Transcript
White House Intelligence Leak?
Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, September 29, 2003; 3:30 PM
President Bush's aides promised Sunday to cooperate with a Justice Department inquiry into an administration leak that exposed the identity of a CIA operative. An administration official told The Washington Post on Saturday that two White House officials leaked the information to selected journalists to discredit former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV.
Washington Post staff writer Walter Pincus was online Monday, Sept. 29 at 3:30 p.m. ET, to discuss the possible intelligence leak, the role of the press and what comes next in the investigation.
Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.
________________________________________________
Washington, D.C.: The idea that Bush was "out of the loop" on the decision to destroy the career of CIA undercover operative seems incongruent with everything we know about what the White House says regarding the president's involvement in national security matters. Especially on things like intelligence secrets, the political people know to act only in unison with the NSC professionals who assure that the mantle of the presidency is not sullied by the politicization of national security issues. Nonetheless, it seems too easily accepted that Bush didn't know.
Walter Pincus: The White House story is that the president does not know about any one who may have leaked the information from the White House, not the tory itself. Since I'm sure the original Novak column was read within the White House, the matter must have been called to his attention back on July 14. Whether anything was done at that time by either the president or his aides is something that the press and Congress are now pursuing.
_______________________
New York, N.Y.: Hi Walter,
It seems to me that this is the most immediately dangerous and simple to explain political bomb that the Bush administration has faced so far. At this point in the election cycle, the Democrats, foreign and domestic press, and others who are ethically principled will be most interested in the full investigation of this situation, and Bush has few plausible explanations available. The leakers must be sacrificed. This has it all, like a West Wing episode -- laws broken by senior Bush advisors, lives endangered, confidences violated, intrigues with spies, and all due to another untruth (Niger yellowcake) by the President, and increasing curiosity and pressure. Time to wag the dog with another crisis before this one gets a Special Prosecutor appointed just in time for the election cycle?
Walter Pincus: I would caution you that this is not fiction but fact and won't be solved in an hour episode or even several. It also is not guaranteed that the story gets beyond where it stands. To review: Only Bob Novak, as of today, says the name of Amb. Wilson's wife was leaked to him from administration officials and even when The Washington Post's source said they were White House officials that still covers a wide number of people. Some official steps need to be taken and as of this moment there has been as far as I know no official steps taken by the Justice Department to initiate an investigation.
There is a long way to go before anyone is identified as the leaker.
_______________________
Austin, Tex.: Mr. Pincus,
The story in the Post said that it was high-level White House officials that leaked to the media. Based on folks you have spoken with, do you have any thoughts as to who they might be? Also, any insights as to why they thought they could get away with this.
Thank you.
Walter Pincus: I would not speculate as to who may be involved.
I can say the reason for putting out the story out about Wilson's wife working at the CIA was to undermine the credibility of his mission for the agency in Niger. Wilson, as the last top diplomat in Iraq at the time of the Gulf War, had credibility beyond his knowledge of Africa, which was his specialty. SO his going to Niger to check the allegation that Iraq had sought uranium there and returning to say that he could find no confirmation was considered very credible. WIth Richard Leiby, I had written a story about Wilson, including quotes from him that was published in The Post on July 6, the same day his own op-ed appeared in the New York Times.
He was then being interviewed having come forward by name, I and others had published his story without naming him weeks earlier. Whoever leaked his name was attempting to say that his trip was not really officially, just generated by his wife.
Ironically, there was no reason in leaking that story to give out her name or to publish it.
_______________________
Reston, Va.: Didn't Rove get fired by George H.W. Bush for leaking something to Novak back in '82?
Walter Pincus: Not that I am aware of.
_______________________
New York, N.Y.: Hi Walter - Now that the Independent Counsel law has expired, what alternatives are available for an independent investigation completely outside of the Justice Department?
Walter Pincus: If the president wanted to, he could appoint a special counsel, which is how Clinton initially handled Whitewater naming a former Republican prosecutor when the act had died.
_______________________
Edwards Air Force Base, Calif.: Why is the media failing to expose that Mr Wilson is a bitter foe of the Bush administration who clearly is pursing a political agenda?
Also, are you aware that he admitted today on a morning television program that he simply MADE IT UP when he said he thought the "leak" came from Karl Rove?
For the sake of fairness, these points need to be publicized by the press.
Walter Pincus: It was no secret that Amb. WIlson was an outspoken critic of going to war without first getting support from the U.N. We did have that in our July 6 story. "Bitter" seems strong wince he supported the idea of regime change having been one of the few U.S. diplomats who dealt directly with Saddam Hussein.
He did get excessive when he named Karl Rove as being involved or approving the leak without giving any direct evidence and tried to remedy it today by his admission.
_______________________
Paris, France: Do you personally know one or more names floating about in connection with this?
Walter Pincus: I know some of the names "floating around" but don't believe it right to identify anyone without actual evidence and without talking to them directly.
_______________________
Dallas, Tex.: What is the mood of the CIA over this affair?
A reporter on CNN said it was sort of "routine." That the CIA sends cases like this to DOJ 20 or 30 times per year.
Is that true? Is CIA treating it as a routine affair, no big deal? Or, are the CIA people upset at Plame's outing?
Walter Pincus: CIA does send form requests for investigation to Justice but I doubt they consider one that involves the naming of a clandestine officer and perhaps the Whit House is "routine."
As with anything that has the political implications of this situation, there are some who are concerned and some who think as of today that too much is being made of it.
_______________________
Ft. Myers, Fla.: Shouldn't Robert Novak be taken to the wood shed?
Walter Pincus: Bob Novak has been writing well for years and not avoiding controversy, which he must have known would be generated by the column. The only question he should face is why he used Wilson's wife's name, not the story itself.
_______________________
Washington, D.C.: Two basic questions:
How big could this get?
To what extent do you think the general public would care about a story like this? It seems some outside the beltway may write this off as a "it's just politicians being politicians" story, but could this have traction with the public?
Walter Pincus: It is too early to say whether this will grow. It is an inside the beltway type thing right now. And it diverts from more serious questions about Iraq and the U.S. future there.
On the other hand,it indicates that within the administration some people appear uneasy about how this type of thing is being handled. And if it is the first of more such leaks, it could be come big.
Almost 40 years ago I ran an investigation for Sen. J.W. Fulbright based on a story I had done in a magazine on foreign government lobbyists. he said when I started that I should remember, in Washington "It's not what you did that counts, it's what you do after you are caught." Coverup has always been the undoing of government officials.
_______________________
Takoma Park, Md.: The Post said six journalists were told. Who were the five other than Novak? Is Novak the only one of the six who wrote a story based on the leak?
Walter Pincus: The one other name The post was given was Andrea Mitchell of NBC. We are checking to see who else may have carried it before Novak. There were others told who apparently did not write the story, but many carried it after the column appeared. I did not write about it until Sen. Schumer requested the FBI to look into it because I had checked the basic allegation, that it was Wilson's wife who "suggested sending him to Niger" and did not believe it was true. My own first story about Wilson going to Niger, without my naming him, that appeared June 12 was mentioned in Novak's column.
_______________________
Annapolis, Md.: Annapolis, Md.: Can you summarize what Novak wrote?
washingtonpost.com: Robert Novak: Mission to Niger, (July 14, 2003)
Walter Pincus: Novak's column described Wilson's mission to Niger to check on the alleged Iraq seeking of uranium, as generated at a "low level" in the CIA without Director Tenet's knowledge. It said that "two senior administration officials" had told Novak that Wilson's wife, who was named, had "suggested sending him to Niger". Novak said Wilson's report was not regarded by the CIA as definitive but that Wilson became more critical of the administration after he was disclosed as the diplomat who inquired about the Niger story. Novak concluded by saying Wilson's report should be made public.
_______________________
Grand Rapids, Mich.: Since our current President is the son of a former CIA Director, isn't it curious that he has not ordered an internal investigation of this matter since it broke over two months ago? Of note, I found Condi Rice's Sgt. Schultz (of Hogan's Heroes) imitation, "I know nothing, I see nothing", on the Sunday talk shows yesterday particularly troubling.
Walter Pincus: There is a certain irony to the president's position, another being that his father had highly praised WIlson for his action's before and during the Gulf War.
_______________________
Brunswick, Maine: Mr. Pincus,
In your opinion, why has it taken two months for this story to get the traction it developed over the weekend?
Walter Pincus: It is a difficult story to take further than a column was sourced to "two senior administration officials" without have some official steps taken unless some inside source stepped forward. And this weekend, one did.
_______________________
� 2003 Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive
Tuesday, September 30, 2003
Justice reviewing CIA leak claim
White House denies involvement, says it will cooperate with inquiry
Sept. 29 � Former Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV told MSNBC that White House political director Karl Rove probably "condoned" the identification of his wife as a CIA analyst.
MSNBC AND NBC NEWS
WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 � The Justice Department has opened a preliminary inquiry into allegations that White House officials violated federal law by revealing the identity of an undercover CIA agent, senior U.S. officials said Monday. The White House denied that senior political adviser Karl Rove or any other top figure was involved and promised to cooperate with any inquiry.
CIA lawyers told the Justice Department that whoever released the agent�s identity was not authorized to do so and that the news media would not have been able to guess it without the leak.
MEANWHILE, DEMOCRATS charged that the Bush administration could not credibly investigate itself and called for an independent probe after NBC News and MSNBC.com reported Friday that the CIA had asked the Justice Department to look into the matter.
At the center of the controversy is whether White House officials leaked the name of the woman in retaliation for public criticism by her husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, of President Bush�s claim that Iraq tried to buy enriched uranium in Africa as part of its nuclear weapons program.
The leak of the woman�s name is an apparent violation of two laws that bar revealing the identities of covert operatives: the National Agents� Identity Act and the Unauthorized Release of Classified Information Act. But intelligence officials also fear that the leak could enable foreign intelligence officials to track down the woman�s contacts and expose other agents and sources.
Appearing Monday evening on MSNBC�s �Buchanan and Press,� Wilson said that at the very least, identifying his wife �essentially takes a national security asset involved in the search for weapons of mass destruction off the table.�
Curry: Democrats stand to gain
WHITE HOUSE: ROVE �WASN�T INVOLVED�
Wilson, who served as acting ambassador to Iraq before the Gulf War in 1991, pointed the finger of suspicion at Rove, saying, �I believe that Karl Rove at a minimum condoned the leak and the continued leaking of it.�
Wilson said he believed the leaking of his wife�s name was �designed either to smear me or discredit me, or it was designed to discourage me or others from coming forward.� He said he was �struck by how little [the leak] added to the story,� describing it as �gratuitously inserted.�
Bush refused to answer questions about the controversy at an unrelated event Monday. But White House press secretary Scott McClellan said he had spoken to Rove about the allegation that he had something to do with the leak and was reassured that it was �simply not true.�
�He wasn�t involved,� McClellan said of Rove. �The president knows he wasn�t involved.�
Advertisement
Asked whether Bush should fire any official found to have leaked the information, McClellan said: �They should be pursued to the fullest extent by the Department of Justice. The president expects everyone in his administration to adhere to the highest standards of conduct.�
McClellan said White House officials would turn over telephone logs if the Justice Department asked them to do so. But he said Bush had no plans to ask staff members whether they were involved in revealing the name of Wilson�s wife.
2ND LETTER AFFIRMED CALL FOR PROBE
CIA lawyers sent the Justice Department an informal notice of the alleged leak in July, two senior officials told NBC News on Monday.
Although that letter, which was not signed by CIA Director George Tenet, was not a formal request for an investigation, the Justice Department could have opened one at that point, lawyers said. It remained unclear whether it did so.
CIA lawyers followed up the notification this month by answering 11 questions from the Justice Department, affirming that the woman�s identity was classified, that whoever released it was not authorized to do so and that the news media would not have been able to guess her identity without the leak, the senior officials said.
The CIA response to the questions, which is itself classified, said there were grounds for a criminal investigation, the sources said.
Following the report Friday night by NBC News correspondent Andrea Mitchell, an unidentified senior administration official told The Associated Press that the Justice Department and the FBI were trying to determine whether there was a violation of the law and, if so, whether a full criminal investigation was warranted.
What's on MSNBC TV
Hardball, Tuesday, 7-9 p.m. ET
� With days to go before the recall election, Chris Matthews challenges Arnold Schwarzenegger's chief Republican rival Tom McClintock. A special two-hour Hardball with Chris Matthews, Tuesday, 9 p.m. ET
INDEPENDENT INQUIRY SOUGHT
Democratic Party leaders and presidential candidates called for an independent investigation of the charges.
�Such disclosures are a matter of utmost seriousness that could threaten the security of every American,� senior party figures, including Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota and Joseph Biden of Delaware, ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a letter to Bush.
�... We do not believe that this investigation of senior Administration officials, possibly including high-level White House staff, can be conducted by the Justice Department because of the obvious and inherent conflicts of interests involved,� the letter said.
Most of the party�s presidential candidates echoed the call.
Slate: Washington's identity crisis
Howard Dean, the former governor of Vermont, said Attorney General John Ashcroft should recuse himself from an investigation, which Dean believes should be handled by an �independent Justice Department inspector general.�
Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri, campaigning in New Hampshire, called it �a natural conflict of interest� for Justice Department appointees to investigate their superiors and said congressional committees should try to determine what had happened.
