For instance, on Feb. 18, 2007, as jurors were about to begin deliberations in the Libby case, the Post editors gave Toensing space on the front page of the Post’s influential Outlook section for a long article in which she insisted that Plame was not “covert” and published “indictments” of other figures in the scandal, including Wilson and Fitzgerald.
Toensing’s claim about Plame’s covert status was legalistic at best, since it obscured the larger point that Plame was working undercover in a classified CIA position and was running agents abroad whose safety would be put at risk by an unauthorized disclosure of Plame’s identity.
But Toensing wasn’t even right about the law. It doesn’t require that a CIA officer be “stationed” abroad in the preceding five years; it simply refers to an officer who “has served within the last five years outside the United States.”
That would cover someone who – while based in the United States – went abroad on official CIA business, as Plame said she had done, according to her sworn testimony at a March 16, 2007, congressional hearing.
At that hearing of the House Oversight Committee, Chairman Henry Waxman also read a statement that had been approved by CIA Director Michael Hayden. The statement described Plame’s status at the CIA as “covert,” “undercover” and “classified.”
“Ms. Wilson worked on the most sensitive and highly secretive matters handled by the CIA,” Waxman’s statement said, adding that her work dealt with “prevention of development and use of WMD against the United States.”
Toensing appeared as a Republican witness at the hearing and was asked about her bald assertion that “Plame was not covert.”
“Not under the law,” Toensing responded. “I’m giving you the legal interpretation under the law and I helped draft the law. The person is supposed to reside outside the United States.”
But that’s not what the law says, either. It says “served” abroad, not “reside.”
When asked whether she had spoken to the CIA or to Plame about Plame’s covert status, Toensing said, “I didn’t talk to Ms. Plame or the CIA. I can just tell you what’s required under the law. They can call anybody anything they want to do in the halls” of the CIA.
In other words, Toensing had no idea about the facts of the matter; she didn’t know how often Plame might have traveled abroad in the five years before her exposure; Toensing didn’t even get the language of the statute correct.
Nevertheless, Toensing was accepted as an expert by the Washington Post’s editors to issue “indictments” of people – like former Ambassador Wilson and special prosecutor Fitzgerald – who had gotten in the way of Bush’s imperial presidency. [For more on this topic, see Consortiumnews.com’s “Shame on the Post’s Editorial Page,” “Smearing Joe Wilson Again” and “Shame on the WPost, Again.”]
A Sad Truth
The sad truth appears to be that the Washington Post can no longer be counted on to be anything like an honest broker, especially when it comes to issues near and dear to the hearts of neocons. Rather the Post’s role is now to set the parameters for whatever debate the neocons find acceptable.
A recent example of how the Post played this role was its decision to publish only pro-Israeli op-eds and editorials – sometimes two a day – during the first 11 days of the Gaza War, which killed more than 1,000 Palestinians including many children and other non-combatants.
On Jan. 2, for instance, neocon ideologue Krauthammer wrote: “Some geopolitical conflicts are morally complicated. The Israel-Gaza war is not. It possesses a moral clarity not only rare but excruciating.”
Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
5
2
2
