State of the Union Speech – January 29, 2002:
Iran aggressively pursues these weapons and exports terror, while an unelected few repress the Iranian people’s hope for freedom.
Iraq continues to flaunt its hostility toward America and to support terror. The Iraqi regime has plotted to develop anthrax, and nerve gas, and nuclear weapons for over a decade. This is a regime that has already used poison gas to murder thousands of its own citizens — leaving the bodies of mothers huddled over their dead children. This is a regime that agreed to international inspections — then kicked out the inspectors. This is a regime that has something to hide from the civilized world.
States like these, and their terrorist allies, constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world. By seeking weapons of mass destruction, these regimes pose a grave and growing danger. They could provide these arms to terrorists, giving them the means to match their hatred. They could attack our allies or attempt to blackmail the United States. In any of these cases, the price of indifference would be catastrophic.
The infamous speech by Bush in which he declared his “axis of evil”. A year and a half later someone in his administration leaked the identity of a CIA agent to the press. We now know Karl Rove was one of those that contributed to this leak.
Now we find out that the CIA agent, Valerie Plame, was working on Iran and their WMD threat (see video here):
INTELLIGENCE SOURCES SAY VALERIE WILSON WAS PART OF AN OPERATION THREE YEARS AGO TRACKING THE PROLIFERATION OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS MATERIAL INTO IRAN. AND THE SOURCES ALLEGE THAT WHEN MRS. WILSON’S COVER WAS BLOWN, THE ADMINISTRATION’S ABILITY TO TRACK IRAN’S NUCLEAR AMBITIONS WAS DAMAGED AS WELL.
THE WHITE HOUSE CONSIDERS IRAN TO BE ONE OF AMERICA’S BIGGEST THREATS.
So we lost a valuable resource in our intelligence gathering that was working on the particular threat we are facing today. There is a definition for this and I believe it is the Constitution of the United States that carries this definition:
Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.
The Congress shall have power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.
Now we have heard reports that Bush authorized these leaks and Cheney was also heavily involved. Iran is one of our “enemies” as defined by George Bush and there for the CIA leak has given aide to Iran.
This is what Congress needs to look at and act upon and do so right now. After reports of cooked intelligence leading us to the Iraq war, who is to say that we may not face the same manipulations with Iran? Perhaps part of the reason for outting Plame was because they were afraid she would not “play ball” when the time came for Bush to go after Iran. This is even more reason why Congress must hold hearings, subpoena every witness available and force them to testify under oath.