Why You Don't Have the Guys that Are Part of the Story...

by emptywheel

...Covering the story...

Not surprisingly, when David Gregory had Karl Rove on Meet the Press this morning, he never called Rove on any of Rove's misrepresentations. That's par for the course, on NBC. When Russert had Bob Novak on, he didn't call him on any of the misrepresentations, either. (Though to NBC's credit, they had Matt Cooper on to smack Karl around after Karl was gone.) Of course, both Russert (as Libby's fictional source for Plame's identity) and Gregory (as one of the people whom Ari Fleischer leaked Plame's identity to) are key players in this story. They're not exactly reporting from a position of comfort or clarity.

So it falls to me to do what Gregory ought to have done while he had Karl in front of him. Here's the transcript, with my annotations:

MR. GREGORY:  Let me talk about the CIA leak case, of which you were obviously a, a central part.  This is what the president said in 2003 after the identity of Valerie Plame was divulged in a Robert Novak column.  Watch.

(Videotape, September 30, 2003)

PRES. GEORGE W. BUSH:  If there’s a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is.  And if the person has violated laws, that person will be taken care of.

(End videotape)

MR. GREGORY: Robert Novak, who divulged Valerie Plame’s name in his column, appeared on this program with Tim Russert back in July, and Tim asked about his book.  Watch.

(Videotape, July 15, 2007)

MR. RUSSERT: Then you go on to say, in the book, “Senior White House adviser Karl Rove returned my call late that afternoon [July 8^th, 2003],” the same day.  “I mentioned I had heard that Wilson’s wife worked at the CIA in the counterproliferation section and that she had suggested Wilson be sent to Niger.  I distinctly remember Rove’s reply, ‘Oh, you know that, too.’ Rove and I also discussed other aspects of Wilson’s mission, but since he never has disclosed them publicly, neither have I.” So you considered Rove’s comments, “Oh, you know that, too,” as a confirmation?

MR. ROBERT NOVAK:  Yes.

(End videotape)

MR. GREGORY:  Were you a confirming source for Robert Novak?

Note, Gregory didn't focus on the Administration's earlier claims that Karl was not involved in the leak. Rather, he sets the bar higher, with Bush's quote that he would "take care of" (and how--can you say commutation?) anyone who "violated laws."

MR. ROVE:  No. And I, I remember it slightly differently.  I remember saying, “I’ve heard that, too.” Let, let me say this.  There is a civil lawsuit filed by Mr. Wilson and Ms. Plame.  It has been tossed out at the district court level.  They’ve announced their intention to appeal.  I think it is better that I not add anything beyond what is already in the public record until that suit is resolved.  But, as I’m—my recollection is that I said, “I heard that, too.” We—I would point you to...

MR. GREGORY:  Where, where had you heard that?

Ah, the ongoing legal proceedings dodge. You'd think, at a minimum, Gregory would have pushed Rove for a commitment to come clean after the dismissal is held up on appeal.

But the more important question would be, "Karl, that line, 'I've heard that too,' exactly parallels the line that Scooter Libby claims to have used with journalists, that he had simply 'heard this news from journalists.' Is it just a freakish coincidence that your story about your involvement in this leak so perfectly resembles Libby's story--a story that a jury has already determined to be a deliberate lie?"

MR. ROVE:  You’ll have to wait.

MR. GREGORY:  But that’s an important distinction, because the—you—“I heard that, too,” suggests that you heard it from somebody else rather than knowing it yourself.

MR. ROVE:  That’s correct.

MR. GREGORY:  But he, he took those notes down just as you said them.

Notes? Novak has notes? In spite of the fact he has in the past Novak said he didn't have notes?

MR. ROVE:  Well, but I—my recollection is, “I’ve heard that, too.” So—but the point is, if, if, if a journalist had said to me, “I’d like you to confirm this,” my answer would have been, “I can’t.  I don’t know.  I’ve heard that, too.”

