Stunned Sheep Going Over Cliff
CNN June 19, 2005 article on Joseph Wilson: Wilson was stunned when Bush stated in his 2003 State of the Union address, "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
PBS Wilson interview with PBS August 2003:
Q: So you debrief, you go back home, you go back to your job. When does this rear its head again?
WILSON: The first time after my own particular trip out there that there was any talk that came to my attention about nuclear sales or sales of yellow cake to Iraq was in the British white paper, which made the statement that was later used by the president -- that Iraq had sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.
Q: What did you think when you heard that?
WILSON: It was mildly curious, but since they talked about Africa and not Niger, there was not much for me to say or to do. It was only after the president's State of the Union address that I called the State Department Bureau of African Affairs and spoke with somebody over there, and just asked the questions.
Q: What do you say exactly?
WILSON: I just basically said that if the president was speaking about Niger in the State of the Union address, then the State Department needed to be comfortable that he was accurately reflecting the facts, since my own trip out there, as well as the ambassador's own reports on the subject, as well as the senior military officer's report on the subject, said that there was nothing to that particular story. The response I got was that perhaps the president was speaking about another African country, which is totally conceivable. There are three other countries in Africa that actually produce uranium: Namibia, South Africa and Gabon. So the president could have been speaking about one of those countries. That was the response I got. That was satisfactory to me. I had no reason to believe otherwise.
Q: So you didn't make much of it at that point after the president's speech?
WILSON: No.
April 2004 Wilson publishes memoirs The Politics of Truth. He claims wife "Valerie had nothing to do with the matter," "She definitely had not proposed that I make the trip." Talks about Bush administration deceiving us into war which most thinking folks knew already and with more than 16 words, unlike Wilson who goes from mildly curious and not making much of it, to stunned.
July 10, 2004 WaPo article: The report states that a CIA official told the Senate committee that Plame "offered up" Wilson's name for the Niger trip, then on Feb. 12, 2002, sent a memo to a deputy chief in the CIA's Directorate of Operations saying her husband "has good relations with both the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity." Wilson says of her memo: "I don't see it as a recommendation to send me." (What happened to she had nothing to do with the matter?)
Wilson, long-time corporate government servant, lifelong registered republican. Under Daddy Bush in 1990 Wilson served as acting ambassador to Iraq (did he tell SH it was okay to invade Kuwait?)
Wilson, left, 1990 with SH. 
He continued to serve under GHW Bush and Clinton before retiring in 1998, now serves on the CPS "team."
Wilson, retired, sports car and youngish 3rd wife = wanted power spot with Bush the Boy president, didn't get it = pissed off conservative turned tail, trying to eat his own. There really is nothing to see here.
13 comments:
RE: "how could a little nobody thug like Hitler rise to power without major players backing him? Whose global money financed the Nazi agenda? Who were all the players in the campaign to overturn the tables of the global moneychangers? "
One of those men was GW Bush's grandfather Prescott Bush... the managing partner of Brown Brothers Harriman (banking) which was seized by the U.S. government on Oct. 20, 1942, under the Trading with the Enemy Act.
Bush, Harriman and several senior Nazi officials were partners in that bank until the US government seized it. Run a search: Prescott Bush Brown Brothers Harriman Amazing stuff. Just a coincidence or a family heirloom? What IS "organized crime" anyway?
Thanks anon, I was being a bit facetious with that question. Actually, the Bush crime family can be tracked back further with Samuel Prescott Bush, born 1863,and Buckeye Steel, government war profiteers. There's also momma Babs line. It's basically been the same thugs, buddies, and spawn that need a war every generation.
Organized crime is having the power to make some criminal activity neat and legal.
The front company that Ms. Plame worked for is a major oil company. A direct competator of Halliburtin. Years of hard work by the CIA where flushed down the toilet. Who do you think was in their sights. Enemy's of this country. Oil money used for operations against the US. Do not dismiss Ms. Plames work,you seem to take her education and success as a personal affont. What happened is treason. If you or I had done something like this we would be in jail for the rest of our lives 5 mins later.
If you speak of Brewster Jennings it was not a valid business, never developed into a viable front company for Ms. Plame, nor would it as a CIA front company have been in competition with Halliburton.
There is still no validation that a crime has been committed. A lot of speculation and guessing by the press and pundits.
