The American Spectator

at his wife’s recommendation , which would seem to be a salient fact. There is simply no way that, if not for his wife, Joe Wilson would ever have been selected for a CIA mission. p> THROUGHOUT HER TESTIMONY, Plame Wilson attempted to cast doubt on the conclusions of the Senate Intelligence Committee report. At Lynch’s prompting, Plame Wilson even implied that the only ones who think she had anything to do with her husband going to Niger are Republicans: br> /p>

REP. LYNCH: Thank you. And I want to go back to that Senate Intelligence Committee hearing. There were three Republican senators who included a more definitive statement which — now this is a quote. It said, “The plan to send the former ambassador to Niger was suggested by the former ambassador’s wife, a CIA employee.” What is your reaction to that statement in the Senate report about the genesis of your husband’s trip to Niger in 2002?

MS. PLAME WILSON: Congressman, it’s incorrect. It’s been borne out in the testimony during the Libby trial, and I can tell you that it just doesn’t square with the facts.

REP. LYNCH: Okay.

MS. PLAME WILSON: Those additional views were written exclusively by three Republican senators.

br> The reference here is to an addendum to the report (.pdf) titled “Additional Views,” in which Senators Pat Roberts, Christopher Bond, and Orrin Hatch grumble about a number of conclusions that Senate Democrats moved to exclude from the bipartisan report. The trouble with this effort at partisan point-scoring is that Roberts, Bond, and Hatch didn’t simply pull that conclusion out of the air; though the Republican senators were frustrated that this finding wasn’t emphasized in the “Conclusions” section, it was certainly included in the bipartisan report. (The relevant paragraphs of the bipartisan report can be found on page 39 — page 4 of this .pdf under “B. Former Ambassador.”): br>

Some CPD officials could not recall how the office decided to contact the former ambassador, however, interviews and documents provided to the Committee indicate that his wife, a CPD employee, suggested his name for the trip. The CPD reports officer told Committee staff that the former ambassador’s wife “offered up his name” and a memorandum to the Deputy Chief of the CPD on February 12, 2002, from the former ambassador’s wife says, “my husband has good relations with the PM [prime minister] and the former Minister of Mines (not to mention lots of French contacts), both of whom could possibly shed light on this sort of activity.”

br> Plame Wilson knows this; elsewhere in her testimony she disputed this part of the report. Here’s more of her response to Lynch, in which she disputes the email evidence: br>