Sounds like the sixties when the CIA had "assets" in the media. The administration clearly had an "asset" in the media, Judy Miller- and she served Chalabi and Bush well helping to deceive us into a war. As we used to say in basketball "a liability on the court is an asset on the bench." Any responsible journalistic organization should clearly make Judy an asset on the bench. Let her just go work for Bush overtly rather than covertly, pretending to be a journalist.

I think Miuller's 'security clearance' is a red herring.  I once had a Top Secret clearance, but I didn't have carte blanche to see anything I wanted that was classified Top Secret.  Information was only available on a 'need to know' basis.

What level was Miller's clearance and what level was the memo that identified Plame?

Bingo!

It has long been my suspicion that the NYT has fought to keep Miller from testifying precisely because they did not want this to come out.

The last thing they want is for Libby (or any other official) to use the defense that leaking Plame's identity was not a crime because Miller had a security clearance.

OTOH, Democrats in Congress would be wise to use a little ju-jitsu to highlight Miller's ties by demanding her security clearance be revoked. Certainly someone who recieves classified information, cannot remember where she received it, and then loses the notebook in which she recorded it cannot be trusted.

As just another Dutchman (:-)), my knowledge on the topic of security clearances is limmitted, but couldn't it just be that the alleged clearance Miller had was given to all embedded reporters in Iraq?

Wasn't Geraldo Rivera expelled from Iraq for giving away secret info live on TV about future U.S. military operations? It is my understanding all embedded reporters in Iraq had some sort of security clearance and had to obey certain rules regarding the info they could broadcast live.

I don't think the Pentagon would have allowed all embedded journalists to report on whatever they wanted without some minimal restrictions.

Judith Miller's appalling October 16 article, together with the NYT's tag-team effort of the same date, make it clear that Miller has operated as a War Whore supplying lies and deception on behalf of the neocons,  and Sulzberger has acted as her pimp, pushing her services off on a credulous American public and its representatives.  To salvage its tattered reputation, the NYT should fire her forthwith, clean out the Augean stables that pass for editorial offices,  and apologize to its readers and the American public.

On the issue of Miller's Secret clearance, a blindingly obvious conflict of interest, there's the additional question, when exactly did she obtain this clearance?  Could the Bush Administration possibly have cleared her for secrets back in August of 2002 when the facts were being fixed around the policy and when the war marketing campaign was being formulated for its September 2002 roll-out?  Probably not, since she basically turned the NYT into a bullhorn for the WHIG gang in the White House, but a question worth asking anyway. 

Having a security clearance does not mean that one gets to see secure data on a whim, one must first demonstrate a "need to know" thus Judy Kneepads would be hard pressed to be on a need to know list regarding Valerie Plame.

ElGringo-- I'm a reporter in Baghdad and I've been embedded, and I sure never got a "secret" clearance. And only once have I had military guys try to censor me, and that was done by refusing to allow the translator to work rather than reading my copy. Most of the unit commanders don't review your stories as long as you seem like a responsible type, i.e., don't give away future operations, don't reveal dead people before their families are notified and other common-sense restrictions. Miller's "secret" clearance strikes me as highly -- HIGHLY -- unusual and prompts me to ask, WTF? 

Bolton was in State but acted as if he reported to Rummy et al. 

How many stains does Judy have on HER blue GAP dress? Whose DNA will we find there?

It is SO obvious that she is an asset belonging to the secret Pentagon Information War, a Pentagon Operative embedded, like a mole, in the paper with the strongest reputation for 'liberal bias'.

The handwriting is all on the wall, for the Daniels among us with eyes to see.

Let us hope and pray that the days of their Bushite Kingdom are truly numbered.

One issue this raises is with respect to the law against outing operatives.

As I recall, that law makes an exception for the reporter herself -- it is only the person who has the security clearance who can be charged with revealing the classifed info, not the reporter.

But what if the reporter also has clearance to receive the info?

Does this mean Miller may herself be chargeable under this law? 

Whether Milller had clearance or not doesn't really matter, except in evaluating how inappropriate it might seem. It's unlikely that Cooper, Chris Matthews, Novak, et al also had security clearance, so Libby and Rove were clearly sharing sensitive intel with people who weren't cleared, and who they knew weren't cleared.
And since Miller never wrote a story, her clearance is even less significant, except, again, in exposing that she was even more of a tool than we already knew she was.

As others here have noted, having a security clearance does not prohibit one from mentioning having it.  That question can come up all the time for perfectly legitimate reasons, and answered.  For instance, I've run across job listings for employment or contractor positions, specifically stating, "must have current gov't security clearance."

