Amen.

Mr. Wilson, I agree with what you say. Do you know anything about whether Judith Miller may have informed the Bush administration about the identity of your wife, the fact that she was your wife, and so on? Specifically on the very day that the NYT published your op-ed?

First, can we please not call it a "sentencing"? I know, I know, I'm being picky, but she hasn't been sentenced for a crime, she's being confined until she complies with a subpoena.

Second, I'm not prepared to accept Judith Miller as a victim here until I know more about her involvement. Cooper got the benefit of the doubt; she doesn't.

It makes you wonder why the Administration has any credibility left at all.

Personally, I'd like to have seen Ms. Miller reveal her source.  I think the rule on anonymous sources ought to be that someone could not hide one's identity if the intent is to break the law or deceive the public.  Perhaps, if that were the case, there would be less BS put out by 'anonymous sources.'

Keep up the good fight, Joe. You're a hero in a time when heroes are few and far between.

I think this whole affair may finally answer a question I've long had, which is why does the media seem to always act in such a reliably pro-White House way: Are they dupes or fiends?

I have yet to see a believable explanation for why the press so willingly pimps Swift Boat Vet lies and burries mind-blowing stories like this one. I feel we may soon lift the sheets on the whole sordid relationship between journalists and the Rove machine. It won't be pretty. 

One thing would be clear, Miller is not defending herself of a crime! If I'm correct, the statute only holds government officials from outing secret agents, but not ordinary citizens. If the latter could be charged with a crime and Miller fears prosecution, she would have plead the 5th and thus not gone (or go) to jail. She may be guilty of showing bad judgment (wouldn't be the first time) but most likely not of committing a crime.

From the NYT:

"But the special prosecutor, Patrick A. Fitzgerald, has suggested that the reporters may also face criminal prosecution, which could entail additional penalties."

While it's true that Miller's jailing is coercive, not punative, she may be more involved than just being a passive recipient of a leak.

Back to Mr. Wilson's initial point.  It's odd that the purpose of confidential sources is to hold the powerful accountable.  In this case both Miller and Cooper (and I imagine, others) have used the notion of confidential sources to prevent the powerful in government from being accountable.

The real victims of this cover-up, which may have turned criminal, are the Congress, the Constitution and, most tragically, the Americans and Iraqis who have paid the ultimate price for Bush’s folly.

Exactly right, Mr Wilson.  My outrage at the leaker of your wife's identity has not eased.  Imagine outing a CIA agent working on WMD!   I still cannot get over this.  I have the sinking feeling that the person or persons who did this may yet get away with it.

The culture of unaccountability and revenge are major driving forces in the Bush administration.

 "But the special prosecutor, Patrick A. Fitzgerald, has suggested that the reporters may also face criminal prosecution, which could entail additional penalties."

My understanding is that Fitzgerald was saying that continued contempt crosses over into a crime in and of itself.  It is at the discretion of the judge, I believe.  He said that if Miller/Cooper refused to repair the contempt, she/he could be charged with criminal contempt and jailed.

RE: the underlying smarminess of the Whitehouse:

I believe that Ambassador Wilson has suggested, in the past, that the Administration's underlying motive in exposing his wife's identity was to silence potential critics from inside the CIA.  That it was both an attack against him and his family but, simultaneously, a shot across the bow of the CIA.  There are a lot of untold stories of Cheney's visits to the CIA that I'm sure would shed some light on the whole 'shaping intelligence' issue that would, imo, be the crux of an impeachment effort.

I wonder if that is why Scooter Libby's name surfaced so early and, if in fact, Cheney is really where this all started.  Rove is probably technically innocent.  This may really be a Cheney vs. CIA battle at it's heart.

If someone's life was endangered because of this leak, then someone should go to jail. If Ms.Miller wants to be that someone, I'm not going to cry any tears. This is the national security of our nation and the individuals that risk their lives protecting it that is at stake.  I have not patience that it has taken this long.

If she was working on a story why should she be fired. It's not illegal for her to reveal Plame was CIA. On what grounds would Wilson sue her?

Ambassador  Wilson-

Thank you for your service.

Personally I am less inclined to display any sympathy for either Mr. Cooper or Ms. Miller.  While confidentiality of a source is important, I think it must be on a case by case basis.

