To appreciate the Plame-inspired desperation in the West Wing, look no further than the way in which (and the speed with which) White House aides are turning on one another. The long knives are out for Andy Card, top officials in Cheney’s office are cooperating with Patrick Fitzgerald, and Karl Rove’s lawyers are frantically pointing fingers directly at Scooter Libby.
White House adviser Karl Rove told the grand jury in the CIA leak case that I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Vice President Cheney’s chief of staff, may have told him that CIA operative Valerie Plame worked for the intelligence agency before her identity was revealed, a source familiar with Rove’s account said yesterday.
In a talk that took place in the days before Plame’s CIA employment was revealed in 2003, Rove and Libby discussed conversations they had had with reporters in which Plame and her marriage to Iraq war critic Joseph C. Wilson IV were raised, the source said.
The new spin obviously contradicts the old spin in a variety of ways. We were told, for example, that Rove didn’t know who Valerie Plame was at the time of the leak. Perhaps more importantly, the White House insisted that Rove and Libby weren’t involved in this fiasco in any way. (McClellan described the very suggestion as “ridiculous.”) The latest news suggests these points are no longer “operative.”
Nevertheless, details about Rove’s latest grand jury testimony, which were probably leaked by his lawyers, seem to focus around the idea that Rove knew about Plame, but only because Libby talked to him about it. A desperate attempt to save Rove’s butt and hang Libby out to dry? We’ll see.
Aside from what Libby may or may not have told Rove, to a surprising degree, much of Rove’s defense appears to be dependent on him having a really bad memory.
Rove, for example, had previously said he couldn’t remember where he learned about Plame’s identity. What changed his story? Fitzgerald showed Rove Libby’s testimony, which apparently helped Rove remember that the two had chatted shortly before Plame’s cover was blown.
Rove also told the grand jury initially that he had no conversations with reporters about the Plame matter. He later said he had forgotten about his chats with Bob Novak and Matt Cooper, but a long-lost email helped Rove remember.
For a guy who can recall precinct-by-precinct voter trends, Rove sure is forgetful, isn’t he?
Also, both the WaPo and AP accounts report that Libby and Rove continue to suggest that reporters told them about Plame, not the other way around.
In testimony shown to Rove, Libby stated that numerous journalists appeared to have learned about Plame’s identity in the period before her name was published and that he and Rove talked to each other about their contacts with reporters.
Libby’s testimony stated that Rove had told him about his contact with Novak and that Libby had told Rove about information he had gotten about Wilson’s wife from NBC’s Tim Russert, according to a person familiar with the information shown to Rove.
Prosecutors, however, have a different account from Russert. The network has said Russert told authorities did not know about Wilson’s wife’s identity until it was published and therefore could not have told Libby about it.
Prosecutors also have evidence that Libby initiated the call with Russert and had initiated similar contact with another reporter, Judith Miller of The New York Times, several weeks earlier. Miller was jailed for 85 days before agreeing to testify before the grand jury.
It doesn’t seem like that tack is going to work.