MSNBC Analyst Says Cooper Documents Reveal Karl Rove As Source In Plame Case

[Gold9472]

MSNBC Analyst Says Cooper Documents Reveal Karl Rove as Source in Plame Case

http://www.mediainfo.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000972839

Published: July 01, 2005 11:30 PM ET

NEW YORK Now that Time Inc. has turned over documents to federal court, presumably revealing who its reporter, Matt Cooper, identified as his source in the Valerie Plame/CIA case, speculation runs rampant on the name of that source, and what might happen to him or her. Tonight, on the syndicated McLaughlin Group political talk show, Lawrence O'Donnell, senior MSNBC political analyst, claimed to know that name--and it is, according to him, top White House mastermind Karl Rove.

Here is the transcript of O'Donnell's remarks:

"What we're going to go to now in the next stage, when Matt Cooper's e-mails, within Time Magazine, are handed over to the grand jury, the ultimate revelation, probably within the week of who his source is.

"And I know I'm going to get pulled into the grand jury for saying this but the source of...for Matt Cooper was Karl Rove, and that will be revealed in this document dump that Time magazine's going to do with the grand jury."

Other panelists then joined in discussing whether, if true, this would suggest a perjury rap for Rove, if he told the grand jury he did not leak to Cooper.

[Gold9472]

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/3130139/

A 1982 law makes it illegal for any person with “authorized access to classified information that identifies a covert agent” to intentionally disclose any information identifying that agent to anyone who is not authorized to get such information.

The law seems to set a high bar for conviction — it requires that person leaking the identity of the agent must know that “the United States is taking affirmative measures to conceal such agent’s intelligence relationship to the United States.”

[Gold9472]

I want to see them get out of this one...

[erose001]

I keep meaning to post my info, but suddenly got very busy with a couple of deadlines. It's still coming.

Couldn't resist this latest development, though, had to drop in. Seems legit, being posted at E&P, which is, of course, watching this whole Plame business play out inning by inning. Well, actually the whole naval-gazing media is, and that is the irony to me. The neo-cons (the "love to label people to divide them up" group) call the media "liberal," and yet these journalists were "protecting" neo-con scum. This proves what we already knew, it's become virtually state-run media.

Nor is the Rove connection any surprise. Although you'd think he'd know better since Bush 41 signed off on the law that made it treason to reveal the identity of an undercover intelligence operative.

I must admit to being happy to finally seeing some cracks in the Neo-con/Media Wall of Silence and Secrecy. Couldn't help but have John Mellencamp's song go through my head:

Saw my picture in the paper
Read the news around my face
And now some peopkle
Don't want to treat me the same

When the walls come tumblin' down
When the walls come crumblin' crumblin'
When the walls come tumblin' tumblin' down

Now, if only they could really pin this on him. Add in the Downing Street documents, and the growing discord between the actual conservatives in DC and the neo-cons, and we might FINALLY get the Watergate we've been waiting for for four+ years. Which would, of course, open the door to allow people to see the truth behind 9/11.

a giggling,
elizabeth

P.S. In case you didn't catch it, Democracy Now did a good interview yesterday with former member of Congress Liz Holtzman, who was among those on the committee to get the Nixon impeachment ball rolling (prompting his resignation). She has an article coming out in The Nation, July 18th issue, "Torture and Accountability." (http://www.thenation.com/docprint.mhtml?i=20050718&s=holtzman)

She is the first person I've heard speak in the media (other than a brief and quickly buried mention of KUBARK in the NY Times) about the history of systemic torture and rendition in this country. It was so refreshing to finally hear someone willing to put some history on the issue. Even the independent media only focus on the current torture, but you can't understand just how deep the torture system runs unless you understand the history. (Kinda like how everyone wants to forget about NORTHWOODS and is blinded by denial from seeing its connection to 9/11.)

It's like AI. So many of us have been complaining to them for years about the School of the Americas, MK-ULTRA, etc., etc. but they couldn't bring themselves to include America, paragon of human rights, on their list of countries that torture until this year. Except that the U.S. is one of the few countries that hasn't ratified virtually every human rights treaty ever written. For example, it took William Proxmire lambasting the Senate every single day for some 15-odd years before we signed the treaty against genocide. Imagine how many days that is, going down to the floor while the Senate is in session and speaking about genocide for all those years, and still we didn't sign. (And we still tend to look the other way, considering what is happening in Darfur.) Trafficking in children has been denounced and a treaty has been signed by every major nation except the U.S. and SOMALIA. Get that. Thailand and India, for example, who only recently stopped looking the other way when children were being sold into slavery, signed the treaty - but the U.S. hasn't. Pakistan, which is among the countries that only slaps honor killers on the wrist and considers rape a crime of adultery - by the woman, no less - signed the treaty. But not the U.S. AI gets on us about the death penalty, but it's about damn time they started looking at our track record on human rights in general. Stop with the blind eye to the black-budgeted CIA operations directorate with it's illegal comingled funding. (Which should, IMO, be shut down immediately.)

