The Newsweek article was oversold

[quaoar]

This line on page 2 says it all:

Nothing in the Cooper e-mail suggests that Rove used Plame's name or knew she was a covert operative.

The article confirms that Rove was the source and that he is the one who caled Cooper and gave him permission to talk.

But if the article does anything, it attempts to whitewash Rove's involvement.

[oldtime dfl_er]

1. that is so much BS!!!

"or knew she was a covert operative". My ass!!! The a-hole knew exactly what she was.

http://www.cafepress.com/scarebaby/654252

[sam sarrha]

4. And This is why, Rove was covering Chaneys profiting spreading WMD's,Link>

http://s93118771.onlinehome.us/DU/AMERICANJUDAS.pdf

this is an Adobie Reader 6. pdf... try it a couple times or download the free Adobie Acrobat program.. or update the one you have

this is an important article.. !!

[joemurphy]

5. Maybe that's why Fitz wants testimony from Cooper & Miller

Why should Rove want deep double secret "Don't Tell a Soul" coverage on something as innocuous as "Hey, don't quote me on this, but Wilson's wife works for the CIA on a WMD project and she's the one that got him sent to Niger."

If that's all Rove wanted to pass on, how does that impeach Wilson's report? In doing this was Rove implying that Wilson's jaunt to Niger was some kind of fun junket based on nepotism and his report should be discounted for that reason? If so, big deal. Why the need for deep double secrecy?

This sounds lame to me. I think the hush hush stuff was about the fact that Plame was covert and Rove knew it. He either told Cooper she was a big time CIA operative or urged Cooper to call another source to get it.

But again, even with this, how does this impeach Wilson's report unless Rove, for some reason, wanted the CIA to look bad too.

It's all pretty wierd to me.

[Jane Austin]

20. That's a very good point.

You said:

Why should Rove want deep double secret "Don't Tell a Soul" coverage on something as innocuous as "Hey, don't quote me on this, but Wilson's wife works for the CIA on a WMD project and she's the one that got him sent to Niger."

***********

I would add, and why would the White House drag it's feet for two years on this matter, if it were so easily explained away by Rove.

If that's all Rove said or did (that which is reported in the Newsweek story) Rove could have come forward two years ago and said, "Oh, man! I told some reporters about Wilson's wife sending him to Niger, but I sure as hell didn't know she was covert!"

That would have cleared up the story and gotten Rove off the hook right then. It would also have saved however many millions of dollars Fitzgerald's investigation has cost as well as the legal fees of any number of reporters.

[Elidor]

2. The article does not whitewash anything

It states only what can be proven from the emails, rather than speculating, and it leaves it to the reader to connect the dots.

What I wouldn't give to know what Fitzgerald knows about all this.

[quaoar]

6. It goes beyond that

The sentence I quote in the original post implies that Rove did not violate the law. That is speculation.

[Elidor]

24. I don't read it that way

Nothing in the Cooper e-mail suggests that Rove used Plame's name or knew she was a covert operative.

Perhaps 'suggests' is too strong. They could just as easily say "Rove does not specifically name Valerie Plame in Cooper's email to his bosses." But it is an important point so far in the story. And the word 'suggests' can easily clue a reader in to the underlying idea: that there is more to this story than meets the eye.

God, I'm starting to sound like Josh Marshall. That sucks.

[meg]

12. yes, indeed it does

Notice the cherry picked quotes inter mixed with framing of the issue. WE don't get to see the emails. WE don't get the benefit of talking to Cooper.

That article is meant to frame the issue and do damage control.

[Elidor]

25. Perhaps you're right. I'll read it again.

I don't place terrible importance on all this diversionary media wrangling. I think it's all moot next to the grand jury proceedings, but perhaps I'm missing the larger picture.

[still_one]

3. The point is no one from an administration should be talking

about intelligence matters that involve specific people

[DaveT]

7. Yes, Newsweak Is Weak, but. . . .

the article is significant for its revelation of the text of the email.


The relevant portion reads:

Rove told Cooper that Wilson's trip had not been authorized by "DCIA"—CIA Director George Tenet—or Vice President Dick Cheney. Rather, "it was, KR said, wilson's wife, who apparently works at the agency on wmd issues who authorized the trip."

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/8525978/site/newsweek


Legally, this quote, by itself, does not prove a prima facie case against Rove for violating the statute prohibiting the public indentification of CIA undercover agents. In the first place, it does not prove that Rove knew she was a covert agent. Also, the phrasing is vague as to how Cooper knew that she "works at the agency on wmd."

Nevertheless, this is an amazing revelation.

