The defense based on clearing up your errors to the same grand jury is why I brought up the point that Libby admitted his prior knowledge. It's apparent that he admitted prior knowledge, admitted he did not learn it from reporters, and tried to explain that he forgot what he knew. I don't know the law on the subject, but I guess there must be some threshold of non-lameness that your explanation has to cross before it becomes a valid defense.
Her classified status gives both motive and materiality, so the defense gets to go into that.
It is very interesting that the indictment refers twice to discussions that Libby had with others in the OVP about how to respond to reporters' questions, but doesn't say who they were with, or what they decided or whether what Libby did was in conformity with what they discussed. That may have something to do with why Libby lied as well.
Wilson could certainly have been thoroughly discredited without ever mentioning his wife. Why they didn't just do that, I don't know. I speculate that they were caught up in the CIA v. The White House war, and saw Plame's role as highly significant - as we do - because it made L'Affaire Wilson into a CIA disinformation campaign against an incumbent president and they wanted to get that out to the media.
It is hypocritical, to say the least, for Fitz to give a sermon on the importance of telling the truth in the announcement of an indictment for perjury that repeats Wilson's abundant and obvious lies at face value without ever noting their falsity.
If I was Libby, I would make this into the trial of Wilson and the CIA to the max extent possible. There's a war on, ferchrissake.
Did Libby run back to the grand jury to testify that he now remembered? I don't know one way or the other. Remember, it is a DC jury. Waging war on Wilson and the CIA as to what it was doing to the Bush adminstration may not be as appealing there as in say, Lubbock.
"If I was Libby, I would make this into the trial of Wilson and the CIA to the max extent possible. There's a war on, ferchrissake." ~ Buckhead
Absolutely.
Investigate The CIA
Investors.com ^ | 10/24/2005 | Editorial
Posted on 10/25/2005 7:21:39 AM EDT by Jim Robinson
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1508739/posts
While the Bush administration hunkers down on indictment watch, Congress should take a look at political and possibly illegal activity by agenda-driven intelligence operatives.
Whatever fate befalls White House adviser Karl Rove, Vice Presidential Chief of Staff Lewis Libby and any other administration official caught up in the prosecution over the leaked name of a CIA officer, there's a back story to this case that should not be ignored.
It's about the CIA itself.
This is a story that most of the media will be trying hard not to cover. They share former Ambassador Joseph Wilson's stated desire to see Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald "frog-march" Rove out of the White House in handcuffs.
So Congress should leave the media no choice. Hold hearings. Put the CIA on the spot and blow the lid off any politically motivated funny business. Bring some transparency to what has become a very murky issue.
We believe that someone needs to answer the questions raised recently by Joseph F. DiGenova, a former federal prosecutor and independent counsel:
Was there a covert operation against the president?
If so, who was behind it?
These aren't the musings of the tinfoil-hat brigade. A sober-minded case can be made that at least some people in the CIA may have acted inappropriately to discredit the administration as a way of salvaging their own reputations after the intelligence debacles of 9-11 and Iraqi WMD.
(Excerpt) Read more at investors.com ...