Sunday, January 01, 2006
What I Didn't Find in Africa
By JOSEPH C. WILSON 4th
WASHINGTON -- Did the Bush administration manipulate intelligence about Saddam Hussein's weapons programs to justify an invasion of Iraq?
Based on my experience with the administration in the months leading up to the war, I have little choice but to conclude that some of the intelligence related to Iraq's nuclear weapons program was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat.
For 23 years, from 1976 to 1998, I was a career foreign service officer and ambassador. In 1990, as chargé d'affaires in Baghdad, I was the last American diplomat to meet with Saddam Hussein. (I was also a forceful advocate for his removal from Kuwait.) After Iraq, I was President George H. W. Bush's ambassador to Gabon and São Tomé and Príncipe; under President Bill Clinton, I helped direct Africa policy for the National Security Council.
It was my experience in Africa that led me to play a small role in the effort to verify information about Africa's suspected link to Iraq's nonconventional weapons programs. Those news stories about that unnamed former envoy who went to Niger? That's me.
In February 2002, I was informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency that Vice President Dick Cheney's office had questions about a particular intelligence report. While I never saw the report, I was told that it referred to a memorandum of agreement that documented the sale of uranium yellowcake — a form of lightly processed ore — by Niger to Iraq in the late 1990's. The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president's office.
After consulting with the State Department's African Affairs Bureau (and through it with Barbro Owens-Kirkpatrick, the United States ambassador to Niger), I agreed to make the trip. The mission I undertook was discreet but by no means secret. While the C.I.A. paid my expenses (my time was offered pro bono), I made it abundantly clear to everyone I met that I was acting on behalf of the United States government.
In late February 2002, I arrived in Niger's capital, Niamey, where I had been a diplomat in the mid-70's and visited as a National Security Council official in the late 90's. The city was much as I remembered it. Seasonal winds had clogged the air with dust and sand. Through the haze, I could see camel caravans crossing the Niger River (over the John F. Kennedy bridge), the setting sun behind them. Most people had wrapped scarves around their faces to protect against the grit, leaving only their eyes visible.
The next morning, I met with Ambassador Owens-Kirkpatrick at the embassy. For reasons that are understandable, the embassy staff has always kept a close eye on Niger's uranium business. I was not surprised, then, when the ambassador told me that she knew about the allegations of uranium sales to Iraq — and that she felt she had already debunked them in her reports to Washington. Nevertheless, she and I agreed that my time would be best spent interviewing people who had been in government when the deal supposedly took place, which was before her arrival.
I spent the next eight days drinking sweet mint tea and meeting with dozens of people: current government officials, former government officials, people associated with the country's uranium business. It did not take long to conclude that it was highly doubtful that any such transaction had ever taken place.
Given the structure of the consortiums that operated the mines, it would be exceedingly difficult for Niger to transfer uranium to Iraq. Niger's uranium business consists of two mines, Somair and Cominak, which are run by French, Spanish, Japanese, German and Nigerian interests. If the government wanted to remove uranium from a mine, it would have to notify the consortium, which in turn is strictly monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Moreover, because the two mines are closely regulated, quasi-governmental entities, selling uranium would require the approval of the minister of mines, the prime minister and probably the president. In short, there's simply too much oversight over too small an industry for a sale to have transpired.
(As for the actual memorandum, I never saw it. But news accounts have pointed out that the documents had glaring errors — they were signed, for example, by officials who were no longer in government — and were probably forged. And then there's the fact that Niger formally denied the charges.)
Before I left Niger, I briefed the ambassador on my findings, which were consistent with her own. I also shared my conclusions with members of her staff. In early March, I arrived in Washington and promptly provided a detailed briefing to the C.I.A. I later shared my conclusions with the State Department African Affairs Bureau. There was nothing secret or earth-shattering in my report, just as there was nothing secret about my trip.
Though I did not file a written report, there should be at least four documents in United States government archives confirming my mission. The documents should include the ambassador's report of my debriefing in Niamey, a separate report written by the embassy staff, a C.I.A. report summing up my trip, and a specific answer from the agency to the office of the vice president (this may have been delivered orally). While I have not seen any of these reports, I have spent enough time in government to know that this is standard operating procedure.
I thought the Niger matter was settled and went back to my life. (I did take part in the Iraq debate, arguing that a strict containment regime backed by the threat of force was preferable to an invasion.) In September 2002, however, Niger re-emerged. The British government published a "white paper" asserting that Saddam Hussein and his unconventional arms posed an immediate danger. As evidence, the report cited Iraq's attempts to purchase uranium from an African country.
Then, in January, President Bush, citing the British dossier, repeated the charges about Iraqi efforts to buy uranium from Africa.
The next day, I reminded a friend at the State Department of my trip and suggested that if the president had been referring to Niger, then his conclusion was not borne out by the facts as I understood them. He replied that perhaps the president was speaking about one of the other three African countries that produce uranium: Gabon, South Africa or Namibia. At the time, I accepted the explanation. I didn't know that in December, a month before the president's address, the State Department had published a fact sheet that mentioned the Niger case.Those are the facts surrounding my efforts.
The vice president's office asked a serious question. I was asked to help formulate the answer. I did so, and I have every confidence that the answer I provided was circulated to the appropriate officials within our government.
The question now is how that answer was or was not used by our political leadership. If my information was deemed inaccurate, I understand (though I would be very interested to know why). If, however, the information was ignored because it did not fit certain preconceptions about Iraq, then a legitimate argument can be made that we went to war under false pretenses. (It's worth remembering that in his March "Meet the Press" appearance, Mr. Cheney said that Saddam Hussein was "trying once again to produce nuclear weapons.") At a minimum, Congress, which authorized the use of military force at the president's behest, should want to know if the assertions about Iraq were warranted.
I was convinced before the war that the threat of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of Saddam Hussein required a vigorous and sustained international response to disarm him. Iraq possessed and had used chemical weapons; it had an active biological weapons program and quite possibly a nuclear research program — all of which were in violation of United Nations resolutions. Having encountered Mr. Hussein and his thugs in the run-up to the Persian Gulf war of 1991, I was only too aware of the dangers he posed.
But were these dangers the same ones the administration told us about? We have to find out. America's foreign policy depends on the sanctity of its information. For this reason, questioning the selective use of intelligence to justify the war in Iraq is neither idle sniping nor "revisionist history," as Mr. Bush has suggested. The act of war is the last option of a democracy, taken when there is a grave threat to our national security. More than 200 American soldiers have lost their lives in Iraq already. We have a duty to ensure that their sacrifice came for the right reasons.
Joseph C. Wilson 4th, United States ambassador to Gabon from 1992 to 1995, is an international business consultant.
WASHINGTON -- Did the Bush administration manipulate intelligence about Saddam Hussein's weapons programs to justify an invasion of Iraq?
Based on my experience with the administration in the months leading up to the war, I have little choice but to conclude that some of the intelligence related to Iraq's nuclear weapons program was twisted to exaggerate the Iraqi threat.
For 23 years, from 1976 to 1998, I was a career foreign service officer and ambassador. In 1990, as chargé d'affaires in Baghdad, I was the last American diplomat to meet with Saddam Hussein. (I was also a forceful advocate for his removal from Kuwait.) After Iraq, I was President George H. W. Bush's ambassador to Gabon and São Tomé and Príncipe; under President Bill Clinton, I helped direct Africa policy for the National Security Council.
It was my experience in Africa that led me to play a small role in the effort to verify information about Africa's suspected link to Iraq's nonconventional weapons programs. Those news stories about that unnamed former envoy who went to Niger? That's me.
In February 2002, I was informed by officials at the Central Intelligence Agency that Vice President Dick Cheney's office had questions about a particular intelligence report. While I never saw the report, I was told that it referred to a memorandum of agreement that documented the sale of uranium yellowcake — a form of lightly processed ore — by Niger to Iraq in the late 1990's. The agency officials asked if I would travel to Niger to check out the story so they could provide a response to the vice president's office.
After consulting with the State Department's African Affairs Bureau (and through it with Barbro Owens-Kirkpatrick, the United States ambassador to Niger), I agreed to make the trip. The mission I undertook was discreet but by no means secret. While the C.I.A. paid my expenses (my time was offered pro bono), I made it abundantly clear to everyone I met that I was acting on behalf of the United States government.
In late February 2002, I arrived in Niger's capital, Niamey, where I had been a diplomat in the mid-70's and visited as a National Security Council official in the late 90's. The city was much as I remembered it. Seasonal winds had clogged the air with dust and sand. Through the haze, I could see camel caravans crossing the Niger River (over the John F. Kennedy bridge), the setting sun behind them. Most people had wrapped scarves around their faces to protect against the grit, leaving only their eyes visible.
The next morning, I met with Ambassador Owens-Kirkpatrick at the embassy. For reasons that are understandable, the embassy staff has always kept a close eye on Niger's uranium business. I was not surprised, then, when the ambassador told me that she knew about the allegations of uranium sales to Iraq — and that she felt she had already debunked them in her reports to Washington. Nevertheless, she and I agreed that my time would be best spent interviewing people who had been in government when the deal supposedly took place, which was before her arrival.
I spent the next eight days drinking sweet mint tea and meeting with dozens of people: current government officials, former government officials, people associated with the country's uranium business. It did not take long to conclude that it was highly doubtful that any such transaction had ever taken place.
Given the structure of the consortiums that operated the mines, it would be exceedingly difficult for Niger to transfer uranium to Iraq. Niger's uranium business consists of two mines, Somair and Cominak, which are run by French, Spanish, Japanese, German and Nigerian interests. If the government wanted to remove uranium from a mine, it would have to notify the consortium, which in turn is strictly monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Moreover, because the two mines are closely regulated, quasi-governmental entities, selling uranium would require the approval of the minister of mines, the prime minister and probably the president. In short, there's simply too much oversight over too small an industry for a sale to have transpired.
(As for the actual memorandum, I never saw it. But news accounts have pointed out that the documents had glaring errors — they were signed, for example, by officials who were no longer in government — and were probably forged. And then there's the fact that Niger formally denied the charges.)
Before I left Niger, I briefed the ambassador on my findings, which were consistent with her own. I also shared my conclusions with members of her staff. In early March, I arrived in Washington and promptly provided a detailed briefing to the C.I.A. I later shared my conclusions with the State Department African Affairs Bureau. There was nothing secret or earth-shattering in my report, just as there was nothing secret about my trip.
Though I did not file a written report, there should be at least four documents in United States government archives confirming my mission. The documents should include the ambassador's report of my debriefing in Niamey, a separate report written by the embassy staff, a C.I.A. report summing up my trip, and a specific answer from the agency to the office of the vice president (this may have been delivered orally). While I have not seen any of these reports, I have spent enough time in government to know that this is standard operating procedure.
I thought the Niger matter was settled and went back to my life. (I did take part in the Iraq debate, arguing that a strict containment regime backed by the threat of force was preferable to an invasion.) In September 2002, however, Niger re-emerged. The British government published a "white paper" asserting that Saddam Hussein and his unconventional arms posed an immediate danger. As evidence, the report cited Iraq's attempts to purchase uranium from an African country.
Then, in January, President Bush, citing the British dossier, repeated the charges about Iraqi efforts to buy uranium from Africa.
The next day, I reminded a friend at the State Department of my trip and suggested that if the president had been referring to Niger, then his conclusion was not borne out by the facts as I understood them. He replied that perhaps the president was speaking about one of the other three African countries that produce uranium: Gabon, South Africa or Namibia. At the time, I accepted the explanation. I didn't know that in December, a month before the president's address, the State Department had published a fact sheet that mentioned the Niger case.Those are the facts surrounding my efforts.
The vice president's office asked a serious question. I was asked to help formulate the answer. I did so, and I have every confidence that the answer I provided was circulated to the appropriate officials within our government.
The question now is how that answer was or was not used by our political leadership. If my information was deemed inaccurate, I understand (though I would be very interested to know why). If, however, the information was ignored because it did not fit certain preconceptions about Iraq, then a legitimate argument can be made that we went to war under false pretenses. (It's worth remembering that in his March "Meet the Press" appearance, Mr. Cheney said that Saddam Hussein was "trying once again to produce nuclear weapons.") At a minimum, Congress, which authorized the use of military force at the president's behest, should want to know if the assertions about Iraq were warranted.
I was convinced before the war that the threat of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of Saddam Hussein required a vigorous and sustained international response to disarm him. Iraq possessed and had used chemical weapons; it had an active biological weapons program and quite possibly a nuclear research program — all of which were in violation of United Nations resolutions. Having encountered Mr. Hussein and his thugs in the run-up to the Persian Gulf war of 1991, I was only too aware of the dangers he posed.
But were these dangers the same ones the administration told us about? We have to find out. America's foreign policy depends on the sanctity of its information. For this reason, questioning the selective use of intelligence to justify the war in Iraq is neither idle sniping nor "revisionist history," as Mr. Bush has suggested. The act of war is the last option of a democracy, taken when there is a grave threat to our national security. More than 200 American soldiers have lost their lives in Iraq already. We have a duty to ensure that their sacrifice came for the right reasons.
Joseph C. Wilson 4th, United States ambassador to Gabon from 1992 to 1995, is an international business consultant.
The Voices from the Past. The Security of Our Nation
Men of Integrity. Caption: Former CIA analysts, Larry Johnson, center, with former analyst and case worker, Col. W. Patrick Lang (ret.), left, and Jim Marcinkowski, right, testifies on Capitol Hill before a joint Senate and House committee, Friday, July 22, 2005, in Washington. The Democrats of the Senate Policy Committee and House Government Reform Committee held a hearing on the CIA leak and the national security implications of disclosing the identity of a covert intelligence officer.
From the Washington Post
Ex-CIA Officer Rips Bush Over Plame Leak
By DONNA DE LA CRUZ
The Associated PressSunday, July 24, 2005; 9:24 AM
WASHINGTON -- President Bush is jeopardizing national security by not disciplining Karl Rove for his role in leaking the name of a CIA officer, and has hampered efforts to recruit informants in the war on terror, former U.S. intelligence officers say.
