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Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper

 
paladin
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01/28/2007 04:33 PM
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Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper

by David Frenkel
Sun Jan 28, 2007 at 09:29:45 AM PST

"Ultimately, Cheney crafted an on-the-record statement to be attributed to Libby by name. Libby called Matt Cooper of Time, who had emailed questions to Martin earlier" (Cathie Martin, former top press assistant to Dick Cheney). This was the last paragraph of a page A12 story in the Boston Globe today (January 28).

Here at last is a smoking gun that shows Vice President Cheney together with some able helpers was the author, architect and instrument of the smear campaign designed to obscure the truth regarding the alleged imminent WMD threat. We all "knew it" but until now we just could not prove it. I would bet not too many Boston Globe readers still know it.

David Frenkel's diary :: ::
No wonder we have had serial failures of the media to get the story right and known. Here is a story that eventually circles back to nailing Cheney for his secretive backroom media manipulation designed to cover up the fact that he did not have the evidence he claimed about WMD. His former press aid, Cathie Martin has revealed what kind of techniques are being used to destroy clarity, to twist the facts and to smear anyone that might shed some kind of light on the facts.

This is not a page A12 story. A12 is a left hand page to make it worse buried by advertisements. The right hand page is a full page ad. This quarter page story, it could be argued, had the worst position in the double page spread. Why?

Is it just negligence? Is it a failure of editorial leadership? Some of the front page stories today were justified but were watered down. "Thousands rally on National Mall" seems to be less than the truth when it was clearly Tens of Thousands but under a Hundred Thousand. Does a "Winter warm-up costing N.E. region" really trump the Cheney is outed by his own staff for outing Valerie Plame to cover his trumped up imminent WMD threat story? Is this Cheney/Libby trial evidence story not the seeds of an eventual ouster of the VP?

The other above the fold story "Governor weighing deal in pay hikes" is an important piece of political gossip but it is part of a much larger bargaining process. Surely this does not trump the Cheney smoking gun story either.

My complaint is that even a newspaper as reputed to be left of center as the Boston Globe seems to have trouble identifying seminal events and effectively bringing them to people’s attention. Without any editorializing, the facts being read into the record at this Libby trial should have Americans enraged at the perversion of the news and facts that have been driven by Vice President Dick Cheney. The fact is that most people still do not know the facts and the media need to do a far better job of ensuring that the public knows how this Iraq debacle came to pass.

[link to www.boston.com]

This is the link to the AP story carried in the Boston Globe today,



[link to www.dailykos.com]
zacksavage

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01/28/2007 04:40 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
Yes,...I heard this was true Paladin. Everyone knows the VP is corrupt beyond all known measures. Just a matter of time until the house’o Cards comes tumbling down.

I look forward to the gutless, hat-in-hand apologists that will flock to defend 5 deferment Cheney the ScumSucker.





Z
Free your mind,...your ass will follow.

--- parliament funkadelic
paladin  (OP)

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01/28/2007 04:43 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
hey...Z..

I have been on top of the case.....it is sad it is not reported on GLP..

my falt..

I will be posting all of it for now on..
zacksavage

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01/28/2007 04:52 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
hey...Z..

I have been on top of the case.....it is sad it is not reported on GLP..

my fault..

I will be posting all of it for now on..
 Quoting: paladin


Great that you will keep us updated paladin. It is an important case. It could be responsible for the push to start a conflict soon with ANY nation,…to provide diversion and cover the Treason.

Who knows????



Z
Free your mind,...your ass will follow.

--- parliament funkadelic
paladin  (OP)

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01/28/2007 04:53 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
hey ....Z..

here is a blog that is on top of it...



[link to www.firedoglake.com]




[link to firedoglake.com]

most other sites are linking to this site..
zacksavage

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01/28/2007 04:56 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
Thanks,...I heard mention of that site recently on the Malloy Show,...or maybe Thom Hartmann.

Anyway, will check it out.




Z
Free your mind,...your ass will follow.

--- parliament funkadelic
paladin  (OP)

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01/28/2007 04:59 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
hey all..


here is a link so you all can get up to speed.....



