From Cartoonist John Sherffius

Via Hoffmania:

Is BushCo About To Sacrifice Cheney?

It is starting to look that way. From Newsweek:

Once again, it appears that the old cliche applies: it's not the crime but the cover-up. And once again, the hoary "Howard Baker Questions" are being asked: what did he know and when did he know it? This time, however, the target isn't the president, protected for now by his reputation as a rigorous delegator, but Cheney, viewed as the most powerful vice president in modern times.

Perhaps it's no surprise, therefore, that at least some administration officials—speaking on background, of course—have begun retroactively to dismiss Cheney's role. Even if they are rewriting history, the revision is politically significant—and an ominous sign for Cheney in a city where power is the appearance of power. As an aide now tells it, Cheney's influence began to wane from the start of the second term and effectively came to an end as the Fitzgerald investigation gained momentum in recent months. "You can say that the influence of the vice president is going to decrease, but it's hard to decrease from zero," said a senior official sympathetic to Cheney's policies.

Even on foreign policy, said a senior Bush aide, the veep has been eclipsed by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who now has the president's ear and works effectively with her successor as national-security adviser, Stephen Hadley. Bush has grown more confident, aides say, having jettisoned the Cheney training wheels. "The president has formulated a lot of his own views," said an aide, "and has a very firm idea of what he wants to do and accomplish with his foreign policy."

Wow, the White House isn't even trying to hide it -- as the Newsweek article suggests, history is being re-written in a fairly lame attempt to soften the political blow that will result from a Cheney departure.

History isn't the only thing being re-written. As Josh Marshall points out, this Washington Post article was altered from the original version that was first posted on-line. The italicized section in the following excerpt was later removed from the piece:

On July 12, the day Cheney and Libby flew together from Norfolk, the vice president instructed his aide to alert reporters of an attack launched that morning on Wilson's credibility by Fleischer, according to a well-placed source.

Libby talked to Miller and Cooper. That same day, another administration official who has not been identified publicly returned a call from Walter Pincus of The Post. He "veered off the precise matter we were discussing" and told him that Wilson's trip was a "boondoggle" set up by Plame, Pincus has written in Nieman Reports.

Marshall promises to have more on this later.

It is pretty clear that Fitzgerald is putting pressure on Libby in an attempt to get him to tell the whole story. In fact, according to TIME Magazine, it was Fitzgerald who nixed any plea agreement with Libby:

Fitzgerald's indictment sets the stage for either a trial next spring or a plea bargain that almost certainly would mean jail time for Libby. That possibility has already been discussed: a source close to the investigation told TIME that Fitzgerald and Libby's attorney Joseph Tate discussed possible plea options before the indictment was issued last week. But the deal was scotched because the prosecutor insisted that Libby do some "serious" jail time.

Does anyone out there really think that Libby was simply acting on his own without any input from his boss, Dick Cheney? You remember Dick Cheney -- he's the one who had this to say about Saddam in the run-up to the Iraq War: ". . . we believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons." Joseph Wilson decided to speak out about BushCo's lies on this point; and since Cheney basically made the whole thing up about Iraq's nuclear program, the only option Cheney had at the time was to attack Fitzgerald and his wife.

And while I'm on that point, I watched the 60 Minutes segment on the outing of Valerie Plame, and the one thing I came away with is the feeling that Bob Novak is even more of a fool than I thought he was. After Novak did the Bush Regime's dirty work and wrote the column outing Plame, he went on CNN and stated that Plame "listed herself as an employee of Brewster-Jennings & Associates. There is no such firm, I'm convinced."

Well, you got that part right, Bob. Brewster Jennings was the CIA front company that Plame used as cover because she was a covert CIA operative.

Really nice reporting there, Novak. I guess he figured that he hadn't yet done enough damage to the security of this country and that he needed to finish the job by announcing the name of Plame's front company -- you know, just in case a few of our enemies might not have figured the whole thing out by that time.

Bush Will Nominate Alito

The Associated Press is reporting that Bush will nominated Samuel Alito later this morning to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court. Some folks call this guy "Scalito" because his judicial philosophy is very similar to that of Antonin Scalia.

I'm glad Bush picked this guy. Now maybe we will see the Democrats finally get fired up over something. The great thing about the Harriet Miers fiasco is that the extreme right can no longer effectively argue that Bush's current nominee should get an "up or down" vote in the Senate, because all the Democrats will need to do is point out is that, thanks to GOP extremists, Harriet Miers did not get an "up or down" vote.

Bill Frist, if he is not under indictment by the time the [Sc]Alito nomination is taken up by the Senate, will probably have to exercise "the nuclear option" in order to thwart the Democrats' filibuster. We'll see how that goes.

Sunday Cat Blogging: See No Evil (Feline Version)

This Is Interesting

From the New York Times:

Mr. Fitzgerald was spotted Friday morning outside the office of James Sharp, Mr. Bush's personal lawyer. Mr. Bush was interviewed about the case by Mr. Fitzgerald last year. It is not known what discussions, if any, were taking place between the prosecutor and Mr. Sharp. Mr. Sharp did not return a phone call, and Mr. Fitzgerald's spokesman, Randall Samborn, declined to comment.

A mere coincidence? Or did Fitzgerald and Bush's lawyer have something to discuss before the Libby indictment was handed down?

The Last Weekend of Trout Season

Oregon's General Trout Season ends on November 1st. Danimal and I wanted to close out the season in epic fashion, so we decided to go to Three Creeks Lake, a very scenic body of water located at the 6500' elevation above the town of Sisters and just below Tam McArthur Rim. The weather report for Saturday wasn't very promising, so we assembled the warmest clothing we each had and expected difficult fishing conditions.

What we didn't expect is how much snow would already be at that elevation. In fact, the road into the lake was snow-covered for the last couple of miles, and there was at least four inches of snow on the ground at the lake. Fortunately for us, the weather was much better than we expected it to be -- it was very cold out, but we had clear skies and little wind.

Launching the boat was no problem even though the primitive ramp (right) was snow-covered. The problem was that, once we got out on the lake, the fish simply refused to bite our trolled frog flatfish and Rooster Tail spinner.

No motors are allowed on Three Creeks Lake -- not even electric trolling motors -- so Danimal rowed us around to various points on the lake, but nothing was hitting our lures. I was concerned that perhaps the water was too cold and the fish were lethargic as a result.

I had promised Danimal that we'd catch a lot of fish, and that wasn't happening. About ninety minutes after we started fishing, a guy who was camped at the lake rowed out in his boat and started trolling. He told us that he started getting into fish the day before when the sun hit the water.

So we continued to troll. Dan broke out a little propane heater he had brought along, and I would shake off the occasional ice that formed on the rod tips as we waited for the sun to come over the ridge line and hit the lake's surface. Once that happened, we continued trolling, but only got one very light strike on the flatfish. So we gave up trolling, set the anchor, and started bottom fishing with bait.

It took awhile, but the fish finally started to respond. I picked up a rainbow on powerbait, then landed a couple more. Dan switched over from his worm/marshmallow combo to powerbait, and he started landing fish as well. The bite was steady from then on, but a lot of the bites were fairly soft and we missed many fish. But we did manage to finally catch our limit, with Danimal landing the largest trout of the trip -- a 13-inch rainbow.

Needless to say, it was a great way to end the season. Hopefully, in a few weeks, Three Creeks Lake will be under three feet of snow, but it was fun to make one last trip to this great place before the snows really start to fly.

Impressions of Fitzgerald Press Conference

At the end of pretty much every Shakespearean tragedy -- Lear might be the only exception -- some authority figure always appears to restore order. That was the feeling I had as I watched Patrick Fitzgerald's press conference today.

As far as any "where do we go from here"-type conclusions, Raw Story is saying stuff about Fitzgerald having explosive evidence on this, that, or the other thing, blah, blah, blah -- we'll wait and see on all that. But one thing that became very clear to me as the press conference unfolded is that any plan the Radical Right has of going after Fitzgerald and attacking his credibility is going to . . ., well -- fail miserably.

In fact, the Extreme Right will have to be satisfied with merely attacking Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson, because Fitzgerald seems like a pretty solid, thorough prosecutor -- the un-Ken Starr, if you will.

And speaking of Ken Starr, my boss's assistant Roxy said something today that pretty much sums up this whole thing. She said: "The Monica Lewinski stuff was funny -- this Valerie Plame stuff is scary."

It is hard to argue with that.

Libby Indicted On Five Counts

The five counts include obstruction of justice, making false statements, and perjury. Here is the press release from Fitzgerald's office.

Has The Senate Intelligence Committee Decided To Investigate BushCo Intel Manipulation After All?

The Murray Waas article from which I quoted yesterday -- the one alleging that Cheney and Libby failed to fully cooperate last year with the Senate Intelligence Committee -- contained these interesting paragraphs:

In recent weeks Fitzgerald's investigation has zeroed in on the activities of Libby, who is Cheney's top national security and foreign policy advisor, as well as the conflict between the vice president's office on one side and the CIA and State Department on the other over the use of intelligence on Iraq. The New York Times reported this week, for example, that Libby first learned about Plame and her covert CIA status from Cheney in a conversation with the vice president weeks before Plame's cover was blown in a July 2003 newspaper column by Robert Novak.

The Intelligence Committee at the time was trying to determine whether the CIA and other intelligence agencies provided faulty or erroneous intelligence on Iraq to President Bush and other government officials. But the committee deferred the much more politically sensitive issue as to whether the president and the vice president themselves, or other administration officials, misrepresented intelligence information to bolster the case to go to war. An Intelligence Committee spokesperson says the panel is still working on this second phase of the investigation.

Still working on it? I was under the impression that the Senator Pat Roberts' committee completed its work and concluded that the Bush Regime did not engage in any intelligence manipulation in the run-up to the Iraq Catastrophe. Did I miss something, or has Senator Roberts finally read the writing on the wall and decided to do his job for a change?

NYTimes: Rove May Escape Indictment For Now

From the New York Times:

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.

Fitzgerald would probably have to impanel a new grand jury instead of extending the term of the current one.

One last thing: Lots of chatter tonight about a guy named Frederick Fleitz, a CIA/WINIPAC officer who was working for Bolton at the time of the leak.

Good night.

OK Fredrick -- Here's Something New For You

From Murray Waas (via Talking Points Memo):

Vice President Cheney and his chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, overruling advice from some White House political staffers and lawyers, decided to withhold crucial documents from the Senate Intelligence Committee in 2004 when the panel was investigating the use of pre-war intelligence that erroneously concluded Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, according to Bush administration and congressional sources.

Wait a minute. I'm sorry -- this isn't new at all. It's just another wrinkle to the same old story, isn't it.

If this means what I think it means, then tomorrow is shaping up to be a very good day.

UPDATE: My Dad, who pays closer attention to this stuff than I do, thinks tomorrow is going to be a "mixed bag" day. He thinks it will be disappointing to some in that only an indictment of Scooter Libby will be announced, but it will also have some good news in that Fitzgerald will announce the impaneling of a second grand jury which will investigate potential conspiracy issues surrounding TreasonGate (including the stuff referred to in the above-linked Murray Waas article).

Fitzgerald Has Acquired More Office Space

From Steve Clemons of The Washington Note:

[N]ews has just reached TWN that Patrick Fitzgerald is expanding not only into a new website -- but also into more office space.

Fitzgerald's office is at 1400 New York Avenue, NW, 9th Floor in Washington.

What I have learned is that the Office of the Special Counsel has signed a lease this week for expanded office space across the street at 1401 New York Avenue, NW.

Another coincidence? More office space needed to shut down the operation?

I think not. Fitzgerald's operation is expanding.

It's beginning to look a lot like FitzMas.

UPDATE: Looks likes Clemons' sources might have gotten a call or two reminding them of certain confidentiality provisions pertaining to the lease. This Fitzpatrick dude is pretty thorough.

Miers Withdraws

Harriet Miers withdrew her nomination to the Supreme Court this morning:

"It is clear that senators would not be satisfied until they gained access to internal documents concerning advice provided during her tenure at the White House -- disclosures that would undermine a president's ability to receive candid counsel," Bush said. "Harriet Miers's decision demonstrates her deep respect for this essential aspect of the constitutional separation of powers -- and confirms my deep respect and admiration for her."

But politics also played a role: Bush's conservative backers had doubts about her ideological purity, and Democrats had little incentive to help the nominee or the embattled GOP president.

Ideological purity. I love that phrase. Sieg Heil anyone?

Seriously -- would the radical right wing religious extremists have supported Miers if she were instead some hack attorney who specialized in representing people who bombed Planned Parenthood clinics and/or folks who murdered abortion-performing doctors, and who spent her spare time away from her law practice protesting in front of abortion clinics? Of course they would have supported her. These people don't care about the overall quality of the nominee -- they care about ideological purity.

Word is that Bush is one pissed-off dude these days, what with this Miers debacle and the Twelve Days of Fitztivus and all that. What I would love to see is Bush react angrily to the right-wing opposition to Miers and pick someone with impeccable credentials but who is clearly a moderate, i.e., someone who would get all the Democratic senators on his or her side as well as all the moderate Republicans in the Senate. Such a nominee might not get a floor vote, but I'd still love to see all the drama anyway.

Another thing I'd like to see is Miers come out and announce that she would have voted to overturn Roe v. Wade. I have the suspicion that she would have indeed voted that way had she been confirmed and had the opportunity arisen.

But what will probably happen is that Bush will bend to political pressure from the extreme right and nominate someone like Janice Rogers Brown. That would also be fine with me because it would light a fire under the Democrats and force Bush to engage in a major political battle at a time when the White House will probably be in turmoil from the fallout caused by the Fitztivus indictments.

One last thought -- why announce this Miers withdrawal today? Does the Bush Regime think that the indictments will be handed down today? It appears to me that Fitzgerald will announce his indictments tomorrow, meaning that tomorrow would have been a more politically effective time to announce Miers's withdrawal and thus pull some coverage away from the TreasonGate story.

A Likely TreasonGate Indictment Scenario

Sorry Fredrick, but I have to do one more pre-FitzMas post on PlameGate, because this analysis of what happened today makes a lot of sense to me:

[TIME Magazine's] MIKE ALLEN: A lot of activity happening that we’re not seeing. A likely scenario for what happened today, Patrick Fitzgerald got some indictments from this grand jury. He is now able to go to the…

CHRIS MATTHEWS: You think they’re sealed right now?

MIKE ALLEN: Very possible. What I’m told is typically, in a case like this, he could get the indictments and now he can go to the targets and say, you can plead to these or I’ll go back Friday and get more. You have 12 to 24 hours to think about it.

CHRIS MATTHEWS: And he can give them a little Whitman Sampler of suggestions pleading to the charge of obstruction or perjury or…

MIKE ALLEN: I can add a bunch of counts. You can take a couple of counts or we can do a bunch more.

A juror was reportedly overheard saying to another juror, "See you on Friday." I guess it is possible that these two jurors might have agreed to go clubbing on Friday night, but it is more likely that the grand jury will be meeting again on Friday morning. That gives the folks who were indicted some time to think about whether they want to enter pleas or attempt to sneak out of the country.

This guy makes a lot of sense as well:

Yes, I'm as eager as everyone else to know what Fitzgerald is going to do. But today's delay strikes me as both a Good Thing in itself and a good sign as to the eventual outcome.

It's a Good Thing because it keeps the Plame scandal on the front page and keeps the bad guys paralyzed with fear. Moreover, after two years of steady drumbeat of conservative propaganda about no crime having been committed and no charges forthcoming, the more time the commentariat and the public have to wrap their heads around the idea of All the President's Men going to stir over burning a CIA NOC, the better.

It's a good sign (I hope and believe) because it suggests that someone might have blinked in Fitzgerald's multi-player staring contest.

OK, this will be my last pre-Fitztivus post on TraitorGate. I guarantee it.*

* This is not a guarantee.

Gore Looking Good For An '08 Run

I found this encouraging (via Altercation):

Forget that half-hearted declaration Al Gore gave at an economic forum in Stockholm, Sweden two weeks ago about having "absolutely no plans and no expectations of ever being a candidate again." According to friends, family and political advocates, Gore's playing it coy and has every intention of entering the race. "I'm not discouraged at all by what he said," said one of the Gore backers who's recently spoken with US News & World Report. "He doesn't want to be embarrassed and he won't just slowly tip-toe into the race. He wants the whole thing set up for him and that will be easy to do."

I've really changed my mind about Gore in the last few years. I still think he ran a horrible campaign back in 2000, but he's made up for it by turning into one of the most outspoken opponents of the Bush Regime.

Sure, Gore took a lot of heat from the Extreme Right for some of the things he said regarding the Iraq Debacle, but it will be pretty hard for the extremists to dig up those Gore statements and claim that he was wrong. And that is what will make Gore a strong presidential candidate in 2008.

John Kerry is making noise about another run for the White House, and Hillary Clinton will probably go for it as well, but both Kerry and Hillary voted for the Iraq War. They can't go back and change their votes, and any attempts to finesse their vote on that issue will not succeed. That strategy didn't work for Kerry last year, so why should it work in 2008?

I know I would not vote for either of them in a primary because of how they voted on the Iraq War. The Democrats must run someone who was consistently against it, and Gore is that man. Wes Clark is not too bad in that regard, but even Clark flip-flopped a little bit on Iraq.

Another thing Gore has going for him is the impression that he actually won the 2000 election. I think his campaign could use that very effectively. It could say, for example, that America has the chance to correct what now must be viewed as one of the most disastrous events in American political history, namely, the appointment of George W. Bush as our 43rd president.

A Change of Pace

Fredrick suggested that I get off the Fitzmas stuff for a while (at least until the indictments -- if any -- are handed down) and move on to other things. So here is something that I think is pretty funny.

FitzMas Delayed? (with updates)

I was hoping that folks on the West Coast might wake up this morning to find that St. Pat had delivered some lovely gifts for us. Instead, it appears that today just might be "wrapping day" and the presents won't be opened until tomorrow:

The federal grand jury investigating the leak of a covert CIA operative's identity met on Wednesday with special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald amid signs the prosecutor was preparing to seek criminal charges.

Fitzgerald, who have interviewed many senior White House figures as he seeks the source of the leak, declined comment as they began the grand jury session at about 9 a.m.

Any charges that are brought by the grand jury could be sealed, preventing a public announcement by the court or the prosecutor until possibly on Thursday or Friday, when the grand jury is scheduled to expire.

CNN just announced that there will be no announcements today. And Raw Story is saying that Fitzgerald has asked the grand jury to indict Rove and Libby.

UPDATE (from Raw Story):

Special Prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald has asked the grand jury investigating the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson to indict Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby and Bush’s Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice, lawyers close to the investigation tell RAW STORY.

Fitzgerald has also asked the jury to indict Libby on a second charge: knowingly outing a covert operative, the lawyers said. They said the prosecutor believes that Libby violated a 1982 law that made it illegal to unmask an undercover CIA agent.

The Raw Story piece states that "[t]wo other officials, who are not employees in the White House, are also expected to face indictments." Could one of them be the "Mr. X" individual referred to yesterday in the Think Progress piece?

The Raw Story article also contained these interesting tidbits regarding Karl Rove:

Those close to the investigation said Rove was offered a deal Tuesday to plead guilty to perjury for a reduced charge. Rove’s lawyer was told that Fitzgerald would drop an obstruction of justice charge if his client agreed not to contest allegations of perjury, they said.

Rove declined to plead guilty to the reduced charge, the sources said, indicating through his attorney Robert Luskin that he intended to fight the charges. A call placed to Luskin was not returned.

Those familiar with the case said that Libby did not inform Rove that Plame was covert. As a result, Rove may not be charged with a crime in leaking Plame’s identity, even though he spoke with reporters.

One thing is for certain: We will soon know whether or not Raw Story's sources are reliable.

UPDATE II: For what it's worth, here's what Richard Sale has to say:

An hour ago I was contacted by a U.S. government official close to the Fitzgerald case. This person told me that there WILL be indictments announced later this afternoon, and the Special Prosecutor will hold a press conference tomorrow.

And this is interesting:

Although most press accounts emphasized that Fitzgerald was likely to concentrate on attempts by Libby Rove and others to cover-up wrongdoing by means of perjury before the grand jury, lying to federal officials, conspiring to obstruct justice, etc. But federal law enforcement officials told this reporter that Fitzgerald was likely to charge the people indicted with violating Joe Wilson's civil rights, smearing his name in an attempt to destroy his ability to earn a living in Washington as a consultant.

The civil rights charge is said to include "the conspiracy was committed using U.S. government offices, buildings, personnel and funds," one federal law enforcement official said.

The last one sounds a bit squirrelly to me, but there it is.

UPDATE III: Hunter at Kos has more on Richard Sale's reporting, including the possibility that Fitzgerald may impanel a second Plame grand jury.

Some Fitzmas Eve Odds-And-Ends

From Political Wire:

[A] former high level Bush administration official told Political Wire that "people are turning on each other" at the White House. Lawrence Wilkerson is likely just the first to come out publicly against the administration.

I like to read stuff like that because I know in my heart that Bush was directly involved in TreasonGate and the only way the details of Bush's involvement will come out is if people in the White House start turning on each other.

Meanwhile:

Roll Call reports that special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald "was spotted Tuesday at the law offices of Patton Boggs paying a visit to Robert Luskin, the eccentric (for Washington, D.C.) lawyer who represents Karl Rove."

Finally, the L.A. Times has this:

Prosecutors investigating the leak of a CIA agent's identity returned their attention to powerful White House advisor Karl Rove on Tuesday, questioning a former West Wing colleague about contacts Rove had with reporters in the days leading to the outing of a covert CIA officer.

Special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald also dispatched FBI agents to comb the CIA officer's residential neighborhood in Washington, asking neighbors again whether they were aware — before her name appeared in a syndicated column — that the agent, Valerie Plame, worked for the CIA.

It sure sounds like Fitzgerald might seek at least one indictment asserting that someone leaked Valerie Plame's name illegally. He appears to be tying up some loose ends on that particular issue.

Well, that's it for now. Pleasant dreams, everyone -- and let's hope we wake up to at least a few indictments under the Fitzmas Tree tomorrow morning.

Target Letters Have Reportedly Been Sent

From The Washington Note (via Raw Story):

An uber-insider source has just reported the following to TWN:

1. 1-5 indictments are being issued. The source feels that it will be towards the higher end.

2. The targets of indictment have already received their letters.

3. The indictments will be sealed indictments and "filed" tomorrow.

4. A press conference is being scheduled for Thursday.

I expect some major terror alert will be announced tomorrow.

Thanks, Slic(k) for the heads-up.

UPDATE: CBS adds this:

CBS’ JOHN ROBERTS: Lawyers familiar with the case think Wednesday is when special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald will make known his decision, and that there will be indictments. Supporters say Rove and the vice president’s chief of staff, Scooter Libby, are in legal jeopardy. But they insisted today the two are secondary players, that it was an unidentified Mr. X who actually gave the name of CIA agent V alerie Plame to reporters. Fitzgerald knows who Mr. X is, they say, and if he isn’t indicted, there’s no way Rove or Libby should be. But charges may not focus on the leak at all. Obstruction of justice or perjury are real possibilities. Did Rove or Libby change statements made under oath? Did they deliberately leave critical facts out of their testimony or did they honestly forget? Some Republicans urged Rove to step down if indicted. Not a happy prospect for president Bush.

Now We Know Why Stephen Hadley Thinks He'll Be Indicted

National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley has reportedly told friends that he expects to be indicted for his role in the TreasonGate Scandal. Now we have some clues about why he feels that way (from American Prospect):

With Patrick Fitzgerald widely expected to announce indictments in the CIA leak investigation, questions are again being raised about the intelligence scandal that led to the appointment of the special counsel: namely, how the Bush White House obtained false Italian intelligence reports claiming that Iraq had tried to buy uranium "yellowcake" from Niger.

The key documents supposedly proving the Iraqi attempt later turned out to be crude forgeries, created on official stationery stolen from the African nation's Rome embassy. Among the most tantalizing aspects of the debate over the Iraq War is the origin of those fake documents -- and the role of the Italian intelligence services in disseminating them.

In an explosive series of articles appearing this week in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, investigative reporters Carlo Bonini and Giuseppe d'Avanzo report that Nicolo Pollari, chief of Italy's military intelligence service, known as Sismi, brought the Niger yellowcake story directly to the White House after his insistent overtures had been rejected by the Central Intelligence Agency in 2001 and 2002. Sismi had reported to the CIA on October 15, 2001, that Iraq had sought yellowcake in Niger, a report it also plied on British intelligence, creating an echo that the Niger forgeries themselves purported to amplify before they were exposed as a hoax.

Today's exclusive report in La Repubblica reveals that Pollari met secretly in Washington on September 9, 2002, with then–Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley. Their secret meeting came at a critical moment in the White House campaign to convince Congress and the American public that war in Iraq was necessary to prevent Saddam Hussein from developing nuclear weapons. National Security Council spokesman Frederick Jones confirmed the meeting to the Prospect on Tuesday.

It has been widely reported that Fitzgerald's team has investigated issues regarding the Niger forgeries. Now were are starting to get some hints as to why Fitzgerald is interested in this, and why Hadley thinks he'll be indicted.

I expect that there will be more to come on this particular angle of the TreasonGate Scandal.

Raw Story Reports That Fitzgerald Has Made Up His Mind

Raw Story is reporting that Fitzgerald has decided to seek indictments in the TraitorGate Scandal:

Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has decided to seek indictments in the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson and has submitted at least one to the grand jury, those close to the investigation tell RAW STORY.

Fitzgerald will seek at least two indictments, the sources say. They note that it remains to be seen whether the grand jury will approve the charges.

Raw Story is also reporting that Fitzgerald will probably not seek indictments that assert officials leaked Valerie Plame's name illegally. The sources say that "he will focus charges in the arena of lying to investigators."

This will certainly upset folks like Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, who thought it was just fine to pursue perjury charges against Bill Clinton for lying about consensual sex but who is against perjury/obstruction-of-justice charges for folks who lie during an investigation of the outing of a covert CIA operative working on WMD proliferation issues during a time of war.

I have this to say to Hutchinson and folks like her:

Silver bells, silver bells
It's Fitzmas time in the city
Ring-a-ling, hear them ring
Soon it will be Fitzmas day!

Dick Cheney and TreasonGate

From The New York Times:

I. Lewis Libby Jr., Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, first learned about the C.I.A. officer at the heart of the leak investigation in a conversation with Mr. Cheney weeks before her identity became public in 2003, lawyers involved in the case said Monday.

Notes of the previously undisclosed conversation between Mr. Libby and Mr. Cheney on June 12, 2003, appear to differ from Mr. Libby’s testimony to a federal grand jury that he initially learned about the C.I.A. officer, Valerie Wilson, from journalists, the lawyers said.

It is fairly obvious at this point that Scooter Libby will be charged. As The Times article notes: "[A]ny effort by Mr. Libby to steer investigators away from his conversation with Mr. Cheney could be considered by Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special counsel in the case, to be an illegal effort to impede the inquiry."

The issue now is: Will anyone else in the Bush Administration be indicted? It's pretty clear that Libby lied to the grand jury -- he obviously thought it was worth committing perjury in order to protect his boss. One can only conclude that Cheney must have been up to his eyeballs in all this.

As noted in the New York Times article: "Mr. Libby’s notes indicate that Mr. Cheney had gotten his information about Ms. Wilson from George J. Tenet, the director of central intelligence, in response to questions from the vice president about Mr. Wilson." Cheney clearly took the initiative in going after Wilson -- he was, after all, the one who asked the CIA director about Wilson -- and I really doubt that he merely put the ball in motion and left the rest of the dirty work up to subordinates.

Steve Clemons at The Washington Note has some interesting ideas on who else might be involved:

First of all, this means that Vice President Cheney has known all along that he was Scooter Libby's source -- and whether Libby had license from him or not to try and slaughter the reputation of Joe Wilson -- CHENEY KNEW.

The entire charade of President Bush stating that he wanted to get to the bottom of who leaked Plame's name -- and who was involved -- is no longer believable at any level. Cheney would not have failed to disclose this to Bush, and Bush played along as if none of his staff were involved. They confessed nothing -- accepted no responsibilty -- until forced by Fitzgerald. * * *

My hunch is that [Libby] went to trusted spear-carriers for Vice President Cheney -- the office and staff of Under Secretary of State John Bolton. Fred Fleitz, Bolton's chief of staff, maintained his CIA WINPAC portfolio and access as an active duty CIA staff member while he operated as Bolton's "acting" chief of staff. We know that Fleitz was a key part of the intelligence cherry-picking/stove-piping operation when it came to both the intel and policy response to various global WMD concerns -- in North Korea, Libya, Iran, and Iraq.

We also know that David Wurmser and John Hannah, who have both apparently cooperated after threats of legal action (i.e., time behind bars) with Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald worked both for John Bolton's operation and the Vice President's office.

I recently consulted with a number of senior State Department officials about the level of interaction between Vice President Cheney's office and John Bolton's office -- and was informed that there was "intense" exchange between them, constant. One said that "Bolton and his team were operatives of Vice President Cheney inside the State Department establishment -- there to subvert Armitage and Powell wherever they could, and if not subvert, then there to spy on the them and report back.

Meanwhile, Bush has hit another milestone in Iraq. The U.S. death toll in that debacle has now reached 2000.

UPDATE: I agree with this:

"If Cheney goes down with Scooter and Karl, I'm not sure how Dubya survives -- it would be tantamount to admitting he's just an empty suit they send out to read the teleprompter while other folks run the country. Granted, they'd need the jaws of life to pry him out of the Oval Office, but Republicans in Congress might realize that he's going to drag them down with him."

Your Tax Dollars At Work

Remember when FauxNews went after Al Franken for using the FauxNews logo and the phrase "fair and balanced" on the cover of his "Lying Liars" book? What did the judge in that lawsuit say about Fox's case? Oh yeah -- I remember: "Wholly without merit."

Well, the Bush Administration is trying to pursue a similar claim against The Onion:

"It has come to my attention that The Onion is using the presidential seal on its Web site," Grant M. Dixton, associate counsel to the president, wrote to The Onion on Sept. 28. (At the time, Mr. Dixton's office was also helping Mr. Bush find a Supreme Court nominee; days later his boss, Harriet E. Miers, was nominated.)

Citing the United States Code, Mr. Dixton wrote that the seal "is not to be used in connection with commercial ventures or products in any way that suggests presidential support or endorsement." Exceptions may be made, he noted, but The Onion had never applied for such an exception.

The Onion was amused. "I'm surprised the president deems it wise to spend taxpayer money for his lawyer to write letters to The Onion," Scott Dikkers, editor in chief, wrote to Mr. Dixton. He suggested the money be used instead for tax breaks for satirists.

More formally, The Onion's lawyers responded that the paper's readers - it prints about 500,000 copies weekly, and three million people read it online - are well aware that The Onion is a joke.

Just because 3.5 million readers of The Onion know it is a joke doesn't necessarily mean that Bush understands this. Maybe our commander-in-chief really does believe that Pittsburgh is unprepared for a full-scale zombie attack.

Let The Distancing Continue, Part II

This Daily News article is a little hard to get a handle on. On the one hand, it contains quotes from unnamed White House sources that are obviously aimed at putting some distance between Bush and the rest of his team while simultaneously making it sound as if Bush is in charge:

. . . Bush, who has a long history of keeping staffers in their place, has lashed out at aides as his political woes have mounted.

"The President is just unhappy in general and casting blame all about," said one Bush insider. "Andy [Card, the chief of staff] gets his share. Karl gets his share. Even Cheney gets his share. And the press gets a big share."

The vice president remains Bush's most trusted political confidant. Even so, the Daily News has learned Bush has told associates Cheney was overly involved in intelligence issues in the run-up to the Iraq war that have been seized on by Bush critics.

Nice try, folks, but I've never really been able to buy into talk like that, mostly because it is clear that Bush had a major hand in leading this country into the Iraq Debacle.

After all, it was Bush -- a full year before the Iraq Invasion -- who told TIME Magazine: "F*#k Saddam -- we're taking him out." And we now know from Richard Clarke that Bush was hyper-focused on Iraq in the days immediately following 9-11:

"The president dragged me into a room with a couple of other people, shut the door, and said, 'I want you to find whether Iraq did this.' Now he never said, 'Make it up.' But the entire conversation left me in absolutely no doubt that George Bush wanted me to come back with a report that said Iraq did this.

"I said, 'Mr. President. We've done this before. We have been looking at this. We looked at it with an open mind. There's no connection.'

"He came back at me and said, "Iraq! Saddam! Find out if there's a connection.' And in a very intimidating way. I mean that we should come back with that answer. We wrote a report."

Clarke continued, "It was a serious look. We got together all the FBI experts, all the CIA experts. We wrote the report. We sent the report out to CIA and found FBI and said, 'Will you sign this report?' They all cleared the report. And we sent it up to the president and it got bounced by the National Security Advisor or Deputy. It got bounced and sent back saying, 'Wrong answer. ... Do it again.'

So when I read stuff about how mad Bush is at Cheney for being "overly involved in intelligence issues in the run-up to the Iraq war," I have to laugh because these unnamed White House officials are clearly lying. I have no doubt that Bush knew what Cheney was doing and that Bush may have even been pushing Cheney to go over to CIA Headquarters and "kick some ass" when it came to intelligence on Iraq.

But today's Daily News article also contains statements that probably have some truth to them. Here are some examples:

Bush is so dismayed that "the only person escaping blame is the President himself," said a sympathetic official, who delicately termed such self-exoneration "illogical."

A second senior Bush loyalist disagreed, saying Bush knows "some of these things are self-inflicted," like the Miers nomination, where Bush jettisoned contrary advice from his advisers and appointed his longtime personal lawyer.

"He must know that the way he did that, relying on his own judgment and instinct, was not good," another key adviser said.

The Daily News piece does effectively portray a White House that is bracing for what will certainly be a very difficult next few weeks. I just don't believe everything that these unnamed White House officials are saying.

NBC Got This One Right

This is an actual screen shot from Bill O'Reilly's recent appearance on The Today Show.

Flip-Flopper Kay Bailey Hutchison

This is hilarious:

On Sunday, Republicans appeared to be preparing to blunt the impact of any charges. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, Republican of Texas, speaking on the NBC news program "Meet the Press," compared the leak investigation with the case of Martha Stewart and her stock sale, "where they couldn't find a crime and they indict on something that she said about something that wasn't a crime."

Ms. Hutchison said she hoped "that if there is going to be an indictment that says something happened, that it is an indictment on a crime and not some perjury technicality where they couldn't indict on the crime and so they go to something just to show that their two years of investigation was not a waste of time and taxpayer dollars."

Is she kidding? As Political Wire notes, Hutchinson must have forgotten "that she voted to impeach former President Bill Clinton for the same charge."

Frank Rich had the perfect response to Hutchinson's recitation of the GOP talking points:

I thought they're obviously--I thought they were a real bellwether, that they're extremely nervous. Those are the charges clearly they think are coming, and there's a story in The Washington Post by Walter Pincus today that gives further evidence that that might be the case. And so now they're trying to trivialize those crimes, and the Martha Stewart defense, which Senator Hutchison adds, to me, it's like a Twinkie defense. I don't think it's going to go very far.

And it's clear to me that if there are indictments--and we don't know--this prosecutor has been leak-proof. He's sort of the un-Ken Starr in that way. It almost would have to involve these crimes because we have to assume that Robert Novak, even though he hasn't said so, told the prosecutor who talked to him long ago, and why then would that not be the end of the story if the only crime is the possible leaking of a covert CIA operative's name? There's been something else going on for months.

Swift-Boating Harriet Miers

Jerome Corsi, a co-author of last year's Anti-Kerry Swift Boat book, Unfit for Command, has set his sights on Harriet Miers. I love it right wingers start eating their own.

Meanwhile, the White House is looking into the possibility of withdrawing Miers's nomination:

The White House has begun making contingency plans for the withdrawal of Harriet Miers as President Bush's choice to fill a seat on the Supreme Court, conservative sources said yesterday.

"White House senior staff are starting to ask outside people, saying, 'We're not discussing pulling out her nomination, but if we were to, do you have any advice as to how we should do it?' " a conservative Republican with ties to the White House told The Washington Times.

The White House denied making such calls.

Now, Don't Get Your Hopes Up, But . . .

. . . this can only be viewed as a good sign: Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald has just launched his own web site.

I really doubt he would do something like this unless he's planning on indicting a few people in the very near future. As Froomkin notes:

Could it be that he's getting ready to release some new legal documents? Like, maybe, some indictments? It's certainly not the action of an office about to fold up its tents and go home.

Fitzgerald spokesman Randall Samborn minimized the significance of the Web launch in an interview this morning.

"I would strongly caution, Dan, against reading anything into it substantive, one way or the other," he said. "It's really a long overdue effort to get something on the Internet to answer a lot of questions that we get . . . and to put up some of the documents that we have had ongoing and continued interest in having the public be able to access."

Don't Be Fooled By The Smiling Mug Shot -- DeLay Is One Unhappy Dude

Much has been made of the smiling mug shot taken of Tom DeLay yesterday when he was booked. The reported reason for DeLay's broad smile was that it was a ploy to rob Democrats of good material for campaign ads.

Photoshoppers have, of course, gone crazy with this picture -- some good ones can be found here (that is my humble contribution below).

But I think DeLay's broad smile was merely an attempt to hide the fact that the former majority leader is very unhappy these days.

We already knew about his unhappiness with Prosecutor Ronnie Earle. Now, DeLay is apparently unhappy with the judge in his case and wants a new one:

Inside the courtroom, Judge Bob Perkins told defense lawyer Dick DeGuerin that "the best way for me to handle" the request for a new judge would be to defer further proceedings.

That set the stage for a pointed exchange between the two men that seemed as much a campaign debate as a courtroom exchange.

In respectful tones, DeGuerin noted that Perkins had donated money to MoveOn.org, a liberal organization that he said has been "selling T-shirts with Mr. DeLay's mug shot on it."

"Let me just say I haven't ever seen that T-shirt, number one. Number two, I haven't bought it. Number three, the last time I contributed to MoveOn that I know of was prior to the November election last year, when they were primarily helping Sen. Kerry," responded the judge.

MoveOn.org denied it was selling any such shirts, and issued a statement that said, "DeGuerin has either bad information or lied in court."

Good luck on all this, Hammer. From what I understand about the strength of the prosecutor's case, you're gonna need it.

TARGET And Its Pharmaceutically-Challenged Employees

Target says it is OK for its pharmacies not to sell contraceptives if such things are against a pharmacist-employee's religious beliefs.

John Aravosis at AMERICABlog has this to say about it:

[L]et's ask Target if they also support the following Target employees:

- Check out clerks who verify how fat you are before selling you that package of potato chips?
- Pharmacists who don't want to fill prescriptions for Jewish customers who killed Christ.
- Pharmacists who don't want to help customers who worship a "Satanic counterfeit" (read: "The Pope," in fundie-speak).
- Pharmacists who only dispense HIV medicine to "innocent victims" of AIDS.
- Pharmacists who want proof that women seeking emergency contraception were really raped, and that they didn't "deserve it."
- Pharmacists (or cashiers) who are Christian Scientists - can they refuse to sell any medicine, even aspirin, to anyone?
- Pharmacists who won't sell birth control pills to unmarried women, condoms to unmarried men, or any birth control at all because God doesn't want people spilling their seed.
- Can fundamentalist Christian employees refuse to interact with gay people in any way, shape or form since gays are sinners, abominations, biological errors, and very likely pedophiles?

There is an easy solution to all this. Target should not be allowed to say it has real pharmacies unless it warns its customers that its pharmacies are not "full service."

And I'm not merely referring to one of those "We Have The Right To Refuse Service To Anyone" signs. Congress should pass a law requiring Target and stores like it to specifically warn its customers of any extreme employee beliefs that may cause certain stores to be pharmaceutically challenged.

The following is an example of a sign that Target should be required by law to prominently display at every public entrance of every affected Target store as well as at every affected Target pharmacy counter:
_____________________________________________________

TARGET DOES NOT REQUIRE ITS PHARMACISTS TO FILL PRESCRIPTIONS FOR THE FOLLOWING TYPES OF DRUGS IF A PHARMACIST'S RELIGIOUS BELIEFS ARE OPPOSED TO THE USE OF SUCH DRUGS:

All drugs related to birth control (emergency or otherwise);

All drugs related to treatment of HIV;

All drugs related to treatment for conditions that a Target pharmacist thinks may be caused by HIV (e.g., pneumonia); and

All drugs related to treatment of any disease that could have been sexually transmitted.

GOD BLESS, AND HAVE A SUPER DAY!

____________________________________________________

This is, of course, merely an example of what such a sign could say. Each store's version should vary depending on the particular extremist attitudes of the employees involved. Each violation of this law should be punishable by a hefty civil penalty paid directly to the customer who was unlawfully refused service.

Seriously, if Target wants to take such a ridiculous position and actually hire pharmacists who refuse to fully perform their jobs, then its customers are entitled to know this before attempting to patronize Target's pharmacies. Once something like the above-described notice is mandated by law, I'm pretty sure that good old American capitalism will put this matter to rest once and for all.

UPDATE: Here is The Rude Pundit's take on all this. As always, DO NOT click on this link if you are easily offended.

At Long Last -- A Tom DeLay Mug Shot

Tom DeLay had his mug shot (left) taken today when he was booked in Texas on state conspiracy and money-laundering charges. He posted a $10,000 bond and was then released. CNN has the details here.

Thanks, Hammer, for a nice pre-Fitzmas gift.

Some "Big-Picture" Observations From Chris Matthews

I normally wouldn't give MSNBC's Chris Matthews credit for anything, but he really nails the TreasonGate Big Picture here (via Whiskey Bar):

What did the vice president and his people do, faced with the hot seat that they were sitting on, that they had somehow gotten accused of taking us into war under false pretenses.

That's the environment in which this whole thing may have been hatched. If there was law-breaking, it came out of the vice president and his people's determination to protect themselves against the charge that they led us into a corrupt war, a war based on false pretenses.

That's how hot this thing is.

If there are indictments, they're going to be probably in the vice president's office, they're probably going to come next week and they are going to blow this White House apart.

It's going to be unbelievable.

I think the people watching right now who are voters better start paying attention to this issue. It's not just about whether somebody's name was leaked, it's about whether we went to war under false pretenses or not, whether people knew about that or not, and what they did when they were charged against that kind of offense against the United States.

It's serious business.

Welcome to the reality-based community, Chris. As Billmon notes: "Tweety, much to my amazement, kinda sorta gets it."

UPDATE: Regarding "The Big Picture," here is a guy who really gets it. Thanks, Maude, for the link.

Ex-Powell Aide Blasts Cheney

Talk radio was all abuzz last night about this piece of news:

Vice-President Dick Cheney and a handful of others had hijacked the government's foreign policy apparatus, deciding in secret to carry out policies that had left the US weaker and more isolated in the world, the top aide to former Secretary of State Colin Powell claimed on Wednesday.

In a scathing attack on the record of President George W. Bush, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, chief of staff to Mr Powell until last January, said: “What I saw was a cabal between the vice-president of the United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld, on critical issues that made decisions that the bureaucracy did not know were being made.

“Now it is paying the consequences of making those decisions in secret, but far more telling to me is America is paying the consequences.”

This is the kind of stuff that I hope Fitzgerald gets into during his TreasonGate prosecutions. The corporate media did not want to touch these matters, but somebody has to.

The other thing late night talk radio was abuzz about was that Tom DeLay will be booked and released.

I love it. God help me -- I do love it so.

Let The Distancing Continue -- Or, If One Lie Doesn't Work, Tell Another!

From The New York Daily News:

An angry President Bush rebuked chief political guru Karl Rove two years ago for his role in the Valerie Plame affair, sources told the Daily News. "He made his displeasure known to Karl," a presidential counselor told The News. "He made his life miserable about this."

As I was reading the above-quoted opening paragraph of the Daily News article, I started to wonder what happened to the White House's first attempt to distance Bush from Karl Rove. This happened 11 days ago, when the White House represented that Rove initially told Bush that he was not involved in the outing of Valerie Plame.

My feeling at the time was that this "Bush Didn't Know" angle was . . . now how did I put it -- a crock:

What a crock. The White House has obviously read the writing on the wall and is attempting to put some distance between Karl Rove and President Bush when it comes to this whole Plame TreasonGate Scandal. The administration is now trying to make it look like Bush was on top of things a couple years ago by taking the position that Bush asked Rove the right question and that (gasp!) Rove lied to our president!

So, what happened to the White House's "Karl Lied To Our President" defense? Well, the answer to that question came near the end of today's Daily News article:

A second well-placed source said some recently published reports implying Rove had deceived Bush about his involvement in the Wilson counterattack were incorrect and were leaked by White House aides trying to protect the President.

Sure, the White House was never all that great at lying, but this is getting ridiculous.

UPDATE: Kos has more about all the Bush lying here.

Move Along -- Nothing To See Here (Yet)

Anyone out there expecting TreasonGate indictments to be handed down this week can relax for a while:

The special counsel in the C.I.A. leak case has told associates he has no plans to issue a final report about the results of the investigation, heightening the expectation that he intends to bring indictments, lawyers in the case and law enforcement officials said yesterday.

The prosecutor, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, is not expected to take any action in the case this week, government officials said. A spokesman for Mr. Fitzgerald, Randall Samborn, declined to comment.

A final report had long been considered an option for Mr. Fitzgerald if he decided not to accuse anyone of wrongdoing, although Justice Department officials have been dubious about his legal authority to issue such a report.

By signaling that he had no plans to issue the grand jury's findings in such detail, Mr. Fitzgerald appeared to narrow his options either to indictments or closing his investigation with no public disclosure of his findings, a choice that would set off a political firestorm.

Meanwhile, a few more morsels of information regarding Fitzgerald's investigation have been tossed our way. Larry Johnson had this to say on his blog:

Had lunch today with a person who has a direct tie to one of the folks facing indictment in the Plame affair. There are 22 files that Fitzgerald is looking at for potential indictment . These include Stephen Hadley, Karl Rove, Lewis Libby, Dick Cheney, and Mary Matalin (there are others of course). Hadley has told friends he expects to be indicted. No wonder folks are nervous at the White House.

The Hadley stuff is pretty interesting. Could it be that perhaps Stephen Hadley has received one of those target letters from Fitzgerald? Steve Soto at The Left Coaster has this question:

Yes folks, the National Security Advisor expects to be indicted for activities he allegedly undertook while he was Number Two to our current Secretary of State. So can someone tell me how Condi skates if Hadley gets nailed?

Karl Rove must also think that indictments are headed his way -- he's cancelled his plans to attend two Republican fundraisers.

Meanwhile, Murray Waas has the goods on why Scooter Libby is in so much trouble:

Evidence indicating that Libby or his attorney may have tried to discourage or influence Miller's testimony is significant for two reasons, outside legal experts say. First, attempting to influence a witness's testimony might in and of itself constitute obstruction of justice or witness-tampering, said the experts.

More important, evidence that Libby might have tried to discourage Miller's testimony has put Libby's testimony in a worse light, according to government officials briefed on the matter. Potentially misleading and incomplete answers by Libby to federal investigators are less likely to be explained away as the result of his faulty memory or inadvertent mistakes, the sources said.

And The White House Snitch Is . . .

. . . John Hannah.

This is from Raw Story:

Individuals familiar with Fitzgerald’s case tell RAW STORY that John Hannah, a senior national security aide on loan to Vice President Dick Cheney from the offices of then-Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs, John Bolton, was named as a target of Fitzgerald’s probe. They say he was told in recent weeks that he could face imminent indictment for his role in leaking Plame-Wilson’s name to reporters unless he cooperated with the investigation.

Others close to the probe say that if Hannah is cooperating with the special prosecutor then he was likely going to be charged as a co-conspirator and may have cut a deal. * * *

Those close to the investigation said in June 2003, Hannah was given orders by higher-ups in Cheney’s office to leak Plame’s covert status and identity in an attempt to muzzle Wilson, who had been a thorn in the side of the administration since May 2003, when he started questioning the administration’s claims that Iraq was an imminent threat to the U.S. and its neighbors in the Middle East. The specifics of who issued those orders and what directives were given were not provided.

Interestingly, John Bolton actually visited poor Judy Miller while she was in jail. Maybe they were trying to get their stories straight.

UPDATE: Rumors are circulating in D.C. that Dick Cheney will resign and that Bush will name Condi Rice to take Cheney's place [thanks, Slic(k), for the link].

UPDATE II: What Billmon says.

UPDATE III: Here is some great advice (the fact that such advice needed to be given is a testament to how well Fitzgerald has kept a lid on everything).

A Letter To Tom DeLay

This is pretty good (thanks for the link, Fredrick):

This country was not built by nervous nellies and Sunday school teachers but by bold marauders, dodgers, Sooners, buffalo hunters, forty-niners -- people who saw what they wanted and took it. You're one of them. Politics is about power. You grabbed hold of it and became King of the Republican Hill, a majority leader who knows that one can never have too much majority.

I am disappointed by your attempts to beautify yourself. It's pitiful, sir, and demeaning to blow-dry your hair and try to project warmth through those drill-sergeant eyes and belt-sander voice. You're the man, sir, who redrew the map of Texas to squeeze more Republican congressmen out of it, and got Indian tribes to pay for you and yours to fly to Scotland first-class and play golf, and who paid his wife as a consultant, etc., etc., etc. Personal warmth was not what got you to the dance. The rest of us tiptoe through the tulips, fearful of giving offense, but you, sir, are one brass monkey.

Is There A Snitch In The White House?

It appears so. From the New York Daily News:

[A]t least six current and former Cheney staffers - most members of the White House Iraq Group - have testified before the grand jury, including the vice president's top honcho, Lewis (Scooter) Libby, and two top Cheney national security lieutenants.

Cheney's name has come up amid indications Fitzgerald may be edging closer to a blockbuster conspiracy charge - with help from a secret snitch.

"They have got a senior cooperating witness - someone who is giving them all of that," a source who has been questioned in the leak probe told the Daily News yesterday.

The Daily News article also touched upon an issue that has been running through my head for the last few days, namely, if Cheney is now a target of Fitzgerald's investigation, doesn't that mean that Scooter Libby is as good as indicted? What I mean is -- doesn't the road to Cheney necessarily have to go through Scooter's office first? The Daily News article continues:

Libby is often described as "Cheney's Cheney," a loyal and discreet lieutenant who shares his boss's hard-line philosophy and bareknuckle attitude toward political enemies of the Bush administration.

Cheney and Libby spend hours together in the course of a day, which causes sources who know both men very well to assert that any attempts to discredit Wilson would almost certainly have been known to the vice president.

"Scooter wouldn't be freelancing on this without Cheney's knowledge," a source told the Daily News. "It was probably some off-the-cuff thing: 'This guy [Wilson] could be a problem.'"

I guess I could understand a person like George W. Bush keeping some distance from what his underlings were doing. After all, Bush doesn't appear to be a hands-on, micro-managing type of guy.

But Cheney certainly strikes me that way. After all, Cheney is the one who made all those trips over to CIA Headquarters during the run-up to the Iraq Debacle in order to make sure the analysts at Langley were reaching conclusions about Iraq that would support BushCo's (i.e., PNAC's) invasion plans.

Indeed, the Washington Post reported yesterday that Fitzgerald "has assembled evidence that shows Cheney's long-running feud with the CIA contributed to the unmasking of operative Valerie Plame." It wouldn't surprise me in the least if Cheney was pulling Scooter Libby's strings all along when it came to Libby's TreasonGate-related activities.

Regarding this "secret snitch," I note that the article does not say that this person is a current member of the Bush Administration. The purported "snitch" is merely described as a "senior cooperating witness."

Sounds like an office pool may be in order. I'll take Ari Fleischer.

Would Miers Vote To Overturn Roe v. Wade?