Again, the appropriate follow-up would be, "There you are again, Karl, a story that perfectly mirrors Libby's felonious perjury." And this--not later, after Karl has safely hidden in his dark little world--would be the appropriate time to raise the fact that Rove leaked this information to Cooper with no caveats.

MR. GREGORY: It, it, it’s important to point out that the special prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, declined to bring any criminal charges against you.  But given the president’s emphatic statement about getting to the bottom of this, were you ever held to account by the president for what you did?  

MR. ROVE:  You know, I acted in an appropriate manner, made all the appropriate individuals aware of, of, of my contact.  I met with the FBI right at the beginning of this, told them everything.  You’re right, the special prosecutor declined to take any action at all.  I was never a target. In fact, it’s—what’s interesting to me is that the person who did give the name, Richard Armitage, we found out at the end of the process, did, did have the conversation with Novak, took no action against him either.

Two appropriate follow-ups. First, "Are you saying that you told Bush that you leaked to Matt Cooper and confirmed the story for Bob Novak?"

And after Rove doesn't answer that, you ask "Did the story you told the FBI in October 2003 resemble the story you told in your fifth (FIFTH!?!?!?!) grand jury appearance in April 2006?"

And finally, you point out that, in fact, even Bob Novak doesn't claim Richard Armitage gave him "the name"--that that remains one of the items in Novak's column that had a virgin birth. [To be more specific: As Jeff points out, Novak and Armitage dispute whether Armitage gave Novak Valerie's first name, but neither claims Armitage gave Novak the name "Plame," which is the true virgin birth in Novak's column.]

MR. GREGORY:  Was it an inappropriate investigation?    

MR. ROVE:  It’s entirely appropriate to look into these kind of things, sure.  

MR. GREGORY:  Should Armitage have come forward sooner, do you think, to the administration?

Ug, David? Coming forward on October 1 in an investigation that was publicly announced on September 29 ... that's pretty early in the process, don't you think? Or are you asking whether Armitage should have 'fessed up publicly to his involvement earlier? Because that would be a downright breathtaking question from the one journalist known to have received a leak of Plame's identity, who has not yet come forward with his story of that leak.

MR. ROVE:  That’s—that was his decision, and those are the people who were advising him.  That’s fine.    

MR. GREGORY:  The president seemed frustrated that he didn’t.

You mean the President--the guy whom then White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales worked and still works for? Because Armitage offered to tell him all the details, but Gonzales refused.

MR. ROVE:  I, I’m, I’m going to leave it there.

Ah, I see. Bush really did know, and like Libby, you're just covering up for his involvement in these leaks...

MR. GREGORY:  Do you think you owe Valerie Plame an apology?  

MR. ROVE:  No.    

MR. GREGORY:  You do not?  

MR. ROVE:  No.    

Shorter Rove: If I apologized, that lawsuit would get put back into play faster than you can say "Valerie Plame is a CIA spy."

MR. GREGORY:  You considered her fair game in this debate?  

MR. ROVE:  No. And you know what?  Fair game, that wasn’t my phrase.  That’s a phrase of a journalist.  In fact, a colleague of yours.

This is a really fascinating dodge. We know from Fitzgerald's fall 2004 affidavits that Rove claimed Tweety wrongly characterized this comment--that was one of the many reasons why Fitzgerald suspected Rove was lying his ass off, he was even trying to deny these post-Novak leaks. But he doesn't deny that he said something to this effect, here. Just that Tweety made up the phrase.

MR. GREGORY:  Was she an appropriate target in this debate?  

MR. ROVE:  No.  

MR. GREGORY:  She was not.

Watch this closely, ladies and gentlemen, because this is as close as Karl Rove will ever come to admitting he was wrong for leaking Plame's identity.

Okay, this next bit will require a multi-step debunk:

MR. ROVE:  No.  Look, her husband wrote a op-ed that we now know by—in a statement issued on July 11^th by the director of the CIA, backed by a report by the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, was misleading and inaccurate. The vice president, the White House and the director of the CIA did not send Mr. Wilson to Africa to look into—to the question of uranium cake from Niger to Iraq. 

