hey Fitz... can you say, D-I-S-C-L-O-S-U-R-E??? i knew that you could!!!
Posted on 02/01/2006 8:25:40 AM PST by frankjr
Attorneys for Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff urged a court yesterday to force a prosecutor to turn over CIA records indicating whether former CIA operative Valerie Plame's employment was classified, saying the answer is not yet clear.
The defense team for I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby also asked that the court require Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald to turn over any informal assessments conducted by the CIA to determine whether the leak of Plame's identity in July 2003 damaged national security or agency operations.
Defense lawyers argued in court papers that it is crucial to determine whether Plame was not an undercover operative at the time Libby was discussing her with members of the media, and whether little or no damage was done to national security when her identity was publicly disclosed.
If either is true, the defense argued, it will "challenge the prosecution's contention that Mr. Libby has reason to lie to the FBI and the grand jury about his conversations with reporters in July 2003."
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Oh, they probably want her employment records to verify she was a desk jockey.
Ping
Hello!
So far he wants the White House notes, the media's notes, and now this.
Ain't we got fun?
There can no excuse for holding those records back.Scooter has a right to defend himself and Plames status is central to the case,IMO.
Fitzhooey should co-operate if justice means anything to him.
Bring it on!
hey Fitz... can you say, D-I-S-C-L-O-S-U-R-E??? i knew that you could!!!
Yep!
Fitzgerald will claim that Plame's status was not pertinent to Libby's alleged perjury (which they'll say is a standalone matter), and protest the records acquisition.
Libby's attorneys will then assert that if Fitzgerald knew of Plame's actual status only weeks after being appointed - which he would have without question - then there would have been no need to continue his investigation.
Do you think that this will drag on until W pardons Scooter when he leaves the Oval Office?
Then we will see the wailing and the gnashing of progressive tooths!
It's interesting that nowhere in the indictment does the Special Prosecutor even claim that Libby knew Plame's employment was classified. If he didn't what's his motive to deliberately lie about discussing her with reporters?
Absolutely. And don't forget Fitz's famous news conference, where he repeated over and over again that Her employment was "classified information," even though he brought no charges against Libby having to do with the leaking of classified information.
That's what I can't figure out. It's like Fitz is saying that Libby "thought" (rightly or wrongly) Plame was classified and so actual status does not matter. I don't understand what Fitz would be claiming the motive is otherwise besides releasing classified info. But then Fitz never charges anyone with releasing classified info. How is Fitz going to show Libby thought she was classified? And the 'throwing dirt in the umpire's eyes does not seem to be a good reason not to have an answer.
Even if her job was classified, should it have been? It is easy to classify every person and every job to be safe. One job I had, they discouraged us from putting 'classifed' on every document for fear it would render the status meaningless for all documents.
I think even Harlow didn't think she was classified when he confirmed her employment to Novak.
I assumed when Dow Jones sought the redacted pp in the Miller opinion (remember Tatel's opinion about balancing calssified stuff?) we'd see some evidence that she her employment was classified(and what a curious circumlocution that is). But, aparently nothing like that was in the redacted pp.
And, yes, even if she were--for which we've seen no evidence--she might have been in error; Fitz has indicated she no longer is; and as I said earlier he never claimed Libby knew she was classified.
Political intrigue, and/or job preservtion.
On the political angle, if the story comes out that the "Bush WH" was leaking to manipulate public perception aghainst Wilson, it plays against the WH.
On the job preservation angle, the WH has a reputation for trying to be "tight," and if he was leaking, then perhaps the conduct is outside the boundary of "acceptable."
There could also be a "get the media in trouble, just for fun" angle. Libby's testimony to investigators would, if believed, cast blame on leaking solely to reporters.
He doesn't have to. He has to show that Libby knew Plame's status "for a fact," because Libby called the CIA and asked - and then that Libby consciously withheld from investigators that he knew Plame's status "for a fact," having called the CIA and inquired.
Exactly what her status is isn't pertinent to the question of whether or not his answers to investigators were deliberate misdirection.
"Exactly what her status is isn't pertinent to the question of whether or not his answers to investigators were deliberate misdirection."
I agree. I just don't know what motive would be if he did not believe she was classifed.
Libby's attorney's are first going to establish whether Plame was or was not subject to the Intelligence Identities Protection Act.
When they discover that she was not, Fitzgerald's entire case will fall apart, since there was no basis for his ongoing investigation.
It's like accusing someone of robbing a 7-11 when no such crime occurred, yet continuing an investigation into that non-robbery regardless of the facts.
Eventually one alleged "suspect" asserts he stopped at a 7-11 near his home during the non-crime. Later that same "suspect" says he stopped at the very 7-11 where no crime was actually committed.
He's obviously confused about which 7-11 he visited, so the prosecutor decides to charge him with perjury for those two conflicting statements.
Fitgerald's repeated use of the word "classified" is and was a red herring.
The Identies Act requires that Plame have been "covert" (not "classified") in order for there to have been a crime. And for the Act to be violated, Libby or anyone else would have to have *known* she was "covert", and furthermore must have obtained that information from other classified sources.
This is a pretty high bar, but it's really because the Act is intended to protect foreign covert agents from the kind of outing that Phil Agee (a former CIA agent) had been doing in the 70's. Agee used his classified status to "out" literally hundreds of covert agents.
Also there are tens of thousands of people in the DC area with "classified" jobs and positions, but they are in no way "covert" or protected by the Act. It's not prudent to do so, but if a government employee states that they work at NSA or the FBI or the Pentagon and that their work is classified, no crime has been committed. If Joe Schmoe tells a reporter that his neighbor John Smith has a classified job at the State Department, Joe Schmoe has committed no crime whatsoever.
"Exactly what her status is isn't pertinent to the question of whether or not his answers to investigators were deliberate misdirection."
But it is pertinent to the question of exctly what Fitzgerald was investigating.
A sting to entrap people in a non-crime?
That's novel.
It certainly would diminish his motive to do so.
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