It's a distraction. It's the ruling elite fighting among themselves, as if the matter will make any difference in the lives of Joe Blow.
kate wrote: "[Brewster Jennings] never developed into a viable front company for Ms. Plame, nor would it as a CIA front company have been in competition with Halliburton."
Maybe I am not reading the same sources as you, but it appears to me that Brewster Jennings was quite a large intelligence operation. If you have a different source please share again, I am unable to find it. The 'speculation' from the blogosphere is whether Halliburton or Bush and Co. and Brewster Jennings/CIA were competing for intelligence and for what that intelligence was to be used. As for the battle of the "elites": the big battle going on for the last several years has been between career CIA and State Department versus the political ideologes of the Bush adminstration. The "fucking crazies". So it does matter to Joe Citizen. Unless you are so cynical to think everyone in the government is evil. I doubt that.
Re: "it appears to me that Brewster Jennings was quite a large intelligence operation."
I should have said Plame's intelligence covers and her network of officers she linked with, not simply this company. They wouldn't place all their eggs in one basket, one flimsy shell..
The info I refer to about Brewster/Jennings is similar to this from the Boston Globe.
It may be cynicism, but my experience has been that decent folks who cannot tolerate the machinations of political life in DC - leave. To become a career "servant" or pol, takes a certain amount of callousness, brutishnish, and corruption to to play the game. It may be naive to believe our "leaders" place the masses first when wars, big or small, are waged for corporate profit. That is evil, that is also historically the way countries become empires and superpowers, until they go broke.
The battle between government crazies and CIA likely began with JF Kennedy's threat to the system, which his peers took care of quickly, publically, and permanently.
If you have links to support that Plame's cover was developed beyond more than an address I'd appreciate it.
From Knight Ridder Oct 1, 2003, the following was within the article 'Justice launches probe into CIA leak':
"The CIA declined to discuss Plame's intelligence work, but an agency official disputed suggestions that she was a mere analyst whose public exposure would have little consequence.
"If she was not undercover, we would have no reason to file a criminal referral," the CIA official said, insisting on anonymity because of the sensitivity of the investigation...
http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/7/13/
04720/9340
This is not the way to post a url..cut and paste always works though.. here is some text:
The Big Lie About Valerie Plame
By Larry Johnson
From: TPMCafe Special Guests
The misinformation being spread in the media about the Plame affair is alarming and damaging to the longterm security interests of the United States. Republicans' talking points are trying to savage Joe Wilson and, by implication, his wife, Valerie Plame as liars. That is the truly big lie.
For starters, Valerie Plame was an undercover operations officer until outed in the press by Robert Novak. Novak's column was not an isolated attack. It was in fact part of a coordinated, orchestrated smear that we now know includes at least Karl Rove.
Valerie Plame was a classmate of mine from the day she started with the CIA. I entered on duty at the CIA in September 1985. All of my classmates were undercover--in other words, we told our family and friends that we were working for other overt U.S. Government agencies. We had official cover. That means we had a black passport--i.e., a diplomatic passport. If we were caught overseas engaged in espionage activity the black passport was a get out of jail free card.
A few of my classmates, and Valerie was one of these, became a non-official cover officer. That meant she agreed to operate overseas without the protection of a diplomatic passport. If caught in that status she would have been executed.
The lies by people like Victoria Toensing, Representative Peter King, and P. J. O'Rourke insist that Valerie was nothing, just a desk jockey. Yet, until Robert Novak betrayed her she was still undercover and the company that was her front was still a secret to the world. When Novak outed Valerie he also compromised her company and every individual overseas who had been in contact with that company and with her.
The Republicans now want to hide behind the legalism that "no laws were broken". I don't know if a man made law was broken but an ethical and moral code was breached. For the first time a group of partisan political operatives publically identified a CIA NOC. They have set a precendent that the next group of political hacks may feel free to violate.
They try to hide behind the specious claim that Joe Wilson "lied". Although Joe did not lie let's follow that reasoning to the logical conclusion. Let's use the same standard for the Bush Administration. Here are the facts. Bush's lies have resulted in the deaths of almost 1800 American soldiers and the mutilation of 12,000. Joe Wilson has not killed anyone. He tried to prevent the needless death of Americans and the loss of American prestige in the world.
