Or so say Michael Smith and Sarah Baxter in the London Times.
THE mysterious source who gave America’s foremost journalist, Bob Woodward, a tip-off about the CIA agent at the centre of one of Washington’s biggest political storms was Stephen Hadley, the White House national security adviser, according to lawyers close to the investigation.
Are we sure?
A spokeswoman for the National Security Council (NSC) denied that Hadley was the journalist’s source. However, in South Korea on Friday during an official visit with President George W Bush, Hadley dodged the question.
“I’ve also seen press reports from White House officials saying that I am not one of his sources,†Hadley said with a smile. Asked if this was a yes or no he replied: “It is what it is.â€
A White House official said the national security adviser’s ambiguity was unintentional and repeated that Hadley was not Woodward’s source. But others close to the investigation insisted that he was.
This is the part that makes no sense to me:
Supporters of Cheney’s disgraced aide are jubilant that this casts doubt on special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald’s contention that Libby was the first to spread the word about Plame.
Fitzgerald only said that Libby was the first KNOWN administration official to spread the word about Plame, and I don’t see how Libby’s being first, sixth, or twenty-seventh makes a dadblamed difference to any of the charges against him.
If anything, seems to me it looks a lot worse for the Bushies if someone else was in on the word spreading, especially a whole month earlier. Can we say, conspiracy?
In the past few hours we’ve learned that the Source, whoever it was, kind of “forgot” about the conversation and didn’t go to Patrick Fitzgerald to ‘fess up until Bob Woodward “reminded” him about it. Has Hadley offered any testimony to Fitzgerald or other federal investigators before this? I don’t know. What about the email Karl Rove sent to Hadley after his July 2003 conversation with Matt Cooper? Why did Rove email Hadley?
If Hadley came forward to tell Fitzgerald that he was releasing Woodward from any pledge of confidentiality, what and who prompted Hadley to do this? Did Scooter or Cheney force Hadley’s hand, knowing that Libby wasn’t the first to talk with reporters about Plame’s identity? Remember that just before the Libby indictment, there were stories that Hadley assumed he would be indicted. …
… If Hadley was in fact the first administration official to talk to a member of the media about Plame’s identity, and knowingly revealing that she was a possible covert operative due to her assignment in the Directorate of Operations, how plausible is it that his boss at the time didn’t know about this either. You know, his boss, the current Secretary of State?
Why would Karl Rove have emailed Hadley, in particular? Hmm.
Err …
“It depend on what the definition of is is”.
And Clinton got crucified for his lawerly manner of speaking?
I think Rove is the one who put Fitzgerald on Hadley or whoever Mr. X is. He was frantic to keep himself out of the indictments and I imagine that he said something like, “This was common knowledge, everyone was talking about her way before I said word one. I was under the impression she was only an analyst because of the many people who were talking about her”…and then he named names, all the reporters who were asking for confirmation including Woodward, and all the political operatives including Mr. X.
I do not like giving Rove the benefit of the doubt, but it does appear to me that he may not have been in the loop where Plame’s NOC status was concerned. This appears to be entirely a Cheney in house operation and because Rove likes a good smear campaign was easy to bring him in without telling him her status. He should have checked anyway, but considering all the blabbering going on, he probably didn’t think he had to that those other gossips had checked already.
Either Rove or Fitzgerald then tipped off Woodward and/or Mr X that they were on Fitzgerald’s radar.
“This is the part that makes no sense to me”
There is a talk radio host in Orlando that leans right who said that if even one rusty 25 year old container of a chemical or biological agent was found, regardless if it were still potent or not, would constitute discovering WMD and validate the invasion of Iraq, even if it was one ounce.
This is the logic of the far right.
Pingback: The Heretik
some are suggesting Armitage???(I wish Rove)….But it occurs to me fitztgearld may be a bit off here,, to be clear Bush said he wanted to know about ANYONE involved,, not who commited a crime or who leaked first,,ANYONE…How will he ever know this if fitzgearld refuses to discuss any one he doesn’t charge?How, as bush said, can we get to the bottom of this without all of the information?
And what Bob woodward and the righties ,, and maybe all of us have lost sight of is that it is that it is all about who disclosed it to the public first that is who “outed” her , then learning who this person got the information from.. all the rest is just rightie noise IMHO.Assuming novak was the first to disclose the information , I think we can all pretty much assume since Novak was never in Jail he made a deal and disclosed his sources to save his own ass.I don’t doubt it goes much deeper but shouldn’t the first facts to be dealt with be who reported it first, and who gave them the information?..Seems like a no brainer .
To me charging Libby for telling miller(who DID NOT disclose it to the public) reminds me of the tree falling in the woods,, if no one is there to hear it does it really make a sound?Maybe those on the left were just too happy to see anyone thrown to the wolves and we took our eyes off of the big picture,,,JUSTICE for a leaked CIA agents identity not revenge for the lefts cause.
My feeling is that Fitz is going to get a bigger prize on this next go round. Fitz has make clear that he knows his bounds and wont pursue the unprovable..The fact that somebody found recall in this matter after more than 2 years of high public awareness speaks for itself. We all know that the Plame outting was conspiracy and Fitz knows it too. I believe that Fitz will pin them down to the degree that the evidence will support. But in any case, the investigation shows the conspiracy…The slime machine.
justme, pay attention, Libby was NOT charged with telling Miller. He was charged with obstruction of justice and perjury. When a person lies, misleads, or has convenient recollections and convenient memory lapses, it makes it difficult/impossible for the prosecutor and grand jury to do their jobs. It doesn’t matter if the person is lying to cover for himself, cover for someone else, or is a pathalogical liar who does it for fun. Libby was charged with crimes totally separate from who leaked the name of a CIA NOC, he may be charged with that in later indictments from the next grand jury, or the real culprit may be charged, or Libby’s lies might have made it impossible for Fitzgerald to determine who the culprit is, if so he deserves a long jail sentence for derailing the investigation.
By charged i didn’t mean it in a criminal way…..I meant accused,, sorry for the bad choice of words,,,I was refering to fitzgearlds comments accusing libby of being the first know official to disclose the name of plame to the media…..