Bush WH: the naked truth

If you need singular proof that the Bush administration is FUBAR, read Bob Woodward’s third book on the Bush presidency, “State of Denial.”

In the meantime:

Open your eyes to the truth.

There are eight million stories in the naked truth about the foulness of this administration, and this has been one of them:

KEITH OLBERMANN, “Countdown with Keith Olbermann, MSNBC, 23 October 2007 (LINK): On July 13, 2003, Valerie Plame Wilson was the chief of operations for the Joint Iraq Task Force of the CIA’s counter-proliferation division. Only a handful of people outside the CIA even knew this. For 15-plus years she had used various cover stories to conceal her identity as a CIA operative and to cultivate a network of contacts and sources as part of America’s effort to prevent the spread of nuclear and other nonconventional weapons. She was, in short, a rare and valuable commodity in the battle against weapons of mass destruction and terrorism.

On July 14, 2003, an American blew her cover to the media, trying to tarnish the credibility of her husband, who had just called out President Bush’s 16 words about Iraq’s pursuit of yellow cake uranium as the lie it was.

(BJ note: the parenthetical information in this transcript is mine. “16 words” background: The 16 words in Bush’s 28 January 2003 State of the Union Address – “The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa” – previously had been pulled from a speech Bush gave in Cincinnati, because the CIA determined intelligence surrounding them was shaky. Following the 16 words in Bush’s SOTU address, powerful words which wooed a nation to war with Iraq, CIA Director George Tenet stated he had not followed SOP and vetted the SOTU beforehand. It wouldn’t be the last time Tenet fell on his sword. A few days after Wilson’s op-ed piece appeared, the White House and the CIA conceded the 16 words – based on forged documents - should NEVER have appeared in the SOTU.)

OLBERMANN: The White House lied again, denying its self-involvement (in the Plame leak). A lengthy criminal trial later, and we learn that one State Department official and no less than three top White House aides had peddled Plame’s identity to the media.

Despite his pledge to fire any leaker or leakers, Mr. Bush fired neither Ari Fleischer, Karl Rove nor Lewis “Scooter” Libby. And, when Libby compounded his sin by lying to investigators, President Bush commuted his sentence, removing the one incentive Mr. Libby might have ever had to tell the truth.

No one ever apologized to Valerie Plame Wilson or her husband or her family. Today, in our third story on the COUNTDOWN, after some battling with her former CIA employers, her new book is finally out, “Fair Game: My Life as a Spy, My Betrayal by the White House.” I spoke with her earlier this evening:

OLBERMANN: Welcome.

VALERIE PLAME WILSON, (FORMER CIA COVERT OPERATIVE AND) AUTHOR, “FAIR GAME:” Thank you for having me.

OLBERMANN: The news of the month, let’s start there, Iran. David Shuster had reported that when you were outed, it damaged our ability to track nuclear ambitions by Iran. Give me your professional opinion: is this entire experience, Iraq, repeated right down to the cherry-picking of intelligence and eventually the picking of a fight with a foreign government?

WILSON: Yes, it certainly appears to be that way. I resigned from the CIA in 2006, so I, of course, do not have access to any current intelligence. But, it does seem eerily reminiscent of the run-up to the war with Iraq. And, I hope that we have learned some lessons.

OLBERMANN: Any indications that we have learned some lessons? Another professional opinion; we watch the vice president threaten. We listen to the president make references to World War III. We see the press secretary very politely drumming the beat for a war or conflict of some sort with Iran. Those are sort of a layman’s point of view.

You have dealt with intelligence. You’ve dealt with Iran. What should we be looking at professionally? What are the questions that we should be asking that we haven’t been asking, yet, about this topic?

WILSON: There is no doubt that there is malevolent intent on behalf of Iran, that they are seeking nuclear weapons. There’s no question about that. But, we are a great country, and I believe that as a great country, we can afford to speak to everyone, even our enemies. And, the idea of not using every single tool that we have available to us, primarily diplomacy, is unfortunate. And, obviously our international credibility, moral authority has been severely eroded in the debacle in Iraq.

OLBERMANN: Let me turn to the book, and your story of this last four years. One particular thing jumped out; how much do you believe, with all the information that you have had about this, that your boss at CIA, George Tenet, knew about the province (scope) of the leak when he asked for the investigation of it?