If someone is going to be seeing sensitive information on a regular basis, it is not uncommon for that person to receive a specific clearance.

Confirming as well, just because one has a clearance, does not mean one suddenly gets access to all kinds of unrelated information.  Secure comparmentalized information doesn't work like that.  You only get access to that which is related to your work -- the classic 'need to know' basis.

Anyway, I think this clearance thing is a red herring.  If it shows anything at all, it's merely that Miller was a darling favorite of someone (or several someones) in a position to authorize she be cleared.  Probable favoritism, yes; sinister conspiracy evidence, doubtful. 

A bottom level "secret" DOD clearance isn't a big deal I dont' think.  Every person in the military, starting from the foot soldiers, gets a secret clearance don't they?

I think all it really means, without going into conspiracy theories, is making sure her cousin isn't an Iranian citizen or something like that, putting her through the screen to filter for spies.

As she might have been on some missions that other journalists weren't allowed on, which could have been secret missions.

?

I think the important question is, does Judy still possess some such clearance today?  And could that explain some of the odd obfuscations and strange lapses of memory in her account in the Times - so that, for instance, when she says she 'could not recall where she got the name' of Valerie Wilson, this is her cute way of saying 'I'm not allowed to recall where' etc.?
If so, then either she was playing games with Mr. Fitzgerald - which I highly doubt - or her account of her testimony is full of half-truths and distortions, which seems to the case anyway.

Miller had more than just a bottom level security clearance. In fact, she was pretty much running the little group she was embedded with. To some extent, she was directing soldier’s tasks and assignments and “interviewing” witnesses as if she were part of the military interrogation apparatus. I think she got carried away with the access she was enjoying and the WH used her to peddle their propaganda.

I wonder who was interviewing who, when she met with Libby. The WH did not know at the time of their first meeting that Wilson was going to go wide with his criticism. Perhaps it was Miller reporting his upcoming columns to Libby. Look at how easily she agrees to lie about her source (that Libby was a former WH staffer because he once was one).

As mysterious as the security clearance is the open question about the document Powell had in his possession on Air Force One, marked [S]...

What person in DoS prepared it?  Would that person have the authorization to obtain security clearance for others, say, a person in journo capacity? 

Pardon me if this has been mentioned, but if she was hewing to the constraints of her security clearance in her dealings with Libby, in what way was she operating as a journalist with respect to any secrets he told her?  And if she wasn't operating as a journalist, how could she possibly lay any claim to journalistic privilege?

And does refusing the reveal information because it might screw up your source's false cover story fall under the rubric of privilege -- or of obstruction of justice?  I think clearly the latter and not the former.

If the Times has any shreds of dignity left, if should use those shreds to bind her up and toss her overboard.  Yesterday was already too late.

 In Response to JimG about "every foot soldier" getting a Secret security clearance... I would have to disagree.

 I had a Secret security clearance in the US Navy from 1976 to 1982. Just to get a Confidental (lower level) security clearance, required two agents from the FBI to come to my town and personally interview my high-school teachers, members of my church, and go door-to-door and talk to my neighbors as well as the local polce, not to mention the national and international checks of criminal, political and subversive group databases. And this was just for a kid out of high school. I know these interviews occured because I was asked by many people when I visited my hometown why the FBI was asking about me.

 I was told at the time (1976,) that a standard FBI security clearance check cost the government $25,000 per person. The manhours and expense involved probably costs much more today.

 I received my Secret security clearance ONLY after I finished my training and I was REQURIED TO KNOW my first piece of information with a Secret security classification.

 I would be very surprised if as many as 5% of all service members ever receive as much as a Confidential clearance, let alone a Secret one.

 So if you think that "Every person in the military, starting with the foot soldiers..." automatically gets a Secret security clearance, then perhaps you are not aware of the responsibility of those who are entrusted with classified information.

 In addition, I was also a member of the Personal Responsibility Program (PRP.) This was the program that was also introduced to all military pilots that required all members to subject to regular drug testing at the same time that President Bush stopped flying. The PRP was also used in the sensitive job that I performed.

 The PRP requires regular psychological profiling, and evaluated the ability of it's members to follow orders during times of personal or professional stress.

 In addition: All persons with a security clearance sign a document that confirms their understanding of the penalties under federal law for any violation, or for compromising classified information with ANYONE who does not have the proper clearance as well as a RIGHT TO KNOW. There are also penalties (all with massive fines and jail time) for improperly or inadvertantly disclosing classified information and failing to immediately inform superiors of the breach. And if you don't know if someone has the proper clearance AS WELL AS a RIGHT TO KNOW, you can be prosecuted for failing to determine this status BEFORE disclosing classified information to them.

