TIME Outed Rove and Libby

Published on July 21, 2005 By COL Gene In Politics

The articles in Time this week have clarified a number of issues that have been bouncing around Joe User. The first issue is the status of Valerie Plame in the CIA. Many bloggers on Joe User have claimed she was not a covert CIA Agent. The CIA, in a very unusual action, confirmed that Valerie Plame was in fact an NOC covert agent. This is an agent who works undercover without the protection of any diplomatic immunity and are the agents in the most danger for themselves and the contacts that they develop in living their double life for the CIA. These agents are difficult to establish and are the type of agent that was intended to be protected under 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act. Unfortunately, this law was designed to be very difficult to violate and the one thing that the Time articles did not address is whether Rove or Libby met all the technical requirements that violated this particular statute.

The second issue that was clearly documented in the Time articles was the fact that it was Karl Rove that first identified Wilsonâ's wife as a CIA operative to Matt Cooper of Time magazine. It was not another reporter, it was Rove. In addition, Rove told Cooper Valerie was involved in the WMD which has also been confirmed by the CIA. In addition, Matt Cooper testified before the grand jury that Scooter Libby, the vice presidentâ's chief of staff, confirmed the fact that Wilsonâ's wife was a CIA operative working on WMD. It is now clear that the two White House staff members mentioned in the Bob Novak article which identified Valerie Plame as a CIA Agent were Rove and Libby.

These two individuals consistently lied saying that they were not involved with identifying Wilsonâ's wife as a CIA agent. It is likely that President Bush was unaware at the outset that Rove and Libby were the White House staffers that outed Plame given the fact that Bush said he would fire the persons responsible for identifying Plame as a CIA agent. No one knows exactly when Bush and Cheney learned it was their principal assistants that had loose lips but Bush has now changed the criteria to being convicted of a crime not merely violating the spirit of law which was to protect agents such as Valerie Plame.

Time magazine has done us a great service in identifying Rove and Libby as liars who endangered one of our CIA. Agents. In addition to the potential harm to Plame, there is the danger to people Valerie Plame worked with while she lived her secret life as a covert agent. That is why the CIA went to the Justice Department and a Special Prosecutor was appointed. It is also the reason that the FBI is conducting a major investigation of this matter. Only Patrick Fitzgerald, the Special Prosecutor will be able to determine whether Rove or Lobby actually violated the complex law intended to protect the identity of clandestine operatives in the CIA. There is no question that Rove and Libby are the people that violated at least the spirit of law and lied to the American people. It is time for President Bush to follow his original commitment to terminate Rove and Libby for their actions in identifying one of our covert CIA Agents.

Comments (Page 5)

Daiwa

on Jul 25, 2005

Rove told Cooper that Wilson's wife was a CIA Agent working on WMD

Show us the proof you have of this, Gene. Proof, now - not your assumptions & presumptions.

And I thank God you are no longer responsible for secret documents.

Cheers,
Daiwa

Island Dog

on Jul 25, 2005

That statement about Rove was last October. The info that is comming out every day about the Rove and Libby testimony and the statements of the reporters have expanded this to possible perjury and obstruction of justice. In addition there is an issue of a person with a security clearance revealing classified information.

Actually it hasn't col. You only read what you want to hear. Rove is not guilty of anything.

I have a very clear understanding of how secret and top secret the documents are handled. I was responsible for many many such documents as a nuclear weapons officer in the Army. Please don't tell me I don't know what I'm talking about concerning the handling of classified documents. I was personally responsible for top-secret top-secret crypto no foreign national, secret and confidential documents that filled an entire room.

You don't know what you're talking about. And i seriously doubt you were trusted with anything that didn't have a handle on it.

This is a big deal and I would suspect some people have done things that violated the laws of this country and for which they should be held accountable.

It's not a big deal col. This has to be the biggest non-story this year.

COL Gene

on Jul 26, 2005

Daiwa

First, I NEVER gave classified information to people that were not authorized that info includung members of the press. If Rove and others had handled this information properly, the way I did, we would not be having this conversation.

Proof ARE the statements of Cooper who testified before the GJ as reported in TIME . Also Cooper is not in jail for refusing to comply with the court about who told him about Mrs Plame.

I have a VERY good knowledge of classified procedures and do not give a *** what you think-- It is of NO value as it is predicated on BS! The CIA believes this is a BIG DEAL as does the FBI and Justice Dept. Compared with their opinion, your thoughts are worthless!!!!!!!!!

