Libby: No Plot, No Crime in CIA Leak

[sabra]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6214003,00.html

Libby: No Plot, No Crime in CIA Leak

WASHINGTON (AP) - Attorneys for former White House aide I. Lewis ``Scooter'' Libby dismissed the idea of a White House plot to leak a CIA operative's identity to the press and said Libby plans to tell jurors at his perjury trial that he had no reason to lie.

...

``It is doubtful that anyone committed an 'underlying crime' here,'' Libby's lawyers wrote. ``The government's investigation began as an effort to discover which government officials had 'leaked' Ms. Wilson's affiliation with the CIA to Mr. Novak. After years of overheated media speculation that Ms. Wilson's identity had been publicly revealed as part of a White House plot to wreak revenge on her husband, Mr. Armitage (who was no White House ally) finally confirmed in August 2006 that he was Mr. Novak's primary source.''

Libby's attorneys said Fitzgerald has perpetuated the notion that Libby was the source and said the former aide should be allowed to tell jurors that he was not - and thus had no reason to lie to the FBI or grand jury.

``Members of the jury will have heard for years that Mr. Libby leaked classified information about Valerie Wilson's affiliation with the CIA, due to inaccurate reports in the press,'' defense attorneys wrote. ``Indeed, the government has contributed to the likely misimpressions that potential jurors will have about this case.''

[thereismore]

1. I thought the crime was perjury and obstruction of justice...was I dreaming?

[texpatriot2004]

2. No you weren't dreaming. That's what I heard too. nm

[Nickster]

3. He had no reason to lie, but yet he did......n/t

[Catrina]

5. ~ lol ~

True ~ I feel confident Fitzgerald will continue to point that out to the jury.

As for their claim about Armitage, it's laughable. The Feds knew about Armitage before Fitz was even on the case, and yet, the CIA still insisted on an investigation to find out who leaked her name.

[rodeodance]

4. I think Fitz is really after Cheney. Just a feeling (and will go thru Libby

to get him)

[gratuitous]

6. Oh well, if the defendant says no crime was committed . . .

Waitasecond. Thought I was going to get dizzy from the circular reasoning: It wasn't a crime, so why would I lie about not doing something that I didn't think was a crime? Zzzzwing!

Nice try, uh, Scooter.

[Missy Vixen]

7. Like we'd believe anything his defense attorneys have to say

Yeah, Scooter. We know you're just wrongly accused. Patrick Fitzgerald took your lunch money and shoved you in a mud puddle, too.

Won't anyone call the WAAAAAmbulance?

Julie
still president for life of the PFEB

[Peace Patriot]

8. The "government" (Fitzgerald) has been more tight-lipped in public on

this case, than any other prosecution in living memory (--or history, for that matter).

"...the government has contributed to the likely misimpressions that potential jurors will have about this case.'' --Libby's lawyers wrote.

Total crap. Positively Rovian in its use of the "Big Lie" technique.

I think we should continue to hold out the possibility that Libby has been thrown to the wolves (or will be). Even the Democrats (some of them) seem to be playing along with the game of protecting Bush/Cheney from more exposure of the worst list of "high crimes and misdemeanors" we have ever seen in a U.S. government, including treason charges--treason at the very heart of our government. So it is very hard to gage what is really going on. I tend to think that Rumsfeld was the mastermind (though Cheney is the most visible), and I thought it was interesting that he was the first of Bush's puppetmasters to go. I think it's entirely possible that his departure had nothing to do with the Iraq War (in any obvious way), but had to do with his central role in outing not just Valerie Plame but also the entire WMD counter-proliferation network that she headed (Brewster-Jennings) (--an act that put all of our covert counter-proliferation agents/contacts around the world at great risk of getting killed, and disabled all projects--an act of vengeance (not to mention treason) that was way, way out of proportion to the provocation--an ex-ambassador's dissenting op-ed piece in the NYT). Cheney is not much of a thinker or strategist (except when it comes to padding his own pocket). But Rumsfeld is. The Plame/BJ outingS, and what may really lay behind them, smells more of Rumsfeld than of Cheney, and I think may have involved a plot gone awry, to PLANT nuke weapons evidence in Iraq, after the invasion, to be "found" by the U.S. troops who were looking for WMDs (notably accompanied by Judith Miller), in order to justify the war, to cement Bush/Blair's political positions, and possibly also to discredit the CIA (--to make it more purge-able). But something went wrong. Somebody detected and foiled this Bushite plot to plant the weapons. This would explain the evident panic among top Bushites, in the weeks of late June through July 2003, with the high risk action of outing an entire CIA network, and involvement of so many reporters (journalist witnesses to treason) in trying to get it done (outing of Plame/BJ) quickly.

