This is not an issue of a lie is a lie. It's about the consequences of the lie. It's not justice to punish every lie equally; they ain't the same.
Cycloptichorn wrote:Have you been following the trial, Tico?
Not real closely. I suppose I should follow it more closely, given it is the Trial of the Century and all.
I love the 'of the century' designations in a century only 7 years old...
Though the TX-USC nat'l championship definitely deserves the title of game of the century.
For liveblogging of the trial, see -
firedoglake.com
And for the other side, see
justoneminute.typepad.com
Cheers
Cycloptichorn
Cycloptichorn wrote:And for the other side, see
justoneminute.typepad.com
Cheers
Cycloptichorn
Yeah, I've popped in to justoneminute every now and then. Interesting thought about the mistrial ....
Cheney's Handwritten Notes Implicate Bush in Plame Affair
By Jason Leopold and Marc Ash
t r u t h o u t | Report
Wednesday 31 January 2007
Copies of handwritten notes by Vice President Dick Cheney, introduced at trial by defense attorneys for former White House staffer I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, would appear to implicate George W. Bush in the Plame CIA Leak case.
Bush has long maintained that he was unaware of attacks by any member of his administration against [former ambassador Joseph] Wilson. The ex-envoy's stinging rebukes of the administration's use of pre-war Iraq intelligence led Libby and other White House officials to leak Wilson's wife's covert CIA status to reporters in July 2003 in an act of retaliation.
But Cheney's notes, which were introduced into evidence Tuesday during Libby's perjury and obstruction-of-justice trial, call into question the truthfulness of President Bush's vehement denials about his prior knowledge of the attacks against Wilson. The revelation that Bush may have known all along that there was an effort by members of his office to discredit the former ambassador begs the question: Was the president also aware that senior members of his administration compromised Valerie Plame's undercover role with the CIA?
Further, the highly explicit nature of Cheney's comments not only hints at a rift between Cheney and Bush over what Cheney felt was the scapegoating of Libby, but also raises serious questions about potentially criminal actions by Bush. If Bush did indeed play an active role in encouraging Libby to take the fall to protect Karl Rove, as Libby's lawyers articulated in their opening statements, then that could be viewed as criminal involvement by Bush.
Last week, Libby's attorney Theodore Wells made a stunning pronouncement during opening statements of Libby's trial. He claimed that the White House had made Libby a scapegoat for the leak to protect Karl Rove - Bush's political adviser and "right-hand man."
"Mr. Libby, you will learn, went to the vice president of the United States and met with the vice president in private. Mr. Libby said to the vice president, 'I think the White House ... is trying to set me up. People in the White House want me to be a scapegoat,'" said Wells.
Cheney's notes seem to help bolster Wells's defense strategy. Libby's defense team first discussed the notes - written by Cheney in September 2003 for White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan - during opening statements last week. Wells said Cheney had written "not going to protect one staffer and sacrifice the guy that was asked to stick his head in the meat grinder because of incompetence of others": a reference to Libby being asked to deal with the media and vociferously rebut Wilson's allegations that the Bush administration knowingly "twisted" intelligence to win support for the war in Iraq.
However, when Cheney wrote the notes, he had originally wrote "this Pres." instead of "that was."
During cross-examination Tuesday morning, David Addington was asked specific questions about Cheney's notes and the reference to President Bush. Addington, former counsel to the vice president, was named Cheney's chief of staff - a position Libby had held before resigning.
"Can you make out what's crossed out, Mr. Addington?" Wells asked, according to a copy of the transcript of Tuesday's court proceedings.
"It says 'the guy' and then it says, 'this Pres.' and then that is scratched through," Addington said.
"OK," Wells said. "Let's start again. 'Not going to protect one staffer and sacrifice the guy ...' and then what's scratched through?" Wells asked Addington again, attempting to establish that Cheney had originally wrote that President Bush personally asked Libby to beat back Wilson's criticisms.
"T-h-i-s space P-r-e-s," Addington said, spelling out the words. "And then it's got a scratch-through."
"So it looks like 'this Pres.?'" Wells asked again.
"Yes sir," Addington said.
As such, Cheney's notes would have read "not going to protect one staffer and sacrifice the guy this Pres. asked to stick his head in the meat grinder because of the incompetence of others." The words "this Pres." were crossed out and replaced with "that was" out, but are still clearly legible in the document.
The reference to "the meat grinder" was understood to be the Washington press corps, Wells said. The "protect one staffer" reference, Wells said, was White House Political Adviser Karl Rove, whose own role in the leak and the attacks on Wilson are well documented.
