Plamegate Odds and Ends: Bob Novak's Admission and Air Fleischer's Silence
Following Josh Marshall's lead, a number of people have recently noted the potential significance of this line in Libby's indictment:
But it wasn't just Cheney who knew that Plame worked for the Counterproliferation Division. Here's what Bob Novak wrote in October 2003:
So if Libby had reason to suspect that Plame was a covert operative, so too did Novak's source, whoever he is. I'm not sure what to make of this fact, but it strikes me as being important.
On a somewhat related point, John Dickerson at Slate--whose coverage of the leak investigation has been solid--makes the following astute observation:
This is a very good point and one that is potentially very problematic for Libby. According to the indictment, Libby told Fleischer about Plame on July 7, right as the Wilson story exploded on the White House. Fleischer spent the whole week trying to put that fire out, but in all of his press briefings, he never once mentioned Wilson's wife. Why not? The most likely answer is that Libby knew that piece of information was classified, or at least very sensitive. And if Ari Fleischer knew that, doesn't it stand to reason that the person who told him about Plame did as well (and for that matter, if Fleischer knew the information was sensitive, how could Rove not have known?). This is just one more piece of circumstantial evidence that the leakers in the White House knew that Plame's identity was classified.
On a sidenote, be sure to check out Empty Wheel's post today regarding Ari Fleischer and the INR memo. If I'm following EW's argument correctly, it would seem that both Libby and Rove would have a motive for suggesting (falsely?) that Fleischer read the INR memo on the flight to Africa. If Fleischer read the memo (which indicates that Plame's affiliation with the CIA is classified) but Rove and Libby had not, it could potentially explain why Fleischer was more careful with that information than Rove and Libby were. In other words, attorneys for Libby and/or Rove might have argued that Fleischer knew Plame's identity was classified (and therefore didn't talk about it) because he read a memo that they never saw. I'm not saying I buy this argument, but it could explain why such a fuss was made about the INR memo through anonymous leaks back in July. Of course all this assumes that Fleischer himself wasn't a leaker. As I mentioned before, Fleischer certainly could be the as-of-yet-unidentified source for Bob Novak and/or Walter Pincus.
On or about June 12, 2003, LIBBY wasMarshall noted that the Counterproliferation Division is a part of the CIA's Directorate of Operations, i.e., the home of the CIA's clandestine operations. As Barton Gellman put it in Sunday's Washington Post, Cheney's statement, as reflected in the indictment, is "an unambiguous declaration that her position was among the case officers of the operations directorate." David Corn agrees, noting:
advised by the Vice President of the United
States that Wilson's wife worked at the
Central Intelligence Agency in the
Counterproliferation Division. LIBBY
understood that the Vice President had
learned this information from the CIA.
The Counterproliferation Division is part of the
DO--as it's been called within the CIA--and
anyone familiar with the CIA, especially a
senior administration official obsessed with
WMD issues, ought to know that. This short
sentence suggests that Libby had reason to
assume that (or wonder if) Valerie Wilson was
working undercover at the CIA."
But it wasn't just Cheney who knew that Plame worked for the Counterproliferation Division. Here's what Bob Novak wrote in October 2003:
During a long conversation with a senior
administration official, I asked why Wilson
was assigned the mission to Niger. He said
Wilson had been sent by the CIA's
counterproliferation section at the suggestion
of one of its employees, his wife.
So if Libby had reason to suspect that Plame was a covert operative, so too did Novak's source, whoever he is. I'm not sure what to make of this fact, but it strikes me as being important.
On a somewhat related point, John Dickerson at Slate--whose coverage of the leak investigation has been solid--makes the following astute observation:
More astonishingly, we learn from the
Fitzgerald indictment that Ari Fleischer knew
about Plame and didn't tell anyone at all. He
walked reporters, including me, up to the fact,
suggesting they look into who sent Wilson, but
never used her name or talked about her
position. Why not? It certainly would have
been helpful for him at the time.