Let's look critically at who they are supposedly protecting.  Its not a corporate whistleblower spilling the beans about a dangerous, defective product.  its not a low level govt functionary leaking internal reports that counter official govt positions.  These reporters are not crusading muckrakers.

They are part and parcel of a lazy, co-opted Washington Press Corp who have let the nation down again and again by their reporting on this admin.  The "source" used these reporters as tools for a purely political hatchet job; a job that endangered your family and national security.  A reporter less invested (or dependant) on Admin handouts, leaks, and off the record briefings could have taken the information in your NYTimes editorial, spent a few minutes on the phone or Internet and confirmed most of it.  Then when handed the "inside" scoop that your wife was a CIA employee, they would have seen it for the attempt that it was and that such inside info did not change the truth of your editorial.

While leaks are done to settle political scores every day; once the magnitude of that public revelation and its obvious purpose sank in, I cannot see how protecting a source who so obviously holds the reporters and their readers in complete contempt serves the public good.

But isn't that substituting individual/editorial board judgment for principal?

That is the job of reporters and editorial boards.  They do it every day deciding what to story to follow, what to print, what to drop. That is what they are paid to do and respect for their judgment is why we trust what they report (or used to).

Won't sources stop going to the press if they might be outted?

It that means the press makes it known that they will no longer be used as political tools or protect those who hurt people and the nation by helping them grind political axes....is that a bad thing?  It might mean they will get out and do leg work..., look up records, interview people, use Google for heaven's sake...and not sit at the desk hoping for that whispered phone call.

So put me in the camp that reporters should use their judgment in deciding to protect a source.  If he person and circumstances seem to require that protection; then by all means, stand on principal and use the time in the slammer to write your manifesto.  But if the source is one of the most powerful men in the govt,  has more than adequate resources to defend himself, or is doing purely political dirty work to the real world detriment of innocents and the country--then burn them.

Yours-

Ridge Cook

I dont understand why Miller will want to be imprisoned to protect someone who wants to out a CIA operative--which is a criminal act.
 Nobody has the freedom to out a CIA operative..It is a crime.

IF Miller was doing it to protect a whistleblower for a Crime like Deep Throat did, then it would be worth it to go to prison for Freedom of Speech.

Dear Ambassador Wilson,

You suggest that the "outing" was done to punish you for reporting the truth. Might not the administration been more interested in attacking the CIA for failing to cook the books and provide sufficient evidence to back up Tenet's claim that Iraq would be a cakewalk and WMD would be found.

Miller's behavior has proven her to be a  loathsome lying stenographer for the neo-cons in selling Iraq war with false information and reporting.  Her relationships with Chalabi and Neo- Advisors is well known.   It would surprise no one if indeed, she outed Valerie Plame's identity to Rove, and/or others in the government.

While the Queen of Iraq languishes in jail, should there be any integrity left in this media mata, she might contemplate the motives in her backstory that justify her doing time.

With a person who lacks this much credibility and accounability, nothing would surprise.  Ambassador Wilson's post was right on target.

Ambassador Wilson -- thanks, to you and your wife, for your service. And I completely agree about Bush. I think that journalists and editors need to sit down, preferably as a group, and come up with some general guidelines about when promises of confidentiality can be held to be void. It needs to be some sort of general policy, so that it can be known in advance. Lots of forms of privilege have exemptions and work well regardless. Psychiatrists are not bound by confidentiality when their patients threaten someone else's life;attorneys are not required to maintain confidentiality when their clients tell them about future crimes, etc. Similar limits on the confidentiality owed to sourcdes would be good.
They can't just involve not covering up evidence of a crime, though. Iirc, revealing the Pentagon Papers was a crime. That should not void the privilege.

You are so absolutely right. And so is the Ambassador, whom I also want to thank for his service.

Here are a few guesses;

* The leaker publicly said he was releasing journalists of confidentiality while in private told said journalists he was not releasing them of confidentiality. * The leaker realized that after Time magazine turned over the documents his cover was blown and confidentiality with Cooper was non operative whether Cooper testified or not. So his lawyer advised him to release Cooper of confidentiality in private and tell him it was OK to testify. Cooper probably has little new info. The documents probably tell all he knows. So this was a defensive measure by the leaker. It makes him look like he is "cooperating" with the investigation, now that he has no choice.

