5 Myths About Scooter Libby
Carol Leonnig, who covers the federal courts for WaPo and with whom I had the pleasure of sitting during my brief stint covering the Libby trail, shoots down "5 Myths About Scooter and the Slammer." Her column will irritate both Libby's strongest supporters and most vehement critics. It's now rather clear that Libby lied to the grand jury about ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on June 10, 2007 08:26
CIA Black Op to Destabilize Iranian Regime
CIA sources have leaked to ABC News an alleged covert plan to destabilize the Iranian regime through non-lethal means. The CIA has received secret presidential approval to mount a covert "black" operation to destabilize the Iranian government, current and former officials in the intelligence community tell the Blotter on ABCNews.com. The sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on May 23, 2007 09:35
Democrats Invite Valerie Plame to Testify
Valerie Plame has been invited to testify before Congress. About nothing in particular. Democratic lawmakers are eager to hear from outed CIA operative Valerie Plame as they try to make political fodder out of the 2003 leak scandal. Plame was scheduled to testify before a congressional committee Friday, but it was unlikely the hearing would offer any new information about the ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on March 16, 2007 07:46
David Obey Lies to Catch the Leakers
David Obey has resorted to a time-honored trick for discovering the source of leaks. On Iraq, things have apparently gotten so tense between centrists and liberals in the House Democratic Caucus that Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, D-Wis., has resorted to disinformation tactics. Speaking to reporters Wednesday on the topic of the Iraq spending bill, Obey said, “I purposely gave ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on March 9, 2007 10:14
Libby Trial: Opening Arguments - Government (Live Blog)
The government started its opening arguments at 1037 am. Live blog below the fold. As always, major breaking news will get separate posts. They take us to the day (July 6, 2003) Joseph Wilson's NYT op-ed came out and argues that it was a devastating attack. He also appeared that day on "Meet the Press," questioning the WMD ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on January 23, 2007 10:38
Libby Trial: Politics Central, Facts Secondary
I'm live in the media room at the Prettyman Federal Courthouse awaiting the resumption of voir dire in the Scooter Libby trial. AP's Michael Sniffen reports that the jury selection should end today, although the problems that have plagued it remain. Libby's lawyers, Theodore Wells and William Jeffress, have labored to keep opponents of the Iraq war and the administration off the ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on January 22, 2007 09:47
Can Scooter Libby Get a Fair Trial?
Lewis "Scooter" Libby may well find it hard to get a fair trial, if Pachacutec's account of the jury selection yesterday is any indication: "no jurors were excused for cause based on any predispositions that might prejudice them against the prosecution. Just the defense." His post is worth reading in full but this pretty well sums it up: The Libby team's ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on January 17, 2007 08:26
America’s Stealth Presence in Somalia
Andrew Cochran termed last night's attacks on al Qaeda targets there the "first publicly acknowledged military action against Somalian territory since 1993." His Counterterrorism Blog cohert Daveed Gartenstein-Ross reports for PajamasMedia, though, that "publicly acknowledged" is the key: U.S. ground forces have been active in Somalia from the start, a senior military intelligence officer confirmed. “In fact,” he said, “they were ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on January 9, 2007 11:44
U.S. Submarine, Japanese Ship Collide
The USS Newport News collided with a Japanese ship earlier today. A U.S. nuclear submarine and Japanese merchant ship collided in the Arabian Sea late Monday, but there were no injuries on either vessel, the U.S. Navy and Japanese officials said. There was no damage to the fast-attack USS Newport News submarine or the ship that affected either vessel's ability to ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on January 8, 2007 22:59
Exit-Poll Secrecy Measures Aim to Plug Leaks to Blogs
WSJ reports on extraordinary measures being taken to safeguard exit poll results from diabolical bloggers. Two-by-two, polling specialists from ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox News and the Associated Press will go into rooms in New York and Washington shortly before noon Tuesday. Their cellphones and BlackBerrys will be confiscated; proctors will monitor the doors; and for the next five hours, these ...Posted in Outside The Beltway | OTB on November 7, 2006 11:22
