When Valerie Plame’s status as a CIA operative was revealed in 2003, Bush administration critics were adamant that a serious crime had been committed, that American national security interests had been put into jeopardy, and that the exposure warranted nothing less than the prosecution of a wide array of Bush administration officials.

“The Wilson smear was a thuggish act,” intoned David Corn, then Washington correspondent of The Nation. “Bush and his crew abused and misused intelligence to make their case for war. Now there is evidence Bushies used classified information and put the nation’s counter-proliferation efforts at risk merely to settle a score.”