turning a political downfall into an opportunity for reinvention. so it seems like mcgreevey has learned a lesson. but have we? when he resigned, we focused on the gay affair, not the corruption allegations, and that obsession with sex scandals, with the private lives of our politicians over the public good, or over the harm they can cause, that is still alive and kicking, and when the next scandal arrives, the hot take might not be the right one. ♪

company town at work. off duty politicians and members of the press, sometimes gathering over dinners or drinks to trade gossip and share secrets. because here information is the coin of the realm. but in the early 2000, in the terrible wake of nine over 11, some in the d.c. media got a little too cozy with the bush white house as it tried to make the case for going to war in iraq. and when the bush administration's cause for war started to unravel. an explosive allegation became a federal investigation into whether the white house sought to retaliate against a critic by disclosing the identity of a covert cia agent whose name was suddenly everywhere.

back in 2003, it suddenly seemed as though everyone knew this woman's name. >> valerie plame. >> valerie plame, valerie plame. >> valerie plame. >> you've probably heard my name. >> but valerie plame is a name you and i were never supposed to know because she was a covert cia operative whose cover was blown by some of the most powerful people on the planet. >> my name and identity were carelessly and recklessly abused by senior government officials in both the white house and the state department. >> so why would the u.s. government expose one of its own secret agents? well, to hear plame tell it, that's because her husband tried to blow the whistle on the white house's shaky justification for invading iraq. but that's just one version of the story. and the whole truth is actually more illuminating and in some ways,

troubling. the story begins in the wake of 9/11 with bush administration officials fearful that saddam hussein of iraq might have weapons of mass destruction. >> saddam hussein is a homicidal dictator who is addicted to weapons of mass destruction. >> the only thing that would keep americans safe would be to invade iraq and take him out, bush said. and so we did. and within the year, one man stepped forward with what he believed to be the truth. ambassador joe wilson, valerie plame's husband. wilson wrote an op ed in the new york times claiming that the bush administration was relying on shaky intelligence to assert that saddam was seeking uranium from africa because he was the guy who had been to niger to find out. >> there was no reason to believe that the transaction that had been alleged in these documents, that were later deemed to be forgeries, had ever taken place, or could have taken place. >> and the bush white house did not appreciate that.

>> this claim sets off a firestorm in washington. >> a week after wilson blew the whistle. columnist robert novak, working on a tip from the bush administration, published an article not only refuting wilson's claim, but also suggesting that the trip he took to niger was greenlit by low level cia operatives without the knowledge of higher ups. >> the bush administration struck back by revealing the identity of his wife, a cia operative. somebody deliberately blew her cover. >> it's a serious matter. not only do you put her at risk, but you also put the sources they have worked with over the years at considerable risk. >> the fallout from the whole debacle was massive. the equivalent of a scandal, a dirty bomb. almost every senior white house official had to testify. >> the law makes it illegal to knowingly and maliciously reveal the identity of a covert agent. >> the preliminary inquiry had given way to a full blown criminal investigation. that will, of course, focus on the

president's inner circle. >> this story was incredibly influential to my identity as a journalist. it was a reminder that the press must always challenge the people in power, no matter how much public support those politicians may have in the lead up to the war. our fragile system of checks and balances meant that instead of sounding the alarm, some in the fourth estate, too many of us joined the drumbeat for a war that resulted in the deaths of more than 100,000 iraqis and thousands of u.s. troops, one that diminished trust in the news media and destroyed the cia career of one woman at the center of it all. we good? >> we're good. >> they're great. >> were you concerned at all that the revealing of your name could put lives at risk? is that possible? >> yes, it is possible, absolutely. there's a reason that ops officers work

undercover, which is so that you can move around the world. you can recruit, you can handle the assets without endangering them or their families. the fact that a journalist knew my true cia affiliation or somehow was put onto it, whether it was confirmed or not, was deeply unsettling to me. >> unsettling to also believe that being outed as a covert cia agent is the work of the government. you are risking your life to protect, to take a step back. for those of you who don't remember the bush years, let's remind you of the cast of characters here. president george w. bush campaigned in the year 2000 as a compassionate conservative. decidedly not focused overseas. >> the bush administration understood itself to be a domestic policy administration prior to nine over 11. there wasn't much of a foreign policy strategy in place. >> bush, of course, wanted to be taken seriously on the international stage. but just

