emptywheel,

The only problem with your theory is that you assume the cover story was after the fact. If you assume that Rove was trying to hide his participation in the smear from the beginning, everything makes sense. He tells Ralston not to log the call as soon as he gets off the phone with Cooper. Then, he sends out the emails (to Levine and Hadley) that make it look innocent.

I think Rove might have gotten away with it (hidden his participation) if it hadn’t been for Libby’s blunders and Novak singing his heart out.

emptywheel,

I’m arguing (and I didn’t make this clear) that Rove needed to let Hadley know that he had talked to Cooper about Wilson and Plame, but he didn’t want to include any incriminating details. Here’s the key point to understanding this whole scenario: How did the FBI find out about the Rove-Libby conversation. It makes absolutely no sense that either man testified to that (since they lied about other stuff). I think that that conversation was recorded in Libby’s notes. If you accept that, then Rove’s actions make a lot more sense. There might have been nothing at all to tie Rove to the leak (except Novak, of course, and remember they all assumed that reporters wouldn’t testify) if Libby hadn’t noted that conversation.

Here’s what I think (all speculation based on the information in the Libby indictment and Waas’s reporting):

Libby has extensive notes in chronological order, but I don’t think he dates everything. Rove had no idea what Libby was putting in those notes. Rove was busy covering his tracks on the Plame leak (but nothing else). Rove assumed that the emails and phone logs would be the only record of his activities (no reporter testimony and no Libby notes).

Rove wanted to create a thin cover story that made it appear that his conversations with reporters were always mostly about other things and the it was the reporters who kept bringing up Plame. If you assume that Rove had his cover story (I heard it from reporters) planned all along, then I think the emails make sense. We see Rove hard at work on the President’s domestic agenda and those pesky reporters keep wanting him to comment on Wilson. And they keep telling him about Plame. The only part that doesn’t quite fit is the story about him telling Ralston not to log the Cooper call. Why scrub the phone log when you’re going to send an email anyway?

emptywheel

Two quick points. July 11 was a Friday – not a Thursday – to July 14’s Monday. So, while I remain somewhat skeptical that Novak’s column really went on the wires on July 11, presumably the story is that Novak’s columns ordinarily go out on the wire on the weeknight previous to their publication, so July 11 for July 14 and July 9 for the July 10 Townsend column.

Second, the other issue with regard to the Rove-Libby encounter is what Rove testified to about that meeting. There has been some vague reporting on this, but since Fitzgerald is convinced that Libby lied about his Russert conversation, if Rove testified that Libby told him that he had heard about Plame from reporters, and specifically from Russert, that would constitute pretty slam-dunk evidence for Fitzgerald of a concerted cover-up and obstruction effort. Check this out from Waas’ most recent:

Rove also testified to the grand jury that he had heard from Libby that Plame worked for the CIA. But Rove testified that Libby told him that he only heard the information as rumors being passed on to him by journalists.

It’s unclear if this refers to the July 10 or 11 conversation. If it does, and it’s accurate, that’s trouble for Rove, barring the possibility that Libby lied to Rove at the time. If it refers to an earlier or later conversation, that would be worth knowing, and still likely a problem for Rove.

Capitol Hill Blue says:

Our sources tell us Fitzgerald still has to [I assume they mean â€twoâ€] connections to make before he can indict Rove but say the special prosecutor is determined to do so.

questions:

1) what do we think about â€Capitol Hill Blue†and their â€sourcesâ€?

2) I wonder what these two connections are

ew – I really don’t know what to make of the Rove-Hadley email, assuming we’ve seen all the relevant parts of it, though my best guess remains that Rove was lying to Hadley because he had gone told Cooper tales out of school. Why send the email at all, then, you ask? Who knows? So that when Cooper comes around indicating that he had a conversation with Rove, and also indicating, separately, that he knows about Plame, it looks like it wasn’t Rove who told him the latter? (But was the whole thing on deep background, or only part of it?)

Again, one thing speaking against after the fact alteration of the email is that if Fitzgerald believed that had happened, there’s just no way Luskin could have done anything to stop him from indicting Rove, is there? Especially by telling some goofy story about VNovak. But of course I know your track record of vindication for seemingly outlandish claims. So I am firmly but cautiously skeptical.

it wont change an atom in the universe, let alone indict rove,

and it’s been said before by others who know a lot more about this than i

but rove’s letter to hadley reads like a concocted missive.

among other things, it reads as if rove is addressing a superior.

hadley is national security. rove is domestic policy, i.e., domestic covert action.

sure they may have a working connection thru the iraq group but that doesn’t mean they would routinely communicate like this.

what Fitzgerald may know that i don’t is

how often does rove e-mail hadley?

perhaps the truth will be revealed to us shortly.

on another matter,

given what is going on with the octopus of the k-street project,

and the likelihood of rove’s involvement there

does anyone know where susan ralston is these days?

at the white house?

at commerce, as was rumored some time back.

has she resigned,

retired,

been appointed ambassador to the Philippines?

All very fascinating. And a delightful surprise… I’d gotten the impression you all were on vacation or something because my firefox rss â€live bookmark†thingy for TNH conked out on the 5th without my noticing. I should really visit the actual page more frequently.

Bonus: Finally my hobby reading (this) begins to overlap the reading I’m supposed to be doing right now–about the FFT (â€Fast Fourier Transformâ€) for my research. And, as a double-super bonus, my lame attempt at a mathFFT/RoveFFT joke: in work with the FFT, it’s important to understand the difference between the real and imaginary parts. Ouch.

obsessed — Re: Capitol Hill Blue

Every diary I’ve ever seen at Kos that is sourced to CHB has been slammed. I don’t recall ever reading a single positive word about them. But you never know.

Capital Hill Blue should never be quoted about anything. They have no sources and zero zippo nada credibility.

I have a soft spot for sites like Capital Hill Blue and Wayne Madsen, sometimes they’ve got pretty intriguing stuff. They are regularly trashed, so I get suspicious (especially when Republicans bash them). I always hope they’ll get some big scoop (BTW I thought CHB had shut down recently, intriguingly).

I vaguely remember reading (either just before or just after the Libby indictment) that Hadley was the point man for the WH’s pushback against Wilson, and that was the reason Rove sent him the email. This might make sense if Hadley (or one of his subordinates) was tracking the contacts with press; it would also explain why Rove mentioned the welfare story (i.e. to explain how the Wilson angle came up). Maybe â€welfare reform†was a code.

That said, I trust Cooper more than Rove on what they talked about, and for that reason the email does sound like it was created after the fact.

As to whether Novak’s column went out on the 11th: the evidence that it was *written* before Tenet’s late Friday afternoon statement on the 11th is in Novak’s column itself:

Reluctance at the White House to admit a mistake has led Democrats ever closer to saying the president lied the country into war. Even after a belated admission of error last Monday, finger-pointing between Bush administration agencies continued. Messages between Washington and the presidential entourage traveling in Africa hashed over the mission to Niger.

â€Last Mondayâ€? That is a reference to Ari’s July 7 press gaggle. But the context screams out for a mention of Tenet’s July 11 statement, as does the rest of the column, much of which took on a certain â€didn’t we just hear that†quality; why, for example, reprise the manner in which Wilson was selected without citing Tenet’s explanation?

This was from the July 7 gaggle:

So this was something that the CIA undertook as part of their regular review of events, where they sent him. But they sent him on their own volition, and the Vice President’s office did not request it. Now, we’ve long acknowledged — and this is old news, we’ve said this repeatedly — that the information on yellow cake did, indeed, turn out to be incorrect.

Well, scroll down a bit for some brutal tap-dancing; maybe Ari retired a week later because his knees gave out.

Anyway – I have no trouble believing that on a weekend in the summertime, Novak filed on Friday and headed off. Does someone else think he was planning to work the phones and file on Sunday night? That said, I bet the wire service is pretty flexible (they are a news outfit, after all) – I presume that if Novak *did* want to file on Sunday, he would be able to.

