Thirteen Burning Questions Revisited (Plus a Few New Ones!)

Given the recent flood of revelations that have come out in the Karl Rove/Valerie Plame scandal, I thought it might be time to revisit our Thirteen Burning Questions and see where we stand, and if any new questions have surfaced.

1. What was the genesis of the trip? (SHAKY) No movement to speak of on this question. We're still left with the conclusion that the CIA instituted the trip after hearing a question from Cheney. The role that Plame played in securing Wilson for the trip is still unclear. However, it is becoming increasingly clear that there was, in fact, an a priori partisan agenda that motivated the trip in the first place.

2. Did Iraq seek to purchase yellowcake from Niger? (SHAKY). Zero movement on this question.

3. Did Wilson violate the law by leaking to Pincus and Kristof? (SHAKY) This is becoming a much more relevant question, especially considering that some pretty intelligent people including yours truly are of the opinion that Wilson himself is to blame for his wife's identity becoming public knowledge, at the very least among the press. I'm seeking answers from the Baseball Crank at this moment about Wilson's potential exposure for discussing information that, by all rights, he should not have seen, to the press. Nick Danger has an incredibly plausible theory about how all this came about.

4. Were Wilson's claims about his trip to Niger truthful? (SOLID). No movement on this, but we note this in order to mock it. Silly Seattle Times. Michael Barone takes a closer look, and Wilson comes off looking even worse.

5. Did Wilson claim that Dick Cheney sent him on the trip to Niger? (SOLID) No. No movement.

6. Did Valerie Plame "authorize" the trip? (SETTLED) No. Despite the strident dissent of RedState poster AJStrata, I just don't see how Plame had the pull to pull this off by herself. It certainly is possible that she hoodwinked someone farther up the chain, for sure, but that is different from "authorizing" it oneself.

7. Is Wilson a partisan? (SOLID) Yes. This is one that is becoming more and more solid as the time goes by. The newest tidbit is that Wilson is planning on visiting numerous house parties with notorious moonbat John Conyers to discuss Rovegate and the Downing Street Memo. The man simply has no shame.

8. Did Karl Rove intend to out Valerie Plame? (SOLID) No. We are moving this from shaky to solid, because the deluge of information that has come out over the last week pretty clearly indicates that Rove's leak was not part of an orchestrated campaign of retribution against Wilson, and further it seems that he did not know Plame was even CIA.

9. Was Valerie Plame's identity a secret? (SOLID). No. We have moved this into a solid "no" category, being that the CIA declined to tell Novak not to reveal her identity, and also given the revelations of her former boss that Plame's identity was no secret. It appears that Andrea Mitchell was pretty spot-on about this.

10. Where did Rove learn of Plame's identity? (SHAKY). We have moved this from "Burning Question" to "Shaky", because at last we have evidence from Rove-friendly sources that he learned this information from the media. Now, no liberal source has offered an alternate version of events thus far, but before we move it into "Solid", we're going to give them a chance.

11. Did Karl Rove break the law? (SOLID) No. Given the firming up of answer 8, we are just about to move this one into "Settled." Awaiting the Baseball Crank's analysis before we take that final step.

12. Did Karl Rove release Miller and Cooper in Jan/Dec? (SOLID). Yes. No real movement here.

13. Did President Bush promise to fire anyone involved in the leak? (SOLID) No. It is equally solid that the New York Times is determined to perpetuate this myth. We're unconcerned.

I've also decided to add some further questions that hopefully will be answered soon:

1. If George Tenet was Novak's first source, can it reasonably be claimed that the CIA was attempting to protect Valerie Plame's identity?

2. If Karl Rove is not a "target" of this investigation, who is?

3. Has the New York Times been deliberately hiding exculpatory evidence while simultaneously slinging mud on Karl Rove?

4. If Judith Miller's source was Valerie Plame, will Democrats demand that she be prosecuted for outing herself?

Discuss.

UPDATE: PatHMV throws us a different sort of curve. We'll see what the legal eagles say.

Comments

[Ray Powell]

A corrollary to 'If Karl Rove is not a "target" of this investigation, who is?' would be: 'If Plame was not a covert agent, wouldn't the special prosecutor know that by now?' and 'Is this an investigation in search of a crime?' What am I missing here?

[DW West]

Point 8 - Rove certainly did know that Plame was CIA, telling Cooper that she apparently worked at the "Agency"

Point 9 - You have one former CIA person saying that her identity was not secret, and many other CIA people saying that it was secret. This is far from solid.

Why do you continually refer to those not defending Rove as liberals? It should be obvious by now that many conservatives are not happy with the politically-inspired outing of a CIA employee, the lying about it, and the refusal of the White House to take responsibility. By now you've seen the ABC polling - only 47% of Republicans think the White House is fully cooperating with the investigation, and Republicans overwhelmingly want Rove fired if he leaked classified information (not only if he is convicted for a crime).

[DW West]

Thinking about your theory that Wilson and Plame cooked the whole thing up to embarrass Bush...

The trip to Niger was in February 2002, just 5 months after 9/11. At that time there was great support for Bush, and even his opponents were rallying around the War on Terror. It is doubtful in these circumstances that an ex-diplomat and active CIA analyst involved on the WMD file would even think about mounting a rogue operation, let alone carry it out.