* The leaker is not releasing Miller of confidentiality. She doesn't have any documents to turn over to prossies to identify the leaker. Sure the leaker in public says he is releasing all journalists of confidentiality but in private he will release them only if he has no choice, like with Cooper.

* It is quite possible journalists like Miller were in the know about Plame before others. Remember Kenneth Starr in court papers said journalists were his informants. Maybe Miller was an informant too. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out that Miller worked for the CIA or even the Iraq intel doctoring group.

Paul O'Neill, Larry Lindsey, General Anthony Zinni, John Diulio, Richard Clarke, Scott Ritter.  I'm sure I left some out, but these, along with Joe Wilson, did speak out.  Not enough of us paid attention.

Judith Miller has chosen to side with someone in the White House that has comitted a felony---tantamount to treason---over the American people. Send her straight to jail. No one is above the law, not George W. Bush, not Cheney, not Rove, not Rumsfeld and certainly not Judith Miller. It is time the NY Times started writing about the crimes being comitted by Bush and Company that has caused thousands of American and innocent Iraqis deaths, and robbed the treasury of billions of dollars.

There are a lot of people like the person above who are normally strong advocates of journalistic shield protections, but who find themselves unable to feel comfortable with Miller and Cooper in this, and can't quite put their finger on why.

I can tell you why (and it's not just because "Bush sucks").

It's because the conceptual separation between the crime and the communication about the crime does not exist in this case. In this case, the communication is the crime. The reporters in this case are not passive listeners to the story of the commission of a crime. They are participants (albeit passive, we presume) in the commission of it.

Let me give you an example:
Source tells reporter, "The mayor hired me to rob a liquor store last week because he wants to intimidate the owner into leaving." This reporter learns of the commission of a crime from the guilty party. He/she is later questioned in connection with either the robbery or the mayoral scandal and refuses to reveal the source. Good reporter, yes?

Look at the differences between these two situations. Everyone and his brother has already pointed out the "whistleblower" difference. The source is blowing the whistle on corruption, and the reporter needs to protect the source so that corruption in gov't can be rooted out. In the Plame situation, that's clearly not the case.

But there's an even more fundamental difference at work here: the Plame source wasn't communicating to a reporter about a crime. The Plame source was committing a crime by communicating to a reporter. That is an essential, significant difference. The act of communication itself was a crime.

Shielding the source in this case is damaging in two ways:
1. It is akin to having a murderer ask you to hold the victim's arms to keep them from flailing in self-defense. You may not be the murderer, but you are aiding and abetting. Think about it: who is the victim of this crime? The United States. By acting as passive participant in this crime (which is the act of communication itself), you make it impossible for the United States to defend itself from this crime, because...
2. You make it, ultimately, an unprosecutable crime. It would mean that the crime of this particular kind of communication would be absolutely and utterly unprosecutable if the other person involved happened to be a reporter. That's unacceptable.

The fact of the matter is, not even those accorded the greatest legal privacy protections -- clergy, attorneys, and mental health professionals -- are granted the right to be party to their clients' crimes. By committing a crime which takes the form of a piece of communication to a reporter, the source made the reporter a party to a crime, not just a person who happens to know about a crime.

Those of you who are feeling very squirmy about having to defend Miller and Cooper on this are feeling that way for a damn good reason.

  If Miller was CIA, then she would liable as a government employee to be charged with treason if she was the one who knowingly released Plame's identity. 
 

Thanks Ambassador Wilson for your service and your ethics.  I do wonder about the different strategies used by Cooper and Miller.  In particular, if we assume that Cooper is telling the truth about being directly contacted by his source and released from his confidentiality commitment, and if we assume that Miller has the same source, then why hasn't the source contacted Miller?   Would Miller's testimony be more damning than Cooper's notes and testimony?  Or is it possible, as some are now suggesting, that her testimony would in fact be self-incriminating?  And one question for you legal eagles - why would it be legal for anyone to reveal the identity of a covert CIA agent?  Why isn't Novak in jail right now?  Even if it is legal, I agree with a number of the commentators here that any journalist doing the administration's bidding in such a heinous, potentially damaging manner should at the very least be publicly shamed and fired.

