October 17, 2005

Cheney Target

Bloomberg has a lengthy article on the possibility Vice President Dick Cheney is the target of the Valarie Plame investigation. Maybe this is why Lynne Cheney told Time her husband won't be running for President in 2008.

What we see more sure of is Lewis "Scooter" Libby's indictment. He wrote a letter to NY Times reporter Judith Miller that could be construed at trying to guide her grand jury testimony:

Miller, 57, said she went to jail rather than testify because, unlike other reporters, she didn't feel Libby had given her specific and voluntary permission to speak about their confidential conversations. She relented when Libby contacted her by telephone and letter last month, saying he had always expected her to testify.

Those communications with Miller may pose legal problems for Libby. His letter to her stated that ``the public report of every other reporter's testimony makes clear that they did not discuss Ms. Plame's name or identity with me.''

Miller wrote in her Times article that Fitzgerald asked her to read that portion of the letter aloud to the grand jurors and asked for her reaction to Libby's words. She said that part of the letter had ``surprised me because it might be perceived as an effort by Mr. Libby to suggest that I, too, would say we had not discussed Ms. Plame's identity. Yet my notes suggested that we had discussed her job.''

The Plame story began when Bob Novak mentioned the CIA operative in a column. The special prosecutor has been busy trying to get some reporters to testify while Novak has flown below the radar. He's been pretty quiet. If Libby or even Karl Rove ends up being indicted will that unlock Novak? He's the one I'm most interested in hearing.

A new interesting angle is Joe Wilson considering suing the White House after Patrick Fitzgerald finishes his work:

In an interview yesterday, Wilson said that once the criminal questions are settled, he and his wife may file a civil lawsuit against Bush, Cheney and others seeking damages for the alleged harm done to Plame's career.

If they do so, the current state of the law makes it likely that the suit will be allowed to proceed -- and Bush and Cheney will face questioning under oath -- while they are in office. The reason for that is a unanimous 1997 U.S. Supreme Court decision ruling that Paula Jones' sexual harassment suit against then-President Bill Clinton could go forward immediately, a decision that was hailed by conservatives at the time.

"Cheney May Be Entangled in CIA Leak Investigation, People Say" [via Balloon Juice]