My almost (please let me get a signed decree before the end of the year) ex-husband…

I hear you. I’m rooting for you. It’s SUCH a drain on one’s focus and energy. I’m going through it myself. For over a year now. The clouds will part, the head will clear. It will happen, and then you can enjoy the trial.

IANAL, but it seems to me that Fitz doesn’t need Cheney’s testimony to prove that Libby committed perjury. ….

This trial isn’t about anything but Scooter’s lies to the Grand Jury and the FBI.

Well, that is right, isn’t it!? Great point, Beth.

emptywheel @ 79

That’s what I’m wondering. Also, the privledge belongs to the client not the lawyer, so if Cheney previously answered questions (like during the interview) that involved otherwise privledged matters, the cat is out of the bag and the privledge is waived.

Since you cannot selectively waive, once Cheney (or any other “client”) does that, all testimony relating to the transaction is fair game.

Here’s the bit I’m most fascinated by. Fitz was thinking of calling Dick for two reasons–one, to get him to verify his annotations and admit to how obsessed he was with responding to Joe, and two, to get him under oath wrt the NIE leaking story. Here’s a bit of conversation RE whether Libby can have Dick/Bush interview transcripts so he can prove he didn’t leak the NIE wildly. Best as I can tell, from this and any subsequent filing, Fitz gets out of turning over whatever Bush and Dick had to say on the NIE with some fancy footwork here.

MR. WELLS: I started out making what I characterized as a Brady request to the extent that either the vice president or the president have testified that they did authorize disclosure.

THE COURT: Testified?

MR. WELLS: I’m making a Brady request. I believe there is testimony. I believe there is testimony or interviews.

THE COURT: I didn’t know they had testified.

MR. WELLS: I don’t know the procedure whether they talked to somebody in somebody’s office. But to the extent he has statements from either the vice president or the president, to the extent that disclosure of the NIE was authorized and I believe that maybe that the testimony does not tie it down to a particular day, only that it did take place, I believe I’m entitled to that. All I asked Mr. Fitzgerald from the beginning is are you going to put this stuff in just because of background, because it happened. If you’re not contending that there is anything wrong with it, I don’t need the Brady. I can open on it with comfort.
But if he’s laying back and going to say, ah, got you, I have a right, I believe, if such testimony exists, to know it.

So then they go into a discussion about this–about how Fitz is going to use it [Libby wants to know so he can figure out whether he can call Woodward and use it to incriminate Armitage and thereby distract the jury, among other reasons.] And then, seemingly, Fitz gets out of having to provide Dick and Bush’s testimony with this bit:

THE COURT: I understand that he might open the door in some way that would cause you to have to bring in some information but it seems to me that, if you have any information right now that you know would potentially undermine Mr. Libby’s credibility or suggest something sinister on his part if he brings out information about these earlier events, then it seems to me he has a right to know that.

MR. FITZGERALD: And he has it. It is the grand jury transcript. It is not a big deal. It is his client saying I’m not sure if I had the authority when I talked on July 2nd or not, and he has it. But it is not a focus.

THE COURT: You don’t have anything that would definitively show that he did not have authority.

MR. FITZGERALD: As to the timing, no, I don’t have anything that sets the date other than before, my belief is it is before July 8th. Besides saying July 8 it happened by, I can’t move the date into June or July, a specific date.

In other words, Fitz uses Libby’s own testimony (in which he basically says he got once-in-a-lifetime authorization to leak what he leaked to Judy, but doesn’t know whether he was authorized to leak to Woodward or David Sanger), rather than Dick and Bush’s.

But I’ve always wondered why he didn’t just turn over DIck and Bush’s interview transcripts.

New thread upstairs

Thanks, LHP

I have never played bridge. Don’t know the rules. Is defender a term of art in bridge.

My almost (please let me get a signed decree before the end of the year) ex-husband thinks I am uncivilized b/c i am completely clueless about bridge.

I grew up in a very working class household. I am the first person in me extended famly to go to college. We played poker, for pretzels, in my backyard.

Yeah, defense is a bridge term-of-art. I grew up in a blue-collar household, too. Bridge was thing you crossed on your way to work. I learned bridge in college, but I prefer cribbage or poker.

BC