This is a very good point and one that is potentially very problematic for Libby. According to the indictment, Libby told Fleischer about Plame on July 7, right as the Wilson story exploded on the White House. Fleischer spent the whole week trying to put that fire out, but in all of his press briefings, he never once mentioned Wilson's wife. Why not? The most likely answer is that Libby knew that piece of information was classified, or at least very sensitive. And if Ari Fleischer knew that, doesn't it stand to reason that the person who told him about Plame did as well (and for that matter, if Fleischer knew the information was sensitive, how could Rove not have known?). This is just one more piece of circumstantial evidence that the leakers in the White House knew that Plame's identity was classified.
On a sidenote, be sure to check out Empty Wheel's post today regarding Ari Fleischer and the INR memo. If I'm following EW's argument correctly, it would seem that both Libby and Rove would have a motive for suggesting (falsely?) that Fleischer read the INR memo on the flight to Africa. If Fleischer read the memo (which indicates that Plame's affiliation with the CIA is classified) but Rove and Libby had not, it could potentially explain why Fleischer was more careful with that information than Rove and Libby were. In other words, attorneys for Libby and/or Rove might have argued that Fleischer knew Plame's identity was classified (and therefore didn't talk about it) because he read a memo that they never saw. I'm not saying I buy this argument, but it could explain why such a fuss was made about the INR memo through anonymous leaks back in July. Of course all this assumes that Fleischer himself wasn't a leaker. As I mentioned before, Fleischer certainly could be the as-of-yet-unidentified source for Bob Novak and/or Walter Pincus.
posted by A.L. at 4:46 PM
3 Comments:
The INR memo doesn't say Plame is covert. It says simply she's works at CIA. That's part of the reason I've always said the INR memo is a red herring--it doesn't have all the information that Novak's source would need to have known (specifically, Plame's maiden name and her covert status).
I was actually arguing that Rove and Libby wanted to claim Ari had seen the memo on AF1 either (if you believe Ari is a Pincus/Novak source) because they could argue Ari acted alone, they could pretend he had learned of Plame's identity and leaked that information to Novak by himself, without any collaboration.
Or, if you believe Ari didn't leak, but you know he was talking (as he clearly is), then you spread the story Ari was looking at the INR memo because it seeds with the public, at least, and the prosecutor if he is very dumb, the notion that Ari is a candidate to be the leaker. FWIW I think a great number of the leaks from this summer were trying to incriminate certain witnesses Ari and Powell.
In either case, I'm arguing that Luskin and Tatewere beginning their defense alread, by arguing that one of the prosecutor's most important witnesses is only accusing Libby and Rove because he's trying to hide his own guilt.
emptywheel
EW, I realize the INR memo doesn't say that Plame was covert. But I believe the paragraph that discusses her employment with the CIA is marked "S" for Secret. My point was that if Fleischer read the memo, he might have realized (if he didn't know already) that Plame's role in the story was classified. If Libby and Rove are both claiming that they didn't know her affiliation with the CIA was classified, they may be pointing to the INR memo as an explanation for why Fleischer knew something that they didn't. Does that make sense?
Two comments:
1) Dickerson's comments about Fleischer leading reporters to look into who sent Wilson without actually revealing it himself are interesting. That tracks with what a number of administration officials appear to have been doing until July 12 when Libby goes, relatively speaking, bananas, sharing her role with at least two reporters, after having had a strategy session with Cheney on the plane. What changed? Libby had found out the day before (or the day before that) from Rove that Novak was writing a column about Wilson's wife. So my guess is: Libby, perhaps in consultation with Cheney, knew the cat was coming out of the bag, so they wanted to spread the info about Wilson's wife as widely as possible, thinking they were now able to claim that they hadn't done anything other than repeat information that Novak already had and was publishing.
2)Isn't it interesting that, according to Novak's October 2003 account, the SAO who was presumably his first source (and who was not Libby, right?) knows and shares Wilson's wife's employment at CPD, and that, according to Libby's indictment, Libby got that precise piece of information from none other than Dick Cheney. Nah, couldn't be, since then it's hard to see how Fitzgerald wouldn't have a more or less open and shut case already.
Jeff
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