Add all this issue to the huge laundry list of crimes by this administration, and a real democracy would have had these people (if you can even call them that) in jail four years ago from the time Cheney convened that secret energy meeting right before Enron tanked.

Anyway, sorry for the rant. (And in a postscript!) The Holtzman interview it was pretty cool. The article is linked above. The transcript of the interview is here:

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/06/30/1333214

If you're not already familiar with DN, you might want to investigate. It's the only news I watch anymore. (I get Free Speech TV on my DISH, which shows DN several times a day. And has lots of other good programming too.) I do still read the papers, and sort out the garbage there, but I never watch any of the "Dirty Laundry" on the corporate media anymore thanks to being able to trust DN. (For example, DN was one of the first outlets to report about the human remains of 9/11 that were being stored at Fishkills. And still are, last I heard. They also devoted a show to an interview with David Ray Griffin about a year ago.) If I watch any other news, it's either INN or Mosaic. But most of what I hear there, I've already heard on DN! Okay plug over.

Happy fourth. I'll be pulling my copy of the Declaration out to read at family dinner again, and substituting the one George for the other. Maybe the combined efforts of so many of us combining our brainpower and our willpower will allow us to finally roust these criminals out of DC. (And they can take the freakin' corporate lobbyists with them too.)

[Gold9472]

I've watched Democracy Now... but I never know when they're on, etc... they do really good interviews with people from what I can tell.

[Gold9472]

Reporters Ask Judge for Home Detention
Journalists in Contempt for Not Discussing Sources Also Specify Prisons

By Carol D. Leonnig
Saturday, July 2, 2005; A02

Lawyers for Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper yesterday urged a federal judge not to jail him for refusing to discuss his confidential sources with a prosecutor, arguing in a court filing that there is no need for his testimony now that his employer has turned over his notes, which identify the sources.

Attorneys for New York Times reporter Judith Miller, who, like Cooper, faces four months in jail for defying Chief U.S. District Judge Thomas F. Hogan's order to cooperate with a special prosecutor's investigation, also urged Hogan yesterday not to jail her. In papers filed yesterday, her lawyers said that because she intends to go to jail rather than disclose the name of her source, incarceration would be "merely punitive" and would not cause her to obey the court.

Both reporters said in the documents that if Hogan insists on incarceration, they will propose being detained under restrictive conditions at home. They said the cost of electronic bracelets and other monitoring equipment would be borne by private entities, not taxpayers, and that they would give up much of their contact with the outside world

If jailed, however, Cooper suggested he should be sent to a federal prison camp in Cumberland, in close proximity to Washington, where he lives with his wife, Mandy Grunwald, and their 6-year-old son. Miller proposed a federal women's prison camp in Danbury, Conn., which her lawyers described as "safe" and "near to Ms. Miller's 76-year-old husband," retired book publisher Jason Epstein, in New York City.

Most people found in contempt by a federal court in the District serve their time in the D.C. jail.

Hogan held Miller, Cooper and Time in contempt of court in October for refusing to identify their sources to special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald, who is investigating whether senior administration officials knowingly identified covert CIA operative Valerie Plame to the media.

Plame's name first appeared in a July 2003 syndicated column by Robert D. Novak, shortly after Plame's husband, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, published an opinion piece in the Times that accused the Bush administration of twisting intelligence to justify going to war with Iraq.

Fitzgerald wants to talk to Miller and Cooper about conversations they had with specific government officials. A spokesman for Fitzgerald declined to comment yesterday on the filings or the reporters' detention proposals. Fitzgerald has until Tuesday to reply to Hogan.

Over Cooper's objections, Time yesterday turned over notes and e-mails of Cooper's that were stored in a computer. The magazine, which faces a $1,000-a-day fine that had reached $270,000, said it hoped that by complying it would keep Cooper out of jail.

Time editor-in-chief Norman Pearlstine said Thursday that after the Supreme Court refused on Monday to hear the reporters' appeals of the case, he believed that the magazine had to obey Hogan's order.

In the court papers, the two reporters laid out their final arguments as they prepare for a hearing Wednesday at which Hogan could order them incarcerated.

"Mr. Cooper submits that his testimony would be duplicative and unnecessary, and he respectfully requests the court to inquire of the Special Counsel whether the grand jury still needs Mr. Cooper's testimony," Cooper's attorneys wrote.

In arguing for home confinement, Miller's attorneys said in the filings that Miller would suffer from giving up such tools as her cell phone and Internet access, because "impairing her unrestricted ability to do her job as an investigative journalist . . . would present the strictest form of coercion to her."

They said Miller is not in ill health but contended that home detention is more "suitable" for a 54-year-old woman.

[Gold9472]

In February 2005, Bush said: "Karl Rove is a long-time advisor and trusted member of my team. His hard work and dedication have been invaluable. I appreciate Karl's willingness to continue to serve my Administration in this new position."

[Gold9472]

In the meeting that took place after his first inauguration, the one that Paul O'Neill talked about... the transcript reveals Karl was an intricate part of that meeting as well...

“Karl Rove is saying to the president, a kind of mantra. ‘Stick to principle. Stick to principle.’ He says it over and over again,” says Suskind. “Don’t waver.”

