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Cheney May Be Entangled in CIA Leak Investigation

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Posted by: 97silverlsc

Cheney May Be Entangled in CIA Leak Investigation (Correct)
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...JZyPo&refer=us
(Corrects third paragraph to delete reference to former White House aide Jim Wilkinson; corrects 18th paragraph to say Fitzgerald reports to Justice Department.)

By Richard Keil

Oct. 17 (Bloomberg) -- A special counsel is focusing on whether Vice President Dick Cheney played a role in leaking a covert CIA agent's name, according to people familiar with the probe that already threatens top White House aides Karl Rove and Lewis Libby.

The special counsel, Patrick Fitzgerald, has questioned current and former officials of President George W. Bush's administration about whether Cheney was involved in an effort to discredit the agent's husband, Iraq war critic and former U.S. diplomat Joseph Wilson, according to the people.

Fitzgerald has questioned Cheney's communications adviser Catherine Martin and former spokeswoman Jennifer Millerwise about the vice president's knowledge of the anti-Wilson campaign and his dealings on it with Libby, his chief of staff, the people said. The information came from multiple sources, who requested anonymity because of the secrecy and political sensitivity of the investigation.

New York Times reporter Judith Miller, who has now testified twice before a federal grand jury probing the case after spending 85 days in jail for refusing to cooperate with Fitzgerald, wrote in yesterday's New York Times that Fitzgerald asked her whether the vice president ``had known what his chief aide,'' Libby, ``was doing and saying'' regarding Wilson, a critic of the war in Iraq.

Potential `Big Case'

Fitzgerald has told lawyers involved in the case that he hopes to conclude soon -- the grand jury's term expires Oct. 28, although it could be extended -- and there is a growing sense among knowledgeable observers that the outcome will involve serious criminal charges. ``Fitzgerald is putting together a big case,'' Washington attorney Robert Bennett, who represents Miller, said on the ABC-TV program ``This Week'' yesterday.

The charges could range from a broad conspiracy case to more narrowly drawn indictments for obstruction of justice or perjury, according to lawyers involved in the case. Charges are considered less likely on the law that initially triggered Fitzgerald's probe, which makes it illegal to deliberately unmask an undercover intelligence agent, because of the difficulty in meeting that statute's exacting standards for prosecution.

Lea Anne McBride, a Cheney spokesman, declined to comment yesterday on whether the vice president, 64, has been contacted by Fitzgerald about his status in the case, except to say: ``This is an ongoing investigation, and we are fully cooperating.'' Randall Samborn, a Fitzgerald spokesman, declined to comment. Calls to Robert Luskin, Rove's attorney, and Joseph Tate, Libby's lawyer, weren't returned.

Options

There's no indication Fitzgerald is considering criminal charges against the vice president, who gave unsworn testimony to investigators last year. One option for Fitzgerald is to outline his findings about Cheney's role if he files a final report on the investigation.

Fitzgerald, 45, has also questioned administration officials about any knowledge Bush may have had of the campaign against Wilson. Yet most administration observers have noted that on Iraq, as with most matters, it's Cheney who has played the more hands-on role.

``Anything dealing with intelligence, no matter how big or how small, Cheney is involved in it,'' Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said in an interview. ``This is his portfolio, and he guards it very well.''

Pursuit of Evidence

One lawyer intimately involved in the case, who like the others demanded anonymity, said one reason Fitzgerald was willing to send Miller to jail to compel testimony was because he was pursuing evidence the vice president may have been aware of the specifics of the anti-Wilson strategy.

And both U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Hogan and an appellate-court panel -- including David Tatel, a First Amendment advocate -- said they ruled in Fitzgerald's favor because of the gravity of the case.

Katy Harriger, a political scientist at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, who has written extensively about special-counsel investigations, said the pace and trajectory of Fitzgerald's probe suggests it will end with the indictment of Rove, Libby or both.

Harriger said she anticipates indictments in part because of the special prosecutor's willingness to jail Miller. ``That's not something you do unless you really have something more going on that isn't obvious to the public,'' she said.

Avenues of Investigation

Larry Barcella, a former assistant U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, said the recent activity in the case suggests criminal charges are likely, although not in connection with the 1982 law making it illegal to disclose a covert agent's identity.

A more likely focus is possible ``false statements, conspiracy or obstruction of justice,'' said Barcella, now a defense lawyer for the Washington-based law firm of Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker. ``It's obviously not good that Rove and Libby have spent so much time before the grand jury.''

To make a case against Cheney as part of a conspiracy indictment, Fitzgerald would have to show the vice president was an active participant in a decision to smear Wilson, Barcella said. ``It's a case most easily made if you can prove a person knowingly entered into an agreement to do something illegal,'' he said. ``Beyond that, it can be tricky.''

Fitzgerald's status differs in one potentially important respect from the independent counsels who investigated alleged wrongdoing during earlier administrations. They reported to a panel of appellate judges, while Fitzgerald reports to the Justice Department.

Given the prospect of both protracted criminal cases and then civil lawsuits, it now seems possible the issue will bedevil the final years of Bush's presidency, much as the Iran-contra affair burdened President Ronald Reagan's second term and the Monica Lewinsky scandal plagued President Bill Clinton's.

No Leaks

While there have been virtually no leaks out of Fitzgerald's office, and even the subjects of his investigation are unsure about his intentions, White House officials and Bush supporters are fearful that recent developments spell legal jeopardy for Rove, the central strategist behind Bush's political campaigns and much of his presidency, and Libby, a key architect of the Iraq war strategy.

When the investigation began, White House officials asserted that neither Rove nor Libby played any role in the outing of Plame, and both aides told Fitzgerald that they learned of her identity from journalists.

Reporter's Account

In her Times account, Miller said she told Fitzgerald and the grand jury that Libby, 55, raised the subject of Wilson's wife during a meeting with Miller on June 23, 2003. That was before Wilson, 55, went public in a Times op-ed piece with his accusation that Bush and his aides had ``twisted'' intelligence findings to justify invading Iraq, although administration officials knew he was privately critical.

While Miller didn't say Libby had identified Plame as a covert agent, her account calls into question Libby's assertion that he first learned of Plame's identity from reporters.