three years earlier, he couldn't name the leaders of foreign powers who had nuclear weapons. after 9/11, of course, all that changed. >> the most powerful individual on this subject was vice president richard cheney. >> vice president dick cheney, architect of a neoconservative foreign policy that reshaped the middle east, and adding to his menacing public persona, drew comparisons to darth vader. a public image he ultimately embraced. >> we're going to talk about star wars. we might as well invite darth vader. >> he had developed a reputation as kind of a very pithy tough guy. >> if you provide sanctuary to terrorists, you face the full wrath of the united states of america. >> he was arguably the most powerful veep in history. then there were various secretaries and aides, widely beloved secretary of state colin powell and his close friend and deputy richard armitage, the tough guy

secretary of defense donald rumsfeld and lewis scooter libby, affectionately referred to around the white house as dick cheney's dick cheney. >> libby was chief of staff to the vice president, so he was a senior person helping keep the trains on time. >> and finally, someone who always had president bush's ear. senior adviser to the president, karl rove. >> karl rove was one of bush's top political people and media gurus. >> he was always a colorful character. >> but he will wrap it when you give him a chance. look at him move. doing the rap and dance. >> that's rap. and karl rove, aka. >> m.c. road. >> it was a weird time, but ultimately this was a scandal that could not have happened without the news media. and of course, after months of u.s. troops in iraq, still no serious stockpile of weapons of mass destruction had been found.

>> it makes no sense, except if you look at it from that place in time where the administration is in a little bit of a panic. no wmd has been found. we've been told there is an imminent nuclear threat. the americans are kind of getting restless, and they decided they would want to make an example of joe wilson and valerie plame to shut that down. >> but is that actually what happened? when it comes to rooting out corruption, do the fbi's ends justify the means? >> it was humiliating. it's an embarrassment for the country. >> united states of scandal with jake tapper next sunday at nine on cnn. >> when i really philosophize about it, there's one thing you don't have enough of, and that's time. time is truly a scarce commodity. when you come to that realization, i think it's very important to spend time wisely. and what better way

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>> we're still going for that sweet shot. >> and with higher stroke risk from afib not caused by a heart valve problem. >> we're going for eliquis. eliquis reduces stroke risk and has less major bleeding. over 97% of eliquis patients did not experience a stroke. >> don't stop eliquis without asking your doctor. stroke risk may increase. eliquis can cause serious and in rare cases, fatal bleeding. don't take if you have an artificial heart valve, abnormal bleeding or antiphospholipid syndrome. while taking you may bruise more easily or bleed longer. a spinal injection increases blood clot risk, which may cause paralysis. get medical help right away for unexpected bleeding or bruising or tingling. numbness or muscle weakness. aspirin products nsaids, ssris, snris, and blood thinners. increase bleeding risk. tell your doctor about planned medical or dental procedures. >> ask about the number one prescribed blood thinner eliquis. >> did someone at the white house blow the cover of a cia operative after her husband criticized the run up to the war? >> the white house has certainly been thrown on the defensive as a result of this issue, but it does have the real scandal on its hands.

>> the plame affair did not follow the usual scandal playbook. flame's downfall was not caused by her own flaws or mistakes. no, she was a woman just doing her job until she ran up against the hubris and egos of several men. so when you joined the cia, i understand your mom was worried. >> as every mother would be. >> the central intelligence agency needs men and women with backgrounds in computer and physical sciences. to you, we say these are times to put your training and ability to work where it really counts. at the cia. >> so this is the 1980s. and why would you want to join the cia? like, how did that just because it was the reagan era and patriotism was part of it. >> that was part. >> of it. >> i come from a family of public service. so there was this idea in my family of quiet patriotism. not to mention it sounded like it was a lot more interesting than what any of my friends were doing. >> the need for cia covert operations has been essential, both before and after the

collapse of the soviet union, and with the soviet nuclear stockpile scattered, terrorists at the time were eager to get their hands on any nuclear weapons they could find. valerie plame was part of a clandestine group responsible for making sure that didn't happen. i mean, how would you describe yourself? what were you? >> i was undercover. >> and undercover cia officer. >> yes, i was what's called a case officer. i did operations, i was undercover. >> so you're a spy? >> yeah. >> i just picture i have all sorts of pictures of, like, you know, here you are in casablanca. you know, wearing a hijab and talking to an arms dealer. is that what it was? >> yes, that's a piece of it, yes. >> essentially making sure the bad guys do not get nuclear weapons. i loved what i did. i was proud to serve my country. um, i thought i had the best job in the world. >> valerie and i served our country for a collective 43 years. she served for 20, and i served for 23. we served our country as americans.

