The Politics of Truth_Inside the Lies That Put the White House on Trial and Betrayed My Wife's CIA Identity

by Joseph Wilson

  In David’s office, his windows overlooking the neighborhood high-rises with their brick façades and window air conditioners, I shared my surprise. I explained why for months I had hesitated to write the piece, and asked him if he had ever thought it would have such resonance. He noted that while he rarely knows whether an opinion piece is going to rouse people or not, my article did have one distinct advantage: it at long last attached a name to the allegation. Up to that point, the story had had no protagonist, just ubiquitous unnamed sources; but with my name, David said, it became the first criticism of the administration that really showed teeth. No longer could the White House communications office deflect criticism simply by stating repeatedly that the president had “moved on,” thus indicating that the issue was supposed to be closed to further discussion. Now, with a name to drive the story, the press would be less willing to let it drop, I surmised.

  And, of course, the attack on Valerie now added a whole new dimension. That a vicious act, one with the potential to place her and other innocent people in danger, had been undertaken by some unnamed senior official or officials at the White House lent an element of nefarious mystery to the tale. In and of itself, David noted, that should keep the journalists salivating—and correctly so, given the possibility that a crime had been committed by someone in the administration.

  Somewhat awed by what I’d heard, I left the Times building. This was the widely read and highly regarded “paper of record,” and despite its recent travails with a staffer who had systematically violated the ethics of the profession, it remained an authoritative voice and significant force in every national and international debate. It was clear from my conversation with David that the issue I had addressed, and the government’s response to it, had raised many hackles. Whereas I had been satisfied with the admission that the sixteen words should not have been “put in a presidential speech,” other concerned citizens wanted to know why the Congress and the American people had been lied to on an issue as important as committing their country to war.

  As I had some time to kill, I walked from the Times building on West 43rd Street up to Comedy Central, a stroll of twenty or so Manhattan blocks. The rain had stopped, but the mugginess persisted. By the time I arrived at the Comedy Central studios, my shirt was wet under my suitcoat and I was looking a bit disheveled. I was reminded of the years I had spent in equatorial Africa, when a stroll of just a few minutes would leave me dripping. I would normally have left the jacket at home; after all, New York in August dished up weather barely to be endured in a polo shirt and chinos, let alone a gray suit and tie. But Valerie, always vigilant, pointed out that the people I’d be seeing in New York did not want to meet Joe Wilson, they wanted to meet “the ambassador,” so I’d better dress like the ambassador. Great, I thought, Brian Wilson gets to dress in Hawaiian shirts and Bermuda shorts because he’s known as a Beach Boy, but Joe Wilson has to stick with the gray suit look.

  Fortunately, the Jon Stewart Comedy Central building—yes, it is named after the Daily Show star—was equipped for comfort. I made my way to the door past the line of fans waiting for the day’s show, introduced myself, and was escorted to a dressing room.

  Jon’s team made me feel extremely welcome. They pressed a clean shirt and tie for me, and touched up my suit—while I stretched out in a dressing room and took a nap. When Jon wandered into the area—I could hear him through the door, as he tried out some jokes on his team—I would have stepped out to say hello, but I was still in my boxer shorts.

  I was more excited than I had been for any other television appearance I had yet made. This, after all, was not news; it was satire. I had of course given thought to what lessons from my experiences over the past eight months I wanted to impart to Jon’s audience. The one that stood out most importantly for me that sultry afternoon in New York was that despite all the attacks, these recent weeks had reaffirmed for me what American democracy is all about. For I realized more surely than ever that holding our government accountable for its actions is not just a right protected under our constitution, but a civic duty as well.

  Jon Stewart’s show has an interesting viewership. Its young demographic, if not totally disaffected, tends not to participate in the political process in large numbers. Our hopes for a vibrant democracy require a broader participation than currently exists on the part of our entire population, and especially by younger citizens. Jon Stewart, with all of his humor, provides a way to reach that group. His spoofing of topical subjects leavens serious issues without trivializing them, and makes them less mystifying. And he is very, very funny.

  I loved the show. The round of applause when I walked across the set, even if the audience was cued to provide it, left me unsure about what to do next. I was used to being seated and looking into a blank camera while I listened to a voice asking me questions through an earpiece. But this was a live audience cheering. I didn’t know whether to ignore the applause or to wave; I think I did a little of both. I remember Jon coming around the couch and escorting me to my seat, but the next several minutes are a blur. Jon was so quick and so humorous that I found myself laughing heartily right along with the audience. At the end of the segment, he asked the producer if he could keep me on after the commercial break.

  So we continued for another several minutes, which gave me a chance to share with Jon a form letter I had received from Dick Cheney asking me to be a cochairman of the Washington, D.C., campaign to reelect Bush-Cheney. I told Jon that with the receipt of that letter, I concluded that the administration had decided to let bygones be bygones. Jon took the letter, and I thought he was going to fall off his chair, he was laughing so hard. He showed the letter to the audience, then asked that a hat be passed to raise the one thousand dollars I needed to qualify for the distinction. Even as Republicans would later attack me for contributing to Democratic candidates, they were actively soliciting donations from me.