Okay, check for yourself. Does Joe Wilson say--anywhere in the op-ed--that the vice president, the White House or the director of the CIA sent Joe Wilson? Here's the exact quote:

In February 2002, I was informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency that Vice President Dick Cheney's office had questions about a particular intelligence report. While I never saw the report, I was told that it referred to a memorandum of agreement that documented the sale of uranium yellowcake — a form of lightly processed ore — by Niger to Iraq in the late 1990's. The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president's office.[my emphasis]

Wilson said that "agency officials" asked him to go to Niger, not Cheney, Tenet, or the White House. And in fact, Tenet's statement doesn't refute this scenario, either--it completely supports it. Rove's statement is just a shameless lie--and Gregory likely knows that, too, since he was critical of all the White House prevaricating the week of the leak.

We also know that he did—he came—the information he came back with was not dispositive, was not conclusive, did not disprove the British intelligence finding that the Iraqis had attempted to acquire uranium cake. In fact, we now know that he brought back information not disclosed in his article that added to the belief, that confirmed the British intelligence report that the Iraqis had attempted to acquire uranium cake.

This is actually some pretty admirable Rovian jujitsu. It's jujitsu because Wilson's trip could not have been an attempt to confirm the British report--which was published on September 24, 2002, since he went on the trip in February 2002. More importantly, Rove is pretending that Wilson was sent to confirm or deny the story that Iraq was trying to acquire uranium from Iraq, which is a blatant lie. In fact, Wilson was sent to confirm whether Niger had signed a contract with Iraq to deliver uranium, a claim the administration gave up about the time of the British report. Moreover, the SSCI report that Rove has just cited claims that Wilson's report was never used to confirm or deny the case for uranium (though that, too, is deceiving, since it was used after the IAEA had debunked the forgeries to sustain the case).

He brought back information about a previously unknown contact where the Iraqis, working through a third party, attempted to bring and did bring to Niger a trade delegation.

This, I believe, is a case of Rove believing his own (or Libby and Cheney's) propaganda). Baghdad Bob--the "trade delegation" in question--never went to Niger. Rather, the meeting in question happened in Algeria, on the margins of another meeting. But BushCo likes to claim that the meeting happened in Niger because it confuses the issue and plays into their propaganda.

And since the only thing Niger had to sell was uranium cake that was on a U.N.  sanctions list, they declined to do any business.  He brought back information that affirmed the, the British intelligence report. After this all came out, the British did a study, did a review, appointed a commission to review their intelligence finding and came back and confirmed that they stood by their original assessment that, that Iraq had attempted to acquire uranium yellow cake from Niger in—and exactly as was in the president’s speech.

Uh huh. And yet subsequent reports have proved that the British were still relying on the same crappy forgeries the Bush Administration was. I'd say that's cause to start a war.

So Rove has exonerated himself precisely how? So Rove, after admitting Valerie Wilson was not an appropriate target (forgive me, he's probably thinking, I got carried away!!!), basically can't even lay out a factual case against Joe Wilson either? No wonder they ended up going after Valerie.

Comments

[Waiting in Texas]

Emptywheel,
Call me crazy, but I still think that there is more to this than has been revealed on the Fitz-Plame investigation. I firmly believe that there is a whole other nasty backstory to this that hasn’t seen the light of day - yet.

If I was a covert CIA agent - I’d be pissed, but patient - and if I were Rove, I’d be nervous...

[Jeff]

This is right on, obviously. But I would just add two minor points:

in fact, even Bob Novak doesn't claim Richard Armitage gave him "then name--that that remains one of the items in Novak's column that had a virgin birth.

