home

Waas: Bush Ordered CIA to Cooperate With Woodward

Now we know. Leaks of classified information for political purposes are okay for Bush and Cheney, but not for others.

Murray Waas tonight writes about a letter Sen. Jay Rockefeller, Vice Chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee sent to John Negroponte, Director of National Intelligence.

What prompted Rockefeller to write Negroponte was a recent op-ed in the New York Times by CIA director Porter Goss complaining that leaks of classified information were the fault of "misguided whistleblowers."

Rockefeller charged in his letter that the most "damaging revelations of intelligence sources and methods are generated primarily by Executive Branch officials pushing a particular policy, and not by the rank-and-file employees of intelligence agencies."

Later in the same letter, Rockefeller said: "Given the Administration's continuing abuse of intelligence information for political purposes, its criticism of leaks is extraordinarily hypocritical. Preventing damage to intelligence sources and methods from media leaks will not be possible until the highest level of the Administration cease to disclose classified information on a selective basis for political purposes."

Case in point: Bob Woodward. Waas reports:

....officials on the "seventh floor" of the CIA were literally ordered by then-CIA director George Tenet to co-operate with Woodward's project because President Bush personally asked that it be done. More than one CIA official co-operated with Woodward against their best judgment, and only because they thought it was something the President had wanted done or ordered.

One former senior administration official explained to me: "This was something that the White House wanted done because they considered it good public relations. If there was real damage to national security--if there were leaks that possibly exposed sources and methods, it was not done in this instance for the public good or to expose Watergate type wrongdoing. This was done for presidential image-making and a commercial enterprise--Woodward's book."

As Digby says,

The Bush adminstration suffers from terminal hubris, so I am not sure they completely understand the implications of this. They seem to think they can get away with "leaking" classified information for political purposes with impunity while screaming to high heaven about real whistelblowers leaking classified information to expose wrongdoing by them. There was a time they could do that sort of thing and get away with it. I suspect that time is past. There is too much blood in the water.

< Cheney Accident Becomes Cheney Scandal? | Ghost Air Made 74 Landings in Canada >
  • The Online Magazine with Liberal coverage of crime-related political and injustice news

  • Contribute To TalkLeft


  • Display: Sort:
    Re: Waas: Bush Ordered CIA to Cooperate With Woodw (none / 0) (#1)
    by aw on Fri Feb 24, 2006 at 06:43:08 AM EST
    Bush did it? That's okay then.

    Re: Waas: Bush Ordered CIA to Cooperate With Woodw (none / 0) (#2)
    by Edger on Fri Feb 24, 2006 at 07:48:34 AM EST
    You can't hide your lyin' eyes And your smile is a thin disguise I thought by now you'd realize There ain't no way to hide your lyin' eyes


    Re: Waas: Bush Ordered CIA to Cooperate With Woodw (none / 0) (#3)
    by mjvpi on Fri Feb 24, 2006 at 08:24:34 AM EST
    The administration wasn't worried about the NSA leaks when they thought that they had surpressed the NYT. It was only a big deal after the story broke.

    Re: Waas: Bush Ordered CIA to Cooperate With Woodw (none / 0) (#4)
    by john horse on Sat Feb 25, 2006 at 04:37:25 AM EST
    " And if there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. And if the person has violated law, the person will be taken care of." George Bush in response to a question about Valerie Plame.