Posted on 07/05/2005 8:50:44 AM PDT by Angelie
http://www.needlenose.com/node/view/1592
Is this a dream that could come true?
"At the end of the day, it's of keen interest to me to see whether or not we can get Karl Rove frog-marched out of the White House in handcuffs. And trust me, when I use that name, I measure my words." -- Joseph Wilson, August 21, 2003 (Photoshop image courtesy of d. abides)
Today's hot news, from Newsweek: Its legal appeals exhausted, Time magazine agreed last week to turn over reporter Matthew Cooper's e-mails and computer notes to a special prosecutor investigating the leak of an undercover CIA agent's identity. . . . But Cooper (and a New York Times reporter, Judith Miller) is still refusing to testify and faces jail this week.
At issue is the story of a CIA-sponsored trip taken by former ambassador (and White House critic) Joseph Wilson to investigate reports that Iraq was seeking to buy uranium from the African country of Niger. "Some government officials have noted to Time in interviews... that Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, is a CIA official who monitors the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction," said Cooper's July 2003 Time online article.
Now the story may be about to take another turn. The e-mails surrendered by Time Inc., which are largely between Cooper and his editors, show that one of Cooper's sources was White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove, according to two lawyers who asked not to be identified because they are representing witnesses sympathetic to the White House. Cooper and a Time spokeswoman declined to comment. But in an interview with Newsweek, Rove's lawyer, Robert Luskin, confirmed that Rove had been interviewed by Cooper for the article. It is unclear, however, what passed between Cooper and Rove.
. . . Luskin told NEWSWEEK that Rove "never knowingly disclosed classified information" and that "he did not tell any reporter that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA." Luskin declined, however, to discuss any other details. He did say that Rove himself had testified before the grand jury "two or three times" and signed a waiver authorizing reporters to testify about their conversations with him. "He has answered every question that has been put to him about his conversations with Cooper and anybody else," Luskin said. But one of the two lawyers representing a witness sympathetic to the White House told NEWSWEEK that there was growing "concern" in the White House that the prosecutor is interested in Rove. Fitzgerald declined to comment. So Rove was one of Cooper's sources for the article, but "did not tell any reporter that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA"? From the quote above, someone obviously did -- so, if Rove and his lawyer aren't lying, who was it? (Note: The lawyers for Cooper and Miller are pushing the rumor that Rove or others may be suspected of perjury, so lying is obviously not out of the question.)
The original Time article in question also quotes fellow prime suspect Lewis Libby (chief of staff for VP Dick Cheney) by name, although not about Plame. As I noted back at the end of November, however, Cooper's testimony about Libby was already described in the Washington Post: Time reporter Matthew Cooper has told prosecutors that he talked to Libby on July 12 and mentioned that he had heard that Wilson's wife worked at the CIA, a source knowledgeable about his testimony said. Cooper testified that Libby said he had heard the same thing from the media. At the time, I surmised that this unexpected twist -- and I think I was the only person in the blogosphere who noted it -- came from a "laundering" of the Plame leak through reporters by Libby, Rove, or other Bushite officials ("Whether it was Novak or one of the others, he or she could have gossiped about it to Cooper, who then called Libby to check the story out"). And it may have been that Cooper was just putting in the mouths of "government officials" words he'd confirmed with them after initially learning from another reporter.
In scrambling to catch up doing some hard-digging research on the Plame investigation today, though, I stumbled across this tidbit in the Washington Post in mid-February about exactly why Judith Miller is being ordered to testify to the grand jury by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald: According to the appellate court's opinion, Fitzgerald knows the identity of the person with whom Miller spoke and wants to question her about her contact with that "specified government official" on or about July 6, 2003. Miller never wrote a story on the subject.
Zot!
IBTZ
A sleeper!
You're an idiot. Next time, just sign up and post your trash the same day, okay?
Uh, yeah, sure. It's telling that your fantasies consist of a middle-aged man going to prison.
Reporters ought to obey the law like everybody else. It's time they learned to. Get over it.
Typical liberal, when lacking facts, make them up!
Valerie Plame was not a covert operative. There was no violation of the law, here.
I just stole this img, and had to use it.
Buhbye.
Good bye.
Waited five months for that... LOL.
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