Island Dog

on Jul 26, 2005

Recent news reports and commentary have suggested that top White House adviser Karl Rove might be under investigation for perjury in the Plamegate affair. But sources familiar with the probe say the most frequently cited evidence for such speculation — an apparent inconsistency between Rove's and Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper's accounts of a July 11, 2003, telephone conversation — falls far short of being the basis for any prosecution, much less a perjury charge.

Two days ago, in a front-page story headlined "Testimony By Rove And Libby Examined; Leak Prosecutor Seeks Discrepancies," the Washington Post reported that Plamegate special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald "has been reviewing over the past several months discrepancies and gaps in witness testimony in his investigation of the unmasking of CIA operative Valerie Plame." One such discrepancy, the Post reported, involved vice-presidential chief of staff Lewis Libby. The other involved Rove:

Prosecutors have also probed Rove's testimony about his telephone conversation with Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper in the crucial days before Plame's name was revealed in a syndicated column by Robert D. Novak.

Rove has testified that he and Cooper talked about welfare reform foremost and turned to the topic of Plame only near the end, lawyers involved in the case said. But Cooper, writing about his testimony in the most recent issue of Time, said he "can't find any record of talking about" welfare reform. "I don't recall doing so," Cooper wrote.

The apparent discrepancy, first reported by Bloomberg News, is, according to the Post, evidence that Fitzgerald's investigation "has ranged beyond his original mission to determine if someone broke the law by knowingly revealing the identity of a covert operative." Another Post account, citing the Cooper-Rove discrepancy, quoted an informed source saying that Fitzgerald is now " looking at a coverup: perjury, obstruction of justice, false statements to an FBI agent.'"

But speculation that Rove's conversation with Cooper might somehow form the basis of a perjury charge has no basis, according to knowledgeable sources. There are two reasons. The first is that there is solid evidence to support Rove's version of events. The second is that, even if Rove's account were incorrect, a conflict in testimony about welfare reform is not material to the Plamegate case.

First the evidence. Two weeks ago, Rove lawyer Robert Luskin told NRO that Cooper called Rove on July 11, 2003, and that Cooper began the conversation by talking about welfare reform. After a brief talk about that issue, Luskin explained, Cooper then changed the subject to WMDs and the controversy surrounding former ambassador Joseph Wilson.

But when Cooper testified before the grand jury, he said he did not recall talking to Rove about welfare reform — "I can't find any record of talking about it with him on July 11," Cooper wrote in his Time account of his testimony, "and I don't recall doing so." That, plus Cooper's statement that he was questioned closely about the issue during his grand-jury testimony, led to the current speculation that Rove might have given a false account of the conversation before the grand jury.

But there is more to the story. Just moments after finishing his conversation with Cooper, Rove wrote a description of the talk in an e-mail to Stephen Hadley, who was then the deputy national-security adviser. The e-mail indicates that the two men did indeed begin their conversation with welfare reform. "Matt Cooper called to give me a heads-up that he's got a welfare reform story coming," Rove wrote in the e-mail, which was first reported by the Associated Press. "When he finished his brief heads-up he immediately launched into Niger..."

The e-mail appears to be solid, at-the-time evidence that the two men discussed welfare reform. "It appears that Rove's recollection of a conversation having been initiated about welfare reform is consistent with a contemporaneous e-mail he wrote to Hadley moments after he hung up the phone with Cooper," says a knowledgeable source.

In addition, in a less-quoted section of his article in Time, Cooper himself acknowledged that he might have inquired about welfare reform. Cooper wrote that after reviewing his e-mails from the days in question, "it seems as if I was, at the beginning of the week, hoping to publish an article in Time on lessons of the 1996 welfare-reform law." Cooper also wrote that, "I may have left a message with his office asking if I could talk to him about welfare reform." (The welfare story, Cooper wrote, was ultimately pushed aside by other news.)

It was not until Cooper went before the grand jury and was questioned at length about the welfare-reform issue — did he discuss it with Rove? — that Cooper got the idea that the topic might be important. The questioning, Cooper wrote, "suggested that Rove may have testified that we had talked about welfare reform." But Cooper had no memory of that being part of the conversation.

