fitz!

ok, got that out of the way, now a prediction;

cheney resigns due to “health reasons”, bush pardons him and appoints mccain or his brother as vp

bush resigns, probaby for health reasons also, and whoever is vice president pardons bush

what would America do if that happened?

good Lord, Jane - up ridiculously early or ridiculously late?

Question for Jane: When do you sleep???

I am confused…WOW Jane.

i heart jane.

“Rove and his legal team hope they will be cleared soon.”

Is it just possible Luskin himself will be indicted on Friday ALONG with Rover? Anyone got anything on this angle?

At some point I think it doesn’t even take a legal mind to realize that Fitzgerald extended a *huge* professional courtesy to Rove/Luskin by agreeing to look at Luskin’s “new” exculpatory evidence, and thereby delay indictment. When it turned out to be such obvious crap, mere human nature (assuming Fitz allows himself such a thing) would dictate that Fitz will now not only bring the pain, but maybe even bring it a little harder now.

Look for an obstruction charge to be added to the perjury and false statement charges.

what would America do if that happened?

What we have done in response to all of shrubs crimes; nothing.

Won’t Isikoff, Hume, Booby and the rest of the Beltwat Bleaters have egg on their face when the indictment does comes down?

Perhaps when that does occur Jane, you can point to this analysis as exhibit A of what’s wrong with DC journalism. Save this one-you’ll want it later and please rub Isikoff’s nose in it.

Well why doesn’t Fitz just nail Karl’s ass for the thing itself? The leak, and the law that punishes that? Perjury and obstruction of justice are serious charges, but he’s obviously the original leaker. Nail him for the whole enchillada.

Seems to me that that is what this investigation is really about. Or is this legal dance so kabuki that we’ll see those charges in 2009?

Excellent post Jane. I read the Isikoff story too and felt great uneasiness with it. The only specific fact that I knew was “obscured” by Isikoff was Rove’s 11th hour “memory” AFTER Cooper agreed to testify. Other than that, I was not sure why I was so uncomfortable with this story. Thanks a bunch. YOU refreshed MY memory and now I know why I couldn’t swallow Isikoff’s story.

Either Isikoff is incompetent, or he’s a lying sack of shit. (Or maybe both?)

What does Luskin and Rove hope to gain with all the spin? Do they think they can influence Fitzgerald’s decision or are they simply trying to put a good face on pending bad news that will be another in a long string of negatives for the administration?

It seems a little strange to be using a political strategy in a criminal investigation…the only voters are seated on a Grand Jury and they can’t consider all the fine little explanations offered by the apologists in the MSM. Could they be that out of touch with reality?

more observations here:

www.thoughttheater.com

rove will ask for evdence to clear himself which the president will not allow due to “national security” and the man would walk

the fitz is making sure that type of defense won’t work.

pretty cool

me to me (#2):
bush resigns, probaby for health reasons also, and whoever is vice president pardons bush

what would America do if that happened?

Nothing could be done unless the House voted on impeachment articles first. The prevailing Constitutional view is that pardons arising because of an impeachment proceeding are NULL and VOID. That is one reason why the House Dems (hello? anybody there?) need to be speaking of an impeachment investigatgion now.

if the domcrats manage to overcome the electronic voting machines and voter fraud, cheney resigns immediately, bush pardons him and replaces him, then bush resigns and whoever is the vo parodns him

that’s my story and I’m stickkin to it

Jane, I’m a little confused by your post. In one place you say that “It turns out he testified twice in January of 2004.” and then later that “Before Karl appears before the grand jury for the first time in February 2004, Luskin hears from Viveca Novak that Cooper says Rove was his source.”

While I think that inconsistency doesn’t harm the narrative, it’s the sort of hook that others might seize upon.

OT: check out this line in the Reuters obit of Ken Galbraith:

“Galbraith remained a proponent of traditional Democratic ideals even as they came to appear shrill and out of step.

‘Consigning the least fortunate of our people to the neglect and despair that a purely individualist society prescribes … is not, I submit, a sound conservative strategy,’ he said in his 1986 book, ‘A View from the Stands.’”

Bill O’Reilly goes back to the wires. That’s a great example of “shrill and out of step,” eh?

Galbraith obit

Reuters ombudsman
CNN ombudsman

“Well why doesn’t Fitz just nail Karl’s ass for the thing itself? The leak, and the law that punishes that? Perjury and obstruction of justice are serious charges, but he’s obviously the original leaker. Nail him for the whole enchillada.

Seems to me that that is what this investigation is really about. Or is this legal dance so kabuki that we’ll see those charges in 2009? “

Because they would use greymail to get the case thrown out of court. That’s another reason Rove wasn’t afraid to lie. He and his team thought Fitz would indict the original crime and they could get the case tossed. You can see that in Libby’s defense team responses. All of a sudden Fitz switched the game on them and they are playing baseball instead of basketball. This article proved to me that Rove and Libby are coordinating. Gold Bars didn’t just spin here to Isikoff, Libby’s lawyers are in there too spinning away.

I wonder how Walton is going to feel when he reads this? I wonder if this is going to have any impact on whether he issues a gag order? It is obvious that Rove/Libby are going to try to use the media to affect this case. They get the court of opinion behind them, or at least 40% of Bush loyalists, it will make it easier for Bush to pardon them.

Man, our government sucks.

Just looks like one or all Comstock/Luskin/Rove/Isikoff are ‘begging the question’ so as to setup the inevitable ’swiftboating’ of Fitz and all other investigations when Fitz drops the bomb.

Frankly, I’m hopeful his GJ hands up a whole slew of indictments all at once…Cheney, Hadley, Card, Gonzo…the whole lot of ‘em. Conspiracy.

The story is written in the re-writes.

As the bits come out, we can only hope that Fitz has done his job well and doesn’t let any of these rats get away. And judging from his past performance, he does his job well.

there was a camera pan during colbert’s evisceration, er, performance that caught spikey mikey’s table — and, surprise!, he was not amused by the routine. lol.

I’m with lurker. Time to indict some people for the crime against “Mrs. Joseph Wilson” (a la Stephen Colbert).

I don’t believe for one second they didn’t know exactly what they were doing.

And….five (5) appearances before a grand jury? That’s not right, either. Fitz needs to get the job done now and quit being turned around by these liars.

Randy — the “testified twice in January” bit came from isikoff — not Jane. She was simply reporting what was in his article.

Stephen Colbert is a brave man. A courageous man. I honor him. Would that there was anyone remotely like him in the Washington press corps.

Dishonesty and injustice never sleep; thus, nor can the heroes sworn to defeat them.

Incidentally, the simple fact that Viveca Novak and Bob Luskin’s conversation concerned whether Rove had “a Cooper problem” suggests pretty strongly that the chat took place AFTER Cooper was subpoenaed (i.e., in May, just as Viveca initially remembered).

How could Rove have “a Cooper problem” unless there was a prospect of Cooper being forced to testify?

troll at 5

So is there anything new at all in Isikoff’s article? If not, what’s the excuse for printing it? I would swear that the last paragraph of his you quoted is practically word-for-word from an earlier article, but I can’t find it with a quick google, so I suppose it’s just painfully similar, not identical.

Dishonesty and injustice never sleep; thus, nor can the heroes sworn to defeat them.

P.S. I do, however, suspect that their poodles squeeze in a nap here and there.

To be clear, since numbers get changed, troll at 5 is Alex rockets. Can’t we ban this clown?

I would be very suprised if he indicts for the leak just now. The graymail implications are too great. And he doesn’t need to. He can get them for consrpiray to obstruct just with underlying perjury and possibly some destruction of evidence depending on how the computer forensics turned out.

If he indicts on the underlying crimes, the discovery problems will be huge and there could be spillover onto the Libby case. i love the Libby case, so tight, so focused, so impossible to get out of.

I expect to see something similar for old Rover. And maybe not just Rover.

Something tight, focused and inescapable

Great summation Jane. I suspect Fitz is fed up with having the Sahara desert thrown in his face and may indict Luskin and V. Novack as well round Fitzo de Mayo. Why he may not charge the underlying is still the infernal difficulty or proving it and also it would cut against Fitzers style which is thorough and by-the-book and ‘ Roll-em-up-from-the bottom’.
Long live Fitz!
Luskin’s got some chuzpah trying stunt’s like this on! Impressive…or just dumb probably.
The arrogance of these fascist’s is proven when you look at who else was featured in Newsweak recently. None other than Mussolini style blackshirt, Michael Ledeen. Hard to be further out on the lunar right than TIME but Newsweak manage somehow.
Speaking of fascist’s - the red fascist Hitchens still has a gig with Slate. Kerry never impressed me much but one thing he is reported to have said is how much he hates Leninist’s.
Kerry must have shot a lot of far better Red’s in ‘Nam than this scumbag Hitchen’s.
The National-Bolshevism party rolls on - real men go to Tehran!
Real crooks go to jail and real fascists get shot and real fascists get hung.
Thank’s Jane. Yr the best.
How long do you see the fallout raging?
I clocked G Gorden at around five days heading Googlenews. The Bunkers might want to stock up on weenies!