Wesley Clark, meanwhile, said in a speech in Austin, Texas, that �this issue is too important for political gamesmanship or to be managed by the John Ashcroft Justice Department,� while Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut said, �It is a moral outrage that multiple White House officials are alleged to have [leaked the woman�s name] for political revenge.�
Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., joined in calling for a special counsel. �On too many fronts, from Iraq to environmental policy, this administration has had a problem telling the truth when it conflicts with its political agenda,� he said. �I do not trust John Ashcroft to get to the bottom of this on his own.�
The Justice Department had no immediate comment on the Democrats� request.
WILSON CRITICIZED ADMINISTRATION
The controversy sprouted roots in January, when Bush said in his State of the Union address that British intelligence officials had learned that Iraq had tried to buy yellowcake uranium in Africa. Bush used the citation to back up the administration�s claim that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein posed an immediate threat to the United States.
Revealing the identities of covert officials is a violation of two laws, the National Agents� Identity Act and the Unauthorized Release of Classified Information Act.
The administration has since had to repudiate the claim. CIA Director Tenet said the 16-word sentence should not have been included in Bush�s Jan. 28 speech and publicly accepted responsibility for allowing it to remain in the president�s text.
Questions were raised about the claim soon after the speech, but the issue came to a head in July, when Wilson, who investigated the British intelligence that Iraq had tried to buy the enriched uranium in Niger, said in an opinion piece in The New York Times that he had told the CIA long before Bush�s speech that the information was highly suspect.
�We spend billions of dollars on intelligence,� Wilson wrote. �But we end up putting something in the State of the Union address, something we got from another intelligence agency, something we cannot independently verify, in an area of Africa where the British have no on-the-ground presence.�
A week after Wilson went public with his criticism, Robert D. Novak, a Chicago Sun-Times columnist whose work appears in newspapers around the nation, quoted two anonymous senior administration officials as saying Wilson�s wife, a CIA analyst working on the issue of weapons of mass destruction, had suggested to her superiors that her husband, a retired diplomat, conduct the investigation of the British intelligence.
Novak noted in the column that the CIA denied the accusation, saying that agency officials had picked Wilson and then asked his wife to contact him.
He added Monday during �Crossfire,� the program he co-hosts on CNN, that the officials did not call him to leak the woman�s name. He said the disclosure came when he was interviewing one of the officials about Wilson�s mission to Niger when the official told him that Wilson�s wife had a hand in arranging the mission and that she was a CIA employee.
Novak said that when he called to confirm the information, a CIA official asked him not to use the name. That official, however, did not say there would be any danger to the woman or her sources if her name were disclosed, Novak said.
Wilson said on MSNBC that he did not blame Novak for the disclosure. Instead, he said, the responsibility rested with whoever gave Novak the information.
Novak was not the only journalist that the White House officials tried to interest in the story. A senior administration official cited in a Washington Post report Sunday said two top White House officials called at least a half-dozen journalists and revealed the identity and occupation of Wilson�s wife.
NBC News said Monday evening that reports that Mitchell was one of the reporters who was called were not completely accurate. Mitchell was contacted in connection with the story, it said, but only after Novak revealed the woman�s name in his column in July.
NBC News has decided not to report the woman�s name. MSNBC.com has removed her name from its coverage.
Sept. 28 � National security adviser Condoleezza Rice says she knows nothing of alleged calls by White House officials identifying the CIA agent.
�APPROPRIATE ACTION� PROMISED
Senior Bush administration officials responded Sunday to the allegations.
�The Justice Department will now take appropriate action, whatever that is,� national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said Sunday on NBC�s �Meet the Press.�
Rice said she was unaware of any White House involvement in the matter. �I know nothing about any such calls, and I do know that the president of the United States would not expect his White House to behave in that way,� she said.
White House denies involvement, says it will cooperate with inquiry
Sept. 29 � Former Ambassador Joseph Wilson IV told MSNBC that White House political director Karl Rove probably "condoned" the identification of his wife as a CIA analyst.
MSNBC AND NBC NEWS
WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 � The Justice Department has opened a preliminary inquiry into allegations that White House officials violated federal law by revealing the identity of an undercover CIA agent, senior U.S. officials said Monday. The White House denied that senior political adviser Karl Rove or any other top figure was involved and promised to cooperate with any inquiry.
CIA lawyers told the Justice Department that whoever released the agent�s identity was not authorized to do so and that the news media would not have been able to guess it without the leak.
MEANWHILE, DEMOCRATS charged that the Bush administration could not credibly investigate itself and called for an independent probe after NBC News and MSNBC.com reported Friday that the CIA had asked the Justice Department to look into the matter.
At the center of the controversy is whether White House officials leaked the name of the woman in retaliation for public criticism by her husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, of President Bush�s claim that Iraq tried to buy enriched uranium in Africa as part of its nuclear weapons program.
The leak of the woman�s name is an apparent violation of two laws that bar revealing the identities of covert operatives: the National Agents� Identity Act and the Unauthorized Release of Classified Information Act. But intelligence officials also fear that the leak could enable foreign intelligence officials to track down the woman�s contacts and expose other agents and sources.
Appearing Monday evening on MSNBC�s �Buchanan and Press,� Wilson said that at the very least, identifying his wife �essentially takes a national security asset involved in the search for weapons of mass destruction off the table.�
Curry: Democrats stand to gain
WHITE HOUSE: ROVE �WASN�T INVOLVED�
Wilson, who served as acting ambassador to Iraq before the Gulf War in 1991, pointed the finger of suspicion at Rove, saying, �I believe that Karl Rove at a minimum condoned the leak and the continued leaking of it.�
Wilson said he believed the leaking of his wife�s name was �designed either to smear me or discredit me, or it was designed to discourage me or others from coming forward.� He said he was �struck by how little [the leak] added to the story,� describing it as �gratuitously inserted.�
Bush refused to answer questions about the controversy at an unrelated event Monday. But White House press secretary Scott McClellan said he had spoken to Rove about the allegation that he had something to do with the leak and was reassured that it was �simply not true.�
�He wasn�t involved,� McClellan said of Rove. �The president knows he wasn�t involved.�
Advertisement
Asked whether Bush should fire any official found to have leaked the information, McClellan said: �They should be pursued to the fullest extent by the Department of Justice. The president expects everyone in his administration to adhere to the highest standards of conduct.�
McClellan said White House officials would turn over telephone logs if the Justice Department asked them to do so. But he said Bush had no plans to ask staff members whether they were involved in revealing the name of Wilson�s wife.
2ND LETTER AFFIRMED CALL FOR PROBE
CIA lawyers sent the Justice Department an informal notice of the alleged leak in July, two senior officials told NBC News on Monday.
Although that letter, which was not signed by CIA Director George Tenet, was not a formal request for an investigation, the Justice Department could have opened one at that point, lawyers said. It remained unclear whether it did so.
CIA lawyers followed up the notification this month by answering 11 questions from the Justice Department, affirming that the woman�s identity was classified, that whoever released it was not authorized to do so and that the news media would not have been able to guess her identity without the leak, the senior officials said.
The CIA response to the questions, which is itself classified, said there were grounds for a criminal investigation, the sources said.
Following the report Friday night by NBC News correspondent Andrea Mitchell, an unidentified senior administration official told The Associated Press that the Justice Department and the FBI were trying to determine whether there was a violation of the law and, if so, whether a full criminal investigation was warranted.
What's on MSNBC TV
Hardball, Tuesday, 7-9 p.m. ET
� With days to go before the recall election, Chris Matthews challenges Arnold Schwarzenegger's chief Republican rival Tom McClintock. A special two-hour Hardball with Chris Matthews, Tuesday, 9 p.m. ET
INDEPENDENT INQUIRY SOUGHT
Democratic Party leaders and presidential candidates called for an independent investigation of the charges.
�Such disclosures are a matter of utmost seriousness that could threaten the security of every American,� senior party figures, including Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota and Joseph Biden of Delaware, ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a letter to Bush.
�... We do not believe that this investigation of senior Administration officials, possibly including high-level White House staff, can be conducted by the Justice Department because of the obvious and inherent conflicts of interests involved,� the letter said.
Most of the party�s presidential candidates echoed the call.
Slate: Washington's identity crisis
Howard Dean, the former governor of Vermont, said Attorney General John Ashcroft should recuse himself from an investigation, which Dean believes should be handled by an �independent Justice Department inspector general.�
Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri, campaigning in New Hampshire, called it �a natural conflict of interest� for Justice Department appointees to investigate their superiors and said congressional committees should try to determine what had happened.
Wesley Clark, meanwhile, said in a speech in Austin, Texas, that �this issue is too important for political gamesmanship or to be managed by the John Ashcroft Justice Department,� while Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut said, �It is a moral outrage that multiple White House officials are alleged to have [leaked the woman�s name] for political revenge.�
Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., joined in calling for a special counsel. �On too many fronts, from Iraq to environmental policy, this administration has had a problem telling the truth when it conflicts with its political agenda,� he said. �I do not trust John Ashcroft to get to the bottom of this on his own.�
The Justice Department had no immediate comment on the Democrats� request.
WILSON CRITICIZED ADMINISTRATION
The controversy sprouted roots in January, when Bush said in his State of the Union address that British intelligence officials had learned that Iraq had tried to buy yellowcake uranium in Africa. Bush used the citation to back up the administration�s claim that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein posed an immediate threat to the United States.
Revealing the identities of covert officials is a violation of two laws, the National Agents� Identity Act and the Unauthorized Release of Classified Information Act.
The administration has since had to repudiate the claim. CIA Director Tenet said the 16-word sentence should not have been included in Bush�s Jan. 28 speech and publicly accepted responsibility for allowing it to remain in the president�s text.
Questions were raised about the claim soon after the speech, but the issue came to a head in July, when Wilson, who investigated the British intelligence that Iraq had tried to buy the enriched uranium in Niger, said in an opinion piece in The New York Times that he had told the CIA long before Bush�s speech that the information was highly suspect.
�We spend billions of dollars on intelligence,� Wilson wrote. �But we end up putting something in the State of the Union address, something we got from another intelligence agency, something we cannot independently verify, in an area of Africa where the British have no on-the-ground presence.�
A week after Wilson went public with his criticism, Robert D. Novak, a Chicago Sun-Times columnist whose work appears in newspapers around the nation, quoted two anonymous senior administration officials as saying Wilson�s wife, a CIA analyst working on the issue of weapons of mass destruction, had suggested to her superiors that her husband, a retired diplomat, conduct the investigation of the British intelligence.
Novak noted in the column that the CIA denied the accusation, saying that agency officials had picked Wilson and then asked his wife to contact him.
He added Monday during �Crossfire,� the program he co-hosts on CNN, that the officials did not call him to leak the woman�s name. He said the disclosure came when he was interviewing one of the officials about Wilson�s mission to Niger when the official told him that Wilson�s wife had a hand in arranging the mission and that she was a CIA employee.
Novak said that when he called to confirm the information, a CIA official asked him not to use the name. That official, however, did not say there would be any danger to the woman or her sources if her name were disclosed, Novak said.
Wilson said on MSNBC that he did not blame Novak for the disclosure. Instead, he said, the responsibility rested with whoever gave Novak the information.
Novak was not the only journalist that the White House officials tried to interest in the story. A senior administration official cited in a Washington Post report Sunday said two top White House officials called at least a half-dozen journalists and revealed the identity and occupation of Wilson�s wife.
NBC News said Monday evening that reports that Mitchell was one of the reporters who was called were not completely accurate. Mitchell was contacted in connection with the story, it said, but only after Novak revealed the woman�s name in his column in July.
NBC News has decided not to report the woman�s name. MSNBC.com has removed her name from its coverage.
Sept. 28 � National security adviser Condoleezza Rice says she knows nothing of alleged calls by White House officials identifying the CIA agent.
�APPROPRIATE ACTION� PROMISED
Senior Bush administration officials responded Sunday to the allegations.
�The Justice Department will now take appropriate action, whatever that is,� national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said Sunday on NBC�s �Meet the Press.�
Rice said she was unaware of any White House involvement in the matter. �I know nothing about any such calls, and I do know that the president of the United States would not expect his White House to behave in that way,� she said.
Can Democrats topple Bush?
By Justin Webb
BBC correspondent in Washington
Maybe just maybe they could win, not just win the nomination mind you, but win the presidency.
The economy is still not firing on all cylinders, jobs lost since George W Bush came to power have not been refound and the Iraq plan is plainly in danger of unravelling.
This is a potentially vulnerable president.
Bush may be under pressure, but who could knock him off his perch?
The dawning of this realisation has not made the democrats happy. Far from it. It has made them nervy and testy.
The candidates bicker and jockey for position, aware that both of the last democrats in the White House, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, were certainly not front-runners when the campaigning started. There is all to play for.
Meanwhile the party bigwigs, also suddenly aware that the White House might beckon, moan about the paucity of talent on offer and call for big name figures to come forward.
This is almost certainly why Hillary Clinton's name came back into the frame in recent days.
DEMOCRATIC HOPEFULS
Howard Dean,
former governor of Vermont
Senator John Kerry
of Massachusetts
Senator John Edwards
of North Carolina
Senator Bob Graham
of Florida
Senator Joe Lieberman
of Connecticut
Representative Dick Gephardt
of Missouri
Representative Dennis Kucinich
of Ohio
Carol Moseley Braun,
former Illinois Senator
Al Sharpton,
Civil rights advocate
The contenders in detail
She has made it pretty clear she is not going to run this time but she is being used as a stick to beat the little guys.
The nightmare for the bigwigs is that a vulnerable president might come up against an even more vulnerable Democratic nominee and win by default.