Novak actually claimed that Armitage gave him Wilson's wife's first name, but not her last name. Armitage claims that he did not mention her first name at all to Novak. It's a puzzling discrepancy, and I am inclined to believe Armitage because 1)he didn't give Woodward her name when he blew Plame's cover to him back in June; 2)it is mighty convenient that Novak would say he didn't get her last name from Armitage because, assuming the basis of Armitage's knowledge was the INR memo, he would have identified her as Valerie Wilson, not Plame - and Novak would probably know in any case that Armitage would be unlikely to have used Plame; and 3)Novak might have been worried about explaining why he gave either or both Wilson's friend on the street and Rove her first name - if he knew he had done that, he'd need to account for where he got her name, since he says he didn't look in Who's Who until after all his interviews (although why he couldn't just say he looked up Who's Who before he ever talked to any of them is a good question - maybe one of his assistants was involved?).

This, I believe, is a case of Rove believing his own (or Libby and Cheney's) propaganda).

Basically agree, but worth remembering that Libby and Cheney probably got that information from the CIA, which put it that - apparently mistaken - way in their April 2003 congressional notification which both Cheney and Libby read in early June 2003, after CIA faxed it to OVP.

[Flamethrower]

You should let Chris Matthews know that Rove is disputing his report. Matthews made the same statement more than once on his show. He doesn't like when he's personally discredited -- this might prompt him to take a closer look at MC Rove again.

[Jeff]

One other thing. There were all kinds of news stories, obviously sourced to Luskin, published back in 2005 about where Rove learned about Wilson's wife before he talked with Novak. I don't see why that shouldn't be part of what Fitzgerald unredacted in his recently released 2004 affidavits.

[sarah]

OMG! Gregory, who used to be the only one asking REAL questions at those stupid press briefings. How the mighty have been de-balled....

[Jeff]

Reading what Cooper had to say later on in the show made me realize something about the utter goofiness of Rove's story, which has been sort of noted somewhere (in Hubris, I think): whatever happened with respect to Rove's acknowledgment of the conversation with Cooper, Rove basically had to tell a story where, when he confirmed for Novak on the 8th or 9th, he was just passing along what he had heard about Wilson's wife and he didn't know if it was true, but then, having talked with Novak and Libby, he became confident enough to pass information about Wilson's wife along to Cooper as fact on the 11th. The story that was published back in 2005 was that Rove was uncertain where he first heard about Wilson's wife, but he thought it was in a social setting, and from a reporter or two, though Libby was involved in there somewhere (before or after was often left ambiguous), and there was the conversation with Libby. So on that basis, he felt he had learned enough to pass it along to Cooper volunteered as fact.

This is weird enough to begin with. But two further features. First, there remains the question of what Rove testified he learned from Libby, and when - did he testify that Libby was passing on information from journalists? or simply as fact? And second, this may be part of why it was significant about Novak's column going up on the 11th. Even though the timing doesn't really work, Rove may have said he learned from Novak or from Hohlt on the 11th or before that he had a column coming stating that WIlson's wife was involved in his trip and so forth, so that Rove took it as fact. The trouble with that is that then Rove couldn't claim he didn't know it could be traced back to official government sources.

[Turk Meister]

Here's the thing. Let's suppose Joseph Wilson's op-ed was chock full of fabrications, distortions, false innuendos, lies and misrepresentations. That still would not justify leaking his wife's CIA identity to discredit him.

[Jeff]

One last thing (for now): It's worth underlining, several times, just how extraordinary it is that Rove denies that he was Novak's confirming source, when the simple fact of the matter is he was.

One of the fascinating things about this is that in denying that he was, Rove is essentially compelled to be making the claim that Novak performed bad and irresponsible journalism.

But how much confidence should we put in Gregory's claim that Novak had contemporaneous notes? It sounds plausible, but as far as I know neither Novak nor anyone else has ever publicly stated as much, unless I missed it.

[R P Alderson]

I wonder when the TV movie will come out?
You know, if they covered a lie per episode, the Bush Administration would make a fascinating tv series. Trouble is, it would have to run five nites a week for about ten years to get the bulk of their lies out of the way.
Well, after the next election cycle we'll probably find out more about what truly took place.
I just hope Cheney allows the next election to go ahead.

