Newsweek: The CIA Leak: Boring In on the Veep

[UpInArms]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16960657/site/newsweek/

Feb. 12, 2007 issue - The Scooter Libby trial has put a new focus on Vice President Dick Cheney's own role in the leak of CIA officer Valerie Plame Wilson's identity. When the CIA on July 11, 2003, sent over a draft statement taking responsibility for President George W. Bush's inaccurate assertion that Iraq had sought uranium from Africa, Cheney wrote on the cover sheet "Unsatisfactory" and underlined the word, according to a trial document. The veep thought the agency wasn't going far enough in distancing Cheney's office from the trip by Joseph Wilson (in which the ex-ambassador claimed he'd debunked the uranium shopping reports). "The vice president was frustrated and upset," Libby told the FBI, according to Deborah Bond, an FBI agent who later questioned Libby on the leak.

The next day, aboard Air Force Two, Libby and Cheney talked media strategy, Bond said. "There was some discussion ... about whether they should report to the press that Ambassador Wilson's wife worked at the CIA," Bond testified that Libby told her. Bond added that Libby said "they may have talked about it." This is the first suggestion that Cheney himself talked about disclosing Wilson's wife's identity to the press as a way of undercutting Wilson's credibility.

...more...

and here's the Whoreshington Post:

Vice President's Shadow Hangs Over Trial

Vice President Cheney's press officer, Cathie Martin, approached his chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, on Air Force Two on July 12, 2003, to ask how she should respond to journalists' questions about Joseph C. Wilson IV. Libby looked over one of the reporters' questions and told Martin: "Well, let me go talk to the boss and I'll be back."

On Libby's return, Martin testified in federal court last week, he brought a card with detailed replies dictated by Cheney, including a highly partisan, incomplete summary of Wilson's investigation into Iraq's suspected weapons of mass destruction program.

Libby subsequently called a reporter, read him the statement, and said -- according to the reporter -- he had "heard" that Wilson's investigation was instigated by his wife, an employee at the CIA, later identified as Valerie Plame. The reporter, Matthew Cooper of Time magazine, was one of five people with whom Libby discussed Plame's CIA status during those critical weeks that summer.

After seven days of such courtroom testimony, the unanswered question hanging over Libby's trial is, did the vice president's former chief of staff decide to leak that disparaging information on his own?

...more...

[rodeodance]

1. closing in............dah! I want to HAPPEN--------so so so much.

[aquart]

7. I know. I know.

[Massachusetts]

2. Say good night Dick!

[Danascot]

23. Ha ha

Thanks! I wonder how many here picked up on your cultural reference from long ago.

[54anickel]

25. Maybe we could send him the Flying Fickle Finger of Fate award as a parting gift. n/t

[Danascot]

29. You know,

I think Darth may be seeing the Flying Fickle Finger of Fate approaching at warp speed!

[caledesi]

30. I did (old fart). lst laugh of the day. nt

[Barrett808]

3. Mary Matalin: Wilson "a snake"

From the WaPo piece:

While Cheney and Libby have asserted that their sole intent in contacting journalists was to defend the credibility of their policy, prosecutors disclosed new evidence on Wednesday that the administration was focusing on Wilson himself. Cheney's then-communications director, Mary Matalin, advised Libby in a phone call July 10, prosecutor Peter Zeidenberg said.

Matalin, according to notes Libby made of the conversation, called Wilson "a snake" and warned that his "story has legs," Zeidenberg said. She laid out a plan: "We need to address the Wilson motivation. We need to be able to get the cable out. Declassified. The president should wave his wand."

[Mich Otter]

4. Consider this....

If Dick Cheney resigns as VP, Bush and the Republicans will gang up and pass the blame for every stupid and criminal decision they have made onto the departed VP. Cheney will become the whipping boy for all their crimes and terrible decisions.
I think I will pop up a huge bag of popcorn so we can all just sit back and watch to see how this plays out.
Every Progressive/Liberal/Socialist/Democrat needs to keep reminding those who will listen, all of the Republicans are supporters of the crimes and misdeeds of the Bush administration and the Republicans in office. Don't let anyone tell you, "It was all Cheney's fault, he was the bad influence".

[Whoa_Nelly]

5. The way I see all this re: the lies to start this horrendous war

~Cheney didn't like what Wilson had reported.

