Rove Talked to Novak about Valerie Plame

The New York Times quotes anonymous sources again, Rove Reportedly Held Phone Talk on C.I.A. Officer.

Read it ALL.

Karl Rove, the White House senior adviser, spoke with the columnist Robert D. Novak as he was preparing an article in July 2003 that identified a C.I.A. officer who was undercover, someone who has been officially briefed on the matter said.

Mr. Rove has told investigators that he learned from the columnist the name of the C.I.A. officer, who was referred to by her maiden name, Valerie Plame, and the circumstances in which her husband, former Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, traveled to Africa to investigate possible uranium sales to Iraq, the person said.

After hearing Mr. Novak’s account, the person who has been briefed on the matter said, Mr. Rove told the columnist: “I heard that, too.”

The previously undisclosed telephone conversation, which took place on July 8, 2003, was initiated by Mr. Novak, the person who has been briefed on the matter said.

So, where is the crime here?

Why is Rove culpable in anything but playing politics? Novak has great sources and isn’t called the “Prince of Darkness” for nothing.

Six days later, Mr. Novak’s syndicated column reported that two senior administration officials had told him that Mr. Wilson’s “wife had suggested sending him” to Africa. That column was the first instance in which Ms. Wilson was publicly identified as a C.I.A. operative.

The column provoked angry demands for an investigation into who disclosed Ms. Wilson’s name to Mr. Novak. The Justice Department appointed Patrick J. Fitzgerald, a top federal prosecutor in Chicago, to lead the inquiry. Mr. Rove said in an interview with CNN last year that he did not know the C.I.A. officer’s name and did not leak it.

The person who provided the information about Mr. Rove’s conversation with Mr. Novak declined to be identified, citing requests by Mr. Fitzgerald that no one discuss the case. The person discussed the matter in the belief that Mr. Rove was truthful in saying that he had not disclosed Ms. Wilson’s identity.

Anonymous sources, Anonymous sources……. have a role……. What is the N.Y Times ethics policy?

Robert D. Luskin, Mr. Rove’s lawyer, said Thursday, “Any pertinent information has been provided to the prosecutor.” Mr. Luskin previously has said that prosecutors have advised Mr. Rove that he is not a target in the case, which means he is not likely to be charged with a crime.

In a brief conversation on Thursday, Mr. Novak declined to discuss the matter. It is unclear if Mr. Novak has testified to the grand jury, and if he has, whether his account is consistent with Mr. Rove’s.
As the political debate about Mr. Rove grows more heated, Mr. Fitzgerald is in what he has said are the final stages of his investigation into whether anyone at the White House violated a criminal statute that, under certain circumstances, makes it a crime for a government official to disclose the names of covert operatives like Ms. Wilson.

The law requires that the official knowingly identify an officer serving in a covert position. The person who has been briefed on the matter said that Mr. Rove neither knew Ms. Wilson’s name nor that she was a covert officer.

The Left will be all over this storytomorrow, calling Rove a liar – a leaker, a traitor and anything else that they hope will stick.

Flap hanicaps a very low likelyhood that Rove will be indicted.

The Associated Press weighs in, Source: Rove Got CIA Agent ID From Media

Presidential confidant Karl Rove testified to a grand jury that he learned the identity of aCIA operative originally from journalists, then informally discussed the information with a Time magazine reporter days before the story broke, according to a person briefed on the testimony.

The person, who works in the legal profession and spoke only on condition of anonymity because of the secrecy of grand jury proceedings, told The Associated Press that Rove testified last year that he remembers specifically being told by columnist Robert Novak that Valerie Plame, the wife of a harsh
Iraq war critic, worked for the CIA.

Rove testified that Novak originally called him the Tuesday before Plame’s identity was revealed in July 2003 to discuss another story. The conversation eventually turned to former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who was strongly criticizing the Bush administration’s Iraq war policy and the intelligence it used to justify the war, the source said.

The person said Rove testified that Novak told him he had learned and planned to report in a weekend column that Wilson’s wife, Plame, had worked for the CIA, and the circumstances on how her husband traveled to Africa to check bogus claims of alleged nuclear material sales to Iraq.

Novak’s column, citing two Bush administration officials, appeared six days later, touching off a political firestorm and leading to a federal criminal investigation into who leaked Plame’s undercover identity. That probe has ensnared presidential aides and reporters in a two-year legal battle.

Now the Democrats are getting snarky.

On Thursday, Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada pressed for legislation to strip Rove of his clearance for classified information, which he said
President Bush should already have done. Instead, Reid said, the Bush administration has attacked its critics: “This is what is known as a cover-up. This is an abuse of power.”

Across the Capitol, Rep. Rush Holt (news, bio, voting record), D-N.J., introduced legislation for an investigation that would compel senior administration officials to turn over records relating to the Plame disclosure.

When will this non-story die?