Furthermore, Cheney, in his directive to McClellan that day in September 2003, wrote that the White House spokesman needed to immediately "call out to key press saying the same thing about Scooter as Karl."
McClellan had publicly stated in September 2003 that Rove was not culpable in the leak of Valerie Plame's covert CIA identity, nor was he involved in a campaign to discredit her husband, but McClellan did not say anything to the media that exonerated Libby, which led Cheney to write the note. A couple of weeks later, in October 2003, McClellan told members of the media that it was "ridiculous" for them to suggest Libby and Rove were involved in the leak, because he received personal assurances from both men that they had nothing to do with it.
Moreover, Wells insinuated Tuesday that Cheney's note [seemingly] implicating President Bush in the discrediting of Wilson was one of the 250 pages of emails and documents the White House failed to turn over to investigators who had been probing the leak for more than two years.
Wells insinuated that Cheney's note, because it contained a reference to "this Pres." may have been an explosive piece of evidence that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who at the time of the leak was White House counsel, withheld from investigators, citing executive privilege. Addington told Wells that when subpoenas were first issued by the Justice Department in the fall of 2003, demanding documents and emails relating to Wilson and Plame be preserved, he was given Cheney's notes and immediately recognized the importance of what the vice president had written. Addington said he immediately entered into a "discussion" with Gonzales and Terry O'Donnell, Cheney's counsel, about the note, but Addington did not say whether it was turned over to investigators in the early days of the probe.
Wells's line of questioning is an attempt to shift the blame for the leak squarely onto the shoulders of the White House - a tactic aimed at confusing the jury - and will likely unravel because it has nothing to do with the perjury and obstruction-of-justice charges at the heart of the case against Libby. Still, Tuesday's testimony implicating President Bush may be the most important fact that has emerged from the trial thus far.
Addington revealed during his testimony Monday that in June 2003 there were internal discussions - involving President Bush and Vice President Cheney - about declassifying for specific reporters a portion of the highly classified October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate as a way to counter Wilson's criticisms against the administration. That portion purportedly showed that Iraq was attempting to purchase uranium from Niger to use for building an atomic bomb - a claim that Wilson had debunked when he personally traveled to Niger to investigate it a year earlier.
In late June or early July 2003, "a question was asked of me - by Scooter Libby: Does the president have authority to declassify information?" Addington told jurors Monday, in response to a question by defense attorney William Jeffress. "And the answer I gave was, 'Of course, yes. It's clear the president has the authority to determine what constitutes a national security secret and who can have access to it.'"
President Bush signed an executive order in 2003 authorizing Cheney to declassify certain intelligence documents. The order was signed on March 23, four days after the start of the Iraq War and two weeks after Wilson first appeared on the administration's radar.
Armitage met with Woodward June 13, so apparently he was the first leaker, predating any of the Whitehouse figures telling any reporter days or weeks later. If there was a crime committed in the outing, how come Fitzfong is not going after the original leaker? If he must, he could go after others if he really believes the outing was a crime, which he has never established to this day by the way.
Some of us have been beating the drums here, waiting for Fitzfong to establish the original crime was actually a crime with some credible evidence, but still no evidence put forward yet to this day after years of waiting.
By the way, the so-called conspiracy to cover up is still about a crime that is not yet been claimed to be a crime. Conspiracies of fighting issues in the media are totally legal and are done all the time, so most of this nonsensical dredging up of who knew what when means absolutely nothing as far as I can see, except to convict Libby of lying about a crime that is yet to be shown to be a crime.
okie wrote:Armitage met with Woodward June 13, so apparently he was the first leaker, predating any of the Whitehouse figures telling any reporter days or weeks later. If there was a crime committed in the outing, how come Fitzfong is not going after the original leaker? If he must, he could go after others if he really believes the outing was a crime, which he has never established to this day by the way.
Some of us have been beating the drums here, waiting for Fitzfong to establish the original crime was actually a crime with some credible evidence, but still no evidence put forward yet to this day after years of waiting.
First of all, the 'fitzfong' thing is idiotic. You should drop that, because whether or not you agree with Fitzgerald, he hasn't shown an ounce of incompetence or improper procedure.
You may disagree that Fitzgerald should be attacking Libby for something other than the original crime, but that's immaterial; he was tasked with investigating any and all crimes related to the matter, and that's what he's doing.
Not to mention the fact that you display a real ignorance of how RICO and organized trial crimes work; you flip those at the bottom against the ones at the top in order to make your case. And this is an organized crime.