Now as the campaigning begins in earnest, the spotlight is on the candidates, particularly on two of them.
John Kerry, the senator from Massachusetts and Howard Dean, the former governor of Vermont.
Kerry began the campaign as the front-runner, when there was no running to do.
He backed the war in Iraq and he himself fought in Vietnam, so he was considered a safe choice, not vulnerable to Republican charges of lily-liveredness in the face of the war on terrorism.
But Senator Kerry has been wrong-footed by an occurrence he hadn't bargained for.
The war in Iraq was indeed popular in America and opposing it at the time was not a sure fire vote winner. But lo and behold things have changed.
The war is now not nearly as popular as it was and the peace, such as it is, is persuading many Americans to reappraise their appetite for foreign conflict.
Enter stage-left Howard Dean. Governor Dean opposed the war and is free now to blast the President with both barrels and that is what he has been doing and the party love it.
He is now the man to beat, ahead in all the polls for the early primaries and caucuses.
In the frame
The problem with Governor Dean is that while he could win the nomination, he could probably not win the presidency.
He is a northern liberal and not since JFK has a northern liberal made it to the White House for the Democrats.
The Democrats are struggling to find a truly popular candidate
He could make a stab at packaging himself with a southerner, perhaps Wesley Clark, the former supreme commander of Nato as his vice presidential running mate, but it still would not be easy.
So still it looks as if, when the dust settles the Democrats might have to find a compromise.
Step forward the ever youthful looking Dick Gephardt.
Mr Gephardt stood for the nomination back in 1988. After losing he went on to become a senior party figure in Washington and Leader of the party in the House of Representatives.
He also backed the war but he has a radical and, by American standards, left-wing plan to revitalise health care. He can appeal to the grass roots and perhaps also the wider nation.
There are problems though with the Gephardt candidacy.
'Mountain to climb'
He is seen by many as a machine politician, a friend of organised labour, a backroom operator. For the folksy folk who run the Bush campaign he would make a titivating target.
DEMOCRATS TIMETABLE
Six official debates before end of year
Party elections (primaries) between January and March
Democratic Party convention opens in Boston, 26 July
Presidential election begins 2 November 2004
"What about the others?" I hear you cry. Most haven't a hope.
Joe Lieberman, Al Gore's running mate last time round, might still get into gear but so far his campaign has looked becalmed.
Bob Graham from Florida, in theory he could still trouble the scorers, but so far he has not.
Perhaps the debates, starting with the New Mexico one, will energise the whole process.
Perhaps one of those big figures might still come in at the last minute and blow the others away. An interesting political season is certainly on the cards.
Interesting for me and interesting to you if you've read this far, but not apparently interesting to most Americans.
A recent CBS poll suggested two thirds of the American electorate could not name one of the nine Democrats currently running.
There is a mountain to climb and we are still in the foothills.
By Justin Webb
BBC correspondent in Washington
Maybe just maybe they could win, not just win the nomination mind you, but win the presidency.
The economy is still not firing on all cylinders, jobs lost since George W Bush came to power have not been refound and the Iraq plan is plainly in danger of unravelling.
This is a potentially vulnerable president.
Bush may be under pressure, but who could knock him off his perch?
The dawning of this realisation has not made the democrats happy. Far from it. It has made them nervy and testy.
The candidates bicker and jockey for position, aware that both of the last democrats in the White House, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, were certainly not front-runners when the campaigning started. There is all to play for.
Meanwhile the party bigwigs, also suddenly aware that the White House might beckon, moan about the paucity of talent on offer and call for big name figures to come forward.
This is almost certainly why Hillary Clinton's name came back into the frame in recent days.
DEMOCRATIC HOPEFULS
Howard Dean,
former governor of Vermont
Senator John Kerry
of Massachusetts
Senator John Edwards
of North Carolina
Senator Bob Graham
of Florida
Senator Joe Lieberman
of Connecticut
Representative Dick Gephardt
of Missouri
Representative Dennis Kucinich
of Ohio
Carol Moseley Braun,
former Illinois Senator
Al Sharpton,
Civil rights advocate
The contenders in detail
She has made it pretty clear she is not going to run this time but she is being used as a stick to beat the little guys.
The nightmare for the bigwigs is that a vulnerable president might come up against an even more vulnerable Democratic nominee and win by default.
Now as the campaigning begins in earnest, the spotlight is on the candidates, particularly on two of them.
John Kerry, the senator from Massachusetts and Howard Dean, the former governor of Vermont.
Kerry began the campaign as the front-runner, when there was no running to do.
He backed the war in Iraq and he himself fought in Vietnam, so he was considered a safe choice, not vulnerable to Republican charges of lily-liveredness in the face of the war on terrorism.
But Senator Kerry has been wrong-footed by an occurrence he hadn't bargained for.
The war in Iraq was indeed popular in America and opposing it at the time was not a sure fire vote winner. But lo and behold things have changed.
The war is now not nearly as popular as it was and the peace, such as it is, is persuading many Americans to reappraise their appetite for foreign conflict.
Enter stage-left Howard Dean. Governor Dean opposed the war and is free now to blast the President with both barrels and that is what he has been doing and the party love it.
He is now the man to beat, ahead in all the polls for the early primaries and caucuses.
In the frame
The problem with Governor Dean is that while he could win the nomination, he could probably not win the presidency.
He is a northern liberal and not since JFK has a northern liberal made it to the White House for the Democrats.
The Democrats are struggling to find a truly popular candidate
He could make a stab at packaging himself with a southerner, perhaps Wesley Clark, the former supreme commander of Nato as his vice presidential running mate, but it still would not be easy.
So still it looks as if, when the dust settles the Democrats might have to find a compromise.
Step forward the ever youthful looking Dick Gephardt.
Mr Gephardt stood for the nomination back in 1988. After losing he went on to become a senior party figure in Washington and Leader of the party in the House of Representatives.
He also backed the war but he has a radical and, by American standards, left-wing plan to revitalise health care. He can appeal to the grass roots and perhaps also the wider nation.
There are problems though with the Gephardt candidacy.
'Mountain to climb'
He is seen by many as a machine politician, a friend of organised labour, a backroom operator. For the folksy folk who run the Bush campaign he would make a titivating target.
DEMOCRATS TIMETABLE
Six official debates before end of year
Party elections (primaries) between January and March
Democratic Party convention opens in Boston, 26 July
Presidential election begins 2 November 2004
"What about the others?" I hear you cry. Most haven't a hope.
Joe Lieberman, Al Gore's running mate last time round, might still get into gear but so far his campaign has looked becalmed.
Bob Graham from Florida, in theory he could still trouble the scorers, but so far he has not.
Perhaps the debates, starting with the New Mexico one, will energise the whole process.
Perhaps one of those big figures might still come in at the last minute and blow the others away. An interesting political season is certainly on the cards.
Interesting for me and interesting to you if you've read this far, but not apparently interesting to most Americans.
A recent CBS poll suggested two thirds of the American electorate could not name one of the nine Democrats currently running.
There is a mountain to climb and we are still in the foothills.
White House on the Defensive Over Alleged Press Leak Exposing CIA Agent
VOA News
29 Sep 2003, 18:25 UTC
The White House says it has no evidence any of its officials were behind an alleged press leak that exposed the identity of a CIA operative.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan came under fire over the alleged intelligence leak at his daily briefing Monday, after CIA Director George Tenet asked the Justice Department to investigate whether someone at the White House leaked the name of one of his agents to several reporters.
The CIA agent's husband, former diplomat Joseph Wilson, said today he believes White House officials exposed his wife's identity to a number of reporters to intimidate others from coming forward with critical information. The former ambassador had challenged U.S. evidence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program in a July commentary in the New York Times. Afterwards, he says White House officials called several journalists and exposed his wife as a covert operative. One of the reporters, Robert Novak, named her in a column that ran July 14.
The Justice Department and the FBI are trying to determine whether there was a violation of the law, and if so, whether a full-blow criminal investigation is warranted. Intentionally disclosing the identity of a covert operative would be a felony, punishable by up to 10 years in prison and $50,000 in fines.
Mr. McClellan said the White House will cooperate with the Justice Department if it determines an investigation is merited. He rejected calls from reporters that President Bush should be pro-active in questioning White House staff members. He also rejected any suggestion that the president's top political adviser, Karl Rove, was behind the alleged leak, terming it "ridiculous." Ambassador Wilson said earlier Monday he does not know if Mr. Rove was the source of the information, but he believes that he at least condoned the leak.
Democratic leaders are calling for an independent investigation into the alleged intelligence leak. Senator Charles Schumer of New York said the disclosure of the agent's name was a despicable act and that "whoever did it should go to jail." One of the leading Democratic candidates for the 2004 presidential race, former Vermont Governor Howard Dean, said Attorney General John Ashcroft should play no role in the investigation.
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice told Fox News Sunday that she knew nothing of the matter, and that this would not be the way the president would expect his White House to operate.
Some information for this report provided by Reuters and AP.
VOA News
29 Sep 2003, 18:25 UTC
The White House says it has no evidence any of its officials were behind an alleged press leak that exposed the identity of a CIA operative.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan came under fire over the alleged intelligence leak at his daily briefing Monday, after CIA Director George Tenet asked the Justice Department to investigate whether someone at the White House leaked the name of one of his agents to several reporters.
The CIA agent's husband, former diplomat Joseph Wilson, said today he believes White House officials exposed his wife's identity to a number of reporters to intimidate others from coming forward with critical information. The former ambassador had challenged U.S. evidence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction program in a July commentary in the New York Times. Afterwards, he says White House officials called several journalists and exposed his wife as a covert operative. One of the reporters, Robert Novak, named her in a column that ran July 14.
The Justice Department and the FBI are trying to determine whether there was a violation of the law, and if so, whether a full-blow criminal investigation is warranted. Intentionally disclosing the identity of a covert operative would be a felony, punishable by up to 10 years in prison and $50,000 in fines.
Mr. McClellan said the White House will cooperate with the Justice Department if it determines an investigation is merited. He rejected calls from reporters that President Bush should be pro-active in questioning White House staff members. He also rejected any suggestion that the president's top political adviser, Karl Rove, was behind the alleged leak, terming it "ridiculous." Ambassador Wilson said earlier Monday he does not know if Mr. Rove was the source of the information, but he believes that he at least condoned the leak.
Democratic leaders are calling for an independent investigation into the alleged intelligence leak. Senator Charles Schumer of New York said the disclosure of the agent's name was a despicable act and that "whoever did it should go to jail." One of the leading Democratic candidates for the 2004 presidential race, former Vermont Governor Howard Dean, said Attorney General John Ashcroft should play no role in the investigation.
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice told Fox News Sunday that she knew nothing of the matter, and that this would not be the way the president would expect his White House to operate.
Some information for this report provided by Reuters and AP.
Bush Vows Action if Aides Had Role in Leak
Democrats' Demand for Special Counsel Rejected
advertisement
_____Related Article_____
� Rarely Invoked Statute Could Play a Role (The Washington Post, Sep 30, 2003)
_____Multimedia_____
� Video: Post's Milbank on White House Leak
� Video: White House Spokesman Denies Rove's Involvement
_____Transcript_____
� White House Press Briefing
_____Live Onlines_____
� Kurtz Media Backtalk: Transcript
� Post's Walter Pincus: Transcript
_____Related News_____
� Bush Aides Say They'll Cooperate With Probe Into Intelligence Leak (The Washington Post, Sep 29, 2003)
� Media Review Conduct After Leak (The Washington Post, Sep 29, 2003)
� Bush Administration Is Focus of Inquiry (The Washington Post, Sep 28, 2003)
___ Postwar Iraq ___
___ News From Iraq ___
� Bush Vows Action if Aides Had Role in Leak
� Democrat Disputes Rice on Iraq Claims
� Ambush Sparks Lengthy Firefights
� More News
___ Your Questions Answered ___
� Who Is Governing Iraq?
� Who Are the Kurds?
� Who Are the Shiites?
_____ Photo Gallery _____
Eyes on the War
Photojournalists share their personal experiences behind the enduring images of the war in Iraq.
� More Photos: Iraq Eyewitness
___ The War As It Happened ___
� Washington Post coverage from March-April 2003, including articles, videos, photos and opinion.
Subscribe to
E-Mail This Article
Printer-Friendly Version
Permission to Republish
By Mike Allen and Dana Milbank
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, September 30, 2003; Page A01
President Bush's chief spokesman said yesterday that the allegation that administration officials leaked the name of a CIA operative is "a very serious matter" and vowed that Bush would fire anybody responsible for such actions.
The vow came as numerous Democratic leaders demanded the administration appoint a special counsel to investigate the charges that a CIA operative's name was divulged in an effort to discredit her husband, a prominent critic of Bush's Iraq policy. The White House rejected those calls, also saying it has no evidence of wrongdoing by Bush adviser Karl Rove or others and therefore no reason to begin an internal investigation.
"There's been nothing, absolutely nothing, brought to our attention to suggest any White House involvement, and that includes the vice president's office, as well," said Scott McClellan, Bush's press secretary. He said that "if anyone in this administration was involved in it, they would no longer be in this administration."
Justice Department officials said yesterday they have begun a preliminary probe into whether an administration official violated the law by telling journalists that the wife of former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, a prominent critic of Bush's use of intelligence related to Iraq, worked for the CIA. Wilson has drawn attention for his report on a trip he took to Niger for the CIA that, he said, did not confirm an administration charge that Iraq's Saddam Hussein was seeking nuclear materiel in that country.