[link to www.firedoglake.com]
paladin  (OP)

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01/28/2007 05:05 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
start at the bottom of the page ..

above link
paladin  (OP)

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01/28/2007 05:15 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
Defense Portrays Libby as Scapegoat
Jury Is Told About White House Rifts

By Amy Goldstein and Carol D. Leonnig
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, January 24, 2007; A01



I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby was "put through the meat grinder" by the White House shortly after the Iraq war began, scapegoated to conceal the fact that Karl Rove, the president's top political adviser, helped disclose an undercover CIA officer's identity, a defense attorney contended yesterday as Libby's perjury trial began.

The lawyer, Theodore V. Wells Jr., and Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald agreed that Vice President Cheney ordered Libby, then his chief of staff, to contact reporters early in the summer of 2003 in an effort to rebut criticism that the administration had selectively used intelligence to justify the invasion of Iraq.

According to Wells, the confidential conversations Libby had with several well-known journalists were not intended to spread the identity of Valerie Plame, the covert CIA officer. Instead, Libby's attorney said, he was acting at Cheney's instructions to respond to allegations that the vice president withheld information that would have raised doubts about whether Iraq was trying to develop weapons of mass destruction.

The dramatic opening statements in the first hours of the celebrated trial laid bare fissures deep inside the White House. They came as the prosecution and defense provided the jury crackling portrayals of their opposing theories of the case.

The two sides' accounts exposed jurors to handwritten notes by Cheney, the internal culture of major newsrooms, a tape recording of Libby speaking to grand jurors and a White House under fire as its justification for war was beginning to unravel.

Libby, 56, is accused of five felony charges stemming from a federal investigation into the leak of Plame's identity to the media. Libby is not charged with the leak itself, nor is anyone else. He faces two counts of making false statements to FBI agents, two counts of perjuring himself before a grand jury and one count of obstructing the investigation, and he has pleaded not guilty to all charges.

"How could we reach a point where the chief of staff for the vice president was repeatedly lying to federal investigators?" Fitzgerald asked jurors rhetorically. "That's what this case is all about."

During an hour-long opening statement that started the trial, the prosecutor painted for the jury what he called "a firestorm" inside the White House on the final day of the July 4, 2003, holiday weekend, when an op-ed article by Plame's husband, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, attacked the administration. Wilson, who had been sent to Niger by the CIA to determine whether Iraq was seeking uranium for its nuclear weapons program, said the president and his aides "may have twisted the intelligence" concerning whether Iraq was seeking weapons of mass destruction.

Libby told investigators that at one point he was surprised to learn from NBC's Tim Russert in July 2003 that Wilson was married to Plame. But Fitzgerald contended that Libby, at Cheney's direction, had been actively telling people about Wilson at the same time.

He said Libby's claim to a grand jury that he simply had forgotten what he knew was implausible, because he had passed on Plame's name to reporters and then-White House press secretary Ari Fleischer days before speaking with Russert.

"You can't learn something startling on Thursday that you're giving out Monday and Tuesday of the same week," Fitzgerald said. "Day after day after day after day, he focused on this controversy."

Wells, the defense attorney, countered that "this is a weak, paper-thin, circumstantial evidence case about he-said, she-said."

Wells asserted that the vice president's former right-hand man gave investigators his "good-faith recollection" and that any mistakes in his memory were innocent. He also contended that the journalists and administration officials who are to testify during the trial also have imperfect memories. He said that Libby did not aggressively push the Wilson story, did not know that Plame worked in a covert role and had no motive to lie to investigators.

According to Wells, when the federal investigation of the leak began in the fall of 2003, Libby was not worried about his job, but was "concerned about . . . being scapegoated." Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary at the time, said publicly that Rove was not responsible for any leaks, Wells said, but did not say the same about Libby.

Libby, Wells said, told Cheney he feared "people in the White House are trying to set me up." Wells then showed the jury the text of a note Cheney had jotted that said: "Not going to protect one staffer + sacrifice the guy that was asked to stick his neck in the meat grinder because of the incompetence of others."

Wells said: "That one person was Karl Rove. He was viewed as a political genius. . . . He had to be protected. The person who was to be sacrificed was Scooter Libby." According to Wells, the vice president tried to persuade White House colleagues to publicly clear Libby's name as the source of the leak.

Plame's name first appeared in a July 14 column by Robert D. Novak. Rove and Richard L. Armitage, then the deputy secretary of state, have acknowledged being Novak's sources for the story.

Wells did not make it clear how the White House's handling of Libby's role influenced what he later told the FBI and grand jury. But the attorney said the "meat grinder" Libby was put through meant he took on the extra task of having brief conversations with reporters while carrying out his "day job" dealing with crucial national security matters.

