1. Anonymous says:

    Wow. Ew, along with eRiposte and pollyusa, really is linking this stuff together. I bow down to you all.

    (Meanwhile, in another orbit, TM is hosting an open thread wondering how much Joe Wilson hates Jews. Nice.)

  2. Anonymous says:

    how DO you keep all this stuff in your head?

    have you had some sort of computer transplant the rest of us haven’t heard about?

  3. Anonymous says:

    Orion,

    I don’t keep it in my head. It’s all here in the blog. Once I figured out how to google my own posts, my Plame IQ went up 10 points.

  4. Anonymous says:

    emptywheel,

    I asked eRiposte about this (in a comment to one of his recent posts) and he replied that he believes that the document in question is the DIA version of the earlier NCIS report about the mysterious West African Businessman who seemed to know all about the bogus Niger story and claimed the uranium was in Benin. This would be about par for the course since the original report was obviously bogus and had been completely debunked.

  6. Anonymous says:

    Yesterday, TPM posted a transcript of a recent gaggle with McClellan. There’s apparently a rumor that Scooter Libby was spotted eating lunch in the White House mess on March 30. If true, is there anything potentially significant about this? I thought Bush had banned his staff from communicating with Scooter.

  7. Anonymous says:

    Yesterday on the News Hour David Brooks repeated the GOP talking point that the Plame mess isn’t getting any traction around the country. I think that, and the headlines and news stories focusing on the â€leak†authorized by Bush and whether it was classified info or not miss the real point here.

    The point is that the Administration took advantage of its superior access to information to selectively release intelligence info that supported thier case for war, specifically the Niger uranium and the aluminum tubes, while actively supressing (then and still) all information and opinion from the intel services that disputed their position. They did this to create the impression that the information supporting the WMD stories was much stronger than it in fact was. They did it to preemptively disarm their critics and to stampede the country into war, with the willing assistance of a cheerleading media.

    Karl Rove well knew that if the bogus basis for the war was exposed, and the coverup of the bogusity of that basis was exposed, then Bush would lose the election pure and simple, because selectively misleading the American people to support a war that was far from necessary would be viewed by at least 60-70% of the people as a serious enough matter to deny him the presidency.

    The crime here is not the leaking of information, classified or not. It is the undermining of democracy by denying the people critical information they needed first to evaluate the basis of the war and second to evaluate Bush’s fitness for the presidency.

    Bush lied, thousands died, and he doesn’t deserve to be President. It really is that simple.

  8. Anonymous says:

    mimikatz:

    â€the crime is not leaking the information….It is the undermining of democracy…â€

    well-said.

    that’s precisely the key issue

    and not only on this matter either.

  9. Anonymous says:

    I love the minutiae as much as the next person, but we have really got to keep the narrative fixed on the big picture here. Murray Waas and Greg Sargent are right–the full story hasn’t been told, because they don’t dare. Someone has to ferret it out, though.

  10. Anonymous says:

    EW,

    I posted a comment on the Jan 24 report in an earlier thread here. I think it is the DIA report that was released on that day focusing on the uranium claim. SSCI p. 64.

  11. Anonymous says:

    eR

    Saw that (and noted your take on it in the DKos version of this).

    I’m unsure at this point whether you’re right or me. Yours definitely has the day correct, whereas mine is just a ballpark, definitely. But we’re talking about something that other people were declassifying, not Libby. And there is abundant evidence that Condi and Ari were working on SOTU, whereas there is none that anyone was interested in that DIA report.

  12. Anonymous says:

    Check out the new Washington Post article up. The key judgement point raised by eRiposte and elaborated on by EW is front and center.
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/…..16_pf.html

    â€At Cheney’s instruction, Libby testified, he told Miller that the uranium story was a â€key judgment†of the intelligence estimate, a term of art indicating there was consensus on a question of central importance.

    In fact, the alleged effort to buy uranium was not among the estimate’s key judgments, which were identified by a headline and bold type and set out in bullet form in the first five pages of the 96-page document.

    Unknown to the reporters, the uranium claim lay deeper inside the estimate, where it said a fresh supply of uranium ore would â€shorten the time Baghdad needs to produce nuclear weapons.†But it also said U.S. intelligence did not know the status of Iraq’s procurement efforts, â€cannot confirm†any success and had â€inconclusive†evidence about Iraq’s domestic uranium operations.â€

    Fitz has everything and with each filing to the court, he provides the public with a little more. If Libby keeps it up with his motions, we’ll have a full picture of all the lies and manipulations used take us to war by the November elections.

  13. Anonymous says:

    Mimikatz: this ’big picture’; you speak of – how do we express it? Is it that Bushie knowingly used a forgery to start a war?

  14. Anonymous says:

    TM is hosting an open thread wondering how much Joe Wilson hates Jews.

    Actually, I am following up on an earlier post wondering whether Libby might have thought so.

    Oh well – I normally speak quite highly of Jim E. Maybe he is upset that Kleiman smacked Wilson for gay-baiting.

  15. Anonymous says:

    TM,

    Fuck you. At your blog, as you know, I specifically wrote: â€I have no problem bashing anti-gay bigots like Wilson.â€

  16. Anonymous says:

    I’d like to concentrate on the word â€vigorous†as in â€Iraq’s vigorous attempts to acquire uranium from Niger.â€

    According to Fitz, Libby says he was authorized (by Bush, via Cheney) to use the word â€vigorous†in his initial discussion with Miller on July 8 — but Miller’s notes do not reflect that.

    However, Woodward has just released a statement saying that the â€vigorous†phrase does appear in his notes of his conversation of June 27th with Libby.

    Now, the White House is disclaiming that it gave specific authorization to Libby to leak NIE information to Miller.

    But Murray Waas has pointed out that Bush gave specific permission to various White House officials to leak to Woodward for his forthcoming book — and, I would posit, that would include Bush talking about Iraq’s â€vigorous†efforts to obtain yellowcake.

    Conclusion — Cheney goes to Bush and says, â€we need to get this story out now….we can’t wait until Woodward publishes his book.†Bush says — â€well, just have Libby tell reporters the same thing he told Woodward.â€

    White House now denies that it authorized the disclosure of any specific NIE based information upon Cheney’s request via Libby to Miller — but by authorizing the disclosure of the same info authorized for Woodward, its amounts to the same thing.

    Woodward, figured this out, which is why he broke his silence….

  17. Anonymous says:

    I have an alternate theory (as usual) about this mystery document. In Woodward’s â€Plan of Attack†(p. 288 – 291), there is an interesting story about Libby, the NIE, the OSP and a presentation that Libby presented on Saturday, January 25, 2003. According to Woodward, the CIA sent over a 40 page document of WMD evidence against Iraq. From this document, Hadley and Libby prepared a series of questions that they presented to the CIA in person. The CIA answered back in writing. Based on those answers, the document from the 22nd, and the October NIE, Libby created his presentation, â€a thick sheaf of paperâ€. According to Woodward, Armitage described the presentation as â€overreaching and hyperboleâ€. I’m betting that Libby and Hadley wanted to declassify either the CIA answers to their questions or Libby’s presentation itself.