A senior official quoted Bush as saying, "I want to get to the bottom of this," during a meeting yesterday morning with a few top aides, including Rove. Senior intelligence officials said yesterday that the CIA filed what they termed a "crime report" with the Justice Department in late July, shortly after syndicated columnist Robert D. Novak, citing two unnamed administration sources, identified Wilson's wife by name. The CIA report pointed to a "possible violation of federal criminal law involving the unauthorized disclosure of classified information."
Three weeks ago, intelligence officials said, the CIA returned to the Justice Department a standard 11-question form detailing the potential damage done by the release of the information. Officials said it may have been the first such report ever filed on the unauthorized disclosure of an operative's name. Word of the Justice probe emerged over the weekend after the CIA briefed lawmakers on it last week.
Another journalist yesterday confirmed receiving a call from an administration official providing the same information about Wilson's wife before the Novak column appeared on July 14 in The Post and other newspapers.
The journalist, who asked not to be identified because of possible legal ramifications, said that the information was provided as part of an effort to discredit Wilson, but that the CIA information was not treated as especially sensitive. "The official I spoke with thought this was a part of Wilson's story that wasn't known and cast doubt on his whole mission," the person said, declining to identify the official he spoke with. "They thought Wilson was having a good ride and this was part of Wilson's story."
In addition to Novak's column, an administration official told The Washington Post on Saturday that two White House officials leaked the information to several journalists in an effort to discredit Wilson.
An article that appeared on the Time magazine Web site the same week Novak's column was published said that "some government officials have noted to Time in interviews . . . that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, is a CIA official who monitors the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction." The same article quoted from an interview with I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, saying that Cheney did not know about Wilson's mission "until this year when it became public in the last month or so."
Neither the Novak nor the Time account mentioned that Plame had worked as an undercover operative, which indicates those who leaked the information may not have known she was. Novak, co-host of CNN's "Crossfire," said on the program yesterday that he was not called with the leak but got the information during interviews.
The CIA "asked me not to use her name, but never indicated it would endanger her or anybody else," he said. "According to a confidential source at the CIA, Mrs. Wilson was an analyst, not a spy, not a covert operative, and not in charge of undercover operatives." Sources said Wilson's wife is a clandestine operations officer for the CIA, now out of the field and working on weapons of mass destruction.
At a forum held last month by Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.), Wilson said: "I don't think we're going to let this drop. 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."
Wilson said yesterday that he believes Rove "at a minimum condoned the leak," but said he has no evidence Rove was the original leaker. Wilson said that based on reporters' statements, he believes Rove participated in calls that drew attention to his wife's occupation after Novak's column was published. "My knowledge is based on a reporter who called me right after he had spoken to Rove and said that Rove had said my wife was fair game," Wilson said. He said that conversation occurred on July 21.
Wilson said a producer from another network told him about the same time, "The White House is saying things about you and your wife that are so off the wall that we won't use them." Wilson said the series of similar calls he received, which included four journalists from three networks, stopped on July 22, after he appeared on NBC's "Today" show and said the disclosure of his wife's maiden name could jeopardize the "entire network that she may have established."
NBC anchor Tom Brokaw reported last night that correspondent Andrea Mitchell had such a discussion after the Novak column appeared.
McClellan said Rove "wasn't involved" in any disclosure of the operative's name. "The president knows he wasn't involved. . . . It's simply not true."
Justice Department officials said yesterday they have opened a preliminary inquiry to determine whether to investigate a possible violation of the law protecting the identities of undercover intelligence operatives. If the department's career counter-espionage lawyers find grounds for a full investigation, Attorney General John D. Ashcroft will have to decide whether to name a special counsel to oversee the case. Among the considerations that could lead to such action is the inherent conflict of interest in having the Bush Justice Department investigate employees of the Bush White House, department officials said.
A 1982 law makes it a crime punishable by up to 10 years in prison for someone with authorized access to classified information identifying intelligence officers, agents, informants and sources to intentionally disclose that information to anyone who does not have the proper security clearances.
Some congressional Democrats insisted on the need for a special counsel yesterday. In a letter to Ashcroft, Senate Minority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (S.D.) and Sens. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (Del.), Carl M. Levin (Mich.) and John D. Rockefeller IV (W.Va.) requested a special counsel "because of the obvious and inherent conflicts of interests involved."
Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.), the ranking Democrat on the Governmental Affairs Committee, said he will introduce legislation to revive the independent counsel statute, which expired. Lieberman said White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. should direct all White House personnel to keep all records that could be related to the Justice inquiry.
Asked if he thought an outside counsel should be appointed to investigate the leak, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said he believed that Ashcroft would appoint "career professionals in the Justice Department to examine the situation" and that it would be a "thorough investigation."
Staff writers Walter Pincus, Susan Schmidt, Howard Kurtz and Dana Priest contributed to this report.
� 2003 The Washington Post Company
Democrats' Demand for Special Counsel Rejected
advertisement
_____Related Article_____
� Rarely Invoked Statute Could Play a Role (The Washington Post, Sep 30, 2003)
_____Multimedia_____
� Video: Post's Milbank on White House Leak
� Video: White House Spokesman Denies Rove's Involvement
_____Transcript_____
� White House Press Briefing
_____Live Onlines_____
� Kurtz Media Backtalk: Transcript
� Post's Walter Pincus: Transcript
_____Related News_____
� Bush Aides Say They'll Cooperate With Probe Into Intelligence Leak (The Washington Post, Sep 29, 2003)
� Media Review Conduct After Leak (The Washington Post, Sep 29, 2003)
� Bush Administration Is Focus of Inquiry (The Washington Post, Sep 28, 2003)
___ Postwar Iraq ___
___ News From Iraq ___
� Bush Vows Action if Aides Had Role in Leak
� Democrat Disputes Rice on Iraq Claims
� Ambush Sparks Lengthy Firefights
� More News
___ Your Questions Answered ___
� Who Is Governing Iraq?
� Who Are the Kurds?
� Who Are the Shiites?
_____ Photo Gallery _____
Eyes on the War
Photojournalists share their personal experiences behind the enduring images of the war in Iraq.
� More Photos: Iraq Eyewitness
___ The War As It Happened ___
� Washington Post coverage from March-April 2003, including articles, videos, photos and opinion.
Subscribe to
E-Mail This Article
Printer-Friendly Version
Permission to Republish
By Mike Allen and Dana Milbank
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, September 30, 2003; Page A01
President Bush's chief spokesman said yesterday that the allegation that administration officials leaked the name of a CIA operative is "a very serious matter" and vowed that Bush would fire anybody responsible for such actions.
The vow came as numerous Democratic leaders demanded the administration appoint a special counsel to investigate the charges that a CIA operative's name was divulged in an effort to discredit her husband, a prominent critic of Bush's Iraq policy. The White House rejected those calls, also saying it has no evidence of wrongdoing by Bush adviser Karl Rove or others and therefore no reason to begin an internal investigation.
"There's been nothing, absolutely nothing, brought to our attention to suggest any White House involvement, and that includes the vice president's office, as well," said Scott McClellan, Bush's press secretary. He said that "if anyone in this administration was involved in it, they would no longer be in this administration."
Justice Department officials said yesterday they have begun a preliminary probe into whether an administration official violated the law by telling journalists that the wife of former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, a prominent critic of Bush's use of intelligence related to Iraq, worked for the CIA. Wilson has drawn attention for his report on a trip he took to Niger for the CIA that, he said, did not confirm an administration charge that Iraq's Saddam Hussein was seeking nuclear materiel in that country.
A senior official quoted Bush as saying, "I want to get to the bottom of this," during a meeting yesterday morning with a few top aides, including Rove. Senior intelligence officials said yesterday that the CIA filed what they termed a "crime report" with the Justice Department in late July, shortly after syndicated columnist Robert D. Novak, citing two unnamed administration sources, identified Wilson's wife by name. The CIA report pointed to a "possible violation of federal criminal law involving the unauthorized disclosure of classified information."
Three weeks ago, intelligence officials said, the CIA returned to the Justice Department a standard 11-question form detailing the potential damage done by the release of the information. Officials said it may have been the first such report ever filed on the unauthorized disclosure of an operative's name. Word of the Justice probe emerged over the weekend after the CIA briefed lawmakers on it last week.
Another journalist yesterday confirmed receiving a call from an administration official providing the same information about Wilson's wife before the Novak column appeared on July 14 in The Post and other newspapers.
The journalist, who asked not to be identified because of possible legal ramifications, said that the information was provided as part of an effort to discredit Wilson, but that the CIA information was not treated as especially sensitive. "The official I spoke with thought this was a part of Wilson's story that wasn't known and cast doubt on his whole mission," the person said, declining to identify the official he spoke with. "They thought Wilson was having a good ride and this was part of Wilson's story."
In addition to Novak's column, an administration official told The Washington Post on Saturday that two White House officials leaked the information to several journalists in an effort to discredit Wilson.
An article that appeared on the Time magazine Web site the same week Novak's column was published said that "some government officials have noted to Time in interviews . . . that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, is a CIA official who monitors the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction." The same article quoted from an interview with I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, saying that Cheney did not know about Wilson's mission "until this year when it became public in the last month or so."
Neither the Novak nor the Time account mentioned that Plame had worked as an undercover operative, which indicates those who leaked the information may not have known she was. Novak, co-host of CNN's "Crossfire," said on the program yesterday that he was not called with the leak but got the information during interviews.
The CIA "asked me not to use her name, but never indicated it would endanger her or anybody else," he said. "According to a confidential source at the CIA, Mrs. Wilson was an analyst, not a spy, not a covert operative, and not in charge of undercover operatives." Sources said Wilson's wife is a clandestine operations officer for the CIA, now out of the field and working on weapons of mass destruction.
At a forum held last month by Rep. Jay Inslee (D-Wash.), Wilson said: "I don't think we're going to let this drop. 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."
Wilson said yesterday that he believes Rove "at a minimum condoned the leak," but said he has no evidence Rove was the original leaker. Wilson said that based on reporters' statements, he believes Rove participated in calls that drew attention to his wife's occupation after Novak's column was published. "My knowledge is based on a reporter who called me right after he had spoken to Rove and said that Rove had said my wife was fair game," Wilson said. He said that conversation occurred on July 21.
Wilson said a producer from another network told him about the same time, "The White House is saying things about you and your wife that are so off the wall that we won't use them." Wilson said the series of similar calls he received, which included four journalists from three networks, stopped on July 22, after he appeared on NBC's "Today" show and said the disclosure of his wife's maiden name could jeopardize the "entire network that she may have established."
NBC anchor Tom Brokaw reported last night that correspondent Andrea Mitchell had such a discussion after the Novak column appeared.
McClellan said Rove "wasn't involved" in any disclosure of the operative's name. "The president knows he wasn't involved. . . . It's simply not true."
Justice Department officials said yesterday they have opened a preliminary inquiry to determine whether to investigate a possible violation of the law protecting the identities of undercover intelligence operatives. If the department's career counter-espionage lawyers find grounds for a full investigation, Attorney General John D. Ashcroft will have to decide whether to name a special counsel to oversee the case. Among the considerations that could lead to such action is the inherent conflict of interest in having the Bush Justice Department investigate employees of the Bush White House, department officials said.
A 1982 law makes it a crime punishable by up to 10 years in prison for someone with authorized access to classified information identifying intelligence officers, agents, informants and sources to intentionally disclose that information to anyone who does not have the proper security clearances.
Some congressional Democrats insisted on the need for a special counsel yesterday. In a letter to Ashcroft, Senate Minority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (S.D.) and Sens. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (Del.), Carl M. Levin (Mich.) and John D. Rockefeller IV (W.Va.) requested a special counsel "because of the obvious and inherent conflicts of interests involved."
Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.), the ranking Democrat on the Governmental Affairs Committee, said he will introduce legislation to revive the independent counsel statute, which expired. Lieberman said White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. should direct all White House personnel to keep all records that could be related to the Justice inquiry.
Asked if he thought an outside counsel should be appointed to investigate the leak, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said he believed that Ashcroft would appoint "career professionals in the Justice Department to examine the situation" and that it would be a "thorough investigation."
Staff writers Walter Pincus, Susan Schmidt, Howard Kurtz and Dana Priest contributed to this report.
� 2003 The Washington Post Company
UPI NewsTrack TopNews
Bush aides to cooperate in news leak probe
WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- The Bush administration is promising to cooperate with an investigation into a news leak that revealed the name of a CIA undercover operative.
However, Democrats don't believe the administration can credibly investigate itself despite promises from presidential aides to cooperate with the Justice Department inquiry. The Democrats say an independent investigation is needed.
White House officials told the Post Bush has no plans to ask his staff members whether they played a role in revealing the name of the undercover officer who is married to former ambassador Joseph Wilson IV, an outspoken critic of Bush's handling of intelligence about Iraq.
An administration official told the Post two White House officials leaked the information to selected journalists to discredit Wilson. The leak could constitute a federal crime, and might have endangered confidential sources who had aided the operative throughout her career. CIA Director George Tenet has asked the Justice Department to investigate how the leak occurred.
-0-
Taliban tape urges resistance
United Arab Emirates, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- A tape played on Arab TV al-Jazeera Monday showed what may be first public broadcast by a representative of the former Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
In the tape, which analysts think is an attempt to show the Taliban remains a fighting force, a Taliban commander urged Afghans to resist what he called the foreign occupation of Muslim lands.
The man identified as Mullah Hidayat Allah Akhhond is seen talking to Taliban fighters and referred to recent events in Iraq as part of his call to arms.