Who would make arrests in the White House? DC cops? Feds? Couldn’t Bush, as CIC and head of Gov’t,tell the officers to Cheney themselves.
What if Bushco decides NOT to leave in ‘08.Who is going to stop them and how?

Yep, the noose closes.
1. Rover’s entire hopes rode on reporters privilege…that the courts would never force Coop to testify. When that fell apart one could hear the screaming from Rover-land.
2. Cocktails with Viveka: I believe Luskin reported this chit chat IMMEDIATELY to Rover. But, the Luskin/Rove consensus remained “they got nuthin. You can’t get convicted on newsroom gossip.”
3. Hadley email: I also believe this to be a bit of a red herring. Once the courts ordered Coop to testify…Rover knew he was in deep doo-doo. Rover couldn’t very well skip on down to the GJ and say “gee, on second thought…blah blah blah”. Rover had to come up with an “EXCUSE”…SOMETHING he could hang his hat on as having “jogged” his memory somehow. So…out comes the Hadley email.
4. After the dam broke with Coop going to testify, the Luskin/Rove camp came up with TWO red herrings….the Hadley email, as well as this silly Viveka cocktail chat from months ago designed to try to cover Rover’s ass.
Ghostman
PS: I’ve always wondered about the cocktail chat, in terms of date. Didn’t either party pay with a credit card? Valet park? If either party is a regular…didn’t the bartender or waitress have a memory of date? Interesting.

Let’s do the frog march again!

graphicus:
5 times—when you’re as slippery a greased pig as Rove is, that seems not too excessive, but I totally agree Fitz let himself get spun, but that will hopefully just make the other shoe drop all the harder.

egregious:

what exactly is so outlandishly offensive about Alex Rocket’s post? “ROVE IS GOING DOWN” Using all caps?

I for one don’t get the troll accusation…

Funny, when I read Murray Waas’ recent article, I felt it was Luskin spin. Waas is pretty careful, and from his text I took away that Rove’s defense team was the source of “what Karl told the GJ and when”. I felt Waas had pretty well delineated that the story was coming from Rove’s people.

The gist of Waas article was that Rove’s defense would follow the lines of “all those silly journalists, running and printing unverified gossip as fact, how can you believe them”.

So, if Goldbars is running off to another writer to respond to the first article as you suggest, then I conclude he’s trying to generate a conversation with himself, with the new spin also directed, from a different angle, at the same point - “all those silly journalists, etc.”

Like when you were a kid, spinning the little carousel in the kiddie park. If you get someone on each side, pushing, it spins faster than if only one person pushes.

Given Rover was the MFIC of a White House whose admitting Gannon to the Press Room a day or so after he signed up was a pretty explicit statement of what that White House thinks of reporters, his defense strategy is not surprising.

I can’t help but think that the reason Luskin and Rove waited so long to tell the Viveca Novak story is that it fundamentally undercuts their supposed reason for not granting Cooper a personal waiver sooner. Rove, via Luskin, claimed that he wasn’t trying to obstruct Fitzgerald’s investigation, that he didn’t know he was the source Cooper was protecting.

But the whole Viveca episode totally undermines that claim. By his own words, Rove know claims that he knew all the way back in January 2004 that the word at TIME was that he was Cooper’s source. But in the ensuing year and a half he never picks up the phone to call Cooper and clarify this? Please. He knew Cooper was protecting him all along, and he was perfectly willing to let Cooper go to jail until Cooper took the initiative to seek a waiver.

from a lurker — not egregious, but the issue wasn’t the ALL CAPS text, but the content of the click thru. Some of our computer expert regulars have detected some…erm…problems when you click thru the link. And we try to be very careful about that for our readers.

Is the jury going to be able to sort thru all of this crap?

Jane,

While researching the ongoing move of US armed forces as “advisers” into Lebanon I came across this article - it’s dated but gives good historical background. I thought you or Pach might have a use for it as handy background research reference or even just a source of google search terms for a posting:

At the national convention of a major political party, an ideologically rigid sectarian clique secures the ultimate triumph. It inserts two of its own as nominees for the Presidency and the Vice Presidency. Heavily financed by the most powerful corporations in the world,

[snip]

Founded in the mid-1980s with essentially the same purpose as the Christian Coalition–to pull a broad political party dramatically to the right–the DLC has been far more successful than its headline-grabbing Republican counterpart. After Walter Mondale’s 1984 defeat at the hands of Ronald Reagan, a group of mostly Southern, conservative Democrats hatched the theory that their party was in trouble because it had grown too sympathetic to the agendas of organized labor, feminists, African Americans, Latinos, gays and lesbians, peace activists, and egalitarians.

Behind the DLC Takeover - Democratic Leadership Council

.

Geoffrey — the jury won’t have to sort through all this crap. They’ll only have to sort through the limited information presented to them. All this outside spin is designed to keep Rove in his job, keep the GOP donor base paying the legal bills for Libby (and hopefully soon for Rove), and to keep people confused. It’s about political impact — but the criminal aspect of things will be a much more limited presentation of evidence only dealing with the charges in the indictment and the information around it.

Christy I and quite a few others wish you’d just ban him. He’s a pest and infests blog after blog after blog. him, r2k, “melanie”, New York Bathrooms. All the same outfit.

And EEEEK I left you out of the list of people who might find that article handy. Blush …. swowwy.

Christy

Got it, well if that’s the case, major troll..

Personally I avoid commentor-supplied links unless they’re in URL form or I’ve seen the commentor before.

Ah ploughing through my results (God be thanked for clusty as a research tool it’s way better than google) I find this right web article on the DLC

Some questions for Reddhedd and others who have been prosecutors (or defense atttorneys). Fitz has been on this case (on&off) for over 2 years. He’s had Rove over 5 times. Then Fitz says he needs 10 more days. Why? Is Fitz seriously considering NOT indicting? Despite the spin, we all know that he’s got a solid case against Rover for both perjury and obstruction. Why not do that now (like with Libby), and bring the conspiracy, espionage, etc indictments later? Is he waiting for more evidence? What of such significance could show up within 10 days? Is your forecast that Fitz will indict Rove? Do you believe that Rove “turned”? But if so, why the 10-day game?

Question for RH, Jane, anyone:

When does Fitz subpoena the emails and documents containing various search terms incl. Cooper? That subpoena does go to Rove, right? Why don’t journalists ever ask Luskin while they have him on the phone why it is that he only goes through Rove’s emails from the time in question after Rove has already testified before the Grand Jury? Would Hadley have responded to the subpoena–does the email get missed twice, by both Rove and Hadley’s respective offices?

Also, Jane, this post is brilliant but then everything produced by FDL is brilliant!

OT, but important just the same:

Bush has had US Special Forces troops in Iran since at least July of 2004, trying to bait the Iranians into giving Bush a pretext to invade:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4180087.stm

morning all– SCOTUS just ruled in favor of Anna Nicole Smith.

Joe Biden wants to divy up Iraq into 3 parts.

Isikoff has now lost the tiny shred of credibility he started to regain with me. He was front and center in the effort to destroy Clinton and regurgitated the muck of Ken Starr and Lucianne Goldberg. Nice job Uncovering Isikoff, Jane.

Christy 24 - Thanks for the clarification to Randy 17; I do think the reference is confusing as written, though. Wouldn’t hurt to have a parenthetical (”not February, according to the article”) or something stuck in there. (I know this is Jane’s, not yours - just an fyi for her.)

Luskin’s got to be dizzy from all this spinning. I do hope it all comes back to bite his client on the ass.

Goeff: THIS CASE IS EASY, NOT HARD.

This case is a slam dunker. Double dunker. It’s a fall-down (easy). Here’s why:

You charge Roverer with lying. GET THIS: your evidence is Roverer’s testimony before the GJ.

That’s it. You just present 5 transcripts.

Roverer’s testimony:

1st testy: “I didn’t talk to Cooper….I dunno who those darn leakers are…”

2d: “I didn’t talk to Cooper about Plame. I still dunno who those darn leakers are…”

3d: (Is it here the worm turns, methinks not): “I don’t think I talked to Cooper…”

4th: “Oops, you know what, I guess I did out Plame to Cooper, but I forgot. And here’s an email I wrote, but it still doesn’t help my memory….”

5th: “Oh yeah, it was me who leaked to Cooper but I still can’t remember it. And I’m really sorry.”

So I ask you Geoff: would you acquit based on this? I mean, this case is that easy.

If Roverer actually testifies — he may have to given his GJ testimony — he can reiterate how busy he is, how sorry he is, blah blah blah…

The hardest thing about this case is the prosecutor laying his bed. Trying to come up with reasons beforehand to tell the rest of the office why the case is so hard….you know, laying his bed just so when he wins it won’t look so easy.

One more question…

I thought Fitz had to deal with this inane Viveca Novak story b/c if he ignored it and charged Rove; somehow Luskin would argue later that Fitz ignored crucial 11th hour information. Is that a correct notion?

Good grief…methinks these people are going to hang themselves on the details of the stories they keep embellishing (which is why the truth is so much simpler).

Luskin says he talked to Novak before the January 04 appearances. Not sure how this helped Rove, as it seems like checking the e-mail before Rove ever testified would have been the prudent thing to do. Instead, Luskin would have us believe that he sent Rove to the GJ with nothing more than his “I don’t remember†defense.

Novak says the conversation took place after the January GJ appearance. By the time she testifies, Cooper has also testified, and the Novak/Cooper story seems to hang together better than the Luskin/Rove story, which Luskin thinks he can fix by becoming a witness himself. Maybe he’s thinking that in the battle of “he said, she said†there will be enough confusion that the GJ will be unable to discern what the truth is and be unable to return any indictments. This seems like classic obstructive behavior on Luskin’s part, but what do I know?

It’s taken me awhile to get this posted, so apologies if others have already raised these things.

Rove’s defense may be the first to ever qualify for a RICO designation. That’s some serious smoke.

~

Correct analysis imo.

Anne: my guess, not he doesn’t care about Luskin’s spin but on the off chance that Cooper got it wrong. Wasn’t it at this time when when Bob Woodward also came forward and said: “Everyone in town knew this before Novakula?”

And who can forget Woody’s other greatest hit: “I told Pincus before he learned it anywhere else…”

I think Fitz was worried that he might be missing something, getting something wrong, so he went back and talked to Cooper. Did he talk to Pincus again too?

P.S. Can’t Woody be charged with obstruction if he just made this shit up? I’m just asking…

Anne @53

Spot on and worth the delay—you’ve got it in a nutshell.

If spinning was an olympic sport, you’d be hard pressed who to give the gold to, KR or Luskin.

A real match, made under a very large rock.

The real question is how Luskin can continue as Roverer’s attorney (even as incompetent as he is) when he is not clearly a witness?

Legal ethical rules require attorneys recuse themselves from cases where they are witnesses. Luskin actually testified before the GJ, unprecedented.

Does the Chief Idiot know the national anthem?

OT - Howie Kurtz will be taking questions at the WaPo discussion forum today at noon eastern. I submitted a question to him about the attempt by him and others in the media who are trying not to acknowledge the dead on Colbert critique of the Washington, DC establishment. I encourage others to submit questions/comments to him too.

Good morning all. Thanks for a fascinating discussion last night, sorry I wasn’t able to join. Interesting that it ended with such a negative comment.

I’m sorry to be OT, but just read an interesting article at NYT which others may have seen re: how liberals should look to history to address the international issue of nation-building and war. It’s written by Peter Beinart of the New Republic and makes a number of cogent points about the lack of a message from the liberal side and how that could be corrected, particularly win the areas of humility, the link between economic security at home and foreign policy and how conservatives have thus far, and wrongly, responded since the Cold War. I think this dovetails a bit with some of the discussion last night in terms of how liberals are often feeding at the same trough as conservatives around some of these issues and what needs to happen around changing that paradigm.

“Peter Beinart is editor at large of The New Republic. This essay is adapted from “The Good Fight: Why Liberals — and Only Liberals — Can Win the War on Terror and Make America Great Again,” which will be published in late May by HarperCollins.”

NYT Magazine article

again, sorry OT, but I think it’s worth it.

I don’t know…there are so many stories and so many ways to look at them that at this point, we’re as good as blind-folded and will have no way of knowing which one of us has correctly described the elephant we’re all touching until the blindfolds come off.

Putting aside the known ‘liars,’ it seems to me that VivNovak’s ‘truth’ is one of the biggest and most glaring falsehoods. Her ‘I don’t remember when I met with Luskin’ seems like her most bold faced attempt to save Rove. Because it is definitely the date of that meeting (were there more than one?) that proves most definitely how big Rove’s untruthiness ends up to be. [comment: I broke several grammatical rules in that last sentence but couldn’t figure out how to fix it. too early I guess]

Also, Markof Ireland, thanks for the DLC article. I gues we KNEW that already about the takeover, but to see it in print is confirmative. And that Clinton and Gore realized that publicly they had to run from the DLC talking points is a ‘duh’ moment. But they (the DLC) are still pulling the strings. Like to have an interview with Gore about this very important topic.

You’re welcome grandmaj that’s why i posted them - how’s cody doing?

Randy — thanks, I meant February. Corrected.

GrandmaJ - I agree that the date of Viveca’s meeting with Luskin is a critical data point. And it is looking like Viveca was misleading Fitz about it initially.

My question is, what is the likelihood that Fitz was able to pin down a date that is early enough to destroy Luskin’s excuse? Assuming that Viveca and Luskin met and discussed Cooper at a time prior to the point that Luskin is claiming, how could Fitz find this out? I think there are many ways:

1. Bartender
2. Credit Card Receipts
3. Security Camera Tapes
4. Other witnesses
5. Viveca’s notes
6. Witnesses to Viveca’s subsequent conversations about her meeting with Luskin, if any such conversations occured.
7. Anything else?

looseheadprop 31:

I would be very suprised if he indicts for the leak just now. The graymail implications are too great. And he doesn’t need to. He can get them for consrpiray to obstruct just with underlying perjury and possibly some destruction of evidence depending on how the computer forensics turned out.

If he indicts on the underlying crimes, the discovery problems will be huge and there could be spillover onto the Libby case. i love the Libby case, so tight, so focused, so impossible to get out of.

I expect to see something similar for old Rover. And maybe not just Rover.

Something tight, focused and inescapable

I absolutely concur.

“Fitz has been on this case (on&off) for over 2 years. He’s had Rove over 5 times. Then Fitz says he needs 10 more days. Why?”

I don’t know for sure, but my instinct is that Fitzgerald came back to Chicago to take care of some business connected to one of his other investigations (possibly the one that’s got Fitz looking into some of Mayor Daley’s people) and that the ten days is purely a scheduling issue rather than something connected with the Plame case itself.

I may very well be wrong, but this would seem likely, given that Fitzgerald is currently juggling a few major investigations.

MarkFI — Cody is doing very well, considering. Thanks for asking. Saw both he and his sister yesterday. The daughter who just turned 16, had on a great deal of jewelry. I asked her about it — almost all of it was her mothers. She has her Mother’s bedspread on her bed, she has her personal phone book in her purse, and the last note written to her by her mother (”Don’t forget to wash that load of clothes”) folded in her pocket. So, they are remembering.

There are very worried about Cody redamaging his head, and there are many concerned looks from my son to his son. But he is 11 and wants to be ‘normal’ — Despite the slash of a surgery scare from one ear to the other.

But they are moving forward. My granddaughter has decided to put her energies this summer into advanced placement summerschool. Her mother was urging her to go — and she is. Good for her.

Sorry — you can tell what is on my mind 24/7. I am making myself sick, but time is my friend.

Isikoff if an inside man. A lying sack of shit.

Look at all of those inside clowns(Hat-tip to Colbert) at the Prez’s dinner the other night.

They are the poison in our national system. Inside gamers with nothing but contempt for the the workers and the people that keep them in wine and salad.

The game is coming to a close though. They are looking behind themselves as they runaway.

-GSD

How could Rove have “a Cooper problem†unless there was a prospect of Cooper being forced to testify?

Swopa 31: Well the White House had been subpoenaed about all contact with Cooper in January so I suppose they could have been referring to that, but I don’t believe that was public knowledge at the time. Your comment brings up an interesting question — one of the many that Viveca hasn’t addressed — what exactly was the context for the conversation?

BTW, I think you’re right, and further I think her “I don’t remember” thing was crap. She was working on assignment for a story in January 2004, she’d most certainly be taking careful notes at that point. One would assume.

Uh… Clem (#68)
“my instinct is that Fitzgerald came back to Chicago to take care of some business connected to one of his other investigations … and that the ten days is purely a scheduling issue.”

Sounds reasonable to me. Thanks for answering one of my questions.

Believe me grandmaj we all understand what comes first - the people you love. Thanks for the update. And time as you say is a geat friend here.

Oops - that surgery ’scare’ is supposed to be scar, but all of you knew that. I normally wouldn’t correct small typos, but accuracy is the coin of the kingdom here, as it should be.

Uh… Clem

Time is on Fitz’s side right now. The days leading up to a possible impeachment are prime time for folks to decide to cooperate.

Rove knows that if he is going to cut a deal, it is probably now or never. Why not let him think about that for a while?

Also, why not let everyone who could get ratted out by Rove think about it for a while? If they know that Rove might cooperate, they become highly incentivized to cut a deal with Fitz FIRST.

I’m sure there are other reasons as well, of course. Fitz just got 3+ hours of testimony from Rove. He doesn’t want to do anything until the transcript has been reviewed multiple times by multiple persons in his office, with all the ramifications and implications charted out. This takes time. And maybe the testimony raised the need for Fitz to call in a few witnesses to cover anything new that popped up.

It is also possible that Rove is already cooperating, and all of the leaks to Isikoff, etc. by Luskin are an effort to throw up a smoke screen, making it look like he is “in the clear”, so that no one else jumps in front of Rove in line for the “lets cut a deal with Fitz” game.

Oops, I meant possible “indictment” not “impeachment”. Freud again.

The warm fuzzy Rove indictment trifecta –

Purjury; Obstruction of Justice; and Destruction of Evidence.

Does anyone think this might have an effect on the 20% who weakly support the preznit?

Looseheadprop, I think your summation as to the likely state of affairs with regard to the possibility of indicting on the underlying crime makes a hell of a lot of sense.

Here’s what then pops into my non-lawyerly noggin… can indictments for the underlying crime be brought down the road AFTER the perjury and obstruction cases have played out?

In other words, since it would seem to not raise a double jeopardy problem (right? We’re talking about very different charges here after all) would it make sense for Fitz to use what comes out in the Libby case (and presumably the eventual Rove case as well) to cinch up the case for indictment for the underlying crime of outing a CIA operative?

Again… not a lawyer here. I’m likely missing something fundamental here. But it would seem that since the charges against Libby (and soon to be Rove) are that they obstructed an investigation, would that not tend to mean that a legitimate part of having charged them would be to try and get to the heart of the underlying crime that they tried to cover up, while still trying to nail them for the new crimes of perjury and obstruction?

xyz:

I like your first thougt better :-)

thought… geez!

OT

Uh oh– Jane and Christy– Mike McCurry has issued a loyalty day challenge over at HuffPo
>>>>>>

You can see in blog commentary lots of great huffing and puffing that will get you to exactly 38% of the electorate. I don’t see a lot of useful dialogue on how to get winning coalitions together that can win more than 50% in closely contested elections. As Juliet says, that is one reason we have gerrymandered safe districts and few contested races. It’s also why we have lots of feel-good rants on the web and not enough dialogue about how to win close elections. I take this as a sign that I am getting old, but also that some newcomers in politics will need to get knocked around and lose a few before they understand that winning politics is not as easy as they think.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....20116.html

The brutal part of this is that so many useful brains like Jane’s, Christy’s, and Mr. Fitzgerald’s have to spend so many hours chasing all of this I-am-at-a-loss-for-an-adjective information around, when the whole situation could have been resolved instantly if there were anyone in the administration with a shred of honesty or dignity. As the president said when the issue first came up, whoever in the administration was involved in the leak should come clean and leave the administration. This does not seem to be the advice that he gave in private, eh?

Since we have been clapping for Colbert for a few days now, I am reminded of a report he did back on the Daily Show.
Colbert: … nobody’s going to believe that stuff, Jon, it just doesn’t have the credibility anymore.
Stewart: Stephen, you’re saying the media doesn’t have the credibility anymore?
Colbert: No, Jon, the truth.

peace,
jim

Someone earlier asked why all the leaks to Isikoff etc. Aside from a political purpose, the leaks from Rove that attempt (albeit poorly) to show that he is holding a strong hand are also an effort to keep the the vow of omerta intact among anyone else who might sing or change their story.

If Rove looks like he is likely to indicted, then people will naturally infer that the likelihood he will cut a deal will increase. Then, other participants in the Valerie Plame scandal may want to get in front of Fitz first in order to get the best deal, because there is a huge drop off in return between the first in line and the second at Fitz’s “lets make a deal” table.

By leaking to the media that his case is strong, Rove keeps others who might implicate him further from emerging from the woodwork to cut a deal.

Uh Clem–(78)

The WH is sure to use the State Secrets ploy if Fits goes after the underlying crime, so he has to be careful to limit the indictments to charges that don’t require revealing classified material.
With luck, however, the trial(s) will reveal much about the motives and the operations of the WHIG group that planned both the war and the leak strategy.

New book by David Sirota — Hostile Takeover

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/5/1/105349/7075

There’s a lot of inane talk these days about “polarization,” “red and blue” America, and increased partisanship. It makes for a good storyline - but it hides a very simple truth: American politics is largely dominated by a very tightly-knit consensus that makes sure every policy debate ends with one or another outcome that benefits the Big Money interests that bankroll political campaigns.

As I argue in Hostile Takeover, my new book being released this week, there is an intricate system of lies, myths and half-truths being rammed down Americans’ throats that is designed to make us believe lawmakers are working in our best interests, when in fact they are working against us. These storylines have created the justification for the hostile takeover of our government - and they have marginalized the commonsense policies that most Americans support.

