Rational Grounds

1. What was the genesis of the trip? (SHAKY).

Redstate gets this one pretty well, in my opinion. Vice President Cheney wanted the Iraq-Niger question checked out, and asked the CIA to look into it. Somewhere in there, Wilson was chosen to go to Africa and report back on the situation. While the exact series of events that transpired between those two points can't be pinned down, it's generally accepted by both sides that Plame had a hand in his selection. Whether this constitutes nepotism or favoritism or meddling or simply helping choose the right man for the job is all up in the air. Fortunately, it's all entirely irrelevant to anything.

Whatever the decision making process, Wilson went to Africa at the behest of the CIA, because Cheney wanted the Iraq-Niger connection looked into. That's the "genesis," and nobody disputes it. Class that one as "SETTLED."

2. Did Iraq seek to purchase yellowcake from Niger? (SHAKY).

"Shaky" means there appears to be an answer, however vaguely sourced, as opposed to still being a "Burning Question." Shaky here, I believe, means they think that Iraq did try to purchase the yellowcake, but they can't quite prove it.

Considering that the original claim of a Niger-Iraq connection was based on forged documents, that belief seems to rest solely on this New York Times article, which gives prominent play to the right-wing spin on the affair from back in July 2004. The article is primarily on two new reports investigating the Niger-Iraq issue and other intelligence irregularities leading up to the Iraq War. Here are the key grafs:

One of the reports was released on Wednesday by a British commission reviewing the intelligence used by Prime Minister Tony Blair in making the case for war. The report stood by the British intelligence assessments that were the foundation for Mr. Bush's statement. Though it did not explain in any detail how or why it judged the intelligence to be sound, the report concluded that the assertions by Mr. Bush and Mr. Blair about Iraq's attempts to acquire uranium were "well founded."

The other report came from the Senate Intelligence Committee. It generally found extensive problems with the prewar intelligence assessments about Iraq's weapons programs and in particular documented a long chain of problems in the way the intelligence agencies dealt with suspicions about Iraq's interest in acquiring uranium.

But it also contained some information that tended to bolster the view that Iraq had tried to acquire uranium from Niger and possibly one or two other African nations. It cited a statement by a French official to the State Department in late 2002 that France, which was resisting Mr. Bush's efforts to make an urgent case for war, "believed the reporting was true that Iraq had made a procurement attempt for uranium from Niger." Neither report, however, found evidence that Iraq had actually purchased any uranium from Niger.

The new reports also raised questions about one of the White House's chief critics over the issue, Joseph C. Wilson IV, a former ambassador sent to Niger in 2002 to investigate whether Iraq had tried to purchase uranium there. Among other things, the report pointed out that Mr. Wilson's official account to the C.I.A. noted that a former prime minister of Niger had told him that he had been approached in 1999 about meeting with an Iraqi delegation interested in "expanding commercial relations" between Niger and Iraq. The former prime minister told Mr. Wilson that he interpreted the approach to mean the Iraqis were interested in acquiring a form of uranium.

So what we have is this. The Brits stand by their story, but won't say why. The U.S. investigation turned up a French official who said he had believed the story in 2002. I think we can dismiss those pieces of evidence as laughable.

The last paragraph is a little more prickly. It is evidence that once, three years prior to Wilson's trip, Iraq had broached the idea of buying uranium with Niger. So if you interpret "recently" to mean "within the last three or four years" and "sought significant quantities of uranium" to mean "hinted at wanting to maybe buy some uranium" then Bush's 16 words are true. They at least demonstrate that Iraq at 1999 had a will to pursue nuclear weapons, a fact that is not much in dispute.

However, if this is all the evidence we have of the Deal, then we don't have any evidence. A one-time exploratory message to a Nigerien diplomat is a basis for further investigation, not conclusions.

The Times article refers to further, still classified, sections of the British and U.S. reports. Redstaters are welcome to believe that those conclusions are contained there. I think that a Republican White House, Republican House and Senate, and an embattled British government could find a way - in an election year - to let people know if they were really exonerated on this one. I classify this question a "SOLID" no.

3. Did Wilson violate the law by leaking to Pincus and Kristof? (SHAKY)

I really don't know where this questions comes from. The only article Redstate uses to back up this allegation is a Weekly Standard article attacking Wilson's interviews with reporters after everything went public for being sloppy on the details. There's no mention of illegality at all. I classify this question as "WHA...?"

