Times reporter tried to cut earlier CIA leak deal

By Adam Entous 1 hour, 41 minutes ago

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - New York Times reporter Judith Miller tried a year ago to make a deal with the prosecutor investigating the leak of a
CIA operative's identity but the prosecutor would not agree then to limit her testimony to Vice President
Dick Cheney's top aide, her lawyer said on Sunday.

Some lawyers involved in the case said prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's decision to reject the deal a year ago -- only to agree last week to limit the scope of Miller's testimony to the subject of Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby -- suggested Libby may have become increasingly important to wrapping up Fitzgerald's case.

After spending 85 days in jail for refusing to name Libby as her source, Miller testified before the grand jury on Friday about two conversations she had with him in July 2003.

Lawyers said her testimony should clear the way for Fitzgerald later this month to conclude his 2-year-old inquiry into who leaked CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity and whether anyone broke the law in doing so, lawyers say.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051002/ts_nm/bush_leak_dc

if she was willing to deal, she wasn't principled.

what bullshit is that ? no really, what bullshit is that ? since when does anyone on the stand get to CHOOSE what they will testify about ?

they wanted to ask on any topic. I didn't realize that the GJ could be limited in this way. I must have been wrong...

it ain't necessarily true.

the so-called limitation might be for two audiences - libby-cheney AND her whore-bosses at the NYT.

i am more and more pissed at the NYT. They no longer break stories; they stomp on them and keep them out of print. What the hell has happened to a formerly great paper?

limited to certain areas. Cooper, Russert for example. Pincus testified without revealing his source (but he knew that Fitz already knew who the source was and had taken his testimony regarding their conversation).

So it's not at all implausible that the scope of inquiry/testimony for Miller was limited by agreement with Fitzgerald.

also limit the questions the grand jurors could ask?

Matt Cooper said the jurors also questioned him - I believe they handed their questions to the prosecutor though.

And just had to tie up loose ends on Scooter.

I don't think the Queen Of All Iraq got away with as much as she might think she did.

Call it a hunch.

-as

:woohoo:

Newsweek says Miller caved because Fitz threatened to impanel a new grand jury which would've kept her in jail a lot longer. There's a post on http://www.dailykos.com on this.

with a witness as to which questions could be asked, I believe he would inform the grand jury that the witness did not have to answer certain questions.

testimony to specific areas. They only get the deal if Fitz agrees to it.

I suppose.

I mean there is no journalistic integrity there at all.

and her WMD bullshit.

stand on principle. :rofl:

The article says that Tate (Libby's lawyer) told Abrams (Miller's lawyer) a year ago that it was okay for Miller to testify although Libby's waiver had been "coerced" and that, as a result, Miller wouldn't (or couldn't) testify under canons of journalistic ethics.

Now, Miller is claiming that Fitz wouldn't agree to limit his interrogation of Miller to her contacts with Libby but, instead, Fitz intended to ask her about contacts with other sources who, presumably, had not given her waivers. This too strikes me as hokum. Reconcile this with Judge Hogan's opinion -- which states that Fitz knew who Miller's source was (i.e., Libby) and that that source had given Miller a waiver. Hogan said that under the circumstances Miller's refusal to testify was irrational. If Fitz was trying to get Miller to talk about her contacts with other sources, surely Hogan would have mentioned this in his opinion. I think this is bunk. All Fitz ever cared about were Miller's contacts with Libby. Miller just didn't want to talk. Period.

The only reason she's talking now is that she's sick of jail and was threatened with even more time.

Libby. She supposedly wanted to avoid testifying about her involvement leading up to the Iraq war.

:shrug:

While she didn't participate in the Plame game, she was a bullhorn for the WMD bullshit.

Hmmm.

I wish I had bookmarked the article some months
back that pointed that out.
Given what happens to people who get in the way
of these monsters, I would bet that she is in fear for her
life and that of her family and loved ones.
HOW did we get to this point in history people?
BHN

covering up the Bush Cartel plot to plant WMDs in Iraq for Judith Miller to "find." (--a good guess at what it was that David Kelly knew--that Tony Blair was warned of, on July 7,2003 (Hutton report)--and that got Kelly killed three days after Plame was outed, and four days before Brewster Jennings was also outed, subsequent to the search of Kelly's office and computers).

That's what Miller doesn't want to testify about--their scheme to turn the Iraq nuke allegation into a "reality," and the foiling of that plan.