Former CIA analyst Larry Johnson used the Democratic Party's weekly radio address Saturday to reiterate comments he made Friday to a panel of House and Senate Democrats.
At that event, Johnson and others expressed great frustration that CIA operative Valerie Plame's name was made public. Plame is married to former ambassador Joseph Wilson, a critic of Bush's Iraq policy.
"Instead of a president concerned first and foremost with protecting this country and the intelligence officers who serve it, we are confronted with a president who is willing to sit by while political operatives savage the reputations of good Americans like Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson," Johnson said in the radio address.
Johnson, who said he was a registered Republican, said Bush has gone back on his promise to fire anyone at the White House implicated in a leak.
Federal law forbids government officials from revealing the identity of an undercover intelligence officer.
Rove, Bush's deputy chief of staff, told Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper in a 2003 phone call that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA on weapons of mass destruction issues, according to an account by Cooper in the magazine.
Rove has not disputed that he told Cooper that Wilson's wife worked for the agency, but has said through his lawyer that he did not mention her by name.
In July 2003, Robert Novak, citing unnamed administration officials, identified Plame by name in his syndicated column and wrote that she worked for the CIA. The column has led to a federal criminal investigation into who leaked Plame's undercover identity. New York Times reporter Judith Miller _ who never wrote a story about Plame _ has been jailed for refusing to testify.
Bush said last week, "I think it's best that people wait until the investigation is complete before you jump to conclusions. And I will do so, as well."
Dana Perino, a White House spokesman, said Friday that the administration would have no comment on the investigation while it was continuing.
Johnson said he wished a Republican lawmaker would have the courage to stand up and "call the ugly dog the ugly dog."
"Where are these men and women with any integrity to speak out against this?" he asked. "I expect better behavior out of Republicans."
By DONNA DE LA CRUZ
The Associated PressSunday, July 24, 2005; 9:24 AM
WASHINGTON -- President Bush is jeopardizing national security by not disciplining Karl Rove for his role in leaking the name of a CIA officer, and has hampered efforts to recruit informants in the war on terror, former U.S. intelligence officers say.
Former CIA analyst Larry Johnson used the Democratic Party's weekly radio address Saturday to reiterate comments he made Friday to a panel of House and Senate Democrats.
At that event, Johnson and others expressed great frustration that CIA operative Valerie Plame's name was made public. Plame is married to former ambassador Joseph Wilson, a critic of Bush's Iraq policy.
"Instead of a president concerned first and foremost with protecting this country and the intelligence officers who serve it, we are confronted with a president who is willing to sit by while political operatives savage the reputations of good Americans like Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson," Johnson said in the radio address.
Johnson, who said he was a registered Republican, said Bush has gone back on his promise to fire anyone at the White House implicated in a leak.
Federal law forbids government officials from revealing the identity of an undercover intelligence officer.
Rove, Bush's deputy chief of staff, told Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper in a 2003 phone call that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA on weapons of mass destruction issues, according to an account by Cooper in the magazine.
Rove has not disputed that he told Cooper that Wilson's wife worked for the agency, but has said through his lawyer that he did not mention her by name.
In July 2003, Robert Novak, citing unnamed administration officials, identified Plame by name in his syndicated column and wrote that she worked for the CIA. The column has led to a federal criminal investigation into who leaked Plame's undercover identity. New York Times reporter Judith Miller _ who never wrote a story about Plame _ has been jailed for refusing to testify.
Bush said last week, "I think it's best that people wait until the investigation is complete before you jump to conclusions. And I will do so, as well."
Dana Perino, a White House spokesman, said Friday that the administration would have no comment on the investigation while it was continuing.
Johnson said he wished a Republican lawmaker would have the courage to stand up and "call the ugly dog the ugly dog."
"Where are these men and women with any integrity to speak out against this?" he asked. "I expect better behavior out of Republicans."
From "Thought Crimes." Rick Santorum and Randall Terry meeting regarding Terri Schiavo.. Influence Peddling. Is that what government is for? I didn't think so. I thought it was to govern in a way that benefits the public and not victimize it.
THESE Men Deny a Lot
(Click on Above Link)
WASHINGTON Mar 20, 2005 — Congressional Republicans denied on Sunday that political motivations were behind legislative efforts to reconnect Terri Schiavo's feeding tube.
"I hope we're not … making this human tragedy a political issue," said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. "We've got plenty of other issues that are political in nature for us to fight about."
Leaders of both parties agreed Saturday on legislation that they said would allow Schiavo's feeding tube, which was disconnected Friday afternoon, to be reinserted while federal courts review her case.
The Republican Character is not Condusive to Democracy and it shows up in the extremes vividly.
A Nation cannot have a democracy with racism and bigotry. It's impossible.
An interview with, Rick Santorum, the third ranking Repuglican in the Right Wing. A Vile Extremist.
BROWN: Sam Rayburn, the legendary speaker of the house of representatives was legendary for many things, but is remembered for saying this if you want to get along, go along. Safe to say our guest tonight rarely gets called the get along/go along type. Rick Santorum, the junior senator from Pennsylvania is fiercely partisan, openly devout, frequently outspoken. He's also the third ranking Republican in the United States Senate, and now the author of "It Takes a Family: Conservatism and the Common Good." We're pleased to see him always, and pleased that he's with us in New York tonight. Nice to see you.
… BROWN: You can't know. I'll talk a little about the book, a little about other things. I saw a poll the other day that said 60 percent of the country wanted to know how Judge Roberts felt about Roe v Wade. It's a settled case. Do you think the country's entitled to know whether he believes that that case was decided correctly?
SANTORUM: You know my feeling is, you have to look at the standard of what's been applied in the past. And what judges in the past have been forced to answer is, you know, how they felt about, you know, sort of the black letter law, if you will. Not really looking at, how would you rule in cases.
BROWN: I'm not asking how you'd rule. This is a settled case. Roe v Wade is a settled case, it is settled. Is this a fair question, do you agree that that case was settled correctly? Is that a fair question to ask him?
SANTORUM: Well, let me put it this way. That question was asked of Judge Ginsberg, it was asked of Judge Breyer and neither of them answered the question.
BROWN: So the answer is no you don't think the country is entitled…
SANTORUM: Well I think, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. I mean, it's remarkable that we have an ACLU lawyer, not just someone who -- I mean, an ACLU lawyer who gets a pass on their ideology for the United States Senate and we have a lawyer who is really a lawyer's lawyer, he's been all over the place, is clearly not someone with an agenda and all of a sudden they have to answer litmus test kinds of questions. Is that fair? I would say it's not fair.
I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HIS RANTINGS ARE ABOUT. There is an ACLU lawyer in the Senate. I would like to know who that is. I don't mind. I find it highly objectionable to think John What's his name, Oh, yeah, Roberts. John Robert's is a LAWYER'S LAWYER. I guess that is like being a MAN'S MAN, huh? So a Lawyer's Lawyer is someone who is all over the place in deciding cases. Is that right? Well, I guess you might want to say that to a-kin him to Sandra Day O'Connor, but, there are some of us who weren't born yesterday Ricky.
BROWN: All I want to know is if -- it's really a simple question.
SANTORUM: I'm giving you the answer. The answer is no. If it wasn't answered in the past, it shouldn't be answered in the future.
BROWN: OK. So we're not entitled to know whether he thinks that was settled correctly, no. Why? Isn't that a good thing to know? Because people vote for and against that.
SANTORUM: I think you should know about how a judge makes a decision and what he takes into consideration in making that decision. But as far as applying it to a specific case...
BROWN: Even if that case has been decided?
SANTORUM: Right, you know, I think even if that case has been decided, yeah. I think you want -- you want to look at -- this is not a test of how judges feel about certain issues. You get to elect members of the Congress. We have to answer those questions.
BROWN: Do you think there's a right to privacy in the Constitution?
SANTORUM: No -- well, not the right to privacy as created under Roe v. Wade and all...
BROWN: Do you think there's a right to privacy in the Constitution?
SANTORUM: I think there's a right to unreasonable -- to unreasonable search and seizure...
THIS IS WHERE people like Santorum lose their arguments as they want to see the USA Constitution as a RULE BOOK. It's not. It has guidelines to apply to the life we live but it isn't a dictatorial tool.
The Fourth Amendment if you will:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment04/
There is nothing complicated here and where the Religious Right Republican Party wants to 'getcha' is on the definition of 'Probable Cause.' That is why Texas had a sodomy law. As long as it was illegal for men to make love together by the act in which they chose to express it, they could prove Probable Cause, make homosexuality illegal and jail people. Other than that being a human rights violation raises the issue what happens to repeat offenders.
The Religious Right is trying to 'capture' old 'colonial themes' and apply it to the USA Constitution as if this was a precept to understand the intentions of the Founding Fathers. They do that chronically. It's hideous and poor Justice Souter even felt he needed to defend against it in his argument regarding separating 'church and state.'
The past is not the direction the present takes. It is all too easy to find religious references. PRIMARILY Christian references in Colonial America.
The Jews didn't arrive until the beginning of the 1900s with the immigration movement and the domination of the Nazis in Europe. One of the largest and earliest Jewish congregations to come to this country was Rabbi Max Heller's congregation in New Orleans. Until that point Jews lived among Christians and were primarily poor and rejected by society but as with anything else there was safety and prosperity in numbers.
As an asset to the culture and determined need to survive the earliest forms of medicine, law and media (newsprint) was mastered by the Jews. Those three professions were least advantageous in an agrarian society that met at Church once a week for the news. Colonial America doctored with common sense and horse liniment.
All those professions were on the margins and the reason newsprint was important is because it grew out of a community need to share letters from distant relatives. Rabbi Heller developed a huge community that lived very near their synagogue. The professions flourished with shared concerns and ideas. It was out of the Jewish communities these 'wonders' of medicine and communication grew.
And law.
Colonial America didn't concentrate on law the way society does today. The towns were small, the population less, they were gunslingers who ''smoked people out" into the open and then hung them after ganging up on them in a court of law. To practice law opposing judges was a social sin.
Jews represented criminals because it was a living no one else wanted to perform. After the Jews arrived in American, the landscape changed dramatically.
No one ever says thank you.
I am not sure when the Muslim faith or Hindu or Buddist showed up in this country but they also lived in sequestered areas where they could worship as they wanted without causing too much oddity as Christians would see them.
So, to even TRY to apply Old Colonial Realities to modern day is an outrageous and bigoted thought. The men who wrote the US Consitution were all Caucasian property owners and there were absolutely no women in the process. So, to see the US Constitution as a 'Rule Book' is to be bigoted and why this Evangelical Right Wing Movement does exactly that.
BROWN: For example, if you'd been a Supreme Court judge in Griswold versus Connecticut, the famous birth control case came up, which centered around whether there was a right to privacy. Do you believe that was correctly decided?
Griswold v. Connecticut
381 U.S. 479 (1965)
Docket Number: 496
Abstract
Argued:
March 29, 1965
Decided:
June 7, 1965
Subjects:
Judicial Power: Standing to Sue, Personal Injury
Facts of the Case
Griswold was the Executive Director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut. Both she and the Medical Director for the League gave information, instruction, and other medical advice to married couples concerning birth control. Griswold and her colleague were convicted under a Connecticut law which criminalized the provision of counselling, and other medical treatment, to married persons for purposes of preventing conception.
Question Presented
Does the Constitution protect the right of marital privacy against state restrictions on a couple's ability to be counseled in the use of contraceptives?
Conclusion
Though the Constitution does not explicitly protect a general right to privacy, the various guarantees within the Bill of Rights create penumbras, or zones, that establish a right to privacy. Together, the First, Third, Fourth, and Ninth Amendments, create a new constitutional right, the right to privacy in marital relations. The Connecticut statute conflicts with the exercise of this right and is therefore null and void.
http://www.oyez.org/oyez/resource/case/149/
THERE IS NOTHING COMPLICATED HERE EITHER. Unless. You oppose birth control and family planning. Then there is a lot wrong here but that is individual choice and PRIVACY. Get over it.
SANTORUM: No, I don't. I write about it in the book. I don't.
BROWN: The state of Connecticut had the right to ban birth control for a married couple.
SANTORUM: I think they were wrong. It was a bad law.
BROWN: But they had the right.
SANTORUM: They had the right. They had the right…
BROWN: Why would a conservative argue that government should interfere with that most personal decision?
SANTORUM: I didn't. I said it was a bad law. And...
So, much self righteousness.
THIS IS NOT BAD LAW. However, he is right in stating there are stupid legislators. He provides a magnificent example of one.
BROWN: I'm going to do something I almost never do. The control room just -- we're going to go -- we're going to run long here. This is fun and interesting.
SANTORUM: OK.
BROWN: I want to talk about the thing you said about Boston for a second.
SANTORUM: OK.
You know it sort of reminds me of the way Rick Santorum runs his career as a legislator and the way Repuglicans run their agendas. "It doesn't matter how you get there so long as you do."
BROWN: Do you really think that left and right have a dramatically different view of how a good child is formed?
A GOOD CHILD.
A GOOD CHILD.
Well, where there is a good child I suppose there is a bad child as well.
SANTORUM: I would say yes. The highest virtue of the left in the world today is tolerance, and that is -- that's acceptance of anything, and anything for any reason. Well, I don't believe on the right -- or I don't think most Americans, not just on the right -- I don't think most Americans see it that way.
Well, I don't believe on the right -- or I don't think most Americans, not just on the right -- I don't think most Americans see it that way.
Well, I don't believe on the right -- or I don't think most Americans, not just on the right -- I don't think most Americans see it that way.
WE WENT FROM 'RIGHT' to Most Americans. Well, if it's most Americans the only ones left need to change including 'the left' especially considering we all have to have THE SAME VIEW of a Good Child. They are self righteous at the cost of others freedoms. There way is the only way to them. I've heard it all before.
I think most Americans want people to have certain virtues, honesty, integrity and all those other things. There may be agreement, and certainly obviously the left wants honesty and integrity, but there is a lot of things they don't accept.
Just ahead ,,,, other things to take care of. This is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Control room's recovering from its heart attack.