>> he worked under george h.w. bush. >> h.w. bush called him a true american hero. >> what was it like when you met him? was it love at first sight, or were you swept off your feet? >> it was yes. yes, yes. he was. >> handsome and and so intelligent and spoke perfect french. and he was kind of in my world, having lived and worked overseas. >> ambassador wilson gained considerable distinction. the outset of the gulf war in 1991 for saving american citizens who were resident in kuwait city at the time of the iraqi invasion. >> after five months of having having worked as hard as we have been able to work, having the hostages home, it is a real pleasure to be back here. >> he was something of a heroic figure in the state department at that time. >> joe wilson was a very flamboyant diplomat. >> did you get some lunch and get something? something to eat? >> he didn't suffer fools gladly. and he definitely had confidence in his own abilities.

>> when saddam hussein threatened to hang anyone who assisted american hostages escaping kuwait city, wilson showed up to a press conference with a noose around his neck, bringing new meaning to the term statement piece. it's fair to say, i think, that he had a certain degree of showmanship. is that fair to say? >> i mean, yeah, he was really combative. >> he understood that sometimes the only way you can deal with a bully is get right up into his face. >> but the united states decades of intelligence gathering could not prepare them for the largest international terrorist attack the u.s. ever faced. >> we believe a commercial jet has crashed into one of the towers of the world trade center. at this point, we do not have official injury updates to bring you. >> nine over 11 happens. how did that affect your professional life? >> oh. >> like everyone else, it you knew immediately we were at war. >> within days, the u.s. sent troops to afghanistan to root

out al qaeda operatives responsible for nine over 11. and so, with the war on terror officially underway, president bush adopted a policy to combat any potential threats from around the world. the bush doctrine of preemptive strikes hit them before they hit us. >> george w. bush had become convinced that the way to keep america safe from future terrorist attacks was to spread freedom, and the way to spread freedom in the middle east was to confront threats before they emerged. >> if we wait for threats to fully materialize, we will have waited too long. >> i personally supported us going into afghanistan, routing the taliban. there's no question that was the root of what had happened with 9/11. but there was still smoke coming off the world trade towers when at camp david, rumsfeld is unfolding maps of iraq saying, now, here we have some real

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for less than $20. go to deal.com and see how much you can save. >> twitter. >> breaking the bird. premieres next sunday at ten on cnn. >> there are many theories as to why bush wanted to invade iraq to stop a potential threat to spread democracy in the middle east, to end the reign of a leader who supported terrorism, to exact revenge for saddam trying to kill his dad, president george h.w. bush, and on and on. and yet, even though

trace elements were ultimately detected, it was nothing on the scale of ready to use stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. >> at this point, the white house is trying to build consensus around the fact that iraq has weapons of mass destruction. >> let us flash to 2002. after nine over 11, there is this determination to not only go after al qaeda, but to make sure that any other potential threat is not able to hit the united states. >> that's right. i don't think the country had quite yet realized that we were already pivoting toward iraq. a younger junior analyst received a phone call from the office of the vice president, and they wanted to know about this report that was circulating in the intelligence community at that time about this tremendous sale of 500 tons of yellowcake uranium, which is used in the process to make highly enriched uranium from niger to iraq. so my boss at the time asked me to go home and ask

my husband, ambassador joe wilson, to come into the cia headquarters where they could talk with him about this report and see if he might be willing to go to niger to check it out further. >> wilson had trusted connections with the political elites of niger, and obviously, if there was any truth to these radioactive allegations, wilson would want to alert the bush administration. he flies back from niger. what happens? >> there's cia analysts there at the house to debrief him immediately, because this information goes back to the office of the vice president. so they sit down in the living room and joe said, look, this report about yellowcake uranium, this could never have happened. this is a totally bogus report. here's who i spoke to. here's what they know. and so forth. thank you very much, ambassador wilson. and they left. and that was that.