Miller, 57, said she went to jail rather than testify because, unlike other reporters, she didn't feel Libby had given her specific and voluntary permission to speak about their confidential conversations. She relented when Libby contacted her by telephone and letter last month, saying he had always expected her to testify.

Those communications with Miller may pose legal problems for Libby. His letter to her stated that ``the public report of every other reporter's testimony makes clear that they did not discuss Ms. Plame's name or identity with me.''

Surprise

Miller wrote in her Times article that Fitzgerald asked her to read that portion of the letter aloud to the grand jurors and asked for her reaction to Libby's words. She said that part of the letter had ``surprised me because it might be perceived as an effort by Mr. Libby to suggest that I, too, would say we had not discussed Ms. Plame's identity. Yet my notes suggested that we had discussed her job.''

Bennett, Miller's attorney, yesterday called that part of Libby's letter ``a very stupid thing to do.'' Other lawyers suggested it could become part of any obstruction-of-justice charge Fitzgerald might bring.

Rove's testimony also has been contradicted by others, such as Time magazine reporter Matt Cooper. He said his July 2003 conversation with the White House aide focused more on Wilson and his wife than Rove had testified, while adding Rove had not identified her by name. There is also at least one discrepancy between Rove's version and that of columnist Robert Novak, who first identified Plame as a Central Intelligence Agency operative in July 2003, according to persons familiar with their accounts.

Return for Testimony

Rove, 54, returned to the grand jury for a fourth time on Oct. 14 and testified for more than four hours. His lawyer, Luskin, who has spoken frequently with reporters, has gone from public optimism that his client faces little legal danger to cautiously noting only that Fitzgerald hasn't told them Rove is a ``target.''

Bush refused to comment when asked by a reporter today whether he would expect a member of his administration to resign or take leave if indicted.

``There's a serious investigation,'' Bush said. ``I'm not going to pre-judge the outcome.''

Wilson was dispatched by the CIA in February 2002 to investigate reports, since discredited, that Saddam Hussein's regime was trying to buy uranium in Niger as part of a nuclear- weapons program. After Bush cited similar reports in his Jan. 28, 2003, State of the Union speech and the U.S. invaded Iraq in March of that year, Wilson began telling some journalists anonymously that the claim was questionable.

Reacting to Wilson

That prompted behind-the-scenes administration attempts to discredit Wilson. In his June 2003 meeting with Miller, Libby told her, in the context of a conversation critical of the CIA, that Wilson's wife worked for the spy agency, according to an account published in the Times yesterday.

Wilson went public with his criticism on July 6, 2003. In his Times piece, he concluded: ``Some of the intelligence related to Iraq's nuclear weapons program was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat.''

Over the next week, Libby and Rove talked to reporters, on the condition they not be identified, about Wilson's article and the fact that his CIA-employed wife may have had a role in giving him the Niger assignment.

Publication

Plame's identity was first published by Novak on July 14. He cited ``two senior administration officials'' as the sources of the information that Plame, 42, suggested Wilson for the Niger trip. Novak hasn't commented publicly on those sources.

Miller never wrote a story about Wilson or his wife -- although in one of her notebooks, dated July 8, 2003, a notation appears for ``Valerie Flame.''

One of the subplots is the role played by the New York Times. In addition to Miller's personal account, the Times yesterday published a separate 5,800-word piece that criticized both Miller and the way the newspaper handled the story.

The article reported the paper's publisher, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., and its executive editor, Bill Keller, unequivocally supported their reporter in her legal battle although ``they knew few details about Ms. Miller's conversations with her confidential source,'' and ``did not review'' her notes.

Miller, who wrote many influential pre-war war stories about Hussein's purported weapons of mass destruction that the Times later acknowledged were flawed, told the grand jury she recommended in 2003 that the newspaper pursue the Plame story. Jill Abramson, the newspaper's managing editor, said Miller never made any such recommendation.

In an interview yesterday, Wilson said that once the criminal questions are settled, he and his wife may file a civil lawsuit against Bush, Cheney and others seeking damages for the alleged harm done to Plame's career.

If they do so, the current state of the law makes it likely that the suit will be allowed to proceed -- and Bush and Cheney will face questioning under oath -- while they are in office. The reason for that is a unanimous 1997 U.S. Supreme Court decision ruling that Paula Jones' sexual harassment suit against then- President Bill Clinton could go forward immediately, a decision that was hailed by conservatives at the time.

Posted by: MonsterMark

But Rove was already convicted of this, wasn't he?

Posted by: 97silverlsc

Cheney Told Aide of C.I.A. Officer, Lawyers Report

By DAVID JOHNSTON, RICHARD W. STEVENSON and DOUGLAS JEHL
Published: October 25, 2005

WASHINGTON, Oct. 24 - I. Lewis Libby Jr., Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, first learned about the C.I.A. officer at the heart of the leak investigation in a conversation with Mr. Cheney weeks before her identity became public in 2003, lawyers involved in the case said Monday.

Notes of the previously undisclosed conversation between Mr. Libby and Mr. Cheney on June 12, 2003, appear to differ from Mr. Libby's testimony to a federal grand jury that he initially learned about the C.I.A. officer, Valerie Wilson, from journalists, the lawyers said.

The notes, taken by Mr. Libby during the conversation, for the first time place Mr. Cheney in the middle of an effort by the White House to learn about Ms. Wilson's husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV, who was questioning the administration's handling of intelligence about Iraq's nuclear program to justify the war.

Lawyers involved in the case, who described the notes to The New York Times, said they showed that Mr. Cheney knew that Ms. Wilson worked at the C.I.A. more than a month before her identity was made public and her undercover status was disclosed in a syndicated column by Robert D. Novak on July 14, 2003.

Mr. Libby's notes indicate that Mr. Cheney had gotten his information about Ms. Wilson from George J. Tenet, the director of central intelligence, in response to questions from the vice president about Mr. Wilson. But they contain no suggestion that either Mr. Cheney or Mr. Libby knew at the time of Ms. Wilson's undercover status or that her identity was classified. Disclosing a covert agent's identity can be a crime, but only if the person who discloses it knows the agent's undercover status.