  In the months that followed, one of the most frequent comments I heard from people around the country was, “I saw you on The Daily Show. You were great.” It made me think that perhaps I had found a second career, playing straight man to a stand-up comic. More importantly, it validated my instincts that Americans are more widely interested in public affairs than we assume, but that they do not always get their information from traditional sources. I think political leaders of all stripes would be well-advised to reach out and explore every possible venue for talking to Americans.

  By early August, I was still waiting for the CIA to refer the matter to the Justice Department for investigation. Progress toward that milestone under Attorney General John Ashcroft was unacceptably slow for a national security matter. A letter (pictured on facing page) from the CIA to Representative John Conyers, released February 2004, shows clearly how hard the Agency had to push in July, August, and September before the Justice Department finally took up the case.

  On January 30, 2004, the CIA’s director of congressional affairs, Stanley M. Moskowitz, wrote in response to a request for information from Conyers that an attorney from the Agency first contacted the Counterespionage Section of the Department of Justice by phone on July 24, 2003, explaining that the CIA was beginning an investigation to determine if a violation of law had been committed. The Agency followed up by letter on July 30, stating their review indicated a crime may indeed have occurred; they re-sent that letter on September 5. On September 16, they sent another letter, stating that their review was complete, and requesting that the FBI initiate a criminal investigation. Finally, almost two weeks later, and nearly two and a half months after Novak’s column had exposed Valerie, Justice belatedly advised the CIA that the FBI had begun an investigation. It seemed an extremely sluggish response by the Department of Justice. This, coupled with Ashcroft’s refusal to recuse himself from the investigation once it finally began, left me, and many others, concerned about the ongoing damage to the national security under these lackadaisical conditions. It appeared that politics was winning out and that the
administration was intent on sweeping the matter under the rug. As late as December 5, 2003, “a senior White House official” was quoted in the Financial Times gloating, “We have rolled the earthmovers in over this one.”

  I was invited in August to give a speech to ROAR (Retain Our American Rights), an activist organization in Los Angeles founded by Norman Lear, the legendary producer of such groundbreaking, socially responsible television sitcoms as All in the Family, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, and All That Glitters. I had corresponded with Norman after my appearance on NOW with Bill Moyers in February. I was only casually aware of Norman’s civic activism in the years since his pioneering days in TV production, and to my chagrin I had not followed his efforts to resuscitate our democratic spirit by purchasing an early copy of the Declaration of Independence and touring it to communities around the country.

  Norman met me at his guest house in Brentwood, and we immediately connected, quickly discovering that we are both older fathers of twins. His girls were eight at the time, while my younger set of twins was three and a half. We readily agreed that if parenting at an advanced age didn’t kill you, it would keep you young. It certainly wasn’t killing Norman. In terrific physical shape, he has all the experience of a worldly wise elder statesman and the indomitable passion of a college-age activist. While derided by the extreme Right as a liberal, Norman is fervently committed to democracy and the celebration of our diversity. He is also utterly opposed to the theocratic agenda of the religious Right. His longtime commitment to time-honored American democratic values and respect for the history that has made our country great are true inspirations to anyone who does not believe that our country’s values are the sole property of television preachers.

  We drove over to Beverly Hills to have lunch in a quiet café near Rodeo Drive. Joining us were his wife, Lyn, a gracious lady, easygoing companion, and dedicated partner; Mary Leonard, an ebullient interior decorator and political junkie; and the inimitable Warren Beatty, who breezed in late. Here I was, a middle-aged, moderate ex-bureaucrat, in the midst of some of the most committed progressives in Hollywood, that den of iniquity continually being smeared by right-wingers. All four of them were interesting, engaged, and well-informed students of American politics. I found myself impressed by their thoughtfulness, their enthusiasm, and their infectious optimism. What a welcome change from the politics of fear emanating from the president, the vice president, and their senior staff in Washington.

  At that evening’s ROAR event, I was introduced by Arianna Huffington. I asked for her to do so, not simply because her journey from Newt Gingrich’s knee to Norman Lear’s living room was itself such an unusual tale, but because I had found in her writings of the past few years such engrossing social commentary. Having just announced her candidacy for governor of California in the recall election, she was flush from the adrenaline that such a decision generates. It was an electric evening. The West Coast activists were hungry for news from Washington, and after a month of vexing controversy I was delighted to be so unconditionally welcomed by a community in my home state.

