While I’m sure the White House would love nothing more than to see Congress, the Justice Department, and everyone else forget all about the illegal leak of an undercover CIA agent, the story is nevertheless managing to stay in the news.
The New York Times reported today that a group of former CIA agents, who apparently take undercover status pretty seriously, are demanding that Congress begin an immediate investigation into the scandal. So far, since it’s a Republican Congress and a Republican White House, the former “law-and-order” party has seemed completely indifferent to this scandalous breach of national security.
“The disclosure of Ms. Plame’s name was an unprecedented and shameful event in American history and, in our professional judgment, has damaged U.S. national security, specifically the effectiveness of U.S. intelligence-gathering using human sources,” the former agents wrote in a two-page letter to House leaders.
The former agents’ request “reflects discontent and unrest within the intelligence services about the affair, along with concern that a four-month-old Justice Department investigation into the matter may never identify who was behind the disclosure,” the Times reported.
The article added, “It is unusual for former intelligence officers to petition Congress on a matter like this. The unmasking of Ms. Plame is viewed within spy circles as an unforgivable breach of secrecy that must be exhaustively investigated and prosecuted, current and former intelligence officials say. Anger over the matter is especially acute because of the suspicion, under investigation by the Justice Department, that the disclosure may have been made by someone in the White House to punish Ms. Plames’s husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, for opposing administration policy on Iraq.”
I’d really love to hear an explanation from congressional Republican leaders as to why this matter does not warrant any attention from Congress. When Clinton was in the White House, the GOP held hearings at the drop of a hat. Here, we have fairly concrete evidence that at least two White House officials leaked the name of an undercover CIA agent, violating federal law, out of spite for a political critic. And what do we hear from the GOP? A collective yawn.
At this point, all Congress seems willing to do is dodge the issue and pretend nothing happened. The demands of these former CIA agents will, at a minimum, keep the pressure on.
In the meantime, congressional Democrats are also keeping the issue alive. Rep. Rush Holt (D-N.J.) unveiled a resolution yesterday to authorize an independent House inquiry into the scandal.
If you were so inclined, you could certainly contact your member of Congress to ask for his or her support on Holt’s resolution. Just a thought.