John Dean Got It Wrong

In a recent article on Findlaw, John Dean makes an extensive argument that Valerie Plame was a "covert agent" under 50 USC 421. I find John Dean's comments highly disturbing.


First, Valerie Plame's status was not as a covert agent as intended by the statute. Victoria Toensing, former Chief Counsel for the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, was a key drafter of 50 USC 421. In her testimony before the US House Committee on Government Reform, Toensing stated that Plame was not a "covert agent" under the intent statute.


Second, if Valerie Plame's job was covert, she didn't do a good job at keeping it covert. In a March 11, 2006, article in the Chicago Tribune, John Crewdson blows holes in the theory that she was in deep cover. As he points out, simple internet searches came up with a lot of things that indicated Ms. Plame was not a covert agent but actually connected with the CIA. Russian and Cuban intelligence agencies long before this issue came up. Andrew McCarthy wrote that the CIA durring the Clinton administration exposed Valerie Plame to the Casto government. Furthermore, a careful reading of Robert Novack's collum did not indicate that Valerie Plame was a covert agent. It wasn't until Robert Corn's piece in the nation that indicated that Valerie Plame was a covert agent. And who was his source? Hmmm, Could it be Amb. Joe Wilson himself? After all, he was the primary source for the article.

And let's look at who didn't support the law making it a crime to disclose covert agents names. Do the names Joseph Biden, Gary Hart or Daniel Patrick Moynihan sound familiar? Isn't it funny the hypocrasy of Joe Biden attacking the Bush administration for the Plame affair for a law he didn't support because he thought that US agents in foreign countries should be outed?

Speaking of Amb. Joe Wilson, if you read his declassified CIA report that he filed after his trip to Niger, he claims that Prime Minister Ibrahim Hassanne Mayaki told him that although the Iraqi government has not directly contact him about purchasing Uranium, but third parties did contact him about "expanding commercial relations" with Iraq. Prime Minister Mayaki took that to mean selling Iraq Uranium through these third parties. Then Amb. Wilson contradicted himself in his July 6, 2003, op ed piece by stating that there was no evidence Iraq tried to develop nuclear weapons by purchasing Uranium from Niger. Three seperate investigations all came to the same conclusion: Prime Minister Mayaki was right and that Iraq through third parties tried to purchase Uranium from Niger.