Fitzgerald Never Sleeps
It may be the holidays, but don’t tell that to Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald:
Viveca Novak, a reporter in Time’s Washington bureau, is cooperating with Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald, who is investigating the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity in 2003, the magazine reported in its December 5 issue.
Novak specifically has been asked to testify under oath about conversations she had with Rove attorney Robert Luskin starting in May 2004, the magazine reported.
Novak, part of a team tracking the CIA case for Time, has written or contributed to articles quoting Luskin that characterized the nature of what was said between Rove and Matthew Cooper, the first Time reporter who testified in the case in July.
The Woodward revelation has put this investigation in a new light, and it’s not a flattering one…Fitzgerald should consider folding the tent; it’s becoming more and more apparent that the PlameGate leak was business as usual between the press corps and its sources…
For months now, you’ve been expressing the wish that Fitzgerald would fold his tent and go home. It wasn’t gonna happen then, and it ain’t gonna happen now.
The President, at least, had the grace to make the pretence of wishing to get to the bottom of the matter, and allowing the investigation to run its course.
If (and, right now, I’d put good money on it) there are more indictments to follow, calling for a premature end to the investigation is going to look rather shoddy in retrospect.
The President’s supporters should take a page from his playbook.
Well, better to have a prosecutor who never sleeps than to have one who is asleep at the wheel.
Fitzgerald’s investigation has been leak-proof and adheres to very high ethical standards. He went out of his way in the press conference to make it clear that he was not accusing anyone besides Libby of wrong-doing. (Had this been Eliot Spitzer, for example, I am sure that you would have had leaks, press conferences galore, and insinuations against people who have not been charged). I think Fitzgerald’s behavior thus far should give partisans on both sides the confidence that he will not bring charges against anyone without substance behind them, and all efforts will be made to conduct a full and fair investigation.
In short: he is doing his job, and ought to continue to do so until (as a noted former President said) the last dog dies.
Yes Fitzgerald is doing his job. He is employed by liberal elements to unearth embarrasing possibilities of crime. It is interesting there has been no suggestion of investigating Wilson who blabbed all the time about his wife. Oh yes, but Wilson is anti-Bush so he is untouchable to a Fitzgerald indictment. I suggest the threat of indictments and the inducement of actual indictments will continue at least through through the 2006 election season. There will be no conclusive evidence, meaning no convictions.
Interesting. And here I thought the Department of Justice was paying his salary!
That damned pinko, Gonzales! I knew he couldn’t be trusted.
Now, Jacques, Peter, I’m not accusing Fitzgerald of anything…I’m just saying that I don’t think he’ll win the Libby case, I don’t think he’ll indict anyone else, and I think you are both ignoring the Woodward revelation and what it means…Valarie Plame was about as undercover as Paris Hilton (and no, that doesn’t mean it’s okay to out an undercover asset…but let’s remember, no one has proven that anyone in the administration did INTENTIONALLY do that, and Fitzgerald was quite careful not to make that accusation himself)…
The Libby case, judging from the indictment, is about as slam-dunk as any perjury and OoJ case could be. But, yes, the prosecution could still be bungled.
Given recent developments, that seems like wishful thinking.
But, again, not expecting him to indict anyone (after his investigation is complete) else is not the same thing as calling for him to precipitously close up shop and go home.
Anyone in the Press who knew about Plame, knew about her because someone in the Administration blabbed about her. Woodward’s “revelation” changes nothing, except for the number of Adminstration officials who, we now know, were cavalierly passing around the name of a covert CIA asset.
That is not to say that Fitzgerald can prove that a violation of the statute took place. But, if anything, the Woodward “revelation” supplies him with more ammunition, rather than less.
Should be an interesting few months …
Well, Jacques, let’s just say Joe Wilson was none too discreet (how about that Vanity Fair spread?)…but we’ll see. I don’t dispute that Fitzgerald probably has the goods on Libby on perjury…but that means nothing, with the American juror pool (hey, O.J., how’s that search for the real killer coming?)…
There is no evidence that Wilson revealed her status to anyone prior to the publication of Novak’s article. Conversely, there is sworrn testimony, from multiple sources, to the effect that various Administration officials were telling various members of the Washington press corps about her.
Again, that’s not the same thing as saying there’s a prosecutable case to be made.
Notoriously unreliable, that American Justice system. May Libby could just be declared an Enemy Combatant?
Ha, ha! Good one…let me just stress again that I think FItzgerald is an honorable man, and I don’t think he’s playing politics…I just wonder if we’re reaching the point of diminishing returns (of couse, I freely admit he’d know better than me)…