CQ breaks a mindblowing story:
Rep. Jane Harman, the California Democrat with a longtime involvement in intelligence issues, was overheard on an NSA wiretap telling a suspected Israeli agent that she would lobby the Justice Department to reduce espionage-related charges against two officials of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel organization in Washington.
Harman was recorded saying she would "waddle into" the AIPAC case "if you think it'll make a difference," according to two former senior national security officials familiar with the NSA transcript.
In exchange for Harman's help, the sources said, the suspected Israeli agent pledged to help lobby Nancy Pelosi , D-Calif., then-House minority leader, to appoint Harman chair of the Intelligence Committee after the 2006 elections, which the Democrats were heavily favored to win.
Seemingly wary of what she had just agreed to, according to an official who read the NSA transcript, Harman hung up after saying, "This conversation doesn't exist."
Believe it or not, it actually gets worse - much worse. Harman was actually investigated for this previously, but new revelations indicate she got off the hook for the most odious of reasons:
[C]ontrary to reports that the Harman investigation was dropped for "lack of evidence," it was Alberto R. Gonzales, President Bush's top counsel and then attorney general, who intervened to stop the Harman probe.
Why? Because, according to three top former national security officials, Gonzales wanted Harman to be able to help defend the administration's warrantless wiretapping program, which was about break in The New York Times and engulf the White House.
And that's exactly what she did:
Harman, [Gonazles] told [CIA Director Porter Goss], had helped persuade the newspaper to hold the wiretap story before, on the eve of the 2004 elections. And although it was too late to stop the Times from publishing now, she could be counted on again to help defend the program
[Gonzales] was right.
On Dec. 21, 2005, in the midst of a firestorm of criticism about the wiretaps, Harman issued a statement defending the operation and slamming the Times, saying, "I believe it essential to U.S. national security, and that its disclosure has damaged critical intelligence capabilities."
So, to recap: Harman, a member of the Blue Dogs, offered to help get espionage charges reduced against two AIPAC members, in exchange for an unnamed "Israeli agent" (the person on the other end of the call) lobbying Nancy Pelosi to appoint Harman chair of the Intelligence Committee. (Thankfully, Pelosi did not.)
Then, to make things far more ugly, Alberto Gonzales offered to drop the investigation of Harman's Israeli quid pro quo so that she would help defend the Cheney Administration's outrageous warantless wiretapping program, which she had done before and did again with gusto. Hell, you might even call this blackmail. I can't think of much worse than this. |
