Was Karen Hughes involved in outing Plame?

[Skidmore]

When did she leave the administration to spend more time with her family?

[stopbush]

1. Absolutely. And so were * and cheney.

[Bluebear]

2. "Some people are saying" she certainly was involved. nt

[LeftNYC]

3. "Im waiting for the end of the investigation before I speak out on this

subject. Next?"

[patcox2]

4. I have never seen her name mentioned in any story(see below)

Nor in any speculation by any credible liberal blogger.

She is a bush bootlicker, but seems more in it because she is inlove with him than because she is any kind of strong ideological conservative. In fact, I got the impression that she left because there was a power struggle between her and Rove over control of Bush; this was suggested by the notorious Andrew Card interview in Vanity Fair. She seems one of the sanest of the bunch and has probably been brought back as head State Department spokesman to hold that idiot Rice's hand.

Of course, Walt Starr says she is guilty and all democrats who didn't filibuster her low level appointment should be voted out of the party and we should all go green, or some such hysterical ranting.

Mary Matalin is more likely to be involved.

On edit, I now have seen a story.

Still not enough to oppose this appointment.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

12. Hughes was part of WHIG, the White House Iraq Group, and was...

...present at meetings where Plame was apparently discussed:

White House Iraq `Plumbers Unit' Behind Plame Leak
<http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2005/3229plumbers_plame.html>

QUOTE IN THIS ARTICLE REFERENCING THE WASHINGTON POST:

According to the original news account of WHIG, an Aug. 10, 2003 Washington Post exposé of faking of intelligence on the purported Iraq nuclear weapons program, the unit was established in August 2002, as a coordinating center for the Iraq War. As Washington Post reporters Barton Gelman and Walter Pincus described it, "Systematic coordination began in August, when Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card, Jr. formed the White House Iraq Group, or WHIG, to set strategy for each stage of the confrontation with Baghdad. A senior official who participated in its work called it 'an internal working group, like many formed for priority issues, to make sure each part of the White House was fulfilling its responsibilities'.... The group met weekly in the Situation Room. Among the regular participants were Karl Rove, the president's senior political advisor; communications strategists Karen Hughes, Mary Matalin, and James R. Wilkinson; legislative liaison Nicholas E. Calio; and policy advisors led by Rice and her deputy, Stephen J. Hadley, along with I. Lewis Libby, Cheney's chief of staff."

MORE INFO IN ARTICLE:

According to one Capitol Hill source, WHIG was launched at a moment when the Bush Administration was hit with a series of staggering blows to its Iraq War designs. In early August 2002, Gen. Brent Scowcroft (ret.), former National Security Advisor to President George H.W. Bush, and the head of G.W.'s President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, penned an op-ed, opposing any Iraq invasion, on the grounds that it would detract from the Administration's post-9/11 priority, the Global War on Terrorism. Scowcroft's devastating article was followed, in rapid succession, by a similar published warning from former Bush Sr. Secretary of State James Baker III, and statements by Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) and former House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Tex.) opposing an Iraq war.

[Vinca]

5. Was she being confirmed today?

It wasn't on CSPAN 1 or 2 and I don't get 3. I would hope questions about this, among other things, would be thrown her way.

[cal04]

6. Karen Hughes

Jul 9, 2002, 07:58
As Hughes leaves Washington today to return to Texas, there is talk that Rove will tug Bush toward more conservative stances in the absence of her more moderate views. That prospect has some administration officials fretting that the equilibrium of Bush's inner circle will be knocked off kilter. In the July issue of Esquire, White House chief of staff Andy Card described Rove as "a formidable adversary" and called Hughes "a beauty to Karl's beast."

[patcox2]

7. This is from a Salon story from March, 2004, suggesting maybe so.

Karen Hughes and her actions have fallen under the scrutiny of the prosecutor. The Plame grand jury has subpoenaed records created by the White House Iraq Group in July 2003, the same month Plame was outed in the Novak column. Hughes was a member of the White House Iraq Group, an internal body that coordinated strategy for, among other things, selling the war here at home. Other members of the group were Karl Rove, Mary Matalin, James Wilkinson, legislative liaison Nicholas E. Calio and policy advisers including Condoleezza Rice, her deputy, Stephen J. Hadley, and I. Lewis Libby, Dick Cheney's chief of staff.

A USA Today story from July 2003 also describes how Hughes was among a small group of strategists who devised the strategy to counter Wilson's Niger story. The article says, "The plan: Release all relevant information. Try to shift attention back to Bush's leadership in the war on terrorism. Diminish the significance of that single piece of iffy intelligence by making the case that Saddam was a threat for many other reasons. Put Republican lawmakers and other Bush allies on TV to defend him. Most important: Question the motives of Democrats who supported the war but now are criticizing the president."

[Walt Starr]

8. she was called to testify before the grand jury

That much is factual.

[patcox2]

9. You're right, she probably wasa involved.

Buit I see no reason to turn on every democrat who made a strategic decision you disagree with. Would have been nice if someone asked her a question or two under oath, though.

[Walt Starr]

10. HEck, would have been nice if somebody would have showed up!

[Skidmore]

11. So now she's being approved for some ambassadorial/

state department appointment in the ME? What's wrong with this picture? Congress is so derelict in its duty.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

13. When the indictments come down she'll be another high-ranked....

...NeoCon frog-marched to the Federal pokey.

[Walt Starr]

14. Yep, and everybody on the committee that let it slide

knowing full well she had been called before the GJ for testimony will be held accountable.