JOSHUA TIME 155
REPORT: CHENEY'S CHIEF OF STAFF I. LEWIS LIBBY JR. EXPECTED TO BE
CHARGED WITH MAKING FALSE STATEMENTS IN CIA LEAK PROBE
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BETTER LIBBY JR. THAN CARL ROVE
WE WILL FIND OUT FRIDAY OCR 28 WHO ALL WILL BE CHARGED IN CIA LEAK CASE. LIKE THE CASE MATTERS THERE IS MORE IMPORTANT THINGS TO BE CONCERNED WITH
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Cheney Aide Appears Likely to Be Indicted; Rove Under Scrutiny
and RICHARD W. STEVENSON" name=Author>
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By DAVID JOHNSTONand RICHARD W. STEVENSON
Published: October 28, 2005
WASHINGTON, Oct. 27 - Lawyers in the C.I.A. leak case said Thursday that they expected I. Lewis Libby Jr., Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, to be indicted on Friday, charged with making false statements to the grand jury.
Karl Rove, President Bush's senior adviser and deputy chief of staff, will not be charged on Friday, but will remain under investigation, people briefed officially about the case said. As a result, they said, the special counsel in the case, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, was likely to extend the term of the federal grand jury beyond its scheduled expiration on Friday.
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Doug Mills/The New York Times
I. Lewis Libby Jr. Thursday.
F.B.I. Is Still Seeking Source of Forged Uranium Reports (October 28, 2005)
Doug Mills/The New York Times
Karl Rove, President Bush's senior adviser, was the subject of intense speculation Thursday as he arrived at the White House.
As rumors coursed through the capital, Mr. Fitzgerald gave no public signal of how he intended to proceed, further intensifying the anxiety that has gripped the White House and left partisans on both sides of the political aisle holding their breath.
Mr. Fitzgerald's preparations for a Friday announcement were shrouded in secrecy, but advanced amid a flurry of behind-the-scenes discussions that left open the possibility of last-minute surprises. As the clock ticked down on the grand jury, people involved in the investigation did not rule out the disclosure of previously unknown aspects of the case.
White House officials said their presumption was that Mr. Libby would resign if indicted, and he and Mr. Rove took steps to expand their legal teams in preparation for a possible court battle.
Among the many unresolved mysteries is whether anyone in addition to Mr. Libby and Mr. Rove might be charged and in particular whether Mr. Fitzgerald would name the source who first provided the identity of a covert C.I.A. officer to Robert D. Novak, the syndicated columnist. Mr. Novak identified the officer in a column published July 14, 2003.
The investigation seemed to be taking an unexpectedly extended path after nearly two years in which Mr. Fitzgerald brought more than a dozen current and former administration officials before the grand jury and interviewed Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney to determine how the identity of the officer, Valerie Plame Wilson, became public.
Mr. Fitzgerald is expected to hold a news conference at the Justice Department in Washington on Friday. His spokesman, Randall Samborn, declined to comment.
Mr. Fitzgerald has examined whether the leak of Ms. Wilson's identity was part of an effort by the administration to respond to criticism of the White House by her husband, Joseph C. Wilson IV, a former diplomat. After traveling to Africa in 2002 on a C.I.A.-sponsored mission to look into claims that Iraq had sought to acquire material there for its nuclear weapons program, Mr. Wilson wrote in an Op-Ed article in The New York Times on July 6, 2003, that the White House had "twisted" the intelligence regarding the suspected transaction to justify the invasion of Iraq.
At the White House, the withdrawal of Harriet E. Miers as the president's nominee to the Supreme Court dominated the day. Still, officials waited anxiously for word about developments in the investigation, which has the potential to shape the remainder of Mr. Bush's second term.
Officials said that Mr. Bush, who traveled to Florida on Thursday to view the damage from Hurricane Wilma, would keep to his planned schedule on Friday, including a speech on terrorism in Norfolk, Va., if indictments were announced.
Administration officials said that the White House would seek to keep as low a profile as possible if indictments were issued; Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, did not schedule a briefing for Friday, and Mr. Bush plans to leave in the afternoon for a weekend at Camp David.
With so much about the outcome of the case still in doubt, political strategists in Washington spent the day gaming out the implications of different endings.
The apparent delay in a decision about whether to charge Mr. Rove, and the continuation of the criminal inquiry, is a mixed outcome for the administration. It leaves open the possibility that Mr. Rove, Mr. Bush's closest and most trusted adviser, could avoid indictment altogether, an outcome that would be not just a legal victory but also the best political outcome the White House could hope for under the circumstances.
Yet, in apparently leaving Mr. Rove in legal limbo for now, Mr. Fitzgerald has left him and Mr. Bush to twist in the uncertainty of a case that has delved deep into the innermost workings of the White House and provided Democrats an opportunity to attack the administration's honesty and the way it justified the war to the American people.
Mr. Rove has had to step back from many of his public duties, including appearing at fund-raisers, and he is likely to have to keep a low profile as long as the investigation continues. It could also leave him distracted, depriving the White House of his full attention at a time when Mr. Bush is struggling to regain his political footing after months in which the bloody insurgency in Iraq, Hurricane Katrina and the failed Supreme Court nomination of Harriet E. Miers have left the administration stumbling.
An indictment of Mr. Libby, who is seen by many people in the White House as Mr. Cheney's alter ego, would also keep a focus on the way in which the administration built its case that Saddam Hussein was a threat who had to be dealt with. Any trial of Mr. Libby would likely shine a spotlight in particular on Mr. Cheney and his prewar role.
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THIS IS FROM http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/28/politics/28leak.html?hp&ex=1130472000&en=f4b9e5edc0a35fdf&ei=5094&partner=homepage
HOWEVER THE NY TIMES CAN NOT CLEARLY BE TRUSTED
BUT THIS WAS FROM WWW.DRUDGE.COM THAT DRUDGE REPORT CAN BE TRUSTED. CHECK OUT THIS RELIABLE SITE ITS REUTERS
http://www.today.reuters.com/news/default.aspx
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