Oct 25 2005
Not Good For Wilsons – Great For WH
Drudge is reporting that Fitzgerald has decided to go back and ascertain whether the WH could be the only valid sources for leaking Plame’s employer – the CIA. Fitzgerald is supposedly questioning neighbors. Drudge links to this article capturing the fact that Valerie’s CIA job was not a huge secret at the time of the Wilson article:
A former CIA covert agent who supervised Mrs. Plame early in her career yesterday took issue with her identification as an “undercover agent,” saying that she worked for more than five years at the agency’s headquarters in Langley and that most of her neighbors and friends knew that she was a CIA employee.
“She made no bones about the fact that she was an agency employee and her husband was a diplomat,” Fred Rustmann, a covert agent from 1966 to 1990, told The Washington Times.
“Her neighbors knew this, her friends knew this, his friends knew this. A lot of blame could be put on to central cover staff and the agency because they weren’t minding the store here. … The agency never changed her cover status.”
Not to mention the NY Times and Washington Post probably knew as well to ensure proper sourcing on the anonymous claims of Wilson in those papers prior to his debut in July.
If there is reasonable evidence Plame’s employment could come from sources outside the WH kiss any indictments against Rove and Libby good-bye!
Here is a very interesting rumor – I have no idea to its veracity. Hat tip Lorie Byrd at Polipundit.
AJ, doesn’t it strike you as a little late in the game to be doing these neighborhood interviews? IIRC, some have speculated the Fitzgerald had, for all intents and purposes, concluded the bulk of his investigation in 2004. I find this report somewhat strange.
Lesley,
My first gut reaction was to think of the Fitz phone call to Wilson. Wilson has probably never filed an attorney of record. It was the day before Miller testified (odd) and he has no professional reason to be speaking to him, My feeling is he is putting on some heat?
Lesley,
Yes it does strike me strange. I am beginning to wonder if there is a heated split on Fitzgerald’s team. Those who want to go after Rove and Libby for inaccurate testimony with a try at perjury and obstruction, and those noting that perjury and obstruction only hold water in relation to a crime. No crime and no intent to deceive guts the the rationale for those indictments.
Either that or they are reading on the blogs about all the things they have not thought about and are worried!
It is not a good sign, but it is fine for the WH. It looks like Fitzgerald is worried and trying to shore something up.
Mary, that’s an excellent point. Very possible. Or, the GJ asked for this to be done – at the last minute – and Fitzgerald is abiding by their wishes. But, IF that is so, then it would indicate to me that the GJ has not conclusively settled on certain parts of the indictment(s).
AJ, I wish I shared your equanimity (or as Mark Twain put it, “the calm confidence of a Christian with four aces”) with regard to things being fine for the WH. I’ll admit to being a bit spooked by the Drudge headlines.
You have a truly fine blog. Thanks for being here.
Here is another curiosity I have…what difference to the case against Libby and Rove (and WH officials) does it make if a Wilson neighbor knew she worked at the CIA this late in the game ?
…say two neighbors do and the other 10 don’t, what bearing does 2 neighbors knowing have now
I just don’t see them doing this for a Libby Rove benefit/non-benefit.
Lesley,
Don’t misunderstand me. There is a chance Fitzgerald will try and indict those who told the truth about those who lied. But that is just another hill to climb and challenge to overcome. I am not so much confident of tomorrow as confident that it all will work itself out at some point. I hope Fitzgerald does not try to be the second coming of Ken Starr! But if he does – he has to make his case in court.
And we can win there too.
And I also wonder what all the rest of the neighbors said.
AJ
Here is another more in-depth on the last minute questioning. Lots of black dressed FBI colmbing the neighborhood. This canned statement keeps popping up
“But neighbors contacted by the Los Angeles Times said they told the FBI agents that they had no idea of her agency life, and that they knew her only as a mother of twins who worked as an energy consultant. (from same guy quoted in ALL reports)
curious it is the same writers that reported the Wilson had been called on September 29th (no other paper reported on this) and includes the Italian forgery spec. the left clings to.
