Just to follow up on the last post, the universe of reporters with direct knowledge of the Novak Two is fairly big. And while they’re not revealing their sources to the public, they’re not shy about talking to other reporters.
In the Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz’s media column today, he noted that he spoke to one of the journalists approached with the leak. This reporter told Kurtz on Monday that the White House officials were leaking because “they thought Wilson was having a good ride” in the media. “They just thought Wilson was being turned into a saint.”
Not only does this point to an explanation as to why the White House would be so stupid as to leak classified information, Kurtz is also demonstrating a more important fact: Reporters who know the identity of the leakers are willing to chat with their colleagues about the whole affair.
With this in mind, it’s going to be very difficult to keep this a secret very long. Woodward and Bernstein (and maybe Ben Bradlee) are the only ones to know who Deep Throat is, so it’s been relatively easy to keep that one a secret for 30 years. The identity of the Novak Two, meanwhile, seems to be all over town.