It would not be illegal for either Mr. Cheney or Mr. Libby, both of whom are presumably cleared to know the government's deepest secrets, to discuss a C.I.A. officer or her link to a critic of the administration. But any effort by Mr. Libby to steer investigators away from his conversation with Mr. Cheney could be considered by Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special counsel in the case, to be an illegal effort to impede the inquiry.

White House officials did not respond to requests for comment, and Mr. Libby's lawyer, Joseph Tate, would not comment on Mr. Libby's legal status. Randall Samborn, a spokesman for Mr. Fitzgerald, declined to comment on the case.

Mr. Fitzgerald is expected to decide whether to bring charges in the case by Friday, when the term of the grand jury expires. Mr. Libby and Karl Rove, President Bush's senior adviser, both face the possibility of indictment, lawyers involved in the case have said. It is not publicly known whether other officials also face indictment.

The notes help explain the legal difficulties facing Mr. Libby. Lawyers in the case said Mr. Libby testified to the grand jury that he had first heard from journalists that Ms. Wilson may have had a role in dispatching her husband on a C.I.A.-sponsored mission to Africa in 2002 in search of evidence that Iraq had acquired nuclear material there for its weapons program.

But the notes, now in Mr. Fitzgerald's possession, also indicate that Mr. Libby first heard about Ms. Wilson - who is also known by her maiden name, Valerie Plame - from Mr. Cheney. That apparent discrepancy in his testimony suggests why prosecutors are weighing false statement charges against him in what they interpret as an effort by Mr. Libby to protect Mr. Cheney from scrutiny, the lawyers said.

It is not clear why Mr. Libby would have suggested to the grand jury that he might have learned about Ms. Wilson from journalists if he was aware that Mr. Fitzgerald had obtained the notes of the conversation with Mr. Cheney or might do so. At the beginning of the investigation, Mr. Bush pledged the White House's full cooperation and instructed aides to provide Mr. Fitzgerald with any information he sought.

The notes do not show that Mr. Cheney knew the name of Mr. Wilson's wife. But they do show that Mr. Cheney did know and told Mr. Libby that Ms. Wilson was employed by the Central Intelligence Agency and that she may have helped arrange her husband's trip.

Some lawyers in the case have said Mr. Fitzgerald may face obstacles in bringing a false-statement charge against Mr. Libby. They said it could be difficult to prove that he intentionally sought to mislead the grand jury.

Lawyers involved in the case said they had no indication that Mr. Fitzgerald was considering charging Mr. Cheney with wrongdoing. Mr. Cheney was interviewed under oath by Mr. Fitzgerald last year. It is not known what the vice president told Mr. Fitzgerald about the conversation with Mr. Libby or when Mr. Fitzgerald first learned of it.

But the evidence of Mr. Cheney's direct involvement in the effort to learn more about Mr. Wilson is sure to intensify the political pressure on the White House in a week of high anxiety among Republicans about the potential for the case to deal a sharp blow to Mr. Bush's presidency.

Mr. Tenet was not available for comment Monday night. But another former senior intelligence official said Mr. Tenet had been interviewed by the special prosecutor and his staff in early 2004, and never appeared before the grand jury. Mr. Tenet has not talked since then to the prosecutors, the former official said.

The former official said he strongly doubted that the White House learned about Ms. Wilson from Mr. Tenet.

On Monday, Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby both attended a cabinet meeting with Mr. Bush as the White House continued trying to portray business as usual. But the assumption among White House officials is that anyone who is indicted will step aside.

On June 12, 2003, the day of the conversation between Mr. Cheney and Mr. Libby, The Washington Post published a front-page article reporting that the C.I.A. had sent a retired American diplomat to Niger in February 2002 to investigate claims that Iraq had been seeking to buy uranium there. The article did not name the diplomat, who turned out to be Mr. Wilson, but it reported that his mission had not corroborated a claim about Iraq's pursuit of nuclear material that the White House had subsequently used in Mr. Bush's 2003 State of the Union address.

An earlier anonymous reference to Mr. Wilson and his mission to Africa had appeared in a column by Nicholas D. Kristof in The New York Times on May 6, 2003. Mr. Wilson went public with his conclusion that the White House had "twisted" the intelligence about Iraq's pursuit of nuclear material on July 6, 2003, in an Op-Ed article in The New York Times.

The note written by Mr. Libby will be a crucial piece of evidence in a false-statement case against him if Mr. Fitzgerald decides to pursue it, lawyers in the case said. It also explains why Mr. Fitzgerald waged a long legal battle to obtain the testimony of reporters who were known to have talked to Mr. Libby.

The reporters involved have said that they did not supply Mr. Libby with details about Mr. Wilson and his wife. Matthew Cooper of Time magazine, in his account of a deposition on the subject, wrote that he asked Mr. Libby whether he had even heard that Ms. Wilson had a role in sending her husband to Africa. Mr. Cooper said that Mr. Libby did not use Ms. Wilson's name but replied, "Yeah, I've heard that too."

In her testimony to the grand jury, Judith Miller, a reporter for The New York Times, said Mr. Libby sought from the start of her three conversations with him to "insulate his boss from Mr. Wilson's charges."

Mr. Fitzgerald asked questions about Mr. Cheney, Ms. Miller said. "He asked, for example, if Mr. Libby ever indicated whether Mr. Cheney had approved of his interview with me or was aware of them," Ms. Miller said. "The answer was no."

In addition to Mr. Cooper and Ms. Miller, Mr. Fitzgerald is known to have interviewed three other journalists who spoke to Mr. Libby during June and July 2003. They were Walter Pincus and Glenn Kessler of The Washington Post and Tim Russert of NBC News.

Mr. Pincus and Mr. Kessler have said that Mr. Libby did not discuss Mr. Wilson's wife with them in their conversations during the period. Mr. Russert, in a statement, declined to say exactly what he discussed with Mr. Libby, but said he first learned the identity of Mr. Wilson's wife in the column by Mr. Novak.

Posted by: TheDude

May be? Thats laughable, of course he is, Rove will be the patsy though.

