Recall how in 2003, a massive scandal erupted when Richard Armitage, a State Department official under then-Secretary Colin Powell, happened to leak Valerie Plame’s name to a journalist. Plame was a CIA Stateside employee (arguably NOT under cover). Armitage was basically gossiping, and he never underwent any prosecution because it was no big deal. Except, of course, the Left/media had a field day pushing the scandal complete with the darkest possible allegations against President Bush, lionization of Plame and her partisan-liar of a husband, a federal prosecutor and a ‘gotcha’ conviction of Scooter Libby (a Bush staffer who was not the key leaker; Armitage was).
Recently, the White House leaked the name of a top CIA officer in Kabul, Afghanistan. His name was really a secret. He does serve abroad (and in a danger zone), and he is endangered by the leak. As the Washington Post puts it:
The Post is withholding the name of the CIA officer at the request of Obama administration officials who warned that the officer and his family could be at risk if the name were published…
The CIA officer was one of 15 senior U.S. officials identified as taking part in a military briefing for Obama…Their names were included on a list…circulated by e-mail to reporters…
It is unclear whether the disclosure will force the CIA to pull the officer out of Afghanistan…The identities of at least three CIA station chiefs in Pakistan have been exposed in recent years. In one case, a CIA officer became a target of death threats after his cover was blown, forcing the agency to rush him out of the country.
Should we expect any big scandal, Left/media outrage, federal prosecutors or trumped-up convictions over this?