4. Were Wilson's claims about his trip to Niger truthful? (SOLID)

The link from the question above is actually much more relevant here, and I don't dispute the literal claim. Yes, Wilson seems to have used "literary flair" when talking to reporters in the Spring and Summer of 2003. Specifically, he didn't know documents were forged when he said he knew, and there is doubt as to when specific people in the Administration knew that the Niger-Iraq connection was badly sourced.

The core message remains the same, however. Whatever the bureaucratic trajectory of the forged documents or analysts' warnings throughout 2002-2003, the Administration knew enough in October 2002 to remove any statements about Niger and uranium from the President's speeches. The documents were, in fact, forged. And, per question two above, there is no basis for believing that the Niger-Iraq connection ever existed. Yet Bush announced that we believed in it, or announced that the British believed in it which was rhetorically identical, in his January 2003 State of the Union speech. In this, Wilson has always been correct.

5. Did Wilson claim that Dick Cheney sent him on the trip to Niger? (SOLID)

Here, we agree - No. Nothing to add, except to say that this should thus be "SETTLED."

6. Did Valerie Plame "authorize" the trip? (SETTLED)

No again, and again no beef.

7. Is Wilson a partisan? (SOLID)

Well, yes. He consulted for the Kerry campaign beginning in 2004 - that should qualify. Whenever you hear the Right lambast someone for being a "partisan Democrat" there's rarely much talk of their reasons for being a partisan. I would think that motives would be more important in judging a person's credibility than party affiliation, but that's me. On this question, "SETTLED."

8. Did Karl Rove intend to out Valerie Plame? (SHAKY)

The claim here rests on a particular interpretation of "background" (or "double super secret background" or whatever) now being pushed by Rove's attorney. The story goes, Karl Rove was giving some secret advice to a reporter against pursuing a story he said was false and inadvertently divulged Plame's role as an undercover CIA operative. Matt Cooper then went and willy-nilly published their conversation in Time.

The trouble is, that's not what background means. Backgrounds means that the source of the information isn't to be named, not that the information isn't to be published. If Rove didn't want Cooper to know about Plame, all he had to do was keep his mouth closed. If he was that concerned with warning Matt Cooper away from covering Wilson's allegations (allegations that were at heart true, remember) he could have easily done that without mentioning Plame or Plame's relationship to Wilson.

I'll label this as a "SHAKY" yes (not Redstate's SHAKY no), if only because the truth of Rove's actions and intentions are still to be determined by the investigation.

9. Was Valerie Plame's identity a secret? (SHAKY).

If valerie Plame was not undercover, no law was broken. The CIA would have had no reason to ask for an investigation. No investigation would be taking place - you don't convene a grand jury unless you are pretty sure that there's something to investigate. End of discussion.

SOLID yes.

10. Where did Rove learn of Plame's identity? (BURNING QUESTION)

This I agree is a truly Burning Question. There's some interesting speculation about John Bolton here, but basically this one hasn't even been addressed in public yet.

11. Did Karl Rove break the law? (SOLID)

That SOLID, according to Redstate, is a no. A ballsy conclusion, seeing as that's what Fitzgerald is trying to determine. This question is actually just a rephrasing of question 9. If Valerie Plame was undercover, it certainly appears that Rove broke the law in revealing her CIA affiliation to Matt Cooper.

12. Did Karl Rove release Miller and Cooper in Jan/Dec? (SOLID)

That's a SOLID yes. Now, I don't know what conversations Rove might have had with Judith Miller, so I'll leave that be. Matt Cooper stayed mum even after Rove signed a blanket waiver because he didn't think it was really voluntary. If Rove had refused to sign the waiver, it would have been a veritable admission of guilt. So Cooper wanted a more specific release before he talked.

Sounds like a stand-up guy to me. But Karl Rove did sign the blanket waiver, so technically he did release Cooper in Jan/Dec. So yes, we are agreed.

13. Did President Bush promise to fire anyone involved in the leak? (SOLID)

That's a SOLID no, and I agree. What Bush said was, "if there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. And if the person has violated law, the person will be taken care of." Now, it's reasonable to interpret this as meaning that Bush would fire the person responsible. But that's not quite what he said. I find the distinction meaningless, but there you go.