Lawrence O' Donnell on Luskin and the case

[LeftNYC]

Remember early on when O'Donnell broke this story and everyone said it was no big deal...That seems like ages ago...

from the Huffington Post: www.huffingtonpost.com/theblog/archive/lawrence-odonnell/the-roveluskin-leaks_4551.html

In the 21 days since I broke the story that Karl Rove was Matt Cooper's source, Rove's lawyer, Bob Luskin, has been working the press everyday with a new defense angle that, once committed to print in Newsweek, the Washington Post or the New York Times, gets added to the Republican party's talking points on the scandal. Luskin's first response to my revelation was to say that, well, yes, Rove did talk to Cooper about Joe Wilson's wife but he did not "knowingly" disclose classified information -- knowingly being the essence of Rove's criminal defense (as I have previously discussed).

After getting a lot of embarrassing attention for trying to deny to the Washington Post that Rove was the person who finally gave Cooper a specific release to testify, Luskin has gone undercover and now rarely attaches his name to the defense briefs he dictates to reporters, all of whom would love to use a source other than Luskin but no one in the prosecutor's office is leaking, so they're stuck with Luskin. The Washington Post usually identifies him as a source familiar with Rove's grand jury testimony, but Luskin has managed to negotiate a more indirect label with the Times where he appears as a source who has "been briefed on the case." The Times always points out that the source is sympathetic to Rove. Today's Times piece says that Luskin's latest description about how Rove and Lewis Libby worked together (the prosecutor might say conspired) to respond to Joe Wilson's Op-Ed piece was leaked to the the Times "to demonstrate that Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby were not involved in an orchestrated scheme to discredit Mr. Wilson or disclose the undercover status of his wife, Valerie Wilson, but were intent on clarifying the use of intelligence in the president's address."

That will be Rove and Libby's defense against a possible conspiracy count in the prosecutor's eventual indictment.

It is important for Luskin to get his defense started now because he knows that what one appeals court judge in the case called "the plot against Wilson" is going to become public when the prosecutor reveals everything he has already revealed only to the judges.

Rove is obviously in charge of the day-to-day strategy of what Luskin leaks to the press. Rove is stealing a page from the Clinton scandal management playbook. He is trying to set the stage for the day the prosecutor turns over his cards. Rove-Luskin will then call it all "old news."

Everything Rove-Luskin has leaked has been printed in a form most favorable to the Rove defense without a word of leaked input from the prosecutor. When the prosecutor tells his story, don't expect him to accept Rove's currently uncontested claim that he does not recall who told him that Wilson's wife was a CIA agent and don't expect the "old news" spin to work. When the prosecutor

[Geoff R. Casavant]

1. "Rove is obviously in charge of the day-to-day strategy . . .

. . . of what Luskin leaks to the press."

Rove is not an attorney, and in trying to keep the poitical spin going around, he is constantly painting himself into a smaller and smaller legal corner. I'm sure his attorney has figured out that every statement he makes as an agent on Rove's behalf can be used against his client at trial, but I'm not sure Rove has figured it out yet.

I wonder how Luskin can stand having a client who is in essence telling him how to do his job.

[samdogmom]

3. Hmm..didn't this lawyer accept gold bricks from another client?

If the money is green, he's probably the type that doesn't care that Rove is trying to run the show. After all, Rove is the one that will have to go to the jail. The lawyer gets paid no matter what. Maybe more ethical lawyers can't work with Rove.

[longship]

2. Can you imagine?

Can you imagine how bad the case really is if much of what we're hearing is from Rove's lawyer? There's some very damaging revelations the past week. Every day I am again astounded by what I read. This thing is much bigger than Watergate and, after two years, is now breaking much faster than Watergate ever did.

I expect that when indictments are handed down, we are all going to be very (pleasantly) surprised. *Nothing* is breaking the WH's way. Nada. Zippo. Zilch. In fact, each revelation makes things look far, far more serious.

No wonder the press see blood in the water. There is blood in the water.

Want to bet that the WH is doing nothing but covering up the Plame Affair now? Just like in Watergate, they covered it up for two years--in Fitzgerald's parlance, conspired to suborn perjury and obstruct justice. They are now stuck with that. They have to continue the cover-up because they know their goose is cooked if they don't. So now that's all they can do. Nothing of the country's real business is being done. Everything the WH does from here on out is about covering up the Plame Affair and where that leads. Everthing!

[ThoughtCriminal]

4. Remember those code words

"source familiar with Rove's grand jury testimony" and "a source who has been briefed on the case." = Rove's Lawyer.

If the RNC talking points are all they have, Rove had better hope for a preemptive pardon (before trial) or start looking for countries that won't extradite him.

[imenja]

5. If I were Rove, I'd get a new lawyer

this guy has blown he. It was Luskin's bravado that worked to free Cooper of his pledge of confidentiality. So really we should be grateful to Luskin for being such a putz.

[Beetwasher]

6. The Funny Thing Is, With Every Statement, Rove's Lawyer Is Indicting Him!

He's admitting Rove did in fact speak to reporters about Plame. That's all we need to know. Rove's spin as to WHY he did it is irrelevant. If that's the best they can do, Rove is fucked. They should have just kept their mouths shut and said "no comment". But now their spin is on record and it's indictable.