But don't take my word for it, read the biased Senate intelligence committee report. Even though it was slanted to try to portray Joe in the worst possible light this fact emerges on page 52 of the report: According to the US Ambassador to Niger (who was commenting on Joe's visit in February 2002), "Ambassador Wilson reached the same conclusion that the Embassy has reached that it was highly unlikely that anything between Iraq and Niger was going on." Joe's findings were consistent with those of the Deputy Commander of the European Command, Major General Fulford.
The Republicans insist on the lie that Val got her husband the job. She did not. She was not a division director, instead she was the equivalent of an Army major. Yes it is true she recommended her husband to do the job that needed to be done but the decision to send Joe Wilson on this mission was made by her bosses.
At the end of the day, Joe Wilson was right. There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. It was the Bush Administration that pushed that lie and because of that lie Americans are dying. Shame on those who continue to slander Joe Wilson while giving Bush and his pack of liars a pass. That's the true outrage.
...somewhere I read a tin foil story that folks at Langley say an officer was killed because of the leak. I'm having difficulty finding it, probably a Ruppert or Wayne Madsen story.
Thanks for the link, but I believe the long-term security interests of the US were damaged long ago and over more serious sins than the Wilson-Plame scenario.
Hans Blix stated there were no WMD before the war began and no one in US circles did anything other than smear Blix as incompetent. After the war began and wasn't a weekend success as some have become accustomed to, we had a few men raise questions, i.e. Wilson. Too little too late. There has been no question of the CIA's collusion in faking evidence for BushCo.
I still believe the Wilson affair is a distraction from the heinous corruption and crimes of BushCo, US Intel, and the circle of PNACers.
The worst case scenario is Wilson-Plame writes a spy book, Rove gets canned, and the press waits for it's next assignment that seems to always steer clear of Bush himself and the Project men.
It is starting to look like Ari Fleischer testified to the grand jury that Bush knew about the plan to leak the memo via press sources, at the time thought to be able to adequately shield them.
That plan fell apart when Time Magazine turned over email from Matt Cooper to senior editors that contained information about Karl Rove talking about Wilson's wife as a CIA employee. Cooper could have gone to jail to protect his source, but Time blew his source protection by archiving, then turning over that email. Karl had to let him testify.
That's it kate you give M hell. I am so sick and tired of people trying to cloud the real issues here.
M the trusting liberals and progressives that you have fooled in the past - they have heard so much bullshit that they have caught on. and most of the honest repugs have caught on too. I am so amazed at how many show up to our meetings expressing their outright disgust with the party that they once belonged to. If things keep going like this we will reach a "critical mass" and you monsters will be kicked out. and hopefully sent to prison too.
-super Stevens
I'm a bit puzzled. Stevens do you think I am in the CIA? Or just that I am a right wing nut job? I suggest you read the above posts more closely.
Kate merely requested some admittedly scant evidence that Valerie Plame had a legitimate non official cover in her role within the CIA. I only linked two articles from the only people who would know without a doubt, the spooks themselves. For all I know, they are bullshit, but then maybe not.
I just hope Karl Rove gets to make friends one day with Bubba and his broomstick in a 10' by 10' cell. I don't give a damn about national security. One down, a handful of neocons to go. The US is imperialistic, but the Empires "servants" aren't bent on WW3 (you know the REAL WW3 where your lawn and children are irradiated a few thousand times beyond a lethal dose). The "fucking crazies" the Neo-cons.....the ones who have never before but are now running the show, they only previously advised if you have been keeping score, they have a 24/7 hard on for limitless war.
I'll give you an example. Clinton was an imperial President, lied about the reasons for our involvement in Kosovo, screwed over the Asian economies and passed Welfare 'Reform'. All while padding the pocket book. He wasn't about to get us all killed though. Neither was Dubya's father. Let's say the CIA did take out JFK. Do you think the CIA then, and now thinks like Curtis Lemay?
Now the show is being ran by guys who couldn't get laid when it mattered and it is biting us in the ass.
My point is, we are in a world of hurt when the spooks are the good guys.
To paraphrase Chomsky, we are safe when the president is just a crook, we are in deep shit if we ever elect a true believer.
The one who gave Hussein blank check to invade Kuwait was April Glaspie, you can sure google her out. There is a transcript of their meeting which was lately confirmed by translator who was present. His interview was in Ha'aretz. Again, google for it.
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