Posted by: MonsterMark

"Mr. Libby's notes indicate that Mr. Cheney had gotten his information about Ms. Wilson from George J. Tenet, the director of central intelligence, in response to questions from the vice president about Mr. Wilson. But they contain no suggestion that either Mr. Cheney or Mr. Libby knew at the time of Ms. Wilson's undercover status or that her identity was classified. Disclosing a covert agent's identity can be a crime, but only if the person who discloses it knows the agent's undercover status."

"It would not be illegal for either Mr. Cheney or Mr. Libby, both of whom are presumably cleared to know the government's deepest secrets, to discuss a C.I.A. officer or her link to a critic of the administration."

"The notes do not show that Mr. Cheney knew the name of Mr. Wilson's wife. But they do show that Mr. Cheney did know and told Mr. Libby that Ms. Wilson was employed by the Central Intelligence Agency and that she may have helped arrange her husband's trip."

Yup, somebody needs to hang for this. Heh, somebody cut the noose around Rove's neck. Seems like we have the wrong guy.

Posted by: fossten

Phil, you really stepped in a pile of it by posting this one. Cheney 'leaked' info to one of his aides? HORRORS! Funny, I thought that Cheney was privy to ANY AND ALL info he wants to be privy to, considering he's the VICE PRESIDENT! He can discuss this with Libby if he wants to!

Besides, how could Cheney be the leak if Tenet told him? Wouldn't that make Tenet the leak?

Geez, you guys really gulp down that Kool-Aid!

Posted by: TheDude

Quote:

Originally Posted by fossten

Phil, you really stepped in a pile of it by posting this one. Cheney 'leaked' info to one of his aides? HORRORS! Funny, I thought that Cheney was privy to ANY AND ALL info he wants to be privy to, considering he's the VICE PRESIDENT! He can discuss this with Libby if he wants to!

Besides, how could Cheney be the leak if Tenet told him? Wouldn't that make Tenet the leak?

Geez, you guys really gulp down that Kool-Aid!

I stepped into a HUGE pile of it and I drink Kool-Aid.

Posted by: MonsterMark

Quote:

Originally Posted by 95DevilleNS

I stepped into a HUGE pile of it and I drink Kool-Aid.

We know. We will pray for you.

Posted by: MonsterMark

Quote:

Originally Posted by fossten

Funny, I thought that Cheney was privy to ANY AND ALL info he wants to be privy to, considering he's the VICE PRESIDENT! He can discuss this with Libby if he wants to!

You know maybe Cheney thought Plame was a travel secretary. I mean, she was making travel plans.

Posted by: TheDude

Quote:

Originally Posted by MonsterMark

We know. We will pray for you.

I took Fosstens advice and went back and read up on some issues before I decided to join in here. Look what I found, how ironic. Funny how he feel's a personal attack was made on him by JohnnyBz00LS when he made a 'Step In It' reference, but yet he does it to me. I wasn't offended by his retort, but this is to funny not to let go. You dont have to reply to this, I'm big enough to let it go.

Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnnyBz00LS
OMG, fossten has just stepped in his own pile of stinking doo-doo!

Not only has he quoted from his nemesis CBS, which he has so heartily bashed time and time again here on this board for not having a shred of credibility (in his eyes of course). But he also is quoting POLL DATA, which he has also roundly bashed for not proving anything.

SO WHICH IS IT? You can't have it BOTH WAYS!! Make up your mind!

Edit:

Johnny, please refrain from your personal attacks. They don't help you make your point, and they are against the rules of this forum.

Posted by: rmac694203

Posted by: 97silverlsc

Cheney, Libby Blocked Papers To Senate Intelligence Panel
http://nationaljournal.com/about/njw...05/1027nj1.htm
By Murray Waas, special to National Journal
© National Journal Group Inc.
Thursday, Oct. 27, 2005

Vice President Cheney and his chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, overruling advice from some White House political staffers and lawyers, decided to withhold crucial documents from the Senate Intelligence Committee in 2004 when the panel was investigating the use of pre-war intelligence that erroneously concluded Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, according to Bush administration and congressional sources.
Cheney had been the foremost administration advocate for war with Iraq, and Libby played a central staff role in coordinating the sale of the war to both the public and Congress.

Among the White House materials withheld from the committee were Libby-authored passages in drafts of a speech that then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell delivered to the United Nations in February 2003 to argue the Bush administration's case for war with Iraq, according to congressional and administration sources. The withheld documents also included intelligence data that Cheney's office -- and Libby in particular -- pushed to be included in Powell's speech, the sources said.

The new information that Cheney and Libby blocked information to the Senate Intelligence Committee further underscores the central role played by the vice president's office in trying to blunt criticism that the Bush administration exaggerated intelligence data to make the case to go to war.

The disclosures also come as Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald wraps up the nearly two-year-old CIA leak investigation that has focused heavily on Libby's role in discussing covert intelligence operative Valerie Plame with reporters. Fitzgerald could announce as soon as tomorrow whether a federal grand jury is handing up indictments in the case.

Central to Fitzgerald's investigation is whether administration officials disclosed Plame's identity and CIA status in an effort to discredit her husband, former ambassador and vocal Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson, who wrote newspaper op-ed columns and made other public charges beginning in 2003 that the administration misused intelligence on Iraq that he gathered on a CIA-sponsored trip to Africa.

In recent weeks Fitzgerald's investigation has zeroed in on the activities of Libby, who is Cheney's top national security and foreign policy advisor, as well as the conflict between the vice president's office on one side and the CIA and State Department on the other over the use of intelligence on Iraq. The New York Times reported this week, for example, that Libby first learned about Plame and her covert CIA status from Cheney in a conversation with the vice president weeks before Plame's cover was blown in a July 2003 newspaper column by Robert Novak.

The Intelligence Committee at the time was trying to determine whether the CIA and other intelligence agencies provided faulty or erroneous intelligence on Iraq to President Bush and other government officials. But the committee deferred the much more politically sensitive issue as to whether the president and the vice president themselves, or other administration officials, misrepresented intelligence information to bolster the case to go to war. An Intelligence Committee spokesperson says the panel is still working on this second phase of the investigation.

