1 Much as I like an old Marxist like hitch, AND the word kerfuffle, I'm just too lazy to register there. The other site's lead article is wrong on most counts, as one of the responders cr=orrectly points out. Please tell me this isn't a partisan site. To wit, the investigation was to find "all crimes" related to the incident, and never asked for an investigation of the 1982 law. the wording was more in line with the 1917 law which, in paryt, criminalizes the transfer of certain classified information to someone not authorized to receive it under certain conditions. FitzGerald did say that Mrs. Wilson's oidentity as a CIA agent WAS classified. And he correctly stated what would be invilved in charging a crime under this law, things like state of mind and what one believed at the time. Your little article was spot on.

2 Hitchens is an old radical leftists and such people move easily to the right. They also project their old beliefs on all those to all those left of their current positions. For the record Hitchens also believes that that Irving is a great scholar and that the pope is evil. He like Horwowitz was a nut and will remain a nut. Having grown up and lived around the military I think it usually wrong when people let out information that might be secret or have relevance to our security. Outing CIA agaents is part of this and anyone who has been around these games knows that yes undercover people do work out of headquarters and all kinds of people around bases and stuff know things, but they don't blab it. I can draw an exception for those who release things for the "national good." Though even then they may have to take consequences. It bothers me that many liberals do not share this attitude, but now it's clear many conservatives don't either. They feel it's perfectly ok to blab out confidential stuff for personal gain. The conservative argument that it may not be illegal is fine, but they seem to try to redeem the guilty. Shitting in your living room is legal, but in my opinion it is not a positive indication of character or the kind of behavior decent people want to admire or emulate. The right is undermining itself on this one.