WILSON: I don’t know about that. As I write in the book, the only senior agency official that I spoke to after the leak was the head of the DDO (deputy director of operations, CIA), Mr. Jim Pavitt.

(Background: Pavitt, a 31-year veteran of the CIA, resigned as DDO in 2004, announcing his resignation on June 4, the day after CIA Director George Tenet resigned. Pavitt had served as DDO longer than any other person in 30 years.)

WILSON: So no one ever reached out to me. I have no idea. All I know is that the CIA referred this to the Justice Department at the end of September of 2003, because they thought that a crime should be investigated.

OLBERMANN: The promotional material about this book says some accounts have come close to the truth. Others have veered from it. Anybody get it right? And, in the whole process, has this given you insight that maybe we don’t have about the nature of the news media and whether or not we can rely on us?

WILSON: Well, the different accounts that I have read—and there is so much in the public domain—I sure was surprised. Some of it gets it really right. Some of it is way off base. It has been interesting to see as it all sort of washes over. As far as the media in the Libby trial, I think there was—that was sort of laid bear, the sort of symbiotic relationship between the media and the White House and their need for access. I was—what I was taken with was how easily the mainstream media took what was spoon fed from the administration without digging deeper, without using shoe leather to investigate, talk to maybe mid-level managers about the preparation for the war in Iraq, post-war planning, that sort of thing.

(This is exactly what Bob Woodward’s “State of Denial,” published three years after Plame Wilson’s identity was leaked, does.)

OLBERMANN: Is there anything from the entire experience that stands out at you at this point and makes you say, I can’t believe they got away with this? Or, I can’t believe the media or the politicians ignored this? Any of the things that happened to you that still are somewhat undervalued in this story?

WILSON: Well, I’m just coming off a really—what felt to me like a very ferocious battle with the Agency (CIA) over the censorship. As you know, there are lots of black lines in the book, and I would maintain that most of those redactions deal with the Agency’s position that I’m not permitted to acknowledge my Agency affiliation prior to January 2002. And, I would say that they (the redacted lines) have very little to do with national security, and everything to do with further punitive action by this administration toward me and Joe (Plame’s husband, former Ambassador Joe Wilson).

And, furthermore, I think it also was an attempt to diminish me and my responsibilities at the CIA, because if you diminish me, then the crime is diminished.

OLBERMANN: How antithetical to everything you were trained to do, everything you’ve done for 20-plus years before this happened, is the process of a book? I mean, you were on the side of the people putting the black lines over the books, not the people writing the books.

WILSON: Indeed. If none of this had happened, probably right now I and my family would be serving overseas. And, I would be working on something from which I derive a great sense of satisfaction: counter-proliferation issues. So, all of this is really strange. But, I am—finally, after four and a half years of everyone else talking about me, I get to tell my story, and it is an important one, because it is a story of the consequences of speaking truth to power and the importance of holding your government to account for its words and deeds.

OLBERMANN: Was it worth it?

WILSON: Which part?

OLBERMANN: Knowing that you had an impact on holding the government to its words and deeds when there were probably about 10 people in the country even trying?

WILSON: Absolutely. If we, you know, knew what we know now, then would we still do it? Absolutely. Joe wrote his op-ed piece (“What I Didn’t Find in Africa,” New York Times, 6 July 2003, LINK) as a matter of principle and conscience. We have small children that we have to answer to one day when they grow up and read about this, and ask us, “Well, you mean, you knew this, and you didn’t say anything?” So, there is no question.

And, Joe and I have always been very clear that although everything that has happened to us, and it has been very painful—it’s been a long, strange journey—that is, it is mere inconvenience compared to the news of American families who have their sons and daughters fighting in Iraq, and they get the worst possible news, because of the policies pursued by this administration.

OLBERMANN: Valerie Plame Wilson; the new book is “Fair Game.” It will certainly be one of the great original sources of American history as we live it. Great thanks for coming in and all the best.

WILSON: Thank you for having me.

***

To order:

“State of Denial,” Bob Woodward: LINK

“Fair Game,” Valerie Plame Wilson: LINK