[Gold9472]

The President's "right-hand man" was willing to release the identity of Valerie Plame. Some say that resulted in the deaths of over 70 CIA Operatives overseas... If the President's "right-hand man" is willing to do something as treasonous as that, the idea that the Bush Administration was behind 9/11 doesn't seem so far-fetched.

[beltman713]

Right!

[Gold9472]

Person of the Week: Karl Rove
The strategist behind Tuesday's GOP victory is also the man with the President's ear

http://www.time.com/time/pow/article/0,8599,388523,00.html

By JESSICA REAVES
Posted Thursday, Nov. 07, 2002

George W. Bush doesn't like to travel, and, by all accounts, he doesn't particularly like giving campaign speeches. But he did both until his throat was raw and his nerves frayed in the weeks leading up to Tuesday's elections. He did it because Karl Rove told him it was a good idea. And Tuesday night, voters across the country told the President that Rove was right.

Rove, the President's most trusted political strategist and arguably one of the shrewdest man in Washington, won't publicly acknowledge the outcome of the midterms as any kind of personal affirmation. He'll attribute the Republican gains in the House and Senate to the intelligence of the voters or the general mood of the country. Or, more likely, he'll point to the President's appeal — Rove has no time for basking in past successes. This self-described "very competitive guy" is already moving on to the next big thing (which in this case may be the debate over war with Iraq).

For months before the midterm elections, the White House worried about the outcome of certain key races, calculating the chances that Republicans would maintain control of the House of Representatives (pretty good) and take back the Senate (not so good.) Rove, who has been called a "control freak" by more than one colleague, decided the White House would do very little good standing around worrying about the close races, but could do a great deal of good by actually getting involved — even if it meant tying the President's reputation to the races he was supporting.

And so the President's whirlwind stump schedule was born. Senate races in New Hampshire, Georgia, South Dakota and Minnesota were shaping up to be nail-biters, and so Bush was dispatched to fundraisers, get-out-the-vote events and rallies, touting the experience and political wisdom of John Sununu, Saxby Chambliss and Norm Coleman. The President also spent time in Florida, speaking on behalf of his brother Jeb, whose incumbency to the governor's mansion was under siege. Every one of those campaigns took home a victory Tuesday night. And while it's hard to measure precisely the influence the President had on voters, it's downright impossible to discount that influence completely.

That kind of success is pretty much par for the course for Rove since he joined the Bush campaign in 2000. Rove is considered by both Democrats and Republicans to have one of the country's sharpest and most instinctive political minds. He has made plenty of enemies along his road to success; some say his personality, which is jovial at times, can turn nasty when he (or his candidate) is in trouble. Others say he'll do just about anything to win.

Rove, 48, never graduated from college, leaving the University of Utah in 1971 to become executive director of the College Republicans. He began working for the former President Bush during a stint at the Republican National Committee in 1973, then moved to Texas to join the elder Bush's political action committee. He stayed in Austin for years, divorced his first wife and remarried, working as a consultant and running a mail order business until 1999, when George W. Bush persuaded Rove to come work on his campaign. Two years later, Rove was ensconced in the White House, launching his current career as presidential travel agent.

[Gold9472]

I want to see them try to play Karl off as someone other than the President's "right-hand man"... "Karl? Karl who?"

[Good Doctor HST]

If this is true, Karl Rove will be out of the limelight faster than M.C. Hammer's career. But he'll still push W's buttons from behind the curtain.

[Gold9472]

If this is true, Karl Rove will be out of the limelight faster than M.C. Hammer's career. But he'll still push W's buttons from behind the curtain.

It's not about being "out of the limelight"... it's about committing Treason, which is punishable by death. This isn't something they can push under the carpet... I hope not...

[Gold9472]

I would be ALL FOR the Death Penalty in regards to Karl Rove. I have NO qualms about that.

[Gold9472]

Let the fucker burn for what he's done.

[Gold9472]

Hey Karl... guess what... I'm not concerned about your well-being, and I don't think you need to seek therapy... I think you should hang for what you've done...

See? I can be just as blood-thirsty as any Republican... I just want to make sure the RIGHT people bleed.

[somebigguy]

Another nail in the coffin. If the lilly livered Liberals can't do anything with all the ammo they now have after the last month, were in big trouble.

[Gold9472]

Another nail in the coffin. If the lilly livered Liberals can't do anything with all the ammo they now have after the last month, were in big trouble.

Seriously... with everything they now have... if they get nothing done, then we are a pathetic society, and deserve what we get.

[somebigguy]

Seriously... with everything they now have... if they get nothing done, then we are a pathetic society, and deserve what we get.
You're right, we know there isn't a true two party system, but there has to be a few honest politicians out there that will take this stuff and run with it.

[NeoRevolutionaryChickVol2]

Didn't ROVE (blech) just callall liberals traitors......don'tcha just LOVE it when stuff like that comes back to bite someone like him in the assssssss!!!!!

[911=inside job]

if it bites him at all... these fucking assholes can do anything and get away with it...

orwell is rolling in his grave....