An interview with, Rick Santorum, the third ranking Repuglican in the Right Wing. A Vile Extremist.
BROWN: Sam Rayburn, the legendary speaker of the house of representatives was legendary for many things, but is remembered for saying this if you want to get along, go along. Safe to say our guest tonight rarely gets called the get along/go along type. Rick Santorum, the junior senator from Pennsylvania is fiercely partisan, openly devout, frequently outspoken. He's also the third ranking Republican in the United States Senate, and now the author of "It Takes a Family: Conservatism and the Common Good." We're pleased to see him always, and pleased that he's with us in New York tonight. Nice to see you.
… BROWN: You can't know. I'll talk a little about the book, a little about other things. I saw a poll the other day that said 60 percent of the country wanted to know how Judge Roberts felt about Roe v Wade. It's a settled case. Do you think the country's entitled to know whether he believes that that case was decided correctly?
SANTORUM: You know my feeling is, you have to look at the standard of what's been applied in the past. And what judges in the past have been forced to answer is, you know, how they felt about, you know, sort of the black letter law, if you will. Not really looking at, how would you rule in cases.
BROWN: I'm not asking how you'd rule. This is a settled case. Roe v Wade is a settled case, it is settled. Is this a fair question, do you agree that that case was settled correctly? Is that a fair question to ask him?
SANTORUM: Well, let me put it this way. That question was asked of Judge Ginsberg, it was asked of Judge Breyer and neither of them answered the question.
BROWN: So the answer is no you don't think the country is entitled…
SANTORUM: Well I think, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. I mean, it's remarkable that we have an ACLU lawyer, not just someone who -- I mean, an ACLU lawyer who gets a pass on their ideology for the United States Senate and we have a lawyer who is really a lawyer's lawyer, he's been all over the place, is clearly not someone with an agenda and all of a sudden they have to answer litmus test kinds of questions. Is that fair? I would say it's not fair.
I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HIS RANTINGS ARE ABOUT. There is an ACLU lawyer in the Senate. I would like to know who that is. I don't mind. I find it highly objectionable to think John What's his name, Oh, yeah, Roberts. John Robert's is a LAWYER'S LAWYER. I guess that is like being a MAN'S MAN, huh? So a Lawyer's Lawyer is someone who is all over the place in deciding cases. Is that right? Well, I guess you might want to say that to a-kin him to Sandra Day O'Connor, but, there are some of us who weren't born yesterday Ricky.
BROWN: All I want to know is if -- it's really a simple question.
SANTORUM: I'm giving you the answer. The answer is no. If it wasn't answered in the past, it shouldn't be answered in the future.
BROWN: OK. So we're not entitled to know whether he thinks that was settled correctly, no. Why? Isn't that a good thing to know? Because people vote for and against that.
SANTORUM: I think you should know about how a judge makes a decision and what he takes into consideration in making that decision. But as far as applying it to a specific case...
BROWN: Even if that case has been decided?
SANTORUM: Right, you know, I think even if that case has been decided, yeah. I think you want -- you want to look at -- this is not a test of how judges feel about certain issues. You get to elect members of the Congress. We have to answer those questions.
BROWN: Do you think there's a right to privacy in the Constitution?
SANTORUM: No -- well, not the right to privacy as created under Roe v. Wade and all...
BROWN: Do you think there's a right to privacy in the Constitution?
SANTORUM: I think there's a right to unreasonable -- to unreasonable search and seizure...
THIS IS WHERE people like Santorum lose their arguments as they want to see the USA Constitution as a RULE BOOK. It's not. It has guidelines to apply to the life we live but it isn't a dictatorial tool.
The Fourth Amendment if you will:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/amendment04/
There is nothing complicated here and where the Religious Right Republican Party wants to 'getcha' is on the definition of 'Probable Cause.' That is why Texas had a sodomy law. As long as it was illegal for men to make love together by the act in which they chose to express it, they could prove Probable Cause, make homosexuality illegal and jail people. Other than that being a human rights violation raises the issue what happens to repeat offenders.
The Religious Right is trying to 'capture' old 'colonial themes' and apply it to the USA Constitution as if this was a precept to understand the intentions of the Founding Fathers. They do that chronically. It's hideous and poor Justice Souter even felt he needed to defend against it in his argument regarding separating 'church and state.'
The past is not the direction the present takes. It is all too easy to find religious references. PRIMARILY Christian references in Colonial America.
The Jews didn't arrive until the beginning of the 1900s with the immigration movement and the domination of the Nazis in Europe. One of the largest and earliest Jewish congregations to come to this country was Rabbi Max Heller's congregation in New Orleans. Until that point Jews lived among Christians and were primarily poor and rejected by society but as with anything else there was safety and prosperity in numbers.
As an asset to the culture and determined need to survive the earliest forms of medicine, law and media (newsprint) was mastered by the Jews. Those three professions were least advantageous in an agrarian society that met at Church once a week for the news. Colonial America doctored with common sense and horse liniment.
All those professions were on the margins and the reason newsprint was important is because it grew out of a community need to share letters from distant relatives. Rabbi Heller developed a huge community that lived very near their synagogue. The professions flourished with shared concerns and ideas. It was out of the Jewish communities these 'wonders' of medicine and communication grew.
And law.
Colonial America didn't concentrate on law the way society does today. The towns were small, the population less, they were gunslingers who ''smoked people out" into the open and then hung them after ganging up on them in a court of law. To practice law opposing judges was a social sin.
Jews represented criminals because it was a living no one else wanted to perform. After the Jews arrived in American, the landscape changed dramatically.
No one ever says thank you.
I am not sure when the Muslim faith or Hindu or Buddist showed up in this country but they also lived in sequestered areas where they could worship as they wanted without causing too much oddity as Christians would see them.
So, to even TRY to apply Old Colonial Realities to modern day is an outrageous and bigoted thought. The men who wrote the US Consitution were all Caucasian property owners and there were absolutely no women in the process. So, to see the US Constitution as a 'Rule Book' is to be bigoted and why this Evangelical Right Wing Movement does exactly that.
BROWN: For example, if you'd been a Supreme Court judge in Griswold versus Connecticut, the famous birth control case came up, which centered around whether there was a right to privacy. Do you believe that was correctly decided?
Griswold v. Connecticut
381 U.S. 479 (1965)
Docket Number: 496
Abstract
Argued:
March 29, 1965
Decided:
June 7, 1965
Subjects:
Judicial Power: Standing to Sue, Personal Injury
Facts of the Case
Griswold was the Executive Director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut. Both she and the Medical Director for the League gave information, instruction, and other medical advice to married couples concerning birth control. Griswold and her colleague were convicted under a Connecticut law which criminalized the provision of counselling, and other medical treatment, to married persons for purposes of preventing conception.
Question Presented
Does the Constitution protect the right of marital privacy against state restrictions on a couple's ability to be counseled in the use of contraceptives?
Conclusion
Though the Constitution does not explicitly protect a general right to privacy, the various guarantees within the Bill of Rights create penumbras, or zones, that establish a right to privacy. Together, the First, Third, Fourth, and Ninth Amendments, create a new constitutional right, the right to privacy in marital relations. The Connecticut statute conflicts with the exercise of this right and is therefore null and void.
http://www.oyez.org/oyez/resource/case/149/
THERE IS NOTHING COMPLICATED HERE EITHER. Unless. You oppose birth control and family planning. Then there is a lot wrong here but that is individual choice and PRIVACY. Get over it.
SANTORUM: No, I don't. I write about it in the book. I don't.
BROWN: The state of Connecticut had the right to ban birth control for a married couple.
SANTORUM: I think they were wrong. It was a bad law.
BROWN: But they had the right.
SANTORUM: They had the right. They had the right…
BROWN: Why would a conservative argue that government should interfere with that most personal decision?
SANTORUM: I didn't. I said it was a bad law. And...
IT IS BAD LAW because it doesn't match Rich Santorum's belief system. His ego is so huge here that it fills up every available breathing space in the room. Mr. and Mrs. Santorum doesn't have to do anything they don't want to and they have no right to impose their beliefs on others. Like I said, ' ... the Republican character is not condusive to democracy.' Bush/Cheney talk about spreading democracy but the way they practice it never brings with it peace.
BROWN: But they had the right to make.
SANTORUM: They had the right to make it. Look, legislatures have the right to make mistakes and do really stupid things...
BROWN: OK.
SANTORUM: ... but we don't have to create constitutional rights because we have a stupid legislature. And that's the problem here, is the court feels like they have a responsibility to right every wrong. When they do that, unlike a Congress, that if we make a really stupid mistake and we do something wrong, we go back next year or next month and change it, and we've done that. Courts don't do that. They only get cases that come before them and they have to make broad, sweeping decisions that have huge impact down the road.
So, much self righteousness.
These people don't have modesty.
THAT LAST PARAGRAPH HE SPOKE IS 'JUSTIFICATION' TO REPEATEDLY PRESENT CASE AFTER CASE to the Supreme Court 'thinking' the entire time all the court needs is more exposure to change these decisions. That is how these morons continue to solicit their constituencies by PROMSING this is just the way of reversing 'bad law' and every time we approach the court it changes incrementally better.
"W"rong.
It is high time these legislators set their constituencies straight and tell them the law is set and it's time we live with everyone else and not just our standards.
That's what happened in Griswold. It was a bad law. The court felt, we can't let this bad law stand in place. It's wrong. It was. But they made a -- they created out of whole cloth a right that now has gone far, far from Griswold versus Connecticut.
THIS IS NOT BAD LAW. However, he is right in stating there are stupid legislators. He provides a magnificent example of one.
BROWN: I'm going to do something I almost never do. The control room just -- we're going to go -- we're going to run long here. This is fun and interesting.
SANTORUM: OK.
BROWN: I want to talk about the thing you said about Boston for a second.
SANTORUM: OK.
BROWN: OK. I don't know if we have this. We can put it on the screen, but you said "when the culture is sick, every element becomes infected. While it is no excuse, the scandal" -- referring to the priest abuse scandal -- "it is no secret that Boston, the seat of academic, political, cultural liberalism in America, lies at the center of the storm."
First of all, wasn't that a little over the top?
SANTORUM: Well, what's over the top is taking a three-year-old article...
BROWN: What's the context?
SANTORUM: And the context was, I was writing about the priest scandal and condemning the priest scandal, condemning the church...
BROWN: Well, of course you were condemning it. No one supports it.
SANTORUM: ... and talking about concrete things we need to do to fix it. I was out there. No other United States senator...
BROWN: Why so -- why Boston?
SANTORUM: Because, again, context. What was going on in 2002 -- not 2005, but in 2002 -- that's where the scandal was. It wasn't anywhere else. We weren't talking about it. In 2002, it was the epicenter. We didn't have the report by the bishops conference. We didn't have…
BROWN: So now you wouldn't say that?
SANTORUM: I wouldn't -- well, no, there's a lot of other cities that were involved. But the point is that cultural liberalism and what I talked about is a contributing factor to how people view sexual activity. And I am not the one that says that. Robert Bennett, in the report that he issued on behalf of the bishops conference, called the Bennett report, said exactly my words, except the word Boston wasn't in it.
BROWN: OK. But you wouldn't say that about Boston now. Is that right? Based on what we know about the scandal.
SANTORUM: I said it then, it was the...
BROWN: Not then, now?
SANTORUM: ... yeah, it was the epicenter, and there are many other cities that that would apply.
… and there are many other cities that that would apply.
… and there are many other cities that that would apply.
… and there are many other cities that that would apply.
THE Rebuglican Right Wing wants to make example of "Blue State Stronholds" like New York City. Like Boston. Like San Francisco. Like Los Angeles. Like Chicago as 'epicenters' of SIN. "Sin City" if you will. Bruce Willis made a movie not long ago entitled exactly that. Odd how this party thinks if they introduce a movie to the public it will all be over. The 'idea' behind defaming large cities as areas of sinfulness is to COST them their 'tourist' trade by a large aspect of the population, SUPPOSEDLY, who will boycott these cities until the morality changes. I find it very odd this is a topic of conversation beyond the allotted time considering there was an entire segment on "Paula Zahn NOW" regarding escorts in New York City and one in particular that was featured in "The New Yorker" that billed out at $2000 per hour.
Very odd indeed. THE bad boys of Aaron and Rick decided on break they could 'get away' with clout enough to stretch the interview.
BROWN: What we were talking about in the break was that -- my belief that actually in many respects, the left and the right talk (INAUDIBLE), but they agree on a lot of things. It takes a child -- it takes a family and it takes a village, in fact, are both true. And I think you'd agree with that.
SANTORUM: And I say that, yeah.
BROWN: Right. And that the left doesn't believe it only takes a village any more than the right believes it only takes a family.
SANTORUM: It's where you start from. I think the left -- the left starts from the top down. Believes in the experts, believes in...
BROWN: What is the basis of that? Why do you believe that?
SANTORUM: Well, I mean, look at institutions dominated by the left. I mean, education.
IF THAT isn't the truth. The Red States have the highest literacy rates, the highest divorce rates and the highest teen pregnancy rates. I mean no wonder these people are so religious. Nothing else is working for them.
I talk about this very much in the book. I mean, it was created very much as a way of having, you know, social control from the top, and modernizing it to -- into our culture, progressive children, and having state control of education. It's been a battle ever since for local control of schools, versus the experts on top trying to decide for us how to handle...
BROWN: Republican administration -- this -- your administration has exerted more federal control over schools than any in history.
SANTORUM: Yeah. I have serious -- serious problems and have had serious problems with federal legislation. And had very serious concerns about No Child Left Behind…
BROWN: Did you vote for it?
SANTORUM: I voted for it, because what it basically required was accountability. It didn't dictate how we get there. It dictated that you had the measure how you get there. And to me, that is basically holding folks accountable for what they do, as opposed to dictating what they do.
ACCOUNTABILITY. Not important how you get there, just that you get there, including 'Teaching to the Test,' depriving schools ranked as unattainable from funding and causing greater hardship of those children while the Religious Right takes to the 'Charter School' system and 'Voucher Programs.' Men like Rick Santorum don't care about other children so much as his own and what he has to keep them free of secularism.