Had the withheld information been turned over, according to administration and congressional sources, it likely would have shifted a portion of the blame away from the intelligence agencies to the Bush administration as to who was responsible for the erroneous information being presented to the American public, Congress, and the international community.

In April 2004, the Intelligence Committee released a report that concluded that "much of the information provided or cleared by the Central Intelligence Agency for inclusion in Secretary Powell's [United Nation's] speech was overstated, misleading, or incorrect."

Both Republicans and Democrats on the committee say that their investigation was hampered by the refusal of the White House to turn over key documents, although Republicans said the documents were not as central to the investigation.

In addition to withholding drafts of Powell's speech -- which included passages written by Libby -- the administration also refused to turn over to the committee contents of the president's morning intelligence briefings on Iraq, sources say. These documents, known as the Presidential Daily Brief, or PDB, are a written summary of intelligence information and analysis provided by the CIA to the president.

One congressional source said, for example, that senators wanted to review the PDBs to determine whether dissenting views from the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research, the Department of Energy, and other agencies that often disagreed with the CIA on the question of Iraq's programs to develop weapons of mass destruction were being presented to the president.

An administration spokesperson said that the White House was justified in turning down the document demand from the Senate, saying that the papers reflected "deliberative discussions" among "executive branch principals" and were thus covered under longstanding precedent and executive privilege rules. Throughout the president's five years in office, the Bush administration has been consistently adamant about not turning internal documents over to Congress and other outside bodies.

At the same time, however, administration officials said in interviews that they cannot recall another instance in which Cheney and Libby played such direct personal roles in denying foreign policy papers to a congressional committee, and that in doing so they overruled White House staff and lawyers who advised that the materials should be turned over to the Senate panel.

Administration sources also said that Cheney's general counsel, David Addington, played a central role in the White House decision not to turn over the documents. Addington did not return phone calls seeking comment. Cheney's office declined to comment after requesting that any questions for this article be submitted in writing.

A former senior administration official familiar with the discussions on whether to turn over the materials said there was a "political element" in the matter. This official said the White House did not want to turn over records during an election year that could used by critics to argue that the administration used incomplete or faulty intelligence to go to war with Iraq. "Nobody wants something like this dissected or coming out in an election year," the former official said.

But the same former official also said that Libby felt passionate that the CIA and other agencies were not doing a good job at intelligence gathering, that the Iraqi war was a noble cause, and that he and the vice president were only making their case in good faith. According to the former official, Libby cited those reasons in fighting for the inclusion in Powell's U.N. speech of intelligence information that others mistrusted, in opposing the release of documents to the Intelligence Committee, and in moving aggressively to counter Wilson's allegations that the Bush administration distorted intelligence findings.

Both Republicans and Democrats on the committee backed the document request to the White House regarding Libby's drafts of the Powell speech, communications between Libby and other administration officials on intelligence information that might be included in the speech, and Libby's contacts with officials in the intelligence community relating to Iraq.

In his address to the United Nations on February 5, 2003, Powell argued that intelligence information showed that Saddam Hussein's regime was aggressively pursuing programs to develop chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons

Only after the war did U.N. inspectors and the public at large learn that the intelligence data had been incorrect and that Iraq had been so crippled by international sanctions that it could not sustain such a program.

The April 2004 Senate report blasted what it referred to as an insular and risk- averse culture of bureaucratic "group think" in which officials were reluctant to challenge their own longstanding notions about Iraq and its weapons programs. All nine Republicans and eight Democrats signed onto this document without a single dissent, a rarity for any such report in Washington, especially during an election year.

After the release of the report, Intelligence Committee, Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan., and Vice Chairman Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., said they doubted that the Senate would have authorized the president to go to war if senators had been given accurate information regarding Iraq's programs on weapons of mass destruction.

"I doubt if the votes would have been there," Roberts said. Rockefeller asserted, "We in Congress would not have authorized that war, in 75 votes, if we knew what we know now."

Roberts' spokeswoman, Sarah Little, said the second phase of the committee's investigation would also examine how pre-war intelligence focused on the fact that intelligence analysts -- while sounding alarms that a humanitarian crisis that might follow the war - failed to predict the insurgency that would arise after the war.

Little says that it was undecided whether the committee would produce a classified report, a declassified one that could ultimately be made public, or hold hearings.

When the 2004 Senate Intelligence Committee was made public, Bush, Cheney, and other administration officials cited it as proof that the administration acted in good faith on Iraq and relied on intelligence from the CIA and others that it did not know was flawed.

But some congressional sources say that had the committee received all the documents it requested from the White House the spotlight could have shifted to the heavy advocacy by Cheney's office to go to war. Cheney had been the foremost administration advocate for war with Iraq, and Libby played a central staff role in coordinating the sale of the war to both the public and Congress.

In advocating war with Iraq, Libby was known for dismissing those within the bureaucracy who opposed him, whether at the CIA, State Department, or other agencies. Supporters say that even if Libby is charged by the grand jury in the CIA leak case, he waged less a personal campaign against Wilson and Plame than one that reflected a personal antipathy toward critics in general.

Lawrence Wilkerson, who served as chief of staff to Powell as Secretary of State, charged in a recent speech that there was a "cabal between Vice President Cheney and Secretary of Defense [Donald L.] Rumsfeld on critical decisions that the bureaucracy did not know was being made."

In interagency meetings in preparation for Powell's U.N. address, Wilkerson, Powell, and senior CIA officials argued that evidence Libby wanted to include as part of Powell's presentation was exaggerated or unreliable. Cheney, too, became involved in those discussions, sources said, when he believed that Powell and others were not taking Libby's suggestions seriously.

Wilkerson has said that he ordered "whole reams of paper" of intelligence information excluded from Libby's draft of Powell's speech. Another official recalled that Libby was pushing so hard to include certain intelligence information in the speech that Libby lobbied Powell for last minute changes in a phone call to Powell's suite at the Waldorf Astoria hotel the night before the speech. Libby's suggestions were dismissed by Powell and his staff.

John E. McLaughlin, then-deputy director of the CIA, has testified to Congress that "much of our time in the run-up to the speech was spent taking out material... that we and the secretary's staff judged to have been unreliable."