"We urge you to resist the foreign occupation of the lands of Palestine, Chechnya, Afghanistan and Iraq," he said. "One could wonder what Iraq has done wrong," he went on.
He asked Afghans to resist attempts to drag them into ethnic conflict and criticized U.S.-backed Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
-0-
Court won't block FCC do-not-call rules
WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer refused a request Monday from telemarketers to block implementation of the Do Not Call Registry.
That means the Federal Communications Commission will try to enforce the do-not-call list Wednesday.
The FCC case is separate from two others involving the Federal Trade Commission, which compiled the do not call list.
In one of those separate cases, a federal judge in Oklahoma struck down the list, saying the FCC, not the FTC, had the authority to compile it. That decision has been made moot, because Congress amended the law last week, specifically giving the FTC the authority.
In the second of those separate cases, a federal judge in Denver struck down the list on different grounds. The judge said since the registry bans calls from commercial telemarketers, but not charities and political parties, it was an unconstitutional restriction of speech content.
-0-
Russia hid nuclear accident: Pravda
MOSCOW, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- The Russian Ministry for Nuclear Power withheld knowledge for a month that 11 workers had been exposed to high radiation, Pravda reported Monday.
Quoting reports from the Bellona environmental foundation, Pravda said the workers were cutting up spent rods from nuclear submarines in Gremikha in the Murmansk region in July when they sustained burns.
They were not taken for treatment until five weeks later, the report said.
One welder was said to have an increased thyroid gland and a small cyst in the left cerebral hemisphere. The Murmansk hospital determined the patient had been exposed to radiation that was 10 times higher than the permissible norm of 200 millirems.
The press secretary for the governor of Murmansk could not comment why the governor learned about the incident a month later from mass media and not official sources.
Bush aides to cooperate in news leak probe
WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- The Bush administration is promising to cooperate with an investigation into a news leak that revealed the name of a CIA undercover operative.
However, Democrats don't believe the administration can credibly investigate itself despite promises from presidential aides to cooperate with the Justice Department inquiry. The Democrats say an independent investigation is needed.
White House officials told the Post Bush has no plans to ask his staff members whether they played a role in revealing the name of the undercover officer who is married to former ambassador Joseph Wilson IV, an outspoken critic of Bush's handling of intelligence about Iraq.
An administration official told the Post two White House officials leaked the information to selected journalists to discredit Wilson. The leak could constitute a federal crime, and might have endangered confidential sources who had aided the operative throughout her career. CIA Director George Tenet has asked the Justice Department to investigate how the leak occurred.
-0-
Taliban tape urges resistance
United Arab Emirates, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- A tape played on Arab TV al-Jazeera Monday showed what may be first public broadcast by a representative of the former Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
In the tape, which analysts think is an attempt to show the Taliban remains a fighting force, a Taliban commander urged Afghans to resist what he called the foreign occupation of Muslim lands.
The man identified as Mullah Hidayat Allah Akhhond is seen talking to Taliban fighters and referred to recent events in Iraq as part of his call to arms.
"We urge you to resist the foreign occupation of the lands of Palestine, Chechnya, Afghanistan and Iraq," he said. "One could wonder what Iraq has done wrong," he went on.
He asked Afghans to resist attempts to drag them into ethnic conflict and criticized U.S.-backed Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
-0-
Court won't block FCC do-not-call rules
WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer refused a request Monday from telemarketers to block implementation of the Do Not Call Registry.
That means the Federal Communications Commission will try to enforce the do-not-call list Wednesday.
The FCC case is separate from two others involving the Federal Trade Commission, which compiled the do not call list.
In one of those separate cases, a federal judge in Oklahoma struck down the list, saying the FCC, not the FTC, had the authority to compile it. That decision has been made moot, because Congress amended the law last week, specifically giving the FTC the authority.
In the second of those separate cases, a federal judge in Denver struck down the list on different grounds. The judge said since the registry bans calls from commercial telemarketers, but not charities and political parties, it was an unconstitutional restriction of speech content.
-0-
Russia hid nuclear accident: Pravda
MOSCOW, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- The Russian Ministry for Nuclear Power withheld knowledge for a month that 11 workers had been exposed to high radiation, Pravda reported Monday.
Quoting reports from the Bellona environmental foundation, Pravda said the workers were cutting up spent rods from nuclear submarines in Gremikha in the Murmansk region in July when they sustained burns.
They were not taken for treatment until five weeks later, the report said.
One welder was said to have an increased thyroid gland and a small cyst in the left cerebral hemisphere. The Murmansk hospital determined the patient had been exposed to radiation that was 10 times higher than the permissible norm of 200 millirems.
The press secretary for the governor of Murmansk could not comment why the governor learned about the incident a month later from mass media and not official sources.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 � It wasn�t just the autumn chill, it was the whiff of scandal that invigorated the senses of jaded Washingtonians Monday. The question of the day: Had anyone in the White House tried to punish Iraq war opponent Joseph Wilson by leaking his wife�s identity as a CIA employee to columnist Bob Novak?
WILSON, THE RETIRED diplomat whom the CIA had assigned in February 2002 to find out whether Iraq had been trying to buy uranium from Niger, has charged that White House officials had endangered his wife by unmasking her as a CIA weapons analyst.
It was, he said, an attempt to attack him for filing a report disputing an Iraq-Niger connection.
THE �WHODUNIT�
The sudden excitement in Washington came down to question of: Which would you read first, a 150-page �whodunit� or a 2,000-page treatise on politics?
The leak furor was the whodunit, an art form to which Washingtonians naturally gravitate. The treatise was the ongoing debate over whether Iraq can be transformed into a stable, non-threatening model Arab democracy.
A less-noticed aspect of the whodunit was another mystery, one which raised questions of potential incompetence in the Bush administration.
Who in the White House had been so tone-deaf as to approve the CIA�s choice of Wilson, who turned out to be an outspoken opponent of the Iraq invasion and has criticized it in the left-leaning Nation magazine?
The Wilson affair could sap support for President Bush�s request for $87 billion to pay for military operations in Iraq and the rebuilding of the occupied nation�s electric power grid, hospitals, schools and criminal justice system.
If the president�s credibility and clout are impaired by the charge of White House leaking, will Congress believe him when he says it must spend more money to finish the job in Iraq?
The alleged leak �undermines the administration�s position that it is coming clean on the truth,� said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., at a Capitol Hill news conference Monday.
The latest on the leak allegation
�When anybody does cheap-shot arguments, it means they�re not sure they have their arguments and can�t win,� Schumer said. �When they go below the belt, they�re not sure they can win above the belt.�
Advertisement
Schumer demanded that Attorney General John Ashcroft appoint a special counsel from outside the administration to investigate the leak, which he called �one of the most dastardly and despicable things that I have seen in my more than 20 years in Washington.�
The New York Democrat said, �I am pointing fingers at no one; in fact, I hope it isn�t someone at a high level in the White House,� but he suggested that, based on the way administration officials were acting, the leak probably did emanate from a high level.
CREDIBILITY ON IRAN
Bush would face trouble in the future, Schumer predicted, if he warned of a new threat of weapons of mass destruction from another country.
�Let�s say, God forbid, next September the president comes forward and says, �I have evidence that Iran is on the verge of producing nuclear weapons.� Well, that kind of statement is not going to be as fully accepted after we found out what happened here.�
Schumer pointedly noted, �I supported and voted for the war and would do so again, because I firmly believe that we must make a strong stand against terrorism.�
Democrats such as Schumer � who is running for re-election next year � and presidential contenders Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri have faced an uneasy predicament ever since their vote last October to authorize Bush to invade Iraq.
(Twenty-nine Senate Democrats and 81 House Democrats voted for the Iraq war resolution.)
That vote has proven deeply unpopular with many of their Democratic constituents and has been the primary reason why insurgent presidential contender Howard Dean, who opposed the invasion, has rocketed to the front of the Democratic pack.
An investigation of the Wilson leak gives Schumer, Kerry and other prowar Democrats some political insulation. They can argue that they were misled by an administration that would stop at nothing in order to build a case for invasion. And they can use the Wilson investigation to show that they yield to no one in their vigilance against Bush and his aides.
Kerry, Dean, Gephardt and other Democratic presidential contenders all called Monday for either an outside counsel or a special investigation of the leak by the inspector general of the Justice Department.
A BONUS: ROVE
�This should not be a political issue � this goes way beyond politics,� Schumer contended Monday.
But the Wilson affair did seem to offer a bonus for the Democrats: A criminal investigation would distract and could perhaps even cripple Karl Rove, Bush�s chief political strategist.
Anything that hobbles and harasses Karl Rove, President Bush�s chief political strategist, by extension hurts Bush�s chances of re-election next year.
Wilson said Monday he did not know whether Rove was the source of the leak to Novak, but he did say he thought Rove had �condoned it.� White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Rove was not involved in the incident.
Anything that hobbles and harasses Rove by extension hurts Bush�s chances of re-election next year.
Another politically useful aspect of the scandal for Democrats is that for a time it will postpone the debate on whether, when or how to pull U.S. troops put of Iraq. That debate is divisive within party ranks, sometimes even causing Dean to be at odds with himself on the issue.
A scandal, with all the familiar contrivances of subpoenaed e-mails, aides testifying against their superiors, and mum witnesses escorted into grand jury rooms by their hawk-eyed attorneys, would be grand distraction, Washington-style. It seemed entirely inevitable Monday when one reporter made the Watergate connection in posing a question to Schumer.
WILSON, THE RETIRED diplomat whom the CIA had assigned in February 2002 to find out whether Iraq had been trying to buy uranium from Niger, has charged that White House officials had endangered his wife by unmasking her as a CIA weapons analyst.
It was, he said, an attempt to attack him for filing a report disputing an Iraq-Niger connection.
THE �WHODUNIT�
The sudden excitement in Washington came down to question of: Which would you read first, a 150-page �whodunit� or a 2,000-page treatise on politics?
The leak furor was the whodunit, an art form to which Washingtonians naturally gravitate. The treatise was the ongoing debate over whether Iraq can be transformed into a stable, non-threatening model Arab democracy.
A less-noticed aspect of the whodunit was another mystery, one which raised questions of potential incompetence in the Bush administration.
Who in the White House had been so tone-deaf as to approve the CIA�s choice of Wilson, who turned out to be an outspoken opponent of the Iraq invasion and has criticized it in the left-leaning Nation magazine?
The Wilson affair could sap support for President Bush�s request for $87 billion to pay for military operations in Iraq and the rebuilding of the occupied nation�s electric power grid, hospitals, schools and criminal justice system.
If the president�s credibility and clout are impaired by the charge of White House leaking, will Congress believe him when he says it must spend more money to finish the job in Iraq?
The alleged leak �undermines the administration�s position that it is coming clean on the truth,� said Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., at a Capitol Hill news conference Monday.
The latest on the leak allegation
�When anybody does cheap-shot arguments, it means they�re not sure they have their arguments and can�t win,� Schumer said. �When they go below the belt, they�re not sure they can win above the belt.�
Advertisement
Schumer demanded that Attorney General John Ashcroft appoint a special counsel from outside the administration to investigate the leak, which he called �one of the most dastardly and despicable things that I have seen in my more than 20 years in Washington.�
The New York Democrat said, �I am pointing fingers at no one; in fact, I hope it isn�t someone at a high level in the White House,� but he suggested that, based on the way administration officials were acting, the leak probably did emanate from a high level.
CREDIBILITY ON IRAN
Bush would face trouble in the future, Schumer predicted, if he warned of a new threat of weapons of mass destruction from another country.
�Let�s say, God forbid, next September the president comes forward and says, �I have evidence that Iran is on the verge of producing nuclear weapons.� Well, that kind of statement is not going to be as fully accepted after we found out what happened here.�
Schumer pointedly noted, �I supported and voted for the war and would do so again, because I firmly believe that we must make a strong stand against terrorism.�
Democrats such as Schumer � who is running for re-election next year � and presidential contenders Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri have faced an uneasy predicament ever since their vote last October to authorize Bush to invade Iraq.
(Twenty-nine Senate Democrats and 81 House Democrats voted for the Iraq war resolution.)
That vote has proven deeply unpopular with many of their Democratic constituents and has been the primary reason why insurgent presidential contender Howard Dean, who opposed the invasion, has rocketed to the front of the Democratic pack.
An investigation of the Wilson leak gives Schumer, Kerry and other prowar Democrats some political insulation. They can argue that they were misled by an administration that would stop at nothing in order to build a case for invasion. And they can use the Wilson investigation to show that they yield to no one in their vigilance against Bush and his aides.
Kerry, Dean, Gephardt and other Democratic presidential contenders all called Monday for either an outside counsel or a special investigation of the leak by the inspector general of the Justice Department.
A BONUS: ROVE
�This should not be a political issue � this goes way beyond politics,� Schumer contended Monday.
But the Wilson affair did seem to offer a bonus for the Democrats: A criminal investigation would distract and could perhaps even cripple Karl Rove, Bush�s chief political strategist.
Anything that hobbles and harasses Karl Rove, President Bush�s chief political strategist, by extension hurts Bush�s chances of re-election next year.
Wilson said Monday he did not know whether Rove was the source of the leak to Novak, but he did say he thought Rove had �condoned it.� White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Rove was not involved in the incident.
Anything that hobbles and harasses Rove by extension hurts Bush�s chances of re-election next year.
Another politically useful aspect of the scandal for Democrats is that for a time it will postpone the debate on whether, when or how to pull U.S. troops put of Iraq. That debate is divisive within party ranks, sometimes even causing Dean to be at odds with himself on the issue.