Cycloptichorn
I think Fitzfong fits, cyclops. Where is the evidence of the crime that he was charged to investigate? In fact, I heard him say in a press conference years ago that the intentional outing of Plame probably did not occur, or some such words. Do we need to dredge that up again? And if he really cares about the outing, he would care about Armitage, and he obviously does not care at all. I stick to my assertion that this whole proceeding is a witch hunt about nothing, and should have been ended years ago. This case is highly irritating and a total distraction from what is really important.
okie wrote:I think Fitzfong fits, cyclops. Where is the evidence of the crime that he was charged to investigate? In fact, I heard him say in a press conference years ago that the intentional outing of Plame probably did not occur, or some such words. Do we need to dredge that up again? And if he really cares about the outing, he would care about Armitage, and he obviously does not care at all. I stick to my assertion that this whole proceeding is a witch hunt about nothing, and should have been ended years ago. This case is highly irritating and a total distraction from what is really important.
But, the 'fitzfong' slur implies that Fitz has acted in an inappropriate fashion. Can you point out what that inappropriate behavior is or was? I doubt it.
Also, your memory is faulty, for Fitz has never said 'intentional outing of Plame probably did not occur, or some such words.' You are making things up here, so yes, we probably should dredge that up again, because some of us need a refresher.
The fact is that Plame cannot do her job at the CIA any longer. Whether or not her outing fits the IIPA does not remove the onus from those who launched a concerted attack to smear Wilson and his wife for defying the administration. The fact that you find this to be 'irritating' is frankly immaterial; noone is forcing you to keep up with the trial at all, and your level of irritance has nothing to do with justice.
I would also add that this trial doesn't distract in any way from any other business of the government, so how could it be distracting from 'more important things?'
Cycloptichorn
The scapegoating claim doesn't seem consistent with the type of charges made against Scooter.
Unfortunately, Fitz made a decision not to charge the Plame leakers under the special statute covering this. That is probably why Armitage and Rove are walking. Fitz's prosecutorial discretion is to not charge under the statute because it has not been tested and may be difficult to enforce.
Cycloptichorn wrote:Also, your memory is faulty, for Fitz has never said 'intentional outing of Plame probably did not occur, or some such words.' You are making things up here, so yes, we probably should dredge that up again, because some of us need a refresher.
I agree. I remember calling Fitzgerald out on this, after he strongly implied that Plame was "covert" under the IIPA, yet he never has said as much in so many words ... and I suspect he never will.
I can foresee several different reasons for why this might be, but I fear that I would be leading with my own personal desires, so I won't comment right now as to whether or not furhter action will come from this; I remember our bet, though, and would hate to lose...
Cycloptichorn
Cycloptichorn wrote:okie wrote:I think Fitzfong fits, cyclops. Where is the evidence of the crime that he was charged to investigate? In fact, I heard him say in a press conference years ago that the intentional outing of Plame probably did not occur, or some such words. Do we need to dredge that up again? And if he really cares about the outing, he would care about Armitage, and he obviously does not care at all. I stick to my assertion that this whole proceeding is a witch hunt about nothing, and should have been ended years ago. This case is highly irritating and a total distraction from what is really important.
But, the 'fitzfong' slur implies that Fitz has acted in an inappropriate fashion. Can you point out what that inappropriate behavior is or was? I doubt it.
Also, your memory is faulty, for Fitz has never said 'intentional outing of Plame probably did not occur, or some such words.' You are making things up here, so yes, we probably should dredge that up again, because some of us need a refresher.
The fact is that Plame cannot do her job at the CIA any longer. Whether or not her outing fits the IIPA does not remove the onus from those who launched a concerted attack to smear Wilson and his wife for defying the administration. The fact that you find this to be 'irritating' is frankly immaterial; noone is forcing you to keep up with the trial at all, and your level of irritance has nothing to do with justice.
I would also add that this trial doesn't distract in any way from any other business of the government, so how could it be distracting from 'more important things?'
Cycloptichorn
Okay, I admit the term "Fitzfong" is too harsh for Mr. Fitzgerald, as Nifong is one of a kind, but the point here is that Nifong never brought forward any evidence to support the reason for his investigation and charges, and likewise Fitzgerald has never brought forth any evidence that the original purported crime was committed, even after years of investigation. In fact, he has never claimed the crime was committed, let alone find any evidence against anyone. I believe his investigation therefore is inappropriate behavior. The investigation should have first established whether Plame was in fact a covert agent, as defined by the law that the investigation was formed to identify anyone that broke that law. After years, that has never been established to this day. In my mind, that is a gross misuse of his job, and the investigation should have therefore been dropped long ago.
