The Valerie Plame Affair

A Hot-Water Leak Columnist Novak 'Surprised' by CIA Furor

Editorial: Spinning/Full bore on Wilson-Plame

Be aware also of the White House effort to turn this whole thing into a general "classified information" issue. It's not.

What does it take to get Bush fired up and ready to take names and kick backsides? Blowing the cover of a CIA agent apparently doesn't meet that test.

Dowd: The Spy Who Loved Him

Ms. Plame and Karl Rove attend the same Episcopal Church, and she joked to her husband that she should just go up to the president's strategist and ask if he really considered her "fair game" to be outed — a phrase Mr. Wilson says reporters told him Mr. Rove had used.

At his wife's request, Mr. Wilson has toned down his call to see Mr. Rove "frog-marched out of the White House in handcuffs." But he still holds the man the president calls Boy Genius accountable.

"The act of leaking my wife's name was clearly a political act," he says. "The White House has a political office that's headed by one Karl Rove. That's where I would look. He certainly condoned it."


White House Looks to Manage Fallout Over C.I.A. Leak Inquiry

The administration and the Republican leadership on Capitol Hill worked to ensure that no Republicans in Congress break ranks and call for an independent inquiry outside the direct control of the Justice Department.

"It's slime and defend," said one Republican aide on Capitol Hill, describing the White House's effort to raise questions about Mr. Wilson's motivations and its simultaneous effort to shore up support in the Republican ranks.

"So far so good," the aide said. "There's nervousness on the part of the party leadership, but no defections in the sense of calling for an independent counsel."