[911=inside job]

Another nail in the coffin. If the lilly livered Liberals can't do anything with all the ammo they now have after the last month, were in big trouble.
very true, sbg, very true....

[erose001]

Check this out:

DemocracyNOW News Brief, Today:

NY Times: Karl Rove Was Cooper's Source
Since the beginning of this scandal, the top suspect in many eyes has been President Bush's senior advisor Karl Rove. Today, the New York Times quotes a source the paper says has been officially briefed on the case as saying that Matt Cooper's source was indeed Karl Rove. This detail is buried in the 24th paragraph of the Times lead story. The paper says Cooper's decision to drop his refusal to testify followed discussions on Wednesday morning among lawyers representing Cooper and Rove. The independent prosecutor Peter Fitzgerald was reportedly also involved in the discussions.
###

Here's the article. I've bolded the 24th paragraph to which DN was referring:

July 7, 2005, New York Times

Reporter Jailed After Refusing to Name Source

By ADAM LIPTAK (http://query.nytimes.com/search/query?ppds=bylL&v1=ADAM%20LIPTAK&fdq=19960101&td=sysdate&sort=newest&ac=ADAM%20LIPTAK&inline=nyt-per)
WASHINGTON, July 6 - Judith Miller, an investigative reporter for The New York Times, was sent to jail on Wednesday after a federal judge declared that she was "defying the law" by refusing to divulge the name of a confidential source.

Another reporter who faced jail in the case, Matthew Cooper of Time magazine, was spared after announcing a last-minute deal with a confidential source that he said would allow him to testify before a grand jury.

Before being taken into custody by three court officers, Ms. Miller said she could not in good conscience violate promises to her sources. "If journalists cannot be trusted to guarantee confidentiality," she told Judge Thomas F. Hogan, "then journalists cannot function and there cannot be a free press."

Judge Hogan held the two reporters in civil contempt in October for refusing to cooperate with a federal prosecutor's investigation into the disclosure of the identity of a covert operative of the Central Intelligence Agency. The prosecutor's efforts produced the most serious confrontation between the government and the press since the Pentagon Papers case in 1971. The Supreme Court refused to hear appeals from the reporters last week.

On hearing Mr. Cooper's statement, Judge Hogan indicated he would lift the contempt sanction against Mr. Cooper after he testified.

After listening to Ms. Miller, the judge ordered her sent to "a suitable jail within the metropolitan area of the District of Columbia" until she decided to talk or until the term of the grand jury expired in October.

"I have a person in front of me," Judge Hogan said, "who is defying the law."

Ms. Miller appeared shaken and scared as she left the courtroom. In a telephone interview later in the evening, she said she had been taken to the Alexandria Detention Center in Virginia.

Ms. Miller, who conducted interviews but never wrote an article about the C.I.A. operative, joins a line of journalists who have accepted jail time rather than betray their sources' confidences. That tradition, according to Judge Hogan, does not deserve respect.

"That's the child saying: 'I'm still going to take that chocolate chip cookie and eat it. I don't care,' " the judge said.

Bill Keller, the executive editor of The Times, disagreed.

"The law presented Judy with the choice between betraying a trust to a confidential source or going to jail," Mr. Keller said after the hearing. "The choice she made is a brave and principled choice, and it reflects a valuing of individual conscience that has been part of this country's tradition since its founding."

On Friday, saying it was obligated to comply with a final court order in the case, Time turned over Mr. Cooper's notes and other documents to the special prosecutor in the case, Patrick J. Fitzgerald.

At the hearing here Wednesday, Theodore J. Boutrous Jr., a lawyer for Time, said Time's move should obviate the need for Mr. Cooper's testimony.

Mr. Fitzgerald opposed that request. "Mr. Cooper's testimony is essential," he said. "We need to get this right one way or the other, and we need Mr. Cooper to testify."

Judge Hogan rejected Time's request that he excuse Mr. Cooper from testifying. Indeed, the judge said, the reporters' failure to cooperate, until now a civil matter, may be considered criminal conduct.

"It could be seen to be obstruction of justice," Judge Hogan said.

Mr. Cooper then spoke directly to the judge, reading from a statement.

He said he had awoken Wednesday morning certain that he would continue to be in contempt and had said goodbye to his 6-year-old son. Time's actions, he said, did not absolve him from a promise he had made to his source. He added that a waiver form that his source had signed months ago did not affect his thinking.

Investigators have presented many government officials with waiver forms instructing journalists to ignore pledges of confidentiality. Mr. Cooper, Ms. Miller and other journalists have said they view such waivers as coerced and ineffective.

Mr. Cooper said his situation had changed earlier in the day.

"A short time ago, in somewhat dramatic fashion, I received an express, personal release from my source," Mr. Cooper said. "It's with a bit of surprise and no small amount of relief that I will comply with this subpoena."

Mr. Cooper's decision to drop his refusal to testify followed discussions on Wednesday morning among lawyers representing Mr. Cooper and Karl Rove, the senior White House political adviser, according to a person who has been officially briefed on the case. Mr. Fitzgerald was also involved in the discussions, the person said.

