Josh Marshall (The Hill): It's clear the leakers knew what they were doing

Strip away all the stress and fury on both sides of the aisle this week and you’ll find one key question at the heart of both the legal and political storm surrounding the president’s top political adviser.

That is, did Karl Rove and other top administration officials, for whatever reason, knowingly reveal the identity of a covert CIA agent or were they unaware of her covert status? As prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald would no doubt tell us if he were at liberty to speak, divining, let alone proving, knowledge and intent in such a case is a very tricky business. But there’s a good bit of circumstantial evidence pointing to the conclusion that Rove and others knew exactly what they were doing.

Allow me to explain.

The best evidence for the “they knew” version of events has always been the column that started it all — Robert Novak’s July 14 column in which he named Valerie Plame as “an agency operative on weapons of mass destruction.”

In intelligence jargon, “operative” has a very specific meaning. It means a covert or clandestine officer. Novak’s been a journalist for 50 years. So clearly he used that term because he knew Plame was covert. And if he knew, the logical assumption is that he knew because his sources — “two senior administration officials” — told him.

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http://thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/Comment/JoshMarshall/071405.html

That's what I think as well. Very conscious and intelligent on their parts


We know there were 6 calls because 6 contacts were made (Miller, Cooper, Novak among them). We know 3 contacts confirmed their stories with another "high administration official."

Therefore

1.) 1 man (named Rove by Cooper) made all 6 calls (which reduces the contention of "unknowingly" providing Plame's identity laughable). But he would have had to make sure that there were a few other "high administration officials" ready and willing to confirm his story, which strongly suggests coordination. Did Rove mastermind this portion before "unknowingly" releasing Plame's identity 6 times? Was this coordination "unknowing" as well? What does "knowing" mean? Repeated deliberate acts and coordinating with others for future support suggest a strong and clear intentions. It has knowledgeable design written all over it.

or,

2.) more than 1 person (Rove and at least one other) made the 6 calls. (The fact that one source released Cooper from his agreement of confidentiality but one source did not release Miller suggest at least 2 sources.) Rove would have more to coordinate! To establish guidelines like: No source should call another's contact, Pitch the information off hand, not as the main subject, Make the contact think the source is trying to do him or her a favor ("Don't go too far out on this Wilson thing, I don't want you burnt."), etc. AND Rove would have had to field a group of officials to support the sources stories.

I say Rove coordinated because it is obvious he did so since anyone in the administration in possession of the Plame-Wilson-CIA link would have gone straight to the world master of deceitful politics, and now we know Rove was at least one of the leakers.


So, in the first case we have at least 2 indictments for Rove (exposing and conspiring to expose) and (perhaps) 1 or more indictments for others (confirming and condoning the exposure while furthering it).

But in the second case we have at least 2 for Rove (same as above, but more evidence of conspiracy) and 1 or more clearcut indictments for others (both leakers and confirmers for exposure).

And then we haven't even begun to ask the question of how Rove got the information. (Doesn't leaking the information to him also constitute a crime?) Did Plame give information to officials as one report suggested? Why did Ashbery recluse himself? Did Rove have the proper clearance prior to becoming Deputy Chief of Staff to have seen the material? Or were other federal laws broken to the effect that classified information was used for political purposes? Etc.

I think the great thing we have going for us on this case is Patrick Fitzgerald. By all accounts a fine prosecutor.

prosecuting organized crime in Chicago. Good practice for taking on BushCo.