Not that long ago, the test for newsworthiness was not whether you could take a piece of journalism to a jury to secure a conviction with it -- and only it -- as evidence.

As a matter of fact, the Whitewater investigation made front page news for years with snips and shards of bullshit that ultimately produced absolutely nothing against Bill or Hillary Clinton.



What this document demonstrates is that Karl Rove provided at least some of the information to news reporters that did, in fact, blow Plame's cover. It supports, without proving beyond a reasonable doubt, the conclusion that Rove co-ordinated the operation to blow the cover of a secret agent at work on protecting the American citizenry from a terrorist attack using weapons of mass destruction.

At the very least, Bush and Rove should have to answer some pointed questions about this reveleation to pin them down on a single version of events. This will not happen, of course.

Knowing the history of Rove's role in this administration, I cannot think of any other explanation for how this crime was committed other than Rove being completely responsible for it.


Before the merger of the mass media and the GOP in the 1990s, this would have been a front page scandal with a firestorm of demands for Bush to fire Rove.

We must keep circulating the facts as they are revealed. I think it's rather late in the day to fret about whether the corporate media will do anything but try to protect Bush.

Maybe nothing will happen, but I want to know the truth, and I want as many people as possible to know the truth.

One step at a time. . .

[quaoar]

8. Could be that Rove

knew she was covert, but knew he couldn't actually say that, even in deep background with a reporter. So he just told Cooper that she was Wilson's wife, figuring the dots would later get connected by someone else.

[ltfranklin]

10. It shouldn't matter whether he knew.

Karl Rove is a government employee at a high level, where he had access to classified material. If he knew she worked for the CIA, whether or not he knew in what exact capacity, he should have damn well FOUND OUT before he talked about her, or not talked about her at all. This is the basics, ya'll...don't talk about CIA employees to outsiders, and ESPECIALLY not if they're not already publically KNOWN to be CIA employees, part of the public face of the CIA. If he did this, he deserves to go to jail. There's little doubt that there are people working with the CIA in a low-profile back-channel way that, if it became public that they DID work for the CIA, would put that person and others in danger, or at the very least destroy their effectiveness. Anybody that's been in Government as long as Rove has should know that.

[Zen Democrat]

9. The notes said " Joe Wilson's wife" - how is that different from

saying her name. Rove's doing the dirty work knowing any investigative journalist worth his salt can determine her name. Especially since Wilson had been a Washington insider for many years and they certainly attended "dinner parties" and other social events in Washington.

Identifying Joe Wilson's wife as a spy is tantamount to saying "Valerie Wilson (or Valerie Plame) is a covert agent and sent her own husband on this fact-finding mission to Niger".

Plame's identity was used to discredit Wilson -- and to punish him by ruining his wife's career. What patriotism, Mr. Karl Benedict Rove.

[HardWorkingDem]

11. In the age of the CIA....

Okay, I'm a little over 40yrs and for someone to say someone did or did not know a person was a covert agent with the CIA is a load of crap. Growing up it didn't take me long to realize that about anything involving the CIA was "covert".

It would be different if the Plame woman delievered mail or took out the trash in the CIA, but having the information she "worked for the CIA" is enough to scream that her work was probably secret.

What junk...but watch, that will become a talking point and the American public will buy it....sickening.

[Zen Democrat]

13. It ultimately won't be up to a poll. It will be up to a DC jury.

[sam sarrha]

14. in light of that you must read this article.. it explanes that...LINK>>

http://www.s93118771.onlinehome.us/DU/AMERICANJUDAS.pdf

[grasswire]

15. maybe that's why David Corn hyped it

I don't fully trust that man.

[peacetalksforall]

16. Don't expect Isikoff and Newsweek to expose the whouse. EXPECT

Isikoff and Newsweek to protect the whouse.

I like writing whouse... It fits better than White House.

Yep, we will bring honor and integrity back to the whouse.

[janx]

17. Newsweek exists to sell advertising, like most other media.

And Newsweek only has bits and pieces of evidence. The confirmation of Rove as Cooper's source is good enough for now.

[LunaC]

18. Expand your horizons

It's about the CONSPIRACY......

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4064253&mesg_id=4064253

[quaoar]

19. The conspiracy is fascinating

My beef was with the Newsweek article, which Corn hyped as being a blockbuster.

It isn't.

[kodi]

21. nope it shows rove lied about the timeline.

http://www.prospect.org/webfeatures/2004/03/waas-m-03-08.html
Karl Rove, told the FBI in an interview last October that he circulated and discussed damaging information regarding CIA operative Valerie Plame with others in the White House, outside political consultants, and journalists, according to a government official and an attorney familiar with the ongoing special counsel's investigation of the matter.

