The Real CIA Leak & Protecting America: Defense Not a Priority for Democrats, but Investigations Are

by: Steve Yuhas

There is something to be said about liberals: they do love their investigations (unless they’re the target or it involves a blue dress).  Last weekend Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) gave the Democrats radio address (isn’t it time to get rid of those – FDR only had a radio, but I digress) saying that she found it “remarkable” that a White House aid, Scooter Libby (Vice President Cheney’s former Chief of Staff), and Tom DeLay (R-TX), the former Majority Leader of the House of Representatives, were both indicted. 

She points out that the redness of the autumn leaves in her home state does not match the redness in the faces of the GOP over the embarrassment given the indictments of Libby for committing the same “crimes” as Martha Stewart and DeLay.

Someone really needs to point out to Mikulski that although indictments akin to what sent Martha Stewart to Camp Cupcake for a few months and the political indictment of Tom DeLay are embarrassing; they certainly don’t reach the level of being the proud party that owns the legacy of scandal and embarrassment.  Did she forget that the only impeached elected (Andrew Johnson was not elected) President in United States history, Bill Clinton, comes from her party?  Or that the gay hooker scandal with Barney Frank belongs to Democrats?  But, the pièce de résistance was the all Democrat funeral turned pep rally for Paul Wellstone.

Talk about an embarrassing party: impeachment, gay hookers and a funeral that not even Hollywood would be proud of – and those are just the personal failings; officially they’re even worse.

Democrats are gloating today because they are not the focus of many investigations, but that is because for the most part they have become irrelevant.  They can hardly pull out a win in New Jersey or Virginia for the governorship and the Terminator ousted one of their own from the most populous state – add the mayoral landslide of another Republican, Michael Bloomberg, and you have a party with nothing to offer and no way to win; except sometimes in court. 

It is true that a few Republicans are under indictment, but since liberals like investigations and their enablers in the mainstream press help push for them it is nice that the GOP decided to give them an early Christmas gift this year: their own investigation, but a real one with important implications that could actually send people to jail for more than not properly thawing your turkey before cooking it.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) and the Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert (R-IL) an investigation into who leaked information about “black sites” to the Washington Post.  These sites are places where detainees captured in Iraq, Afghanistan or anywhere else are allegedly being held so the ACLU cannot take up a cause and challenge their detention in U.S. courts.

In a letter to the chairmen of both the Senate and House Intelligence Committees the leaders said, “If accurate (the Post report), such an egregious disclosure could have long-term and far-reaching damaging and dangerous consequences, and will imperil our efforts to protect the American people and our homeland from terrorist attacks.” 

That is certainly important to find out considering that the people being held in these sites want to cut off our heads and blow up our cities – it would certainly be a crime to leak the information to any newspaper and one would think that Democrats would want to know who leaked the information too.  Not quite; they think finding out who disclosed Valerie Plame’s name (you remember her – the desk analyst at the CIA who sent her husband to Niger to discredit President Bush who was outed by her own husband to a former general at Fox News Channel’s Washington, D.C. bureau and had a cover story in Vanity Fair) is more important than finding out who let loose a secret that could damage our national security and help the terrorists who want to kill us.

You read right: Democrats believe that disclosing the name of someone who was not under cover, not covered by any law, who was outed by her own husband and who was a mere analyst as opposed to the James Bond style CIA operative (the press keeps using “operative” because it is sexier than saying she sat at a desk and read and wrote reports) is more important than disclosing the location of secret sites in which terrorists who, if given the opportunity, would use a chemical, biological or nuclear weapon to blow up an American city may be being held.

In a time of war Democrats are more concerned about a CIA babe working in Virginia instead of the safety of the American people and are not at all ashamed of saying it out loud.  They don’t want an investigation into who leaked information that could hurt us – they only want to talk about things that don’t matter. 

It seems that the sanctity of secret information is a bit skewed on the Democratic side of the aisle since Americans care more about whether or not their families are safe and the terrorists dead (with the next best thing being in jail, secret or otherwise).  But the left only cares whether a woman who writes reports and who has a husband who likes being on TV had their name mentioned by a reporter.

The leaders of the Senate and House directed their respective committee to investigate “the actual and potential damage done to the national security of the United States and our partners in the Global War on Terrorism."  Democrats don’t seem to care because they have their token indictment, but in the world of Washington, D.C. that matters more than anything else: care about the clerk – forget about the safety of the American people.

And they wonder why they lose?

The investigation, the most unusual type: a bicameral one that has only been requested a handful of times since the founding of our nation, will happen and Democrats will still be talking about the indictment of Scooter Stewart, I mean Libby.  Before they know it this investigation will join the ranks of that into the Civil War and September 11th.  This should be a banner day for Democrats because they love investigations, but for some reason they’re just not that excited.  I don’t blame them because it will come out who leaked the information and chances are it was not a Republican.

The leak had to come from inside the CIA or from a disenchanted member of someone on the inside of one of the intelligence committees who found something out.  The Post said it used “current and former intelligence officials and diplomats from three continents” for the story - wouldn’t it be interesting if the investigation pointed right back to a Democrat or a CIA agent who was opposed to the Iraq war?

Investigations are interesting things: there are the important ones – like who leaked secret information about terrorists who want to kill us and there are stupid ones – like who leaked the name Valerie Plame that we now know nobody did: her husband did it in the green room at Fox News.  I like the important ones better, but that’s just a red faced Republican talking, but the good news is at least there is not a Clinton involved.

At least not yet, but there could be a blue dress somewhere...

Steve Yuhas is a columnist and radio talk show host on KOGO AM 600 based in San Diego.  He may be reached at steve@steveyuhas.com or www.steveyuhas.com