Open Topic Sunday ... McCarthy Fallout

I can't sleep, so I decided to get a jump on today. It is Sunday, and I'd like to continue addressing the subject of Mary McCarthy, and her recent firing for being found as a leaker in the CIA. Let me concur with the "kids" that she has committed a crime, and should be punished. The law--18 USC 798--has been broken, and the punishment calls for fines, and no less than ten years in jail. I concur. Ring her up.

But I'd like to call into question the thinking of our fearless leader. Maybe it's the cold meds. Maybe he was thinking ahead of his typing, but he contradicted himself last night in his post taking Tim Rutten of the LA Times to task. Mr. Rutten wrote the A-typical media circle-the-wagons column defending James Risen, Eric Lichtblau, and Dana Priest for their Pulitzer-Prize winning pieces of perfidy. Risen and Lichtblau I could care less about. They did break the law in participating in a "conspiracy" to publish a clandestine operation being conducted by an intelligence agency of the United States government; one which is a necessary tool in the Global War on Terror.

And despite a few people about to have a proverbial cow when I say this, I'd like to defend Dana Priest.

Mary McCarthy was the focus of an intensive "mole hunt" in the CIA. They were trying to figure out who had leaked classified information. So, what do you do when you have a mole? You feed it disinformation. You have to narrow the list first, then feed that disinformation to a number of sources. If you limit who is privy to this information, you can track it. Mary McCarthy specifically did that. She took the knowledge she had--that being the CIA Euro-prison story--and handed it over to Dana Priest. It is likely that Ms. McCarthy provided everything in the story needed for Ms. Priest, and no further information was needed. I'm aware that Ms. Priest cited another source in that story, and I'm sure the CIA would love to know who that is. Of course, she could have also made up that source, content that she had all she needed for the story directly from Ms. McCarthy. If there is another source, Ms. Priest needs to come clean with that.

But what is peculiar is that, in reality, there is no story.

The EU's investigation concluded that there are no CIA-run prisons in Europe, to their knowledge. They haven't found them, nor any evidence that any such place existed. And that is despite the fifty hours of testimony EU investigators stated they collected from "by human rights activists and individuals who said they were abducted by US intelligence agents." In truth, this is what investigators had to say, according to the Boston Globe:

Investigations into reports that US agents shipped prisoners through European airports to secret detention centers have produced no evidence of illegal CIA activities, the European Union's antiterrorism coordinator said yesterday.

The investigations also have not turned up any proof of secret renditions of terror suspects on EU territory, Gijs de Vries told a European Parliament committee investigating the allegations.

And to the liberals out there that are already trying to turn this around, no, the administration never stated that the prisons were up and running. In point of fact, the Globe contradicts that assumption in the same story:

The US has never confirmed or denied the renditions. The committee plans to go to Washington to interview former and current CIA officials and Bush administration officials.

But, back to my point: If they never existed, then what was Ms. Priest writing about? She was writing about the disinformation handed to Ms. McCarthy to catch her leaking information. Ms. Priest, in fact, committed no crime, as it stands. The story is false. The person who committed the crime was Ms. McCarthy. REGARDLESS of whether it was true for her, she did break her security agreement with the CIA, and can be prosecuted for that. As far as she knew, and as far as she was told, that information was classified. Her leaking it does not change the crime, nor is the crime altered by the fact the story is false.

However, that does let Ms. Priest off the hook. She, technically, revealed no classified information in her report, because the entire story was bogus. It was all to ferret out a leaker.

Now, to Marcie's point, and a well-made one at that, regarding Joe Wilson and Mary McCarthy. Did she arrange his Niger trip? It doesn't appear she had "direct" involvement with it. In 2001, she started working for Center for Strategic and International Studies. (That is the cached page as CSIS has already removed her biography from their page.) But, as you can see, she was working for them in 2001. Joe Wilson's trip took place in 2002. The dates don't correspond. Now this doesn't mean she might not have had a hand in it, but I doubt direct involvement. She may have made a call or two, but I'd speculate right now that was the end of it for her.

But I would like to bring up something new thanks to Curt at Flopping Aces. Did you know that CSIS has some interesting people that are also members of CSIS?

Zbigniew Brzezinski — Counselor and Trustee, CSIS
General Wesley Clark USA (Ret.), Distinguished Senior Adviser
General Anthony Zinni USMC (Ret.), Distinguished Senior Adviser

As Lestat remarked in "Interview with a Vampire" (sorry, I watched it last night), "One big, happy family." Yes, it is, and now some pieces are starting to fall into place as to where these retired, loud-mouthed, loose-lipped generals might be coming from, and what sort of problem the Clinton years may have placed in our intelligence agencies. And no, to those on the Left that do come here and read, I'm not revisiting the Clintons. Just their mistakes. They did put trust in Sandy Berger, who, by the way, promoted this woman. The same Sandy Berger caught stealing files from the National Archives last year. This is the same administration that trusted klutzes like Richard Clarke to handle counter-terrorism for the nation. And he had such a stellar cast backing him up. We also watched that administration erect a wall between law enforcement intelligence agencies and military intelligence agencies so they couldn't share information. What galls me is the Patriot Act ripped that wall down, and a couple of rogue FISA judges tried to erect it again, leading to In re: Sealed Case where the FISA Court of Review had to chastise the FISA judges for doing that; basically contravening a law passed by Congress.

Yes, they wreaked plenty of havoc within out intelligence agencies, and obviously had fun doing it. So much fun that their minions in those agencies now are doing their best to hurt this nation, no matter the cost, and all for their "glory" as a "whistleblower." Even though Mary McCarthy knew if she were to be caught, she'd be in more trouble than she wanted to deal with. This was a matter of finding the right story to blow. At least for her, or so I'd suppose.

This story is far from over. It's just now starting to get legs, and the blogs will force the media to address this. Especially if the Pulitzer people reexamine that story that Ms. Priest won her award for, and determine that she doesn't deserve the award after all. One of their own will have been harmed, and then their attention will quickly turn to savaging Ms. McCarthy for setting up one of them up. Then, the media will take notice.

And there will be Hell to pay.

Mistress Pundit