AlterNet blog: Dem House staffer e-mail on Fitz indictments

[seafan]

Fitzgerald gossip straight from my inbox

Posted by Jan Frel at 12:44 PM on October 19, 2005


I just got this e-mail from a Democratic House member's staffer with tons of good dirt on the Plame investigation. I'm reprinting it whole cloth to share all, and show that while these Hill staffers are well-informed, they sure could use some capitalization classes.

Among the things I hadn't seen before:

-Fred Flights, an assistant to John Bolton, is a named name who could be indicted.

-Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham have been suggested as replacements for Dick Cheney.

-Colin Powell told John McCain he showed the infamous memo with Plame's identity on it two just two people; Dick Cheney and George Bush.

-Fitzgerald is looking at the precedent set from the indictment of Tricky Dick's veep Spiro Agnew to pursue against Cheney.


Text of the e-mail:

below, some extremely sensitive information about the impending conclusion of the valerie plame investigations. the sources include two senior members of senate and key staffers; counsel for individuals that have been called before the grand jury; and two journalists taking a lead position in investigating the case. the following represents a composite of the information from those sources.

plamegate coming to conclusion. the investigation has focused mostly closely on vice president cheney and his staff, as well as us ambassador to the un (and former undersecretary of state for arms control) john bolton and his staff. we are told that eight indictments have already prepared, with the possibility of another ten. these indictments include senior white house staff, most notably vice president cheney's chief of staff scooter libby, fred flights (special assistant to john bolton), and--very surprisingly--national security adviser steve hadley. apparently, libby and hadley have both been told by their lawyers to expect indictments. the indictment of senior bush political advisor karl rove seems highly probable.

most critically, a plea bargain process has evidently been opened with vice president cheney's lawyer. that does not mean that an indictment is coming. but i've some critical background around the issue.

(more e-mail text at link)


http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/frel/27082/#comments



One question I had about whether both * and Cheney were on the same plane to Africa..... do we know if they were on separate planes? Or did Cheney even go on this trip... I can't recall.

Otherwise, much or most of this info appears likely to me, given what we know from digging into other sources.

[montanacowboy]

1. I believe Big Dick was in the White House

*** was on the plane

[seafan]

4. Thanks. Powell could have showed Cheney the memo before

leaving on the flight to Africa.

Good to see Bolton's tie-in mentioned in this.

[Garbo 2004]

12. Reportedly memo was faxed to Powell while he was on the plane. n/t

[seafan]

13. Thanks for the clarification. n/t

[Dawgs]

2. If true, WOW!!!!!

Good stuff!!! :wow:

[papau]

3. Will Cheney's lawyer offer to give up Bush for a lighter sentence?

?????

:toast:

:-)

[Scout1071]

7. Not a chance. He would go down with the ship rather than give up

Bush.

But it may not matter. If Colin Powell did indeed testify that he showed that memo to Bush and Cheney only, Bush may be dragged into conspiracy charges as well.

[Skip Intro]

9. Its his ship - from day one -he put himself on the ticket

[Scout1071]

17. True dat. n/t

[mamalone]

19. be still my heart..........

nt

[Freedom_from_Chains]

30. With these people, when they get cornered

they would give up their mother if it would get them out of trouble.

[Scout1071]

5. They were not on the same plane. That would never happen.

Cheney was at the White House. John Bolton sent the memo to AF1 as requested via the White House - where Cheney and Libby likely saw the info as well en route to AF1.

[calimary]

24. So does that mean john bolton also saw the memo?

Also, would the White House be willing to pull McCain out of the Senate, costing them a seat - isn't Arizona's governor, Janet Napolitano, a Democrat? Wouldn't that mean she'd appoint a DEMOCRAT to take his place, thus goofind with the majority numbers in the Senate? Granted, it's ONE seat. But every little bit helps. Would the White House risk that? Or would they be looking ahead to "anoint" bush's replacement that way?

And would McCain go for it, in the first place?

[Jackpine Radical]

36. Oh, McCain would go for it alright. The smarmy bastard still thinks

he has a chance at the WH, @ VP is a better launching pad than the Senate. Also, there's always the chance of becoming Gerald Ford II if Shrubby takes a big hit.

[shraby]

6. The president and vice president are never on

the same airplane for obvious reasons.

[yurbud]

8. a theory to avoid Hastert presidency: let Bush appoint agreeable VP

then he resigns or is indicted.

Porkchop Hastert is probably as dirty as the rest of them, he just does it less aggressively as DeLay.

[seafan]

10. Hastert received illegal payments from Turkish nat'ls for favors.

From August, 2005

According to Sibel Edmonds:

--snip

This week, (Edmonds) grabbed headlines again after Vanity Fair published a major story about her. What is making news from that piece are allegations surrounding Illinois congressman and Republican Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert.

Vanity Fair alleges that Hastert may have been the recipient of tens of thousands of dollars of secret payments from Turkish officials in exchange for political favors and information. In the article, titled "An Inconvenient Patriot," Edmonds says that she gave confidential testimony about the payments to congressional staffers, the Inspector General and members of the 9/11 Commission. Edmonds says that she heard of the payments while listening to FBI wiretaps of Turkish officials who were under surveillance by the FBI.

--snip

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/08/10/1346254

Hastert is as dirty as the rest of 'em.

[Ouabache]

25. And I think that could be Richard Lugar

because then Mitch Daniels could appoint a Republican to take Lugar's place in the Senate. Maybe this is why I have seen rumors that Tim Roemer is running for the Dems as Senate in Indiana next year. No big name has ever challenged Lugar, but maybe Roemer KNOWS Lugar won't be the opponent?