The passion that Libby brought to his cause is perhaps further illustrated by a recent Los Angeles Times report that in April 2004, months after Fitzgerald's leak investigation was underway, Libby ordered "a meticulous catalog of Wilson's claims and public statements going back to early 2003" because Libby was "consumed by passages that he believed were inaccurate or unfair" to him.

The newspaper reported that the "intensity with which Libby reacted to Wilson had many senior White House staffers puzzled, and few agreed with his counterattack plan, or its rationale."

A former administration official said that "this might have been about politics on some level, but it is also personal. [Libby] feels that his honor has been questioned, and his instinct is to strike back."

Now, as Libby battles back against possible charges by a special prosecutor, he might be seeking vindication on an entirely new level.

-- Murray Waas is a Washington-based journalist. His previous articles, focusing on Rove's role in the case, Libby's grand jury testimony, the apparent direction of Fitzgerald's investigation, and the Secret Service records that prompted Miller's key testimony also appeared on NationalJournal.com

Posted by: MAllen82

are we really going to start rehashing this "fossten is so mean, wah wah wah, crap", because it's starting to get annoying.

Posted by: barry2952

That was yesterdays news. Any comments on this article?

Posted by: 97silverlsc

Prosecutor in Leak Case Wants to Convene New Grand Jury
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/18/po...rtner=homepage
By DAVID STOUT
Published: November 18, 2005

WASHINGTON, Nov. 18 - The special prosecutor in the C.I.A. leak case announced today that he wants to convene a new federal grand jury, a clear signal that the indictment of I. Lewis Libby Jr. may not be the last episode in the affair.

"The investigation is continuing," the prosecutor, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, said in a court filing here. He said the investigation would now involve a grand jury different from the one that indicted Mr. Libby, a top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney, three weeks ago.

Mr. Libby has been charged with obstruction of justice, perjury and making false statements in connection with an investigation into who leaked the name of Valerie Wilson, a covert operative for the Central Intelligence Agency whose husband, the former diplomat Joseph C. Wilson IV, was highly critical in 2002 of the Bush administration's rationale for war against Iraq.

Timeline of the Leak
A trip by Joseph C. Wilson IV to Niger nearly four years ago was the beginning of a series of events now being investigated by a special prosecutor, Patrick J. Fitzgerald.
Key Articles and Documents

Mr. Libby was not accused of leaking Ms. Wilson's name to journalists but, rather, of trying to impede efforts to find out who did. He has resigned from Mr. Cheney's staff and has pleaded not guilty.

Well before his indictment, Mr. Libby was known to be a focus of Mr. Fitzgerald's inquiry. Lawyers who are familiar with the affair have said that President Bush's key aide Karl Rove also remains under investigation.

The identity of Mrs. Wilson was disclosed by the columnist Robert D. Novak in July 2003. But it came to light this week that Bob Woodward, the Washington Post journalist of Watergate fame, testified recently that he was told about Ms. Wilson in June 2003, weeks before Mr. Novak's column appeared.

Some defenders of Mr. Libby have argued that the revelation that Mr. Woodward had early knowledge of Mrs. Wilson's identity casts doubt on the case against Mr. Libby. Mr. Woodward has written several books about the inner workings of Washington. His known access to people at the highest levels of power has stirred speculation on who told him about Mrs. Wilson.

It ain't over yet!!!!

Posted by: 97silverlsc

CIA Leak Probe Fallout Unlikely to Fade
The Associated Press
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/nati...-CIA-leak.html
Thursday 17 November 2005

Washington - Controversy surrounding the leak of a CIA operative's identity showed no signs of abating Thursday, dashing any hopes White House officials had that the investigation was nearing an end.

A group of former intelligence officers urged President Bush not to pardon anyone convicted of leaking Valerie Plame's name to reporters and to pull security clearances of any White House officials implicated in the investigation.

Plame's husband went on the airwaves urging the Washington Post to conduct an inquiry into why top reporter Bob Woodward kept his editor in the dark about an interview 17 months ago with a senior administration official about Plame's identity and her work at the CIA, a conversation a month before another journalist published her name.

The Woodward revelations renewed attention to an investigation into who was responsible for leaking Plame's name, an inquiry that had appeared to be winding down after last month's indictment of a top aide to Vice President Cheney.

"Obviously, the White House thought they were through with this investigation," said Steven Reich, a senior associate counsel to President Clinton. "It appears now that that information came out earlier than anyone previously thought and it potentially could have come from a source no one previously knew about."

I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, 55, Cheney's former chief of staff, was charged with lying to FBI agents and a federal grand jury about how he learned about Plame's identity and her work at the CIA and when he subsequently shared that information with reporters.

Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, in announcing the charges three weeks ago, portrayed Libby as the government official who first revealed Plame's name to reporters. At a news conference in Chicago Thursday, Fitzgerald ducked questions about how Woodward's assertion, that he got it first and from someone other than Libby, would affect the investigation.

After Fitzgerald was tipped by Woodward's source that they had discussed Plame in June 2003, Woodward met with the prosecutor and on Monday recounted their conversation. His account, but not the source's name, was reported in Tuesday editions of the Washington Post, renewing speculation about who leaked Plame's name and how high in the administration his source resides.

"The Libby case was always going to cause heartburn for the White House," said Washington defense lawyer E. Lawrence Barcella Jr., a former federal prosecutor. "But not like this."

Barcella said the White House could've tried managing news as the Libby case moved through hearings and toward trial on a predictable schedule.

"That's the legal realm," Barcella said. But the Woodward revelations put the investigation back in "the political realm," he said. "And that can have a daily impact" with sustained media coverage.

Plame's husband said Thursday the Post should conduct an inquiry into why Woodward didn't tell his bosses what he knew about the leak until last month and why he was allowed to publicly criticize the Fitzgerald investigation as a spokesman for the newspaper.

"I would hope that the Post would take the lead from what the New York Times did and do an inquiry about how this all happened and report back to its readers," Joseph Wilson, a former U.S. ambassador, told The Associated Press.

Wilson was referring to the inquiry that the Times conducted after it was criticized for the way its former reporter Judith Miller, who spent 85 days in jail for refusing to testify about a source, and her editors handled the Plame matter.