In his statement in court, Mr. Cooper did not name Mr. Rove as the source about whom he would now testify, but the person who was briefed on the case said that he was referring to Mr. Rove and that Mr. Cooper's decision came after behind-the-scenes maneuvering by his lawyers and others in the case.

Those discussions centered on whether a legal release signed by Mr. Rove last year was meant to apply specifically to Mr. Cooper, who by its terms would be released from any pledge of confidentiality he had made to Mr. Rove, the person said. Mr. Cooper said in court that he had agreed to testify only after he had received an explicit waiver from his source.

Richard A. Sauber, a lawyer for Mr. Cooper, said he would not discuss whether Mr. Cooper was referring to Mr. Rove, nor would he comment on discussions leading up to Mr. Cooper's decision.

Mr. Fitzgerald's policy is to refuse to respond to inquiries about the case.

Mr. Rove declined to comment on Wednesday.

In recent days, a lawyer for Mr. Rove has said that Mr. Cooper and Mr. Rove had a conversation not long before the name of the operative first became public. News articles referred to the operative by her maiden name, Valerie Plame, although she now goes by her married name, Valerie Wilson.

Mr. Cooper's involvement in the matter dates back two years, when he and two other reporters wrote an article for Time.com (http://Time.com).

The article said "some administration officials" had told Time and the syndicated columnist Robert Novak that "Valerie Plame is a C.I.A. official who monitors the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction."

The article also noted that she is the wife of Joseph C. Wilson IV, a former diplomat who had recently written an opinion article in The New York Times questioning one of the rationales, concerning Iraq's weapons program, offered by the Bush administration for the Iraq war. Mr. Wilson based his criticism on a trip he had taken to Niger for the C.I.A.

On July 14, 2003, Mr. Novak wrote: "Valerie Plame is an agency operative on weapons of mass destruction. Two senior administration officials told me his wife suggested sending Wilson to Niger."

The Time article, published three days after Mr. Novak's column, suggested that the officials had "declared war" on Mr. Wilson and had released the information about his wife as a form of payback or in an effort to undermine the seriousness of his criticism by suggesting that his trip was a boondoggle.

Mr. Sauber said Mr. Cooper's agreement to testify was limited to a single conversation with a single source.

"It's not open season on Matt's sources," Mr. Sauber said, noting that Mr. Cooper had testified in the investigation on similar terms once before, after receiving the permission from I. Lewis Libby, chief of staff for Vice President Dick Cheney.

Reporters from The Washington Post and NBC testified after similar releases. Mr. Novak has refused on numerous occasions to discuss whether he provided information to Mr. Fitzgerald.

In her statement in court, Ms. Miller said she had received no similar permission from her sources.

"Your Honor," she said, "in this case I cannot break my word just to stay out of jail. The right of civil disobedience based on personal conscience is fundamental to our system and honored throughout our history."

She noted that she had covered the war in Iraq, and had lived and worked all over the world.

"The freest and fairest societies are not only those with independent judiciaries," she said, "but those with an independent press that works every day to keep government accountable by publishing what the government might not want the public to know."

Because Ms. Miller did not write about the Plame matter, it is not known precisely why Mr. Fitzgerald focused on her. But the prosecutor could have learned about her through phone records and the questioning of government officials.

Mr. Keller, The Times's executive editor, acknowledged that the case did not involve classic whistle-blowing.

"To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld," he said, referring to the secretary of defense, "you go to court with the case you've got. It would be nice if there was absolute clarity about the nature of this case. On the contrary, there's immense mystery about this case."

Mr. Fitzgerald, who has relied on secret evidence in persuading courts to order Ms. Miller jailed, said the law now requires her to testify.

"The law says the grand jury is entitled to every man's evidence," he said. "We're doing our honest best to get to the bottom of whether a crime has been committed."

Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation is based on a 1982 law that made it a crime to disclose the identity of covert agents in some circumstances.

Robert S. Bennett, a lawyer for Ms. Miller, urged Judge Hogan to conclude that Ms. Miller would never talk, making confinement pointless.

Mr. Fitzgerald said no one could be sure that Ms. Miller would not talk until she was actually jailed.

"People change their minds," he said. "We saw here today that a source reached out to Mr. Cooper and caused him to testify. How do we know the same would not happen with Ms. Miller?"

In a statement, Arthur Sulzberger Jr., the publisher of The Times, said Ms. Miller had followed her conscience, with the paper's support. "There are times when the greater good of our democracy demands an act of conscience," Mr. Sulzberger said. "I sincerely hope that now Congress will move forward on federal shield legislation so that other journalists will not have to face imprisonment for doing their jobs."

Ms. Miller, speaking from the Virginia jail, said that her first hours in confinement had struck her as surreal but that the jail's staff had been professional and courteous. Her trip from the courthouse to the jail, she said, had brought home the gravity of her situation.

"They put shackles on my hands and my feet," she said. "They put you in the back of this car. I passed the Capitol and all the office buildings I used to cover. And I thought, 'My God, how did it come to this?' "

David Johnston contributed reporting for this article.


