[Huck]

Is it your contention he’s lying?

[Steve_Seattle]

"Is it your contention he's lying?"

The center of the storm was Bob Novak, and neither Libby nor Rove leaked anything to Novak. That is probably what McLellan was addressing in the press conference. Rove's "leak" seemed merely a confirmation of what reporters already knew, so I don't call that a leak. The whole Libby scenario is too confusing to unravel, but Bush was probably assured by Libby that he didn't leak, at least to Novak, which was what this was all about.

[jwalsh07]

Q The Robert Novak column last week identified the wife of Ambassador Joseph Wilson as a CIA operative who was working on WMD issues. Novak said that identification is based on information given to him by two administration sources. That column has now given rise to accusations that the administration deliberatively blew the cover of an undercover CIA operative, and in so doing, violated a federal law that prohibits revealing the identity of undercover CIA operatives. Can you respond to that?

MR. McCLELLAN: Thank you for bringing that up. That is not the way this President or this White House operates. And there is absolutely no information that has come to my attention or that I have seen that suggests that there is any truth to that suggestion. And, certainly, no one in this White House would have given authority to take such a step.

Q So you’re saying —

MR. McCLELLAN: I’m saying that that is not the way that this President or this White House operates, and I’ve seen no evidence to suggest there’s any truth to it.

Q Are you saying Novak was wrong in saying that it was two administration sources who were the source for —

MR. McCLELLAN: I have no idea who “anonymous” is. I often wish —

Q It’s not anonymous. He says senior administration officials.

MR. McCLELLAN: That would be anonymous.

Q Well, that would be senior administration —

Q Like the guy who briefed us last week?

MR. McCLELLAN: Whether it’s anonymous senior administration officials or just anonymous sources, it’s still anonymous.

Q Is Novak lying? Do you think he’s making it up?

MR. McCLELLAN: I’m telling you our position. I’ll let the columnist speak for himself.

Q You’re saying, flatly, it did not happen, nobody —

MR. McCLELLAN: I’m telling you, flatly, that that is not the way this White House operates. I’ve seen no evidence to suggest that there’s any truth to that.

Q That’s different from saying it didn’t happen. Are you saying, absolutely, it did not happen?

MR. McCLELLAN: I’m saying no one was certainly given any authority to do anything of that nature. And I’ve seen no evidence to suggest there’s any truth to it. I want to make it very clear, that is simply not the way this White House operates.

Q If it turns out that somebody in the administration did do that —

MR. McCLELLAN: I’m not even going to speculate about it, because I have no knowledge of any truth to that report.

Q What’s the extent of your knowledge? Don’t you want to get some more facts? I mean, how do you know that no one in the administration — Robert Novak has been around for a long —

MR. McCLELLAN: If I could go find “anonymous,” Terry, I would.

Q Does the President support a criminal investigation —

MR. McCLELLAN: Did you have something?

Q Can I follow on that?

MR. McCLELLAN: Oh, Richard.

Q I’m not following.

MR. McCLELLAN: You answer his question and — (laughter.)

Q On Iraq, if I may. Do we have any evidence that Uday and Qusay actually had a role in the post-Saddam operations, the so-called, as some Pentagon officials have called it, the guerrilla warfare that’s going on?

MR. McCLELLAN: I think that that’s best addressed to our military on the ground there in Iraq, any questions related to that.

Q And do you think that when you capture or even kill an enemy of this kind of stature, what role do you think that potentially plays in trying to damper down some of the violence that we’ve seen over there?

MR. McCLELLAN: I think we’ve made statements on this. But you’re asking me now to assume that something has been confirmed. And I want to —

Q So there’s no connection?

MR. McCLELLAN: — wait until there are any updates or any additional information that we receive.

Q First a real quick question. The President is meeting with the Argentinean President tomorrow, correct?

MR. McCLELLAN: Correct.

Q Is there any — should we take that as any sort of an indication that the U.S. is satisfied with the way Argentina has turned it around since the last couple of years? I think the meeting has been moved up.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, I think we need to let the meeting take place. We did put out a statement in terms of what they would be discussing. I’d refer you back to that statement. Let’s let the meeting take place, and then if there’s a readout from that, we will be — we will be glad to provide you an update at that point. But we did say that they would discuss the bilateral partnership between the United States and Argentina and ways to work together to advance economic growth and prosperity, as well as promoting peace, stability and freedom.

Q Second question. Several times you’ve said — you used the phrase, mountain of evidence, today. At least one of the things that came out of the briefing on Friday is some of that evidence was conflicted, at least in terms of what the various intelligence agencies here were saying, and that the President has not — had not read some of the dissent, most notably with respect to those 16 words that the State Department thought to be highly dubious.

My question — I don’t know if you’ve addressed this in the past, but is the President at all concerned in all of this talk about intelligence that some of his supporters and some of the people in this country may feel misled at all about the imminence of Saddam Hussein’s threat or — as opposed to whether or not the threat could be contained? Because that was really the debate, whether or not Saddam Hussein could be contained or whether he was an imminent threat. Some of the things that you’re talking about go straight to the argument about imminence. So does the President feel or is he concerned that Americans might feel misled?

MR. McCLELLAN: No, the President was very clear when he outlined the grave and gathering threat posed by Saddam Hussein and his regime. The reason we acted was because it was real and because of the new threats that we faced in a post-September 11 world, the potential nexus between outlaw regimes and terrorists or terrorist organizations, where the damage would be far greater and far more tragic and horrific than anything we’ve imagined before, if that came to bear.

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McClellan seems to be implying that ROve and Libby were resonsible for leaking the identity of a covert agent to the press. That is indeed a lie. It would be useful to know exactly what he is talking about but he’ll never see a dime of my money. What a punk.