Feb 05 2006

Novak And Jonathan Landay

Published by at 2:51 pm under All General Discussions,Plame Game

Tom Maguire has linked to a treasure trove of new information on the Plame Game. In this post, Maguire is focused on the redactions and who could be hiding under the blanks:

What other reporter? As of August 2004, Judy Miller had not testified; it is surely not Bob Woodward, nor, from context, could it be Tim Russert.

My educated guess is both reporters must have been leaking classified information about the CIA’s role in the Wilson affair. On Page 3 are these two sentences with two footnotes:

While the initial reporting regarding Ms. Plame’s employment was in a column by syndicated columnist Robert Novak (2), the investigation of unauthorized disclosire is not limited to disclosures to Novak (3).

2. Novak authored a July 14, 2003, Chicago Sun Time column revealing Plame’s purported associattion with the CIA. (A coy of that column is anneced in Exhibit C).

3. Redacted

In seeking to determine the sources for these disclosures, and the motives for the disclosures, the investigation also necessarily has sought to determine whether, as was reported in the Washington Post in September 2003, administration officials called a number of other members of the media in order to reveal information about Ms. Plame.

The investigation has focused primarily on disclosures pre-dating July 14, 2003, the date of Novak’s column.

There is one clear candidate that fits the text I emphasized, and that is the June 12, 2003 article by Jonathan Landay for Knight Ridder – which was nearly 100% accurate in its reporting. Nearly everything in this piece has stood the test of time.

The obvious exception is the Niger forgeries angle, which was the initial major news that Wilson pawned off on Kristof, Pincus and ultimately the nation. Landay had fallen for the Joe and Val stunt – but he had CIA details that were classified and is probably what Fitz-Magoo should have been focused on.

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