The problem with the Powell scenario is that he doesn't seem to do his own dirty work. But his former department has been in this from the get go. This is from October, 2003:(You might also note in the link who the 3 journalists that were mentioned...Novak, Royce and Phelps. The latter 2 are from Newsday. I have always considered that quite interesting.)
The Defence and State departments and the CIA also are part of the investigation.
Promising to co-operate, Secretary of State Colin Powell said his department's officials would search documents and other records "to see if we have anything relevant." He said he was not sure "what they are looking for."
Officials at State were instructed in a separate memo to hold on to the same type of documents demanded at the White House.
"At this stage, Justice is not requesting retrieval/production of documents," the State memo said. "Rather, this is a request that documents that are potentially relevant to the criminal investigation be preserved and not destroyed."
U.S. posts overseas are also being asked to comply. Link
Josh Marshall has posted a second Wilsongate memo from White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales, and a couple of names kind of leap out of it:
Pursuant to a request from the Department of Justice, I am instructing you to preserve and maintain the following:[F]or the time period February 1, 2002 to the present, all documents ... that relate in any way to:
(skipping)
3. Contacts with reporters Knut Royce, Timothy M. Phelps, or Robert D. Novak, or any individual(s) acting directly or indirectly, on behalf of these reporters.
The inclusion of Novak is no surprise, but who are Knut Royce and Timothy M. Phelps? Josh tells us:
Knut Royce and Timothy Phelps of Newsday have done some of the best reporting of anyone in town on the whole issue of Iraq, politicized intelligence and the Joe Wilson matter. They've clearly got some awfully good and pretty generous sources. What are their names doing in this memo?They reported early on Novak's original column. But why that should put them in the mix here isn't immediately clear.
Mind you, the two Newsday reporters do not appear to be among the six allegedly contacted by the White House leakers. So their potential role in the investigation would seem to be limited.
But some of the gang apparently have been thinking about this over at Daily Kos, and Hunter filed a report on a previous thread. So take it away Hunter:
Who the heck are Royce and Phelps? They're the (first) ones who wrote a story about Novak's outing of Plame. (Actually, I think David Corn was first -- billmon) In their story, they say:A senior intelligence official confirmed that Plame was a Directorate of Operations undercover officer who worked "alongside" the operations officers who asked her husband to travel to Niger.See what just happened there? Why Royce and Phelps were named by WH Counsel, and why the investigation is starting over at the CIA? The WH just said -- "Okay, you want an investigation? Fine. We'll do it. Let's investigate who over at the CIA confirmed our original leak to Novak to be true."
Nice backhand, if incredibly evil. They're not going to concentrate on who originally leaked, they're going to dilute it with looking for anyone at the CIA who confirmed the leak... thus putting the CIA under the same guns.
It's looking more and more like war.
I (Billmon) think I'm going to withhold judgment until I've had a chance to check the Newsday stories, and mull things over a bit. But Hunter's theory doesn't appear to be implausible on its face. The FBI did say last night that the investigation would start at the CIA, and Royce and Phelps do appear to have been the recipients of a leak from the agency. But I don't know how the White House expects to turn up daming evidence against the CIA in its own records.
The last time the Mayberry Machiavellis tried to return service to the Ivy League Spooks (back during the original Yellowcakegate affair) they got the ball smashed back into their faces. We'll just have to see whether they're looking for a rematch.
This is Royce and Phelps' original column: