Feb 08 2007
Andrea Mitchell
The venerable Mark [what was I thinking?] Tom Maguire lays out the context of one of the first defense witnesses we will see in the Libby Trial – and it is an enlightening description:
Ms. Mitchell’s time is coming – here is lots of material and transcripts of her past efforts on this subject.
And let’s recap some commentary on her detailed coverage of the Iraq/Niger/uranium story.
On June 23 she broke the State-friendly scoop that a State dissent on Iraq’s nuclear aspirations had been misplaced in the NIE.
On July 6, she interviewed Joe Wilson on Meet The Press while Tim Russert was on vacation.
On July 8 she told us that CIA “operatives” had sent Joe Wilson to Niger without the knowledge of the top CIA brass. In his July 14 column Bob Novak used “operative” to describe Ms. Plame, who he also linked to the decision to send Wilson. Coincidence, same source, or what? FWIW, Novak got the Plame leak from Armitage of State on July 8.
On July 20 she got laughs by going public with a bit of a snit that Richard Armitage would no longer return her phone calls.
I was not aware of all the connections between Mitchell and Armitage, but it is clear she could have had access to the same material that Woodward got in June and Novak got in July. Given her husband’s role in the Government (then Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan) it is easy to see how she was able to make connections to all the big players. What is going to be interesting is if someone has records (phone or schedules or sign in sheets) that place Mitchell with Armitage (or Grossman) during the period of May 3 – July 8th. If they place her at State Department then there will be some interesting fire works. Recall that Fitzgerald had his “obessession blinders” on and did not want to find any exculpatory evidence for Libby – so he avoided people like Mitchell and Gregory and others. This leaves Fitzgerald ignorant of what may be out there to bite him!
The Libby defense team should recall Tim Russert to impeach his integrity and bias against the Bush administration as follows:
Q. Define you position as VP of the NBC Washington bureau?
Q. Does that include: meeting with other more senior executives in making decisions regarding NBC policies and procedures? What and how stories are investigated and reported? Meeting with lawyers, fact checkers, producers, investigators, reporters and others like managers and executives in developing stories?
Q. Is it the responsibility of an on air personality like you to be more thoroughly informed than the average member of the public?
Q. As host and an NBC executive don’t you have wide latitude and discretion on what makes it on the air?
Q. Please define journalistic integrity? Does that include avoiding deliberate misrepresentation? Would you say you have the highest standards of journalistic integrity?
Q. When did you first learn that V. Plame was not a covert CIA operative?
Fitzgerald: Objection. The Q is outside the scope of your Honor’s limitations as to what can be admissible in this proceeding.
Wells: Your honor, the witness opened the door to this line of questioning and I intend to impeach his sworn testimony.
Judge: Objection overruled.
Q. You previously testified that you appear on air nearly every Sunday, 2-3 times a week on the Today show, periodically on Imus and on various other venues, correct?
Q. Between the dates of xx/xx/xxxx and yy/yy/yyyy, how many times did you refer to V. Plame as a covert employee or CIA operative?
Q. Did you ever submit that observation to fact checking?
Q. When did you become aware of a friend of the court brief submitted by numerous news organizations (including NBC?) stating that the NYT reporter should be released because there was no crime as Plame was not an operative nor covert?
Q. Were you present when the decision to file this brief was discussed? Did you participate? Were you consulted? Did any reporter or fact checker point this out to you ever? Are you aware that NBC lawyer Xxxxxxxxxxx says you were present?
Q. How is it credible that you were not aware of this brief?
Q. Let me take you back to your previous testimony that you were not biased against the administration. How could you make XX references to something you knew to be factually incorrect unless you were biased?
Q. How many times did you challenge others who referred to Plame as covert or an operative?
Q. How could you claim to have an ounce of journalistic integrity to make XX references to something you knew to be factually incorrect?
Q. Are you selectively remembering what you want to remember but not recall what you don’t want to recall?
Q. Why should anything you have testified to be believed?
AJ-
I have to admit, I had been pretty impressed with Mark McGuire’s analysis – he never really showed such flashes on insight with the A’s or the Cards.