Once again, it’s the cover-up, not the crime

July 22, 2005

In case you haven’t already seen it, Bloomberg, which has been doing fine work on the Plame scandal, has learned that prosecutors believe that Rove and Libby may have lied during their testimony about how they learned about Plame’s identity (via Think Progress).

Two top White House aides have given accounts to a special prosecutor about how reporters first told them the identity of a CIA agent that are at odds with what the reporters have said, according to people familiar with the case.

Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, told special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that he first learned from NBC News reporter Tim Russert of the identity of Central Intelligence Agency operative Valerie Plame, the wife of former ambassador and Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson, one person said. Russert has testified before a federal grand jury that he didn’t tell Libby of Plame’s identity, the person said.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove told Fitzgerald that he first learned the identity of the CIA agent from syndicated columnist Robert Novak, according a person familiar with the matter. Novak, who was first to report Plame’s name and connection to Wilson, has given a somewhat different version to the special prosecutor, the person said.

Rove and Libby’s attempts to blame reporters reeks of desperation. In fact, it highlights just how big a jam they’re really in.

After all, there are a limited number of ways these two could of obtained the classified information. If it was the July 7, 2003 memo from the State Department, they can’t admit it, because it would prove that they knew the information they were leaking was classified. So they blame reporters for giving them the information, which the reporters quickly explain isn’t true.

If they point to the memo, they’re breaking one law; if they lie and blame journalists, they’re breaking a different law. And so the noose tightens…

Yesterday, Mark Kleiman bet $30 to a conservative’s $20 that Rove will get indicted in this scandal. I’m nearly convinced that Kleiman is going to win that bet.

From the movie my kid’s watching at this very moment:

“A lie keeps growing and growing until it’s as plain as the nose on your face.”–The Blue Fairy

Truer words were never told.

  • Some very interesting testimony in front of a Democratic House committee by Larry Johnson – a former CIA classmate about Plame. The whole thing is pretty good.

    http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/7/22/23342/2018

    INTRO:
    I submit this statement to the Congress in an effort to correct a malicious and disingenuous smear campaign that has been executed against a friend and former colleague, Valerie (Plame) Wilson. Neither Valerie, nor her husband, Ambassador Joseph Wilson has asked me to do anything on their behalf. I am speaking up because I was raised to stop bullies. In the case of Valerie Plame she is facing a gang of bullies that is being directed by the Republican National Committee.

  • Thanks ET–people, this is a great read. A couple key quotes:

    “To those such as Victoria Toensing, Representative Peter King, P. J. O’Rourke, and Representative Roy Blunt I can only say one thing–you are wrong. I am stunned that some political leaders have such ignorance about a matter so basic to the national security structure of this nation.”

    “I voted for George Bush in November of 2000 because I wanted a President who knew what the meaning of “is” was. I was tired of political operatives who spent endless hours on cable news channels parsing words. I was promised a President who would bring a new tone and new ethical standards to Washington.

    So where are we? The President has flip flopped and backed away from his promise to fire anyone at the White House implicated in a leak. We now know from press reports that at least Karl Rove and Scooter Libby are implicated in these leaks. Instead of a President concerned first and foremost with protecting this country and the intelligence officers who serve it, we are confronted with a President who is willing to sit by while political operatives savage the reputations of good Americans like Valerie and Joe Wilson. This is wrong.”

    Dems need politicians like this.

  • Can we add Larry Johnson to Wes Clark’s national security sit-downs with Congressional Dems? And then watch the Dems and Wes and Larry tear apart the right wing spinners on all the talk shows. Pretty please?

  • David Corn has this from the same “hearing”.

    http://www.davidcorn.com/

    Testimony of James Marcinkowski
    July 22, 2005

    Understandable to all Americans is a simple, incontrovertible, but damning truth: the United States government exposed the identity of a clandestine officer working for the CIA. This is not just another partisan “dust-up” between political parties. This unprecedented act will have far-reaching consequences for covert operations around the world. Equally disastrous is that from the time of that first damning act, we have continued on a course of self-inflicted wounds by government officials who have refused to take any responsibility, have played hide-and-seek with the truth and engaged in semantic parlor games for more than two years, all at the expense of the safety of the American people. No government official has that right.

    snip

    The exposure of Valerie Plame’s cover by the White House is the same as the local chief of police announcing to the media the identity of its undercover drug officers. In both cases, the ability of the officer to operate is destroyed, but there is also an added dimension. An informant in a major sophisticated crime network, or a CIA asset working in a foreign government, if exposed, has a rather good chance of losing more than just their ability to operate.

    Any undercover officer, whether in the police department or the CIA, will tell you that the major concern of their informant or agent is their personal safety and that of their family. Cover is safety. If you cannot guarantee that safety in some form or other, the person will not work for you and the source of important information will be lost.

    snip

    There is a very serious message here. Before you shine up your American flag lapel pin and affix your patriotism to your sleeve, think about what the impact your actions will have on the security of the American people. Think about whether your partisan obfuscation is creating confidence in the United States in general and the CIA in particular. If not, a true patriot would shut up.

  • Assuming this is true, it does seem that Rove and Libby
    have got to go down for obstruction, or perjury, at least.
    And that they truly are guilty of the larger crime, whether
    provable or not. And that means Cheney has got to be
    involved, although he’ll almost certainly not be charged.
    But does that mean that Bush is involved? How do we
    know that he wasn’t left out of the loop?

    Help me out here. If I were Rove, I’d have nothing but
    contempt for this president. I’d treat him as a need-to-know
    hack. He’s the front man, the puppet. He doesn’t call the
    shots, and he probably doesn’t understand what the neocons
    are doing. He doesn’t need to know or understand. He just
    needs to stump for them, unwittingly.

    Everything I read about this strange man confirms my
    suspicion that he is totally clueless as to what’s going on
    in his administration.

    Somebody set me straight, so I can hang on to the hope that
    Plamegate will bring the whole gang of bastards down,
    because there ain’t nothin’ left in our arsenals to shoot. They’ve
    dodged every bullet, every bomb, every missle so far.

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