Republicans are trying to paint Wilson as some kind of rabid leftist. That characterization is absurd, but watching him, it looks like he might have been radicalized by this experience. How does going through something like this, and seeing your government do things you never would have imagined, change the way you view the world?

Of course, to call Wilson a rabid leftist is simply ridiculous. His first ambassadorship was under Bush I. He was praised by Bush for his performance [working at the embassy] in Iraq before the first Gulf War.

As for me, I did change in various ways, in particular about my trust in presidents to tell us the truth or to judge our national interest or values reliably. I converted to a belief that the Constitution had it right the first time to take the power of war and peace out of the White House and put it into the hands of Congress so we didn't have an elected king.

I was a cold warrior. I never ceased to be anticommunist. I found the communist system abhorrent. But I became aware that so much of our policy was not any more prudent or productive in terms of fighting communism than an attack on Iraq is a justifiable aspect of our war on terror.

Like you, Wilson has a formidable political machine lined up against him. Do you have any advice for him?

Everything I've seen him do so far has been admirable and exemplary. He certainly has a picture now about what they're prepared to do against him -- he doesn't need to have me warn him.

My advice is not to Wilson but to other people. The purpose of going after Wilson, as in going after me, was to intimidate him and to intimidate other people. I'm totally confident now that he can't be intimidated. He isn't intimidated any more, if I may say, than I was.

What I would really urge is for other people to thwart the White House's hope that they would be intimidated. I want to encourage people to tell the truth, but not by misleading them that it's without risk. My advice to these other people is to consider telling important truths about government lies that are dangerous to this country, consider telling those truths even though you know that they'll go after you personally and professionally. They'll try to destroy your career. They might even try to put you in jail.

CIA analysts said they were appalled that the president used such bogus information [to justify the Iraq war]. My advice to them then and now is that, when they're appalled by misinformation by the president, they should consider risking their careers, risking even going to prison, to correct such bogus information by telling Congress, putting it in the press with documents, and/or coming out publicly.

Do you agree with John Dean that this administration is even more vicious than Nixon's? If so, does that mean they'll be harder to fight?

In terms of the administration, this gang is really different in degree. All administrations lie and others have gotten us into wrongful wars. They haven't invented that stuff. But in terms of their antipathy to democracy, they're unusual.

But what about the rest of the system? In Watergate, the system did work and it worked pretty well. The day my trial was dismissed, Nixon said, "What in the name of God have we come to?" What we'd come back to was a democratic republic, not a monarchy.

Are we seeing that yet? No, but that's not new either. The system really failed on Irangate, Contragate. I didn't believe Reagan and Bush could get away without being impeached, and they did. And they could get away this time. They can cover up anything with enough help from the Congress, enough help from the media and enough apathy from the public.

But if guys like Sens. John McCain [R-Ariz.] and Chuck Hagel [R-Neb.], if they want to hold hearings, we could move ahead. In that case, this leak could turn out to be very good. It could bring down a terrible administration. If Rove made that leak, it would be the best thing he ever did for the country, given that he got caught.

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