Coverage of Libby indictment

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http://mediamatters.org/items/200510280013

With the October 28 indictment of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby as part of the investigation into the leaking of the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame, a flood of conservative misinformation can be expected, resulting in news reports that are confused, muddled, misleading, and sometimes just plain wrong. With that in mind, Media Matters for America offers a pre-emptive refutation of conservative information that is most likely to appear in the media, some of which we've debunked many times already:

MYTH 1: Special counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald is an overzealous prosecutor who was out to get the Bush administration.

FACT: Fitzgerald was appointed U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois by President Bush after he was recommended for the post by conservative Republican Sen. Peter Fitzgerald (R-IL, no relation). He was hand-picked by the Bush Justice Department to investigate the Plame matter.

MYTH 2: Fitzgerald overstepped his authority and went beyond his original mandate to investigate possible violations of the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act (IIPA).

FACT: Fitzgerald's official delegation as special counsel did not mention the IIPA, or any other specific statute. Rather, it granted him "all the authority of the Attorney General with respect to the Department's investigation into the alleged unauthorized disclosure of a CIA employee's identity."