Joe Wilson, confirmed liar, questioning the credibility and honesty of President Bush?

A classic example of projection.   

After 2 years one wonders if the truth will ever come out and break through the web of lies.

Who wrote #53? Karl Rove?

I'm puzzled by Cooper's statement today that his source released him from confidentiality.  It makes sense, if Miller was his source, that under the circumstances, since she was going down anyway, she release him from his obligation.  (Someone suggested her as his source earlier in the thread, which is intriguing.)

But Karl Rove?  It's really hard for me to think he has enough warm blood to call Matt Cooper on the Big Day and tell him, O never mind.  I saw elsewhere, which I had forgotten, that he had signed some sort of blanket waiver allowing reporters to testify--and that was exactly the sort of waiver Cooper trashed in his statment to the media.  Presumably Miller never had to sign any such thing.  So, was it Rove?  Very strange.

Please! put away your outrage.

As if bush has any honesty or integrity to question. 

Don't know if you saw the latest polls, but something like 57% of americans now think Bush distorted the facts relating to wmd prior to the war. 

I am not sure where your "confirmed liar" jab comes from, but I am pretty sure its some hollow hannity reference that has been refuted or explained one hundred times.   

Mr. Wilson, I'll bet you $10 that Mr. Fitzgerald identifies you or your wife as the source of the leak.

Pants-

Thank you for clearly highlighting judicial reasons not to  support these two journalists.  I tried to point out social reasons and advocate a shift away from dependence on inside informers to independence...you  did the same by cogent appeal to commonsense legal example.  I think most people (outside the professional ink stained class) are having trouble swallowing the stated "principal" for remaining silent.  But, Hey!  if Miller likes jumpsuits and cheese sandwiches, then more power to her; however, the martyr's cloak does not fit her well.

Ridge

That's easy. Wilson said his wife didn't get the assignment for him. The Senate intelligence committee's report concluded she did.

Miller is no hero. Thanks for continuing to speak out, a lot of people support you!

Ridge Cook, you hit the nail on the head.

My head is aching with the irony that reporters call it honorable to protect an anonymous source whose sould purpose it is to re-enforce the strength of known lies.

Rove and whom-ever else was involved in this wanted to discredit anything that might bring light to the lies told by the Bush administration.  To protect such lies while legally protected, is not the duty of the press.  Judith Miller is a horrible person who betrays contempt for the American people. I feel no sympothy for her.

I've been curious as to why the NYT has kept Judith Miller on as a journalist, She was obviously slinging propaganda for the neo-cons, why would the Times allow one of their journalists to actively promote the agenda of the ultra conservative Bush administration with respect to Iraq and the lies of WMDs. Then it dawned on me this isn't about the security of the United States, it's about the security of Israel. The Bush administration and Likud are in bed together. I think the neo-con's and the New York Time's loyalties are to another nation and the war in Iraq dovetails nicely with those interests. This is the reason that the seemingly liberal New York Times is suppressing content critical of the Bush administration and actively promoting its war policies. Of course making this obvious connection will be labeled as anti semitic given that any criticism of Israel is anti -semitic by definition in some minds. It seems to me that this is one of the elephants in the room. Israel has a lock on the Congress. There isn't any congressman or senator that I know who dare say anything critical of Israel for fear of being labeled an anti-semite or losing critical campaign funding or being trashed in the press. I wonder if this postulation of mine also extends to the rest of the media and also explains some of subdued behavior of Democrats in Congress. Did Bush and Rove woo and promise Ariel Sharon things that the liberals weren't willing to, thus causing a rift in the traditional jewish-Democrat alliance? Is Judith Millers reporting the outcome of this rift. Have the conservative zionists won out over the liberal N.Y. jewish establishment at least with regards to Israel? 

Ms./Mr. Cook is absolutely correct.  Thank you for your eloquence.

I have been literally lying awake in bed at night, confounded by the press's sympathy for Miller and Cooper.  Forget about the NYT, how could Robert Kuttner and Daniel Shore cover up for Karl Rove?