~Cheney undermined Wilson and set in motion exposing Plame, along with the rumors that she was responsible for sending Wilson there in order to undermine the Bush Wannabe-Totalitarian/PNAC-initiated Regime.

~Scooter, in his paid sychophant position, played along and set in motion more obfuscation by lying from the outset about how he "learned" of Plame's identity.

~Cheney got what he wanted in the short run, and Bush used the BS uranium 16 words in his 2003 SOTU to further the already initiated PNAC plans.

~Now, as has been suspected all along, Cheney is responsible, which makes Bush ultimately responsible for this whole mess.

When the hell will these anti-US Constitionalists be called on their game and be named for the war/terrorist criminals they really are?? :mad:

[LiberalFighter]

9. Bush is the Decider

[Whoa_Nelly]

16. Impeach The Decider!

[goforit]

20. Arrest the Decider and the Decider's Decider(cheney) .....Treasonists!!!!

[coalition_unwilling]

34. More to the point, if Cheney's office was behind the actual

forgeries themselves, i.e., the forgeries that purported to show Iraqi attempts to purchase yellowcake from Niger, then bingo you have an ipso facto case for criminal prosecution for fraud against the United States.

[tabasco]

6. If there is justice in this world, Cheney gets locked up for the rest of his miserable life.

I am waiting to see if good people can put this criminal traitor behind bars or if the pernicious power of the super-rich will get him off the hook..

[LiberalFighter]

10. And a prison far away from Wyoming, Texas and DC

Some prison that would not be environmentally comfortable.

[tabasco]

13. Cheney at the height of his arrogance told Senator Leahy to "Go fuck yourself" on the Senate floor.

Maybe Leahy can visit Chicken Dick in prison and see how that worked out for him.

[LiberalFighter]

14. American citizens wouldn't be lucky enough for Cheney to be sent to a prison

where he might benefit from a reaming.

Best to hope for would be Cheney to lose any 1 for 1 reduction in time if he violates prison infractions.

[aggiesal]

21. Pardon

[caledesi]

31. No pardon because this will bring attention to * and this will not

be a good thing. You think * cares about Libby...thnk again.

[aggiesal]

33. I understnad what you're stating, but I don't think King George will care. ...

He'll do it on Jan 19th 2009, at 11:55pm. When
nobody cares, or is looking.

I believe he'll pardon Cheney in a heartbeat.

[LiberalFighter]

8. Which is worse?

Spiro Agnew charged with tax evasion?
Dick Cheney conspiring to start a war, concealing evidence of conspiracy to commit a crime and revealing classified material? (Is that the extent and correct charge for him?)

[Joe Bacon]

12. What's worse? Jeb appointed to replace THE DICK

That is what's WORSE!

Right now, I would bet the farm that Jeb Bush is doing everything in his power to take over the Presidency. If a deadlocked GOP convention doesn't deliver the Presidency to him, this will.

[yellowcanine]

17. Nope. Majority vote in BOTH houses needed to confirm appointed VP.

No way does Jebbie get that in a Dem House and Senate. Bush messed up. He should have gotten Chaney to resign before the election.

[roamer65]

28. Yuppers. * would have to appoint a very moderate Rethug...

OR actually, I think he would appoint Lieberworm. * and Lieberworm are both neo-cons.

[Danascot]

24. A blow job?

[coalition_unwilling]

35. Possibility that Cheney's office was behind the original forgeries themselves,

which spells out fraud against the United States.

[sakabatou]

11. The dominos are falling again.

[Eurobabe]

15. Desperate men do desperate things

Watch a new war coming soon to your teevee screen. Bush wants a TWOFER distraction, let's hit Iran AND Syria!

Was Iraq shock and awe? You motherfuckers ain't seen nothin' yet!

[HuffleClaw]

18. could they be delaying the iran gambit simply because of THIS?

ok sure, it'll change what headlines appear in the papers but it won't save cheney from prosecution.

[Texifornia]

19. Lock up the guns, Lynn! (n/t)

n/t

[goforit]

22. Will Cheney show up to the trial my friends? I think not!

[Rosa Luxemburg]

26. What will Dr Evil cook up before he testifies?

[AndyTiedye]

27. Never Mind Scooter, GO FOR THE SHOOTER!

[0007]

32. This is the kind of news that makes me believe in America

again.

I'm pumped up!!

[skip fox]

36. Who goes first? Cheney or Rove???

Because Rove probably directed it all.