Declassification unnerved White House aide

By Andy Sullivan
Reuters
Thursday, January 25, 2007; 3:10 PM

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President George W. Bush's 2003 decision to declassify an intelligence report to rebut an Iraq war critic stirred unease even in the White House, an administration official said on Thursday in the perjury trial of a vice presidential aide.

White House official Cathie Martin said she was "not comfortable" in July of that year when her boss, Vice President Dick Cheney, told her to use the information to counter charges that the administration had manipulated intelligence to build a case for invading Iraq.

Bush drew criticism last spring when he admitted he declassified the report and authorized White House officials to leak it to reporters in order to counter criticism from former ambassador Joseph Wilson, who said the administration ignored his findings that no uranium sale had taken place.

With her husband FCC Commissioner Kevin Martin watching from the front row of the courtroom, Martin said she was "still not comfortable about the NIE" even as Cheney's chief of staff, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, began sharing the information with reporters...http://tinyurl.com/2psbqk [Open in new window]
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Ex-spokeswoman contradicts Libby account

By MICHAEL J. SNIFFEN, Associated Press Writer1 hour, 54 minutes ago

Vice President Dick Cheney's spokeswoman testified Thursday she told I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby that a prominent war critic's wife was a CIA employee earlier than Libby has said he first learned it from a reporter.

On the third day of Libby's trial, Cathie Martin became the first member of Cheney's inner circle to contradict statements by Libby that led to the charges he lied to the FBI and a grand jury investigating who leaked the wife's identity to reporters in 2003.

Theodore Wells, defense lawyer for Cheney's former chief of staff, quickly sought to limit any damage from the testimony of Cheney's former assistant for public affairs.

Wells got Martin to acknowledge that she herself could not recall for sure whether she relayed the information about CIA operative Valerie Plame, wife of Iraq war critic Joseph Wilson, to Cheney and Libby on June 11, 2003, or as late as July 6, 2003.

The date is important because Libby told investigators he first heard of Plame's job from NBC reporter Tim Russert on July 10. Libby claims that because he was preoccupied with pressing national security issues, he simply forgot he had earlier learned about her work at CIA from government officials...http://tinyurl.com/2rp9xh [Open in new window]

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There was a great line in the trial testimony today about a discussion among Cheney's staff. Someone said something like, "we like to use Meet The Press." I guess that's kind of like saying, "I like to use the whore house over on ____St." I hope you're proud Tim. How much Jack Welch/GE money did it take to make it OK to be called a whore by a sleazeball in Cheney's office?

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