Asked about the defense's portrayal, White House spokeswoman Dana M. Perino said yesterday: "We are not commenting on an ongoing criminal matter."

Both sides yesterday provided small pieces of new information about the events leading to Libby's indictment.

Fitzgerald disclosed, for instance, that Libby had underlined his own copy of Wilson's op-ed piece. Fitzgerald also identified a CIA employee Libby asked about Wilson as Craig Schmall.

Late in the afternoon, the prosecution's first witness, Marc Grossman, a former undersecretary of state, testified that Libby had asked him in late May 2003 to look into Wilson's CIA-sponsored trip to Niger to investigate the uranium claim. Grossman said he spoke to Wilson and learned that his wife worked at the CIA and had appeared to help arrange the trip.

"I thought the whole business was of less than zero importance," Grossman testified. "I thought the wife was an interesting tidbit, though."



[link to www.washingtonpost.com]
paladin  (OP)

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01/28/2007 05:20 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
LIBBY V. ROVE; GREGORY AND RUSSERT

News out of the opening statements in Scooter Libby's trial: The defense is going to argue that in the fall of 2003, with the White House under pressure to come clean on its role in the leaking of Valerie Plame's identity the past summer, Libby was scapegoated in an effort to save Karl Rove, who, Libby's lawyer said, had pushed the story with reporters that summer. This is a very smart move on the part of Libby's defense, if for no other reason that it make Libby the victim of the one man who may be more intensely reviled than Libby's boss, Dick Cheney. It also complements the Libby defense's apparent intention to suggest that Libby was acting merely as a loyal subordinate to Cheney in taking on the job of responding to Joe Wilson's allegations in the press in July 2003 -- which in turn, they seem to be arguing, explains why Cheney and Libby together sought to get the White House in fall 2003 to put out the word that Libby was not involved in blowing Plame's cover. (These actions are going to be portrayed by Patrick Fitzgerald as part of an effort by Libby to save his job.)

The other big news is that former Press Secretary Ari Fleischer apparently told NBC News' David Gregory on July 11, 2003 that Plame worked at the CIA. Libby's defense will argue that the fact that Gregory knew -- a fact not previously publicly known -- makes it more likely that Gregory's colleague Tim Russert did indeed know about Plame and could have conveyed that information to Libby, as Libby originally testified. There are a couple of challenges this aspect of the defense might face. First, Fitzgerald has suggested the discussion between Libby and Russert took place on July 10, and if he can pin down that date, then it will not help Libby to show what Gregory learned on July 11. Second, Fitzgerald has framed the charges in such a way that even if Russert did tell Libby about Plame, Libby is still liable for testifying falsely when he said that he was surprised by the information, since he had been discussing Plame throughout the June-July period with numerous government officials and one reporter, including a couple of discussions days before Libby's conversation with Russert.

The second reason this news is significant: Fleischer is in fact a prosecution witness who has been immunized. It turns out he initially took the Fifth Amendment before agreeing to testify in exchange for immunity. That obviously provides an opening for the defense to impeach Fleischer's expected testimony that he learned of Plame from Libby on July 7, 2003, when Libby told him the information was "hush hush," and "on the q.t."

UPDATE:Apparently, Fitzgerald is putting on his first witness this afternoon, former Undersecretary of State Marc Grossman, who is set to testify that in early June 2003 he told Libby that Joe Wilson's wife was at the CIA and had been involved in Wilson's 2002 mission to Niger. Grossman will be the first of a succession of government officials -- at State, CIA, Office of the Vice President, and the White House -- who will testify that they either told Libby or were told by him about Plame's CIA employment in the month before Libby purportedly learned the information from Tim Russert (having forgotten, according to Libby, that Vice President Cheney had already told him that Plame worked in the Counterproliferation Division on the clandestine side of the Agency. Libby was compelled to tell the FBI about his June 2003 conversation with Cheney after finding that he had taken notes on what Cheney had told him).

--Jeff Lomonaco


[link to www.prospect.org]
paladin  (OP)

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01/28/2007 05:27 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
hey all..

sorry for all the post....just trying to bring everyone up to speed..

