“Congressional oversight committees have failed miserably to exercise prompt oversight. They’re at the root of the politicization of the intelligence apparatus. I would assert that Sen. Pat Roberts is the root of the problem,” Valerie Plame Wilson, the outed CIA operative, said during a recent visit to the University of Kansas. She blames the inaccurate intelligence that led to the Iraq war on the Bush administration but also on the Kansas Republican senator, who chaired the Senate Intelligence Committee at the time.
In response, a spokeswoman for Roberts told the Lawrence Journal-World that Wilson “is not a credible source. Valerie Plame is hawking a book and appears willing to say anything to get media attention.”
40 Comments
Let’s check out Raw Story, shall we?
http://rawstory.com/news/2005/HowSenate_Intelligence_chairman_fixed_intelligence_and_diverted_blame_fromWhite_House__0811.html
Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, President George W. Bush issued an order to the Central Intelligence Agency, Department of Defense, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the State Department, and his cabinet members that severely curtailed intelligence oversight by restricting classified information to just eight members of Congress.
“The only Members of Congress whom you or your expressly designated officers may brief regarding classified or sensitive law enforcement information,” he writes, “are the Speaker of the House, the House Minority Leader, the Senate Majority and Minority Leaders, and the Chairs and Ranking Members of the Intelligence Committees in the House and Senate.”
The order is aimed at protecting “military security” and “sensitive law enforcement.”
But what was said to be an effort to protect the United States became a tool by which the Republican chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee Pat Roberts (R-KS) ensured there was no serious investigation into how the administration fixed the intelligence that took the United States to war in Iraq or the fabricated documents used as evidence to do so.
Coupled with limited access to intelligence documents, RAW STORY has found that Roberts and a handful of other strategically-placed Washington players stymied all questions into pre-war intelligence on Iraq and post-invasion cover-ups, including the outing of a CIA covert agent, by using targeted leaks and artfully deflecting blame from the White House.
The Senate and House intelligence committees were created in the 1970s after a series of congressional investigations found that the CIA had acted like a “rogue elephant” carrying out illegal covert action abroad.
And how about a timeline?
http://rawstory.com/robertsintel.htm
Isn’t it amazing how facts have a “liberal” bias?
Pat Roberts should take the lead of Sen. Peggy Palmer and Sheriff Steed, and bow out of trying to be re-elected. Slattery is going to kick butt and take names, and deservedly so. Pat Roberts needs to be relegated to the same history file as Bush/Cheney. After all, Roberts was President Bush’s patsy for the last 7 years. Why would we want to keep him around?
Maybe he should be impeached and put on trial for leaking classified intel. From the timeline 3/20/03:
“It’s a little ironic that Roberts, who fired an intelligence staffer in May for discussing unclassified information outside the committee, is so animated by intelligence leaks. On March 20, the day after the U.S. strike on a bunker where Saddam Hussein was thought to be hiding, Roberts told a group of newspaper editors that the Bush administration had used “what we call human intelligence [that] indicated the location of Saddam Hussein and his leadership.” Some intelligence officials were stunned by the comments, which soon appeared throughout the media and may have jeopardized CIA sources in Baghdad. “People flipped out,” says one. ”
http://www.contrarianreview.com/dontlook.html
Isn’t the a law against crap like this? How about treason against the United States?
Unfortunately, the Bush apologists will find nothing wrong with the so-called intelligence that led to the invasion Iraq. This whole thing has been gone over and over, and the general consensus is the Bush administration slanted much of the intelligence so we could invade. Combine that with the massive amounts of signing statements by Bush, basically insulating himself from having to follow the letter of the laws congress wrote and passed, and one gets the distinct impression Bush wants to play dictator.
And Roberts pulled on a double set of kneepads, because one wasn’t enough. There really should be a committee formed to justify criminal charges against many in the Bush administration, including Bush, Cheney and Roberts. Just MHO.
I agree, “Valerie Plame is hawking a book and appears willing to say anything to get media attention.”
A resident in the most guarded city in the world, surrounded by a million federal employees, double dipping the federal payroll with her husband another CIA employee, playing the role to the hilt as a “undercover agent” … Valerie Plame is complaining in court that her identification has been blown by some unnamed source.
Shame on Valerie Plame when millions of American military personnel wear their identification on their uniforms everywhere in the world.
Anybody see an attempt to set up future movies, “Valerie Plame I, undercover agent,” and eventually “Valerie Plame II, inside the Washington freeway.”
U.S. Senator Pat Roberts from Kansas, former U.S. Marine, is a lot better qualified than Valerie Plame to deal with security problems facing this country.