 Every page of a classified document is marked with it's security clearance level, and a database is supposed to be kept of everyone who views each classified document. 

 This is the LAW and those of us who have had the privledge of being entrusted with classified information should know that these safeguards are never open to interpretation or debate. 

 Well that's my two cents anyway... 

"Certainly someone who receives classified information, cannot remember where she received it, and then loses the notebook in which she recorded it cannot be trusted."

To that I would add: "...and then conveys that information to a person (Novak, or whomever.) who does not have proper clearance is guilty of something by that act alone."

I'm sure whatever clearance she had at the time it was signed had conditions as to how she used any classified info she might be given. I would also assume there are limits to it's period or purpose of validity...does it still hold when she's back stateside and no longer embedded on the mission for which it had been granted???  

I find it would not be a very good defense to use miller's security clearance. The issue would be his intent if libby leaked Plames identity with the "intent" to out her.Using Miller to achieve his objective makes him guilty, no matter what her security clearance.

ARGH. They who have the need to know, have the data, instead of just "They need to know."

Farfetched, but it sounds like Miller's clearance presents a convenient way to launder secret information. Could a journalist with a secret clearance be set up for use as a gateway for leaking secret information?

Say you need to leak a name that's classified.  You're aware of the penalties so you don't want to be known as the source.

You give her enough hints about where to look in her classified sources so that she can track down the name you want and read it back to you. Now, if you're Libby, you can refer other journalists and colleagues to Miller and know you're not able to be fingered as the source.

It certainly sounds from the tenor of their correspondence, the history of uncritical articles, and Libby's insistence on a completely misleading attribution that Miller was completely under Libby's influence and the perfect accomplice for laundering information of any type.

If Miller's security clearance lapsed, isn't there are requirement to perform a debriefing to audit and confirm the status of the intel she had access to?  Who would have performed that debriefing?

I (also) guess there might be a security requirement for her to get clearance for, and report details of, all of her foreign travel and contacts with foreign officials.  That sounds like quite a sacrifice for an investigative journalist to make.

It's been Pentagon practice for a long time (since the manhattan project?) to grant clearances to reporters to let them cover stories that would otherwise be impossible to write about (and yes, it does involve some level of oversight/censorship of the text. (This is separate from the traditional oversight of war correspondents, where it's mostly details of places and dates that gets cut by good censors.)

 Sometimes this is a good idea (if you want someone to write well about the building of an atomic bomb or suchlike, or if you have some piece of evidence, like a surveillance photo or a radio intercept, that will convince reporters that your spokecritter's statement about something is indeed fact-based). Often it's a really bad idea, because the reporters are effectively captured by the Pentagon: they see only the particular classified bits their handlers want them to see, so they get a cherry-picked version of the facts; and secrecy rules prohibit them from writing without approval about things they've learned in classified briefing, even if they knew those things already from other sources or have since gotten nominally unclassified confirmation. During the Reagan administration (which was when I was following this kind of thing closely) some reporters declined lassified briefings and the clearances that went with them to make sure that they could write honest, objective stories.

As lots of people have pointed out, the "Miller had a clearance" thing is pretty much irrelevant to the Plame case, because, in contrast to leaks, classified briefings (or a state of locally high security) are always identified as such by anyone with a brain and a sense of self-preservation. But I think that her clearance probably does go a long way to explain the debacle that was the NYT's coverage.

 Remember the part (assuming for the moment that it's not a fabrication) where she complains to Libby that she can't share sensitive information with her editors. What sensitive information does she have? Stuff she got in briefings approved by Rumsfeld and/or his subordinates. Which is to say for the most part, the work product of WHIG and the Office of Special Plans. She was getting fed the same kind of undersourced, overhyped, cherry-picked crap that Rumsfeld and Cheney were demanding, and because of her specially-cleared access she swallowed it whole. And then used "I know all these things I can't tell you" to browbeat any editor who might have stood in her way.

 For some reason the term "useful idiot" comes to mind.

Giving a reporter a clearance seems unusual, but since she was embedded with a team that was presumably using highly classified information in their WMD search, giving her a clearance essentially allows the government an additional avenue to control what information she could and could not release- i.e. she would be subject to prosecution if she released classified information.

In other words, say both Geraldo and Judy stumbled upon the same  tidbit of sensitive information. Geraldo, not having a clearance, could deny knowledge of its classification and blab it out to anyone who would listen and are too stupid to change the channel (aka FOX viewers). The worse fate he would face would be to get kicked out of Iraq back into his luxury condo. Judy, on the other hand, would face prosecution for releasing classified information and thus the government (by controlling classification) can decide what is releasable, and this control functions for as long as the information is classified, not just for the length of time the reporter is in Iraq.