Post spokesman Eric Grant did not return calls for comment.

Also on Thursday, 16 former intelligence officers released a letter they wrote to Bush early in the week asking for a pledge to not pardon anyone involved in the leak and to pull security clearances of anyone at the White House who spoke to reporters about the CIA status of Wilson's wife.

One of the letter's authors, former CIA analyst Larry Johnson, said the pledge on security clearances "definitely ... would apply to Woodward's source."

Johnson noted that Bush ordered everyone in the administration to cooperate with Fitzgerald nearly two years ago. "Clearly, there's someone at a senior level who hasn't fully cooperated," he said.

Posted by: fossten

OOPS, PHIL, YOU JUMPED THE GUN AGAIN!

Source: Cheney Isn't Woodward's Source

Nov 18, 4:48 AM (ET)

By JOHN SOLOMON

(AP) Vice President Dick Cheney makes remarks to honor retired Sen. Malcolm Wallop, R-Wyo., at the...
Full Image

WASHINGTON (AP) - Vice President Dick Cheney is not the unidentified source who told Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward about the CIA status of the wife of Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson, a person familiar with the investigation said Thursday.

The vice president did not talk with Woodward on the day in question, did not provide the information that's been reported in Woodward's notes and has not had any conversations over the past several weeks about any release for allowing Woodward to testify, said the person, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Woodward gave a sworn deposition in the CIA leak investigation on Monday, testifying that a senior administration official told him in mid-June 2003 that Plame worked as a CIA analyst on weapons of mass destruction.

Plame's identity was revealed in July 2003 by columnist Robert Novak, eight days after her husband, a former U.S. ambassador, accused the Bush administration of twisting prewar intelligence to exaggerate the Iraqi threat.

The Woodward revelations renewed attention to an investigation into who was responsible for leaking Plame's name, an inquiry that had appeared to be winding down after last month's indictment of Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

Posted by: Calabrio

...O.k.
But since we know that there was no crime committed by revealing the name of Valerie Plame to anyone... At this point, why do I care? And why are we funding an investigation designed to find out who didn't break the law?

Posted by: 97silverlsc

Quote:

Originally Posted by Calabrio

...O.k.
But since we know that there was no crime committed by revealing the name of Valerie Plame to anyone... At this point, why do I care? And why are we funding an investigation designed to find out who didn't break the law?

First of all, we don't know that no crime was committed. That is what the investigation will determine, which was requested by the CIA because they thought there were enough questions concerning how Valerie Plame's name was released.

Secondly, I'd be willing to bet that less money has been spent on the investigation than was spent on investigating whether slick willy lied about a bj, and I'm sure you cared about that.

Posted by: Calabrio

Quote:

Originally Posted by 97silverlsc

No, we actually do know that no crime was committed.

Quote:

Secondly, I'd be willing to bet that less money has been spent on the investigation than was spent on investigating whether slick willy lied about a bj, and I'm sure you cared about that.

Secondly, no one investigated Bill Clinton over a blow job. However, liberals have reframed history like that because they would like us all to think what happened was trivial.

Bill Clinton lied to a grand jury. And then he engaged in a conspiracy to have other people lie to the same grand jury. And this was all confirmed. In a system of laws, it's considered a bad thing when the mad who is charged with defending the constitution engages in a conspiracy to undermine the court system. It was bad when Nixon did it, it was bad when Clinton did it. It wasn't about the infidelity. That aspect just made the story more tabloid friendly, and it gave the Clinton supporters an angle to make the story seem trivial when it wasn't.

But on topic-
so what are they investigating? They want to find out exactly WHO legally revealed the name of Valerie Plame? Or are they just trying to investigate to jusitfy the special prosecutors next career move?

Posted by: 97silverlsc

Quote:

Originally Posted by Calabrio

No, we actually do know that no crime was committed.

And you know this how?

Posted by: MonsterMark

Quote:

Originally Posted by 97silverlsc

And you know this how?

Because she was no longer covert at the time her 'identity' (lol) was revealed. That's how!

Posted by: 97silverlsc

Quote:

Originally Posted by MonsterMark

Because she was no longer covert at the time her 'identity' (lol) was revealed. That's how!

So says you, but the prosecutor said otherwise at the press conference announcing charges against Libby as do others who have far greater knowledge of the workings of the CIA. Contrary to your belief, just cause FOX news says it so doesn't make it so.

Posted by: MonsterMark

Quote:

Originally Posted by 97silverlsc

Prosecuter didn't say crap about it. 2 years and millions of dollars later, he gets a guy for not remembering correctly about something that happened years ago. Wow, I'm impressed. Read the statute. There cannot be a violation because she wasn't covert according to the law. End of story.

Gee, I noticed how there was NOT a mention in the indictment of the revelation of a covert operative as was the intent of the investigation. But I suppose if I spent 2 years fishing for something, I'd eventually settle for a carp and call it a kingfish.

Posted by: fossten

Quote:

Originally Posted by 97silverlsc

Sorry, Phil, here's an excerpt from the press conference that refutes your point. Besides, Fitzgerald contradicted himself in the same press conference.

QUESTION: Can you say whether or not you know whether Mr. Libby knew that Valerie Wilson's identity was covert and whether or not that was pivotal at all in your inability or your decision not to charge under the Intelligence Identity Protection Act?

FITZGERALD: Let me say two things. Number one, I am not speaking to whether or not Valerie Wilson was covert. And anything I say is not intended to say anything beyond this: that she was a CIA officer from January 1st, 2002, forward.

I will confirm that her association with the CIA was classified at that time through July 2003. And all I'll say is that, look, we have not made any allegation that Mr. Libby knowingly, intentionally outed a covert agent.

FITZGERALD: We have not charged that. And so I'm not making that assertion.

And this part applies to you "BUSH LIED" fanatics:

QUESTION: A lot of Americans, people who are opposed to the war, critics of the administration, have looked to your investigation with hope in some ways and might see this indictment as a vindication of their argument that the administration took the country to war on false premises.

Does this indictment do that?

FITZGERALD: This indictment is not about the war. This indictment's not about the propriety of the war. And people who believe fervently in the war effort, people who oppose it, people who have mixed feelings about it should not look to this indictment for any resolution of how they feel or any vindication of how they feel.