I had asked Roberts too look into Governor Sebelius breaking the Law and he gave my complaints to her and said, “She has the right to investigate herself”. He needs too go. He is an idiot!!! I hold Roberts and others like him responsible for the death of our soldiers. He and his, pulled the trigger, plain and simple!! Herbert West III west.herb@yahoo.com http://www.wen2k.com top25.
How about some horse stew anyone? I believe this horse has been dead for some time… you really can stop whipping it! Plane was under cover according to the CIA, Roberts did not protect America from the enemy Foreign or DOMESTIC. What’s next shall we go on and on about the 2000 election? Oh wait a minute that was yesterday!
If you like Bush’s Misbegotten War, you should love Pat Roberts. He helped lie Bush’s way into it, then he helped lie a cover up and helped Bush blame the CIA for his mistake. The blame lies with the Great Decider, the Commander in Chief. Pat Roberts, we remember what you did. You’ll go down in history as part of the problem.
Valerie Plame…er Plame-Wilson, has her opinion. Doesn’t make it true.
Al Gore believed there were terrorists and WMD development in Iraq.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=0h6gehCPvpk&feature=related
Notice how Pat Roberts has no defense except to attack the motives of the truth-teller?
Yup, he’s a CON.
For protecting Worst. President. Ever., Roberts became Worst. Senator. Ever.
This is all ridiculous. Herbert West III, you call him in an idiot but write “too” where you meant “to” two times. How ironic. No one is happy about lives being lost, especially not someone who served his country as a Marine. However, the notion that Pat Roberts covered-up information for political reasons is absurd. I know Pat Roberts as a person. He is a good and honest man who cares about Kansas and Kansans and is a strong voice for us in Washington. His opponent has been selling his loyalty to the highest bidder for years. All of you Bush haters should re-think lumping Pat Roberts in with the current administration.
Ok…I re-thought it and Roberts is still tied to the Bush admin.
All Repubs are tied to the Bush admin and have to go.
Didn’t take long for me to rethink either.
I’ve watched Roberts march lock-step with bushco. He is as guilty, he is as useless, he is as dispensable as the administration he has supported.
He certainly didn’t support Kansans or Americans!
Scooter Libby should be in jail for lying to the FBI and to a grand jury, multiple times, under oath. Karl The Architect Rover should be in the cell next to him, and Pat Roberts should be next to him. Roberts knew the truth and so did Bush. The revenge outing of CIA Officer Valerie Plame cost the United States government millions of dollars. By outing Plame, the Libby-Rove-Cheney conspiracy also outed the “front company” that the CIA created to hide her identity as well as the other CIA officers who worked there. Roberts was part and parcel of the liars who started Bush’s Misbegotten War on a lie and who continue it on a lie. How much money has Roberts taken from Halliburton, Blackwater and other “contractors” who have bilked the our government out of billions of dollars? And why did he vote in favor of a Bush bill that resulted in the “outsourcing” of our refueling tankers to AirBus? We won’t forget.
“Notice how Pat Roberts has no defense except to attack the motives of the truth-teller?”
Truth teller? Oh, it’s her husband Joe Wilson who is the liar in the family.
“In response, a spokeswoman for Roberts told the Lawrence Journal-World that Wilson “is not a credible source.”
But Curveball and Ahmed Chalabi ARE credible sources? Sorry Roberts but the Wilsons have been shown to be infinitely more credible than you and the rest of the BushBots. Just how IS that search for WMDs going?
It’s going to same way for Roberts as it is for Clinton and all the other Dems who voted to authorize the war, Ben.
Ol’ Partisan Pat’s chickens are coming home to roost. He thought he could evade them by resigning from the Senate Intel. committee, but they’re still following him home!
He’s given Kansas another black eye in the annals of history. He is our shame and embarrassment.
An example of ‘What’s The Matter with Kansas’ is that they will vote for Roberts, Brownback and McCain even though McCain proposed legislation making it possible for Airbus to walk away with the contract, and Roberts and Brownback put their stamp of approval on it.
For those who didn’t catch it, I posted an article under Tiahrt Tanker late last night showing why Boeing should have gotten the award.
Pat Roberts repeatedly used his position as Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee to stall, delay, prevent releasing the various reports he promised to deliver regarding the Iraq War. He put his party ahead of his country to prevent the general publics right to have access to this information and the conclusions reached by the professionals.
Pat Roberts is a sneasel, a combination snake/weasel.
…double dipping the federal payroll with her husband another CIA employee…
Double dipping, Jwink??
So if I and my (imaginary) husband are working for the same company…say the USPS (he’s a carrier & I work in the REC)…we’re double dipping?
