Tag: Fitzgerald

Woodward Apologizes, Cheney Speaks

This is just getting silly now. I say just quit now and forget anything ever happened. There will be no end, there will be no conclusion. There’ll always be someone who’s not talking. Bob Woodward says he knew of Valerie Plame a month before Libby supposedly leaked her identity. It’s kinda hard for Libby to be the source of the leak when others knew of it before he had a chance to “leak.”

Bob Woodward apologized to The Washington Post yesterday for failing to reveal for more than two years that a senior Bush administration official had told him about CIA operative Valerie Plame, even as an investigation of who disclosed her identity mushroomed into a national scandal.

Woodward, an assistant managing editor and best-selling author, said he told Executive Editor Leonard Downie Jr. that he held back the information because he was worried about being subpoenaed by Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special counsel leading the investigation.

“I apologized because I should have told him about this much sooner,” Woodward, who testified in the CIA leak investigation Monday, said in an interview. “I explained in detail that I was trying to protect my sources. That’s job number one in a case like this.”


No shit ya shoulda spoke up earlier. I can understand where he’s coming from though. I can’t say that I’d be too enthused about revealing new information in an investigation of that magnitude. I’d probably keep my mouth shut too, but this isn’t about me. Scott at ScrappleFace thinks special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald may be close to discovering who told Valerie Plame that she was an undercover CIA agent. Could it be Woodward? Sure, I don’t see why not. heh.

Don Surber is happy to see Dick Cheney speak out against the various lies about the Bush administration produced by those mostly in the democratic party. It’s definately a good thing to see. If I were in control I’d be out there blasting these guys all the time, Bush and Cheney have been too quiet until recently. From Don Surber:

Sixty years ago, such a speech would not be necessary. People understood the need to put partisanship aside and to rally behind our troops. In Vietnam, I was told by many that they would support the military if our nation were ever attacked.
That too has now been proved to be a lie.

Reuters via Yahoo News on Cheney’s speech:

“The president and I cannot prevent certain politicians from losing their memory, or their backbone — but we’re not going to sit by and let them rewrite history,” said Cheney, a principal architect of the war and a focus of Democratic allegations the administration misrepresented intelligence on Iraq’s weapons program.

Cheney said the suggestion Bush or any member of the administration misled Americans before the war “is one of the most dishonest and reprehensible charges ever aired in this city.”

“Some of the most irresponsible comments have, of course, come from politicians who actually voted in favor of authorizing force against
Saddam Hussein,” he said in a speech to the conservative Frontiers of Freedom Institute.

Way to go Mr. Vice President. Get right at the heart of the matter and try not to offend anyone. The Washington Post has a little on the speech by Cheney now too.

Lots of blog coverage on Woodward:
Ace of Spades HQ
Michelle Malkin
Outside The Beltway
Wizbang
Big Brass Blog
Decision ’08
NewsBusters

And blogs on Cheney:
The Belgravia Dispatch
Just One Minute
Michelle Malkin
Pundit Guy

This post is linked at Cao’s Blog, Jo’s Cafe, Euphoric Reality, The Political Teen, TMH’s Bacon Bits and Stop the ACLU.

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Scooter Libby Not So “Lucky”

The NYT is reporting that Karl Rove, Bush’s deputy chief of staff and a senior advisor, won’t be indicted in the Plame case. He will remain under investigation though, lucky him.

Sooter Libby Jr., Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, will be indicted on charges of “making false statements to the grand jury in the C.I.A. leak inquiry”.

WASHINGTON, Oct. 27 – Lawyers in the C.I.A. leak case said Thursday that they expected I. Lewis Libby Jr., Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, to be indicted on Friday, charged with making false statements to the grand jury.

Karl Rove, President Bush’s senior adviser and deputy chief of staff, will not be charged on Friday, but will remain under investigation, people briefed officially about the case said. As a result, they said, the special counsel in the case, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, was likely to extend the term of the federal grand jury beyond its scheduled expiration on Friday.

As rumors coursed through the capital, Mr. Fitzgerald gave no public signal of how he intended to proceed, further intensifying the anxiety that has gripped the White House and left partisans on both sides of the political aisle holding their breath.

Being indicted doesn’t mean guilty. Basically, the prosecutors feel they’ve got enough on Libby to link him to crimes he’s suspected of commiting. They just need more time before they’re confident enough in their evidence to indict Rove.

None of this is even known to be 100% true yet. It sounds very plausible though, along with a few thousand other possibilities. I almost hope it goes down that way. I expect aggression and general outrage from left leaning bloggers if Rove does “get lucky” and comes out still under investigation. Should be a good time.

This post kindly linked at bRight & Early, The Political Teen, Cao’s Blog, MacStansbury, Jo’s Cafe, Adam’s Blog, and NIF. Also linked at Real Teen, who’s hosting his first true open trackback party.

UPDATE 1: ABC news has picked this up now too. h/t Dan @ Riehl World View.

UPDATE 2: NBC News is confirming (along with WaPo now) that Libby will be indicted today while Rove will remain under investigation. h/t Real Teen.

James Joyner of OTB notices that most news sources are reporting on the non-indictment of Rove rather than the indicement of Libby. Sounds like the liberal media trying to ruffle feathers again. Conservative Cat gets serious about Plamegate and looks at how cats would make better military leaders than humans, sort of.

UPDATE 3: I caught Patrick Fitzgerald explaining all the charges in a press conference while I was at lunch. The Political Teen has the video. I think Fitzgerald did a nice job explaining everything and why Libby is being indicted. The Q&A was basically worthless, Fitzy didn’t really answer much. It’s not his fault reporters ask questions they already know the answers to though, or non-answers in this case.

And Bush is supposed to speak about the Libby indictment at 3:50 PM ET. So in like 2 minutes.

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