A scandal, with all the familiar contrivances of subpoenaed e-mails, aides testifying against their superiors, and mum witnesses escorted into grand jury rooms by their hawk-eyed attorneys, would be grand distraction, Washington-style. It seemed entirely inevitable Monday when one reporter made the Watergate connection in posing a question to Schumer.
Friday, September 26, 2003
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher urged the Bush administration Friday to back away from its goal of helping to nurture a democratic Iraq as part of broader plan to promote democracy throughout the Middle East.
"They will not be a model and no model will be imposed on them," Maher told a gathering sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations.
He called on the administration to "let Iraq be itself."
The administration is using its politically-dominant role in post-Saddam Iraq to try to instill democratic processes from the local to the national level as an alternative to the country's long tradition of violent extremism.
"I don't think that countries are eager to be models," said Maher, who noted that Egypt never had good relations with Saddam Hussein and had no reason to lament his demise.
He said the U.S. role as occupier of Iraq must end as soon as possible in the interest of avoiding an unstable situation in the region.
On the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, Maher urged the United States to call off its "blame (Yasser) Arafat" policies and strive toward a more evenhanded approach."
While asserting that Arafat is not an "angel," Maher said the Palestinian Authority chairman is an essential part of the solution to the ongoing standoff with Israel.
He said it would be a mistake to regard the liberation movement Arafat has headed as incapable of living in peace with Israel once Palestinian independence is achieved.
"Liberation movements turn into governments and act differently," Maher said.
While restating his friendship for the United States, Maher said it was "absolutely necessary" for the administration to lean on Israel from time to time instead of focusing its wrath on the Palestinians.
He said Egypt does not allow the Palestinian to go "scot free" when they engage in wrongdoing and the West should do the same with Israel.
As an example of what he described as the pro-Israeli posture of the United States, he cited the examples of Israel's destruction of seven- and eight-story buildings where Palestinian noncombatants live.
In response to those incidents, he said, "We haven't heard any clamor in the West."
He added: "Israel considers the death of an Israeli child to be one thing and the death of a Palestinian child to be another."
Maher also took aim at the wall that Israel is building in the Palestinian territories, contending that it shows an unwillingness by Israelis to pursue the goal of living in peace with Palestinians.
Beyond that, he said, the wall won't achieve the Israeli goal of greater security because "Palestinians have missiles which can fly over walls."
"They will not be a model and no model will be imposed on them," Maher told a gathering sponsored by the Council on Foreign Relations.
He called on the administration to "let Iraq be itself."
The administration is using its politically-dominant role in post-Saddam Iraq to try to instill democratic processes from the local to the national level as an alternative to the country's long tradition of violent extremism.
"I don't think that countries are eager to be models," said Maher, who noted that Egypt never had good relations with Saddam Hussein and had no reason to lament his demise.
He said the U.S. role as occupier of Iraq must end as soon as possible in the interest of avoiding an unstable situation in the region.
On the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, Maher urged the United States to call off its "blame (Yasser) Arafat" policies and strive toward a more evenhanded approach."
While asserting that Arafat is not an "angel," Maher said the Palestinian Authority chairman is an essential part of the solution to the ongoing standoff with Israel.
He said it would be a mistake to regard the liberation movement Arafat has headed as incapable of living in peace with Israel once Palestinian independence is achieved.
"Liberation movements turn into governments and act differently," Maher said.
While restating his friendship for the United States, Maher said it was "absolutely necessary" for the administration to lean on Israel from time to time instead of focusing its wrath on the Palestinians.
He said Egypt does not allow the Palestinian to go "scot free" when they engage in wrongdoing and the West should do the same with Israel.
As an example of what he described as the pro-Israeli posture of the United States, he cited the examples of Israel's destruction of seven- and eight-story buildings where Palestinian noncombatants live.
In response to those incidents, he said, "We haven't heard any clamor in the West."
He added: "Israel considers the death of an Israeli child to be one thing and the death of a Palestinian child to be another."
Maher also took aim at the wall that Israel is building in the Palestinian territories, contending that it shows an unwillingness by Israelis to pursue the goal of living in peace with Palestinians.
Beyond that, he said, the wall won't achieve the Israeli goal of greater security because "Palestinians have missiles which can fly over walls."
Wednesday, September 24, 2003
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
LATELINE
Late night news & current affairs
TV PROGRAM TRANSCRIPT
LOCATION: abc.net.au > Lateline > Archives
URL: http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2003/s953110.htm
Broadcast: 24/09/2003
Bush appeal met with criticism
There were no apologies from George W Bush at the United Nations today. The US President told the General Assembly America was right to go to war to oust Saddam Hussein, and the world must now put its differences aside to help Iraq. But it appears much of the international community is not convinced. The US position has been met with unprecedented criticism from the UN secretary-general and France.
Compere: Tony Jones
Reporter: Norman Hermant
NORMAN HERMANT: George Bush put on a brave face.
But after the war in Iraq, winning friends here was not going to be easy.
Perhaps this was an omen - Kofi Annan taking the unusual step of opening the General Assembly in French.
Then unreserved criticism of US policy.
A decisive moment for the UN, said the secretary-general, will be the debate over the doctrine of pre-emptive action.
KOFI ANNAN, UN SECRETARY GENERAL: This logic represents a fundamental challenge to the principles on which, however imperfectly, world peace and stability have rested for the last 58 years.
NORMAN HERMANT: But there were no apologies from the US President.
The United States, he said, removed the threat of Saddam and restored the credibility of the UN.
GEORGE W BUSH, US PRESIDENT: The Security Council was right to vow serious consequences if Iraq refused to comply.
And, because there were consequences, because a coalition of nations acted to defend the peace and the credibility of the United Nations, Iraq is free.
NORMAN HERMANT: The President pushed on.
Differences over the war, he said, should now be put aside, for Iraq's sake.
GEORGE W BUSH: Every young democracy needs the help of friends.
Now the nation of Iraq needs and deserves our aid and all nations of good will should step forward to provide that support.
NORMAN HERMANT: The response was muted, and minutes later the American position was again under attack, from French President Jacques Chirac.
"The war which was started without the authorisation of the Security Council has shaken the multilateral system," he said.
Washington's biggest critic on the war went on.
"In an open world, no-one can live in isolation, no-one can act in the name of everyone, no-one can accept the anarchy of a society without rules."
Later, the two leaders, who have battled so publicly, met for private talks.
There was no breakthrough, although French officials say they have no plans to veto a new UN resolution on Iraq.
Behind the scenes, Washington is lobbying for that resolution and hopes it will clear the way for more international money and troops.
But even representatives of Iraq's Governing Council say they're not impressed.
They want power handed over as quickly as possible and they say troops shouldn't be coming to Iraq, they should be leaving.
AHMED CHALABI, CURRENT PRESIDENT, IRAQ GOVERNING COUNCIL: Foreign troops are already in Iraq and there are enough troops in Iraq.
It is not our job to solicit more foreign troops for Iraq.
NORMAN HERMANT: The war in Iraq and the war on terror dominated much of the discussion today.
But from the President of Indonesia there was also a reminder of the views of many countries in the Muslim world about the the roots of Islamic terror.
MEGAWATI SUKARNOPUTRI, INDONESIAN PRESIDENT: Once the major powers behave in a more just manner and make clear their impartiality in the Middle East, then most of the root causes of terrorism perpetrated in the name of Islam, which in any circumstances cannot be justified, would have been resolved.
NORMAN HERMANT: With the Middle East road map in tatters and Iraq dragging down his popular support, George Bush could have come to the UN with a message of conciliation.
Critics say he didn't do that and he leaves with much of the world still unimpressed.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MULTIMEDIA
Bush appeal met with criticism
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/2003/09/20030924ll_un.ram
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lateline Archives About
Lateline@your.abc.net.au
� 2003 Lateline. Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
LATELINE
Late night news & current affairs
TV PROGRAM TRANSCRIPT
LOCATION: abc.net.au > Lateline > Archives
URL: http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2003/s953110.htm
Broadcast: 24/09/2003
Bush appeal met with criticism
There were no apologies from George W Bush at the United Nations today. The US President told the General Assembly America was right to go to war to oust Saddam Hussein, and the world must now put its differences aside to help Iraq. But it appears much of the international community is not convinced. The US position has been met with unprecedented criticism from the UN secretary-general and France.
Compere: Tony Jones
Reporter: Norman Hermant
NORMAN HERMANT: George Bush put on a brave face.
But after the war in Iraq, winning friends here was not going to be easy.
Perhaps this was an omen - Kofi Annan taking the unusual step of opening the General Assembly in French.
Then unreserved criticism of US policy.
A decisive moment for the UN, said the secretary-general, will be the debate over the doctrine of pre-emptive action.
KOFI ANNAN, UN SECRETARY GENERAL: This logic represents a fundamental challenge to the principles on which, however imperfectly, world peace and stability have rested for the last 58 years.
NORMAN HERMANT: But there were no apologies from the US President.
The United States, he said, removed the threat of Saddam and restored the credibility of the UN.
GEORGE W BUSH, US PRESIDENT: The Security Council was right to vow serious consequences if Iraq refused to comply.
And, because there were consequences, because a coalition of nations acted to defend the peace and the credibility of the United Nations, Iraq is free.
NORMAN HERMANT: The President pushed on.
Differences over the war, he said, should now be put aside, for Iraq's sake.
GEORGE W BUSH: Every young democracy needs the help of friends.
Now the nation of Iraq needs and deserves our aid and all nations of good will should step forward to provide that support.
NORMAN HERMANT: The response was muted, and minutes later the American position was again under attack, from French President Jacques Chirac.
"The war which was started without the authorisation of the Security Council has shaken the multilateral system," he said.
Washington's biggest critic on the war went on.
"In an open world, no-one can live in isolation, no-one can act in the name of everyone, no-one can accept the anarchy of a society without rules."
Later, the two leaders, who have battled so publicly, met for private talks.
There was no breakthrough, although French officials say they have no plans to veto a new UN resolution on Iraq.
Behind the scenes, Washington is lobbying for that resolution and hopes it will clear the way for more international money and troops.
But even representatives of Iraq's Governing Council say they're not impressed.
They want power handed over as quickly as possible and they say troops shouldn't be coming to Iraq, they should be leaving.
AHMED CHALABI, CURRENT PRESIDENT, IRAQ GOVERNING COUNCIL: Foreign troops are already in Iraq and there are enough troops in Iraq.
It is not our job to solicit more foreign troops for Iraq.
NORMAN HERMANT: The war in Iraq and the war on terror dominated much of the discussion today.
But from the President of Indonesia there was also a reminder of the views of many countries in the Muslim world about the the roots of Islamic terror.
MEGAWATI SUKARNOPUTRI, INDONESIAN PRESIDENT: Once the major powers behave in a more just manner and make clear their impartiality in the Middle East, then most of the root causes of terrorism perpetrated in the name of Islam, which in any circumstances cannot be justified, would have been resolved.
NORMAN HERMANT: With the Middle East road map in tatters and Iraq dragging down his popular support, George Bush could have come to the UN with a message of conciliation.
Critics say he didn't do that and he leaves with much of the world still unimpressed.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MULTIMEDIA
Bush appeal met with criticism
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/2003/09/20030924ll_un.ram
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lateline Archives About
Lateline@your.abc.net.au
� 2003 Lateline. Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
Annan Trounces Bush at UN
By Ian Williams, AlterNet
September 23, 2003
While the U.S. media will most likely play up George Bush's boring speech to the UN, the day clearly belonged to Kofi Annan.
In his distinctively quiet-spoken manner, Annan trounced the Bush administration's foreign policy doctrine of unilateral preemptive strikes at the United Nations General Assembly. Saying the world had "come to a fork in the road," at what "may be a moment no less decisive than 1945 itself, when the United Nations was founded," Annan spelt out explicitly and in the most public way possible the position he has until now reserved for quiet off-the-cuff sessions with the media. Drawing on the power of his office, he ripped apart the U.S. policy of hot preemption � though without pointing specifically at the Bush administration:
"Until now it has been understood that when states go beyond (self-defense), and decide to use force to deal with broader threats to international peace and security, they need the unique legitimacy provided by the United Nations.
"Now, some say this understanding is no longer tenable, since an 'armed attack' with weapons of mass destruction could be launched at any time, without warning, or by a clandestine group. Rather than wait for that to happen, they argue, states have the right and obligation to use force pre-emptively, even on the territory of other states, and even while weapons systems that might be used to attack them are still being developed.
"According to this argument, states are not obliged to wait until there is agreement in the Security Council. Instead, they reserve the right to act unilaterally, or in ad hoc coalitions.
"This logic represents a fundamental challenge to the principles on which, however imperfectly, world peace and stability have rested for the last fifty-eight years ... if it were to be adopted, it could set precedents that resulted in a proliferation of the unilateral and lawless use of force, with or without justification.
By UN standards, it was an unprecedented, if justly deserved, rebuff to the United States.
George Bush's speech that followed displayed the usual tone-deaf rhetoric that has become a hallmark of his foreign policy. While there were no outright lies, he was, as a British Cabinet Minister once said, "economical with the truth." Indeed, the president was positively miserly with the truth this time around.
