How about a Plamegate thread, folks? :^)

[GreenPartyVoter]

"How to Prosecute the Plame Case"

Pundits right, left, and center have reached a rare unanimous verdict about one aspect of the grand jury investigation into the Valerie Plame leak: They've decided that no charges can be brought under the Intelligence Identities Protection Act of 1982, because it imposes an impossibly high standard for proof of intent. Typically, writing for Slate on July 19th, Christopher Hitchens described the 1982 Act as a "silly law" that requires that "you knowingly wish to expose the cover of a CIA officer who you understand may be harmed as a result." Similarly, columnist Richard Cohen, in the July 14 Washington Post, said he thought Rove was a "political opportunist, not a traitor" and that he didn't think Rove "specifically intended to blow the cover of a CIA agent." Such examples could be multiplied many times over.

Shocking as it may seem, however, the pundits are wrong; and their casual summaries of the requirements of the 1982 statute betray a fundamental misunderstanding regarding proof of criminal intent.

Do you have to intend to harm a CIA agent or jeopardize national security in order to violate the Intelligence Identities Protection Act? The answer is no.

Before presenting any case, a prosecutor like Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald in the Plame case has to figure out "the elements of the crime"; in other words, the factors he has to prove under whatever statute he is considering. If a grand jury finds probable cause to believe that each element has been proved, it may then return an indictment. At trial, the judge instructs the jury about these same elements. Parties can argue about whether the elements have been proved beyond a reasonable doubt, but neither side can add, delete, or modify the elements even slightly to suit their arguments.

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0812-22.htm
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Add more Plame/Rove/DSM thoughts and articles here

[longship]

1. This is a good analysis.

I read this yesterday and I pray that it's true.
I'd like to see the headline:

"Condi, Treason"

[libertypirate]

2. Please call it Treason Gate....

Plame is going to be the least of their worries when this thing gets opened up.

[dogday]

3. I would of liked to be a fly on the

wall of Air Force I that day Powell walked on board with Valeries' dossier....

[H2O Man]

10. Powell didn't.

He did not walk on board with Valeries' dossier.

[dogday]

11. He was spotted with it before boarding AF1

I have read this many times

[H2O Man]

12. Who spotted him?

And how did they know he had information on Valerie? (You may have read that; however, it isn't accurate.)

[dogday]

14. Here read some of these....

A senior U.S. official said he believed then-Secretary of State Colin Powell took it with him aboard Air Force One July 7, 2003, when he accompanied Bush on a trip to Africa.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/07/21/cia.leak/


The memo was delivered to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell on July 7, 2003, as he headed to Africa for a trip with President Bush aboard Air Force One

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/20/AR2005072002517_pf.html


The memo was sent to Colin Powell, then the secretary of state, just before or as he traveled with President Bush and other senior officials to Africa starting on July 7, 2003

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0716-03.htm

[H2O Man]

15. That doesn't say

he was spotted with them before he boarded the AF1. Anyhow, I don't need to read them. Without any chance of error, I can assure you that Powell was on AF1 when Dick Armitage faxed the report to him. It was not a file on Valerie; she was mentioned briefly in it.

[dogday]

16. No it was not a file, it was one sheet of paper

describing what she does, that is why I called it a dossier. It told who she was and what she did. Now if you don't want to read those links, that is up to you. I have not heard what you are saying, however, I have read many times in the news and on various websites what I am saying.

Believe what you want, you asked me, I gave to you...

[H2O Man]

17. Read Time.

Powell is a sad excuse for a man, who humiliated himself while serving in the Bush administration. However, he is not responsible for spreading the information on Plame. Saying he did indicates a lack of knowledge about the case.

[dogday]

18. I did read time and this is what I find

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1083895,00.html


July 7: Secretary of State Colin Powell boards Air Force One for a trip to Africa with the President. Either just before or during that trip, Powell is given a memo concerning Wilson's Niger probe. The memo, prepared by State Department officials in June in reaction to media stories about the trip, says Wilson's wife works for the CIA and refers to her as Valerie Wilson.

Again this says either just before or during the trip, Powell is given this memo....

[Telly Savalas]

4. Sorry, but we're all booked with Cindy threads this week.

We can probably squeeze you in after the gun control flamewar next Tuesday.

[Bluebear]

5. What does Cindy think of it?

JUST kidding, JUST kidding! :)

[GreenPartyVoter]

6. I think we know what she thinks of it. She is one smart, informed lady ;^)

[Bluebear]

8. She certainly is.

She is accomplishing what our own Democratic leadership has failed to do. Just being snarky here :)

[wishlist]

7. The author of that common dreams article has unusually good credentials

This experienced federal prosecutor concludes her article as follows:

"Whether charges will be brought under the Intelligence Identities Protection Act or, if they were, what a jury would decide, we cannot possibly know. But we do know that it is not a law under which guilt is nearly impossible to prove -- as the pundits, citing each other, have led us to believe. It also bears mentioning that experienced prosecutors never underestimate juries. Most juries are like the special grand jury described by Matt Cooper: thorough, highly-engaged people who are absolutely committed to applying the law only to the evidence they have heard in court as they are instructed to do. They are not easily fooled. They have common sense. And they are firmly rooted in the reality-based community.

Elizabeth de la Vega has recently retired after serving more than 20 years as a federal prosecutor in Minneapolis and San Jose. During her tenure, she was a member of the Organized Crime Strike Force and Chief of the San Jose Branch of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of California.

(I especially like her last statement about grand jury being "firmly rooted in the reality-based community" As opposed to RW idealogy!)

[damntexdem]

9. What all those pundits conclude means little.

The question is whether the Grand Jury will indict, whom it might indict, and for what.

[jsamuel]

13. Who is David Margolis?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4332457

[wishlist]

19. Here is LBN thread about David Margolis, Comey's pick for oversight

Here is a little more info about Comey's pick to oversee the Fitzgerald investigation in LBN thread

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1697382

[GreenPartyVoter]

20. Thanks for that

[Independent_Liberal]

21. Thanks for posting this.

We needed another Plamegate thread. We can't get too bogged down in one thing or else we lose track of the other.

[GreenPartyVoter]

22. They all tie together.. Plame... the DSM.. Casey's and countless

other deaths. We can hardly talk about the one without thinking of the others.