Valerie Plame, Nude! [Was today's Slate article inspired by a FR poster?]

Slate ^ | Wednesday, July 6, 2005 | Timothy Noah

[summer]

Valerie Plame, Nude!

Well, without sunglasses and a scarf, anyway.

By Timothy Noah, Slate

Posted Wednesday, July 6, 2005, at 7:40 AM PT


Plame reveals herself in the madding media
crowd. [3rd photo down, on right]

Valerie Plame's career in the Central Intelligence Agency was destroyed by whoever leaked her name to Robert Novak, and that is a terrible wrong. If we ever find out who the leaker is, the president must fire him. (Or them.) That said, I'm starting to weary of the story line that Plame avoids the media spotlight. "She has guarded her privacy" and "shunned publicity," Scott Shane wrote in the July 5 New York Times. That was true once, but it isn't true now. Shane pointed out a glaring exception late in 2003, when Plame "posed with her husband for a Vanity Fair photographer, wearing sunglasses and with a scarf over her blond hair." On Jan. 5, 2004, her husband, Joe Wilson, was quoted telling Howard Kurtz of the Washington Post that there was no remaining national-security reason to continue hiding Plame's face, since her cover was "completely blown." Then why the scarf and sunglasses? "She had to be clothed as generic blonde in order to deal with the genuine concern that some wacko on the street might easily identify her," Wilson explained. "It was just in the interest of personal security." Wilson repeated the need for this precaution in his memoir, The Politics of Truth:

She had already been described as the beautiful blond that she is, and her cover had long since been blown, so the only concern remaining was whether strangers would be able to use a photo to recognize her in public. With proper precautions taken, I saw no reason to deprive ourselves of the pleasure of being photographed together as the happily married couple that we are.

Fair enough. But on Page 70 of the July 2005 Vanity Fair—the one with Nicole Kidman on the cover and Mark Felt's Deep Throat confession inside—there's a photograph of the happy couple at Vanity Fair's party celebrating the Tribeca Film Festival. No scarf and no sunglasses. Plame, seated, is smiling and leaning into the camera. If you're a wacko on the street, please avert your eyes.

[cyncooper]

I really doubt "the leaker" of her "name" committed a crime.

I believe there are other avenues surrounding the story being looked at.

[traderrob6]

Appears Lawrence O'Donnell has changed his tune as well...

http://exposingtheleft.blogspot.com/2005/07/transcriptcnn-newsnight-aaron-brown.html

[dead]

She had already been described as the beautiful blond that she is

“Beautiful” is really too strong. “Doable” is the word he’s looking for.

[cyncooper]

Here's one at a luncheon. Notice the stack of his books:

[LeeHarvey]

From Nathan's Luncheon

They're smiling because they're not wearing any pants..

[LeeHarvey]

Beat me to it by 11 seconds... ;-)

[cyncooper]

They're everywhere!

She accompanied him to a Press Club event, too. I guess the reporters were privy to view her secret countenance but not the average joe.

Except for all these Vanity Fair pics and the luncheon and so on and so on and so on.

[Dashing Dasher]

I think they are talking to you!

[summer]

Thanks for your replies here.

The link in your post #159 on THIS THREAD yesterday is what me really understand this case a lot better.

That's the link to lawyer Victoria Toensing's Washington Post article about the fact there was no crime committed, because she was not covert, since among other factors, she was not living abroad for five years -- and, Victoria Toensing co-wrote the subject federal law in this matter!

i noticed Lawrence lassie O'Donnell quoted her in that article practiclarly word for word last night on CNN. Meanwhile, David Corn and other liberals still have no clue.

I think the real fall-out in this case with respect the blogger point of view, will be the anger the liberal bloggers feel against the journalists who were "protecting" Karl Rove, when Rove had committed no crime -- according to Lawrence O'Donnell NOW -- and had already signed a waiver releasing the reporters from any confidentiality agreement -- which Lawrence O'Donnell STILL hasn't told the bloggers, since doing so would ruin his big "scoop" claim.

