« The Sweet, Sweet Taste of Science | Main | American Idol Live Recap »

April 25, 2006

Apology, I Wonder

Will the right-wing blog brigades be extending any kind of apology to alleged CIA leaker Mary McCarthy in light of this?

A lawyer representing fired CIA officer Mary O. McCarthy said yesterday that his client did not leak any classified information and did not disclose to Washington Post reporter Dana Priest the existence of secret CIA-run prisons in Eastern Europe for suspected terrorists.

The statement by Ty Cobb, a lawyer in the Washington office of Hogan & Hartson who said he was speaking for McCarthy, came on the same day that a senior intelligence official said the agency is not asserting that McCarthy was a key source of Priest's award-winning articles last year disclosing the agency's secret prisons.

McCarthy was fired because the CIA concluded that she had undisclosed contacts with journalists, including Priest, in violation of a security agreement. That does not mean she revealed the existence of the prisons to Priest, Cobb said.

Cobb said that McCarthy, who worked in the CIA inspector general's office, "did not have access to the information she is accused of leaking," namely the classified information about any secret detention centers in Europe. Having unreported media contacts is not unheard of at the CIA but is a violation of the agency's rules.

Assuming all of the above is true, my bet is that it will change to a "yeah, but" regarding her media contacts in general. Of course, if a CIA employee had undisclosed contacts with Fox News, I think the battle cry might be a little different...

The more I look to the left and right wings of the political spectrum, the more I dislike what I see: unhinged and off-the-handle partisan whackjob nuttiness.