Posted on 07/11/2006 10:51:06 PM PDT by brain bleeds red
WASHINGTON — Columnist Robert Novak said publicly for the first time Tuesday that White House political adviser Karl Rove was a source for his story outing the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame.
In a column, Novak also says his recollection of his conversation with Rove differs from what the Rove camp has said.
"I have revealed Rove's name because his attorney has divulged the substance of our conversation, though in a form different from my recollection," Novak wrote. Novak did not elaborate.
A spokesman for Rove's legal team, Mark Corallo, said that Rove did not even know Plame's name at the time he spoke with Novak, that the columnist called Rove, not the other way around, and that Rove simply said he had heard the same information that Novak passed along to him regarding Plame.
"There was not much of a difference" between the recollections of Rove and Novak, said Corallo.
Novak said he is talking now because Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald told the columnist's lawyer that after 2 1/2 years his investigation of the CIA leak case concerning matters directly relating to Novak has been concluded.
(Story continues below)
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Triggering the criminal investigation, Novak revealed Plame's CIA employment on July 14, 2003, eight days after her husband, White House critic and former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, accused the administration of manipulating prewar intelligence to exaggerate the Iraqi threat from weapons of mass destruction.
Novak's secret cooperation with prosecutors while maintaining a public silence about his role kept him out of legal danger and had the effect of providing protection for the Bush White House during the 2004 presidential campaign.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
bttt
Novak already knew when he called Rove; Rove just said he had heard the same thing.
The CIA confirmed her employment to Novak when he called them. If the CIA reveals your employment over the phone, you are not covert. Period.
The whole investigation was a hoax, from the beginning. If they give you up over the phone, you aren't covert.
Who cares? Don't people have anything better to spend their time on? The investigation is over, move on, if the liberals want to waste their time on this, more power to them. This is one of those baffling nobody-cares issues that never dies because too many people are getting some kind of notoriety out of it that they crave.
Novak really is being cute on this. He gives up Rove because Rove's attorney talked about Rove's conversation with Novak to third parties but Novak won't disclose the name of his original source even though Novak has said that that source did the exact same thing that Rove's attorney did (i.e. talk to third parties about the source's off the record conversation with Novak). I guess the lesson is -- don't take any chances and don't talk to Novak anymore.
Egads....will someone put a bullet into this freaking story? It would be nice if the MSM would move on...after all isn't that the name of the organization they get their orders from - Move On?
They just keep beating a dead horse. No one cares about this tripe. It's been going on for over a year and nothing has come of it yet. Note to libs: Try something else, you idiots!
Novak is a JOURNALIST. Get it?
?
This story is actually bigger than you think, and not because Novak supposedly "named" Rove, a typically AP headline that misses the real story. There are a lot of good points made on this thread. A lot of people made interesting contributions, but let me refer you to my posts: Why this is a big story, and
why Rove has testified so often. Just because they're mine, and I don't feel like retyping, not because they're more insightful than anyone else's.
Here's the deal:
1. Novak found out about "Wilson's wife" setting him up for the trip to Niger from a yet-unnamed source, who Novak repeats is NOT in the White House and NOT a political gunslinger. He goes on to say this source did not intend to "leak" anything.
2. Novak called Karl Rove for confirmation that "Wilson's wife" set up his trip and he did not go at Dick Cheney's request as he had told everyone.
3. Novak says Rove answered "oh, you know that too" while Rove told the investigators and the grand jury he said "oh, I heard that too."
4. Novak then looked up Joe Wilson in "Who's Who in America" and found his wife's name right there in print.
5. Novak called Harlow at CIA to confirm Valerie Plame worked there. Harlow confirmed.
6. Novak had his story and ran it.
Novak goes on to say that Fitzgerald already knew about all three of his sources before he was questioned by investigators or the grand jury. In other words, Fitz knew this whole story was a crock very early on, but carried on for two years anyway and spent millions of our dollars for nothing. And the whole "White House War on Wilson" and nefarious plot by Karl Rove to "retaliate" against Wilson by "outing" his wife was a complete fiction peddled by the Kerry campaign and bought by Matt Cooper, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the rest of the MSM.
"It would be nice if the MSM would move on."
Is Fox news considered to get its orders from Move On? I'm confused. Also when and to whom did the CIA give up Plame on the phone? Whether she was currently active, none the less outing her exposes all her contacts in her previous overseas posts to scrutiny and possible danger or death.
Is Novak trying to get a job with the New York Times?
Those were excellent posts.
Did you sign up last December just to tell us that exposing Valerie Plame was a serious breach of security? Get real.
That sound you hear is the last thread of the limb you liberals have walked out on breaking. The White House did not orchestrate any leaks, and the leaks that were made weer inadvertent and did not damage anything but Joe Wilson's credibility, which deserved damaging.
Fox is hardly the MSM....not in the vein of CBS, CNN, New York Times, NBC, ABC....they ARE the whimpering subjects that obey Move On..
The operative issue is she was NOT active...now repeat that 1000 times til something sinks in. That's a good lil libnut...say aren't you up past your bed time?
Ah...please forgive me. Aunt Hillary didn't give you warm milk and read to you from all the stolen FBI files she and Bill kept eh? It's understandable then that you are so fidgety.
Look, there isn't now and hasn't been for yonks, anyone anywhere, who would be danger, if Plame's name were outed. For crying out loud, her own husband introduced them as THE AMBASSADOR AND THE SPY, at every social gathering they've gone to for years.
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