[el Kabong]

Just to add:

...according to some dedicated investigative reporters at the respected Italian newspaper La Repubblica, they [forged Niger documents] resurfaced [after they had already been discredited] before long at a very suspicious meeting. This meeting occurred in December 2001 in Rome, and included Michael Ledeen, an associate of Defense Department Undersecretary for Policy Douglas Feith and a key figure in the White House's war-propaganda program, Larry Franklin, a top Defense Intelligence Agency Middle East analyst who later pleaded guilty to passing classified information to two employees of the America Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), convicted Iraqi bank swindler Ahmed Chalabi, then head of the CIA-created Iraqi National Congress, and Harold Rhode of the sinister Defense Department Office of Special Plans, that office set up by the White House and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld....

http://www.commondreams.org/views07/0306-38.htm

[Ralph]

Bottom line: Rove lied shamelessly to David Gregory on MTP.

That's all a congressperson or presidential candidate needs to say about this. They need to say it clearly and confidently. Then if someone asks the appropriate next question (what lies did Rove tell?), go into the details, using Marcy's always-superb analysis as a reference.

There is no sense numbing the average listener with all the facts and maneuvers. Just let the world know that Rove lied, that he continues to lie, and that he may still be in legal jeopardy.

[cavjam]

That there's not a laugh track playing any time one of these smarmy hair-oil salesmen opens his mouth is an indictment of TV "journalism."

[Jay]

How very droll that Rove was quoting Napoleon on the talk shows this morning. One of my personal favorite Napoleon quotes was a parting shot at the departing Talleyrand, a scheming political manipulator of the day:

Ah! tenez, vous êtes de la merde dans un bas de soie!

(Oh, get out of here--you are a shit in silk stockings!)

Seems particularly relevent in Mr. Rove's case.

[Jeff]

el Kabong

Please let's not get started with that again. Those very reporters have said there is absolutely no evidence tying Ledeen to the forgeries; Laura Rozen has reported the same. The passage you cite also contains some errors. So please let's not.

Rove also had some really rather remarkable things to say on Fox News">http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,293743,00.html">News today. Interestingly, Rove does not seem to understand why he got off the hook on charges for the underlying conduct:

WALLACE: But do you think that you should even have been discussing a CIA operative?

ROVE: Look. There are 30-some-odd thousand people who work at the CIA. I did not know that — and I'm not even certain to this day whether she fit the definition of a CIA operative.

WALLACE: I want to take you back...

ROVE: I would remind you also if she were, I suspect that the special prosecutor would have done something different about both Mr. Richard Armitage, who was the person who had an extensive conversation with Mr. Novak about this, and would have done something different about me.

Two other things of particular note. Despite the fact that Rove says everything he said today was already in the public record, there is some news on what it was he told McClellan, and the President:

WALLACE: Question: Did you mislead the present and Scott McClellan?

ROVE: No, I didn't. In fact, the president said classified information. I was very clear right from the beginning on this with both the counsel's office and with the FBI.And look. If I had leaked classified information, Peter (sic) Fitzgerald would have done something different. And what I told Scott McClellan was I didn't know her name, didn't know her status at the CIA.

It's not news that Rove hung his job defense on a legalism about classified information, just as Libby tried to do publicly. But it is news that he told McClellan only that he didn't know her name, as distinct from her identity as a CIA employee, however identified (whether as Valerie Plame, Valerie Wilson, or Wilson's wife or whatever); and that he didn't know her status at the CIA, as distinct from the fact of her CIA employment. I can't wait until Maguire gets a load of that - he has spent years and years complaining about NBC's public statement about Russert's knowledge or non-knowledge about Plame, which played exactly the same games. (I know, I know, Maguire will claim the point is that the stakes whether each was being casuistic and legalistic are different in each case.)

Finally, there is this gem:

WALLACE: Matt Cooper, the second reporter you're talking about, who then worked for Time, says you told him that Joe Wilson's wife, who worked for the CIA, authorized the trip.