Do you have a photo of Reagan on the wall and have regular worship services?
Speaking of oversight, how many billions have been ‘lost’ in Iraq? Unaccounted for. How about weapons? How many have been ‘lost’?
This administration seems to think that it is accountable to no one. Time to shorten the leash.
Valerie Plame is a liar and a grand standing political hack and publicity hound.
Joe Wilson, her husband, is a liar and a grand standing political hack and publicity hound.
The entire legal case against Libby should have been dropped:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/16/AR2007021601705_pf.html
Joe Wilson admitted, in a Senate Hearing, that he LIED in his Op-Ed piece! There is no way that Joe Wilson could possibly know about the “forged documents” he mentioned in his Op-Ed, prior to the time that Wilson gave his oral (not written, another Wilson lie) “report” to the CIA upon his return from Niger.
Plame was NOT “undercover” — the CIA saying Plame was “undercover” is like the police chief saying that a police shooting was justified prior to an investagation of the matter.
The CIA does NOT have the power to bring criminal charges against anyone. The CIA does not have the authority, even, to give a legal opinion on the matter.
NO ONE was charged with “outing” Plame.
Those who claim that Plame was “outed” have absolutely nothing to back that up, other than non-binding, non-controlling opinions of non-qualified public officials.
Again, the CIA is NOT qualified to determine if a criminal law was violated.
The case was referred to a competent legal authority, the Independent Prosecutor. The Independent Prosecutor never charged ANYONE with “outing” Plame.
Besides, a very good case can be made that Joe Wilson “outed” his wife, Plame! (But she was not covert, anyway, she had not been outside the United States in the 5 years prior to the Novak story so she was NOT covered by the law in question.)
“Bush’s adversaries quickly concluded that he or someone close to him had illegally “outed” Plame in retribution for her husband’s editorial, and thus a “scandal” was born. Many of them demanded that Karl Rove, the President’s close advisor and an early suspect in the case, be fired immediately. Many more speculated and hoped that the “leak” would ultimately bring Bush down in classic Watergate style.
President Bush appointed a Special Prosecutor to investigate the matter, and thus began one of the most ridiculous episodes in American history. The original conspiracy theory was absurd on its face and has been debunked, but the “mainstream” media has kept most of the American public ignorant of several absurdities that have permeated this case from start to finish. For at least six reasons, the Plame episode was and is a farce.
Reason #1: Plame was not a covert agent when the “leak” occurred
The “mainstream” media routinely refer to Plame as a former “covert” or “undercover” agent, but they almost always conveniently neglect to mention that she had not been one for several years prior to the so-called “leak.” When the “leak” occurred, Plame was working openly at a desk job at CIA headquarters and had been for over five years. Whether or not she was “officially” categorized as covert by the CIA bureaucracy is essentially irrelevant.
Common sense suggests that once an agent works regularly at CIA headquarters, the agent is no longer useful for long-term, high-priority covert work. The law that was supposedly broken sets the threshold at five years, and Plame had exceeded that threshold for not working an extended undercover assignment in a foreign country. Hence, the law about “outing” a covert agent simply did not apply.
The law also requires that the leak be intentional, which is very difficult to prove under any circumstances. When the “outed” agent had been working openly at a desk job at CIA headquarters for several years prior to the “outing,” malicious intent is almost impossible to prove. And when the agent is married to a high-visibility public figure, forget about it.
Victoria Toensing and Bruce W. Sanford wrote in the Washington Post:
“As two people who drafted and negotiated the scope of the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act, we can tell you: The Novak column and the surrounding facts do not support evidence of criminal conduct.”
http://russp.us/Plame.htm
Six Reasons Why the Plame Episode is a Farce:
http://russp.us/Plame.htm
What part of the meaning of “truth” do you guys not understand?
Testimony Of Rep. Henry Waxman:
“Ms. Wilson was a covert employee of the CIA. We cannot discuss all of the details of her CIA employment in open session.
I have met with General Hayden, the head of the CIA, to discuss what I can and cannot say about Ms. Wilson’s service…. I have been advised by the CIA that even now, after all that has happened, I cannot disclose the full nafure, scope, and character of Ms. Wilson’s service to our nation without causing serious damage to our national security interests.
But General Hayden and the CIA have cleared these following comments for today’s hearing.
During her employment at the CIA, Ms. Wilson was under cover.
Her employment status with the CIA was classified information prohibited from disclosure under Executive Order 12958.
At the time of the publication of Robert Novak’s column on July 14,2003, Ms. Wilson’s CIA employment status was covert.”