[yurbud]

26. Lugar is an odd duck--he has something about peak oil &

switching to biofuels on his webpage, but of course in public and more recently, he repeats all the Bush BS about terrorists and WMD.

[Garbo 2004]

11. Previously debunked here and by some blogs. Cheney didn't go to Africa,

wasn't on Air Force One with Powell and the memo, the memo reportedly was shown to a number of folks on the plane and/or its contents known to a number of Administration folks, it didn't use the name "Plame" and didn't ID Valerie Wilson as a covert CIA agent.

It's a email with disinformation that has been spammed to a number of bloggers and others. Now why would that be? Only question is why some blog sites and Buzzflash that have been following the Plame investigation and should know better are posting this disinfo and apparently giving it credence.

Billmon's comments on the email: http://billmon.org/archives/002276.html

[niallmac]

33. thanks for that reality check. 'tis true what ye speak.

[nradisic]

14. Oh no! Karl?Dick?Scooter?

Who's left? How is assrocket going to run the country now? There will literally be "no brain" in the White House.

[seafan]

16. * is on the run today, hiding from Fitz.

Just like on 9-11-------> Nebraska

Katrina------> Arizona, California

Rita/Sept 24 protests at WH-------> Colorado and Texas

[flying_wahini]

20. he can run, but he cannot hide..........bwahhaahahahaha

[newscott]

15. I hate to be a wet blanket

But sometimes I feel we're being set up. But I am still hopefull.

[Joe Chi Minh]

18. I suspect the chief problem for Bush, if his cronies

are removed from office - and indeeed, the apparent difficulty he has in abjuring cronyism - is that networking by courtesy of paternal nepotism is all, basically, he knows. And that, by way of networking with people without any advanced technical technical, but rather with that passion for money and power, however obtained, that epitomises the neocon base.

Consequently, I suspect he feels lost at the prospect of operating in a kind of rational (as opposed to familial) way, with his lieutenants actually being technical experts in their fields, with the ambition primarily to do their jobs well, rather than as one of his loyal personal housecarls - albeit of an unusually chickenhawk stamp. It may be the inevitable inferiority complex of someone massively promoted beyond their competency.

[alcibiades_mystery]

21. If this is "extremely sensitive information"

Why is this douchebag posting it on his blog?

Some friend!

I call bullshit.

[DoYouEverWonder]

22. These are the WH officials

that were on AF1 for Bush's tour of Africa.




Not shown but also on the trip were Dan Bartlett and Ari Fleischer.

If Collin only showed the memo to Cheney and Bush, then it is Bush who brought it to the meeting of AF1 where they discussed what to do about the Wilson problem.

The big question for me is why was Wilson so important to them? You don't put on a full frontal assault for just any one.

[seafan]

23. I think it's because Wilson was a direct threat of exposure of their

preformulated plan to stampede into Iraq on false pretenses.

When Wilson went public, saying that the * administration was trumping up false evidence for a war, those guys squealed like stuck pigs, and came at Wilson with pointed tusks.

Also, I believe Plame (and David Kelly) were very close to finding ties between Cheney and arms/nuclear components trafficking to rogue states....the very states that support and grow terrorism.

Cheney has got some 'splainin' to do.

[GetTheRightVote]

27. I hope, I pray, I am waiting to celebrate.

:kick:

[peacebird]

29. If there is any justice in the universe ....

then this mis-administration will be sept away by the perfect storm of Abramof, Frist, DeLay, Miers, and the indictments by the mighty Fitz!

[symbolman]

28. It's Fred Fietz

not FLIGHTS.. he was Bolton's Bullyboy - when Theilman was ordered by Powell to attend daily meetings (keep an eye on Bolton) then FIETZ met Theilman at the door and said, "We don't want you coming to the meetings anymore - Bolton want's to keep it in the Family (PNAC?).."

Then Bolton demanded RAW intelligence which the State Dept always ran through their bowels before anyone else got, and Bolton GOT IT, and started a ROGUE Intel Op right there in the State Dept..

FIETZ was also a CIA guy, he'd saved his CIA job WHILE he was working with Bolton, why? SO he could do nifty things like see ALL the data, CHANGE it when he wanted to, Cherry Pick it, OUT PLAME, things like that..

I've got all this in my "Rove's War" film at Takebackthemedia.com, along with the Italian Forger/Ledeen/Franklin/SISMI/Chablai Meeting in Dec of 2001 to create the causus belli for the war, get the Niger docs up and running..

http://www.takebackthemedia.com The Definitive Plame Outing Chronology at 150 minutes of RED MEAT :)

This is important stuff, spent a year researching, came to a lot of these conclusions a long time ago..

But you should fix the name: FIETZ, not FLIGHTS..

[DainBramaged]

31. The thought about McCain troubles me

The sheeple on both sides of the aisle love him, the Fundies hate him, the Indies unsure (yes we have sheeple, do you honestly think all 50+ million of us are intelligent?). It also gives him a launching pad to 2008.

Scary thought, but the Boy King needs to do something spectacular right now to shore up his popularity. Maybe this McCain deal is payback for 2000.


I do not like McCain near the White House. He will not help us.

[Alizaryn]

32. This was found to be a phoney yesterday I believe

Cheney and Bush did not fly together on the same plane and the memo never referred to Valerie Plame by name.

[halobeam]

34. What if Powell only showed it to Bush and Cheney,

it doesn't say he only showed it to them on the plane. If Powell really did only show it to them, then Bush did bring it on the plane. Is this plausible, or am I missing something here?

[lala_rawraw]

35. I think this was debunked, no? Fleitz should be indicted, that is for sur

but I thought this was rumor, help?