This is simply an indictment that says, in a national security investigation about the compromise of a CIA officer's identity that may have taken place in the context of a very heated debate over the war, whether some person -- a person, Mr. Libby -- lied or not.

The indictment will not seek to prove that the war was justified or unjustified. This is stripped of that debate, and this is focused on a narrow transaction.

And I think anyone's who's concerned about the war and has feelings for or against shouldn't look to this criminal process for any answers or resolution of that.

Posted by: 97silverlsc

http://www.truthout.org/fitzgeraldcalling.shtml
What Viveca Novak Told Fitzgerald
By Viveca Novak
TIME

Sunday 11 December 2005

It was in the midst of another Washington scandal, almost a decade ago, that I got to know Bob Luskin. He represented Mark Middleton, a minor figure in the Democratic campaign-finance scandals of 1996. Luskin kept Middleton out of the spotlight and never told me much. Still, there is the occasional source with whom one becomes friendly, and eventually Luskin was in that group.

We'd occasionally meet for a drink - he didn't like having lunch - Cafe Deluxe on Wisconsin Avenue, near the National Cathedral and on my route home. In October 2003, as we each made our way through a glass of wine, he asked me what I was working on. I told him I was trying to get a handle on the Valerie Plame leak investigation. "Well," he said, "you're sitting next to Karl Rove's lawyer." I was genuinely surprised, since Luskin's liberal sympathies were no secret, and here he was representing the man known to many Democrats as the other side's Evil Genius.

I began spending a little more time than usual with Luskin as I tried to keep track of the investigation. But how it all bought me a ticket to testify under oath to special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald still floors me.

Read the full article

Jason Leopold | For Rove, New Testimony, New Problems
By Jason Leopold
t r u t h o u t | Report

Friday 09 December 2005

There are unanswered questions about whether Karl Rove was truthful when he was first interviewed by FBI and Justice Department investigators in early October 2003 regarding whether he played a role in the leak of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson. According to sources close to the probe, he was not.

In that very first interview, which took place just three months after Plame Wilson's name was published in a July 14, 2003, story by conservative columnist Robert Novak in an attempt to discredit her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, a critic of the Bush administration's prewar Iraq intelligence, Rove testified that he did speak with a handful of journalists and told them about Plame Wilson and that she worked at the CIA - but only after her identity had already been made public. In fact, Rove had been one of the two "senior administration officials" cited in Novak's column confirming Plame Wilson's identity. Additionally, Rove had also been a source for Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper, who also published Plame Wilson's name in a story three days after Novak's column - another fact President Bush's deputy chief of staff allegedly withheld from prosecutors.

Moreover, the five-count indictment handed up by a grand jury in late October against I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, shows that Rove had learned of Plame Wilson's identity a month or so before Novak's column was published. Neither Rove nor his attorney, Robert Luskin, has so far clarified Rove's alleged misstatements to investigators two years ago. Those falsities, which Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is homing in on, will likely end Rove's political future, sources close to the investigation said Thursday.

Read the full article

CIA Leak Grand Jury Hears New Evidence
By Pete Yost
The Associated Press

Wednesday 07 December 2005

Washington - Special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald was back before a federal grand jury on Wednesday in the CIA leak case, with deputy White House chief of staff Karl Rove still under investigation.

Since the Oct. 28 indictment of Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, two more reporters have been pulled into the investigation - The Washington Post's Bob Woodward and Time magazine's Viveca Novak.

Woodward has given a deposition about a conversation he had in mid-June 2003 in which a senior Bush administration official disclosed the CIA status of undercover officer Valerie Plame. Fitzgerald is seeking Novak's testimony about her conversations with Rove's lawyer, Robert Luskin, in 2004.

Read the full article

Fitzgerald Presents New Information to Grand Jury
By Carol Leonnig
The Washington Post

Wednesday 07 December 2005

First appearance in probe since Libby indictment.

Special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald appeared this morning to present information to a new grand jury in the CIA leak investigation.

Fitzgerald has been probing for two years what role senior Bush administration officials have played in leaking a CIA operative name to the media in 2003.

Read the full article

Rove Running Out of Answers, Time
By Jason Leopold
t r u t h o u t | Investigative Report

Sunday 04 December 2005

The attorney representing Karl Rove in the federal investigation into the leak of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson has made a desperate attempt to ensure President Bush's deputy chief of staff does not become the subject of a criminal indictment.

In doing so, Rove's attorney, Robert Luskin, has turned the tables on the media, who ultimately fought a losing battle to protect Rove - their source - who revealed to some reporters Plame Wilson's identity and CIA status.

Now Luskin has fired back, revealing to Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that Viveca Novak - a reporter working for Time magazine who wrote several stories about the Plame case - inadvertently tipped him off last year that her colleague at the magazine would be forced to testify that Rove was his source who told him about Plame Wilson's CIA status, several people close to the case said this week.

Read the full article

In CIA Leak, More Talks with Journalists
By Richard W. Stevenson and Douglas Jehl
The New York Times

Friday 02 December 2005

Washington - A conversation between Karl Rove's lawyer and a journalist for Time magazine led Mr. Rove to change his testimony last year to the grand jury in the C.I.A. leak case, people knowledgeable about the sequence of events said Thursday.

Mr. Rove's lawyer, Robert D. Luskin, spoke in the summer or early fall of 2004 with Viveca Novak, a reporter for Time magazine. In that conversation, Mr. Luskin heard from Ms. Novak that a colleague at Time, Matthew Cooper, might have interviewed Mr. Rove about the undercover C.I.A. officer at the heart of the case, the people said.

Time reported this week that the prosecutor in the case, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, has summoned Ms. Novak to testify about a conversation she had with Mr. Luskin, but provided no explanation of what Mr. Fitzgerald might be looking for. The account provided Thursday by people with knowledge of the discussions between Ms. Novak and Mr. Luskin suggests that Mr. Fitzgerald is still trying to determine whether Mr. Rove was fully forthcoming with investigators and whether he altered his grand jury testimony about his dealings with reporters only after learning that one, Mr. Cooper, might identify him as a source