Personally, I'd like to have seen Ms. Miller reveal her source.  I think the rule on anonymous sources ought to be that someone could not hide one's identity if the intent is to break the law or deceive the public. 

Even if this rule were immediately put into effect, she wouldn't be bound to it because it was made after the fact.  Presumably, she would be bound to her pledge of confidentiality under the state of affairs that existed at the time.  

Also, because we don't know who Miller's source was, we have no way of knowing his or her intent. 

Perhaps, if that were the case, there would be less BS put out by 'anonymous sources.' 

And perhaps it would also have a chilling effect on Deep Throat types, who might be afraid that their cover would be blown.  I'm not sure how you think this determination of the source's intent should be made, or by whom.  By the reporter?  It couldn't be by the court, because the reporter would have to reveal what she knew before the court could decide. 

Some future Deep Throat might be less likely to speak knowing that there was a loophole that would allow, even compel the reporter to spill the beans. 

what he's talking about, afghanwarvet, is the idea that if george bush said, within the administration, you will all sign waivers, that's not really an independent and specific release of confidentiality. According to Cooper, he today received, in fairly dramatic fashion, that specific, individual waiver of confidentiality.

Sending Miller to jail is the wrong move.  She should be subjected to around the clock interrogation for 120 h or more. If she doesn't crack by then they should send her to Gitmo for "extra legal" treatment given to enemy non-combatants.  We are engaged in a Global War on Terrorism.  We cannot accomodate those that would protect terrrosts and traitors to the US.  Traitors in our government are damaging our national security.  Outing Plame was likely a death sentence for some friends of the US.  This treason deserves every effort to root it out.  

No, she wouldn't.  It was Bob Novak who reported on Plame's identity.  Miller had nothing to do with it. 

And the crime wouldn't be treason, it would be revealing of classified information.  And the person charged wouldn't be the reporter, but the person who leaked the information, presumably the subject of the grand jury investigation. 

I cannot believe that I'm the only Netizen to have observed the following concatenation of facts, but here goes:
1. George Bush & Co. told a large number of lies to launch the war in Iraq.
2. Among these lies was the claim that Iraq had tried to purchase yellowcake from Niger. Ambassador Wilson (blessings be on his head) was sent on a fact-finding mission to Niger and as a result of what he saw there, refuted this claim.
3. Bush & Co. tried to cover up Ambassador Wilson's report, so Mr. Wilson wrote an Op-Ed piece in the NY Times.
4. Ambassador Wilson's wife was outed in the press as the result of a leak by -- if we ask the ancient Roman procurator's question, cui bono? who benefits? -- someone with an interest in punishing him, i.e., by the concoctors of the lie about the yellowcake. This is a serious felony. The claim that Ambassador Wilson's fact-finding trip was the result of nepotism involving his wife doesn't pass the giggle test: he is eminently qualified, and Niger isn't, um, exactly a holiday destination.
5. Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. Attorney in Chicago, was appointed special counsel and began an investigation.
6. Patrick Fitzgerald is a Republican.
7. Fitzgerald's investigation has focused not on who outed Ambassador Wilson's wife, but on two of the reporters involved. The connection of Matthew Cooper and particularly Judith Miller to the leak is far less than that of Robert Novak, who first published the leak and who may or may not have told the grand jury the name(s) of the leaker(s).
8. The master narrative of this sorry affair now is not the lies about the war, or the coverup of Ambassador Wilson's findings, or even the identity of the leaker(s). It is about the first-amendment issues of sending reporters to jail.
Changing the master narrative is an old Bush trick. Is there credible evidence that he shirked his Air National Guard duties? Make it a story about the paperwork. Is John Kerry a decorated war hero? Make it a story about a bunch of disgruntled and highly partisan sailors (the U. S. Navy does not hand out major decorations lightly). Is there credible evidence that U. S. personnel desecrated the Koran in the prisons holding the "unlawful enemy combatants"? Make it a story about sourcing. And on and on.
There is thus good reason to believe that Patrick Fitzgerald is queering the pitch in this investigation: it's right out of the Rove playbook. I'll be happy to make a meal of these words when someone high in the Bush administration is indicted in this sinister affair.