Larisa Alexandrovna: Is Someone Leaking Classified Info To Robert Novak Again?

[Hissyspit]

http://www.atlargely.com/2007/07/is-someone-leak.html

Is someone leaking classified information to Robert Novak again?

Robert Novak, the worthless hack for Karl Rove, is out pimping his book The Prince of Darkness (a better title might have been "My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult"). According to a blogger at DailyKos, Novak made an interesting assertion while on the Tucker show. He apparently claimed that Valerie Plame-Wilson was outed by Robert Hanssen, the Russian FBI spy who also, like Karl Rove, happened to leak classified information to Robert Novak.

This was on the tube, so I don't yet have a transcript of the alternate reality in which Novak roams around in. But if Novak did in fact say this, then boy do I have some serious issues with that statement. Before I begin with the logical pickle Novak has now encased himself in, I want to assure you folks that Novak is lying, or worse, being fed bad information - which is worse, because it means that Karl Rove is still hoping to score a direct hit on anyone in a 50 mile radius of Valerie Wilson who might have had a bagle once with Robert Hanssen. I am more inclined to think that Novak wanted to say Aldrich Ames, because that is a popular far right talking point, despite it being equally as laughable. But let us stick to the Hanssen narrative for now.

Problem 1: I interviewed the FBI agent, Eric O'Neill, who brought down Robert Hanssen. If you want to get an idea of how that played out, I suggest you rent the excellent film Breach. O'Neill explained to me that the damage assessment of Hanssen's activities has the highest classification and is fully known to only a few people. Not even he, O'Neill, knew the extent of the damages and who was or was not compromised. In fact, the US government is still trying to assess the damage to our national security. But, let us assume for a moment that what Novak was saying were true, how did he come by that information? This is not information - were it true - that would be provided, even if requested by the President, to any single person in full. So either Robert Novak needs to admit he is lying, or Robert Novak needs to be dragged back in front of Fitzgerald. By the way, the same applies to the Ames case, because as with Hanssen, the damage assessment would be highly classified.

Problem 2: If Valerie Plame's cover was blown ages ago, why was she then tasked to find WMD in Iraq by President Bush? Or for that matter, why was she tasked to monitor WMD movement in and out of Iran? Is Robert Novak claiming that he knows something that even the DCI did not know or the Director of Operations at the CIA did not know? Is Novak saying that despite this breach, something as important as WMD in Iran/Iraq would have been given to an agent who had her cover blown "ages ago?" More importantly, is Robert Novak claiming to know that Mrs. Wilson - despite being a covert officer of the agency - was outed and continued to travel abroad and possibly put other agents and officers into harms way? Is Robert Novak certain he is not the one who has been outed "ages ago" as an Opus Dei loyalist who regularly acts like a spy's proxy, once for Hanssen (at least that we know of, who knows what he and Hanssen did on their Opus Dei prayer sessions together), and once for Rove and Armitage? This would also apply to the Ames scenario, because the same questions still stand despite who the claimed blower of covers was.

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