Copyright 2005 (http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html) The New York Times Company (http://www.nytco.com/)

Links:
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/07/07/1340259
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/07/politics/07leak.html

[erose001]

I don't know that this is "treason" per se, but it is against the law, signed into the U.S. Code by none other than Bush Senior. It is a felony, punishable by up to life in prison, I believe. It's still an open question as to whether Mr. Rove will be standing before a judge, however, as the Ol Boyz Club has a way of getting guys off the hook, even guys like Prescott Bush, who DID commit treason and who should've hung. I just can't help but wonder if the world would in a less-awful state if the Bush family had been discredited back during WWII when Prescott Bush was trading with the Nazis. I do seriously doubt we would've had any of these conniving recent and current Bushes in political office.

Speaking of conniving, as I was reading the horrible news about the London attacks today, my first thought was that Shrub would be thrilled. "He'll probably say something like, 'The war on terror continues.'" Guess what he said? This just plays right into his plans, in spite of the fact that it was the U.S. invasion of Iraq that prompted this retaliation.

I'm off to check on Gold's links. It does seem as if there are a few in Congress lately who have stopping being so conciliatory, so I pray everyday that these people will lead the charge to boot these bootlickers out of office. However, they sure aren't getting help from the media, which tried to bury the Downing Street Memos, and now have demonstrated clearly that they've been protecting Mr. Mean for two years.

I appreciate that journalists want to protect their sources, but there should be a limit when the source has violated Federal law to reveal info. Judith Miller belongs in jail, IMO. No one should protect Karl Rove for engaging in this despicable, vengeful, and felonious activity, and those who do are, IMO, co-conspirators.

[erose001]

P.S. If other professionals are required by law to reveal to law enforcement people who appear to be an imminent danger to themselves or others, then why do journalists think they get a pass? Had Valerie Plame been undercover at the time, she might very well have been in imminent danger (hence, the law against this). If she had been made, and hurt or murdered as a result, that would have been not just Rove's fault, but the fault of anyone who knew about the danger and didn't tell law enforcement.

I believe in free speech and I understand some sources need to be confidential. But the founders didn't advise limiting secrecy for nothing. This is exactly the kind of situation they were concerned about. Not to mention the abuses of power occurring in secret by both administration and certain members of Congress. Or the abuses of the black budget which has led to things like the torture of detainees. If I could, I would shut the black budget and the CIA Operations Directorate DOWN. Keep the analysts and the legit agents, but get rid of the muckity mucks who use illegally comingled funds to order coups, assassinations, and to train assassins at the School of the Americas.

Do these people have any clue how evil their behavior is??? How at odds with national security their actions are???

Okay, that's the end of my rant on this for now. ;)

[erose001]

I don't credit the Times for much, but lately it has at least tried to sneak some reporting that isn't straight from the mouth of Scott Maclellan. Until today:

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/07/opinion/07thu1.html?th&emc=th

July 7, 2005
Judith Miller Goes to Jail

This is a proud but awful moment for The New York Times and its employees. One of our reporters, Judith Miller, has decided to accept a jail sentence rather than testify before a grand jury about one of her confidential sources. Ms. Miller has taken a path that will be lonely and painful for her and her family and friends. We wish she did not have to choose it, but we are certain she did the right thing.

She is surrendering her liberty in defense of a greater liberty, granted to a free press by the founding fathers so journalists can work on behalf of the public without fear of regulation or retaliation from any branch of government.

The Press and the Law

Some people - including, sadly, some of our colleagues in the news media - have mistakenly assumed that a reporter and a news organization place themselves above the law by rejecting a court order to testify. Nothing could be further from the truth. When another Times reporter, M. A. Farber, went to jail in 1978 rather than release his confidential notes, he declared, "I have no such right and I seek none."

By accepting her sentence, Ms. Miller bowed to the authority of the court. But she acted in the great tradition of civil disobedience that began with this nation's founding, which holds that the common good is best served in some instances by private citizens who are willing to defy a legal, but unjust or unwise, order.

This tradition stretches from the Boston Tea Party to the Underground Railroad, to the Americans who defied the McCarthy inquisitions and to the civil rights movement. It has called forth ordinary citizens, like Rosa Parks; government officials, like Daniel Ellsberg and Mark Felt; and statesmen, like Martin Luther King. Frequently, it falls to news organizations to uphold this tradition. As Justice William O. Douglas wrote in 1972, "The press has a preferred position in our constitutional scheme, not to enable it to make money, not to set newsmen apart as a favored class, but to bring to fulfillment the public's right to know."

Critics point out that even presidents must bow to the Supreme Court. But presidents are agents of the government, sworn to enforce the law. Journalists are private citizens, and Ms. Miller's actions are faithful to the Constitution. She is defending the right of Americans to get vital information from news organizations that need not fear government retaliation - an imperative defended by the 49 states that recognize a reporter's right to protect sources.

A second reporter facing a possible jail term, Matthew Cooper of Time magazine, agreed yesterday to testify before the grand jury. Last week, Time decided, over Mr. Cooper's protests, to release documents demanded by the judge that revealed his confidential sources. We were deeply disappointed by that decision.

