In this thread people were debating the nature of what the administration did (if someone in the administration actually did deliberately “out” Plame). While it would be technically illegal to expose an agent (and there was some conflation in that thread of legal and political processes, e.g., impeachment), I’m still wondering what they thought to accomplish by doing so. I know they didn’t like Joe Wilson for things he was saying, but telling the press that his wife is a CIA agent doesn’t seem to help them in any way that I can see. I know that they implied that she somehow was responsible for his trip to Niger, but that’s been apparently discredited. But even if she had been responsible, it doesn’t mean his evaluation of the situation was necessarily no good, considering his experience.
What do you think they were trying to do, if they did in fact deliberately leak Plame’s job and identity?
Intimidate anyone else who might have been harboring thoughts of publicly questioning the drive to war. Who’d go up against somebody with the power and will to risk their family’s lives?
To quote Rosie Perez in “White Men Can’t Jump”: “Is this some macho dick thing? Can I watch?”. IOW, it gave Scooter et al. testosterone rushes.
Create a smokescreen and sow confusion about Wilson’s credentials. The talking point seems to have been “The whole trip was just a boondoggle set up by his wife.” It doesn’t really matter if the charge is refutable. Just getting that version of the story out into the discussion muddies the waters enough for some people to write the whole episode off as “he said/she said” partisan bickering.
FWIW, I don’t think they INTENDED to burn a covert asset. I think they were so eager to throw some mud at Wilson that they got careless.
Pissed-off enemy agents who now know the truth about her?
Actually, I believe the outing of Valerie Plame was less about endangering her and more about getting revenge on her husband. “You screwed with the wrong Administration, pal, so we’re gonna destroy your career and your wife’s career.”
Her life probably isn’t at risk. However the same can’t be said for any foreign contacts she may have developed during her career. Once she was exposed it casts suspicion on anyone who dealt with her in the past. I can’t imagine the government of Kazakhstan would be very happy with any Kazakh nationals who passed intelligence about their country’s nuclear weapons to her.
Yes, she claimed to work for Brewster Jennings & Associate as an “energy analyst”. BJ&A has been revealed to be a CIA front.
Some have suggested that it was to slow the investigation into the source of the Niger forgeries by reducing the effectivess of Brewster Jennings employees.
Look long and carefully back over the behavior of this administration and tell me again how you think they plan ahead and make accurate predictions of the consequences of their actions???
That’s probably it in a nutshell: nobody thought. They could have refuted Wilson’s statements by questioning his findings, or asserting they had some evidence he hadn’t seen, or suggesting he hadn’t done a good investigation, or whatever, without dragging his wife into it.
But that’s not how this crowd operates. Never attack a person’s arguments when you can attack the person–that’s how they operate. It’s not enough for administration critics to be simply wrong; they have to be wrong AND pathetic, unmanly (or unwomanly), godless, cowardly, unpatriotic, and generally despicable. So never mind Wilson’s findings, discredit him by suggesting he only went on the trip because his wife was finding him something to do. Maybe she’s desperate to get him out of the house…snicker, snicker.
Nobody considered there might be consequences until it was too late. Then, of course, they panicked and started trying to cover up. Allegedly. (The “allegedly” is pro forma.)
I tend to think if it was intentional it basically done with a lack of foresight.
I actually don’t think it was done intentionally, and I’m not even positive a crime was committed, it all depends on how the information came out and I think we’ll need the case to develop more before I’d be able to say precisely what has happened.