You know it sort of reminds me of the way Rick Santorum runs his career as a legislator and the way Repuglicans run their agendas. "It doesn't matter how you get there so long as you do."
BROWN: Do you really think that left and right have a dramatically different view of how a good child is formed?
A GOOD CHILD.
A GOOD CHILD.
Well, where there is a good child I suppose there is a bad child as well.
SANTORUM: I would say yes. The highest virtue of the left in the world today is tolerance, and that is -- that's acceptance of anything, and anything for any reason. Well, I don't believe on the right -- or I don't think most Americans, not just on the right -- I don't think most Americans see it that way.
Well, I don't believe on the right -- or I don't think most Americans, not just on the right -- I don't think most Americans see it that way.
Well, I don't believe on the right -- or I don't think most Americans, not just on the right -- I don't think most Americans see it that way.
WE WENT FROM 'RIGHT' to Most Americans. Well, if it's most Americans the only ones left need to change including 'the left' especially considering we all have to have THE SAME VIEW of a Good Child. They are self righteous at the cost of others freedoms. There way is the only way to them. I've heard it all before.
I think most Americans want people to have certain virtues, honesty, integrity and all those other things. There may be agreement, and certainly obviously the left wants honesty and integrity, but there is a lot of things they don't accept.
Just ahead ,,,, other things to take care of. This is NEWSNIGHT.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BROWN: Control room's recovering from its heart attack.
CIA Leak Case By the Numbers
Number of days after the article outing Ambassador Wilson's wife appeared that the White House required its staff to turn over evidence relating to the leak: 85
Approximate hours between then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzalez's advance notification to White House Chief of Staff Andy Card that he would require staff to turn over evidence relating to the case and formal notification to staff of that requirement: 12
Minimum number of times an Administration official leaked classified information about the identity of Ambassador Wilson's wife: 11
Minimum number of times after the beginning of the Justice Department's investigation that White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan claimed Karl Rove was not involved: 5
Number of press conferences since evidence linking Karl Rove to the leak was made public where Press Secretary McClellan has refused to comment on the case, citing an ongoing criminal investigation: 7
Minimum number of hearings held by Senate Republicans to investigate accusations against President Clinton involving the "Whitewater" case: 20
Total hearings held by Senate Republicans to investigate the leak of the covert identity of Ambassador Joseph Wilson's wife: 0
Approximate hours between then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzalez's advance notification to White House Chief of Staff Andy Card that he would require staff to turn over evidence relating to the case and formal notification to staff of that requirement: 12
Minimum number of times an Administration official leaked classified information about the identity of Ambassador Wilson's wife: 11
Minimum number of times after the beginning of the Justice Department's investigation that White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan claimed Karl Rove was not involved: 5
Number of press conferences since evidence linking Karl Rove to the leak was made public where Press Secretary McClellan has refused to comment on the case, citing an ongoing criminal investigation: 7
Minimum number of hearings held by Senate Republicans to investigate accusations against President Clinton involving the "Whitewater" case: 20
Total hearings held by Senate Republicans to investigate the leak of the covert identity of Ambassador Joseph Wilson's wife: 0
Karl Loses. Wagering with one's 'chance' of overthrowing the USA Consitution isn't a good idea.
The ONLY way Rove, Libby, Cheney and Bush were to come out of this without a scratch was to make a coupe against the USA Constitution. I mean they were only kidding themselves to believe an entire Intelligence Community would let them get away with playing politics with National Security.
Of course, everyone besides me has thought this through. They are attempted treasonists and nothing short of it.
Rove should look oddly appropriate in Minimum Security Prison Gardener's Attire
Prosecutor Weighs Charges Against Rove in Leak Case
By ELISABETH BUMILLER and DAVID JOHNSTON
WASHINGTON, April 27 — Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor in the C.I.A. leak case, is expected to decide in the next two to three weeks whether to bring perjury charges against Karl Rove, the powerful adviser to President Bush, lawyers involved in the case said Thursday.
With the completion of Mr. Rove's fifth appearance before the grand jury on Wednesday, Mr. Fitzgerald is now believed to have assembled all of the facts necessary to determine whether to seek an indictment of Mr. Rove or drop the case.
Lawyers in the case said Mr. Fitzgerald would spend the coming days reviewing the transcript of Mr. Rove's three hours of testimony on Wednesday and weigh it against his previous statements to the grand jury as well as the testimony of others, including a sworn statement that Mr. Rove's lawyer gave to the prosecutor earlier this year. The lawyers were granted anonymity so they could speak about the internal legal deliberations in Mr. Rove's case.
A lawyer with knowledge of the case said that Mr. Rove had known for more than a month that he was likely to make another appearance before the grand jury, and that he had known since last fall that he would be subject to further questions from Mr. Fitzgerald before the prosecutor completed his inquiry.
Mr. Rove was relieved of his day-to-day domestic policy duties at the White House in a staff shake-up last week, but White House officials say the change was unrelated to his legal complications.
Randall Samborn, a spokesman for Mr. Fitzgerald, declined to comment.
Mark Corallo, a spokesman for Mr. Rove, said Mr. Rove would be cleared. "We're confident at the end of this that Mr. Fitzgerald is going to find that Karl has been totally truthful and not only has done nothing wrong but has done everything right," Mr. Corallo said.
Mr. Fitzgerald must specifically decide whether Mr. Rove misled the grand jury in testimony he gave in 2004 about his conversations with reporters about Valerie Wilson, the intelligence officer at the heart of the C.I.A. leak case.
In his February 2004 testimony, Mr. Rove acknowledged talking to the columnist Robert D. Novak about Ms. Wilson, but he did not tell the grand jury about a second conversation he had about her with Matthew Cooper, a Time magazine reporter. Mr. Novak revealed her name and C.I.A. employment in a column on July 14, 2003.
Critics of the Bush administration have asserted that the revelation was retaliation against her husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV, a former diplomat who had publicly accused the administration of twisting some of the intelligence used to justify going to war with Iraq.
Mr. Rove later voluntarily told the grand jury about the conversation with Mr. Cooper, and said that he had forgotten about it in the rush of his daily business. But Mr. Fitzgerald has long been skeptical of Mr. Rove's account of his forgetfulness, lawyers in the case say. On Wednesday Mr. Fitzgerald questioned Mr. Rove about how he came to remember his conversation with Mr. Cooper.
Robert D. Luskin, Mr. Rove's lawyer, issued a statement on Wednesday declaring that Mr. Rove had testified "voluntarily and unconditionally" about a matter that had arisen since Mr. Rove's last grand jury appearance, in October 2005. Mr. Luskin was evidently referring to the testimony of Viveca Novak, a former reporter at Time magazine, who has said that she told Mr. Rove's lawyer in early 2004 that she believed that Mr. Rove had been a source for Mr. Cooper.
Mr. Rove admitted from the outset to investigators that he spoke to Mr. Novak on July 9, 2003, about Ms. Wilson. It was in that conversation that Mr. Rove first learned the name of Ms. Wilson from Mr. Novak, lawyers in the case said.
Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Cooper occurred two days later. In that conversation, Mr. Rove did not mention Ms. Wilson's name, but, Mr. Cooper said, Mr. Rove did say that she worked at the C.I.A.
Mr. Fitzgerald did not learn of Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Cooper until long after the investigation had begun, when a search of Mr. Rove's e-mail messages uncovered one that he had sent to Stephen J. Hadley, then the deputy national security adviser, about the Cooper conversation.
It is still not publicly known why Mr. Rove's e-mail message to Mr. Hadley was not turned over earlier, but a lawyer in the case said White House documents were collected in response to several separate requests that may not have covered certain time periods or all relevant officials. Mr. Rove had no role in the search for documents, which was carried out by an administrative office in the White House.
Also on Thursday, a federal judge refused to dismiss charges against I. Lewis Libby Jr., the former top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney who was indicted on perjury and obstruction charges in the leak case last year.
The judge, Reggie B. Walton of Federal District Court, turned down a motion by lawyers for Mr. Libby who challenged Mr. Fitzgerald's authority to handle the case.
By ELISABETH BUMILLER and DAVID JOHNSTON
WASHINGTON, April 27 — Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor in the C.I.A. leak case, is expected to decide in the next two to three weeks whether to bring perjury charges against Karl Rove, the powerful adviser to President Bush, lawyers involved in the case said Thursday.
With the completion of Mr. Rove's fifth appearance before the grand jury on Wednesday, Mr. Fitzgerald is now believed to have assembled all of the facts necessary to determine whether to seek an indictment of Mr. Rove or drop the case.
Lawyers in the case said Mr. Fitzgerald would spend the coming days reviewing the transcript of Mr. Rove's three hours of testimony on Wednesday and weigh it against his previous statements to the grand jury as well as the testimony of others, including a sworn statement that Mr. Rove's lawyer gave to the prosecutor earlier this year. The lawyers were granted anonymity so they could speak about the internal legal deliberations in Mr. Rove's case.
A lawyer with knowledge of the case said that Mr. Rove had known for more than a month that he was likely to make another appearance before the grand jury, and that he had known since last fall that he would be subject to further questions from Mr. Fitzgerald before the prosecutor completed his inquiry.
Mr. Rove was relieved of his day-to-day domestic policy duties at the White House in a staff shake-up last week, but White House officials say the change was unrelated to his legal complications.
Randall Samborn, a spokesman for Mr. Fitzgerald, declined to comment.
Mark Corallo, a spokesman for Mr. Rove, said Mr. Rove would be cleared. "We're confident at the end of this that Mr. Fitzgerald is going to find that Karl has been totally truthful and not only has done nothing wrong but has done everything right," Mr. Corallo said.
Mr. Fitzgerald must specifically decide whether Mr. Rove misled the grand jury in testimony he gave in 2004 about his conversations with reporters about Valerie Wilson, the intelligence officer at the heart of the C.I.A. leak case.
In his February 2004 testimony, Mr. Rove acknowledged talking to the columnist Robert D. Novak about Ms. Wilson, but he did not tell the grand jury about a second conversation he had about her with Matthew Cooper, a Time magazine reporter. Mr. Novak revealed her name and C.I.A. employment in a column on July 14, 2003.
Critics of the Bush administration have asserted that the revelation was retaliation against her husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV, a former diplomat who had publicly accused the administration of twisting some of the intelligence used to justify going to war with Iraq.
Mr. Rove later voluntarily told the grand jury about the conversation with Mr. Cooper, and said that he had forgotten about it in the rush of his daily business. But Mr. Fitzgerald has long been skeptical of Mr. Rove's account of his forgetfulness, lawyers in the case say. On Wednesday Mr. Fitzgerald questioned Mr. Rove about how he came to remember his conversation with Mr. Cooper.
Robert D. Luskin, Mr. Rove's lawyer, issued a statement on Wednesday declaring that Mr. Rove had testified "voluntarily and unconditionally" about a matter that had arisen since Mr. Rove's last grand jury appearance, in October 2005. Mr. Luskin was evidently referring to the testimony of Viveca Novak, a former reporter at Time magazine, who has said that she told Mr. Rove's lawyer in early 2004 that she believed that Mr. Rove had been a source for Mr. Cooper.
Mr. Rove admitted from the outset to investigators that he spoke to Mr. Novak on July 9, 2003, about Ms. Wilson. It was in that conversation that Mr. Rove first learned the name of Ms. Wilson from Mr. Novak, lawyers in the case said.
Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Cooper occurred two days later. In that conversation, Mr. Rove did not mention Ms. Wilson's name, but, Mr. Cooper said, Mr. Rove did say that she worked at the C.I.A.
Mr. Fitzgerald did not learn of Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Cooper until long after the investigation had begun, when a search of Mr. Rove's e-mail messages uncovered one that he had sent to Stephen J. Hadley, then the deputy national security adviser, about the Cooper conversation.
It is still not publicly known why Mr. Rove's e-mail message to Mr. Hadley was not turned over earlier, but a lawyer in the case said White House documents were collected in response to several separate requests that may not have covered certain time periods or all relevant officials. Mr. Rove had no role in the search for documents, which was carried out by an administrative office in the White House.
Also on Thursday, a federal judge refused to dismiss charges against I. Lewis Libby Jr., the former top aide to Vice President Dick Cheney who was indicted on perjury and obstruction charges in the leak case last year.
The judge, Reggie B. Walton of Federal District Court, turned down a motion by lawyers for Mr. Libby who challenged Mr. Fitzgerald's authority to handle the case.
Saturday, December 31, 2005
DEBATING A LEAK: THE INVESTIGATION; Democrats Want Ashcroft Out of Inquiry
By CARL HULSE AND RICHARD W. STEVENSON; ERIC LICHTBLAU AND GLEN JUSTICE CONTRIBUTED TO THIS REPORT. (NYT)
1126 wordsPublished: October 3, 2003
Correction Appended
WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 - Democrats insisted on Thursday that Attorney General John Ashcroft remove himself from the investigation into the disclosure of an undercover C.I.A. officer's identity, defying Republican efforts to contain the furor over the affair.
The clamor will probably be fed by financial data underscoring the close political ties between Mr. Ashcroft and Karl Rove, the presidential adviser whose role in the leak has come into question. Campaign finance data show that Mr. Rove's former company received more than $300,000 from Mr. Ashcroft's 1994 Senate campaign in Missouri for direct-mail work and other services, in addition to his role in two earlier Ashcroft campaigns.
''Does anyone really believe that this attorney general can with a straight face say they're going to investigate these people when they work for them, they have close ties?'' Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, asked on the Senate floor on Thursday.
Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, said on Thursday that Mr. Ashcroft should recuse himself immediately. Mr. Schumer said three or four Republicans had come to him and said, ''You guys are right on this issue.''
Justice Department officials said they were leaving open all options.
Republicans in Congress described the controversy as a ''tempest in a teapot'' and said Joseph C. Wilson IV, the former ambassador married to the officer whose identity was disclosed to the syndicated columnist Robert Novak, was becoming viewed as a partisan figure.