ROVE: Which I had been told by a reporter.

Now, either Rove is saying he had been told that by Novak, in which case something doesn't make sense: how could he have told Novak he'd heard that too and serve as Novak's confirming source if Novak was the basis for his telling that to Cooper? or alternately, Rove is claiming that he was told that originally before talking with Novak by another reporter. Who? Again, what was reported in 2005 was that Rove thought he had heard it from one or two reporters, but couldn't recall whom. We know it's not Woodward. The only other reporter we know had knowledge of Plame's CIA identity by that point (that is, before Rove talks with Novak) is Judith Miller, and she strikes me as an unlikely source for Rove. I suppose there's always Cliff May, but he strikes me as an unlikely candidate. So who?

[Swopa]

"Gregory (as one of the people whom Ari Fleischer leaked Plame's identity to)"

FWIW, I'm not comfortable with treating this as a fact. Gregory was supposedly told as part of a group including John Dickerson of Time and Tamara Lippert of Newsweek. Dickerson and Newsweek each reported, well in advance of Fleischer's claim of the trial, consistent accounts that Plame's identity was not leaked:

Newsweek:">http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8600327/site/newsweek/print/1/displaymode/1098">Newsweek:

... on a long Bush trip to Africa, Fleischer and Bartlett prompted clusters of reporters to look into the bureaucratic origins of the Wilson tripL. How did the spin doctors know to cast that lure?

Dickerson:">http://www.slate.com/id/2135565/">Dickerson:

The senior administration official spoke to me on background about Wilson and the president's amazing decision to blame the CIA. Other reporters wandered in and out of the conversation, but there were stretches where it was just the two of us (my tedious newsmagazine questions always had a tendency to drive other deadline-oriented reporters away). The official walked me through all the many problems with Wilson's report: His work was sloppy, contradictory, and hadn't been sanctioned by Tenet or any senior person. Some low-level person at the CIA was responsible for the mission. I was told I should go ask the CIA who sent Wilson.

An hour later, as Bush spoke at an AIDS treatment center, I chatted with a different senior administration official, also on background. We talked about many different aspects of the story—the fight with the CIA, the political implications for the president, and the administration's shoddy damage control. This official also pointed out a few times that Wilson had been sent by a low-level CIA employee and encouraged me to follow that angle. I thought I got the point: He'd been sent by someone around the rank of deputy assistant undersecretary or janitor.

At the end of the two conversations I wrote down in my notebook: "look who sent." [...]

At some time after 1 p.m. his time, I called [Matt Cooper]. He told me that he had talked to Karl Rove that morning and that Rove had given him the same Wilson takedown I'd been getting in Uganda. But Matt had the one key fact I didn't: Rove had said that Wilson's wife sent him.

So, that explained the wink-wink nudge-nudge I was getting about who sent Wilson. Matt and I agreed to point out in our files to the cover story that White House officials were going so directly after Wilson. We also agreed that I wouldn't go back to my sources about the wife business. The universe of people who knew this information was undoubtedly small. Mentioning it to other officials would potentially out Rove as Time's source to his colleagues. Plus, it was Matt's scoop and his arrangement with Rove. He had a better sense of how to get the information confirmed without violating their agreement.

Note the discussion between Cooper and Dickerson, sharing the information and deciding how to pursue it. As Russert testified at the trial, NBC didn't have any such discussions before the Novak column, because no one there knew about Wilson's wife working for the CIA.

So the circumstantial evidence seems strong that Fleischer didn't really leak about Plame on that roadside in Uganda, his testimony notwithstanding. For whatever reason, he apparently got backwards who he did leak to (e.g., Pincus) and who he didn't.