Why involve Bush, Cheney, Libby, Rove, Powell, Rice, Bolton and god knows who else--the whole gang, the entire regime--just to punish Joseph Wilson? Why contact at least SIX reporters in the space of a week, and circulate the Plame memo on AF-1, putting all the top Bushites at risk of treason charges, in a seeming panic to get her outed? Something more an stake here than a dissenting article.

she was dancing partners with Bushco and their killing spree in Iraq. Why wouldn't she understand what they are capable of?

Puh-lease.

eom

In the military don't they call this "chaff"?

Either that or she's freaking nuts.

Miller Attorney Says He Tried to Cut a Deal a Year Ago

By Adam Entous, Reuters

Published: October 02, 2005 10:00 PM ET

WASHINGTON New York Times reporter Judith Miller tried a year ago to make a deal with the prosecutor investigating the leak of a CIA operative's identity but the prosecutor would not agree then to limit her testimony to Vice President Dick Cheney's top aide, her lawyer said on Sunday.

Some lawyers involved in the case said prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's decision to reject the deal a year ago -- only to agree last week to limit the scope of Miller's testimony to the subject of Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby -- suggested Libby may have become increasingly important to wrapping up Fitzgerald's case.

snip

Floyd Abrams, one of Miller's lawyers, told CNN: "I tried to get a deal a year ago."

But Abrams said that when he spoke to Fitzgerald about it at the time, he would not agree to limit his questions "to assure that the only source he would effectively be asking about was Mr. Libby."

Fitzgerald's spokesman was not immediately available to comment on Abrams' account of the offer.

more
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001220211




More spin and intrigue.

Of course, the prosecutor can offer the best deal up front on a hard-nosed take-it-or-leave-it, in this case go-to-jail manner. Or he can wait patiently to see what else he can tease out of the witness. I think here he just wanted closure. Get her out of jail to testify and end the GJ's term.
There is still a lot more to this story--but we'll have to wait and see how long it takes to get it.

She was really waiting for a deal from Fitz. She only told people that she was going to jail to avoid devulging her source when really she went to jail to try to get a deal from Fitzgerald. Looks like she got it, too.

...and didn't need as much from Miller as he thought he might a year ago. (OK, call me Pollyanna, but I insist on hoping for the best until the story comes out. )

to why Miller wouldn't testify.

What IS she hiding? Cannot help it, I think Miller is a really dark, shady character. Something along the lines of a double-agent. So who does she Really work for? And why does the NYT support her while apologizing for her WMD stories?

This whole episode is very, very strange. We might find out that our "Liberal Media" is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Shadow Government.

Translation: "Judy Miller is the bestest person in the world."

With her two lawyers contradicting each other no wonder!

She first claims that she went to jail because Libby didn't give her an explicit waiver.
- his lawyer says he did
Then she testifies. Sources close to the Fitzgerald investigation (Fitzgerald himself?) say that her testimony was not isolated to Libby.
- now her lawyer is saying that it was isolated, and that this testimony was for all practical purposes the same testimony that she offered to give a year ago.

Her lawyer is throwing out all kinds of crap that is easy to verify as false. Is it possible that he's being kept in the dark?

This whole episode seems very weird to me. But I know that just because it seems weird to me, that DOESN'T mean that the 'players' don't know what they are doing.

Once again, the corporate-military-industrial-complex-media is leaving US and the U.S. out of the loop.

Let's assume that Judy is part of a bigger espionage and disinformation operation run on behalf of a foreign government. Her job as a NYT reporter gave her great cover and some legal protection from having to testify.

If the above assumption is correct, U.S. intelligence and the FBI have likely known about it for a long time, but to prosecute her would require that they reveal what they know about other bigger fish in Judy's network. They're not ready to go after her handlers and the agency insiders yet.

The deal here in the Plame case, limiting her testimony, protects both sides.

This explanation makes sense to me. What do you think?

others in a round table the Sunday talk shows and a lady (can't remember her name) made the statement that the average Joe doesn't know who some of these people are in the government so one story might not make them stop and think, but if you add together the Delay indictment, the trouble that Frist is having and then the Plame all of these together can grab some attention. Also, David Brooks started out with the thing with Delay was no biggie, but the others in the group disagreed and then Brooks ended up saying something like Delay is a thug. I was speechless when I heard that!

Seriously. This is all you need to know about Plamegate.

1) Bob Novak took a call from someone inside the White House who tipped him off as to Valerie Plame's identity as a CIA agent.

2) Bob Novak's personal assistant is Kathleen Connolly. Kathleen takes all of Bob's calls.

3) Kathleen Connolly is Patrick Buchanan's sister.

4) Patrick Buchanan KNOWS that the culprit is Scooter Libby.

(See July 18, 2005 post on this page for a transcript of Buchanan's "question": http://www.struat.com/election/2005_07.html )