One senior Republican aide said that if the uproar did not abate, some Republicans were considering proposing that the White House allow the F.B.I. director, Robert S. Mueller III, to appoint a prosecutor.
''The problem with Mr. Ashcroft is that he is not seen as an independent figure,'' the aide said.
But publicly, no Republicans have broken ranks with the White House and the Justice Department by calling for Mr. Ashcroft to recuse himself or appoint an outside counsel.
So much is riding on Republican unity that CNN caused a brief flurry on Thursday by reporting that Senator Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania, had called on Mr. Ashcroft to recuse himself.
But the senator quickly put out a press release saying he had been misquoted and said later in an interview that the decision was best left to the attorney general. He said he was confident that career Justice Department lawyers could ably oversee the investigation.
The two Republican chairmen of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees said their panels were not pursuing the matter. Senator Pat Roberts of Kansas and Representative Porter J. Goss of Florida said that in their own view, based on limited knowledge, the disclosure was inadvertent. But both men said that if it turned out it was calculated they would treat it very seriously.
''I would say there is much larger dose of partisan politics going on right now than there is worry about national security,'' said Mr. Goss, a former C.I.A. agent. ''But I would never take lightly a serious allegation backed up by evidence.''
He added, referring to the independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr's inquiry into former President Clinton, ''If somebody sends me a blue dress and some DNA, I will have an investigation.''
Three female Democratic senators raised furious objections to the disclosure of the name, saying that whoever dragged Mr. Wilson's wife into a political dispute over his work on a weapons of mass destruction went far beyond accepted limits of partisan infighting.
''This betrayal by someone or some people in the administration has reached a new low by attacking the family of one of its own,'' said Senator Mary L. Landrieu, Democrat of Louisiana. ''There's an unwritten rule in politics that no matter how rough the politics gets, families are off limits, particularly spouses and children.''
With interest in investigation intense, the F.B.I. said today that it was developing a protocol to help ensure investigators access to witnesses and documents.
''There's a protocol we're developing on the way investigators will handle the interviews and the records and how we obtain those,'' said Susan Whitson, a spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which is leading the inquiry. ''Our whole purpose here is get to the bottom of an unauthorized disclosure.''
Ms. Whitson said the interviews could begin within days. ''We're going to be very aggressive in this investigation, and any tool or legal methods that we use in criminal cases will be used here,'' she said.
Ms. Whitson declined to discuss details, but current and former law enforcement officials said from past experience that they expected that a gatekeeper at the White House and the Central Intelligence Agency -- probably in the counsel's offices -- would act as a clearinghouse for interview and document requests.
In the White House, it was Alberto Gonzales, counsel to the president, who issued a staff-wide directive this week that any records relevant to the investigation not be destroyed.
The C.I.A. received similar instructions, and a government official disclosed today that the State Department and the Defense Department did as well. But the official stressed that the move was simply standard procedure based on who had access to classified C.I.A. information.
Scott McClellan, Mr. Bush's spokesman, said he was not aware of anyone at the White House having been contacted by the F.B.I. in the case.
White House officials have pledged their cooperation, but the F.B.I. could seek grand jury subpoenas if needed.
Under Justice Department policy on investigations involving reporters, a subpoena for something like a journalist's telephone records would have to be approved by Mr. Ashcroft.
For now at least, the investigation will be led by investigators in the F.B.I.'s inspections division, officials said. It will be overseen by lawyers in the Justice Department's counter-espionage section within the criminal division.
Mr. McClellan said any decision about Mr. Ashcroft recusing himself rested with the Justice Department. But he signaled again that Mr. Bush is not pressing for any changes in the investigation.
''The Department of Justice has publicly stated that all legal options are on the table,'' Mr. McClellan said. ''That's where it stands. But I would remind you that career Justice Department officials are the ones who are leading this investigation. These are individuals with vast experience and are in the best position to get to the bottom of this.''
Mr. Bush ''has made it very clear that he wants to get to the bottom of this,'' he added. ''Unfortunately, there are some that are looking through the lens of political opportunism. There are some that are seeking partisan political advantage. I don't need to go into names. We all know who they are.''
Correction: October 4, 2003, Saturday Because of an editing error, an article yesterday about Democratic demands that Attorney General John Ashcroft remove himself from the investigation into the disclosure of a C.I.A. officer's identity misattributed the statement that interviews in the case could begin within days. It was made by government officials who spoke on condition of anonymity -- not by Susan Whitson, an F.B.I. spokeswoman; she refused to discuss the timeline of the case under any circumstances.
By CARL HULSE AND RICHARD W. STEVENSON; ERIC LICHTBLAU AND GLEN JUSTICE CONTRIBUTED TO THIS REPORT. (NYT)
1126 wordsPublished: October 3, 2003
Correction Appended
WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 - Democrats insisted on Thursday that Attorney General John Ashcroft remove himself from the investigation into the disclosure of an undercover C.I.A. officer's identity, defying Republican efforts to contain the furor over the affair.
The clamor will probably be fed by financial data underscoring the close political ties between Mr. Ashcroft and Karl Rove, the presidential adviser whose role in the leak has come into question. Campaign finance data show that Mr. Rove's former company received more than $300,000 from Mr. Ashcroft's 1994 Senate campaign in Missouri for direct-mail work and other services, in addition to his role in two earlier Ashcroft campaigns.
''Does anyone really believe that this attorney general can with a straight face say they're going to investigate these people when they work for them, they have close ties?'' Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, asked on the Senate floor on Thursday.
Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, said on Thursday that Mr. Ashcroft should recuse himself immediately. Mr. Schumer said three or four Republicans had come to him and said, ''You guys are right on this issue.''
Justice Department officials said they were leaving open all options.
Republicans in Congress described the controversy as a ''tempest in a teapot'' and said Joseph C. Wilson IV, the former ambassador married to the officer whose identity was disclosed to the syndicated columnist Robert Novak, was becoming viewed as a partisan figure.
One senior Republican aide said that if the uproar did not abate, some Republicans were considering proposing that the White House allow the F.B.I. director, Robert S. Mueller III, to appoint a prosecutor.
''The problem with Mr. Ashcroft is that he is not seen as an independent figure,'' the aide said.
But publicly, no Republicans have broken ranks with the White House and the Justice Department by calling for Mr. Ashcroft to recuse himself or appoint an outside counsel.
So much is riding on Republican unity that CNN caused a brief flurry on Thursday by reporting that Senator Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania, had called on Mr. Ashcroft to recuse himself.
But the senator quickly put out a press release saying he had been misquoted and said later in an interview that the decision was best left to the attorney general. He said he was confident that career Justice Department lawyers could ably oversee the investigation.
The two Republican chairmen of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees said their panels were not pursuing the matter. Senator Pat Roberts of Kansas and Representative Porter J. Goss of Florida said that in their own view, based on limited knowledge, the disclosure was inadvertent. But both men said that if it turned out it was calculated they would treat it very seriously.
''I would say there is much larger dose of partisan politics going on right now than there is worry about national security,'' said Mr. Goss, a former C.I.A. agent. ''But I would never take lightly a serious allegation backed up by evidence.''
He added, referring to the independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr's inquiry into former President Clinton, ''If somebody sends me a blue dress and some DNA, I will have an investigation.''
Three female Democratic senators raised furious objections to the disclosure of the name, saying that whoever dragged Mr. Wilson's wife into a political dispute over his work on a weapons of mass destruction went far beyond accepted limits of partisan infighting.
''This betrayal by someone or some people in the administration has reached a new low by attacking the family of one of its own,'' said Senator Mary L. Landrieu, Democrat of Louisiana. ''There's an unwritten rule in politics that no matter how rough the politics gets, families are off limits, particularly spouses and children.''
With interest in investigation intense, the F.B.I. said today that it was developing a protocol to help ensure investigators access to witnesses and documents.
''There's a protocol we're developing on the way investigators will handle the interviews and the records and how we obtain those,'' said Susan Whitson, a spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which is leading the inquiry. ''Our whole purpose here is get to the bottom of an unauthorized disclosure.''
Ms. Whitson said the interviews could begin within days. ''We're going to be very aggressive in this investigation, and any tool or legal methods that we use in criminal cases will be used here,'' she said.
Ms. Whitson declined to discuss details, but current and former law enforcement officials said from past experience that they expected that a gatekeeper at the White House and the Central Intelligence Agency -- probably in the counsel's offices -- would act as a clearinghouse for interview and document requests.
In the White House, it was Alberto Gonzales, counsel to the president, who issued a staff-wide directive this week that any records relevant to the investigation not be destroyed.
The C.I.A. received similar instructions, and a government official disclosed today that the State Department and the Defense Department did as well. But the official stressed that the move was simply standard procedure based on who had access to classified C.I.A. information.
Scott McClellan, Mr. Bush's spokesman, said he was not aware of anyone at the White House having been contacted by the F.B.I. in the case.
White House officials have pledged their cooperation, but the F.B.I. could seek grand jury subpoenas if needed.
Under Justice Department policy on investigations involving reporters, a subpoena for something like a journalist's telephone records would have to be approved by Mr. Ashcroft.
For now at least, the investigation will be led by investigators in the F.B.I.'s inspections division, officials said. It will be overseen by lawyers in the Justice Department's counter-espionage section within the criminal division.
Mr. McClellan said any decision about Mr. Ashcroft recusing himself rested with the Justice Department. But he signaled again that Mr. Bush is not pressing for any changes in the investigation.
''The Department of Justice has publicly stated that all legal options are on the table,'' Mr. McClellan said. ''That's where it stands. But I would remind you that career Justice Department officials are the ones who are leading this investigation. These are individuals with vast experience and are in the best position to get to the bottom of this.''
Mr. Bush ''has made it very clear that he wants to get to the bottom of this,'' he added. ''Unfortunately, there are some that are looking through the lens of political opportunism. There are some that are seeking partisan political advantage. I don't need to go into names. We all know who they are.''
Correction: October 4, 2003, Saturday Because of an editing error, an article yesterday about Democratic demands that Attorney General John Ashcroft remove himself from the investigation into the disclosure of a C.I.A. officer's identity misattributed the statement that interviews in the case could begin within days. It was made by government officials who spoke on condition of anonymity -- not by Susan Whitson, an F.B.I. spokeswoman; she refused to discuss the timeline of the case under any circumstances.
K N O W L I N G L Y ??????
Yesterday (July 4, 2005), Karl states,
"Who me? Out any CIA agents? No, not me.
"Today (July 5, 2005), Karl's Lawyer states, "
Knowingly, Karl Rove never did anything "W"rong !!!
"KNOWINGLY ?
Name dropping is name dropping when it comes to espionage and national security, babe.
Karl Rove is a Homeland Security Risk.
Tomorrow?
HOW DEEP DOES IT GO ???
...............................................
July 5, 2005, approx. 4:30 pm :: The ultimate Propagandists, CNN's John King and Dana Bash, the fastest talking heads on the planet. BACK PEDDLE, BACK PEDDLE, Get Karl out of this, the ship is sinking, the ship is sinking.Ever wonder if Dana Bash is an alien? She is so gaunt that even when she is on camera she looks like a Spielberg Alien from "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."
...................................................................
Things are taking shape.
How deep does it go?
Bush/Cheney easily.
July 5, 2005. 10:34 PM
There is doubt Karl Rove had the type of security clearance needed to know Ms. Plame was an agent. However, Bush would know. He would be very concerned as Commander and Chief and so would Cheney over a 'loose cannon' regarding the 'Yellow Cake' in Africa in Joe Wilson. It would also be all too easy to be 'just angry enough' with Karl Rove in the Oval Office and the door closed to have a weak moment and reveal to Rove the name of Wilson and Plame in the same breath as a 'traitor husband and wife team' along with her advocating for Joe's next assignment.
How deep does it go?
All the way to the top.
They are all dirty as they come.
"Who me? Out any CIA agents? No, not me.
"Today (July 5, 2005), Karl's Lawyer states, "
Knowingly, Karl Rove never did anything "W"rong !!!
"KNOWINGLY ?
Name dropping is name dropping when it comes to espionage and national security, babe.
Karl Rove is a Homeland Security Risk.
Tomorrow?
HOW DEEP DOES IT GO ???
...............................................
July 5, 2005, approx. 4:30 pm :: The ultimate Propagandists, CNN's John King and Dana Bash, the fastest talking heads on the planet. BACK PEDDLE, BACK PEDDLE, Get Karl out of this, the ship is sinking, the ship is sinking.Ever wonder if Dana Bash is an alien? She is so gaunt that even when she is on camera she looks like a Spielberg Alien from "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."
...................................................................
Things are taking shape.
How deep does it go?
Bush/Cheney easily.
July 5, 2005. 10:34 PM
There is doubt Karl Rove had the type of security clearance needed to know Ms. Plame was an agent. However, Bush would know. He would be very concerned as Commander and Chief and so would Cheney over a 'loose cannon' regarding the 'Yellow Cake' in Africa in Joe Wilson. It would also be all too easy to be 'just angry enough' with Karl Rove in the Oval Office and the door closed to have a weak moment and reveal to Rove the name of Wilson and Plame in the same breath as a 'traitor husband and wife team' along with her advocating for Joe's next assignment.
How deep does it go?
All the way to the top.
They are all dirty as they come.
People who know him say he is a nice man. It brings into question his friends character as well.
Karl (Marx) Rove.
The Treasonist.
He thumbs his nose at the world, at Bush and the American people.
His ego needs to be stroked so frequently it is fabled the media who want to be closest to priviledge promote The ExxonMobile "The Brain" Commercial in respect of Bush's Brain.
Bush's Idea of Freedom and Democracy does not include Peace !
Before God: A Shi'ite man prays next to an artificial leg on Friday under a scorching sun in Baghdad's Sadr City. A top aide to Iraq's Shi'ite spiritual leader was among 18 people killed in insurgent attacks across the country on Friday, including a bombing near an office of Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari. (Ahmad Al-Rubaye, AFP)
The Price for Freedom should never be this high when the rest of the world is at Peace.