Hence the conflict. But it is a conflict, at least from what is publicly known, between an account — Rove's — that is supported by an e-mail written at the time, and an account — Cooper's — that is based on a lack of recollection, hedged by Cooper's concession that he had, in fact, been working on a welfare reform story. That is not, experts suggest, the stuff of perjury.

"Even if [Rove] didn't have that contemporaneous e-mail, it has to be about something material," says Victoria Toensing, a former federal prosecutor who also, as a Capitol Hill aide, helped draft the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. "Whether [Cooper] called [Rove] about welfare reform or the price of milk, it wasn't at the heart of what the testimony was about, which was Valerie Plame. It would never be considered material."

Rather, Toensing says, the difference between Rove's and Cooper's account of their conversation falls within the normal differences in recollection that often occur when two people are asked about the same event. And if such differences were the basis for a perjury prosecution, Toensing says, one might as well speculate that Matt Cooper could face such charges. Both scenarios, she suggests, are ridiculous. "Somebody remembers something as happening on Tuesday, and somebody remembers it happening on Wednesday. People differ in their memory. It's not perjury."

Link

drmiler

on Jul 26, 2005

I have a VERY good knowledge of classified procedures and do not give a *** what you think--

That's okay cause we don't give a rat's butt what "you" think either! Oh and btw.....

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann featured Joe Wilson in an "exclusive" live interview on Friday night's Countdown to plug Wilson's book, The Politics of Truth, "now in an updated paperback version." Though, as the Weekly Standard recalled last week, "the bipartisan Senate Select Committee on Intelligence thoroughly shredded Wilson's credibility," and the magazine contended that "almost every public pronouncement of Joe Wilson's from the spring of 2003 forward is either an exaggeration or a falsehood or both," Olbermann refused to question Wilson's undermined claims and instead treating him and his wife as maligned victims. Olbermann posed such questions as, "Do you have a sense, specifically a chain of events of what happened and who made it happen, who actually ruined your wife's usefulness in the war on terror?" And: "Do you and your wife, or either one of you, ultimately hold the President responsible for what happened here?" He followed up: "Is he [President Bush] responsible for the leak?" Olbermann wondered: "Have the two of you considered civil suits against anybody who might have been involved in the leak of your wife's name and work?"

I. Wilson denied that his Feb. 2002 mission to Niger to investigate reports of an Iraqi uranium deal was suggested by his wife, who worked in the CIA's counterproliferation division. In fact, according to the bipartisan findings of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Wilson's wife "offered up his name" at a staff meeting, then wrote a memo to her division's deputy chief saying her husband was the best man for the job.

II. Wilson insisted both that he had debunked reports of Iraqi interest in Niger's uranium and that Vice President Cheney, whose interest in the subject reputedly prompted Wilson's trip, had to have been informed of this. The Intelligence Committee found otherwise when it questioned Wilson under oath:

On at least two occasions [Wilson] admitted that he had no direct knowledge to support some of his claims....For example, when asked how he "knew" that the Intelligence Community had rejected the possibility of a Niger-Iraq uranium deal, as he wrote in his book, [Wilson] told Committee staff that his assertion may have involved "a little literary flair."

III. In the spring of 2003, after a purported "memorandum of agreement" between Iraq and Niger was shown to be a forgery, Wilson began to tell reporters, on background, that he'd known the documents were forgeries all along. But the Senate Intelligence Committee found that the CIA (and Wilson) had been unaware of the documents until eight months after his trip. Moreover, it found that "no one believed" Wilson's trip "added a great deal of new information to the Iraq-Niger uranium story." It found that "for most analysts, the former ambassador's report lent more credibility, not less, to the reported Niger-Iraq uranium deal."

IV. Wilson's confidence that Cheney knew about his trip served as the basis for his accusation, passed along uncritically by the New Republic, that it "was a flat-out lie" for President Bush to have accused Saddam Hussein of trying to obtain uranium in Niger. He told Meet the Press interviewer Andrea Mitchell, "The office of the vice president, I am absolutely convinced, received a very specific response to the question it asked and that response was based upon my trip out there."

The Intel Committee's findings: "Because CIA analysts did not believe that [Wilson's] report added any new information to clarify the issue...CIA's briefer did not brief the Vice President on the report, despite the Vice President's previous questions about the issue."

As Senate Intelligence Committee chairman Sen. Pat Roberts concluded in the "Additional Views" section of his report: "The former ambassador, either by design or through ignorance, gave the American people and, for that matter, the world a version of events that was inaccurate, unsubstantiated, and misleading."