So, for instance, the raging debate over immigration has included almost no discussion of reforming our corporate-written trade policies like NAFTA - a pact that President Clinton joined with Republicans to ram down Americans throat, a pact that we were told would increase American wages and decrease illegal immigration by improving the Mexican economy; yet a pact that has resulted in stagnating wages for Americans, 19 million more Mexicans living in poverty and thus increased illegal immigration. But because this free trade orthodoxy has helped maximize corporate profits, even a discussion of reforming those trade policies is considered off limits by elites in Washington - even in an immigration debate where it is central, even when polls show Americans want our trade policies reformed.

A few things: 1) re the exact date of Vivnovka’s meeting with Luskin, can you doubt for a minute that Fitz didn’t have his versions of Briscoe and Green on things like this from the get? He probably knows not only the date they met but the drinks they ordered, where they went to boink afterwards, and whether it was good for either of them ;) … 2) I think Fitz may be working on the establishment of a conspiracy to cover up the crime so as to avoid the greymail and Exec privilege issues as I think lhp mentioned - remember in his press conference he said you bring charges you can prove and justice will be served even if all the guilty only go to jail for related crimes; 3) I can’t believe I’m throwing around terms like greymail!; and finally 4) he’s methodical and inexorable in his progress from investigation through trial, so while I can relate to sentiments like “let’s hurry the fuck up and indict them all for treason,” I think he’s more concerned with rigging up a noose that won’t slip off than just rushing over to the nearest tree with a bungee cord. My 2 cents. And Jane is a goddess. And I’m a slow typer so any and all of this may have been said more pithily and eloquently already.

Somewhat off topic, although important:

By way of Raw Story - what to do with two deciders?

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld.....tstory.jsp

Cheney exempts his own office from reporting on classified material

BY MARK SILVA
Chicago Tribune

WASHINGTON - As the Bush administration has dramatically accelerated the classification of information as “top secret” or “confidential,” one office is refusing to report on its annual activity in classifying documents: the office of Vice President Dick Cheney.

A standing executive order, strengthened by President Bush in 2003, requires all agencies and “any other entity within the executive branch” to provide an annual accounting of their classification of documents. More than 80 agencies have collectively reported to the National Archives that they made 15.6 million decisions in 2004 to classify information, nearly double the number in 2001, but Cheney continues to insist he is exempt.

Explaining why the vice president has withheld even a tally of his office’s secrecy when such offices as the National Security Council routinely report theirs, a spokeswoman said Cheney is “not under any duty” to provide it.

That is only one way the Bush administration, from its opening weeks in 2001, has asserted control over information. By keeping secret so many directives and actions, the administration has precluded the public - and often members of Congress - from knowing about some of the most significant decisions and acts of the White House.

(snip)

ot, sorry

more cheney rubbish, he not only knows he’s the president, he isn’t afraid to put bush in his place and give h9m a time out

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld.....tstory.jsp

Cheney exempts his own office from reporting on classified material

BY MARK SILVA
Chicago Tribune

WASHINGTON - As the Bush administration has dramatically accelerated the classification of information as “top secret” or “confidential,” one office is refusing to report on its annual activity in classifying documents: the office of Vice President Dick Cheney.

A standing executive order, strengthened by President Bush in 2003, requires all agencies and “any other entity within the executive branch” to provide an annual accounting of their classification of documents. More than 80 agencies have collectively reported to the National Archives that they made 15.6 million decisions in 2004 to classify information, nearly double the number in 2001, but Cheney continues to insist he is exempt.

Explaining why the vice president has withheld even a tally of his office’s secrecy when such offices as the National Security Council routinely report theirs, a spokeswoman said Cheney is “not under any duty” to provide it.

oops, I’m a post late, sorry

“By leaking to the media that his case is strong, Rove keeps others who might implicate him further from emerging from the woodwork to cut a deal.”

Very true indeed… as long as the media spin outweighs the DC rumor mill and all the backroom whispers and whatnot, of course. This would probably suggest an explanation as to why Rove may have gone out of his way to appear positive and “jolly” at the weenie-fest last week after his GJ appearance. Gotta keep the rumor mill spun in addition to the general media, after all.

Oops, i gotta proofread. I meant to say Luskin is “now” clearly a witness, not “not a witness”.

OT.

Does this mean that we are training them over there so that they can fight over here?

Chicago gang signs showing up in Iraq. Fear that gang members are joining the military to get urban training to bring back to the states.

Heckuva job.

http://cbs2chicago.com/local/l.....03636.html

-GSD