Adnan Hamid held his son, Hassan, as his wife, Zainab, held their daughter, Benin, in May. Hamid?s brother Kaiss (R) also lives with the family in Sadr City. (World Picture News File Photo / Scott Nelson)
The Promises of Holy Men - People Face Adversity in the Faith of Islam
For Iraqi family, scars slow to heal
Casualties of war struggling amid poverty, grief
By Thanassis Cambanis, Globe Staff July 4, 2005
BAGHDAD -- Benin Hamid, now a coquettish 4-year-old, swings the stuffed yellow duck that has been her constant companion in a short life punctuated by an invasion and two uprisings that forced her and her family to flee their home in Sadr City.
She has never named the duck, and it is not clear how well she remembers her older brother and her two sisters, who were killed with her aunt, on the catastrophic day in April 2003 when a mortar struck the house.
Life goes on in the Hamid household, a two-story jumble of rooms that contains four scarred families whose uneven progress since the US invasion mirrors the struggles of many in the Shi'ite Muslim slum where they live.
Casualties of war struggling amid poverty, grief
By Thanassis Cambanis, Globe Staff July 4, 2005
BAGHDAD -- Benin Hamid, now a coquettish 4-year-old, swings the stuffed yellow duck that has been her constant companion in a short life punctuated by an invasion and two uprisings that forced her and her family to flee their home in Sadr City.
She has never named the duck, and it is not clear how well she remembers her older brother and her two sisters, who were killed with her aunt, on the catastrophic day in April 2003 when a mortar struck the house.
Life goes on in the Hamid household, a two-story jumble of rooms that contains four scarred families whose uneven progress since the US invasion mirrors the struggles of many in the Shi'ite Muslim slum where they live.
The Naked Truth for sale.
Hear Novak Tell All!
You pay only $595.
That's right. Only $595.
by Sydney H. SchanbergAugust 23rd, 2005 11:54 AM
Robert Novak, whose "confidential" sources helped him light the match that set off the Plamegate wildfire, is now on the Internet blithely hawking "confidential" sessions with Washington's power elite. He's only asking $595 a person. The invitation says: "This meeting is 100% off the record." The e-mail letter goes on to explain that the secrecy is necessary so that the speakers can speak candidly and tell the truth. The truth, in the nation's capital—that's certainly worth $595.
You pay only $595.
That's right. Only $595.
by Sydney H. SchanbergAugust 23rd, 2005 11:54 AM
Robert Novak, whose "confidential" sources helped him light the match that set off the Plamegate wildfire, is now on the Internet blithely hawking "confidential" sessions with Washington's power elite. He's only asking $595 a person. The invitation says: "This meeting is 100% off the record." The e-mail letter goes on to explain that the secrecy is necessary so that the speakers can speak candidly and tell the truth. The truth, in the nation's capital—that's certainly worth $595.
Novak confirms Rove was Plame source
PETE YOST
Associated Press
Lauren Shay, Associated Press file
Karl Rove, left, and Robert Novak are pictured together in Washington, D.C. in this June 2003 file photo. Novak said for the first time July 11, 2006 that he cooperated with the investigation into who leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame.
WASHINGTON - Now that Karl Rove won't be indicted, now that the president won't fire him, now that it really doesn't matter anymore, more details of the Valerie Plame leak investigation trickle out.
In his latest syndicated column, released Wednesday, columnist Robert Novak revealed his side of the story in the Plame affair, saying Rove was a confirming source for Novak's story outing the CIA officer, underscoring Rove's role in a leak that President Bush once promised to punish.
As Rove's legal problems grew a year ago, the president qualified his earlier pledge to fire anyone involved in the Plame leak, saying it would apply to "someone who committed a crime."
The columnist said he learned of Plame's CIA employment from a source he still refuses to publicly identify, and then confirmed with Rove and then-CIA spokesman Bill Harlow, whose roles in talking to Novak have been previously reported.
Novak said for the first time that prosecutors looking into the leaks already knew his sources when he agreed to disclose them. The columnist was to appear Wednesday on Fox News.
Novak comes late to the Plame game, long after several other reporters talked publicly about the involvement of Rove and of Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis Libby, in leaking the CIA identity of the wife of Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson. Novak says he kept his mouth shut so long because prosecutors asked him to.
A month ago, Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald said he didn't anticipate seeking charges against Rove. Novak wrote that, more recently, Fitzgerald told his lawyer that after 2 1/2 years his investigation of the CIA leak case concerning matters directly relating to Novak has been concluded, freeing him to talk now.
Triggering the criminal investigation that resulted in Libby being charged with perjury, obstruction and lying to the FBI, Novak revealed Plame's CIA employment on July 14, 2003, eight days after her husband went on the attack against the Bush administration.
Initially refusing to identify his sources to the FBI, Novak knew that Fitzgerald had obtained signed waivers from every official who might have provided Novak information about Plame. Despite that, Novak was prepared to resist. He says he relented in early 2004 when it became clear that Fitzgerald "knew the names of my sources."
Novak could still have protected his sources, but his lawyer told him "I was sure to lose a case in the courts at great expense."
In contrast to other reporters whose news organizations footed the bill for lengthy and expensive legal battles, the fact that Novak was a no-show in contentious court proceedings fed a rumor mill.
"Published reports that I took the Fifth Amendment, made a plea bargain with the prosecutors or was a prosecutorial target were all untrue," Novak writes. The facts were simpler. He was telling prosecutors everything he knew, and taking a beating in public for not talking about it.
Keeping quiet had the effect of providing protection for the Bush White House during the 2004 presidential campaign, because the White House had denied Rove played any role in the leak of Plame's CIA identity.
Now that he's finally opening up, Novak is stirring up more trouble, saying without elaboration that his recollection of his conversation with Rove about Plame differs from Rove's. Rove's spokesman says the difference amounts to very little.
"I have revealed Rove's name because his attorney has divulged the substance of our conversation, though in a form different from my recollection," Novak wrote. Novak did not elaborate.
A spokesman for Rove's legal team, Mark Corallo, said that Rove did not even know Plame's name at the time he spoke with Novak, that the columnist called Rove, not the other way around, and that Rove simply replied he had heard the same information that Novak passed along to him regarding Plame.
"There was not much of a difference" between the recollections of Rove and Novak, said Corallo.
Novak says he told Fitzgerald that Harlow of the CIA had confirmed information about Plame.
Harlow declined to comment Tuesday night. But a U.S. intelligence official familiar with the matter denied that Harlow had been a confirming source for Novak on the story. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Harlow repeatedly tried to talk Novak out of running the information about Plame and that Harlow's efforts did not in any way constitute confirming Plame's CIA identity.
The official spoke on condition of anonymity because Harlow may end up being a witness in a separate part of Fitzgerald's investigation, the upcoming criminal trial of Libby.
On the Web:
Chicago Sun-Times report:
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-leak11.html
Associated Press
Lauren Shay, Associated Press file
Karl Rove, left, and Robert Novak are pictured together in Washington, D.C. in this June 2003 file photo. Novak said for the first time July 11, 2006 that he cooperated with the investigation into who leaked the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame.
WASHINGTON - Now that Karl Rove won't be indicted, now that the president won't fire him, now that it really doesn't matter anymore, more details of the Valerie Plame leak investigation trickle out.
In his latest syndicated column, released Wednesday, columnist Robert Novak revealed his side of the story in the Plame affair, saying Rove was a confirming source for Novak's story outing the CIA officer, underscoring Rove's role in a leak that President Bush once promised to punish.
As Rove's legal problems grew a year ago, the president qualified his earlier pledge to fire anyone involved in the Plame leak, saying it would apply to "someone who committed a crime."
The columnist said he learned of Plame's CIA employment from a source he still refuses to publicly identify, and then confirmed with Rove and then-CIA spokesman Bill Harlow, whose roles in talking to Novak have been previously reported.
Novak said for the first time that prosecutors looking into the leaks already knew his sources when he agreed to disclose them. The columnist was to appear Wednesday on Fox News.
Novak comes late to the Plame game, long after several other reporters talked publicly about the involvement of Rove and of Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis Libby, in leaking the CIA identity of the wife of Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson. Novak says he kept his mouth shut so long because prosecutors asked him to.
A month ago, Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald said he didn't anticipate seeking charges against Rove. Novak wrote that, more recently, Fitzgerald told his lawyer that after 2 1/2 years his investigation of the CIA leak case concerning matters directly relating to Novak has been concluded, freeing him to talk now.
Triggering the criminal investigation that resulted in Libby being charged with perjury, obstruction and lying to the FBI, Novak revealed Plame's CIA employment on July 14, 2003, eight days after her husband went on the attack against the Bush administration.
Initially refusing to identify his sources to the FBI, Novak knew that Fitzgerald had obtained signed waivers from every official who might have provided Novak information about Plame. Despite that, Novak was prepared to resist. He says he relented in early 2004 when it became clear that Fitzgerald "knew the names of my sources."
Novak could still have protected his sources, but his lawyer told him "I was sure to lose a case in the courts at great expense."
In contrast to other reporters whose news organizations footed the bill for lengthy and expensive legal battles, the fact that Novak was a no-show in contentious court proceedings fed a rumor mill.
"Published reports that I took the Fifth Amendment, made a plea bargain with the prosecutors or was a prosecutorial target were all untrue," Novak writes. The facts were simpler. He was telling prosecutors everything he knew, and taking a beating in public for not talking about it.
Keeping quiet had the effect of providing protection for the Bush White House during the 2004 presidential campaign, because the White House had denied Rove played any role in the leak of Plame's CIA identity.
Now that he's finally opening up, Novak is stirring up more trouble, saying without elaboration that his recollection of his conversation with Rove about Plame differs from Rove's. Rove's spokesman says the difference amounts to very little.
"I have revealed Rove's name because his attorney has divulged the substance of our conversation, though in a form different from my recollection," Novak wrote. Novak did not elaborate.
A spokesman for Rove's legal team, Mark Corallo, said that Rove did not even know Plame's name at the time he spoke with Novak, that the columnist called Rove, not the other way around, and that Rove simply replied he had heard the same information that Novak passed along to him regarding Plame.
"There was not much of a difference" between the recollections of Rove and Novak, said Corallo.
Novak says he told Fitzgerald that Harlow of the CIA had confirmed information about Plame.
Harlow declined to comment Tuesday night. But a U.S. intelligence official familiar with the matter denied that Harlow had been a confirming source for Novak on the story. The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Harlow repeatedly tried to talk Novak out of running the information about Plame and that Harlow's efforts did not in any way constitute confirming Plame's CIA identity.
The official spoke on condition of anonymity because Harlow may end up being a witness in a separate part of Fitzgerald's investigation, the upcoming criminal trial of Libby.
On the Web:
Chicago Sun-Times report:
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-leak11.html
'Slime and Defend'
By PAUL KRUGMAN (NYT)
732 wordsPublished: October 3, 2003
On July 14, Robert Novak published the now-famous column in which he identified Valerie Plame, the wife of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, as a C.I.A. ''operative on weapons of mass destruction,'' and said ''two senior administration officials'' had told him that she was responsible for her husband's mission to Niger. On that mission, Mr. Wilson concluded -- correctly -- that reports of Iraqi efforts to buy uranium were bogus.
An outraged President Bush immediately demanded the names of those responsible for exposing Ms. Plame. He repeated his father's statement that ''those who betray the trust by exposing the names of our sources'' are ''the most insidious of traitors.'' There are limits to politics, Mr. Bush declared; Mr. Wilson's decision to go public about his mission had embarrassed him, but that was no excuse for actions that were both felonious and unpatriotic.
Everything in the previous paragraph is, of course, false. It's what should have happened, but didn't. Mr. Bush took no action after the Novak column. Before we get bogged down in the details -- which is what the administration hopes will happen -- let's be clear: we already know what the president knew, and when he knew it. Mr. Bush knew, 11 weeks ago, that some of his senior aides had done something utterly inexcusable. But as long as the media were willing to let the story lie -- which, with a few honorable exceptions, like David Corn at The Nation and Knut Royce and Timothy Phelps at Newsday, they were -- he didn't think this outrage required any action.
And now that the C.I.A. has demanded a Justice Department inquiry, the White House's strategy isn't just to stonewall, Nixon-style; as one Republican Congressional aide told The New York Times, it will ''slime and defend.''
The right-wing media slime machine, which tries to assassinate the character of anyone who opposes the right's goals -- hey, I know all about it -- has already swung into action. For example, The Wall Street Journal's editorial page calls Mr. Wilson an ''open opponent of the U.S. war on terror.'' We've grown accustomed to this sort of slur -- and they accuse liberals of lacking civility? -- but let's take a minute to walk through it.
Mr. Wilson never opposed the ''war on terror'' -- he opposed the war in Iraq precisely because it had no obvious relevance to the campaign against terror. He feared that invading a country with no role in 9/11, and no meaningful Al Qaeda links, would divert resources from the pursuit of those who actually attacked America. Many patriots in the military and the intelligence community agreed with him then; even more agree now.
Unlike the self-described patriots now running America, Mr. Wilson has taken personal risks for the sake of his country. In the months before the first gulf war, he stayed on in Baghdad, helping to rescue hundreds of Americans who might otherwise have been held as hostages. The first President Bush lauded him as a ''truly inspiring diplomat'' who exhibited ''courageous leadership.''
In any case, Mr. Wilson's views and character are irrelevant. Someone high in the administration committed a felony and, in the view of the elder Mr. Bush, treason. End of story.
The hypocrisy here is breathtaking. Republicans have repeatedly impugned their opponents' patriotism. Last year Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, said Democrats ''don't want to protect the American people. . . . They will do anything, spend all the time and resources they can, to avoid confronting evil.''
But the true test of patriotism isn't whether you are willing to wave the flag, or agree with whatever the president says. It's whether you are willing to take risks and make sacrifices, including political sacrifices, for the sake of your country. This episode is a test for Mr. Bush and his inner circle: a true patriot wouldn't hesitate about doing the right thing in the Plame affair, whatever the political costs.
Mr. Bush is failing that test.
Correction: Many people, including Paul Bremer in recent testimony and myself in my Sept. 30 column, have linked Churchill's remark about the ''most unsordid act'' to the Marshall Plan. In fact, Churchill was referring to an earlier program, Lend-Lease. But one suspects that he wouldn't have minded the confusion.