Furthermore, "smearing Wilson" is not illegal. It is political, and is done all the time between people on opposite sides of the political fence. Wilson actually started the process, by "smearing" the administration. You can argue which side is correct, but that is not the point. Also, how you define "smearing" makes a great deal of difference, and I think the Swift Boat people had a right to get the facts out about Mr. Kerry, while others viewed as smearing. This issue has the same elements to it.
Lastly, I did not remember the exact words of Fitzgerald, and that is the reason I said "or some such words." I think this is what I recalled, although I am not sure after over a year.
"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."
That statement seems clear to me that he has never established whether Plame was covered by the main law purportedly broken here, so I would suggest he go back to his law books and determine that finally after how many years has he been investigating this. And even if she were covered by the law, he would have to show that the leaker or leakers knew that to be the case when they told reporters. I think he knows he does not have a case, but he continues to work like this case merits some kind of superman effort to dig up something. I suspect if you deal with people's memories from 3 or 4 years ago, then make them testify in court as to exactly what they said and thought 3 years ago concerning a crime that is not a crime, you might eventually turn up something. I think it is totally pathetic.
Quote:In fact, he has never claimed the crime was committed, let alone find any evidence against anyone. I believe his investigation therefore is inappropriate behavior.
Well, there could be several different crimes here- violating the IIPA is the underlying crime, but you have to understand that crimes committed during the investigation of whether or not the IIPA was outed count as real crimes too!
If I had to guess I would say that Fitz would be working towards a larger Conspiracy to commit a criminal act charge - that the WH colluded amongst themselves to keep the truth from being known about what they did, and this lead to various people lying to the FBI. This is a crime as well, even if you don't believe that it was a crime to out Plame in the first place.
Remember the whole Nixon thing... the coverup is as important as the crime itself.
Fitz has maintained throughout this whole thing that he was tasked with finding out the truth about the matter and prosecuting
any crimes he came across.
Here's a link to Fitz's news conference - basically the last public thing he's said about the case. I've highlighted one aspect for ya -
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/28/AR2005102801340.html
Quote:QUESTION: Mr. Fitzgerald, this began as a leak investigation but no one is charged with any leaking. Is your investigation finished? Is this another leak investigation that doesn't lead to a charge of leaking?
FITZGERALD: Let me answer the two questions you asked in one.
OK, is the investigation finished? It's not over, but I'll tell you this: Very rarely do you bring a charge in a case that's going to be tried and would you ever end a grand jury investigation.
I can tell you, the substantial bulk of the work in this investigation is concluded.
FITZGERALD: This grand jury's term has expired by statute; it could not be extended. But it's in ordinary course to keep a grand jury open to consider other matters, and that's what we will be doing.
Let me then ask your next question: Well, why is this a leak investigation that doesn't result in a charge? I've been trying to think about how to explain this, so let me try. I know baseball analogies are the fad these days. Let me try something.
If you saw a baseball game and you saw a pitcher wind up and throw a fastball and hit a batter right smack in the head, and it really, really hurt them, you'd want to know why the pitcher did that. And you'd wonder whether or not the person just reared back and decided, "I've got bad blood with this batter. He hit two home runs off me. I'm just going to hit him in the head as hard as I can."
You also might wonder whether or not the pitcher just let go of the ball or his foot slipped, and he had no idea to throw the ball anywhere near the batter's head. And there's lots of shades of gray in between.
You might learn that you wanted to hit the batter in the back and it hit him in the head because he moved. You might want to throw it under his chin, but it ended up hitting him on the head.
FITZGERALD: And what you'd want to do is have as much information as you could. You'd want to know: What happened in the dugout? Was this guy complaining about the person he threw at? Did he talk to anyone else? What was he thinking? How does he react? All those things you'd want to know.
And then you'd make a decision as to whether this person should be banned from baseball, whether they should be suspended, whether you should do nothing at all and just say, "Hey, the person threw a bad pitch. Get over it."
In this case, it's a lot more serious than baseball. And the damage wasn't to one person. It wasn't just Valerie Wilson. It was done to all of us.
And as you sit back, you want to learn: Why was this information going out? Why were people taking this information about Valerie Wilson and giving it to reporters? Why did Mr. Libby say what he did? Why did he tell Judith Miller three times? Why did he tell the press secretary on Monday? Why did he tell Mr. Cooper? And was this something where he intended to cause whatever damage was caused?
FITZGERALD: Or did they intend to do something else and where are the shades of gray?
And what we have when someone charges obstruction of justice, the umpire gets sand thrown in his eyes. He's trying to figure what happened and somebody blocked their view.
