Valerie Plame: Cause For Bitterness

Valerie Plame’s new book, Fair Game, hits the shelves and the outted CIA Agent turned author is on the publicity circuit peddling the tell-all which will finally give, from her point of view, the facts on the incidents surrounding her outting.

To date, I still find the recounting of the events leading to her outting in the book Hubris to be sufficiently upsetting enough, and I can only imagine that the disappointment and danger that Plame’s telling will undoubtedly evoke will be all the worse.

Indeed, the Wilsons have had much to be angry for over the past few years; one an obscure diplomat, the other a spy, and both thrust into the spotlight with their names dragged over the coals over what was, truthfully, a patriotic attempt to put the brakes on America’s needless march to war.

And through it all, Plame has made considerably little noise, though she would be most definately justified in doing so.

What am I talking about? In 2004 the FBI received intelligence that Al Qaeda hit teams were enroute to the United States to kill Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, and Valerie Plame. The FBI informed Valerie of this threat. This was just more “good” news piled on the fact that her intelligence career was in shambles, that intelligence assets she had recruited/managed were destroyed, and that she was unable to rebut publicly false and malicious smears of her character and reputation by a bunch of partisan Republican hacks. As the mother of two pre-school children, her first thoughts were about protecting her kids. She took the threat seriously and asked for help.

When the White House learned of these threats they sprung into action. They beefed up Secret Service protection for Vice President Cheney and provided security protection to Karl Rove. But they declined to do anything for Valerie. That was a CIA problem.

Valerie contacted the office of Security at CIA and requested assistance. They told her too fucking bad and to go pound sand. They did not use those exact words, but they told her she was on her own.

In truth, what Valerie has experienced is, in essence, no different that the same kind of hostility that anyone against the Iraq invasion has ever experienced from the beginning.  The Administration had, from day one, engaged in wholesale subjugation of anyone not in line with its neoconservative agenda, particularly in Iraq, blackballing politicians, and labeling dissenters unpatriotic.

It was Plame’s position in the CIA that made things unique.  In being so indiscriminate in the wrath they visited upon those who would be the rational voice of dissent, the Administration demolished the career of a valued CIA employee, and put her life in danger.

This says something about the character of the Bush administration, its blatant audacity and apathy towards the people it employs and governs.  This only highlights how truly dangerous this guise of our government has become to the people who put it in place, and the sheer arrogance with which it pursues its policies.

But then, we knew this already.  Did Valerie Plame really need to be made an example out of?