Honest Dick Cheney told I. "Scooter" Libby to rat out Valerie Plame because of her husband's criticism of pre-war intelligence.

The disclosure in a legal document written by special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald demonstrates one way in which Cheney was involved in responding to public allegations by Plame's husband, former ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, that the administration had exaggerated questionable intelligence to justify war with Iraq.

In a letter written in January and released in court papers filed by Libby's defense Monday, Fitzgerald wrote that Libby testified that his "superiors" authorized him to disclose information from the National Intelligence Estimate to reporters in the summer of 2003.

The National Journal first reported on its Web site yesterday that Cheney had provided the authorization.

The intelligence estimate is a classified report prepared by intelligence officers for high-level government officials, and some parts are regularly declassified in a summary and available to the public.

Assuming, at this point, that everything the administration and their pundits have said is true, that Plame wasn't covert anymore, that no laws were broken, etc., then why did Cheney authorize giving her name to Novak and others? What was there to gain? The political fallout has certainly been rough and it's cost Bush and the administration a lot of it's credibility. Was it worth the hassle? Wouldn't it have been easier to let Wilson talk with some damage control? IF the administration did nothing illegal, what's the point to all this? Why is ther even a question as to the investigation? We'll see what happens but I think this act was down with absolute malice and Cheney needs to be impeached over this whole thing.

|