As you sit here now, if you're asking me what his motives were, I can't tell you; we haven't charged it.
So what you were saying is the harm in an obstruction investigation is it prevents us from making the fine judgments we want to make.
I also want to take away from the notion that somehow we should take an obstruction charge less seriously than a leak charge.
This is a very serious matter and compromising national security information is a very serious matter. But the need to get to the bottom of what happened and whether national security was compromised by inadvertence, by recklessness, by maliciousness is extremely important. We need to know the truth. And anyone who would go into a grand jury and lie, obstruct and impede the investigation has committed a serious crime.
FITZGERALD: I will say this: Mr. Libby is presumed innocent. He would not be guilty unless and until a jury of 12 people came back and returned a verdict saying so.
But if what we allege in the indictment is true, then what is charged is a very, very serious crime that will vindicate the public interest in finding out what happened here.
It is my personal opinion that the 'obstruction of justice' charge is thrown in b/c Fitz has reason to believe that Libby is lying to protect Cheney or Bush, and that without his testimony Fitz doesn't believe he could make a good case. Regardless, it is still important to find out the truth of the matter, even if the underlying event isn't found to rise to the level of a crime under the IIPA.
Cycloptichorn
It seems to me that for a coverup to occur, there needs to be something to cover up. If it is found out they were covering up something that is never charged as a crime, does that not strike you as very odd, and something to be very questionable? If I am mentioned as possibly robbing a bank, but never charged because there is no evidence, can a friend of mine be charged in covering up the theory that I robbed the bank, even though no evidence exists that I did rob the bank? I am no lawyer, but it seems like a real stretch to say the least. Is this how convoluted this case has become, cyclops?
Quote:If it is found out they were covering up something that is never charged as a crime, does that not strike you as very odd, and something to be very questionable?
Waitaminute. 'Covering up'
is a crime.
The likely scenario is that the Bush crew didn't know whether or not outing Plame was a crime or not; it is plainly obvious that there was a lot of confusion surrounding this. Just in case, I suspect there was collusion amongst members of the Admin. to get their story straight once the investigation came around; that in itself is a crime, if provable.
The act of trying to impede an investigation - even if the underlying acts which led to the investigation are never charged - is a major crime in itself.
This certainly isn't a cut-and-dry case, and we won't see any 'perry mason' moments, I suspect; but that doesn't make it a false or invalid one. Just sort of boring.
Cycloptichorn
Bingo, Tico.
And did you notice these questions?
"You had in your notes the name Joe Wilson," Jeffress said. "You had his phone number. You had his extension. So who did you talk to about Joe Wilson?"
"I don't remember who I talked to about Joe Wilson."
"Do you remember talking to Joe Wilson?"
"I don't believe I did."
This has been a long held suspicion among some folks out here, and yes, I would like to know, did Judith Miller learn of Valerie Plame from Joseph Wilson himself? How come she said, "I don't believe I did." instead of simply saying "no, I did not"? This all brings up new questions, why did this lady choose to sit in jail for months, just for the fun of it or was it to wait until the dust settled and watch further developments and get her story planned out?
After all, it has never made sense to me this woman would be that dedicated to her source, namely Mr. Libby, that she would sit in jail just to protect him as her source. That has never made any sense.
I may be sticking my neck out again, as I did in the first pages of this thread, that maybe Joseph Wilson himself was the source of the original leak to somebody in the press. I wonder if Woodward knows something. He is uncharacteristically ambivalent about this case and always has been, so could there be more reasons than we know for this ambivalence? I could be wrong on this, probably so, but a hunch nonetheless that should be considered.
Obviously, Mr. Wilson should be placed on the stand, under oath, and asked a few questions, like did you talk to anyone in the press, who did you talk to, and what did you talk about? He is material to this case. Why wouldn't he jump at the chance to testify, after all he wants the truth about this mess, right?
Has Mr. Fitzgerald shown any interest in this theory?
http://www.nationalreview.com/may/may200507150827.asp
Notwithstanding his memory defense, I gather that it is a given that Scooter lied to a grand jury and obstructed justice, which are serious crimes. Thus, the judge correctly ruled that Wilson's testimony would be irrelevant.
While the IIPA is not in play, there may have been the dissemination of classified information, a crime. However, Bush did say something about declassification in the Plame matter. This, perhaps, is the reason that Fitz is not charging Rove and others for the dissemination.
Miller's testimony is nothing more than gilding the lilly at this point.
Libby talked to several people about Wilson's wife.
This is hardly the same case as Clinton where he said/she said. This is a case of he said to 6 or more different people that all remember with different levels of certainty.
