If it looks like a coverup, and smells like a coverup... We will have to wait and see. But I would love to hear why certain e-mails weren't archived through the normal process.
There's no reason they shouldn't have been archived... after Iran-Contra, the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) established new regulations for both Federal and more specifically, Presidential Records, to include email systems. (I guess they and Congress didn't like the fact that NARA had to go through hundreds of hard disks extracted from WH computers during the I-C investigation... Ollie North anyone?) All email systems since Iran-Contra have to be examined and approved by NARA experts and comply with the regulations. The aim was to standardize the preservation of such records and make the regs simple, transparent, and applicable to all so they could not be abused by future administrations. Incidentally, one of the first things Bush did upon assuming the office was gut the Presidential Records ACt... passed after Watergate... via Executive Order.
That article is a good one lays out the precedent for looking into this. But I don't think we have a congress that is willing to stand up and take the long hard look we need at this. It might be better if Fitzgerald started calling folks and in and questioning them about it, and and going to straight to obstructing justice indictments, at the least, and possibly more if the evidence warrants it.
"A federal judge on Friday set former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby's trial date for January 2007, two months after the midterm congressional elections. Libby, who faces perjury and obstruction of justice charges, will go on trial Jan. 8, said U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton. Walton said he had hoped to start the trial in September but one of Libby's lawyers had a scheduling conflict that made an earlier date impossible." 'Scheduling conflict'. Nice. -- Josh Marshall
There's nothing at all unusual about trial dates being postponed because a lawyer has a scheduling conflict - e.g., another trial or arbitration during that period, or major personal reasons (getting married or something...etc).
I wish! No, Josh is probably one of the best writers in the bloggshpere today. An amazing writer. Here are his sites... http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/ http://www.tpmcafe.com/
More Allegations of Libby Lies Revealed Judge's Report Shows Cheney Aide Is Accused Of Broad Deception By Carol D. Leonnig Washington Post Staff Writer Saturday, February 4, 2006; A03 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/03/AR2006020302095_pf.html The special prosecutor in the CIA leak case alleged that Vice President Cheney's former chief of staff was engaged in a broader web of deception than was previously known and repeatedly lied to conceal that he had been a key source for reporters about undercover operative Valerie Plame, according to court records released yesterday. The records also show that by August 2004, early in his investigation of the disclosure of Plame's identity, Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald had concluded that he did not have much of a case against I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby for illegally leaking classified information. Instead, Fitzgerald was focused on charging Cheney's top aide with perjury and making false statements, and knew he needed to question reporters to prove it. The court records show that Libby denied to a grand jury that he ever mentioned Plame or her CIA job to then-White House press secretary Ari Fleischer or then-New York Times reporter Judith Miller in separate conversations he had with each of them in early July 2003. The records also suggest that Libby did not disclose to investigators that he first spoke to Miller about Plame in June 2003, and that prosecutors learned of the nature of the conversation only when Miller finally testified late in the fall of 2005. All three specific allegations are contained in previously redacted sections of a U.S. Court of Appeals opinion that were released yesterday. The opinion analyzed Fitzgerald's secret evidence to determine whether his case warranted ordering reporters to testify about their confidential conversations with sources. Fitzgerald revealed none of these specifics when he publicly announced Libby's indictment in October on charges of making false statements, perjury and obstruction of justice. The once-sealed portions of the federal court opinion were written in February 2005 by U.S. Circuit Judge David S. Tatel, who was a member of a three-judge panel that agreed with Fitzgerald that the testimony of two reporters, Miller and Time magazine's Matthew Cooper, was crucial to his investigation. Yesterday, the same panel concluded that because Libby was indicted and now faced public charges, the court no longer had to keep secret many of the details of the grand jury investigation that Tatel analyzed. Dow Jones Inc., parent company of the Wall Street Journal, had petitioned the court to release the eight-page Tatel opinion. Three of the pages were redacted. Attorneys for Libby and Fleischer and a spokesman for Fitzgerald declined to comment yesterday. Since January 2004, Fitzgerald has been investigating whether senior Bush administration officials knowingly leaked Plame's identity to discredit allegations made by her husband, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV. Plame's name and her CIA role were first mentioned publicly in a column by syndicated columnist Robert