By PAUL KRUGMAN (NYT)
732 wordsPublished: October 3, 2003
On July 14, Robert Novak published the now-famous column in which he identified Valerie Plame, the wife of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, as a C.I.A. ''operative on weapons of mass destruction,'' and said ''two senior administration officials'' had told him that she was responsible for her husband's mission to Niger. On that mission, Mr. Wilson concluded -- correctly -- that reports of Iraqi efforts to buy uranium were bogus.
An outraged President Bush immediately demanded the names of those responsible for exposing Ms. Plame. He repeated his father's statement that ''those who betray the trust by exposing the names of our sources'' are ''the most insidious of traitors.'' There are limits to politics, Mr. Bush declared; Mr. Wilson's decision to go public about his mission had embarrassed him, but that was no excuse for actions that were both felonious and unpatriotic.
Everything in the previous paragraph is, of course, false. It's what should have happened, but didn't. Mr. Bush took no action after the Novak column. Before we get bogged down in the details -- which is what the administration hopes will happen -- let's be clear: we already know what the president knew, and when he knew it. Mr. Bush knew, 11 weeks ago, that some of his senior aides had done something utterly inexcusable. But as long as the media were willing to let the story lie -- which, with a few honorable exceptions, like David Corn at The Nation and Knut Royce and Timothy Phelps at Newsday, they were -- he didn't think this outrage required any action.
And now that the C.I.A. has demanded a Justice Department inquiry, the White House's strategy isn't just to stonewall, Nixon-style; as one Republican Congressional aide told The New York Times, it will ''slime and defend.''
The right-wing media slime machine, which tries to assassinate the character of anyone who opposes the right's goals -- hey, I know all about it -- has already swung into action. For example, The Wall Street Journal's editorial page calls Mr. Wilson an ''open opponent of the U.S. war on terror.'' We've grown accustomed to this sort of slur -- and they accuse liberals of lacking civility? -- but let's take a minute to walk through it.
Mr. Wilson never opposed the ''war on terror'' -- he opposed the war in Iraq precisely because it had no obvious relevance to the campaign against terror. He feared that invading a country with no role in 9/11, and no meaningful Al Qaeda links, would divert resources from the pursuit of those who actually attacked America. Many patriots in the military and the intelligence community agreed with him then; even more agree now.
Unlike the self-described patriots now running America, Mr. Wilson has taken personal risks for the sake of his country. In the months before the first gulf war, he stayed on in Baghdad, helping to rescue hundreds of Americans who might otherwise have been held as hostages. The first President Bush lauded him as a ''truly inspiring diplomat'' who exhibited ''courageous leadership.''
In any case, Mr. Wilson's views and character are irrelevant. Someone high in the administration committed a felony and, in the view of the elder Mr. Bush, treason. End of story.
The hypocrisy here is breathtaking. Republicans have repeatedly impugned their opponents' patriotism. Last year Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, said Democrats ''don't want to protect the American people. . . . They will do anything, spend all the time and resources they can, to avoid confronting evil.''
But the true test of patriotism isn't whether you are willing to wave the flag, or agree with whatever the president says. It's whether you are willing to take risks and make sacrifices, including political sacrifices, for the sake of your country. This episode is a test for Mr. Bush and his inner circle: a true patriot wouldn't hesitate about doing the right thing in the Plame affair, whatever the political costs.
Mr. Bush is failing that test.
Correction: Many people, including Paul Bremer in recent testimony and myself in my Sept. 30 column, have linked Churchill's remark about the ''most unsordid act'' to the Marshall Plan. In fact, Churchill was referring to an earlier program, Lend-Lease. But one suspects that he wouldn't have minded the confusion.
In this photograph taken in June 2003, Karl Rove, senior advisor to President Bush and Robert Novak are pictured together at a party marking the 40th anniversary of Novak's newspaper column at the Army Navy Club in Washington DC.
Karl Rove and Bob Novak
What is there to understand here?
You have a group of private sector losers turned treasonists because it is the only way they can have their wealth and keep it, too.
Cheney and Halliburton.
There are questions about all these relationhips?
Rove Reportedly Held Phone Talk on C.I.A. Officer
By DAVID JOHNSTONand RICHARD W. STEVENSON
WASHINGTON,
July 14 - Karl Rove, the White House senior adviser, spoke with the columnist Robert D. Novak as he was preparing an article in July 2003 that identified a C.I.A. officer who was undercover, someone who has been officially briefed on the matter said.
Mr. Rove has told investigators that he learned from the columnist the name of the C.I.A. officer, who was referred to by her maiden name, Valerie Plame, and the circumstances in which her husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, traveled to Africa to investigate possible uranium sales to Iraq, the person said.
After hearing Mr. Novak's account, the person who has been briefed on the matter said, Mr. Rove told the columnist: "I heard that, too."
The previously undisclosed telephone conversation, which took place on July 8, 2003, was initiated by Mr. Novak, the person who has been briefed on the matter said.
Six days later, Mr. Novak's syndicated column reported that two senior administration officials had told him that Mr. Wilson's "wife had suggested sending him" to Africa. That column was the first instance in which Ms. Wilson was publicly identified as a C.I.A. operative.
The column provoked angry demands for an investigation into who disclosed Ms. Wilson's name to Mr. Novak. The Justice Department appointed Patrick J. Fitzgerald, a top federal prosecutor in Chicago, to lead the inquiry. Mr. Rove said in an interview with CNN last year that he did not know the C.I.A. officer's name and did not leak it.
The person who provided the information about Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Novak declined to be identified, citing requests by Mr. Fitzgerald that no one discuss the case. The person discussed the matter in the belief that Mr. Rove was truthful in saying that he had not disclosed Ms. Wilson's identity.
On Oct. 1, 2003, Mr. Novak wrote another column in which he described calling two officials who were his sources for the earlier column. The first source, whose identity has not been revealed, provided the outlines of the story and was described by Mr. Novak as "no partisan gunslinger." Mr. Novak wrote that when he called a second official for confirmation, the source said, "Oh, you know about it.
"That second source was Mr. Rove, the person briefed on the matter said. Mr. Rove's account to investigators about what he told Mr. Novak was similar in its message although the White House adviser's recollection of the exact words was slightly different. Asked by investigators how he knew enough to leave Mr. Novak with the impression that his information was accurate, Mr. Rove said he had heard parts of the story from other journalists but had not heard Ms. Wilson's name.
Robert D. Luskin, Mr. Rove's lawyer, said Thursday, "Any pertinent information has been provided to the prosecutor." Mr. Luskin has previously said prosecutors have advised Mr. Rove that he is not a target in the case, which means he is not likely to be charged with a crime.In a brief conversation on Thursday, Mr. Novak declined to discuss the matter. It is unclear if Mr. Novak has testified to the grand jury, and if he has whether his account is consistent with Mr. Rove's.
The conversation between Mr. Novak and Mr. Rove seemed almost certain to intensify the question about whether one of Mr. Bush's closest political advisers played a role in what appeared to be an effort to undermine Mr. Wilson's credibility after he challenged the veracity of a key point in Mr. Bush's 2003 State of the Union speech, saying Saddam Hussein had sought nuclear fuel in Africa.
The conversation with Mr. Novak took place three days before Mr. Rove spoke with Matthew Cooper, a Time magazine reporter, whose e-mail message about their brief talk reignited the issue. In the message, whose contents were reported by Newsweek this week, Mr. Cooper told his bureau chief that Mr. Rove had talked about Ms. Wilson, although not by name.
After saying in 2003 that it was "ridiculous" to suggest that Mr. Rove had any role in the disclosure of Ms. Wilson's name, Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, has refused in recent days to discuss any specifics of the case. But he has suggested that President Bush continues to support Mr. Rove. On Thursday Mr. Rove was at Mr. Bush's side on a trip to Indianapolis.
As the political debate about Mr. Rove grows more heated, Mr. Fitzgerald is in what he has said are the final stages of his investigation into whether anyone at the White House violated a criminal statute that under certain circumstances makes it a crime for a government official to disclose the names of covert operatives like Ms. Wilson.
The law requires that the official knowingly identify an officer serving in a covert position. The person who has been briefed on the matter said Mr. Rove neither knew Ms. Wilson's name nor that she was a covert officer.
Mr. Fitzgerald has questioned a number of high-level administration officials. Mr. Rove has testified three times to the grand jury. I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, has also testified. So has former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell. The prosecutor also interviewed Mr. Bush, in his White House office, and Mr. Cheney, but they were not under oath.
The disclosure of Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Novak raises a question the White House has never addressed: whether Mr. Rove ever discussed that conversation, or his exchange with Mr. Cooper, with the president. Mr. Bush has said several times that he wants all members of the White House staff to cooperate fully with Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation.
In June 2004, at Sea Island, Ga., soon after Mr. Cheney met with investigators in the case, Mr. Bush was asked at a news conference whether "you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found" to have leaked the agent's name.
"Yes," Mr. Bush said. "And that's up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts.
"Mr. Novak began his conversation with Mr. Rove by asking about the promotion of Frances Fragos Townsend, who had been a close aide to Janet Reno when she was attorney general, to a senior counterterrorism job at the White House, the person who was briefed on the matter said.
Mr. Novak then turned to the subject of Ms. Wilson, identifying her by name, the person said. In an Op-Ed article for The New York Times on July 6, 2003, Mr. Wilson suggested that he had been sent to Niger because of Mr. Cheney's interest in the matter. But Mr. Novak told Mr. Rove he knew that Mr. Wilson had been sent at the urging of Ms. Wilson, the person who had been briefed on the matter said.
Mr. Rove's allies have said that he did not call reporters with information about the case, rebutting the theory that the White House was actively seeking to intimidate or punish Mr. Wilson by harming his wife's career. They have also emphasized that Mr. Rove appeared not to know anything about Ms. Wilson other than that she worked at the C.I.A. and was married to Mr. Wilson.
This is not the first time Mr. Rove has been linked to a leak reported by Mr. Novak. In 1992, Mr. Rove was fired from the Texas campaign to re-elect the first President Bush because of suspicions that he had leaked information to Mr. Novak about shortfalls in the Texas organization's fund-raising. Both Mr. Rove and Mr. Novak have denied that Mr. Rove had been the source.
Mr. Novak's July 14, 2003, column was published against a backdrop in which White House officials were clearly agitated by Mr. Wilson's assertion, in his Op-Ed article, that the administration had "twisted" intelligence about the threat from Iraq.
But the White House was also deeply concerned about Mr. Wilson's suggestion that he had gone to Africa to carry out a mission that originated with Mr. Cheney. At the time, Mr. Cheney's earlier statements about Iraq's banned weapons were coming under fire as it became clearer that the United States would find no stockpiles of chemical or biological weapons and that Mr. Hussein's nuclear program was not far advanced.
Mr. Novak wrote that the decision to send Mr. Wilson "was made at a routinely low level" and was based on what later turned out to be fake documents that had come to the United States through Italy.
Many aspects of Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation remain shrouded in secrecy. It is unclear who Mr. Novak's other source might be or how that source learned of Ms. Wilson's role as a C.I.A. official. By itself, the disclosure that Mr. Rove had spoken to a second journalist about Ms. Wilson may not necessarily have a bearing on his exposure to any criminal charge in the case.
But it seems certain to add substantially to the political maelstrom that has engulfed the White House this week after the reports that Mr. Rove had discussed the matter with Mr. Cooper, the Time reporter.
Mr. Cooper's e-mail message to his editors, in which he described his discussion with Mr. Rove, was among documents that were turned over by Time executives recently to comply with a subpoena from Mr. Fitzgerald. A reporter for The New York Times, Judith Miller, who never wrote about the Wilson case, refused to cooperate with the investigation and was jailed last week for contempt of court. In addition to focusing new attention on Mr. Rove and whether he can survive the political fallout, it is sure to create new partisan pressure on Mr. Bush. Already, Democrats have been pressing the president either to live up to his promises to rid his administration of anyone found to have leaked the name of a covert operative or to explain why he does not believe Mr. Rove's actions subject him to dismissal.
The Rove-Novak exchange also leaves Mr. McClellan, the White House spokesman, in an increasingly awkward situation. Two years ago he repeatedly assured reporters that neither Mr. Rove nor several other administration officials were responsible for the leak.The case has also threatened to become a distraction as Mr. Bush struggles to keep his second-term agenda on track and as he prepares for one of the most pivotal battles of his presidency, over the confirmation of a Supreme Court justice.
As Democrats have been demanding that Mr. Rove resign or provide a public explanation, the political machine that Mr. Rove built to bolster Mr. Bush and advance his agenda has cranked up to defend its creator. The Republican National Committee has mounted an aggressive campaign to cast Mr. Rove as blameless and to paint the matter as a partisan dispute driven not by legality, ethics or national security concerns, but by a penchant among Democrats to resort to harsh personal attacks.
But Mr. Bush said Wednesday that he would not prejudge Mr. Rove's role, and Mr. Rove was seated conspicuously just behind the president at a cabinet meeting, an image of business as usual. On Thursday, on the trip with Mr. Bush to Indiana, Mr. Rove grinned his way through a brief encounter with reporters after getting off Air Force One.
Mr. Bush's White House has been characterized by loyalty and long tenures, but no one has been at Mr. Bush's side in his journey through politics longer than Mr. Rove, who has been his strategist, enforcer, policy guru, ambassador to social and religious conservatives and friend since they met in Washington in the early 1970's. People who know Mr. Bush said it was unlikely, if not unthinkable, that he would seek Mr. Rove's departure barring a criminal indictment.
David E. Sanger contributed reporting for this article.
WASHINGTON,
July 14 - Karl Rove, the White House senior adviser, spoke with the columnist Robert D. Novak as he was preparing an article in July 2003 that identified a C.I.A. officer who was undercover, someone who has been officially briefed on the matter said.
Mr. Rove has told investigators that he learned from the columnist the name of the C.I.A. officer, who was referred to by her maiden name, Valerie Plame, and the circumstances in which her husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, traveled to Africa to investigate possible uranium sales to Iraq, the person said.