There is also the extraordinary coincidence of the highly suspicious death of the Brits' chief WMD expert, David Kelly, the same week. Kelly began whistleblowing to the BBC about the "sexed up" pre-war intel, in late May. He was discovered, interrogated at a "safe house" and threatened with the Official Secrets Act, in late June. And here is the July sequence. July 6: Wilson publishes his article. July 7: Blair is informed that Kelly "could say some uncomfortable things" (could say, not HAD said). July 14: Plame outed, by Novak. July 18: Kelly found dead near his home (slashed wrist, one minor artery); his office and computers are searched. July 22: The entire Brewster-Jennings network is outed (also by Novak).

Whatever was going on, the bits of what we know seem to stick up like the tips of icebergs, holding deep and lethal secrets.

"'It is doubtful that anyone committed an "underlying crime" here,'' Libby's lawyers wrote. Well, that is just laughable on its face. But the next part is interesting....

"'The government's investigation began as an effort to discover which government officials had "leaked" Ms. Wilson's affiliation with the CIA to Mr. Novak. After years of overheated media speculation that Ms. Wilson's identity had been publicly revealed as part of a White House plot to wreak revenge on her husband, Mr. Armitage (who was no White House ally) finally confirmed in August 2006 that he was Mr. Novak's primary source.''' (--Libby's lawyers)

If, as I tend to believe, this "overheated media speculation"--that the Plame/BJ outingS were chiefly for revenge on Wilson for his article--was actually fed by the White House disinformationsists (as a cover story), to throw suspicion off the REAL reasons for the outingS (to kill those who had foiled the WMD-planting scheme, and to frighten--and possibly to capture and torture--others)--then the strategy of using that cover story to defend Libby is almost funny, if it wasn't connected to such grave crimes. And I can imagine Dick Cheney, furiously marking up a newsclipping of Wilson's article (after Libby was caught lying), to create the "evidence." Oh, yes, he was so-o-o-o worried about this droplet of truth in the river of lies that our war profiteering corporate news monopolies had been unleashing on the American people and the world. Har-har. He actually WROTE NOTES, so his underlings would be sure to GET THE POINT. ("Will no one rid me of this meddlesome ex-ambassador!?").

Next stop for Rumsfeld--Paraguay maybe? Time for more distraction, and we might be surprised where it comes from.

[NOLADEM]

9. It's Opposite Day again at Neo-Con Fantasy World

Just a reminder Lewis (I cannot call a grown man Scooter),

The motive was revenge for Wilson exposing your administration's fraudulent scheme in generating the Niger Yellowcake documents, in which the administration orchestrated or participated in a scheme in which an embassy was broken into, letterhead stolen, and sloppy, fraudulent documents were generated to falsely support the cause for an elective war, justified in part on the back of the lie these documents supported.

The crimes are treason, obstruction, revealing a covert operative's identity and perjury.

The costs? The war has since killed hundreds of thousands, including 2900 Americans, bankrupted our treasury and made the Middle East even WORSE. And outing Valerie Plame has done immeasurable damage to our covert operations into the nuclear capabilities of our adversaries, an actual threat as opposed to the imagined threat posed to us by Iraq before the war.


Let me know if you forget again, Lewis. I know you have a memory problem. I would be happy to remind you anytime.

What an idiotic asshole this man is. Do us all a favor and write a tell all then kill yourself.

[savemefromdumbya]

10. Did Cheney get a SEALED indictment?

that's it