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Bombshell

Posted By Matt On 24th October 2005 @ 21:51 In Politics, Dick Cheney, Plame Investigation, Patrick Fitzgerald | 3 Comments

From the New York Times: Cheney Told Aide of C.I.A. Officer, Notes Show

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 said the notes show 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.

And which “lawyers involved in the case,” pray tell, were those? Do they happen to be lawyers for Scooter Libby?

If so, James Wolcott was right on the money:

So, imagine you’re Scooter Libby awaiting the word from the grand jury.

Are you going to be the fall guy, the patsy, the designated chump bearing the cross of blame while Rove plays the part of injured bystander? Are you happy at the prospect that your name may soon be a national joke on the lips of every late-nite comedian? Are you going to ignore the humiliation of being hung out to dry by your colleagues and hold your head high in silent stoic resolve?

See, I’m imagining that if I’m Scooter Libby, I might be thinking that Karl and his crew overplayed their hand making me the leper, and maybe I’ve got some things of my own to divulge, and if I go down, maybe I won’t be going down alone.

They’re not going to pin this all on me.

I had no idea that Wolcott was part-Vulcan.

Back to The Times:

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.

Oh, yeah, baby — I like it like that.

Here are a few other relevant reads:

  • Tiny Revolution: Top Ten Things We Will Soon Learn About Patrick Fitzgerald (via Two Political Junkies)
  • Billmon’s last twenty-five posts, but especially The New Pravda’s Lost Year and Fitzgerald’s New Boss

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    3 Comments To "Bombshell"

    #1 Comment By Neil Shakespeare On 24th October 2005 @ 22:19

    So how did Cheney know? Did George tell him?

    #2 Comment By Matt On 24th October 2005 @ 22:22

    Yes, actually — but a different George:

    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.

    #3 Trackback By The Heretik On 24th October 2005 @ 22:48

    NOW IT GOES BIG TIME

    NOW IT GETS WEIRD Libby heard about Plame from Cheney. And this story that was big before hits Big Time.[story]I. Lewis Libby Jr., Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, first learned about the C.I.A. officer at the heart

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