>> but the public heard a different message dictated by the white house information group headed up by karl rove, scooter libby, national security advisor condoleezza rice, and vice president dick cheney. their mission was to market and sell the iraq war. driving home the message of the president and to some who bought the message, a supporting detail stood out in that march 2002, cia intelligence report based on wilson's visit to niger, mentioning that wilson learned of an inquiry iraq had made about expanding commercial relations with niger, whose leading export was uranium. but since there was no active deal, what was reported was that there wasn't much to it. the ways in which the news media and the white house interact can be very inside baseball, but it's crucial to understanding just how exactly this story unfolded. because i was not a member of the white house press corps at the time, i turned to my old friend matthew cooper, who was on the beat for time magazine in 2002 and ended up being caught

in the eye of the storm. in some ways, i look. >> back at the. >> bush years and how there was not enough critical coverage of the case for war. when the bush administration was making it, i don't think. >> no press. >> i think. >> dropped the ball at times. >> right. what is the gig of a white house correspondent other than reporting on what the president does and trying to break stories? >> the gig is to have relationships, but it's to never forget what those relationships are for. they're in service of getting information to the reader. it's not about you making friends or it's not about you feeling important. i mean, look, people in the white house know that you're not there to be their friend. but, you know, sometimes it serves their interest to to leak certain things. >> washington, dc is a company town. everyone is here to participate in politics. knowing people and relationships is actually the key to journalism. >> you could be at a table at brunch, and someone very powerful is sitting next to you, and you can get a scoop. d.c. is

just that kind of town. it never shuts off. the information is churning 24 hours. >> and with a grief stricken nation fully supporting them after 9/11, the bush administration was headed towards war in iraq. and to further their case, they planted intelligence with new york times reporter judith miller, who, along with matthew cooper from time magazine, was among the white house press corps heavy hitters. scooter libby met with miller, and september 2002, judith miller and writes an article in the new york times. it alleges that the iraqi government has, quote, sought to buy thousands of specially designed aluminum tubes, which american officials believe were intended as components of centrifuges to enrich uranium. now, we later find out scooter libby, who is vice president cheney's chief of staff, told this to judith miller, right? >> yeah. so you're you're at a point where it's a total echo

chamber, right? >> the echo chamber worked like this. the white house would leak opinions and information to select friendly journalists, those that had a strong relationship with those journalists would report that information, sometimes without independently confirming it to be true. and then officials from the white house would go on tv and cite those journalists as proof of their claims. >> there's a story in the new york times this morning that, in fact, he has been seeking to acquire the kinds of tubes that are necessary to build a centrifuge. and the centrifuges required to take low grade uranium and and enhance it into highly enriched uranium, which is what you have to have in order to build a bomb. >> it worked so well. they kept doing it. >> we don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud. >> you can't distinguish between al qaeda and saddam. when you talk about the war on terror. >> and while they've been building their case for war through the news media pipeline, the coup de gras came at the state of the union address when president bush read these 16

words that were absolutely chilling. >> the british government has learned that saddam hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from africa. >> as we prepare to go to combat in march 2003, i thought maybe the president and his inner circle has access to intelligence far beyond my pay grade. >> so you were giving him the benefit of the doubt? >> yes, i was. >> but joe wasn't necessarily. >> joe was just continuing to sort of dig away at the state of the union address, which, you know, is the most heavily vetted. each word is weighed and thought and argued. how did that get in? that doesn't make sense. >> tell us about accepting bribes. >> the stuff he did that was completely legal destroys democracy. i'm still not sure that you're repentant. >> i have. >> nothing to hide. >> if he hadn't been such a he

would have gotten away with it. >> they would. >> abuse her on television. >> it was. >> this unholy combination of overwhelming. >> greed and money. it's not a bribe. >> it's trading favors. >> united states of scandal with jake tapper. a new season starts next sunday at nine on cnn. >> i brought in ensure max protein with 30g of protein. those who tried me felt more energy in just two weeks. here, i'll take that. >> ensure max protein, 30g protein, one gram sugar and a protein blend to feed muscles up to seven hours. >> my eyes, they're. >> dry. >> uncomfortable. looking for extra hydration. now there's blink neutral tears. it works differently than drops. blink neutral tears is a once daily supplement clinically proven to hydrate from within, helping your eyes produce more of their own tears to promote lasting, continuous relief. you'll feel day after day. try blink neutral tears a different way to support

