Posted on 07/05/2005 5:35:28 PM PDT by CHARLITE
Columnist Robert Novak has made a career for himself as a human flamethrower for conservative causes. Yet, even Novak appears surprised at the mounting cost of his disclosure in 2003 of the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame.
It was classic Novak: a hatchet job directed not at Plame, but at her husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV. The firestorm that erupted has consumed millions of dollars in investigation and litigation costs and has wreaked havoc with the career not just of Plame (who had to leave the CIA) but of two reporters who were hauled into court and threatened with prison.
Novak refused to answer even the most basic question, such as whether "in general … you cooperated with investigators in the case." Novak insisted his lawyer had told him not to answer "until this case is finished." His reliance on his lawyer's advice is a rather feeble and perplexing defense.
Yes, lawyers often prefer that their clients remain quiet under the theory that what you don't say can't be used against you. But Novak is not some button-man for the Gotti family. He is a self-described journalist who started a firestorm with a politically engineered attack piece on a civil servant for which another reporter is in danger of going to jail. Novak himself would never accept the "my lawyer did it" defense from a public figure.
Now facing incarceration, Miller personifies the need for a federal shield law protecting journalists from such coercion — similar to those laws passed in 49 states and the District of Columbia. As for Novak, he promises another blockbuster: Once he is no longer at risk, he will "reveal all in a column." At least it should make interesting reading for Miller in her cellblock.
(Excerpt) Read more at jewishworldreview.com ...
Turley's statement is more than a bit misleading, even if it may be considered to be technically correct. Plame evidently hasn't "left" the CIA. According to this New York Times article, Plame took a leave of absence but has now returned to work at the CIA:
On June 1, after a year's unpaid leave, Ms. Wilson, now known to the country by her maiden name, Valerie Plame, returned to a new job at the Central Intelligence Agency, determined to get her career back on track, her husband said. Neither the agency nor Mr. Wilson would describe her position, except to make what might seem an obvious point: she will no longer be working under cover, as she did successfully for almost 20 years.
I think what Turley is saying is that it is senseless for the two reporters to go to jail if Novak has already fessed up.
It does seem senseless to me for them to keep holding out if Novak has already revealed the source. But they just don't know for sure.
I would like to know what Novak said if I was them.
they don't have to go to jail - go in there and tell the truth. but they can't seem to do that. why? are they really holding out to protect Rove? what are the chances of that? sure, they can claim they are holding out on "principle" - but this very article from Turley tips us that this isn't true. their only "principle" in this matter seems to be staying out of the perjury trap - which is why Turley is telling Novak to talk.
I don't know as much about the specifics of this case as others, and perhaps you.
But I don't discount reporters being willing to go to jail over principle.
I'm sure they hold confidentiality just as dearly as a pastor or priest.
Can you imagine a pastor getting subpoenaed over a counseling session or a priest over a confession?
(But my cynical side says your theory is probably right.)
others with more legal knowledge then I have can comment on that - I do not believe the right of a pastor to not testify is absolute in all cases.
My money is still on Joe Wilson, but I think that some State Department Marxists and other Democrats may have also had a hand. Everything points to the Democrats. I believe somebody set a trap, and the rats (including their accomplices in the press) took the bait.
I think Novak confirmed that his source was a "senior administration official."
Novak said his source was a Bush administration official.
This guy obviously didn't read the piece.
Right. Why would such an important figure as Karl Rove risk "political capital" on such "small fry?" Valerie hadn't been undercover for awhile, as I understand. It's not as though she was "Deep Throat!"
Someone on this thread took exception to my recollection (from Rush Limbaugh), that Novak quipped soon after the thing exploded, that he was surprised "because everyone inside the Beltway know that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA." I don't know if Novak said that, but I heard Rush quote him as having said it."
On the other hand, if Novak said such a thing, it is hard to believe that he was sincere about it, because his revelation about Wilson's wife didn't add to the story he wrote and were clearly intended to be a "bomb" which he added gratuitously.
