Bush* Aides Testify in Leak Probe (McClellan & Matalin)

[kskiska]

Grand Jury Called McClellan, Matalin

By Mike Allen and Susan Schmidt
Tuesday, February 10, 2004; Page A01

A federal grand jury has questioned one current and one former aide to President Bush, and investigators have interviewed six others in an effort to discover who revealed the name of an undercover CIA officer to a newspaper columnist, sources involved in the case said yesterday.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan said yesterday that he talked to the grand jury last week. Mary Matalin, former counselor to Vice President Cheney, testified Jan. 23, the sources said. Neither is suspected by prosecutors of having exposed undercover CIA officer Valerie Plame, but both were questioned about White House public relations strategy, the sources said.

(snip)

Officials interviewed by the FBI include Karl Rove, Bush's senior adviser; McClellan; Matalin; White House communications director Dan Bartlett; former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer; Adam Levine, a former White House press official; I. Lewis Libby, Cheney's chief of staff; and Cathie Martin, a Cheney aide, according to the sources.

more…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A26979-2004Feb9.html

[demgrrrll]

1. What a rogue's gallery! Indictments are just around the corner.

What I wouldn't give to be a fly on the wall.

[leesa]

2. Will Mary go down for her hero?? Stay tuned.

[AZCat]

3. Matalin, huh?

I wonder if Carville will have anything to say about this tomorrow.

[Snazzy]

4. Ari on-deck?

My first prediction was that it was Ari, or he was involved.

If I recall correctly, he split WH just when this happened--which had a plausible deniability/going away present feel to it.

[AZCat]

5. Yep, check this thread for the Ari discussion

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=354776

[Snazzy]

7. most cool DU is on the case

My take: Ari leaving allowed Novak and maybe others to lamely say that no-one in the WH released Plame's name, if it was in fact Ari (or Ari in some circumstances).

How we ended up with the leaker in OEOB/Cheney--at least that was the story at some point.

[AZCat]

8. I agree with your take- it seems right on the money

I don't know why the focus is now on Cheney's underlings, but I'm not part of the investigation and don't know what they do.

I'm pretty sure that the media wouldn't hear about this unless there was something serious going on- the WH control is too tight to let gossip slip by the controllers.

[Stephanie]

9. Maybe a sideways connection?

Cheney is running the admin. Cheney is 'president in all but name' ("PIABP"). Cheney is PNAC. Cheney pushes through the Iraq war on false pretenses, at the urging of his neo-con pals.

Wilson outs Cheney in the NYT on Iraq/Niger lies.

Cheney is pissed. His subs coordinate attack on Wilson via his wife.

Wouldn't they have alerted Ari as to the line of attack? So that he would be prepared to defend their position?

Ari might be, therefore, complicit, but not the architect.

Make sense?

[Snazzy]

6. same day

Original Novak column 7/14:
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/robertnovak/printrn20030714.shtml

Ari's last day, 7/14 (~24 mentions of "Niger" in the gaggle):
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/07/20030714-4.html

[Trajan]

10. From this same report ...

"A parallel FBI investigation into the apparent forgery of documents suggesting that Iraq attempted to buy yellowcake uranium from Niger is "at a critical stage," according to a senior law enforcement official who declined to elaborate. That probe, conducted by FBI counterintelligence agents, was launched last spring after U.N. officials pronounced the documents crude forgeries."

-snip-

So: .... The FBI IS investigating the 'production' of the Niger letter .... I had no idea .... This, I presume, will point to Shulsky and the OSP ...

[leftchick]

11. and to a certain....

Mr. Chalabi.....

[DoYouEverWonder]

12. So a high level WH staffer testifies to a grand jury

last week and we are just finding this out now. Remember the media frenzy when Monica testified before a grand jury? Where were the lights, cameras, action, now? Too busy replaying Janet's tit?

[JNelson6563]

13. one lies the other attests to it

I hope they were wired to lie detectors otherwise it's useless. These people don't knwo the meaning of truth.

Julie