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nine tablets for just $7 is try friday plans.com. >> i'm natasha bertrand at the pentagon and this is cnn. >> by march 2003, the u.s. invaded iraq, partly using bush's infamous 16 words as a final justification for war. and now, with the war on terror raging in both iraq and afghanistan, popular culture followed suit in favor of toby keith's aggressive brand of patriotism. >> we have put a boot in your. it's an american. >> way. >> many reputations. >> are on the line, and so many americans watching the war unfold on tv seemed comforted to know that, yes, our troops were indeed kicking. >> we're continuing. >> to watch the skies over

baghdad. >> on a very active. >> night there, having what have been characterized as a relatively easy time of it. >> disappointed that the bombs. >> or the cruise missiles fell before you got your orders to move forward? >> no, sir. >> it's post 911. america and the white house can ride that story line forever. and in some ways, the press can too. >> the whole world was watching. and then just six weeks into the invasion of iraq, a new made for tv spectacle, president bush hitching a ride on a fighter jet to the uss abraham lincoln just off the coast of san diego to make what proved a premature announcement. george w. bush puts on a flight suit. >> yeah. >> a tight one. frankly. >> he's got the look, doesn't he? i'm telling you, that. >> is the fighter pilot strut. if i ever saw it, he's got it going. >> tom cruise, look out! >> and then he gives a speech about the end of combat operations with a huge banner behind him that says, mission accomplished. >> yeah. >> um, the mission was not

accomplished. >> no. >> not remotely accomplished. and it will go down as one of the great moments of presidential hubris of all time. >> in the battle of iraq. the united states and our allies have prevailed. >> the united states had not won a war in iraq. the united states had started a war in iraq. >> this moment encapsulated everything that critics of the iraq war were saying, which was that this was too much about marketing and not enough about solid intelligence. and then the other thing that was not particularly covered here, as aggressively as i think you would agree it should have, which is where are the weapons of mass destruction? where are they, exactly? >> i mean, we get there and there's no secret labs, there's no reactor, there's no centrifuges. the whole cause of war suddenly seems rather suspect. >> yeah, there's an understatement, because as soon as u.s. troops landed in iraq, it quickly became apparent that

americans were as safe from wmd in iraq as the troops actively searching for them. no weapons. >> of mass. >> destruction were. >> found. >> and far from being a quick. >> victory. >> iraq went up. >> in sectarian flames. >> i remember this very well. i was writing for the website salon.com, and i was covering the way u.s. service members were not finding weapons of mass destruction. most americans and journalists seem to take it for granted that wmd would eventually be found. but of course, that's because none of us knew what joe wilson had been up to. and watching the war proceed was just too much for joe. so what did joe do from the state of the union in 2003? >> he turned this over every moment. joe was like, look, i know i went to niger. i investigated these reports. that wasn't true. he spoke to his former colleagues in the state department. he spoke to people up on the hill, um, that, you

know, this isn't right. >> it became an obsession. >> yes. >> joe wilson was so upset that after months of stewing over bush's false statement, he published an op ed in the new york times refuting bush's state of the union address claim, basically calling the president out as a liar. >> wilson accused the white house of manipulating the intelligence from niger to justify an invasion of iraq. >> new questions about the president's case against iraq, with some of it based on bad intelligence. >> so tell me about when you first read joe wilson's op ed. >> it was really like a lightning bolt, a galvanizing. he had a lot of credit because he'd been a bush won ambassador, and all of a sudden the kind of, wait, where the hell are the nuclear weapons? question was front and center. >> all hell broke loose. did the administration mislead us on weapons of mass destruction? >> the british government has learned that saddam hussein recently sought significant

