Quote
Originally posted by: forkushV
Did the White House hire Scooter Libby?
Oh wait, that time it wasn't inadvertent, it was deliberate.
The White House had nothing to do with the outing of Valerie Plame.
" . . . the man who told Novak about Valerie Plame was Richard Armitage, Colin Powell's deputy at the State Department, . . . the bureaucracy at the State Department and the CIA appear to have used the indiscretion of Armitage to revenge themselves on the 'neoconservatives' who had been advocating the removal of Saddam Hussein. Armitage identified himself to Colin Powell as Novak's source before the Fitzgerald inquiry had even been set on foot."
Ref: Slate
This brief summary of the entire episode, in a Free Republic comment, presents the facts:
"In January 2004, the Justice Department chose prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald to investigate the leak of Valerie Plame's identity. He became aware that the leaker was Armitage, who resigned from the State Department in November 2004 but remained a subject of the inquiry until February 2006 when Fitzgerald told him in a letter that he would not be charged, The New York Times reported on Sept. 2, 2006.
Mr. Armitage cooperated voluntarily in the case, never hired a lawyer and testified several times to the grand jury, according to people who are familiar with his role and actions in the case. He turned over his calendars, datebooks and even his wife's computer in the course of the inquiry, those associates said. But Mr. Armitage kept his actions secret, not even telling President Bush because the prosecutor asked him not to divulge it, . . . Why would the prosecutor keep this vital information from the president who had expressed concern over the outing of a CIA operative? Meanwhile, the liberal press hysterically speculated that it was Karl Rove and Vice President Cheney who most likely leaked Plame's identity to the press.
[n.b. Apparently forkushV was taken in by the liberal press, . . . . again. - DD]
Despite the fact Fitzgerald knew the source of the leak, he decided to go after reporters who refused to name their sources. Thus, Times reporter Judith Miller spent 85 days in jail for refusing to reveal her sources to the prosecutor. She was finally released when she agreed to testify before a grand jury.
So, why did Fitzgerald go after Scooter Libby, Vice President Cheney's top aide? Apparently, Armitage had read a memorandum Libby had commissioned as part of an effort to rebut criticism of the White House by Joe Wilson. Who wrote the memorandum, and did it mention Valerie Plame? Was it the source of any leaks to the press? Apparently not, for it was Armitage who supposedly read the report and made the leak, not Libby.
Nevertheless, it was Libby who Fitzgerald decided to indict, and the jury found Libby guilty of perjury and obstruction of justice. But how could he have obstructed justice when it wasn't Libby who outed Valerie Plame, but Armitage, who voluntarily admitted that he was the perpetrator of the so-called crime of outing a CIA covert agent?"
[boldface added - DD]