This failure of the journalists to get the facts out, when American Prospect already had published facts about Rove a year ago, is what really angered some of the liberal bloggers.

And, I think they are right to be angry at the journalists. It seems to me no journalist was ever threatened with going to jail for protecting Karl Rove!

Also, Victoria Toensing's article you linked to is particularly interesting in light of the fact no one else ever mentioned it recently -- yet, she is the co-author of the subject federal law! Again, only on FR do you get the facts!!

[Republican Red]

I think NRO's Corner was first with it yesterday.

[summer]

Re posts #24 and #25 - Yes! That's the photo I recall seeing on the thread I posted this weekend. So, that was yet ANOTHER photo of her without the scarf and glasses? And Slate dug up a DIFFERENT one? Whoa, this guy and his wife are going to lose public support in a big way with these photos. I am sorry. But, she can't claim a covert status when she doesn't meet the legal requirements AND likes to have her photo taken in the media!!!

[Palladin]

Blonde? Yes.

Beautiful? No.

[summer]

Re my post #29 - It was also very interesting to me that in the link you posted to Toensing's article, she wrote something like this: If Wilson's trip had been "official" then he would have been required to sign a standard confidentiality form -- and he would NEVER have been able to write about it in a NYT Op-Ed piece.

[summer]

Never been able to write about his TRIP, that is.

[1Old Pro]

He looks hammered in that photo. He's drinking all his book profits. I notice they had a glass of water put on the table to make it appear that he's not drinking.

[Republican Red]

Yesterday's (7/5) blog from Byron York at NRO:

VALERIE PLAME, GUARDING HER PRIVACY [Byron York] From an article in today's New York Times about Valerie Plame, the CIA operative at the center of the Plamegate affair and husband of Bush antagonist and former ambassador Joseph Wilson:

Ms. Wilson, 42, whose husband said she has used her married name both at work and in her personal life since their 1998 marriage, declined to speak for this article. She has guarded her privacy, with rare exceptions. She posed with her husband for a Vanity Fair photographer, wearing sunglasses and with a scarf over her blond hair. She drafted an op-ed article to correct what she felt were distortions of her and her husband's actions, but the C.I.A. would not authorize its publication, saying it would ''affect the agency's ability to perform its mission.''

Those were the only two examples given of Plame's rare exceptions to guarding her privacy. Perhaps the Times has not seen the July 2005 issue of Vanity Fair, which contains, in its "Vanities" section, this photograph:



According to Vanity Fair, the photo was taken at the magazine's annual dinner for the Tribeca Film Festival, and Plame's and Wilson's fellow guests included Robert deNiro, Nicole Kidman, Barry Diller, Willem Dafoe, John McEnroe, and many others. Plame's and Wilson's photo appears below a shot of David Bowie and Sean "P. Diddy" Combs. The Times also cites friends who say the privacy-protecting Plame and ambassador Wilson "have had a low-key social life." Posted at 11:57 AM

The Corner

[cyncooper]

But, she can't claim a covert status when she doesn't meet the legal requirements AND likes to have her photo taken in the media!!!

Check this out (I'll find a link later, if I can), when the 9/11 commission did establish that yes, Valerie Plame wrote a memo from her desk at Langley giving her husband's qualifications for the Niger trip, Joe Wilson came out spinning how this was not proof she recommended him and he had been reluctant to go on the trip anyway because they have two tiny twins and (drumroll) ***Valerie was afraid to be left alone for a couple weeks***.

Some fearless double naught spy, eh?

[summer]

Gesh, you know I was VERY sympathetic to her in the beginning, but now -- I think if it's true the Dems demanded this investigation, well, maybe they should first read the subject laws before demanding investigations. What a waste of taxpayer money this has been -- oh, and some journalists made themselves look like idiots. OK. I think we're done here!

[summer]

No trying to hide her name or anything in that caption! And, that IS a different photo than the luncheon photo. Good grief!