quantities of uranium from africa. >> and wilson, refuting those 16 words, caused the white house to retreat from the statement faster than you could say. freedom fries. >> no one. >> now what. >> we did not. >> know at the time of the state of the union and the president, in retrospect, would not have included that remark in the state of the union speech. as you know. >> you can't expect. >> the. >> president to know. >> every detail. >> about every phrase. >> and such a long and complex address. unless, of course. >> you go to the most unlikely of sources. the white house's own website, which displays a picture of the president, quote, reviewing the state of the union address, line by line and word by word. >> behind the scenes, vice president cheney strongly opposed the white house taking it back. the british, after all, were standing by their intelligence. your husband. he made his point. the white house conceded his point. done. >> that's right. >> except it wasn't. the bush team could have dropped this right then and there, but they didn't. where were you when the

robert novak column came out in the washington post? >> the first time i read it in print. um, was the morning of. >> but you didn't know that he had done it. you knew? >> oh, i had no idea. i had no idea. we had no idea. >> robert novak was a legendary conservative columnist with more than 40 years of reporting in washington, d.c. >> i'm robert novak. >> but to many of his colleagues, he was known as. >> the prince of darkness. he was a fixture on cable news. >> do you think. >> democrats have got their house. >> in order? after taking a pasting from the republicans last november? no way. >> he was very tied in to the bush administration. and if he was saying something, you knew that he was getting it straight from the white house. >> the washington post lands on your stoop. >> yeah. bright and early. 530 joe picks up the paper, comes upstairs, and he threw the paper on the bed. and i snatched it up, read it. there was a journalist out there who knows

my name. i'm undercover. >> novak was trying to discredit ambassador wilson. >> with the leak of my name. i just felt like i'd been sucker punched. the son of a did it. >> certainty. if there was only certainty and no doubt there would be no faith. >> make some noise. >> bye bye. >> you can do. >> anything. >> i know. >> the oscars, hosted by conan o'brien. sunday, march 2nd, live on abc and hulu. >> when you. >> live with. >> diabetes. >> progress is having your coffee. like you like it. >> without an. >> audience.

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have. call now and we'll come to you. >> 882 one 4000. >> in late 2003, while the bush administration was very busy sending troops into iraq to not find any wmd, valerie plame was dealing with her own show. after her covert cia status was revealed by robert novak in his syndicated opinion column. >> wilson never worked for the cia, but his wife, valerie plame, is an agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. >> you must have a theory about why they did this. >> i think that the white house was feeling pretty vulnerable, and so they decided to make the story about joe wilson and valerie plame. >> were you worried about your babies? >> i was, because there's a lot of people out there that don't think highly of the cia. but whatever happens to me, happens to me, you know, it's part of the deal. but my children and

that it was absolutely horrifying. >> you are outed as a cia operative undercover, and all sorts of countries can then go back and look at cia sources that are in their own governments, in their own countries, and potentially even imprison, torture or kill them. >> exactly. this is horrifying. it pains me to think that i even inadvertently, would put anyone in danger. >> it is really, truly despicable to a public servant. is wasting his time attacking my family. >> with valerie being the talk of the town. wilson and plame wanted justice. wilson says. >> the leak was payback for his criticism of the administration's iraq policy. >> i would hope that an investigation would yield the information as to who was responsible for the precise leak. >> the cia was, in fact, very upset about what happened, and they ultimately asked the justice department to do an investigation. >> the justice department has launched an inquiry into who gave a nationally syndicated columnist the name of a cia agent.

>> if there's a leak out of my administration, i want to know who it is. if the person has violated law, the person will be taken care of. >> the justice department began an investigation into the leak in september 2003. the first journalist to have reported her name was novak. obviously. so the prosecutor, patrick fitzgerald, summoned novak for a private meeting. the public did not learn about this for years, but it turns out that the late robert novak, the all powerful prince of darkness, immediately revealed his confidential sources. >> patrick fitzgerald. >> knew that armitage was the leak because in the first secret. interrogation of me, fitzgerald indicated he knew the identity of not only my primary source, but my secondary source and my tertiary source. >> deputy secretary of state richard armitage had apparently inadvertently leaked plame's identity, and karl rove, to his surprise, became novak's second source, based only on what he remembers telling novak. quote, i heard that, too. it came

