Missed the live broadcast of Countdown, but fortunately remembered to catch the tape delayed West Coast version. Joe Wilson, once again, showed how to stand up to weasely thugs (apologies to weasels). In doing so, he also demonstrated (again), that he's in good standing--pun intended--with the vertebrate community:
[OLBERMANN:] Thank you again for your time tonight, sir.
JOSEPH WILSON, FORMER ACTING AMBASSADOR TO IRAQ: Hi, Keith. Good to be with you.
OLBERMANN: The president says today he declassified the NIE to show the American people the truth, yet the information that was in it had already been thoroughly debunked as, at best, wildly unreliable.
The White House says the president had been (INAUDIBLE) -- did not know it had been debunked. Do you find that all plausible?
WILSON: Well, of course, over the weekend, there was a lot of reporting that fleshed out the assessment of the total document, the National Intelligence Estimate. I had known for a long time, since the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report came out, that the Senate was informed in October of 2002, and the White House shortly thereafter, that, in the judgment of the CIA and the intelligence community, the British had stretched and/or exaggerated the case of uranium sales from Africa to Iraq.
The national intelligence officer wrote a piece in the middle of January, again, before the State of the Union address, in which he said, as you pointed out, the charge was baseless.
And all—the president, I think, is laudable in wanting this information to have come out. I would have loved to have had it come out after my opinion piece appeared, because it would, of course, have substantiated what I said in that opinion piece.
Instead, Mr. Libby leaked certain portions of it, which were not sustainable by all the facts. And my wife and I have had to endure a three-year smear campaign, orchestrated, as the filing says, by multiple sources in the White House and elements within the RNC and the right-wing echo chamber.
OLBERMANN: Multiple officials in the White House, to quote it exactly from Mr. Fitzgerald‘s documents that came out over the weekend, the vice president‘s named as a designer of the plan, we have Mr. Libby‘s name mentioned in there, Mr. Rove. Even at this late date, are you surprised by how big this effort to discredit you and your wife allegedly was?
WILSON: Well, I had been told a couple of years ago that it was a group of people around the office of the vice president. I hoped then, and I hope now, that it didn‘t extend to constitutional officers, the president or the vice president.
I think we would benefit from their releasing the White House transcripts of their conversations with Mr. Fitzgerald, so we can all know precisely what they knew then and what they testified to.
OLBERMANN: Do you believe that what the president said today amounted to an admission to starting this ball rolling, or this snowball going downhill?
WILSON: Well, I think the president was well within his rights to declassify the entire document. I would have loved that, as I said. It was really just the selective leaking of portions of it that are—should be some—troublesome.
I‘d also point out, of course, that the declassification of the document was not matched by a publication of the document. It was selectively leaked to one reporter, and it was a perpetuation, essentially, of the disinformation campaign that had been in place when they made the State of the Union address in the first place.
OLBERMANN: Mr. Fitzgerald still has not filed any charges that directly relate to the leaking of your wife‘s name or any other secret information. He made it clear from the beginning of this that he was probably not going down that route.
If this is all we get prosecutorially, are you satisfied? Do you feel vindicated?
WILSON: Well, let me just say, first of all, that Mr. Fitzgerald has said repeatedly, both in the indictment and in subsequent filings, that Valerie was a classified officer, and as a consequence, she was covered by law.
And anybody who leaked her name is in violation of the national security of the country, even if it‘s not prosecutable. It‘s the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. It is what is called in the business a security violation.
I find it appalling that the president continues to retain on his staff these multiple White House officials who were involved in leaking her name, beginning with Karl Rove. I believe he‘s betrayed the national security of the country. I believe he and the others have betrayed the public trust of the country. I can‘t imagine the president wanting them still on his staff.
OLBERMANN: I mentioned earlier that today there were two more defenders of the administration who insisted still, today, that Iraq indeed tried to get uranium in Niger. Can you clear this up for us? Firstly, on National Public Radio today, Joseph DiGenova, who was an attorney in the Reagan administration, said that your original report on Niger, I‘m quoting him, “supported the conclusion that Iraq had sought uranium,” end of the quote. Did your original report conclude that?
WILSON: Well, Mr. DiGenova has been wrong on so many things, and he‘s certainly wrong on this. I never supported any such conclusion.
What Republicans tend to argue is that a meeting at which uranium was never raised might have supported the president‘s allegation that Iraq attempted to purchase significant quantities of uranium from Africa, again, where uranium was never mentioned.
But about Mr. DiGenova, who‘s an attorney in this town, he has also continued to say it‘s not clear that Valerie was a covert officer, despite the fact that it shows up in the indictment and in subsequent filings by Mr. Fitzgerald, and was in his press conference. I‘m not sure that that‘s the kind of attorney that I would hire if I were in some legal jeopardy.
OLBERMANN: Is that the same story as this, that was purported online today by Christopher Hitchens, whose reporting is on occasion very sound, he wrote that in February of ‘99, a man named Wisam al-Zahawari, Zahaiwai, excuse me...
WILSON: Zahawi.
OLBERMANN: ... Zahawi, was the Iraqi representative at that point of the International Atomic Energy Agency, paid an official visit to Niger. He doesn‘t come out and explicitly say that that trip in ‘99 was to seek uranium, but his headline does. It reads, “Sorry, everyone, but Iraq did go uranium shopping in Niger.” Is there merit to the Hitchens story?
WILSON: No. Mr. Al-Zahawi, Wisam al-Zahawi, who is a man that I know from my time as the acting ambassador in Baghdad during the first Gulf War, in the first Bush administration. He was ambassador to the Vatican, and he made a trip in 1999 to several West and Central African countries for the express purpose of inviting chiefs of state to violate the ban on travel to Iraq.
He has said repeatedly to the press, he‘s now in retirement, and also to the International Atomic Energy Agency, to their satisfaction, that uranium was not on his agenda.
OLBERMANN: Ambassador Joseph Wilson, as always, sir, great thanks for taking the time to join us.
WILSON: Good to be with you, Keith.
OLBERMANN: Thank you.
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