Maybe. Read all about it here:

Mr. Dobson says he spoke with Mr. Rove on Sunday, Oct. 2, the day before President Bush publicly announced the nomination. Mr. Rove assured Mr. Dobson that Ms. Miers was an evangelical Christian and a strict constructionist, and said that Justice Hecht, a longtime friend of Ms. Miers who had helped her join an evangelical church in 1979, could provide background on her. Later that day, a personal friend of Mr. Dobson's in Texas called him and suggested he speak with Judge Kinkeade, who has been a friend of Ms. Miers's for decades.

Mr. Dobson says he was surprised the next day to learn that Justice Hecht and Judge Kinkeade were joining the Arlington Group call. He was asked to introduce the two of them, which he considered awkward given that he had never spoken with Justice Hecht and only once to Judge Kinkeade. According to the notes of the call, Mr. Dobson introduced them by saying, "Karl Rove suggested that we talk with these gentlemen because they can confirm specific reasons why Harriet Miers might be a better candidate than some of us think."

What followed, according to the notes, was a free-wheeling discussion about many topics, including same-sex marriage. Justice Hecht said he had never discussed that issue with Ms. Miers. Then an unidentified voice asked the two men, "Based on your personal knowledge of her, if she had the opportunity, do you believe she would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade?"

"Absolutely," said Judge Kinkeade.

"I agree with that," said Justice Hecht. "I concur."

Wow, I'm really glad that BushCo consults with a radical right wing religious extremist like Dobson prior to announcing major decisions. I'll sleep more soundly tonight now that I know this. And it sure was nice of the Bush Regime to supply the guest speakers for that meeting on Miers. As Harriet would probably say, "How cool is that!?!"

I doubt, however, that this will do anything to quell the radical Christian right's anger over Bush's nomination of Miers. In order to get the support of the extremists, she'd have to swear on several stacks of Bibles that she would indeed vote that way, then write such a promise in blood, then anoint herself in some of John Ashcroft's cooking oil, then purchase a goat to use as . . . .

Oh Hell, there is nothing Miers could ever do to convince any of Amerika's religious nutjobs that she'd vote to overturn Roe. Never mind.

Rant of the Year

Hunter at Daily Kos takes the John Aravosis post to which I referred yesterday and runs with it. Although you really need to read the whole thing, here is a sample:

Conservatism, whatever it may be, is hopefully not this. You don't have far to look, in the Republican Party, to find true conservatives. I may not like the political stances of a John McCain or an Arlen Specter, but nor do I fear for the nation if they come to lead the Republican party. Men of integrity can disagree on the principles of government; men whose sole moral compass is directed by what they can technically get away with, however, aren't political men. They're just crooks.

But for every politician of questionable honesty, for every staffer under arrest, for every Republican lobbyist caught as bagman, there's a hundred desperate Bill Kristols willing to prostrate themselves and their own morality in exchange for another perceived half an inch towards their own movement's elusive prize: some nebulous faux-conservative utopia that always turns to a deficit-riddled, pork-choked, crony-laden hell within the first years their chosen Republican leaders try to implement it. And then, the political cycle repeats.

No, Movement Republicans are people who not only are willing to overlook advantageous crimes, but celebrate them, if done in service to the party. Successful pundits include Iran-Contra figure Oliver North and convicted Watergate burglar G. Gordon Liddy -- people who, in any movement with the integrity of week-old tuna, would have been drummed out, not hired on as voices of the movement.

Thanks For The Input, Brit

Luckily, Digby has the stomach to watch FauxNews:

Referring to the NY Times coverage of the Judy Miller saga, Brit Hume said something today to the effect of, "I don't think the American people care about this and as I was reading it today it occurred to me that I don't care much either."

Well, he wouldn't. Brit's career as the dean of FoxNews was made by covering the important stories, after all. . . .

It's true -- Brit certainly knows an important story when he sees one. As Digby points out, FoxNews, with Hume's help, "grew to its current status riding on Clinton's penis."

Meanwhile, Kevin Drum explains the significance of Judith Miller's "Valerie Flame" notation, and also points out why Miller is so obviously a liar:

Judith Miller's contention that she can't remember who originally provided her with the name "Valerie Flame" is completely ridiculous. She apparently wrote down the name in her notebook sometime around July 8, 2003, and obviously she knew where it came from at the time. Within a week, Robert Novak had written his infamous column in which he outed Valerie Plame, and Miller certainly hadn't forgotten who provided her the name that quickly. A couple of days later all hell broke loose, and that would have etched the name of her source in her mind permanently.

Also, Mickey Kaus has suggested that Judith Miller's lawyer may have pulled a fast one on the prosecutor by getting Fitzgerald to limit his Miller questioning to Mr. Libby and the Wilson matter. Kaus' argument goes like this:

[A] key question is who told Miller the name "Valerie Plame," which she miswrote as "Valerie Flame" in her notebook. Miller says she's not sure it was Libby. Therefore it might have been someone else--i.e. she might well have had another very "meaningful" source, contrary to Bennett's alleged representations to the prosecutor. Am I missing something, or does Fitzgerald have grounds for being extremely p[isse]d off?

I have some different thinking on that point. I think Fitzgerald set a trap of sorts for Judy Miller. If Miller were to have come forward and testified -- clearly and unequivocally -- that Scooter gave her Valerie Plame's name, then that would have obviously been fine with Fitzgerald.

Instead -- as noted above -- Miller clearly lied during sworn testimony to the grand jury when she said she couldn't remember who gave her Valerie Plame's name. I think Fitzgerald will now ask the grand jury to indict Judith Miller for perjury and obstruction of justice; and if that happens, then Fitzgerald will be able to put the screws to Miller in the hope that she has had enough of jail cells and will choose to cleanly give up Scooter and any other "meaningful" TreasonGate source she might have.

Some will say that Fitzgerald won't be able to do that because, according to Judith Miller, he told the grand jury that Miller "is only a witness in this case and not a target." Well, that may be true, but I really doubt that Fitzgerald agreed not to pursue an indictment against Miller should she end up committing perjury during her grand jury testimony.

I think Judy might be in a little trouble.

From Rick McKee of The Augusta Chronicle

The Grand Old Party of Treason

John Aravosis at AMERICAblog takes on the Republicans' attempt to minimize TraitorGate:

[T]he Republicans are now making light of an intentional effort to expose an undercover CIA agent, working on weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East, no less, while we are at war in the Middle East on that very issue. * * *

The Republican party's gift to the American people, and the Bush administration's legacy, will be the normalization of treason. The notion that betraying your country during wartime for personal gain is no more serious than running a stop sign or going 60 in a 55 zone.

If a senior aide to the president had intentionally outed a CIA agent during World War II, an agent whose work was central to our mission of defeating the Germans, that aide would very likely be put to death. While no one is yet arguing that Karl Rove be executed, it is the height of hypocrisy and hubris for the Republican party to attempt to minimize a crime that not only puts our troops at risk, but risks the lives of every American man, woman and child.

It is truly a sad day when the Republcan party minimizes treason in a selfish effort to defend a traitor. Is this what nearly 2,000 American soldiers gave their lives for?

The Traitorous Judith Miller Is Also A Liar

At least it seems that way. As Arianna noted yesterday:

The first question raised by the Times’ Judy-Culpa and by Judy Miller’s own account is: Who told Judy about Valerie Plame (or “Flame” as the name appears in Judy’s notes)? According to these two pieces, the name was immaculately conceived. "As I told Mr. Fitzgerald, I simply could not recall where that came from," Miller writes.

When the Plame case broke open in July 2003, these notes were presumably no more than a few weeks old. But who had revealed Plame’s name was not seared on Miller's mind?

This is as believable as Woodward and Bernstein not recalling who Deep Throat was. It also means that Judy went to jail to protect a source she can't recall.

Arianna's last point touches upon what was going on in my mind yesterday as I was reading the NYTimes account of all this as well as Miller's own account. This scandal centers on who outed Valerie Plame. Although Miller claims she can't remember who told her about Plame's status as a covert CIA operative, she was perfectly willing to sleep on a thin jail mattress for a couple months merely because her notes might have suggested that it was Libby who told her about Plame. That's Judy Miller's story and she's sticking to it.

That doesn't make any sense to me, particularly when you consider that Miller had a signed waiver from Libby all through this ordeal. Indeed, the reason the judge threw her in jail is because Miller had that waiver. "She has the keys to release herself," Judge Hogan said. "She has a waiver she chooses not to recognize."

Miller, in her own account, unwittingly points out the ridiculousness of her "I can't remember" defense:

Mr. Fitzgerald asked whether I ever pursued an article about Mr. Wilson and his wife. I told him I had not, though I considered her connection to the C.I.A. potentially newsworthy. I testified that I recalled recommending to editors that we pursue a story.

Mr. Fitzgerald asked my reaction to Mr. Novak's column. I told the grand jury I was annoyed at having been beaten on a story. I said I felt that since The Times had run Mr. Wilson's original essay, it had an obligation to explore any allegation that undercut his credibility. At the same time, I added, I also believed that the newspaper needed to pursue the possibility that the White House was unfairly attacking a critic of the administration.

