Apr 23, 2006 
The war between the Bush Administration and the CIA continues. David Corn spotted this at the end of a Washington Post story on Mary McCarthy:
The White House also has recently barraged the agency with questions about the political affiliations of some of its senior intelligence officers, according to intelligence officials.
Hmm. Porter Goss, the news story says,
… personally oversaw the leak investigation that led to McCarthy’s dismissal, rather than asking the Justice Department to do it — as previous directors had requested in similar probes.
I wonder if Goss checked McCarthy’s political affiliations before he made her a target.
Even the agency’s employment policies have changed: Applicants are now asked more aggressively whether they have any friends in the news media, several agency employees said. And the hurdles to making public statements persist for those who have left: Former CIA agents report that the agency’s process for reviewing what they write about current events has recently become lengthier and more difficult.
If the Bushies had only been half as interested in catching Osama bin Laden as they are in gagging the CIA …
Speaking of McCarthy, head on over to Juan Cole’s place to play “All Right, Not All Right.” Example:
It IS all right for Bush campaign strategist Karl Rove to leak classified intelligence about the identity of Valerie Plame as an undercover CIA operative.
It is NOT all right for CIA employee Mary McCarthy to leak classified information and blow the whistle on secret torture prisons maintained by the US government in Eastern Europe.
Update: See Glenn Greenwald, “Treason by Association” and “Eliminating all checks against lawbreaking.”
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