COVERT….From Valerie Plame Wilson’s opening statement to Congress this morning:
I served the United States loyally and to the best of my ability as a covert operations officer for the Central Intelligence Agency.
I worked on behalf of the national security of our country, on behalf of the people of the United States until my name and true affiliation were exposed in the national media on July 14, 2003, after a leak by administration officials.
Today, I can tell this committee even more. In the run-up to the war with Iraq I worked in the counter proliferation division of the CIA — still as a covert officer whose affiliation with the CIA was classified.
….While I helped to manage and run secret worldwide operations against this WMD target from CIA headquarters in Washington, I also traveled to foreign countries on secret missions to find vital intelligence.
For whatever reason, Patrick Fitzgerald decided he couldn’t win a case against any of the Plame leakers merely for leaking her name. Maybe that was because he decided she didn’t qualify as “covert” under the very specific legal requirement of the IIPA Act. Maybe it was for other reasons. Who knows?
But whatever the legal case, Plame herself sure thinks she was covert. And her job sure sounds covert. And if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck…..