originally from the state department. the leak. >> well, what we now know is that there were actually multiple points. >> there were multiple points of leak. we know that it was richard armitage who was the deputy secretary of state. >> correct. >> and with that much internal chatter about the op ed, valerie plame's name found its way to journalists, including judith miller and matthew cooper. cooper published an article in time saying government officials had revealed to him valerie's name. miller didn't publish anything. the justice department subpoenaed them both to testify about who their sources were. they want to know who your sources were. >> it was clear that that's what they were interested. >> in. >> and you wouldn't tell them? >> i wouldn't tell them. >> and judith miller was in jail? >> yes. she was found in contempt. and she did go to jail. >> it is. >> a sad time when. when two journalists face the prospect. of going to prison for keeping those confidences. >> cooper narrowly avoided jail

time when his source, karl rove, granted cooper permission to reveal his identity to fitzgerald's grand jury. and you heard valerie plame's name from. >> i heard from a couple of people. heard it from karl rove in shorter form from scooter libby, the vice president's chief of staff. >> cooper called rove, and he's like, wilson's wife's all cia. and karl was like, i know, right? but you totally can't tell anyone i told you. and that was all. i totally won't. and karl ezell, you double secret won't tell. and matt was all, i totally super secret. double, super secret. won't tell. >> by this point, so many bush officials had been identified as leakers. it seemed easier to ask who was not involved. finger pointing was everywhere. joe wilson earned ire within the white house for what he was saying, such as at a forum in seattle when he said, quote, wouldn't it be fun to see karl rove frogmarched out of the white house in handcuffs? but as for who actually got in trouble for the leak, only one member of the information task force took

the fall. lewis scooter libby, the vice president's right hand man, actually testified that he first heard the name from late nbc washington bureau chief tim russert. >> and he said, did you know that. >> ambassador wilson's wife works at the. >> cia? >> and i was a little taken aback by that. and i said, uh, no, i don't know. >> that. >> but russert disputed that, and fitzgerald charged libby with perjury. >> the indictment. charges libby with one count of obstruction of justice, two counts of false statements to fbi agents, and two counts of perjury. >> i wish fitzgerald had been able to. convict more, because clearly there was a conspiracy. >> and there was a law that passed that under reagan making it a crime to out intelligence operatives. >> that's correct. it's called the intelligence identities protection act. unfortunately, the bar is is pretty high to be

able to prove that someone did it knowingly. and this is what special prosecutor fitzgerald was up against to try to prove that any of them had my identity revealed. for, uh, nefarious purposes. for me? what? when i found this out, i felt like they were passing out my name like candy. are you kidding me? whether you know my covert status or not, you just don't do that. you just don't do that. and armitage should have known better. >> what's weird is that armitage kind of escapes this whole thing with his reputation intact, don't you think? >> yeah. he kind of said, i'm sorry. i'm sorry i did that. >> i feel terrible. >> every day. >> i think i let down the president, i let down the secretary of state. i let down my department, my family, and i also let down mr. mrs. wilson. >> others should have been held accountable. clearly, there was a conspiracy. >> was there? it all started, after all, when robert novak ran into joe wilson in the nbc meet the press green room. and novak

thought wilson was a, quote, then when novak talked to armitage a couple days later, he asked why the cia would send wilson to niger. >> what's up with this guy? and that's when armitage told him, well, i think his wife sent him. >> washington, d.c. is more gossipy than a high school lunchroom. >> it's washington, more like house of cards. or is it more like veep? and i'm here to tell you, washington is more like veep. stupidity is always the explanation. in washington, d.c. >> there was a sort of conspiracy to push out this certain narrative dick cheney had written in the margins of joe's op ed, who's his wife? question mark. >> what cheney had actually written, quote, have they done this sort of thing before? send an ambassador to answer a question. do we ordinarily send people out pro bono to work for us? or did his wife send him on a junket? bush white house

supporters note that patrick fitzgerald never charged anyone but libby never proved a conspiracy and never proved that anyone knew plame was covert. but in his closing arguments at libby sentencing, fitzgerald stated, quote, there is a cloud over what the vice president did that week. we didn't put that cloud there. that cloud remains because the defendant has obstructed justice. he lied about what happened. tell us about accepting bribes. >> the stuff he did that was completely legal destroys democracy. i'm still not sure that you're repentant. >> i have nothing to hide. if he hadn't been such a, he would have gotten away. >> with it. >> they would abuse her on television. >> it was. >> this unholy combination of overwhelming greed and money. >> it's not a bribe. >> it's trading favors. >> united states of scandal with jake tapper. a new season starts next sunday at nine on cnn. >> sheldon, we think you might be overreacting to our ads for

