With the Bush Administration, timing is everything. The nomination of controversial the right wing John Roberts to the Supreme Court came just as the heat on Karl Rove became impossible for anyone to ignore. So what happened yesterday while the press was busy talking about John Roberts’ wife and kids, and how much Roberts likes dogs, and all that sort of fluff?
A group of eleven former CIA agents sent a letter the United States Congress explaining their professional opinion that the leak by Bush Administration officials of the identity of Valerie Plame, an undercover CIA agent, was profoundly damaging to America’s national security. For weeks now, the Republicans have had the audacity to argue that exposing the identities of undercover CIA agents is no big deal. Well, now the professionals have spoken, and they say it is a big deal, and that the Bush Administration’s political games have amounted to a damaging attack on Americans’ safety.
But that’s not all. Also included in this letter to Congress is the news that the Bush Administration has been coaching officials in the government, including CIA officials, about what to tell members of the press about Valerie Plame. The Bush Administration’s directions about what to tell the public about Valerie Plame include suggestions that she never deserved any protection in the first place – in spite of the fact that she was working on a secret mission for the CIA to defend America’s security.
From this letter, we learn that not only is the Bush Administration still engaging in personal attacks against a working CIA agent, trying to defame Valerie Plame, but that the Bush Administration is telling CIA officials and other to lie to the public about the case. Did the Bush Administration also tell these government officials how to testify before the grand jury? That would be witness tampering, and that, I believe, is a crime.
