She tells NEWSWEEK that the CIA’s Publications Review Board, the wing of the agency that edits the public writings of ex-employees, moved to approve her work before being overruled by director Michael Hayden. According to Plame, board chairman Richard Puhl told her that her book required only minor redactions before publication, but that “the seventh floor”–a euphemism for senior management–was still debating more extensive cuts. A week later, Puhl told her that she could not reveal that she worked for the CIA prior to 2002, a decision that required her to strike large sections of text. Puhl also told her that the decision was “ludicrous” and that the CIA’s censorship was merely a “fig leaf” over information that was already public in the Congressional Record and elsewhere. In 2006, the CIA sent Plame an unclassified letter about her pension eligibility that said she had worked for the agency for “20 years, 7 days,” including “6 years, 1 month and 29 days of overseas service.”
CIA spokesperson Mark Mansfield declined to comment on Plame’s accusations beyond saying that “Director Hayden takes his obligation to protect classified information very seriously.” He also denies that Plame’s memoir was given particularly harsh treatment. “For her, as for other employees, there was just one yardstick in the pre-publication review process: that no classified information be released.”
In August, a federal judge ruled that the CIA was acting within its rights and in the interest of the national security. “The information at issue was properly classified, was never declassified and has not been officially acknowledged by the C.I.A.,” Judge Barbara Jones wrote, adding that the agency’s court filings had persuaded her of “the harm to natural security that could reasonably be expected” if the CIA confirmed the accuracy of the information at issue. Plame and her publisher say this is nonsense. “Welcome to my Alice in Wonderland world,” says Plame. “The world can talk about me, but I can’t talk about me.”