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saturday. on cnn. >> in the fallout from the plame investigation. only scooter libby was sentenced to 30 months in prison, which george w. bush later commuted. cheney thought libby was guilty of nothing worse than a faulty memory, and thought bush would pardon him. but at a private lunch, bush told cheney he would not. mr. president, cheney told him, you are leaving a good man wounded on the field of battle. >> i was clearly. >> not happy that we, in effect, left scooter sort of hanging in the wind. >> beyond all of it. armitage, bush. cheney, rove, libby. fitzgerald was valerie plame, a woman who had done nothing but serve her country and was now left to pick up the pieces of her life and career. you and joe separated before he passed away in 2019. i mean, did this tear you apart or was it? >> yeah. >> it caused a great deal of damage because i couldn't speak

out for some time. he was carrying the water for both of us. and, um, i think ultimately it just cut so deeply. >> hoping to prevent future leaks, congress called a hearing on whether white house officials followed protocol for protecting valerie plame's identity. >> we in the cia always know that we might be exposed and threatened by foreign enemies. it was a terrible irony that administration officials were the ones who destroyed my cover. >> leaving her with. well, a lot of shock and awe. >> ultimately, we were sort of the template for what we see today in terms of distortion and disinformation and the involvement in the media, unwittingly or not. >> as the wilson plame drama ended on the domestic front, the cost on the international stage of the wmd issue was much harsher, with an entire region paying a much deadlier price

because of a war, many americans would come to view as a mistake. this was a war that ended up with tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dead, innocent iraqis. complete destabilization of iraq. thousands of american dead service members wounded. service members. service members who went on to take their own lives. they thought they were doing good, but the result of it is hard to justify. >> we're not just talking about abstract things. kind of, you know who was right, who was wrong, who's good, who's bad. this had real consequences. and so this is the rare scandal that really mattered. >> one year into the war. it was finally dawning on the bush administration, the gravity of its actions. >> so tonight, i'm going to do one of my slideshows. those

weapons of mass destruction has got to be somewhere. >> i'm kidding. obviously that didn't happen. >> nope. no weapons over there. >> i vividly remember sitting in that very room, incredulous people were dead or wounded because of this hunt for wmd. this wasn't funny. it made me sick. and a whole room full of news media was all in on the so-called joke. a joke that had a body count. what is this about? is it about media being too chummy with politicians? is it about an administration so blinded by their desire to go to war and justify it, that they're willing to do anything? >> you know the old adage, you know, the first casualty of war is the truth. it's really true here. i mean, they did want to extend their prevarication, their lying, however you want to

put it about the war through another means. but it's also about a culture of the press. that's not always responsible. both. both on the administration side and the press side. >> so many people in the media were taking the bush administration's words at face value. >> totally. everybody has to do a hard look at themselves afterwards. >> looking back at this scandal, i am struck by the fact that the real source of the leak was dick armitage, someone who seemed to have just gotten caught up in gossip in an incestuous gab fest with a columnist with an agenda. and then my focus turns to us. maybe in the plame affair. we in the news media found a convenient narrative to go after the bush administration because we did not push back enough on its defense of faulty intelligence. the first time disinformation is rampant, trust in the media is the lowest it's ever been. if we encounter an event that unites the country as

feverishly as september 11th, 2001 did, well, that's when we'll see how much we've actually learned. and what about president bush? recently, he spoke against vladimir putin's barbaric invasion of ukraine, which putin justified by citing bush's iraq war. and while the comparison differs in many key ways, putin was not the only one with iraq on his mind. >> the result is an absence of checks and balances in russia and the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of iraq. i mean, of ukraine. iraq. anyway, uh. >> one of the most uncomfortable freudian slips i've ever seen.