McCarthy's Mess

Mary McCarthy denies any role in the leaks. Confederate Yankee notes Olbermann was trying to turn McCarthy into some kind of scapegoat for multiple leaks coming from the CIA and as a warning to others to cease and desist from leaking. Well, there's actually a point there - the CIA needs to stop these leaks from happening because they're undermining the Agency's ability to do its job of protecting the country from threats. A broken clock is right twice a day, and this may be one of those situations. McCarthy isn't simply a scapegoat, but her firing is a warning to others to stop. However, a McCarthy prosecution would do a far better job of deterring others from leaking.

Allahpundit wraps up the situation with Mary McCarthy in a neat package, as ugly as that may seem. Lots of connections to former Clinton officals, including several who have been involved in intel brouhahas of their own - can you say Sandy Berger? And that's the tip of the proverbial iceberg.

So extensive is the crackdown on leaks, and so adamant has Goss been about plugging them since becoming DCI in 2004 (and with good reason), that some bloggers wondered whether the story about secret prisons might have been floated to McCarthy intentionally as part of a sting. The sting theory stems from the fact that a recent EU probe into the prisons uncovered no evidence of illegal CIA activity there – which some took to mean that the prisons were fictional, and Priest’s story bogus. Not so; as Rick Moran explains, Priest had multiple sources for her report. What’s more, it simply beggars belief to think that CIA higher-ups would have concocted a story as incendiary as one involving secret prisons in the expectation that it might end up in the Washington Post. In all likelihood, it was the fact that McCarthy worked in the rarefied air of the IG’s office that led investigators to her. Quoth WaPo: “[Some intelligence officials] pointed out that the information in question was known by so few people that the number of suspected leakers was fairly small, enabling investigators to work swiftly.” (emphasis mine) There was no sting; McCarthy simply got caught.

And man, did she ever get caught. WaPo says she failed multiple polygraphs before confessing. AJ Strata cites reports describing a “pattern of behavior”. But what’s really got right-wing bloggers exercised is the discovery that McCarthy and her husband have donated upwards of $10,000 to Democratic political campaigns and organizations since 2004. Curiously enough, certain mainstream media outlets have had trouble nailing down the exact figure despite the fact that Ace and Tom Maguire were able to find it on OpenSecrets.org in about thirty seconds. And that’s not the only convenient omission from their predictably sympathetic coverage. Sweetness & Light looks at two of the press’s go-to guys on this story – former CIA analysts Ray McGovern and Larry Johnson – and reveals a few salient facts about their views on intelligence that somehow have managed to fly under the media’s radar.

Righty bloggers have also been having fun playing connect-the-dots with the various moonbat hearthrobs making cameos in this story: McCarthy, Beers, Richard Clarke (for whom McCarthy once worked at the NSC), Joe Wilson, John Kerry (who received the lion’s share of the McCarthys’ political donations), and Dana Priest and her husband William Goodfellow, who happens to be Executive Director of the Center for International Policy, which advocates rapprochement with Fidel Castro’s Cuba. Smells real bad, but there’s much less here than meets the eye: as mentioned above, the best anyone’s been able to do thus far conspiracy-wise is put McCarthy and Wilson on the NSC at the same time eight years ago, which is hardly damning.

All of this jibes with my take thus far, except that I was considering the secret prison story as a mole hunt to be a plausible explanation given the facts. While there is still the possibility that the secret prisons story is a mole hunt in that Priest's multiple sources could have all fed from the same trough and been provided, or had access to, the same story - to ferret out the moles, this is increasingly unlikely. Also, Occam's Razor suggests that the best explanation is the simplest one. McCarthy was caught leaking a true and accurate story about secret prisons - though the CIA has done a good job hiding it from those investigating its existence in Europe.

As for those who think that McCarthy's rise through the CIA was extraordinary, Outside the Beltway notes that she came to the CIA with a PhD in African History, which means she would have entered the CIA at a far higher grade than someone with little or no experience.

AJ Strata notes that Rand Beers is running interference for McCarthy, and suggests some implications of that relationship. Also, Rick Moran has more on Ty Cobb, the lawyer representing McCarthy.

Then again, nothing is simple when it comes to the CIA, leaks, and politics.

UPDATE:
Rick Moran at the Right Wing Nut House notes connections to the VIPS and their ongoing war with the Bush Administration. It makes for an interesting read and provides some interesting backstory on some of the figures coming forward to defend McCarthy's actions. It also notes the rationale for such defenses.

Earlier coverage: L'Affaire McCarthy, Web of Leaks, Cronyism at the CIA, Friday Night Link Dump.