We do not see how a newspaper, magazine or television station can support a reporter's decision to protect confidential sources even if the potential price is lost liberty, and then hand over the notes or documents that make the reporter's sacrifice meaningless. The point of this struggle is to make sure that people with critical information can feel confident that if they speak to a reporter on the condition of anonymity, their identities will be protected. No journalist's promise will be worth much if the employer that stands behind him or her is prepared to undercut such a vow of secrecy.

Protecting a Reporter's Sources

Most readers understand a reporter's need to guarantee confidentiality to a source. Before he went to jail, Mr. Farber told the court that if he gave up documents that revealed the names of the people he had promised anonymity, "I will have given notice that the nation's premier newspaper is no longer available to those men and women who would seek it out - or who would respond to it - to talk freely and without fear."

While The Times has gone to great lengths lately to make sure that the use of anonymous sources is limited, there is no way to eliminate them. The most important articles tend to be the ones that upset people in high places, and many could not be reported if those who risked their jobs or even their liberty to talk to reporters knew that they might be identified the next day. In the larger sense, revealing government wrongdoing advances the rule of law, especially at a time of increased government secrecy.

It is for these reasons that most states have shield laws that protect reporters' rights to conceal their sources. Those laws need to be reviewed and strengthened, even as members of Congress continue to work to pass a federal shield law. But at this moment, there is no statute that protects Judith Miller when she defies a federal trial judge's order to reveal who told her what about Valerie Plame Wilson's identity as an undercover C.I.A. operative.

Ms. Miller understands this perfectly, and she accepts the consequences with full respect for the court. We hope that her sacrifice will alert the nation to the need to protect the basic tools reporters use in doing their most critical work.

To be frank, this is far from an ideal case. We would not have wanted our reporter to give up her liberty over a situation whose details are so complicated and muddy. But history is very seldom kind enough to provide the ideal venue for a principled stand. Ms. Miller is going to jail over an article that she never wrote, yet she has been unwavering in her determination to protect the people with whom she had spoken on the promise of confidentiality.

The Plame Story

The case involves an article by the syndicated columnist Robert Novak, who revealed that Joseph Wilson, a retired career diplomat, was married to an undercover C.I.A. officer Mr. Novak identified by using her maiden name, Valerie Plame. Mr. Wilson had been asked by the C.I.A. to investigate whether Saddam Hussein in Iraq was trying to buy uranium from Niger that could be used for making nuclear weapons. Mr. Wilson found no evidence of that, and he later wrote an Op-Ed article for The Times saying he believed that the Bush administration had misrepresented the facts.

It seemed very possible that someone at the White House had told Mr. Novak about Ms. Plame to undermine Mr. Wilson's credibility and send a chilling signal to other officials who might be inclined to speak out against the administration's Iraq policy. At the time, this page said that if those were indeed the circumstances, the leak had been "an egregious abuse of power." We urged the Justice Department to investigate. But we warned then that the inquiry should not degenerate into an attempt to compel journalists to reveal their sources.

We mainly had Mr. Novak in mind then, but Mr. Novak remains both free and mum about what he has or has not told the grand jury looking into the leak. Like almost everyone, we are baffled by his public posture. All we know now is that Mr. Novak - who early on expressed the opinion that no journalists who bowed to court pressure to betray sources could hold up their heads in Washington - has offered no public support to the colleague who is going to jail while he remains at liberty.

Ms. Miller did not write an article about Ms. Plame, but the prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, wants to know whether anyone in government told her about Mr. Wilson's wife and her secret job. The inquiry has been conducted with such secrecy that it is hard to know exactly what Mr. Fitzgerald thinks Ms. Miller can tell him, or what argument he offered to convince the court that his need to hear her testimony outweighs the First Amendment.

What we do know is that if Ms. Miller testifies, it may be immeasurably harder in the future to persuade a frightened government employee to talk about malfeasance in high places, or a worried worker to reveal corporate crimes. The shroud of secrecy thrown over this case by the prosecutor and the judge, an egregious denial of due process, only makes it more urgent to take a stand.

Mr. Fitzgerald drove that point home chillingly when he said the authorities "can't have 50,000 journalists" making decisions about whether to reveal sources' names and that the government had a right to impose its judgment. But that's not what the founders had in mind in writing the First Amendment. In 1971, our colleague James Reston cited James Madison's admonition about a free press in explaining why The Times had first defied the Nixon administration's demand to stop publishing the Pentagon Papers and then fought a court's order to cease publication. "Among those principles deemed sacred in America," Madison wrote, "among those sacred rights considered as forming the bulwark of their liberty, which the government contemplates with awful reverence and would approach only with the most cautious circumspection, there is no one of which the importance is more deeply impressed on the public mind than the liberty of the press."

Mr. Fitzgerald's attempts to interfere with the rights of a free press while refusing to disclose his reasons for doing so, when he can't even say whether a crime has been committed, have exhibited neither reverence nor cautious circumspection. It would compound the tragedy if his actions emboldened more prosecutors to trample on a free press.