After hearing Mr. Novak's account, the person who has been briefed on the matter said, Mr. Rove told the columnist: "I heard that, too."
The previously undisclosed telephone conversation, which took place on July 8, 2003, was initiated by Mr. Novak, the person who has been briefed on the matter said.
Six days later, Mr. Novak's syndicated column reported that two senior administration officials had told him that Mr. Wilson's "wife had suggested sending him" to Africa. That column was the first instance in which Ms. Wilson was publicly identified as a C.I.A. operative.
The column provoked angry demands for an investigation into who disclosed Ms. Wilson's name to Mr. Novak. The Justice Department appointed Patrick J. Fitzgerald, a top federal prosecutor in Chicago, to lead the inquiry. Mr. Rove said in an interview with CNN last year that he did not know the C.I.A. officer's name and did not leak it.
The person who provided the information about Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Novak declined to be identified, citing requests by Mr. Fitzgerald that no one discuss the case. The person discussed the matter in the belief that Mr. Rove was truthful in saying that he had not disclosed Ms. Wilson's identity.
On Oct. 1, 2003, Mr. Novak wrote another column in which he described calling two officials who were his sources for the earlier column. The first source, whose identity has not been revealed, provided the outlines of the story and was described by Mr. Novak as "no partisan gunslinger." Mr. Novak wrote that when he called a second official for confirmation, the source said, "Oh, you know about it.
"That second source was Mr. Rove, the person briefed on the matter said. Mr. Rove's account to investigators about what he told Mr. Novak was similar in its message although the White House adviser's recollection of the exact words was slightly different. Asked by investigators how he knew enough to leave Mr. Novak with the impression that his information was accurate, Mr. Rove said he had heard parts of the story from other journalists but had not heard Ms. Wilson's name.
Robert D. Luskin, Mr. Rove's lawyer, said Thursday, "Any pertinent information has been provided to the prosecutor." Mr. Luskin has previously said prosecutors have advised Mr. Rove that he is not a target in the case, which means he is not likely to be charged with a crime.In a brief conversation on Thursday, Mr. Novak declined to discuss the matter. It is unclear if Mr. Novak has testified to the grand jury, and if he has whether his account is consistent with Mr. Rove's.
The conversation between Mr. Novak and Mr. Rove seemed almost certain to intensify the question about whether one of Mr. Bush's closest political advisers played a role in what appeared to be an effort to undermine Mr. Wilson's credibility after he challenged the veracity of a key point in Mr. Bush's 2003 State of the Union speech, saying Saddam Hussein had sought nuclear fuel in Africa.
The conversation with Mr. Novak took place three days before Mr. Rove spoke with Matthew Cooper, a Time magazine reporter, whose e-mail message about their brief talk reignited the issue. In the message, whose contents were reported by Newsweek this week, Mr. Cooper told his bureau chief that Mr. Rove had talked about Ms. Wilson, although not by name.
After saying in 2003 that it was "ridiculous" to suggest that Mr. Rove had any role in the disclosure of Ms. Wilson's name, Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, has refused in recent days to discuss any specifics of the case. But he has suggested that President Bush continues to support Mr. Rove. On Thursday Mr. Rove was at Mr. Bush's side on a trip to Indianapolis.
As the political debate about Mr. Rove grows more heated, Mr. Fitzgerald is in what he has said are the final stages of his investigation into whether anyone at the White House violated a criminal statute that under certain circumstances makes it a crime for a government official to disclose the names of covert operatives like Ms. Wilson.
The law requires that the official knowingly identify an officer serving in a covert position. The person who has been briefed on the matter said Mr. Rove neither knew Ms. Wilson's name nor that she was a covert officer.
Mr. Fitzgerald has questioned a number of high-level administration officials. Mr. Rove has testified three times to the grand jury. I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, has also testified. So has former Secretary of State Colin L. Powell. The prosecutor also interviewed Mr. Bush, in his White House office, and Mr. Cheney, but they were not under oath.
The disclosure of Mr. Rove's conversation with Mr. Novak raises a question the White House has never addressed: whether Mr. Rove ever discussed that conversation, or his exchange with Mr. Cooper, with the president. Mr. Bush has said several times that he wants all members of the White House staff to cooperate fully with Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation.
In June 2004, at Sea Island, Ga., soon after Mr. Cheney met with investigators in the case, Mr. Bush was asked at a news conference whether "you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found" to have leaked the agent's name.
"Yes," Mr. Bush said. "And that's up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts.
"Mr. Novak began his conversation with Mr. Rove by asking about the promotion of Frances Fragos Townsend, who had been a close aide to Janet Reno when she was attorney general, to a senior counterterrorism job at the White House, the person who was briefed on the matter said.
Mr. Novak then turned to the subject of Ms. Wilson, identifying her by name, the person said. In an Op-Ed article for The New York Times on July 6, 2003, Mr. Wilson suggested that he had been sent to Niger because of Mr. Cheney's interest in the matter. But Mr. Novak told Mr. Rove he knew that Mr. Wilson had been sent at the urging of Ms. Wilson, the person who had been briefed on the matter said.
Mr. Rove's allies have said that he did not call reporters with information about the case, rebutting the theory that the White House was actively seeking to intimidate or punish Mr. Wilson by harming his wife's career. They have also emphasized that Mr. Rove appeared not to know anything about Ms. Wilson other than that she worked at the C.I.A. and was married to Mr. Wilson.
This is not the first time Mr. Rove has been linked to a leak reported by Mr. Novak. In 1992, Mr. Rove was fired from the Texas campaign to re-elect the first President Bush because of suspicions that he had leaked information to Mr. Novak about shortfalls in the Texas organization's fund-raising. Both Mr. Rove and Mr. Novak have denied that Mr. Rove had been the source.
Mr. Novak's July 14, 2003, column was published against a backdrop in which White House officials were clearly agitated by Mr. Wilson's assertion, in his Op-Ed article, that the administration had "twisted" intelligence about the threat from Iraq.
But the White House was also deeply concerned about Mr. Wilson's suggestion that he had gone to Africa to carry out a mission that originated with Mr. Cheney. At the time, Mr. Cheney's earlier statements about Iraq's banned weapons were coming under fire as it became clearer that the United States would find no stockpiles of chemical or biological weapons and that Mr. Hussein's nuclear program was not far advanced.
Mr. Novak wrote that the decision to send Mr. Wilson "was made at a routinely low level" and was based on what later turned out to be fake documents that had come to the United States through Italy.
Many aspects of Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation remain shrouded in secrecy. It is unclear who Mr. Novak's other source might be or how that source learned of Ms. Wilson's role as a C.I.A. official. By itself, the disclosure that Mr. Rove had spoken to a second journalist about Ms. Wilson may not necessarily have a bearing on his exposure to any criminal charge in the case.
But it seems certain to add substantially to the political maelstrom that has engulfed the White House this week after the reports that Mr. Rove had discussed the matter with Mr. Cooper, the Time reporter.
Mr. Cooper's e-mail message to his editors, in which he described his discussion with Mr. Rove, was among documents that were turned over by Time executives recently to comply with a subpoena from Mr. Fitzgerald. A reporter for The New York Times, Judith Miller, who never wrote about the Wilson case, refused to cooperate with the investigation and was jailed last week for contempt of court. In addition to focusing new attention on Mr. Rove and whether he can survive the political fallout, it is sure to create new partisan pressure on Mr. Bush. Already, Democrats have been pressing the president either to live up to his promises to rid his administration of anyone found to have leaked the name of a covert operative or to explain why he does not believe Mr. Rove's actions subject him to dismissal.
The Rove-Novak exchange also leaves Mr. McClellan, the White House spokesman, in an increasingly awkward situation. Two years ago he repeatedly assured reporters that neither Mr. Rove nor several other administration officials were responsible for the leak.The case has also threatened to become a distraction as Mr. Bush struggles to keep his second-term agenda on track and as he prepares for one of the most pivotal battles of his presidency, over the confirmation of a Supreme Court justice.
As Democrats have been demanding that Mr. Rove resign or provide a public explanation, the political machine that Mr. Rove built to bolster Mr. Bush and advance his agenda has cranked up to defend its creator. The Republican National Committee has mounted an aggressive campaign to cast Mr. Rove as blameless and to paint the matter as a partisan dispute driven not by legality, ethics or national security concerns, but by a penchant among Democrats to resort to harsh personal attacks.
But Mr. Bush said Wednesday that he would not prejudge Mr. Rove's role, and Mr. Rove was seated conspicuously just behind the president at a cabinet meeting, an image of business as usual. On Thursday, on the trip with Mr. Bush to Indiana, Mr. Rove grinned his way through a brief encounter with reporters after getting off Air Force One.
Mr. Bush's White House has been characterized by loyalty and long tenures, but no one has been at Mr. Bush's side in his journey through politics longer than Mr. Rove, who has been his strategist, enforcer, policy guru, ambassador to social and religious conservatives and friend since they met in Washington in the early 1970's. People who know Mr. Bush said it was unlikely, if not unthinkable, that he would seek Mr. Rove's departure barring a criminal indictment.
David E. Sanger contributed reporting for this article.
Grand Jury set to expire in October
Rove assistant appears before grand jury
RICHARD B. SCHMITT
Los Angeles Times
WASHINGTON - A top assistant to White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove appeared last week before the federal grand jury investigating possible criminal wrongdoing by the Bush administration in the exposing of a CIA operative, a person familiar with the case said Tuesday.
The interest in Susan Ralston, Rove's longtime executive assistant, was unclear; but it comes as special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald has been focusing on differences in witness statements made to federal agents and the grand jury investigating who revealed the identity of Valerie Plame.
Ralston's appearance Friday followed grand-jury testimony last month by Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper, who recounted a conversation he had with Rove in July 2003 in which Rove alluded to Plame without mentioning her by name. Cooper and columnist Robert Novak subsequently wrote stories identifying Plame after talking with administration officials.
It can be a violation of federal law to disclose the name of a covert CIA agent. Some people close to the case have said they believe Fitzgerald has begun focusing on whether other laws may have been broken, such as perjury, obstruction of justice or making "misstatements" to investigators.
Cooper's version of his conversation with Rove differed from the version Rove has offered investigators. Some people close to the case said Fitzgerald apparently was seeking to resolve the differences in the two stories.
A person familiar with Cooper's testimony said Ralston's name did not come up during the reporter's grand-jury appearance. That indicates Fitzgerald may be interested in her testimony for other reasons.
Ralston could not be reached for comment.
The prosecutor earlier said in court papers that his investigation essentially was complete as of last October except for the testimony of Cooper and New York Times reporter Judith Miller. Miller was jailed four weeks ago for refusing to cooperate and remains incarcerated. Fitzgerald, who has been leading the investigation since December 2003, has not indicated when he intends to be done. The grand jury that has been hearing testimony is set to expire in October, although it could be renewed.
WHY isn't Steven Hadley involved with this investigation? The History of the SAME people is too significant to overlook.
Julian Borger Names Karl Rove
"Several of the journalists are saying privately 'yes it was Karl Rove who I talked to.'"
Prior Reputation of Karl Rove and Robert Novak (They are subversives by reputation):
"Sources close to the former president say Rove was fired from the 1992 Bush presidential campaign after he planted a negative story with columnist Robert Novak about dissatisfaction with campaign fundraising chief and Bush loyalist Robert Mosbacher Jr."
Mr. Rove told the columnist: "I heard that, too."
But, Karl, who did you hear that from?
And what is with Libby's Color Coded Folders to keep the Sources Straight.
A source close to Rove, who declined to be identified because he did not wish to run afoul of the prosecutor or government investigators, added that there was "absolutely no inconsistency" between Cooper's e-mail and what Rove has testified to during his three grand-jury appearances in the case. "A fair reading of the e-mail makes clear that the information conveyed was not part of an organized effort to disclose Plame's identity, but was an effort to discourage Time from publishing things that turned out to be false," the source said, referring to claims in circulation at the time that Cheney and high-level CIA officials arranged for Wilson's trip to Africa.
Rove told then-deputy national security adviser Stephen Hadley in the July 11, 2003, e-mail that he had spoken with Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper and tried to caution him away from some allegations that CIA operative Valerie Plame's husband was making about faulty Iraq intelligence.July, 14, 2003 - Novak's Article stating Valerie Plame and outing her as a CIA Agent.What goes on between Novak and the Bushes?
Robert Novak has a security clearance to the USA for purposes of pundancy?
The plot thickens and it seems to me everyone is running for cover.
"Several of the journalists are saying privately 'yes it was Karl Rove who I talked to.'"
Prior Reputation of Karl Rove and Robert Novak (They are subversives by reputation):
"Sources close to the former president say Rove was fired from the 1992 Bush presidential campaign after he planted a negative story with columnist Robert Novak about dissatisfaction with campaign fundraising chief and Bush loyalist Robert Mosbacher Jr."
Mr. Rove told the columnist: "I heard that, too."
But, Karl, who did you hear that from?
And what is with Libby's Color Coded Folders to keep the Sources Straight.
A source close to Rove, who declined to be identified because he did not wish to run afoul of the prosecutor or government investigators, added that there was "absolutely no inconsistency" between Cooper's e-mail and what Rove has testified to during his three grand-jury appearances in the case. "A fair reading of the e-mail makes clear that the information conveyed was not part of an organized effort to disclose Plame's identity, but was an effort to discourage Time from publishing things that turned out to be false," the source said, referring to claims in circulation at the time that Cheney and high-level CIA officials arranged for Wilson's trip to Africa.
Rove told then-deputy national security adviser Stephen Hadley in the July 11, 2003, e-mail that he had spoken with Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper and tried to caution him away from some allegations that CIA operative Valerie Plame's husband was making about faulty Iraq intelligence.July, 14, 2003 - Novak's Article stating Valerie Plame and outing her as a CIA Agent.What goes on between Novak and the Bushes?
Robert Novak has a security clearance to the USA for purposes of pundancy?
The plot thickens and it seems to me everyone is running for cover.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)