[Jeff]

Swopa

Sorry, the italics are my fault. That's a good connection on the Fineman column and Lippert - I'd always wondered where Fineman got that. Interestingly, recall that Fineman too confirmed hearing the same thing as 1x2x6 on Hardball on September 29, 2003 (I believe that's the date). Though he sources it to someone int he White House, which is significant, whom he considers reliable, he may have been encouraged to believe the story by what he seems to have known from Lippert. And i think I agree with your point here, though it seems that Cooper testified that he thought he had a source indirectly via another reporter - though he too may have been confused and then may have been deliberately ambiguous in testifying at trial in order not to give the defense an opening it didn't want anyway. So in other words, it served everybody's purposes for Cooper to be maddeningly ambiguous at trial about whether he was told about Wilson's wife by Dickerson.

However, this puzzles me:

As Russert testified at the trial, NBC didn't have any such discussions before the Novak column, because no one there knew about Wilson's wife working for the CIA.

Given your famous 1x2x6 theory, shouldn't you be committed to the notion that someone at NBC *did* hear on July 12, since Fleischer and Bartlett divided up the calls where Fleischer was going to call the papers (apaprently meaning the Times and the Post) and Bartlett was going to call the Sunday talk shows, so they could see what they were all working on in this regard? Or will you save the theory with the notion that between them they made 6 miscellaneous calls and we don't need Bartlett's presumed call to MTP to get to 1x2x6?

[emptywheel]

Swopa

I actually agree with you, completely. All of which makes it more likely that Ari was pursuing, like the others, a limited admission strategy, always drawing attention away from the leaks that matter. That is, Libby was happy to admit to leaking to Cooper (like Ari, he didn't leak to whom he said he did), because it distracted attention away frmo his leak to Judy, as well as his conversation with Novak.

[Jeff]

But emptywheel, that doesn't make sense in the case of Ari, he was completely untouchable except for perjury, why take the risk? I'm not saying Fleischer wasn't lying, but it can't be explained by drawing attention away from the leaks that matter unless he was doing it purely and simply for the sake of others. And why would the Pincus leak be one that mattered, anyway, more than the others, that is? In Libby's case, it's clear, he pushed everything as late as possible, and drew a blank over Miller. But Fleischer claimed to have leaked earlier than he actually did (assuming he did not leak to Gregory-Lippert-Dickerson). Among other things, Libby's story meant that he was leaking only after Novak's column had already gone on the wires - and even though he testified that he did not know about Novak's column actually being out, still he may have calculated that no prosecutor is going to go after him (or the VP) for passing around information that is already sitting in hundreds of newsrooms around the country. (And he couldn't admit to knowing about the Novak column either because then he would have to admit he was aware that there were official sources for the information about Wilson's wife, not just journalistic gossip.)

[emptywheel]

Jeff

Let me distinguish between agreeing with Swopa on the "didn't leak" point and my comment that it is "more likely" that there was a more organized "admit to the leaks you didn't make" strategy.

I'm mostly thinking about suspicions on the part of some who were invovled that Ari is still lying. Mind you--Ari was COMPLETELY convincing when Jeffress asked him if he had abeen charged with perjury. He looked like shit. But then again,he's an accomplished liar.

Still, IF Ari is lying, I think the explanation would be that they all tried to confuse the issue.

[Swopa]

Given your famous 1x2x6 theory, shouldn't you be committed to the notion that someone at NBC *did* hear on July 12, since Fleischer and Bartlett divided up the calls where Fleischer was going to call the papers (apparently meaning the Times and the Post) and Bartlett was going to call the Sunday talk shows...

I don't think Russert/NBC covered up -- or would try to cover up -- knowing about Plame before Novak's column, nor would Fitzgerald (who had Bartlett's testimony, and the AF1 phone records) build a case around Russert's lack of knowledge when there was evidence to the contrary. Thus I presume that whoever Bartlett called, he failed to talk to anyone at NBC.

[Jeff]

emptywheel

I can easily see why people think Ari is still lying. I guess my point is the more minor one about what the explainatory motive would be - it would that Fleischer simply threw up a bunch of stuff to be confusing, as you suggest here, rather than trying to draw attention away from a specific leak. On a related note, surely one of the weirdest parts of Libby's story was his pretty detailed efforts to take responsibility for the reported July 12 leak to a Washington Post reporter by saying that yeah, he and Kessler (not even the right reporter!) might well have talked boondoggle. The only motive I can imagine for that, apart from the effort to sow sheer complex confusion, is that he might have feared that Cheney had talked with Pincus. But even that I think is unlikely.