His speech barely acknowledged the fact that the vast majority of UN members disagreed with the invasion being conducted in their name. Being the president of the United States means never having to say you're sorry. But even so, an occasional hands-on contact with reality would be useful. While Bush admitted last week that there was no connection between Saddam Hussein and the Sept. 11 attacks, he declared once again today, "The regime of Saddam Hussein cultivated ties to terror while it built weapons of mass destruction." The phrase "ties to terror" is seemingly the ambiguous phrase of choice, carefully crafted to reinforce the mistaken beliefs of the 70 percent of Americans are convinced that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11 without having to actually say so.
Indeed, Bush's speech introduced a whole new word to the spin-meisters' dictionary: "proliferators." This is an entirely new category of people, who have joined the ranks of assorted "evildoers," as enemies of all that is good in this world. While he did not explicitly mention a list of potential target countries like Cuba, Syria, or Iran as "proliferators," it sounded a lot like neoconservative vigilante justice as usual: "Because proliferators will use any route or channel that is open to them, we need the broadest possible cooperation to stop them."
To add to the Bush in Wonderland effect, he welcomed the delegation from the Iraqi Governing Council which was sitting in the Iraqi seat at the UN. They were, he said, "the first truly representative institution in that country." Could this be the same IGC that the administration says is not ready or fit to take over Iraqi sovereignty? The same leaders who are pushing for a greater UN role?
More disturbingly, there was little evidence in Bush's speech of any of the new-found flexibility being touted in the media. On the subject of transferring power, Bush claimed that the handover of sovereignty "must unfold according to the needs of Iraqis, neither hurried, nor delayed by the wishes of other parties." No prizes for guessing who will be the judge of these "needs." The same US government that handpicked the members of the IGC and flew Ahmed Chalabi and his friends in as a government in exile!
Bush even mentioned the resolution he is trying to get past the Security Council, giving a full and frank disclosure of his vision of the "vital role" to be played by the UN. The United Nations, he said, "should assist in developing a constitution, in training civil servants, and conducting free and fair elections." In short, it should do what it is told.
In the end, there was little that was new in Bush's speech � just the same old tired assortment of cliches about terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and Iraq. It's not an argument that won many supporters in the UN when it was new, and is unlikely to do so six months into a botched-up occupation.
By Ian Williams, AlterNet
September 23, 2003
While the U.S. media will most likely play up George Bush's boring speech to the UN, the day clearly belonged to Kofi Annan.
In his distinctively quiet-spoken manner, Annan trounced the Bush administration's foreign policy doctrine of unilateral preemptive strikes at the United Nations General Assembly. Saying the world had "come to a fork in the road," at what "may be a moment no less decisive than 1945 itself, when the United Nations was founded," Annan spelt out explicitly and in the most public way possible the position he has until now reserved for quiet off-the-cuff sessions with the media. Drawing on the power of his office, he ripped apart the U.S. policy of hot preemption � though without pointing specifically at the Bush administration:
"Until now it has been understood that when states go beyond (self-defense), and decide to use force to deal with broader threats to international peace and security, they need the unique legitimacy provided by the United Nations.
"Now, some say this understanding is no longer tenable, since an 'armed attack' with weapons of mass destruction could be launched at any time, without warning, or by a clandestine group. Rather than wait for that to happen, they argue, states have the right and obligation to use force pre-emptively, even on the territory of other states, and even while weapons systems that might be used to attack them are still being developed.
"According to this argument, states are not obliged to wait until there is agreement in the Security Council. Instead, they reserve the right to act unilaterally, or in ad hoc coalitions.
"This logic represents a fundamental challenge to the principles on which, however imperfectly, world peace and stability have rested for the last fifty-eight years ... if it were to be adopted, it could set precedents that resulted in a proliferation of the unilateral and lawless use of force, with or without justification.
By UN standards, it was an unprecedented, if justly deserved, rebuff to the United States.
George Bush's speech that followed displayed the usual tone-deaf rhetoric that has become a hallmark of his foreign policy. While there were no outright lies, he was, as a British Cabinet Minister once said, "economical with the truth." Indeed, the president was positively miserly with the truth this time around.
His speech barely acknowledged the fact that the vast majority of UN members disagreed with the invasion being conducted in their name. Being the president of the United States means never having to say you're sorry. But even so, an occasional hands-on contact with reality would be useful. While Bush admitted last week that there was no connection between Saddam Hussein and the Sept. 11 attacks, he declared once again today, "The regime of Saddam Hussein cultivated ties to terror while it built weapons of mass destruction." The phrase "ties to terror" is seemingly the ambiguous phrase of choice, carefully crafted to reinforce the mistaken beliefs of the 70 percent of Americans are convinced that Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11 without having to actually say so.
Indeed, Bush's speech introduced a whole new word to the spin-meisters' dictionary: "proliferators." This is an entirely new category of people, who have joined the ranks of assorted "evildoers," as enemies of all that is good in this world. While he did not explicitly mention a list of potential target countries like Cuba, Syria, or Iran as "proliferators," it sounded a lot like neoconservative vigilante justice as usual: "Because proliferators will use any route or channel that is open to them, we need the broadest possible cooperation to stop them."
To add to the Bush in Wonderland effect, he welcomed the delegation from the Iraqi Governing Council which was sitting in the Iraqi seat at the UN. They were, he said, "the first truly representative institution in that country." Could this be the same IGC that the administration says is not ready or fit to take over Iraqi sovereignty? The same leaders who are pushing for a greater UN role?
More disturbingly, there was little evidence in Bush's speech of any of the new-found flexibility being touted in the media. On the subject of transferring power, Bush claimed that the handover of sovereignty "must unfold according to the needs of Iraqis, neither hurried, nor delayed by the wishes of other parties." No prizes for guessing who will be the judge of these "needs." The same US government that handpicked the members of the IGC and flew Ahmed Chalabi and his friends in as a government in exile!
Bush even mentioned the resolution he is trying to get past the Security Council, giving a full and frank disclosure of his vision of the "vital role" to be played by the UN. The United Nations, he said, "should assist in developing a constitution, in training civil servants, and conducting free and fair elections." In short, it should do what it is told.
In the end, there was little that was new in Bush's speech � just the same old tired assortment of cliches about terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and Iraq. It's not an argument that won many supporters in the UN when it was new, and is unlikely to do so six months into a botched-up occupation.
Sunday, September 21, 2003
File photograph of Hans Blix (Photo: AP)
�I don't think anything will come to light in Iraq that will justify the invasion.�
U.N. chief weapons inspector Hans Blix, quoted in a Greek newspaper
(AP) Former U.N. chief weapons inspector Hans Blix accused the United States of showing �questionable honesty� over Iraq and said the country was attacked despite posing no immediate threat.
Blix spent three years searching for Iraqi chemical, biological and ballistic missiles as head of the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission. He has been critical of the role played by the U.S. and British governments in Iraq, in interviews since his retirement on June 30.
�In Iraq, there was no sign of an immediate threat� from weapons of mass destruction, Blix told the Athens daily Kathimerini, in an interview published Sunday. �What worries me is the questionable honesty of a government that publicly presents certain arguments, but privately has different thoughts.�
President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair have come under increasing pressure to prove that Iraq had a weapons of mass destruction.
�The American government ... has the tendency to reach hasty conclusions,� Blix said �I don't think anything will come to light in Iraq that will justify the invasion.�
In the weeks before U.S. and British forces invaded Iraq, some U.S. officials strongly criticized Blix's reports to the Security Council for failing to support the Bush administration's contention that Saddam had an active illegal weapons programs.
Blix, whose remarks were published in Greek, was interviewed in Stockholm, Sweden
Blair gets the cold shoulder at Berlin summit
Luke Harding in Berlin
Sunday September 21, 2003
The Observer
Tony Blair's efforts to seek agreement with France and Germany over Iraq suffered an embarrassing setback yesterday when French President Jacques Chirac bluntly insisted that power should be handed back to Iraqis in a 'few months'.
Speaking after a meeting with Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schr�der, Blair sought to set aside his diplomatic feud with Paris and Berlin - and said all three leaders believed the United Nations should play a 'key role' in rebuilding Iraq. 'Whatever differences there have been over Iraq, it is important that France and Britain and Germany should work together,' Blair said.
But his conciliatory remarks did little to hide the continuing split between Britain and the United States and France - and, to a lesser extent, Germany - over the timetable for returning Iraq to domestic rule. Chirac yesterday repeated his demand that the UN be given a 'significant and operational role' in running the country. The transfer of sovereignty should be 'immediate', he added. While Schr�der was less outspoken, it was clear that Germany supports the French position.
Schr�der, who hosted yesterday's summit, greeted Blair with a polite, effusive handshake. By contrast, he gave the French President an enormous bear hug, a sign of the two countries' continuing political warmth.
Chirac's unambiguous comments make it less rather than more likely that agreement can be reached next week at the UN on a new resolution drafted by Washington. All three leaders are flying to New York for discussions, with the German Chancellor meeting George Bush for the first time in more than a year.
The Bush administration is offering to give the UN an increased role in the Iraqi political process in the hope that UN involvement will be enough to get other countries to provide troops for Iraq. In reality, though, the US will still rule the country. 'We all want to see a stable Iraq. We all want to see Iraq make a transfer to democratic government as swiftly as possible,' Blair said yesterday.
There was no disagreement with the principle that the UN should play a key role in Iraq, Blair added. But British and American officials have made it clear they believe the French demand that power be transferred in months is 'totally unrealistic'.
The fragile situation inside Iraq was dramatically confirmed yesterday when gunmen shot one of only three women members of Iraq's governing council. Aqila al-Hashimi was leaving her Baghdad home when unidentified men opened fire. US doctors were last night treating her for abdominal wounds. The US administrator in Iraq Paul Bremer condemned the attack, saying he was 'shocked and saddened'.
Yesterday's meeting in Berlin was the first between Europe's three biggest players since the fall of Saddam five months ago - and their public feud which saw Britain, the US's closest ally, pitted against France and Germany, its biggest critics. Yesterday Blair was asked whether he had gone to Berlin to heal the rift as an envoy of Bush.
'He has been invited as Tony Blair. He came as Tony Blair and I'm quite definite he is going to return as Tony Blair,' Schr�der joked. It had been 'fascinating' to listen to the Prime Minister, he added.
US officials have indicated their latest diplomatic strategy on Iraq is to isolate the French, ignore the Germans and buy off the Russians. There are some signs this is working, with Berlin much keener than Paris to mend its relationship with Washington.
However, in Moscow President Putin said Russian troops would not serve in any international force in Iraq. 'We are not even considering this matter,' Russian news agencies reported him as saying. Putin meets Bush at Camp David on Friday and Saturday.
Luke Harding in Berlin
Sunday September 21, 2003
The Observer
Tony Blair's efforts to seek agreement with France and Germany over Iraq suffered an embarrassing setback yesterday when French President Jacques Chirac bluntly insisted that power should be handed back to Iraqis in a 'few months'.
Speaking after a meeting with Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schr�der, Blair sought to set aside his diplomatic feud with Paris and Berlin - and said all three leaders believed the United Nations should play a 'key role' in rebuilding Iraq. 'Whatever differences there have been over Iraq, it is important that France and Britain and Germany should work together,' Blair said.
But his conciliatory remarks did little to hide the continuing split between Britain and the United States and France - and, to a lesser extent, Germany - over the timetable for returning Iraq to domestic rule. Chirac yesterday repeated his demand that the UN be given a 'significant and operational role' in running the country. The transfer of sovereignty should be 'immediate', he added. While Schr�der was less outspoken, it was clear that Germany supports the French position.
Schr�der, who hosted yesterday's summit, greeted Blair with a polite, effusive handshake. By contrast, he gave the French President an enormous bear hug, a sign of the two countries' continuing political warmth.
Chirac's unambiguous comments make it less rather than more likely that agreement can be reached next week at the UN on a new resolution drafted by Washington. All three leaders are flying to New York for discussions, with the German Chancellor meeting George Bush for the first time in more than a year.
The Bush administration is offering to give the UN an increased role in the Iraqi political process in the hope that UN involvement will be enough to get other countries to provide troops for Iraq. In reality, though, the US will still rule the country. 'We all want to see a stable Iraq. We all want to see Iraq make a transfer to democratic government as swiftly as possible,' Blair said yesterday.
There was no disagreement with the principle that the UN should play a key role in Iraq, Blair added. But British and American officials have made it clear they believe the French demand that power be transferred in months is 'totally unrealistic'.
The fragile situation inside Iraq was dramatically confirmed yesterday when gunmen shot one of only three women members of Iraq's governing council. Aqila al-Hashimi was leaving her Baghdad home when unidentified men opened fire. US doctors were last night treating her for abdominal wounds. The US administrator in Iraq Paul Bremer condemned the attack, saying he was 'shocked and saddened'.
Yesterday's meeting in Berlin was the first between Europe's three biggest players since the fall of Saddam five months ago - and their public feud which saw Britain, the US's closest ally, pitted against France and Germany, its biggest critics. Yesterday Blair was asked whether he had gone to Berlin to heal the rift as an envoy of Bush.
'He has been invited as Tony Blair. He came as Tony Blair and I'm quite definite he is going to return as Tony Blair,' Schr�der joked. It had been 'fascinating' to listen to the Prime Minister, he added.
US officials have indicated their latest diplomatic strategy on Iraq is to isolate the French, ignore the Germans and buy off the Russians. There are some signs this is working, with Berlin much keener than Paris to mend its relationship with Washington.
However, in Moscow President Putin said Russian troops would not serve in any international force in Iraq. 'We are not even considering this matter,' Russian news agencies reported him as saying. Putin meets Bush at Camp David on Friday and Saturday.