So, she was "annoyed" that she was beaten on a story, but she doesn't remember who gave her the story on which she was beaten? As eriposte at The Left Coaster points out:

[H]ere is what Miller wants us to believe. She wanted so badly to write a story about Valerie Plame/Wilson and her CIA identity, but she just does not recall the source who gave her the name "Valerie [F/P]lame". Does anyone really believe this nonsense other than her partner-in-journalistic-malpractice Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., and her feckless boss Bill Keller? What was she going to say in that article - "A source I can't recall (and a former Hill staffer) said that Valerie Plame works in the CIA"?

Not to mention, her claim that she recommended an article be written, itself appears to be a fabrication, as the NYT article notes. . . .

Miller's ability to now claim that she simply does not remember was undoubtedly aided by the amount of time that had passed between the outing of Plame and Miller's eventual appearance in front of the grand jury. And that was obviously the whole BushCo strategy all along -- stall out this matter by referring it to Attorney General (and Karl Rove-buddy) John Ashcroft for a few months.

After all, the longer the whole thing stayed on the back burner, the easier it would be for the traitors involved to later claim "we don't remember." The Bush Regime's strategy was certainly aided by a complacent Corporate Media -- the mainstream press did not report on this story until nearly two-and-a-half months after the now-infamous Robert Novak column revealed Plame as a CIA operative.

That's what Judith Miller is doing here -- she's following the BushCo playbook as best she can and hoping that the passage of time makes her story appear less absurd. Although Miller's statement that she doesn't remember who told her about Valerie Plame is quite obviously a lie, it re-raises this important question: Is she merely protecting Scooter Libby, or someone higher up in the administration?

Nice Try, Scotty

At last Thursday's White House press briefing, Scott McClelland said this in response to Helen Thomas' questioning:

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, Helen, the President recognizes that we are engaged in a global war on terrorism. And when you're engaged in a war, it's not always pleasant, and it's certainly a last resort. But when you engage in a war, you take the fight to the enemy, you go on the offense. And that's exactly what we are doing. We are fighting them there so that we don't have to fight them here. September 11th taught us --

Q It has nothing to do with -- Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, you have a very different view of the war on terrorism, and I'm sure you're opposed to the broader war on terrorism. The President recognizes this requires a comprehensive strategy, and that this is a broad war, that it is not a law enforcement matter.

My God, McClelland, what year do you think this is, 2002? Maybe your predecessor could get away with that crap a few years ago, but the times they are a-changin'.

Terry Moran of ABCNews instantly called McClelland on his horseshit remark about Thomas:

Q On what basis do you say Helen is opposed to the broader war on terrorism?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, she certainly expressed her concerns about Afghanistan and Iraq and going into those two countries. I think I can go back and pull up her comments over the course of the past couple of years.

Q And speak for her, which is odd.

MR. McCLELLAN: No, I said she may be, because certainly if you look at her comments over the course of the past couple of years, she's expressed her concerns -

Q I'm opposed to preemptive war, unprovoked preemptive war.

MR. McCLELLAN: -- she's expressed her concerns.

Timelad posted this comment at Daily Kos in response to McClelland's idiotic remark:

Surgeon: "I'm happy to report that the operation was a big success."

Patient: "But you amputated the wrong arm!"

Surgeon: "Well, you may have a different view, Helen, and I'm sure you're opposed to the idea of surgery in general...."

Right on.

As Usual, Frank Rich Nails It

Frank Rich gives the TreasonGate Scandal some much needed perspective:

When Scott McClellan later declared that he had been personally assured by Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby that they were "not involved" with the leak, the case was still in the safe hands of the attorney general then, John Ashcroft, himself a three-time Rove client in past political campaigns. Though Mr. Rove may be known as "Bush's brain," he wasn't smart enough to anticipate that Justice Department career employees would eventually pressure Mr. Ashcroft to recuse himself because of this conflict of interest, clearing the way for an outside prosecutor as independent as Mr. Fitzgerald.

THIS modus operandi was foolproof, shielding the president as well as Mr. Rove from culpability, as long as it was about winning an election. The attack on Mr. Wilson, by contrast, has left them and the Cheney-Libby tag team vulnerable because it's about something far bigger: protecting the lies that took the country into what the Reagan administration National Security Agency director, Lt. Gen. William Odom, recently called "the greatest strategic disaster in United States history."

Whether or not Mr. Fitzgerald uncovers an indictable crime, there is once again a victim, but that victim is not Mr. or Mrs. Wilson; it's the nation. It is surely a joke of history that even as the White House sells this weekend's constitutional referendum as yet another "victory" for democracy in Iraq, we still don't know the whole story of how our own democracy was hijacked on the way to war.

Meanwhile, Karl Rove's defense team ain't sounding too optimistic these days: "Rove's defense team asserts that President Bush's deputy chief of staff has not committed a crime but nevertheless anticipates that special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald could find a way to bring charges in the next two weeks. . . ."

The Much-Anticipated NYTimes Piece on Judith Miller and TreasonGate

I just finished reading the long but occasionally interesting New York Times piece regarding the Judith Miller ordeal. This early paragraph in the article regarding Miller's September 30th grand jury testimony caught my eye:

And when the prosecutor in the case asked her to explain how "Valerie Flame" appeared in the same notebook she used in interviewing Mr. Libby, Ms. Miller said she "didn't think" she heard it from him. "I said I believed the information came from another source, whom I could not recall," she wrote on Friday, recounting her testimony for an article that appears today.

It sure sounds like she's still trying to cover up for old Scooter. Miller was clearly trying to do this back in the summer of 2004, when she was subpoenaed by Prosecutor Fitzgerald. The New York Times retained First Amendment lawyer Floyd Abrams to help Miller, and she gave the OK for Abrams to speak with Scooter Libby's attorney, Joseph Tate:

Mr. Abrams told Ms. Miller . . . that Mr. Tate said she was free to testify. Mr. Abrams said Mr. Tate also passed along some information about Mr. Libby's grand jury testimony: that he had not told Ms. Miller the name or undercover status of Mr. Wilson's wife.

That raised a potential conflict for Ms. Miller. Did the references in her notes to "Valerie Flame" and "Victoria Wilson" suggest that she would have to contradict Mr. Libby's account of their conversations? Ms. Miller said in an interview that she concluded that Mr. Tate was sending her a message that Mr. Libby did not want her to testify.

According to Ms. Miller, this was what Mr. Abrams told her about his conversation with Mr. Tate: "He was pressing about what you would say. When I wouldn't give him an assurance that you would exonerate Libby, if you were to cooperate, he then immediately gave me this, 'Don't go there, or, we don't want you there.' "

Mr. Abrams said: "On more than one occasion, Mr. Tate asked me for a recitation of what Ms. Miller would say. I did not provide one."

Meanwhile, Miller has placed her own "personal account" of her grand jury testimony on the New York Times website, and she provides some clues as to where Fitzgerald might be going with his investigation:

During my testimony on Sept. 30 and Oct. 12, the special counsel, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, asked me whether Mr. Libby had shared classified information with me during our several encounters before Mr. Novak's article. He also asked whether I thought Mr. Libby had tried to shape my testimony through a letter he sent to me in jail last month. And Mr. Fitzgerald asked whether Mr. Cheney had known what his chief aide was doing and saying.

As ponificator at Daily Kos notes, the following paragraphs from Miller's article certainly suggest that Fitzgerald is targeting Scooter in a big way:

Mr. Fitzgerald asked me to read the final three paragraphs [of Libby's letter to Miller] aloud to the grand jury. "The public report of every other reporter's testimony makes clear that they did not discuss Ms. Plame's name or identity with me," Mr. Libby wrote.

The prosecutor asked my reaction to those words. I replied that this portion of the letter had surprised me because it might be perceived as an effort by Mr. Libby to suggest that I, too, would say we had not discussed Ms. Plame's identity. Yet my notes suggested that we had discussed her job.

Finally, Judith Miller's days at the New York Times are probably numbered. Raw Story is reporting that Miller has taken an indefinite leave of absence:

"Judy is going to take some time off until we decide what she is doing next," Times' spokesperson Catherine Mathis told RAW STORY Saturday afternoon. * * *

The Times' Sunday story asserts that Miller has not signed a book deal as previously reported.

"She said she thought she would write a book about her experiences in the leak case, although she added that she did not yet have a book deal," the article says. "She also plans on taking some time off but says she hopes to return to the newsroom."

Two reporters inside the newsroom say they have heard Miller will resign from the paper.

Miller was not cooperative with the Times internal probe, reporters told RAW STORY Thursday. This was confirmed in the New York Times' internal probe.

By the way, 1970 American soldiers have died in Iraq so far. I wonder how many more will be dead when Miller's inevitable book comes out.