[link to www.youtube.com]



I love these 2 women....
:dance cat:
Dick
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01/30/2007 08:30 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
You can all just go and fuck yourselves.
Green Man
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01/30/2007 08:49 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
I see a movie in the making:

Deadeye Dick and the Smoking Gun

dick hunter

Hey, you! Do you hate our freedoms?
Anonymous Coward
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01/30/2007 08:50 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
Note to Special Prosecutor:

Indict Cheney.
Green Man
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01/30/2007 08:53 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
hey all..

sorry for all the post....just trying to bring everyone up to speed..

[link to www.youtube.com]



I love these 2 women....
:dance cat:
 Quoting: paladin


Is the gal on the right CHEWING GUM while she is on camera?

No network news for her!
paladin  (OP)

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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
1/27/2007
The press look away as Russert pancakes at the Libby trial


[link to www.btcnews.com]
paladin  (OP)

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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
In Ex-Aide's Testimony, A Spin Through VP's PR

By Dana Milbank
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 26, 2007; Page A01

Memo to Tim Russert: Dick Cheney thinks he controls you.

This delicious morsel about the "Meet the Press" host and the vice president was part of the extensive dish Cathie Martin served up yesterday when the former Cheney communications director took the stand in the perjury trial of former Cheney chief of staff I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.




[link to www.washingtonpost.com]
paladin  (OP)

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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
Miller Testimony Contradicts Libby Story

By MICHAEL J. SNIFFEN
Associated Press Writer



[link to hosted.ap.org]
Anonymous Coward
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01/30/2007 09:16 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
latest vlog


[link to www.youtube.com]
paladin  (OP)

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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
 Quoting: Anonymous Coward 151551




thanks...AC 151551


I saw on CNN tonight that the White House might have set up Libby..
paladin  (OP)

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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
WASHINGTON DC, January 23, 2007 - The Associated Press has partnered with the Media Bloggers Association to distribute its members' coverage of the trial of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, former chief of staff for Vice President Dick Cheney, to the news organization's member websites, the bloggers group announced today.


[link to www.mediabloggers.org]



the information black out is huge people..
Anonymous Coward
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
Recess

Miller’s attorney then appears and tells judge that he will object to any attempt by either the defense or the prosecution to ask questions about any other sources Miller may have. But he also adds he does not believe there are other sources she can recall dealing with about Joseph Wilson, his wife, or the issues before the court in this trial.

Bennett then asks for a minute to consult with his client.

When they come back, Miller agrees to answer if there were any other sources she had acquired information about Wilson from.

Jeffress is asking about Miller’s statement that she had spoken or met with other sources when planning to write about Wilson’s op-ed piece in the NYT that set the entire controversy off in the first place. Before he gets too far, however, the judge intercedes and a bench conference ensues.

More discussion of what Miller can be asked about—and not. Fitzgerald warns of going off in “an irrelevant fishing expedition.”

Judge Walton says the question must be relevant to the issues before him.

Jeffress says he believes Miller cannot remember any other sources. That is obviously what he is trying to establish. Miller testified to the grand jury that she wondered how Wilson had come to write his article in the first place.

“How is challenging her in that regard relevant?” asks the judge.

Because it impeaches her ability to speak on the matter, Jeffress responds.

Walton wants to stick to the point—and not go far afield.

Jeffress says it if were not germane, why would it be in her affidavit?

Walton says he will make up his own mind in his own case as to what is germane.

Jeffress says Miller may be trying to protect other sources, and that may have been part of why she went to jail. More likely though is that she will say—if he is permitted to ask the question – that she just doesn’t remember. They are trying “classic impeachment” of the witness. “The very essence of her cross-examination is about her credibility.” It has nothing to do with the First Amendment.

Fitzgerald says if the trial becomes about Wilson’s op-ed—and its charges that the Bush Administration twisted intelligence to lead the nation into wear. “If that’s what this trial is going to be about, we’re going to have to move in cots,” he notes.

Judge Walton decides to sleep on the matter and rule tomorrow—court adjourned.

[link to www.roryoconnor.org]
zacksavage

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02/05/2007 04:34 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
bump





Z
Free your mind,...your ass will follow.

--- parliament funkadelic
zacksavage

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02/05/2007 10:29 PM
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Re: Smoking Gun: Cheney wrote the Libby statement that went to Time’s Matt Cooper
dick<-- I enjoy hunting and torture.... hehehe



fighter1 <--Get over here Fat Boy and take your meds!!!


Z
Free your mind,...your ass will follow.

--- parliament funkadelic





GLP