Char :)
Novak's testimony has nothing to do with what the prosecutor wants to talk to Cooper and Miller about. The prosecutor wants to know the substance of other conversations that the reporters had with the leaker on other subjects (per Fox news) . I heard, months ago that there was a collateral investigation which grew out of the Plame investigation, regarding a leak from the CIA to reporters, warning a terrorist supporting group of an imminent raid on their premises just hours before it happened. My guess is that the prosecutor is going after the CIA agent and it is this source that the reporters are protecting.
Novak's testimony (whatever it may be), and perhaps other evidence you mention, is the checkmate to Miller & Cooper simply walking in there with the same story - and lying.
If the truth indeed points to this collateral investigation - so be it, perhaps it will. Let them talk so we can find out.
Poor Jonathan is pretty bitchy in this thing...sounds like he might have sand in his vagina.
According to Fox, the prosecutor stated that the information that he was seeking was on a subject other than Plame and that was the reason that the notes were not sufficient. He wants to know what else they talked to the source about.
Read this:
Judith Miller, TWA 800 and the Death of Press Freedom ^
Posted by johnny7 to Eva
On News/Activism ^ 07/06/2005 8:01:20 AM PDT · 21 of 24 ^
Found this.
The Justice Department has charged that a veteran New York Times foreign correspondent warned an alleged terror-funding Islamic charity that the FBI was about to raid its office — potentially endangering the lives of federal agents. The stunning accusation was disclosed yesterday in legal papers related to a lawsuit the Times filed in Manhattan federal court.
The suit seeks to block subpoenas from the Justice Department for phone records of two of its Middle Eastern reporters — Philip Shenon and Judith Miller — as part of a probe to track down the leak. The Times last night flatly denied the allegation.
U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald of Chicago charged in court papers that Shenon blew the cover on the Dec. 14, 2001, raid of the Global Relief Foundation — the first charges of their kind under broad new investigatory powers given to the feds under the Patriot Act. "It has been conclusively established that Global Relief Foundation learned of the search from reporter Philip Shenon of The New York Times," Fitzgerald said in an Aug. 7, 2002, letter to the Times' legal department. He said he understood journalists' concerns about protecting the identities of their sources, but national security and preventing leaks that thwart probes into "terrorist fund-raising" trump such confidentiality. "I would posit that the circumstances here — the decision by the reporter to provide a tip to the subject of a terrorist fund-raising inquiry which seriously compromised the integrity of the investigation and potentially endangered the safety of federal law-enforcement personnel — warrant such cooperation in full," Fitzgerald said.
Times lawyer George Freeman told The Post that Fitzgerald "wrongly" suggested that Shenon alerted the Islamic charity to the raid. "We deny he tipped anyone off," Freeman said. He added that Global Relief would have anticipated the raid in any case because the feds had already hit the office of another suspected terror-funding Islamic charity, the Holy Land Foundation, and the government had frozen the assets of several other charities.
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I do not believe that the subpeonas she is likely to refuse to comply with today, that she litigated to the SCOTUS and lost, has anything to do with this story. while it does mean that the same precedent can be used to get her to talk about this (is there a grand jury on this one?), I don't believe this is the issue they are in court about today. Its about Plame today.
Well, they have said that it does not relate to the Plame case, that they interested in other conversations on other subjects. My guess is that they want to know what else this leaker revealed and that the CIA leaker is now the target of the investigation. It was said in other earlier articles that the Special Council had moved on to a tangental investigation that was opened up by the Plame issue.
Okay, here I go again. Were Cooper and Miller grabbed by the scruffs of their necks and dragged before the Grand Jury. No, they were sent subpoena and walked in under their own power. No undignified "hauling." No panties on their heads (although...never mind). They weren't "threatened". The consequence of their actions was explained to them. It is the law. What drama queens.
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