As for Ari, it still is strangely risky if he was trying to just sow confusion too.

Swopa

Yes, that's a good case that Bartlett did not tell anyone at NBC. So either Bartlett actually called others besides the talk shows, or he didn't do his share of the leaking.

[Mugsy]

I posted a video on YouTube regarding just how deplorable of forgeries those documents were:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NCH4CB5w3c

[Tom Maguire]

1. I think we ought to have a Special Counsel try to get to the bottom of this.

2. Re this:

Two appropriate follow-ups. First, "Are you saying that you told Bush that you leaked to Matt Cooper and confirmed the story for Bob Novak?"

And after Rove doesn't answer that, you ask "Did the story you told the FBI in October 2003 resemble the story you told in your fifth (FIFTH!?!?!?!) grand jury appearance in April 2006?"

I am not sure Rove ever testified to a specific memory of his side of the Cooper call; my recollection is that eventually he came in and discussed the possible meaning of his email to Hadley, but that he never admitted actually remembering the call. IIRC.

As to Novak, Rove's original story was that he may have discussed Plame with Novak but believed (during July, Aug, and Sept, anyway) that he had said too little to be the confirming source.

Murray">http://news.nationaljournal.com/articles/0608nj1.htm">Murray Waas had part of that:

Rove told the FBI that when Novak mentioned Plame's CIA connection and that she might have played a role in selecting her husband to go to Niger, he (Rove) simply said that he had heard much the same information. According to sources, Novak later told investigators a virtually identical story.

This Waas">http://nationaljournal.com/about/njweekly/stories/2005/1007nj3.htm">Waas story had that Rove version in which he admiited speaking to Novak but didn't think he said enough to be a source.

And, per Waas, the FBI didn't quite see how the conversation Rove described could have made him a source either, but of course they thought Rove was lying about what he said. Hey, everyone's a critic - eventually, Cooper explained that "I heard that, too" is a clear second sourcing, which may have helped Karl a bit.

3. Totally agree that Gregory is a bad choice for these interviews. Why oh why has he declined, at this point, to clarify his version of Ari's alleged leak to him?

Suspicious minds will note that Gregory would lose nothing by declaring, as Dickerson did, that Ari was wrong. OTOH, if Gregory came out and admitted that Ari was right, Russert's story that no one at NBC knew anything takes on water.

Tough to handicap, but one might infer that Gregory thinks silence is golden because disgracing the Washington Bureau chief (and his boss) is sort of unappealing.

[Albert Fall]

Turk--

You nailed it.

Even if Joe Wilson lied about everything, it does not making outing a CIA agent not treason.

The Rep's continued return to the story of how they were "victims" of Wilson shows how blind they are to what that story demonstrates about their petty vindictive personalities.

[1st Republic 14th Star]

One of the false assumptions used to frame the debate about who leaked Valerie Wilson's name is whose leak was published first -- Rove, Libby, etc. would all have us believe that since Armitage leaked to Novak and Novak was the first to publish, that makes Armitage the leaker. In fact, Libby gave Valerie Wilson's name to Judith Miller before Richard Armitage gave it to Robert Novak.

In addition, it makes no difference whether Armitage or Libby leaked first. The Bush administration officials and supporters associated with this episode would have you believe that there can be only one leaker, and that once you know who leaked first, anyone who did it afterwards is not culpable.

In fact, EVERYONE who leaked Valerie Wilson's name was wrong -- the fact that one person may have revealed classified information does not relieve anyone else of their responsibility to safeguard it. The proper response when a journalist was looking for a confirming source on Valerie Wilson's identity isn't "I heard that too." The correct reply would be "I have no idea what you're talking about and I can't answer one way or the other."