But Rove also adamantly insisted to the FBI that he was not the administration official who leaked the information that Plame was a covert CIA operative to conservative columnist Robert Novak last July. Rather, Rove insisted, he had only circulated information about Plame after it had appeared in Novak's column (on July 14, 2003).

He also told the FBI, the same sources said, that circulating the information was a legitimate means to counter what he claimed was politically motivated criticism of the Bush administration by Plame's husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson.

Rove and other White House officials described to the FBI what sources characterized as an aggressive campaign to discredit Wilson through the leaking and disseminating of derogatory information regarding him and his wife to the press, utilizing proxies such as conservative interest groups and the Republican National Committee to achieve those ends, and distributing talking points to allies of the administration on Capitol Hill and elsewhere. Rove is said to have named at least six other administration officials who were involved in the effort to discredit Wilson.


Now we find out that Rove lied abort the timeline of these disclosures to the press.

we learn of a call between Cooper and Karl Rove on July 11th, 2003:

note http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8525978/site/newsweek/
What Karl Rove told Time magazine's reporter.

Time magazine correspondent Matt Cooper was tapping out an e-mail to his bureau chief, Michael Duffy. "Subject: Rove/P&C," (for personal and confidential), Cooper began. "Spoke to Rove on double super secret background for about two mins before he went on vacation ..." Cooper proceeded to spell out some guidance on a story that was beginning to roil Washington. He finished, "please don't source this to rove or even WH " and suggested another reporter check with the CIA.

Rove's words on the Plame case have always been carefully chosen. "I didn't know her name. I didn't leak her name," Rove told CNN last year when asked if he had anything to do with the Plame leak. Rove has never publicly acknowledged talking to any reporter about former ambassador Joseph Wilson and his wife
NEWSWEEK obtained a copy of the e-mail that Cooper sent his bureau chief after speaking to Rove. (The e-mail was authenticated by a source intimately familiar with Time's editorial handling of the Wilson story, but who has asked not to be identified because of the magazine's corporate decision not to disclose its contents.) Cooper wrote that Rove offered him a "big warning" not to "get too far out on Wilson." Rove told Cooper that Wilson's trip had not been authorized by "DCIA"—CIA Director George Tenet—or Vice President Dick Cheney. Rather, "it was, KR said, wilson's wife, who apparently works at the agency on wmd issues who authorized the trip."

Nothing in the Cooper e-mail suggests that Rove used Plame's name or knew she was a covert operative. Nonetheless, it is significant that Rove was speaking to Cooper before Novak's column appeared; in other words, before Plame's identity had been published

How did Rove know Plame was at CIA if her position there as a covert NOC was a state secret?

I grant that Rove might well be telling the truth here, that he did not know Plame was a covert NOC. But obviously someone did, otherwise how could they know she was at CIA? That party or a subsequent party give this information told Rove.

Someone must have known of her status as a NOC and told someone else Plame was CIA. Even if Rove is telling the truth, Fitzgerald is seeking that person who knew this and divulged that Plame was CIA to parties not privy to such secret information. It is this party who broke the National Security Act of 1947:TITLE VI—PROTECTION OF CERTAIN NATIONAL SECURITY INFORMATION PROTECTION OF IDENTITIES OF CERTAIN UNITED STATES UNDERCOVER INTELLIGENCE OFFICERS, AGENTS, INFORMANTS, AND SOURCES SEC. 601. 50 U.S.C. 421-431.

So, we have proof of Rove lying to the FBI about when he spoke to journalists about wilson’s wife.

We return again to Novak’s use of the term “operative” in his column of 7/14/03, because whoever told him about Plame also told Novak she was a covert agent, unless Novak had a brain fart and used the term “operative’ in manner unlike he has used it in his entire journalistic history when referring to intelligence matters.

[quaoar]

22. We already knew Rove lied about the timeline

The Newsweek article didn't add much that we didn't already know. That was my point -- this was advertised as some kind of blockbuster and it wasn't. We learned a few new things but not a hell of a lot.

[Justice]

23. Perhaps, but we are saying that Rove was too stupid to know

Plame was undercover, so he gets off?

Nagging question #1 - Just How DID Rove know about Plame at all? How did he know she worked at the CIA?

Nagging question #2 - After her identity was out there - Rove called several reporters to keep story alive - he told Matthews Plame was fair game. Does this sound like a man who mistakenly outed a covert operative and now realizes the extent of his blunder? How could he have determined to his complete satisfaction that he was without legal liability?