Leaker Updates and Liberal Excuses

HOT BREAKING UPDATE HERE
------------
The information surrounding fired CIA leaker Mary McCarthy is thick across the net. Rather than trying to rehash it all, here's the links that have some of the best information:

Jay at StoptheACLU - CIA Officer Fired For Leaking Classified Info

Kim at Wizbang blog - Was it a Sting?

Macs Mind - Rockefeller did you "teller?"- XI - Mary is only the beginning

RightWing Nuthouse - CIA VS. THE WHITE HOUSE: THE LEAKER AND THE SQUEALER

Now the view from the Dark Side...

Katherine Schrader at the Associated Press calls it an "alleged leak" despite including the following in her article...Agency spokesman Paul Gimigliano confirmed an officer had been fired for having unauthorized contacts with the media and disclosing classified information to reporters, including details about intelligence operations.
"The officer has acknowledged unauthorized discussions with the media and the unauthorized sharing of classified information," Gimigliano said. "That is a violation of the secrecy agreement that everyone signs as a condition of employment with the CIA."

The New York Times offered the typical Blame Bush excuses as justification for McCarthy's leaks:
"But former colleagues who worked with her at the C.I.A. and the White House say they had trouble fathoming her as a leaker. Some said they flatly refused to believe the accusations.
"We're talking about a person with great integrity who played by the book and, as far as I know, never deviated from the rules," said Steven Simon, a National Security Council aide in the Clinton administration who worked closely with Ms. McCarthy."

"Others said it was possible that Ms. McCarthy, who began attending law school at night several years ago and had announced her intention to retire from the C.I.A., had grown disenchanted with the methods that the Bush administration used for handling Al Qaeda prisoners since the September 2001 terror attacks and felt she had no alternative except to go to the press."

"But some former C.I.A. employees who know Ms. McCarthy remain unconvinced, arguing that the pressure from Mr. Goss and others in the Bush administration to plug leaks may have led the agency to focus on an employee on the verge of retirement, whose work at the White House during the Clinton administration had long raised suspicions within the current administration."

"It looks to me like Mary is being used as a sacrificial lamb," said Larry Johnson, a former C.I.A. officer who worked for Ms. McCarthy in the agency's Latin America section."

Is anyone shocked that the NYT would defend a leaker? Sounds like they are already planning their own defense for publishing classified intel...