Below is a Bloomberg article which is reporting that Karl Rove, senior adviser to the President and deputy chief of staff, and Lewis Libby, chief of staff to Vice President Cheney, are being investigated for having lied to a federal grand jury about how they learned the identity of a covert CIA agent, Valerie Plame (Murray Waas at the American Prospect wrote a similar story yesterday).

Rove, Libby Accounts in CIA Case Differ With Those of Reporters

July 22 (Bloomberg) — Two top White House aides have given accounts to a special prosecutor about how reporters first told them the identity of a CIA agent that are at odds with what the reporters have said, according to people familiar with the case.

Lewis “Scooter” Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, told special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that he first learned from NBC News reporter Tim Russert of the identity of Central Intelligence Agency operative Valerie Plame, the wife of former ambassador and Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson, one person said. Russert has testified before a federal grand jury that he didn’t tell Libby of Plame’s identity, the person said.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove told Fitzgerald that he first learned the identity of the CIA agent from syndicated columnist Robert Novak, according a person familiar with the matter. Novak, who was first to report Plame’s name and connection to Wilson, has given a somewhat different version to the special prosecutor, the person said.

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A great moment from today’s White House press briefing. It’s great to see White House reporters working in concert to at least try to get the truth out.

Q Why does Karl Rove still have security clearance and access to classified documents when he has been revealed as a leaker of a secret agent, according to Time magazine’s correspondent?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, there is an investigation that continues, and I think the President has made it clear that we’re not going to prejudge the outcome of that investigation.

Q You already have the truth.

MR. McCLELLAN: We’re not going to prejudge the outcome of that investigation through –

Q Does he have access to security documents?

MR. McCLELLAN: — through media reports. And these questions came up over the last week –

Q Did he leak the name of a CIA agent?

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Considering that so many of John Roberts’s positions remain unknown (or at least unclear), the Conservative support behind him seems remarkably consistent. Without going into details, Weekly Standard Editor William Kristol “unreservedly” praises the Roberts pick:

He’ll be a little more incremental, a little more cautious, than some of us rabid constitutionalists will sometimes like. But he is a conservative pick, and a quality pick–and, to my surprise, a non-PC, non-quota pick.

Larry Kudlow of the National Review followed suit, lauding Roberts’s record on economic issues:

Let it also be said that President Bush was true to his word. He nominated a conservative based solely on the judicial merits, a church-going Catholic father of two children who is a truly distinguished lawyer and jurist.

Manuel Miranda, writing for the Wall Street Journal, goes beyond Kudlow and Crystal, praising Roberts as a judge in the mold of Scalia or Thomas.

Last night George Bush kept his campaign promise that he would name a justice in the mold of Antonin Scalia or Clarence Thomas In John Roberts, the president got what he wanted, and we conservatives did too.

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Way back in 2001, White House press secretary Ari Fleischer went public with a declaration:

While a few [White House] senior aides are free to speak to media organizations if they alert the press office, others “should not talk to the press without authorization — it’s not their job.”

Furthermore, Fleischer claimed that the “policy [predated] Sept. 11, but it has more urgency now. ‘In a time of war, people are more concerned about nobody making mistakes,’ he said.”

So here’s a question: When Karl Rove leaked the identity of Valerie Plame, was he authorized to do so?

If no, then Karl Rove betrayed the trust of the White House.
If yes, and Rove’s actions were cleared through the press office, then the White House betrayed the trust of the American people and our nation’s security.

So, which one was it?

President Bush is working overtime to get the Central American Free Trade Agreement passed. Today he was using the same basic talking points, particularly the claim that CAFTA “would open up the market of 44 million consumers to U.S. businesses, U.S. farms, and U.S. manufacturers.” But the combined economies of the six other CAFTA nations “only equal that of New Haven, Conn.” and “account for barely one percent of U.S. trade.” With CAFTA, President Bush is trading American jobs and Central American human dignity for more corporate profits. Overall, CAFTA fails at being smart trade policy. Maybe that’s why the lobbying effort to get CAFTA passed is starting to show its desperation:

A political group working for the passage of the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) has raised the ire of U.S. Rep. Charlie Gonzalez, who claims that the organization has been making harassing calls to his constituents.

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A common thread runs through the early assessments of John Roberts: Chief Justice William Rehnquist.

Roberts “spent time in his formative years with Rehnquist, for whom he clerked in 1980-1981 and with whom he remains in touch.” Individuals “familiar with Roberts” say he appears “to be a conservative consensus-builder in the mold of…Rehnquist,” and while Roberts “hasn’t had time to build a large body of opinions,” the few he has penned “leave little doubt that he is as conservative as…Rehnquist.”

The Washington Post echoes this view. Roberts is “simultaneously skeptical of federal power over the states and supportive of executive-branch power in foreign and military affairs, and his sparse judicial record resembles the conservatism of a man he once worked for at the Supreme Court, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist.”

E.J. Dionne even calls Roberts “a William Rehnquist for the 21st century.”

CNN political analyst Bill Schneider said, “if you’re looking at Roberts and saying what kind of justice do you expect him to be, he might be pretty much like Rehnquist.” [7/19/05]

And Bill Kristol said on Fox that “Picking Roberts is like picking a replacement for Rehnquist.” [7/19/05]

In terms of judicial philosophy, John Roberts is not Justice O’Connor’s replacement. He is quite clearly a preemptive replacement of Chief Justice Rehnquist.

This is important to recognize substantively, but also strategically. As it stands today, Roberts seems very likely to be confirmed. Moreover, notwithstanding Roberts’ conservatism, President Bush and conservative activists will almost certainly insist on appointing a far-right nominee when Rehnquist eventually leaves the bench. To improve our chances of appointing a more moderate nominee in Rehnquist’s position, progressives should make clear now that we consider Roberts to be Rehnquist’s replacement. Then, when Rehnquist retires, we can rightfully demand that President Bush appoint a justice in the mold of Justice O’Connor.

The front page of the Washington Post today contains an explosive story proving once and for all that the White House knew Valerie Plame’s identity as a CIA agent was secret. Read a little further into the story, though, for another interesting — and damning — point:

[The secret State Department memo] records that the INR analyst at the [Feb. 19, 2002] meeting opposed Wilson’s trip to Niger because the State Department, through other inquiries, already had disproved the allegation that Iraq was seeking uranium from Niger.

There it is – proof the White House knew in February 2002 that Saddam was not trying to buy yellowcake from Niger. That’s nearly a year before President Bush tried to terrify the American people by including that claim in his state of the union.

Busted.

You’ll definitely want to check out some of the latest posts at our partner blog Supreme Court Extra:

Brad Joondeph writes of his experience having John Roberts as a “mentor” during a summer associateship at Roberts’ former firm, Hogan & Hartson. (Joondeph explains why he has “nothing but a profound sense of respect for John Roberts” and why Roberts “could ultimately be a progressive’s worst case scenario.”)

David Franklin, who clerked for Justice Ginsberg, ponders the immediate difference that Roberts’ confirmation will make to the landscape of constitutional law.

And American Progress’s Robert Gordon, the blog’s lead organizer, explains why Justice Scalia’s writings read “like a brief for Democrats like Chuck Schumer who are eager to press Judge Roberts on his views.”

(Congratulations are in order for the SCExtra contributors. The blog has already received some very positive reviews since its launch on Monday.)