  The following day was filled with interviews and speeches that had been organized by Robert Greenwald, the cofounder of Artists for Winning Without War, then producing the documentary Uncovered . One audience that I addressed was made up largely of religiously affiliated social workers who had been in Latin America for the previous three decades. If they had developed there an abiding dislike of the CIA, which they blamed for every disruptive occurrence from the suicide of Chilean President Salvador Allende to the support of the death squads in El Salvador’s civil war, they had finally found something they hated more than CIA officers themselves, and that was a government that would so callously expose one of them. It was striking how offended they were by Valerie’s outing, and it was proof that even those who saw themselves as implacable foes of the CIA were shocked at what the government had done to her.

  In my interview with Greenwald that afternoon, I told my tale for his documentary and then spent the evening at a reception at his home on the beach. Present were leading progressives and liberals from Southern California, there to support Alternet, the Internet-based news site. I found myself surrounded by activists such as Tom Hayden, one-time defendant in the ’60s’ notorious Chicago Seven trial, and the leaders of Code Pink, a women’s antiwar movement.

  Overnight, Valerie and I had become symbols for the progressive Left. Or, rather, we had become examples of a broader, more general unease with the direction in which the administration was leading the country. Our case classically illustrated the lengths to which big government would go to crush its adversaries. We had become the human faces that people could identify with in the larger, increasingly unsettling political story of the Iraq war.

  I had spent years living in dictatorships abroad and knew from personal experience what happened to people who dared to criticize their governments in such regimes. In Saddam’s world, friends of mine, including senior Iraqi officials, would routinely be called in for questioning just for talking with me. In Africa, an editor friend of mine in Burundi would routinely find himself harassed if a particular article displeased the president; and in Gabon, the opposition presidential candidate had his home shelled by the Gabonese army after a particularly nasty election campaign designed to move the country from authoritarian rule to democracy. In the United States, though, our system thrives only when people participate in it. The differences were huge between what Valerie and I had endured and what critics suffered in other countries. But it was reassuring nonetheless to realize firsthand that in California and New York City we had gained so much support. Strength in numbers is important when facing a hostile government hell-bent on limiting the rights and freedoms of its citizens in the name of national security. I was delighted to be embraced by so many fine American citizens, who were as concerned as I was about—and were participating in—the future of our country.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Frog-Marching

  FOR THE BETTER PART OF JULY, I had been sidetracked by the fallout from my piece in the New York Times, and from Robert Novak’s article alleging that Valerie was a CIA operative. No longer were people interested in my views on the other two debates that were then raging in Washington, which I characterized as “how did we get into this mess” and “how do we get out of it.” Instead, all anybody wanted to know was if I really was a partisan hack as alleged by the Republicans, and who had leaked my wife’s name to the press. I didn’t want to dignify the first charge by commenting on it, though I was unwilling to become a punching bag, and so hit back when necessary; meanwhile, I was still trying to quell public discussion of the latter topic, when possible, or at least reserve it for the realm of the hypothetical.

  After appearing on the Daily Show, I was invited on CNN’s Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer, for Sunday, August 3. I followed a spirited discussion between Senators Trent Lott and Evan Bayh about the situation on the ground in Iraq and what the U.S. should be doing there to create more stability.

  I had met Senator Lott several times during the previous year in CNN and FOX green rooms and found him to be affable, even if our views on a number of issues were diametrically opposed. I remembered meeting him when he was the House of Representatives minority whip and Tom Foley was his Democratic counterpart. Their conversations were characterized by humor and congeniality. Rough partisan edges had not been in evidence then, and despite whatever differences we might have had, they were not in evidence now. Senator Lott was a courtly Southern gentleman. In fact, listening to him talk with Wolf, I discovered that we shared many of the same concerns regarding the situation in Iraq. I told him so as we changed positions on the set, laughing when he allowed that it wouldn’t be in either of our interests to be seen in agreement on any subject right now. For Republicans, I was radioactive.

  Wolf was kind enough to expand his line of questioning to include more than queries about Valerie. He asked me about the ongoing search for weapons of mas
s destruction being led by Dr. David Kay, a former U.N. inspector and then an aide to CIA Director George Tenet. I replied:I’ve had confidence that we would find weapons of mass destruction, and weapons of mass destruction programs, from the very beginning of the run-up to the war in Iraq. 687, the initial U.N. resolution dealing with weapons of mass destruction, demanded compliance; and it had, as its objective, disarmament. We have not yet achieved disarmament, so it was perfectly appropriate to continue to try and gather together the international consensus to disarm Saddam and his programs.

  I think we’ll find chemical weapons. I think we’ll find biological precursors that may or may not have been weaponized. And I think we will find a continuing interest in nuclear weapons. The question really is whether it met the threshold test of imminent threat to our own national security, or even the test of grave and gathering danger.

  Many months later, I must now admit that I was mistaken about the discovery of WMD. But then I never premised a preemptive war on the fervent certainty that they would be found, nor had I argued that a preemptive war was necessary to achieve the objective. On the other hand, Kay has since resigned as head of the CIA’s Iraqi Survey Group and concluded that there never were weapons to be found, nullifying one of the administration’s prime justifications for the invasion of Iraq. The intrusive inspections actually had been working.