Our Bottom Line

Responsible journalists recognize that press freedoms are not absolute and must be exercised responsibly. This newspaper will not, for example, print the details of American troop movements in advance of a battle, because publication would endanger lives and national security. But these limits cannot be dictated by the whim of a branch of government, especially behind a screen of secrecy.

Indeed, the founders warned against any attempt to have the government set limits on a free press, under any conditions. "However desirable those measures might be which might correct without enslaving the press, they have never yet been devised in America," Madison wrote.

Journalists talk about these issues a great deal, and they can seem abstract. The test comes when a colleague is being marched off to jail for doing nothing more than the job our readers expected of her, and of the rest of us. The Times has been in these fights before, beginning in 1857, when a journalist named J. W. Simonton wrote an editorial about bribery in Congress and was held in contempt by the House of Representatives for 19 days when he refused to reveal his sources. In the end, Mr. Simonton kept faith, and the corrupt congressmen resigned. All of our battles have not had equally happy endings. But each time, whether we win or we lose, we remain convinced that the public wins in the long run and that what is at stake is nothing less than our society's perpetual bottom line: the citizens control the government in a democracy.

We stand with Ms. Miller and thank her for taking on that fight for the rest of us.





Copyright 2005 (http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/copyright.html) The New York Times Company (http://www.nytco.com/)

[erose001]

Here's my letter to the New York Times in response to their verbal vomit:


Judith Miller is exactly where she belongs until she testifies. And to compare
her situation to that of our historical visionaries is nauseating, especially in
light of her terrible reporting before the war in Iraq.

There is no mistaking that she has put herself above the law. The law is very
clear. It is a felony to reveal the identity of an undercover intelligence
agent. Anyone who has knowledge that this information has been revealed,
including who revealed it, not only has the responsibility to report the
incident to law enforcement, but in not doing so, becomes an accessory to the
felony.

Regardless of who the administration staffer was who revealed Valerie Plame's
identity, every reporter who had that knowledge was obliged by the law (and by
the responsibilities of citizenship) to report the incident to law enforcement.
(And, preferably NOT to print the information as Mr. Novak stupidly did.) Had
Ms. Plame been put in imminent danger as a result of what many of us believe to
be a retaliatory action, then the staffer and those to whom the staffer talked
would all be complicit in the danger Ms. Plame faced.

A free press IS essential, and some sources should be given assurance of
confidentiality - if publishing their information does not place someone else in
imminent danger. Health care, lawyers, and law enforcement are required to
report such situations, even when interactions with the individuals in question
would otherwise be confidential. Journalism does not get a free pass. The
First Amendment encourages a free press to encourage transparency to PREVENT
abuses of power. It was never intended to support secrecy to allow the kind of
abuse of power that permitted a vengeful White House to reveal the identity of a
CIA operative just because she was the spouse of another official who had not
towed the administration line.

I had been willing to ignore the Times as you continued in your denial of the
crime occurring here in your twisted and subverted interpretation of the First
Amendment, and even though this is administration propaganda in the first
degree. But when Judith Miller was compared to Rosa Parks, that was where I drew
the line. You people need to screw your heads on straight. If Judith Miller is
remembered by history at all, it will as the woman who was willing to let the
most secretive administration in history keep a felony secret too. She will NOT
be on the same page as Rosa Parks.

Angrily submitted,
Elizabeth Rose
Lisbon, ND
[That's me, and I did also include full addy and phone, as you are required to in these letters.]

[beltman713]

Actually, it is said (Allegedly) that as many as 70 agents may have been killed as a result of this leak.

[Gold9472]

I don't think I've ever known someone from North Dakota.

[Gold9472]

They have people there?

[erose001]

Actually, it is said (Allegedly) that as many as 70 agents may have been killed as a result of this leak.

Yeah, I have read that myself since I sent the letter. Thanks for the info.

70 more murders on the heads of these people. By the time it is all over, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao will look like bit players on the world stage of ideological murder. Especially if you add in all the disappearances at the hands of SOA-trained assassins in Latin America.

[erose001]

I don't think I've ever known someone from North Dakota.

Nort Dahkotahn's tend to be very circumspect. You won't see many North Dakotan's on message boards like these. Although many of them do feel as we do, don't take it on faith that this is a red state where everyone loves Bush. It just turned out that more Bush supporters voted here. People here weren't too thrilled with Kerry, so they just didn't vote for President. However, whenever Bush has stopped in here, e.g., to promote the Social Security nonsense, there is always a pretty big group of protestors. Especially considering that North Dakota is second only to Wyoming in population size.

I actually grew up in and around the Washington area. But I do have family here, so I moved here when I became disabled.

[erose001]

They have people there?

On behalf of North Dakota, I resemble that remark. :spit:

North Dakota's population is 700,000+. ND, SD, and Wyoming are the least-populated states, but we do really have people here. Many who are very passionate and progressive.

One of our Senators, Sen. Dorgan, is also one of the most activist Senators on the Hill. He even appeared in Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911.