Have you seen the remake of the Disney film Homeward Bound? The one where Sally Fields, Michael J. Fox and Don Ameche do the voices of the three animals?

There's a cute scene where an animal control officer is trying to catch the cat (Sally Fields). He creeps after her saying, "Here Kitty, Kitty." The cat answers, "No dummy, dummy."

In this instance, Ted Rall is the animal control officer, and those of us that actually pay attention to detail are the cat.

Rall leads off with:

The Libby charges clearly point to the real culprit:
Dick Cheney, who told Libby about Plame's covert status in the first place.

I watched the reading of the indictment, and the subsequent press conference on TV. Patrick Fitzgerald, the prosecutor for the grand jury, referred to Valerie Plame as a "CIA officer", and the fact that she was one was "classified". He never said that she was "covert".

It may seem like I am splitting hairs. But there is a big difference.

Let's look at some definitions, and examples.

A person working for the CIA in a "covert" status is what we would, classically, think of as a spy. Okay? Revealing the identity of a person in covert status is a felony just short of treason.

A "CIA officer" is just about anyone that works for the CIA above a clerical or janitorial status. For instance, if you saw the press conference, you noticed that it was mentioned several times that the CIA has "desk jockeys" that do nothing but sit at a desk in Langley and read the US news to see if there is anything in the news that implies a security leak.

The fact that a person is a CIA officer, no matter how low-level, is classified.

Let's talk about "classified".

There are three levels of "classified": Top Secret, Secret, and For Official Use Only.

Now, as most of you know, I am a musician for the Army. I am a noncommisioned officer ... a sergeant ... actually, Staff Sergeant. The Army has kept me around for over 16 years now because of my skills as a musician. My primary purpose is to play my part in the appropriate Sousa march at the appropriate time in a ceremony.

I hold a Secret clearance.

Why?

Because there are all kinds of things that are classified.

Did you know that the number of bassoon players a given Army Band has is classified? the number of bass drum mallets that the 1st Infantry Division Band has on hand at the moment is, as well? Etc., etc. I could go on ad nauseum.

Now, all of those things I listed are classified "For Official Use Only", but if you don't have the appropriate clearance AND a need to know, then it is just as illegal for me to tell you those things that committed the crimes that instigated this investigation.

In fact, imbedded reporters committed similar "crimes" numerous times while reporting on the invasion of Iraq ... all with Department of Defense approval.

So, someone in the current administration leaked that Valerie Plame was, at least, a paper-pushing, desk jockey for the CIA. Nothing more was actually leaked. Could she have been more? Yes. Was that leaked? No.

Can you say "tempest in a teacup", boys and girls?

Good.