Posted on 04/06/2006 8:51:49 AM PDT by good god
APRIL 6--A former top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney told a federal grand jury that President George Bush authorized him to leak information from a classified intelligence report to a New York Times reporter. Details of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby's testimony were included in a court filing made yesterday by Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, who is prosecuting Libby for perjury, obstruction of justice, and making false statements in connection with the probe into the leaking of CIA agent Valerie Plame's identity.
According to Fitzgerald's filing, an excerpt of which you'll find below, Libby, 55, testified in 2003 that he provided reporter Judith Miller with information from a classified National Intelligence Estimate after being told by Cheney that Bush "specifically had authorized" him to "disclose certain information in the NIE." Libby also testified that Cheney also specifically directed him to speak to other reporters about information in the classified NIE (which addresses Iraq's purported weapons of mass destruction programs) as well as a cable authored by Plame's husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson. The leaking of the classified material was apparently done in an effort to counter claims made by Wilson regarding the White House's justification for invading Iraq.
The Fitzgerald filing also notes that Libby told grand jurors that he conferred with David Addington, Cheney's counsel, about the leak directive and that Addington told him "that Presidential authorization to publicly disclose a document amounted to a declassification of the document."
While both Bush and Cheney have been interviewed by Fitzgerald, it is unknown whether they confirmed or disputed Libby's assertion that he was authorized to disclose findings in a classified report. Libby, Cheney's former chief of staff, resigned his White House post last October following his indictment on five felony counts.
(Excerpt) Read more at thesmokinggun.com ...
Apparently the same thing his profile says.
Thanks, good god.
Remember, the president has the authority to declassify any intelligence and make it..uh...unclassified.
Nice try.
Meow.
Lookie heeyah, boy! When da Admin Mod aks you a question, you better git on heeah and talk most respectful like. Unnahstan?
More:
A 25-page version of the National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction was released in October 2002. It made clear-cut statements about Iraq's nuclear, biological and chemical weapons capabilities in two pages of "Key Judgments."
The document can be found here. Warning: .pdf file
ABC radio news just said there was no authorization to give out anyone's name.
The MSM will try and make this news because Bush complained about leaks.
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In B4ZOT?
ZOT?
WOW.
You didn't last long.
Philistine
: )
The Mods often work in mysterious ways : )
The media keeps "revising" their coverage of this story.
The most recent Fox Radio News headline ended with a paraphrased version of "The president didn't leak because as president he can declassify information".
Aye, that you do, lad!
The media keeps "revising" their coverage of this story.
The most recent Fox Radio News headline ended with a paraphrased version of "The president didn't leak because as president he can declassify information".
That's because they pulled Brit Hume on air to explain and he was furious that even their titles were misleading and read like the AP and used the words "Bush authorized leak'. They haven't said it since!
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