D. Novak on July 14, 2003, eight days after Wilson publicly accused the administration of twisting intelligence to justify a war with Iraq. According to Tatel's summary of the evidence that Fitzgerald presented in the court's chambers in August 2004, the prosecutor had at least a good circumstantial case on perjury but charging Libby with intentionally leaking classified information was "currently off the table," though it could be "viable" if he gained new evidence. Tatel wrote that interviewing Miller would be crucial to making that decision, because Libby might have mentioned to her that he knew Plame's status was covert. He concluded that simply lying about a national security matter was serious enough to warrant ordering the reporters to testify about their conversations with Libby. "While it is true that on the current record the special counsel's strongest charges are for perjury and false statements rather than security-related crimes ... perjury in this context is itself a crime with national security implications," he wrote. The information gives a fuller picture of the case that Fitzgerald will likely put on against Libby. Yesterday, a federal judge scheduled his trial to start on Jan. 8, 2007. In public remarks about the indictment, Fitzgerald has accused Libby of lying when he said that he believed he first learned of Plame from NBC reporter Tim Russert and passed along that information strictly as unverified gossip to Miller and Cooper. Tatel's opinion also includes previously unknown details about testimony by Libby and other officials. For example, Libby acknowledged to investigators that Cheney told him in mid-June 2003 about Plame's CIA role and said she helped send her husband on a mission to Niger to determine whether Iraq was seeking nuclear material from the African nation. That was soon after a Washington Post article on Wilson's Niger trip appeared. Libby emphasized in his testimony that Cheney only said it "in an off sort of curiosity sort of fashion." Fitzgerald also contended that Libby lied to the grand jury when he said he never mentioned Plame or her CIA job to Fleischer when they had lunch on July 7. Fleischer recalled before the grand jury that Libby did mention Plame and said she worked in the "counterproliferation area of the CIA." Fleischer said Libby stressed that "the vice president did not send Ambassador Wilson to Niger . . . the CIA sent Ambassador Wilson to Niger . . . he was sent by his wife." Fleischer added that he thought the lunch was "kind of weird" because the normally "closed-lip" Libby was sharing confidences and remarking that the information was "hush-hush" and "on the q.t." Libby was also asked about two July conversations he had with Miller. He said he never mentioned Wilson's wife to Miller in the first conversation but passed along some information another reporter told him about Plame in the second, according to the documents. Miller testified last year, however, that she thought Libby was the first government official to mention Wilson's wife to her and that he did so in three conversations: on June 23, when she visited his office in the Executive Office Building, and on July 8 and 12.
The CIA Leak: Plame Was Still Covert Newsweek Feb. 13, 2006 issue - Newly released court papers could put holes in the defense of Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby, in the Valerie Plame leak case. Lawyers for Libby, and White House allies, have repeatedly questioned whether Plame, the wife of White House critic Joe Wilson, really had covert status when she was outed to the media in July 2003. But special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald found that Plame had indeed done "covert work overseas" on counterproliferation matters in the past five years, and the CIA "was making specific efforts to conceal" her identity, according to newly released portions of a judge's opinion. (A CIA spokesman at the time is quoted as saying Plame was "unlikely" to take further trips overseas, though.) Fitzgerald concluded he could not charge Libby for violating a 1982 law banning the outing of a covert CIA agent; apparently he lacked proof Libby was aware of her covert status when he talked about her three times with New York Times reporter Judith Miller. Fitzgerald did consider charging Libby with violating the so-called Espionage Act, which prohibits the disclosure of "national defense information," the papers show; he ended up indicting Libby for lying about when and from whom he learned about Plame. The new papers show Libby testified he was told about Plame by Cheney "in an off sort of curiosity sort of fashion" in mid-June—before he talked about her with Miller and Time magazine's Matt Cooper. Libby's trial has been put off until January 2007, keeping Cheney off the witness stand until after the elections. A spokeswoman for Libby's lawyers declined to comment on Plame's status. —Michael Isikoff © 2006 Newsweek, Inc. © 2006 MSNBC.com URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11179719/site/newsweek/
