In his syndicated column today, Robert Novak reiterates what I argued in my recent pieces for NRO and NRDT : that when Novak wrote that Valerie Plame had “suggested” her husband, Joseph Wilson, for the CIA Niger assignment, he had no idea she was in any sense a covert agent.

It was not until two days later that the Nation’s David Corn wrote a story revealing that Plame was a “top-secret operative.” Corn also described the kind of work she had done undercover, and the cover story she had used. (He also first raised allegations of criminality and revenge by the Bush White House.)

I ask again: How did David find all this out? Since he names only one source in his story, I think the evidence points in one direction. He learned it from that single source. He learned it from Joe Wilson himself.