Libby Prosecutor Outlines Effort at High Levels

The Wall Street Journal Onlline ^ | April 8, 2006 | ANNE MARIE SQUEO

[libstripper]

WASHINGTON -- The special prosecutor trying the case against former vice presidential chief of staff I. Lewis Libby will try to show that the leaking of a CIA agent's name grew out of a highly organized administration effort that commanded high-level attention, a court filing this week shows.

Pretrial filings by Mr. Libby's defense team indicate they intend to argue that any misstatements made in Mr. Libby's testimony to investigators and a grand jury were innocent mistakes because of his focus on more pressing national-security issues. They are seeking a wide array of classified and sensitive information they say is necessary for trial, including secret daily intelligence briefings given to the president.

[shhrubbery!]

Plame was probably never a NOC.

"She wasn’t an NOC, period.” -- Some Plame Truths

[Just mythoughts]

bttt

[Sal]

From your #36 link: ...prosecutors are not allowed to take testimony when no underlying crime is at issue. And that could certainly explain Patrick Fitzgerald’s refusal to turn over in discovery to Libby documentation of her status – which he mentioned as “classified” in both his indictment press conference and the indictment itself.

Okay, so this is what Libby's really after with his request for classified docs. I admit I'm disappointed that it isn't an exposure of the CIA cabal. OTOH it might still lead to that via Armitage...

Because of the huge amount of newsworthy items that never make it to old media, I call them the Silent Dog media after the Sherlock Holmes story about the dog that didn't bark because the perp was its master.

[Freedom is eternally right]

I'm certain that the decision of who to send was made far below the level of the President and VIce President.

I would say it is far below the level of President or Vice President (or any administration official). Rather, it appears that career CIA types made that decision (who might qualify as loose cannons, how would we know since this person/persons has never been identified?). Here is Joe's own explanation of how he came to make the trip:

In February, 2002, I was asked by the CIA to meet with the American intelligence community officials charged with understanding Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs, in order to discuss an intelligence report that had caught the attention of the office of the Vice President. That report concerned the alleged sale of a significant amount of uranium yellowcake from the West African nation of Niger to Iraq.

----SNIP----

At the meeting I was asked if I would consider traveling to Niger to try to find answers to lingering questions that analysts might have. That was the first time the suggestion of traveling to Niger was ever raised with me.

[Freedom is eternally right]

OTOH it might still lead to that via Armitage...

Armitage (and Powell) will give us the State department cabal, Tenet the CIA cabal, Mrs. Greenspan the media cabal. So many cabals, so little time...

[Laverne]

Novak said his source was an "administration" source. Fitzy knows the original source of the leak was someone NOT IN THE WHITEHOUSE.

[Freedom is eternally right]

Things that make you shake your head about Fitz's worldview: UGO's leak to Novak was a harmless leak, meant only as gossip. Libby's same information is bad, because it was meant as background info. Thus gossip is good, providing background is bad. (Fitz's mother apparently never admonished him that gossip was bad).

[cpdiii]

Could someone here at FR please explain to this "suburban housewife" just what the he** is the crime here?

Libby said he found out the information from a reported. He said this under oath. The reporter said he did not give this information to Libby. The reporter is Tim Russert. Libby is now charged with lying under oath. The point that is missed or ignored is the following. There is no reason for Libby to lie. He could have easily said, as Hillary Clinton did when deposed, "I do not recall." I think it was over a hundred times she said this. Perhaps Tim Russert is mistaken and did tell it to Libby. Perhaps Tim Russert is lying. Perhaps, Libby learned it from another reporter and thought it was Tim Russert. There is not reason for him to lie.

[STARWISE]

I think the more accurate question is: WHO in the CIA asked for the investigation that Tenet requested be initiated at DOJ.

[nopardons]

Thanks for the ping.

[nopardons]

Spot on.

[Laverne]

Do you think the Valerie herself asked for the investigation under some whistle blower law? BTW: I was just watching msnbc for a few minutes, their bimbo COntessa kept trying to create a comparison between this leak and the NSA leak. What is it about these idiots in the media that they cannot understand? Are they idiots, or are they DNC hacks (and is there even a difference?) :-)

[nopardons]

BTTT

[nopardons]

No, you really can't use the Martha Stewart analogy; though many have tried to do so, here, re the Libby case.

Martha actually had evidence CHANGED/TAMPERED WITH! Scooter never did so; that we know of. And no, even the "supposed" perjury is quite different from having a third party change evidence and then change that, to something of a semblance of the original. They "got" Martha on that.

[nopardons]

Exactly!

[STARWISE]

Their mad, brainwashed babble is unending. THEY are the conspiracy nuts ... they see it in everything this admin. does.

[Fedora]

What I find interesting is the chronological context of the CIA's request for a DOJ investigation of the Plame leak in relation to other investigation requests related to the broader Wilson/Niger affair. For instance, shortly after Wilson's NYT op-ed appeared in July 2003 a petition to Congress for an investigation into the Niger forgeries was made simultaneously by Dennis Kucinich (the head of the Congresional antiwar lobby that sent Jim McDermott to Bagdhad in September 2002) and Carl Levin (who on January 29, 2003 had asked CIA for details on what the US intelligence community knew about the Iraqi attempts to acquire uranium from Africa mentioned in President Bush’s January 28 State of the Union address; Levin and Joseph Wilson appeared together with the French and German ambassadors on Nightline about a month after this; Levin likewise--through prearrangement with the producer--followed up Wilson's appearance on Meet the Press with Andrea Mitchell the day after Wilson's NYT op-ed). While Levin was addressing the Senate on this on July 15, 2003, Kucinich held a press conference with VIPS’ Ray McGovern and retired Australian intelligence agent Andrew Willkie. The next day Wilson’s Nation friend David Corn accused the Bush administration of leaking Plame’s name to Novak, a charge echoed July 17 by TIME reporter Matthew Cooper. Tenet's request for a DOJ investigation came to fruition two months after this.