Saturday, September 06, 2003
Inside Karl Rove's Diary: "Things Aren't Going So Well"
By Bernard Weiner
The Crisis Papers
Wednesday 03 September 2003
Dear Diary:
Things aren't going so well. We were on a good two-year roll there after 9/11. Our in-your-face hardball politics had so frightened and flummoxed the opposition that it looked like we were going to get everything we wanted, not the least another term in the White House.
Now there's: Iraq imploding on us; the economy still in the tank, with 2,500,000 who've lost their jobs since we took over; investigations proceeding on the 9/11 coverup, and maybe also on our outing of Wilson's wife as a CIA agent and our lying about the air-quality in Lower Manhattan for nine months after the WTC collapsed; and a pack of mean Democrat dogs out there yapping away at our domestic and war policies.
The total control we've exercised over the mass media -- conglomerate ownership sure has paid off for our side -- is beginning to crack. We hear that even some conservative GOP stalwarts are beginning to see vulnerabilities in our approach and are wondering whether to hedge their bets and start looking for others to lead the fight.
Granted, President Dim Bulb isn't what we would have wished for -- someone with some brights who can articulate our vision and not mess up all that often -- but he's a nice enough guy who still thinks Cheney and I are geniuses, so he does what Dick and I tell him.
The problem is that Rummy's nice, tidy Iraq scenario that the neo-cons had worked out (in their heads!) isn't playing out that way on the ground. They told us what the Iraqi exiles told them: that the U.S. forces would be greeted as liberators and that the Iraqis would cooperate with us in getting Iraq back on its feet in joint projects with our American corporate friends.
But Rummy and the boys made a few miscalculations: They thought we could win the war and the peace with the small army we sent in -- but, since they anticipated an easy post-war period, they didn't plan for an alternative transition. For chrissakes, we've got 150,000 combat troops over there trying to nation-build while riding around in heavily armored vehicles. And the natives are restless, with nightly guerrilla attacks and sabotage and mass-bombings. The press-sharks are starting to smell the blood of Vietnam in the Persian Gulf waters.
I'd never admit this out loud, but, diary, I guess we should have listened more to Powell and the diplomat boys, who said we shouldn't do this all on our own. Instead, we took all our cues from the PNAC playbook, which said that in order to maintain our superpower dominance and total control, we had to keep everyone else out of our way. The result was that we so humiliated and insulted our would-be allies before the war that now, when we need them, they don't want to come in and help us run the place. Or, more importantly, help pay the cleanup bill.
Neo-con strategy works in theory -- "we big superpower, you no stop us, get out of way" -- but apparently not always in practice. Now the U.N. won't go in without a new Security Council resolution and without the U.S. agreeing to share some of the authority. The allies won't cough up the bucks needed to reconstruct Iraq, and are delighting in reminding us that we shouldn't have deconstructed it in the first place.
If we don't get the troops and money we need, it means we have to do it all alone, everything. Well, the Brits will help a bit, but that assumes Tony Blair keeps his job and moral authority in England -- ha! good joke, that -- and that's no sure thing. He ate all the bullshit pie we served him on his WMD plate -- just like our gullible Americans -- and it's no wonder he's suffering from political indigestion.
Now, granted, we want to bankrupt the social programs the Democrats have established for decades, and we have a good excuse that permits us to do that: "The Treasury has no extra money because we're fighting a war on terrorism and reconstructing Iraq; protecting the homeland is expensive." But jeezus, we're going into a half-trillion-dollar deficit next year and, while it'll be great fun slashing-and-burning Head Start and privatizing Social Security and Medicare, we won't be able to pay for any of the programs WE want, and the economy will keep going further into the toilet.
There's even serious re-thinking among some conservatives about the huge tax cuts we gave ourselves and our friends. I couldn't believe our luck when the Democrats didn't stop us; thank God the populace is scared silly and doesn't care what we do as long as there are no al-Qaida attacks inside our borders. But that acceptance can't cancel the criticism about us being incompetent bunglers, with the economy, the war, the veterans, whatever.
The scary thing is that it's not just the Democrats making those charges; a lot of Republicians are starting to voice doubts about how we're handling the war and the economy -- and even some traditional, small-government conservatives are looking at Ashcroft's Patriot Act with amazement and anger.
A lot of GOP politicos look at Bush's re-elect numbers, around 40% now, and the likelihood that Wesley Clark will jump into the race, and they're scared they'll lose their own re-election bids in 2004. Hell, even the new Clinton, Dean, might be able to beat Bush. (Oh, diary, this is good! I'm salivating at the idea of secretly helping Kucinich get the nomination!)
I keep trying to tell our GOP scaredy-cats that we've covered all the bases. We'll take care of the Democrats in California and Texas and Florida and Colorado and elsewhere. There still isn't a lot of mainstream agitation about our friends in the computer-voting industry -- but why in hell did that Ohio computer-voting executive get caught promising to deliver the vote to the GOP in that state? And we can arrange for a good ol' patriotic surprise that will reinforce the support-the-president-during-wartime mood before the 2004 election.
The problem is that even though the Cheney-Rummy-Wolfy agenda calls for another big move in the Middle East -- using our leverage in Iraq to get the other Arab leaders to do what we want or there may have to be another "regime change" scenario -- we may be so bogged down in Iraq that we won't be able to initiate it with the required force behind our threats. And then there's that crazy midget in North Korea that could upset all our apple carts with his nuclear chessgame.
The result of all these things going wrong is that I'm having to use up a lot of my political ammunition and threats way too early. But The Genius will just have to do what I know works: When on the defensive, get on the offensive as quickly as possible, by hook or by crook. Take the heat and attention off the scandals. Get Schwarzenegger into the race. Report some more terror alerts. Trot out some heart-tugging 9/11 stories. Have Bush visit a few more national parks to counter his environmental record. Denounce gay marriage and cry over the Ten Commandments case to lock up the South. Whatever it takes.
And I mean that "whatever." We've got to get the Man-Child re-elected, and I don't much care what we have to do to accomplish that end. If we don't get the next four years, we can't fulfill our domestic or foreign goals -- and set it up for Jeb -- and we'd open the door for the liberals and pinkos to re-enter and ruin things. If we truly want to destroy the Democrats and prepare the way for the one-party rule that will make our program fully possible, we can't afford to lose any of the big electoral-vote states in 2004.
Given Bush's, how shall we say, intellectual limitations when dealing with the fibs that he's told, and the scandals that cling to our administration -- and to such vote-magnets as Schwarzenegger -- it might not be as easy as it seemed some months back.
But, as I say, we'll do what we have to do to win (for sure keeping those voting-machine software codes secure in the corporate vaults). And if the voters don't like our victory results, then they'd better get used to the New World Order -- or hasta la vista, baby.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bernard Weiner, a playwright and poet, has peeked into numerous other diaries -- including those of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden and others -- which are available at The Crisis Papers (crisispapers.org), which he co-edits
By Bernard Weiner
The Crisis Papers
Wednesday 03 September 2003
Dear Diary:
Things aren't going so well. We were on a good two-year roll there after 9/11. Our in-your-face hardball politics had so frightened and flummoxed the opposition that it looked like we were going to get everything we wanted, not the least another term in the White House.
Now there's: Iraq imploding on us; the economy still in the tank, with 2,500,000 who've lost their jobs since we took over; investigations proceeding on the 9/11 coverup, and maybe also on our outing of Wilson's wife as a CIA agent and our lying about the air-quality in Lower Manhattan for nine months after the WTC collapsed; and a pack of mean Democrat dogs out there yapping away at our domestic and war policies.
The total control we've exercised over the mass media -- conglomerate ownership sure has paid off for our side -- is beginning to crack. We hear that even some conservative GOP stalwarts are beginning to see vulnerabilities in our approach and are wondering whether to hedge their bets and start looking for others to lead the fight.
Granted, President Dim Bulb isn't what we would have wished for -- someone with some brights who can articulate our vision and not mess up all that often -- but he's a nice enough guy who still thinks Cheney and I are geniuses, so he does what Dick and I tell him.
The problem is that Rummy's nice, tidy Iraq scenario that the neo-cons had worked out (in their heads!) isn't playing out that way on the ground. They told us what the Iraqi exiles told them: that the U.S. forces would be greeted as liberators and that the Iraqis would cooperate with us in getting Iraq back on its feet in joint projects with our American corporate friends.
But Rummy and the boys made a few miscalculations: They thought we could win the war and the peace with the small army we sent in -- but, since they anticipated an easy post-war period, they didn't plan for an alternative transition. For chrissakes, we've got 150,000 combat troops over there trying to nation-build while riding around in heavily armored vehicles. And the natives are restless, with nightly guerrilla attacks and sabotage and mass-bombings. The press-sharks are starting to smell the blood of Vietnam in the Persian Gulf waters.
I'd never admit this out loud, but, diary, I guess we should have listened more to Powell and the diplomat boys, who said we shouldn't do this all on our own. Instead, we took all our cues from the PNAC playbook, which said that in order to maintain our superpower dominance and total control, we had to keep everyone else out of our way. The result was that we so humiliated and insulted our would-be allies before the war that now, when we need them, they don't want to come in and help us run the place. Or, more importantly, help pay the cleanup bill.
Neo-con strategy works in theory -- "we big superpower, you no stop us, get out of way" -- but apparently not always in practice. Now the U.N. won't go in without a new Security Council resolution and without the U.S. agreeing to share some of the authority. The allies won't cough up the bucks needed to reconstruct Iraq, and are delighting in reminding us that we shouldn't have deconstructed it in the first place.
If we don't get the troops and money we need, it means we have to do it all alone, everything. Well, the Brits will help a bit, but that assumes Tony Blair keeps his job and moral authority in England -- ha! good joke, that -- and that's no sure thing. He ate all the bullshit pie we served him on his WMD plate -- just like our gullible Americans -- and it's no wonder he's suffering from political indigestion.
Now, granted, we want to bankrupt the social programs the Democrats have established for decades, and we have a good excuse that permits us to do that: "The Treasury has no extra money because we're fighting a war on terrorism and reconstructing Iraq; protecting the homeland is expensive." But jeezus, we're going into a half-trillion-dollar deficit next year and, while it'll be great fun slashing-and-burning Head Start and privatizing Social Security and Medicare, we won't be able to pay for any of the programs WE want, and the economy will keep going further into the toilet.
There's even serious re-thinking among some conservatives about the huge tax cuts we gave ourselves and our friends. I couldn't believe our luck when the Democrats didn't stop us; thank God the populace is scared silly and doesn't care what we do as long as there are no al-Qaida attacks inside our borders. But that acceptance can't cancel the criticism about us being incompetent bunglers, with the economy, the war, the veterans, whatever.
The scary thing is that it's not just the Democrats making those charges; a lot of Republicians are starting to voice doubts about how we're handling the war and the economy -- and even some traditional, small-government conservatives are looking at Ashcroft's Patriot Act with amazement and anger.
A lot of GOP politicos look at Bush's re-elect numbers, around 40% now, and the likelihood that Wesley Clark will jump into the race, and they're scared they'll lose their own re-election bids in 2004. Hell, even the new Clinton, Dean, might be able to beat Bush. (Oh, diary, this is good! I'm salivating at the idea of secretly helping Kucinich get the nomination!)
I keep trying to tell our GOP scaredy-cats that we've covered all the bases. We'll take care of the Democrats in California and Texas and Florida and Colorado and elsewhere. There still isn't a lot of mainstream agitation about our friends in the computer-voting industry -- but why in hell did that Ohio computer-voting executive get caught promising to deliver the vote to the GOP in that state? And we can arrange for a good ol' patriotic surprise that will reinforce the support-the-president-during-wartime mood before the 2004 election.
The problem is that even though the Cheney-Rummy-Wolfy agenda calls for another big move in the Middle East -- using our leverage in Iraq to get the other Arab leaders to do what we want or there may have to be another "regime change" scenario -- we may be so bogged down in Iraq that we won't be able to initiate it with the required force behind our threats. And then there's that crazy midget in North Korea that could upset all our apple carts with his nuclear chessgame.
The result of all these things going wrong is that I'm having to use up a lot of my political ammunition and threats way too early. But The Genius will just have to do what I know works: When on the defensive, get on the offensive as quickly as possible, by hook or by crook. Take the heat and attention off the scandals. Get Schwarzenegger into the race. Report some more terror alerts. Trot out some heart-tugging 9/11 stories. Have Bush visit a few more national parks to counter his environmental record. Denounce gay marriage and cry over the Ten Commandments case to lock up the South. Whatever it takes.
And I mean that "whatever." We've got to get the Man-Child re-elected, and I don't much care what we have to do to accomplish that end. If we don't get the next four years, we can't fulfill our domestic or foreign goals -- and set it up for Jeb -- and we'd open the door for the liberals and pinkos to re-enter and ruin things. If we truly want to destroy the Democrats and prepare the way for the one-party rule that will make our program fully possible, we can't afford to lose any of the big electoral-vote states in 2004.
Given Bush's, how shall we say, intellectual limitations when dealing with the fibs that he's told, and the scandals that cling to our administration -- and to such vote-magnets as Schwarzenegger -- it might not be as easy as it seemed some months back.
But, as I say, we'll do what we have to do to win (for sure keeping those voting-machine software codes secure in the corporate vaults). And if the voters don't like our victory results, then they'd better get used to the New World Order -- or hasta la vista, baby.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bernard Weiner, a playwright and poet, has peeked into numerous other diaries -- including those of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden and others -- which are available at The Crisis Papers (crisispapers.org), which he co-edits