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No, you missed the point... he is ANONYMOUS. That's telling me he didn't get approval.

I think you're being a bit naive here. This isn't a pamphlet being circulated for free. It's a commercial endeavor, and the author will be paid for his product. Now, I know the CIA has its failings, but it wouldn't be too difficult for them to find out who he is if they didn't know already.

The "anonymous" nom de plume was probably required by the Agency so that no extrapolations could be made from his actual name. Once identified publicly, the author's identity would present a series of dots that other intelligence agencies could connect.

But I suppose you could be right, that he did not receive approval. If that's the case, we probably won't hear from him for very long.

Actually, no, Mr. Bird, I'm not naive at all about this. I happen to know a little something about the subjects here... that is writing, working for the government, clearances and what sort of rules folks are under about writing material and publishing it. --- However, I will grant you this, let's assume for a minute that his book was approved (which it probably was?), then why be "anonymous"?

Secondarily, the book COULD have been approved solely on it's LACK of material which may (or may not) have been considered "classified". Usually, political statements by anyone are open to interpertation and if the fella is going on and on with opinion (and no, I have not read the book, I'm merely postulating here) then there is literally nothing ANYONE can do about it.

That's why big, loud-mouthed liars can become president (Clinton) and other big, loud-mouthed liars can make movies (Moore) and others can behead innocent people without anyone really seeming to get upset (except us) while everyone is OUTRAGED over alleged "torture" (yelling, prodding and making terrorists miss a little sleep).

So you see, there is plenty here to think about. Most IMPORTANTLY is that no matter WHAT you write (me included) the material (based on clearances you held) have to be read and approved before you can publish. If I want to write a SCI-FI thriller, I have to go get it approved to make sure I don't accidently include anything that MIGHT be classified (even if I GUESS at it and have no clue something might exist).

My point wasn't naive at all, it was factual, in that IF this guy really worked for CIA he had a clearance of some level. Depending on that level, he might or might not have been exposed to particular peices of intelligence that might or might not have been classified (at the time) and thus, perhaps is giving out something to those we don't really want to know (like where, how or from whom we obtained that intel).

Make sense?