So much for that ca-ca!

COL Gene

on Jul 27, 2005

This is not about Wilson. You are in the ca-ca. The issue is Rove and Libby providing the idendity of a CIA Agent to the press, Again, if this were not a serious issue, the CIA, FBI and Dept of Justice would not be investigating this matter!

drmiler

on Jul 27, 2005

So using "your" logic, since Rove is NOT the target of the investigation does that mean he's in the clear?

Daiwa

on Jul 27, 2005

Once again, Gene, you ignore anything you can't answer & just regurgitate the same shit over & over. You are a propagandist of the worst kind because you understand exactly what you are doing, by your own claims.

Cheers,
Daiwa

Island Dog

on Jul 27, 2005

The issue is Rove and Libby providing the idendity of a CIA Agent to the press, Again, if this were not a serious issue, the CIA, FBI and Dept of Justice would not be investigating this matter!

This "issue" is about someone leaking the name of this CIA employee. It was not Rove. I know your mind doesn't let you think about anything but "blame Bush", but Rove is the target here, except by the media.

COL Gene

on Jul 27, 2005

IslandDog

I will try this slowly. Cooper testified it was Rove that told him Mrs. Plame was a CIA Agent. The CIA was so concerned they went to the Justice Dept, and a SP was appointed and the FBI started a major investigation. Please tell me which of there words you do not understand?

Island Dog

on Jul 27, 2005

I will try this slowly. Cooper testified it was Rove that told him Mrs. Plame was a CIA Agent. The CIA was so concerned they went to the Justice Dept, and a SP was appointed and the FBI started a major investigation. Please tell me which of there words you do not understand?

Col, you have not listened to anything presented here to you, so don't try that with me. Rove told him Wilson's wife worked for the CIA. There is no crime there col. Why are people still sitting in jail if Rove is the "leak"? I have told you before these types of investigations are common in Washington. The only people making a big deal out of this is the Bush haters and their media allies. Other than that, it's a non-story.

Read this real slowly again col because you haven't responded to it yet. The prosecutor says Rove is not the target of the investigation. Do you understand this col?

COL Gene

on Jul 27, 2005

The prosecutor said that Rove was not a target of the investigation last October (2004). That was BEFORE much of the most current information, including the differences between Rove/Libby and the reporters testimony took place. There is another law that will not allow someone that knows information in classified and has a security clearence from releasing that information. Rove admitted to Cooper the information HE GAVE COOPER was classified and said it was to be declassified soon! Rove also has a security clearence. BINGO!!!

Investigations the size and scope of this inveatigation do NOT HAPPEN ALL THE TIME. This case, according to the CIA, is a SERIOUS violation. I will believe the CIA LONG before people on JoeUser!

drmiler

on Jul 27, 2005

WRONG ANSWER Klink! Read the date and cry in your beer! Try THIS year, NOT 2004!
WRONG ONCE AGAIN!

Wednesday, July 13, 2005 8:50 a.m. EDT
Prosecutor: Karl Rove Not Target of Probe

Plamegate special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald had told top White House advisor Karl Rove that he's not a target of his investigation into who leaked the identity of CIA analyst Valerie Plame to columnist Robert Novak.

And Fitzgerald has also asked the top Bush aide not to discuss the case in public.

Daiwa

on Jul 28, 2005

Rove admitted to Cooper the information HE GAVE COOPER was classified and said it was to be declassified soon! Rove also has a security clearence. BINGO!!!

Uh, BING-NO!!!, Gene. You might want to be a little more specific about what you are alleging here and where exactly the allegation came from. I suspect you are talking around the facts or using unconfirmed "leaks" again. I know I'm wasting my time, but just for the record.

Cheers,
Daiwa

Island Dog

on Jul 28, 2005

Investigations the size and scope of this inveatigation do NOT HAPPEN ALL THE TIME. This case, according to the CIA, is a SERIOUS violation. I will believe the CIA LONG before people on JoeUser!

This investigation is no bigger than any other. The only people who are blowing this up is liberals and their media allies col. Don't you understand that. Nobody cares about this.

WRONG ANSWER Klink! Read the date and cry in your beer! Try THIS year, NOT 2004!
WRONG ONCE AGAIN!

Will you finally admit you are wrong col?

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