the accountability they demanded, declaring Friday that the blame for... Bush's false allegation about an Iraqi nuclear deal rested squarely with him and his agency. The CIA should never have let Mr. Bush repeat a British report that Iraq was seeking uranium from the African country of Niger when U.S. intelligence analysts could not corroborate it, Tenet said in a statement... 'Let me be clear about several things right up front,' he said. 'First, CIA approved the president's State of the Union address before it was delivered. Second, I am responsible for the approval process in my agency. And third, the president had every reason to believe that the text presented to him was sound.'" But the CIA and envoy Joseph Wilson warned Bush and Cheney repeatedly that the Niger Uranium story was untrue -- starting back in March 2002. So the Bush team didn't think to ask Tenet, Hey you told us back then it was bogus --- what makes you so sure now?

From Reuters: "The top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee clashed on Sunday over whether to open another probe into alleged White House manipulation of intelligence to make the case for war against Iraq. Michigan Sen. Carl Levin told NBC's "Meet the Press" that new accusations by former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson over claims Iraq bought uranium from Niger added fuel to an investigation he was opening with his own staff. But the committee chairman, Virginia Republican Sen. John Warner, said he favored letting the Senate Intelligence Committee finish its probe before deciding whether his panel should dig further."

AP reports: "A former envoy sent by the CIA to Africa to investigate allegations about Iraq's nuclear weapons program contends the Bush administration might have manipulated his findings, possibly to strengthen the rationale for war. That conclusion came yesterday from Joseph Wilson, former US ambassador to the West African nation of Gabon, who was dispatched in February 2002 to investigate whether Iraq attempted to buy uranium from Niger... Writing in a New York Times op-ed piece, Wilson said it did not take him long 'to conclude that it was highly doubtful that any such transaction had ever taken place.' In an interview on NBC's 'Meet the Press,' Wilson insisted his doubts of a Iraq-Niger connection reached the highest levels of government, including Vice Resident Dick Cheney's office. In fact, he said, Cheney's office inquired about the purported Niger-Iraq link." Eventually, "the United Nations determined the uranium reports were based predominantly on forged documents."

On NOW with Bill Moyers, former diplomat Joseph Wilson said, "I think it's far more about re-[draw]ing the political map of the Middle East... trying to install regimes in the Middle East that are far more friendly to the United States - there are those in the administration that call them democracies. Somehow it's hard for me to imagine that a democratic system will emerge out of the ashes of Iraq in the near term. And when and if it does, it's hard for me to believe that it will be more pro-American and more pro-Israeli than what you've got now... [Richard Perle is] the architect of a study that was produced in the mid-'90s for the Likud Israeli government called 'a clean break, a new strategy for the realm.' And it makes the argument that the best way to secure Israeli security is through the changing of some of these regimes beginning with Iraq and also including Syria. And that's been since expanded to include Iran."

Joseph Wilson, the senior American diplomat in Baghdad during Desert Shield, advocated a muscular US response to Saddam's brutal annexation of Kuwait in flagrant violation of the United Nations charter, but has different views of Bush's new adventurism. "The upcoming military operation has one objective, though different from the several offered by the Bush Administration. This war is not about weapons of mass destruction. The intrusive inspections are disrupting Saddam's programs, as even the Administration has acknowledged. Nor is it about terrorism. Virtually all agree war will spawn more terrorism, not less. It is not even about liberation of an oppressed people. Killing innocent Iraqi civilians in a full frontal assault is hardly the only or best way to liberate a people. The underlying objective of this war is the imposition of a Pax Americana on the region and installation of vassal regimes that will control restive populations."

David Corn writes that Bush's "obsessive focus on Saddam Hussein, transformed the 9/11 recall-a-thon into a prep session for war. They have exploited a terrible event for their next crusade. And on their watch, the horror of that day has been used not to lessen the distance between America and the rest of the world but to increase it, as other nations recoil from and fear Bush's march to war. [A friend in Europe wrote]: "One year ago, everybody here was with the American people, suffering and sympathizing [with them]... Can the Bush administration be for one minute aware of the solidarity and sympathy capital it has wasted?...People here are more afraid of George Bush than of Saddam Hussein." Euro-hyperbole? Perhaps. But on the same day, Joseph Wilson... the last US official to meet with Saddam, also sent me an email and observed, 'It is criminal that the world now fears American jingoism more than Saddam.' Bush has tainted a tragedy."