The Leaker-in-Chief
From: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040706J.shtml
Friday 07 April 2006
Is there not some chosen curse,
Some hidden thunder in the stores of heaven,
Red with uncommon wrath, to blast the man
Who owes his greatness to his country's ruin?
- Joseph Addison
"I don't know of anybody in my administration who leaked classified information," said George W. Bush on September 30,
2003. "If somebody did leak classified information, I'd like to know it, and we'll take the appropriate action."
"If someone leaked classified information," said White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan on October 7, 2003, "the
President wants to know. If someone in this administration leaked classified information, they will no longer be a part
of this administration, because that's not the way this White House operates, that's not the way this President expects
people in his administration to conduct their business."
"I'd like to know if somebody in my White House did leak sensitive information," said Bush on October 28, 2003. On this
same day, Bush said, "I have no idea whether we'll find out who the leaker is, partially because, in all due respect to
your profession, you do a very good job of protecting the leakers."
On Thursday, we found out who the leaker is.
TruthOut investigative reporter Jason Leopold wrote in the first of two reports that, "Attorneys and current and former White House officials close to the investigation into the leak of covert CIA
operative Valerie Plame Wilson said Thursday that President Bush gave Vice President Dick Cheney the authorization in
mid-June 2003 to disclose a portion of the highly sensitive National Intelligence Estimate to Washington Post reporter
Bob Woodward and former New York Times reporter Judith Miller."
In the second of Leopold's reports, he writes, "Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald stated in a court filing late Wednesday in the CIA leak case that
his investigators have obtained evidence during the course of the two-year-old probe that proves several White House
officials conspired to discredit former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, a critic of the administration's pre-war Iraq
intelligence. This is the first time the special counsel has acknowledged that White House officials are alleged to have
engaged in a coordinated effort to undercut the former ambassador's credibility by disseminating classified intelligence
information that would have contradicted Wilson's public statements."
So there it is. We have Bush authorizing the disclosure of classified information, and we have that disclosure taking
place for no other reason than to discredit an administration critic. Bush is often fond of defending his wildly
inappropriate and often illegal activities by claiming that he has every right to do whatever he wants because America
is "at war."
Never mind that no war has actually been declared. If we take his premise that we are in fact at war, than the
disclosure of classified information for political gain must be defined simply and directly.
It is treason.
Representative Jane Harman, ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, made the following statement on
Thursday. "Leaking classified information to the press when you want to get your side out or silence your critics is not
appropriate. The reason we classify things is to protect our sources - those who risk their lives to give us secrets.
Who knows how many sources were burned by giving Libby this 'license to leak?' If I had leaked the information, I'd be
in jail. Why should the President be above the law?"
"The President has the legal authority to declassify information," continued Harman, "but there are normal channels for
doing so. Telling an aide to leak classified information to the New York Times is not a normal channel. A normal
declassification procedure would involve going back to the originating agency, such as the CIA, and then putting out a
public, declassified version of the document. I am stunned that the President won't tell the full the Intelligence
Committee about the NSA program because he's allegedly concerned about leaks, when it turns out that he is the
Leaker-in-Chief."
We can even take this a step further. The name of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame was all over the classified
National Intelligence Estimate Bush ordered to be leaked. The pertinent text of the 1947 National Security Act reads as
follows:
SEC. 601. (50 U.S.C. 421) (a) Whoever, having or having had authorized access to classified information that identifies
a covert agent, intentionally discloses any information identifying such covert agent to any individual not authorized
to receive classified information, knowing that the information disclosed so identifies such covert agent and that the
United States is taking affirmative measures to conceal such covert agent's intelligence relationship to the United
States, shall be fined under title 18, United States Code, or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both.
(b) Whoever, as a result of having authorized access to classified information, learns the identity of a covert agent
and intentionally discloses any information identifying such covert agent to any individual not authorized to receive
classified information, knowing that the information disclosed so identifies such covert agent and that the United
States is taking affirmative measures to conceal such covert agent's intelligence relationship to the United States,
shall be fined under title 18, United States Code, or imprisoned not more than five years, or both.
(c) Whoever, in the course of a pattern of activities intended to identify and expose covert agents and with reason to
believe that such activities would impair or impede the foreign intelligence activities of the United States, discloses
any information that identifies an individual as a covert agent to any individual not authorized to receive classified
information, knowing that the information disclosed so identifies such individual and that the United States is taking
affirmative measures to conceal such individual's classified intelligence relationship to the United States, shall be
fined under title 18, United States Code, or imprisoned not more than three years or both.
George W. Bush and his people lied with their bare faces hanging out about the existence of weapons of mass destruction
in Iraq.
They lied about connections between al Qaeda and the Iraqi government, lied about Iraqi connections to September 11,
and further lied about the threat to America posed by Iraq.
They made a decision to invade that had nothing to do with those weapons, and even conspired with their British
counterparts to goad Hussein into a war regardless of whether the weapons were there or not.
They used September 11 against the American people to frighten them into a fearfully subservient acceptance of the
invasion.
They bypassed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in order to spy illegally on thousands of American citizens.
They leaked classified intelligence information in order to destroy a political foe, and in the process annihilated an
intelligence network run by Valerie Plame. That network, it should be noted, was dedicated to tracking any person,
nation or group that would deliver weapons of mass destruction to terrorists.
Every time they broke the law, their cronies in Congress manipulated those laws to make the actions taken legal.
Tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians are dead. Tens of thousands more have been maimed. Millions live with the wretched
deprivations caused by this war. The new Shia-dominated government wants no part of American involvement in this, and
their so-called armed forces are in truth death squads masquerading as police and soldiers.
2,345 American soldiers have been killed in Iraq, with 17 of those deaths coming in the first six days of April alone.
Tens of thousands more have been grievously wounded; nearly two thirds of all injuries suffered by American soldiers in
Iraq are brain injuries, and amount to permanent debilitation.
We will be generations digging out from under the vomitous refuse left behind by this administration. From this day
forward, any politician who claims that censure is not appropriate and impeachment is a waste of time should have their
head examined by a whole team of medical experts. Bush and his people have committed treason, and did so for the lowest
of reasons: personal gain and political protection.
"The dead cannot cry out for justice," said Lois McMaster Bujold. "It is a duty of the living to do so for them." So
very many have died at the hands of this administration, its lies, and its crimes. If there is to be no reckoning for
this, even after all this time, there will never again be a person in America who can speak of justice while keeping a
straight face.
*************
William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times and internationally bestselling author of two books: War on Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want You to Know and The Greatest Sedition Is Silence.