I would love to hear basso's take on this. For almost as long as this has been a scandal, it has been basso's belief that it was quite possible that Plame wasn't really covert anymore, and that she didn't meet the requirements as laid out by that 1983 law. Now that there are documents stating contrary, I wonder if anyone changes their mind on the seriousness of this offense?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060210...cELqkMGw_IE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3MXN1bHE0BHNlYwN0bWE- Libby: White House 'Superiors' OK'd Leaks By TONI LOCY, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 12 minutes ago A former top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney told a federal grand jury that his superiors authorized him to give secret information to reporters as part of the Bush administration's defense of intelligence used to justify invading Iraq, according to court papers. Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald said in documents filed last month that he plans to introduce evidence that I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Cheney's former chief of staff, disclosed to reporters the contents of a classified National Intelligence Estimate in the summer of 2003. The NIE is a report prepared by the head of the nation's intelligence operations for high-level government officials, up to and including the president. Portions of NIEs are sometimes declassified and made public. It is unclear whether that happened in this instance. In a Jan. 23 letter to Libby's lawyers, Fitzgerald said Libby also testified before the grand jury that he caused at least one other government official to discuss an intelligence estimate with reporters in July 2003. "We also note that it is our understanding that Mr. Libby testified that he was authorized to disclose information about the NIE to the press by his superiors," Fitzgerald wrote. White House spokesman Scott McClellan refused to comment. "Our policy is that we are not going to discuss this when it's an ongoing legal proceeding," he said. William Jeffress, Libby's lawyer, said, "There is no truth at all" to suggestions that Libby would try to shift blame to his superiors as a defense against the charges. Libby, 55, was indicted late last year on charges that he lied to FBI agents and the grand jury about how he learned CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity and when he subsequently told reporters. He is not charged with leaking classified information from an intelligence estimate report. Plame's identity was published in July 2003 by columnist Robert Novak after her husband, former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, accused the administration of twisting intelligence about Iraq's efforts to buy uranium in Niger. The year before, the CIA had sent Wilson to Niger to determine the accuracy of the uranium reports. Wilson's revelations cast doubt on President Bush's claim in his 2003 State of the Union address that Niger had sold uranium to Iraq to develop a nuclear weapon as one of the administration's key justifications for going to war in Iraq. On Thursday, Sen. Edward Kennedy (news, bio, voting record), D-Mass., said Cheney should take responsibility if he authorized Libby to share classified information with reporters. "These charges, if true, represent a new low in the already sordid case of partisan interests being placed above national security," Kennedy said. "The vice president's vindictiveness in defending the misguided war in Iraq is obvious. If he used classified information to defend it, he should be prepared to take full responsibility." In the summer of 2003, White House officials — including Libby — were frustrated that the media were incorrectly reporting that Cheney had sent Wilson to Niger and had received a report of his findings in Africa before the war in Iraq had begun. In an effort to counter those reports, Libby and other White House officials sought information from the CIA regarding Wilson and how his trip to Niger came about, according to court records. Fitzgerald, in his letter to Libby's lawyers, said he plans to use Libby's grand jury testimony to support evidence pertaining to the White House aide's meeting with former New York Times reporter Judith Miller. During the meeting with Miller on July 8, Libby also discussed Plame, Fitzgerald said. "Our anticipated basis for offering such evidence is that such facts are inextricably intertwined with the narrative of the events of spring 2003, as Libby's testimony itself makes plain," the prosecutor wrote. Miller spent 85 days in jail for refusing to discuss her source.
Have all those who previously defended Bush, Cheney, Rove and Libby on the Plame scandal all changed their minds? Do those that defended him have nothing to say? I'm asking because I am curious to know how the group that believed it wasn't serious to begin with, feels now. I can't find anyone who thinks that it is ok to speak up. Even the talking heads on conservative TV and radio aren't talking about it.
I put this in the Dick leaking thread, but it can go here just as well... 23 Administration Officials Involved In Plame Leak The cast of administration characters with connections to the outing of an undercover CIA agent: Karl Rove I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby Condoleezza Rice Stephen Hadley Andrew Card Alberto Gonzales Mary Matalin Ari Fleischer Susan Ralston Israel Hernandez John Hannah Scott McClellan Dan Bartlett Claire Buchan Catherine Martin Jennifer Millerwise David Wurmser Colin Powell Karen Hughes Adam Levine Bob Joseph Vice President Dick Cheney President George W. Bush You can read how each is invovled here... http://www.thinkprogress.org/leak-scandal
And remember This accusation isn't coming from partisan Democrats or fringe conspiracy theorists; this is coming from the special prosecutor. It just goes to show how far the administration was willing to go to cover their lies about the lead up to war. They were willing to compromise national security by leaking highly classified information in order to cover their ass.