Anyway, I believe Waas about July 9 – that briefing book story seems like the sort of thing that Rove *would* remember, and have aides to vouch for, and phone records to support (especially if it were true).

Tom – The puzzling thing about the idea that Novak’s column went on the wires on the 11th is, first, it’s never been reported by anyone other than Susan Schmidt at the WaPo; and I don’t see why Libby et al wouldn’t have used this as part of their explanation for what they were doing on the 12th (though maybe they did, after all).

One detail – Novak’s reference to Monday the 7th isn’t precisely to Fleischer’s absolutely amazing press gaggle, where you can just watch the wheels come off, but to the admission of error issued later that evening or even night to a limited number of press outlets.

Also, in light of the Cult of Tom’s continuing insistence that Cheney had nothing to do with Wilson’s trip and refusal to acknowledge that the White House lied at all about OVP’s role in triggering Wilson’s trip, note that you quote Fleischer issuing an entirely characteristic lie (and how much do you want to bet this is one of the things Libby thanked Fleischer for at lunch that day):

So this was something that the CIA undertook as part of their regular review of events, where they sent him.

The trip was, of course, not at all something that the CIA undertook as part of their regular review of events. They specifically cooked up the idea of a trip, and delegated Wilson to do it, as a way of answering a specific question that Cheney had asked. There is, of course, nothing wrong whatsoever with Cheney’s question or his role in triggering the trip. But the White House and OVP insisted on mixing such falsehoods with the truth Fleischer goes on to articulate, that CIA sent Wilson on its own volition, and that Cheney didn’t request the trip.

As to Ari – Tenet hit a similar theme (No VP, all CIA) that Friday

Yes, there was a concerted effort to mislead about the role that OVP did play in triggering Wilson’s trip, presumably in part to make it more plausible that OVP never got wind of the results of Wilson’s trip – a question to which, shockingly enough, we still do not know the answer. But the least that can be said is that Tenet was just deeply misleading. (That July 11 statement will go down in history as a masterpiece of rhetoric.) Fleischer, among others, outright lied.

Robert Novak was on Fox & Friends this morning, and was asked about the Plame case, specifically the claim by Libby’s lawyers that Plame’s identity was well-known around town. Novak said that his lawyers were advising him to say nothing about the case so that he’d â€stay out of trouble.†But he did say that the â€traitor†Ames, not himself, outed Plame, and he complained about how long the case had been dragging on. When asked about what Libby’s lawyers were saying about Plame’s identity, Novak quickly said, â€I have no idea about that.â€

There was really nothing newsworthy about his appearance. I do wonder, though, if Fitz has doubts about Novak’s testimony.

I have no predictions about Rove’s future. The very fact that David Shuster so blatently suggested last night that he thought Rove would be indicted makes me think that Rove’s off the hook.

Jim E

Novak is at risk for two reason. First, yes, Fitz has doubts about his testimony (for example, I suspect Fitz has doubts about the FFT story; if that’s what Novak has been telling and Fitz can prove it’s a lie, Novak will go to jail along with the rest of them).

Also, Novak wants to avoid being put in Judy’s position. Novak most likely testified as he had to stay out of trouble, but in such a way as to not be too helpful to Fitz. But if Libby (or Rove, more likely) finds out about it, he can use it the way he did against Judy, to undercut his credibility. And while Novak might not mind if that got Rove off, he does care mightily about his reputation.

Judy Miller found her notebooks! Developing….

Seriously, TalkLeft has Judy Miller’s reply to Libby on the her motion to quash the subpoena.

TalkLeft now has the legal filings of all of the reporters seeking to â€quash†Scooter’s subpoenas.

Can someone ask Jeralyn if she can post the original motion to quash from NBC/Mitchell, which was initially filed in paper form and so not electronically? She had gotten the NYT, Miller’s and Time’s, but I’ve never seen NBC/Mitchell’s.