[PJ-Comix]

It looks like the Left WON'T be having a Merry Fitzmas.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Here's a link to the DOJ indictment. It says specifically that Valerie Wilson's employment status with the CIA was classified.

Luckily I'm not a lawyer because to me this looks like every day in the Clinton administration.

Based on the charges against Libby, I don't understand why Judith Miller and Tim Russert weren't prosecuted as well. They could just as easily be assumed to be lying as well as Libby.

[newcthem]

Apparently as Grandma would say "the sh*t is starting to fall apart" Really hard to make a case when you forgot to ask for evidence of a crime. But he sure gives a good press conference.

[IllumiNaughtyByNature]

PJ, there has got to be DUFU thread in the works over this. Some of them are either going to go on meds or be so freaked out they'll forget to take their meds.

[LibLieSlayer]

Fitz has NO credibility left. Lawyers at a friends office were laughing at his ineptness this morning!

LLS

[MarxSux]

Fitzgerald is stonewalling. He needs to be seen as stonewalling.

[cgk]

Something about it being impossible to prove a negative?

[Lurking in Kansas]

The more I read about Fitzgerald, the more he seems to be a classic case of the Peter Principle at work.

[mass55th]

I'd still like to know how a supposed "undercover" agent makes political contributions in the name of a fabricated company created to cover one's CIA employment. Wouldn't that be against the policy of the CIA? 10 to 1, Plame used a CIA phone line to pledge these contributions...another act that is not allowed while in the employment of a government agency. But I guess since Al "the wood" Gore did it, others feel it's okay to do it too.

[Republican Red]

Another post by Byron York at NRO:

PATRICK FITZGERALD, UNCONSTITUTIONAL? [Byron York]

Lawyers for Lewis Libby have just filed a motion to dismiss the perjury, obstruction, and false statement charges against him in the CIA leak case. That is standard procedure, and to be expected, but what is interesting about the motion is that it is based on a question that has been discussed privately among observers in Washington but has not really been fully explored in public. That question is whether the Bush administration gave CIA leak prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald too much authority. In essence, Fitzgerald has as much power as prosecutors under the old independent counsel statute, but without the supervision of the attorney general or a three-judge panel, and without the requirement that he report his findings to the public.

Fitzgerald's authority comes from a December 30, 2003 letter from Deputy Attorney General James Comey in which Comey -- after the recusal of then-Attorney General John Ashcroft -- "delegated to Mr. Fitzgerald all the authority of the Attorney General with respect to the Department's investigation into the alleged unauthorized disclosure of a Central Intelligence Agency employee's identity." In that letter, Comey told Fitzgerald, "I direct you to exercise that authority as Special Counsel independent of the supervision or control of any officer of the Department."

Libby's motion to dismiss argues that that is a unique, and constitutionally unsupportable, grant of power:

Acting without any direction or supervision, Mr. Fitzgerald alone decides where the interests of the United States lie in an investigation that involves national security, the First Amendment, and important political questions. He alone decides which individuals to subject to investigation, what evidence will be obtained or not obtained, and whether or not continued investigation and prosecution are warranted. He is subject to no oversight and has no obligation to comply with Department of Justice policies and regulations that constrain the exercise of law enforcement powers in all other federal cases. Furthermore, he has unilateral authority to expand his jurisdiction and the power to say when, if ever, his office should be terminated. It was limitations on those powers that led the Supreme Court to uphold the independent counsel provisions of the Ethics in Government Act. It is the absence of such controls that violates the Appointments Clause in this case.

After the independent counsel law expired, the Clinton Justice Department came up with a set of rules governing the appointment and practices of special prosecutors for future investigations. Those rules included supervision and control of the prosecutor. But the Bush administration, for reasons that have never been made public, decided not to follow those rules and instead gave Fitzgerald unlimited powers -- a decision that some in the administration no doubt regret and one which raises real constitutional questions. Now we'll see what the judge in the CIA leak case thinks about it.

[Real Cynic No More]

There was discussion on Fox News tonight that Fitzgerald is refusing to provide information demonstrating that Plame's position at the CIA was classified. Several questions became apparent to me:

1. Does he not have evidence? His indictment apparently used the word "classified". If he has no evidence, is he guilty of perjury for a false certification of the indictment?

2. If he doesn't have evidence that Plame's role was classified, is he then guilty of fraud on the American people for not first investigating whether there was a crime committed?

3. If he committed fraud on the American people by attempting to entrap individuals to allegedly make false statements regarding a non-crime, is he guilty of squandering the taxpayers' money when an early finding might have revealed that no crime was committed?

4. Did he just drag this case on so he could have a low-stress, guaranteed paycheck for as long as he could make it last.

Inquiring minds, ie those who footed the bill for this farce, want to know.

[Real Cynic No More]

The government argues that "Ms. Wilson's employment status was either classified or it was not, ...

If her status wasn't classified, wouldn't Fitzgerald be committing fraud if he continued to pursue and investigation once he determined that she wasn't classified? Does Fitzgerald have a conflict of interest between his personal interests and those of the government, ie, protecting his own butt against the accusation that he pursued an investigation under false pretenses, ie when the release of the information may not have been a crime at all?

[Real Cynic No More]

That is where the argument stands today. In each instance, Fitzgerald's underlying argument is that Libby is charged with perjury, obstruction, and making false statements, and the question of Wilson's status is not relevant to the question of whether Libby lied under oath.

It appears that Fitzgerald is stonewalling in an attempt to avoid potential charges of illegality against himself, for continuing an investigation into a non-crime.

[SuziQ]

I guess it's time for him to 'put up or shut up'.

[Beckwith]

"... her employment status was classified."

I would wager that the official CIA list of its employees, their status AND clearances is classified.

That doesn't mean that mean that Plame was a covert operator. I bet there are thousands of CIA employees holding Confidential, Secret and even Top Secret clearances that are office workers at Langley and other sites.

He's playing with words here.

[PGalt]

Great article. Great thread. Thanks.

[satchmodog9]

for later

[Hoodat]

Is this the same Patrick Fitzgerald that helped write the indictment against OBL which tied al Qaeda with Iraq?