Source: http://oversight.house.gov/Documents/20070316104030-43341.pdf
Pat Roberts is a liar and a grand standing political hack and publicity hound.
RussP.us is a liar and a grand standing political hack and publicity hound.
David
You are being intentionally obtuse.
What the CIA says does NOT matter!
The LAW in question has specific requirements. Those legal requirements stand alone, the CIA “status” does not matter.
The CIA has no authority to determine if any law was brokent.
Plame was NOT outside the United States in the 5 years prior to the Novak column.
Beyond that, in order to violate the law in question, you must KNOW that you are violating the law.
Hard to prove, when dealing with a desk-job employee who has such a high profile husband!
Again, the entire Plame thing is a FARCE!
Next Tuesday, a Kansan will announce his intention to run against and defeat Sen. Roberts.
Let’s hope Roberts will get swept away with the rest of the Republicans who have failed us these past eight years.
Both Roberts and Brownback have opened the door for two new Democratic senators. Roberts is a shining example of non-feasance when he chaired the Senate Intel Committee. Yahoo Brownback has associated himself with an anti-Catholilc bigot. And both were complicit in shipping thousands of Boeing jobs out of Wichita to France. Amazing. Kansas, a Republican state, with one Blue county out of 105, now has a Democratic governor, a Democratic Lt. Gov., a Democratic AG, and TWO! Democratic members of Congress. Soon to have TWO Democratic United States Senators?
David
Slattery would be wise to stay away from the liars Wilson and Plame.
Those two have NO credibility at all!
LIke I say.. deny the truth all you want. If the CIA calls an agent covert, I think they may probably be covert.
If you say a covert CIA agent is not covert… you can twiddle all the words you want…
Some accuse liberals of making morality ‘relative’. I say making the truth relative far more dangerous.
Obtuse! LOL!
I demonstrate a lack of intelligence … yeah, I am sure you are right. I am not very bright.
Thank you for sweetening my day.
David
So, when a government official claims that you broke the law, that is all we need?
The defininitions and classifications that the CIA uses are not at all important, in a criminal case.
The people who WROTE the law, protecting CIA agents’ identities, say that the law THEY WROTE was NOT violated in the Plame case.
Roberts should have called for an immediate investigation, and damage assessment from the outing, instead of playing partisan politics with the matter
An honorable person would have put his country and those that work to protect it first and foremost above politics.
Roberts, take a clue from many of your compatriots,and do one honorable thing, announce you’ll not be running for re-election.
I don’t even know where to begin, so I don’t even think I’ll try. I learned long ago that it is useless trying to argue with conspiracy-minded individuals such as most of the bloggers on here today. What do you people think? That former-Marine Roberts woke up one morning and said “I think I’m going to get a bunch of my comrades killed today”? If so, you need to go stick your head in a cold bucket of water and re-group. There is one part of the American political system you are so conveniently forgetting in your finger pointing–that while Senator Roberts was chair of the committee, there was a vice chair too who was *Gasp* a Democrat! As someone stated earlier-a limited number of officials had the classified information and half of those officials were dems. If this is all as horrible, corrupt, and evil as everyone on here is suggesting, how did those high-powered dems not notice it or do anything at the time? How convenient that it is all resurfacing NOW–an election year just days before Slattery (finally) formally decides to run. Let’s paint Senator Roberts–who has been working for Kansans and has proved himself to be a noble and hard-working Senator, regardless of what you conspiracy hacks say–as next to kin of the devil. I guess that’s to try to get the Kansans who will absolutely hate recent liberal lobbyist Slattery to see him as the lesser of the two evils? As a proud Kansan, I know that we are smarter than that.
Roberts was the Chairman with a repub. majority, add to that he was calling for increased scrutiny/punishment for leaks, well I mean for leaks that didn’t come from his side of the aisle or from the administration.
He played bush’s defense team, now it catches up with him. Have no mercy (he wouldn’t have).
I don’t even know where to begin, so I don’t even think I’ll try. RedHawk
————-
Followed by MANY words. Sure glad you didn’t “try.” You couldn’t use enough words to make Roberts not guilty of exactly what he is charged with — he failed his duty to exercise prompt oversight.
4 Trackbacks
[…] One Thousand Reasons wrote an interesting post today on Roberts failed at oversight, Wilson saysHere’s a quick excerptShe blames the inaccurate intelligence that led to the Iraq war on the Bush administration but also on the Kansas Republican senator, who… […]
Employment In Iraq…
There is only one thing infamous in love, and that is a falsehood. ~ Paul Bourget…
Faxless Payday Loans…
…
[…] Original post here […]