IF this was Fitz putting the heat on Wilson, they are sending out this one neighbor to push the innocent spin.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-leak26oct26,0,2944833.story?coll=la-home-headlines
I hope the retired CIA guys in the VIPS are being investigated by the Grand Jury and the FBI. They are promoting conspiracy theories about the government. Look at what I just read about them them. I just about fell out of my chair.
No retired CIA guys I know talk like this.
I also don’t know much about the conspiracy theory of this dead writer mentioned below, (and what I have read makes me skeptical)but his death gave the conspiracy a credibility it might not have had otherwise.
“Radical leftist ex-CIA employees are not as rare as one might suppose. Several of them in fact have banded together to form the “Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanityâ€. This was founded by one Ray McGovern, who once worked in the CIA’s Russian desk before the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, and claims his group now contains 35 disgruntled ex-employees who left the Agency. William (“Billâ€) Christison was a member of its “steering committeeâ€, and his wife Kathleen a rank and file member. Another member, David MacMichael, has helped promote the urban myths about the CIA being involved in the drug trade. When Danny Casolaro, a Washington D.C. freelance investigator, was found dead in a hotel room, evidently having committed suicide, MacMichael helped fabricate a “theory†that the CIA or FBI had murdered him, a theory that has naturally been “adopted†by dozens of conspiracist web sites. ”
http://frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=19643
I read that one of the VIPS guys (possibly McGovern) was just at an Able Danger conference organized by Cytnthia McKinney in Washington. Even Ward Churchill came to that.
Something weird is going on here. There is Plame, Able Danger, and Ward Churchill.
Hello. I’ve been following this blog and have really enjoyed your thoughts. If my memory serves me right….I seem to recall back when President Bush first took office, that he was concerned right from the beginning about “leaks” from any and all government agencies and of course, the overall politics of Washington. Right away, the press and dems spun this to mean that this was a “secretive and corrupt” WH, which I felt was BS. It also seems to me that the general public, to the degree that they follow all of this, recognize how negative the press and dems are and in general “trust” President Bush.
Taking this to the next level. As an outsider, I have always had the “gut” feeling that the Democrats and Liberal Media have been staging a massive “conspiracy” campaign against anything and everything that the Bush Administration has done. Again, as an outside observer, I believe that what the Media, the Kennedys, the Reeds, Durbins, Leahys, Levins, Polesis, etc. have done approaches being completely criminal. They obviously have their beliefs, their followers and lobbiest but it seems unbelievable that they all, really believe everything that they have been saying. All we ever hear from the press is “as reported”, undisclossed, reliable source, etc.” and then they start commenting and speculating as if it based on facts. Many of “us”, I believe, see the insincerity of all of these statements and the reporting (as in Bush being re-elected by a larger majority).
To get my “fill” of leftist BS, I force myself to watch Chris Mattews quite often and it has actually been very comical this last few weeks to see how he is coming unglued. Anyone that is on his show, is over-spoken by Matthews, if they are not going down the path that he wants. His opening statements the last couple of weeks already have Rove and Libby guilty, the WH undone and the War over. he is so negative. If many of the GJ results come out as this site speculates, it is hard to imagine Matthews even showing his face, though I’m sure he’ll be in the lead….knocking the results.
If the CIA and it’s past and present employees are trying to undermine the President and his efforts, it seems to me that it should be investigated and prosecuted as one of the biggest conspiracies in the history of this country. How can the country operate, if government employees, are using their positions to undermine the President of the United States? The anti-war faction of this country, if allowed to continue to do everything that they do, could eventually be our downfall. I can’t understand, how anyone, could have felt safe in the World, especially in this country, with Sadam in power, in a large country where we did not really know what they were doing, and knowing that he had had WMD, had used them and was supporting terrorism all over the world. It would have been irresponsible for the POTUS to not confront Sadam under the above circumstances. My own answer to the above question, to a great degree, is because of the Liberal Media and Liberal Democrates.
Thanks again for this excellent, informative site.
jcox31mc
JCOX31MC,
Thanks for the great comments and perspective. And I too have had to put up with more Mathews than I care to this week, just to watch the leftwing echo chamber ramp itself up.
Unfortunately, there is a good chance Fitzgerald will try and indict that ham sandwich, which is not going to be good. In the long run it will work out. I obviously prefer the shorter version.
Thanks again, AJStrata