Tim Russert, Washington bureau chief of NBC News, uses crutches to walk into U.S. Federal Court in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 7, 2007 for the I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby perjury trial. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
Posted on 02/07/2007 2:32:08 PM PST by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON - NBC newsman Tim Russert testified Wednesday he never discussed a CIA operative with vice presidential aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, contradicting Libby's version to a grand jury in the CIA leak investigation.
The testimony came as prosecutors prepared to rest their perjury case against Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff.
Russert, the host of "Meet the Press," testified about a July 2003 phone call in which Libby complained about a colleague's coverage. Libby has said that, at the end of the call, Russert brought up war critic Joseph Wilson and mentioned that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA.
"That would be impossible," Russert testified Wednesday. "I didn't know who that person was until several days later."
That discrepancy is at the heart of Libby's perjury and obstruction trial. He is accused of lying to investigators about his conversations with reporters regarding Wilson's wife, CIA operative Valerie Plame.
During Libby's 2004 grand jury testimony, he said Russert told him "all the reporters know" that Wilson's wife worked at the CIA. Libby now acknowledges he had learned about Plame a month earlier from Cheney but says he had forgotten about it and learned it again from Russert as if new.
Libby subsequently repeated the information about Plame to other journalists, always with the caveat that he had heard it from reporters, he has said. Prosecutors say Libby concocted the Russert conversation to shield him from prosecution for revealing information from government sources.
Plame's identity was leaked shortly after her husband began accusing the Bush administration of doctoring prewar intelligence on Iraq. The controversy over the faulty intelligence was a major story in mid-2003.
Given that news climate, defense attorney Theodore Wells was skeptical about Russert's account.
"You have the chief of staff of the vice president of the United States on the telephone and you don't ask him one question about it?" Wells asked. He followed up moments later with, "As a newsperson who's known for being aggressive and going after the facts, you wouldn't have asked him about the biggest stories in the world that week?"
"What happened is exactly what I told you," Russert replied.
Russert originally told the FBI that he couldn't rule out discussing Wilson with Libby but had no recollection of it, according to an FBI report Wells read in court. Russert said Wednesday he did not believe he said that.
Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has spent weeks making the case that Libby was preoccupied with discrediting Wilson. Several former White House, CIA and State Department officials testified that Libby discussed Plame with them — all before the Russert conversation.
Fitzgerald has said Russert would be his final witness. Prosecutors spent the past few days playing audiotapes of Libby's grand jury testimony in court. In the final hours of those tapes Wednesday, Libby described a tense mood in the White House as the leak investigation began.
Though President Bush was publicly stating that nobody in the White House was involved in the leak, Libby knew that he himself had spoken to several reporters about Plame. He said he did not bring that up with Bush and was uncertain whether he discussed it with Cheney.
Libby did remember one conversation with Cheney, however, in which the vice president seemed surprised when told by his aide where Libby had learned Plame's identity.
"From me?" Cheney asked, tilting his head, Libby recalled.
Libby said he had forgotten that Cheney was his original source until finding his own handwritten notes on the conversation. The notes predated the Russert phone call by more than a month.
___
Associated Press writer Pete Yost contributed to this report.
Tim Russert, Washington bureau chief of NBC News, uses crutches to walk into U.S. Federal Court in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 7, 2007 for the I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby perjury trial. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
You know how you can tell Russert's lying?
from day 1....
R-U-S-S-E-R-T
Did Libby's attorneys get to cross Russert? That is what I have been looking forward to.
They all knew who she was....they attending parties with them..
Actually, contrary to the flipping headline, Russert contradicted HIMSELF!
What really infuriates me is that Libby's defense team has not put the real liar, Joe Wilson, on the stand and made him answer numerous questions under oath on his constantly changing stories. Also, the defense could easily play several obvious lies from Russert's broadcasts, establish a pattern of hostility to republicans, put the entire media on trial in essence. They need to drill it to the jury over and over how this whole sham is due to Joe Wilson's lies.
Why should Russert just be given a pass? Why can't he be mistaken?
Oh. I forgot. He's MSM...we all know they *always" report the truth.
How about a new rule on FR. NO MORE SCOOTER LIBBY POSTS.
I couldn't care less about this whole leftist wet-dream FARCE.
Talk to me about the prosecution of Sandy Berglar.
"Russert originally told the FBI that he couldn't rule out discussing Wilson with Libby but had no recollection of it, according to an FBI report Wells read in court. Russert said Wednesday he did not believe he said that."
If he couldn't remember then how is it he remembers today? If all the witnesses can't rememeber exactly what happened at that time then that testimony is tainted if they say they rememeber now.
They all laughed and drank, wined and dined, knew everything but told THE BIG LIE.
Ask about the dinners together..ask about the dinners.
R-U-S-S-E-R-T
They all laughed and drank, wined and dined, knew everything but told THE BIG LIE.
Ask about the dinners together..ask about the dinners.
R-U-S-S-E-R-T
Wilson lied about who sent him to Niger - it wasn't Dick Cheney - it was a group at the CIA that included his wife. Wilson lied about documents he never saw and what his junket in Africa discovered and what it didn't.
Libby is on trial for lying to investigators, but the only proven liar in the entire saga thus far is JOE WILSON.
Yes, read the article. who do you think Wells is?
FYI
The judge wont let him because its not germane to whether Libby lied or not.
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