If this was the reason for Judy's clearance, than I suspect that it was revoked after her "mission" was done.

Regardless of the state of her clearance, an unsecure telephone (or worse, cellphone) is not an appropriate method to convey classified information. Most likely, Judy having (or had) a clearance is an interesting aside that warrents futher investigation, but it is not necessarly evidence of a nefarious conspiracy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird

Carl Bernstein, CIA and the Media, Rolling Stone Magazine (20th October, 1977)

Even in the age of Paid Fake Pundits, Americans still don't get it. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird

Doesn't matter where Miller got the Valerie "Flame" or Victoria Wilson name.  Libby told her that Wilson's wife worked at the CIA (WinPac) on WMD and that effectively outted her. Miller could use the Wilson's wife info to ask around until she got it.  According to the directive that WH staff signs regarding their responsibility pertaining to classified information (displayed and discussed awhile back on Meet the Press), ignorance about whether or not something is classified is not an excuse.  Before speaking to anyone about even possibly classified info the individual is required to find a reliable source to clarify the issue.  Libby asked Miller about her clearance and she told him she didn't know if it was still in effect.  Because he talked to her anyway without verifying that she was an acceptable person to receive the info, he was breaking the law.

First, if Libby knew Miller was cleared to see secret information his discussing it with her might not be regarded as an unauthorized disclosure of classified information (which is one of the crimes Libby could be charged with).

 My understanding of the situation is quite different. First, there are different kinds of security clearance and you can bet the house (or the NYT assets) that JM did not have clearance for access to Plame's status. Second, Something that is classified as it was in the AirForceOne Powell memo (parts of it, not the entire thing) cannot be revealed to anyone without the specific clearance. It is not even clear that every WH staffer who saw or heard about the memo had sufficient clearance. Just spreading the information to them would have qualified as a criminal act. Taking it outside is an even bigger problem, irrespectively of JM's clearance.

 On the more difficult point, as to why JM would have any clearance to begin with (and I agree that newspapers should not allow this situation), it seems that this might have been a reward for her loyal service on the WMD front. Assuming that she indeed was cleared and if my guess is correct, this would be another criminal act, since JM had no business receiving classified information to begin with.

 In any case, all of this seems very strange. We can't be sure about much with Miller, other than the fact that her martyrdom is complete fiction. The move was calculated and she deserved to be in jail for a number of reasons. She's lied just about everything else.

 I recognize JM archetype. I taught a required course at Harvard at one point. The purpose of the course was to teach undergrads some very basic statistics (along with a couple of other introductory subjects). Every student had to either complete the class or pass a corresponding test by the end of the sophomore year. One student who showed up for the first class was a "reporter" at the Crimson (Harvard daily). In the beginning of second class, she stormed out, screaming that she is "a journalist" and does not "need to know statistics". She ended up failing the course and suspended from school (did not complete the requirement on time). I don't know if she ever finished, but her attitude seems to resemble closely that of JM. Although there were plenty of students in that class who did not want to be there and who did not believe understanding of statistics--however rudimentary--was important to their profession, none had made an issue of it or a symbolic gesture of storming out of class. For a self-professed "journalist" the claim was patently absurd (although it is simply amazing how many real-time journalists have no basic understanding of statistics). IMHO, the petulent behavior and claims of journalistic privilege resemble JM's behavior.

A couple of things about JM's clearance:

One: in the NYT confessional, she said in one breath that she couldn't remember if she'd discussed classified material with Libby and, in the next, that he handled classified material "carefully." If statement A is true, statement B is a lie.

Second: Her security arrangement affected her reporting as an embedded jrlist in 2003 in Iraq. Reputbale stories in fall 2003 and early 2004 detailed this arrangement -- supposedly approved personally by Rumsfeld. Plus, her stories out of Iraq were censored.

IMO, JM was far too cozy with the people she was supposed to be "watching" (watchdog press). The fact that she that she orchestrated the clearance, agreed to the censoring, is telling.

.
"Embedded" "reporters/moles"

 • Armstrong Williams
 • Gannon/Guckert
 • Karen Ryan
 • Mstr. Sgt. Corine Lombardo

And now ...
 • Judy Miller

  -- datora

I'm not sure I'm comfortable with reporters having security clearance, but I know I'm uncomfortable with reporters who don't reveal that in their stories. If a reporter receives classified information based on his/her classified status, and is going to use the information in some way for a story, I think I'm entitled to know that.