I just wrote a
post at Needlenose about a curiously written story by Walter Pincus in the
Washington Post tonight.
Taken at face value, the story examines the conflicting accounts of why Joseph Wilson was sent to Niger in 2002 -- was it because his wife suggested him, or not?
Although the article doesn't make this point explicitly, I think Pincus is intentionally noting that the version of events Rove, Libby, and whoever were blabbing to reporters before Novak outed Valerie Plame matches the classified State Dept. memo they claim wasn't their source ... and no other known account of how Wilson's trip happened.
Pincus sez, in the
Post article:
. . . the CIA has maintained that Wilson was chosen for the trip by senior officials in the Directorate of Operations counterproliferation division (CPD) -- not by his wife -- largely because he had handled a similar agency inquiry in Niger in 1999. . . .
. . . Senior Bush administration officials told a different story about the trip's origin in the days between July 8 and July 12, 2003. They said that Wilson's wife was working at the CIA dealing with weapons of mass destruction, and she suggested him for the Niger trip, according to three reporters.
Pincus then goes on to name the three reporters -- himself, Matt Cooper of Time magazine, and Plame leak trigger-man Bob Novak, all of whom have related the story of what they were told in previously published accounts.
But, so what? Who cares if Karl Rove, Lewis Libby, and whoever else may have blabbed about Joe Wilson's wife all told a version of events that the CIA denies? Pincus coyly explains in a paragraph toward the end of his story:
Two other sources appear to support the view that Wilson's wife suggested her husband's trip. One is a June 2003 memo by the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR). The other, which depends in good part on the INR document, is a statement of the views of Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, and two other Republican members.
In other words, in the course of an apparent inquiry into who sent Joseph Wilson to Niger, Pincus seems to "accidentally" stumble onto the discovery that the only document backing up the White House/Republican viewpoint is ... the State Department memo.
You know, the same State Department memo that would get Karl Rove and Lewis Libby in deep trouble if it was shown to be their source of information about Valerie Plame Wilson.
Why did the story they told reporters match the State Dept. memo, but not any other known account of how Joe Wilson's trip was arranged? It's not such an innocent question when you think about it, is it?