Left-Over's "The Year in Leakage!"

This article appearing yesterday in Raw Story got my attention for a couple of reasons. First of all, it includes all kinds of juicy speculation about the CIA leak case. If true, the investigation could quickly turn into a dream come true for many of us lefty bloggers. Second, it offers a convenient excuse to recap some of the coverage of this story that has appeared in Left-Over during its first three months of life.

Clearly there are any number of bloggers out there who consistently offer more detailed and insightful commentary than we could ever aspire to write. Emptywheel at The Next Hurrah and Jane and Reddhedd at Firedoglake spring to mind, but there are many others as well. Our contribution to the conversation, while perhaps containing some occasional and usually unintentional kernels of wisdom, usually can be characterized as good old-fashioned trash talking!

But trash talking has its place among the !!BREAKING!! news stories and meticulously researched position papers, and our readership has grown in recent weeks while many of our best rants are buried deep in the internet landfill we call “the archives.” With that in mind, I thought I would take a few moments to summarize our coverage of the CIA leak case. Besides, after reading the new Raw Story piece, I suspect that some of that old trash might actually end up being worthy of the Antique Roadshow.

In what was my virgin post on the site, Dumber than Watergate looked at the early administration strategy to defend accusations that they purposefully went after Joseph Wilson - by purposefully going after Patrick Fitzgerald! You can see how well the strategy worked here.

Shortly after Fitzgerald issued his five-count indictment, Scooter Libby, Lightning Rod posits the theory that Libby deliberately made himself look guilty to draw attention away from the other better-known and more politically exposed conspirators, and how Fitzgerald wasn’t really buying it.

Karl Rove’s last minute reprieve was covered in Did Rove Play the Pardon Card? Fortunately, this one won’t be making it out of the landfill, as Rover still looks destined to join Scooter in the big house.

In several wild-eyed, scream-at-the-keyboard rants, Fitzgerald’s prosecutorial strategy was compared to both coaching a football game and playing the cello. Fortunately, it appears Fitzgerald is closer to matching the proficiency of my cello playing idol than my football team!

Bob Woodward got a lot of attention here, as elsewhere. In various posts, he sprung a leak, was the subject of some chatter, went down in a massive fireball, and got a frustrated woody! His still mysterious source got some attention too. Stephen Hadley was thrown out for consideration in one post, but ultimately Woodward’s source was revealed in in another post that left me waaaay out on a limb sawing frantically without knowing which side of the cut the tree was on.

Which brings me back to the Raw Story piece, and what I’m still hoping turns out to be the million-dollar 18th century antique coffee table that got pushed off the page of Left-Over weeks ago. You see, the article in Raw Story contains the following disclosure:

More than two dozen people from the White House have been interviewed or testified before the grand jury since Fitzgerald was tapped to lead the investigation two years ago. Some of those people, who sources close to the case would only say were "senior level," have cooperated with the prosecutor in exchange for immunity related to their role in the case.

(snip)

One of those individuals may be an unnamed State Department official cited in a Sept. 28, 2003 Washington Post story. The official told the Post that six journalists were called and told about Plame Wilson's undercover status in an attempt to discredit her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, a critic of the Bush administration's prewar Iraq intelligence who challenged the veracity of the uranium claim.

(snip)

The unnamed State Department official cited in the Post story appears to have intimate knowledge of the campaign to discredit Wilson. He also appears to have been sympathetic to the former ambassador.

The Associated Press also quoted an unnamed retired State Department official who told them of a Department memo describing Plame's alleged role in sending her husband to Africa and disputed the legitimacy of administration claims that Iraq sought to acquire uranium.

Sources close to the probe said the State Department official referenced in both stories is the same, and has been providing the special counsel with crucial evidence against certain White House officials for the past two years.

I don't know about you, but that “Senior Level State Department Official” sounds pretty darned familiar, don’t you think? Does anyone have any recommendations for a good wood stain remover?