I'm beginning to think it possible that Karl Rove either is not going to be charged in the Valerie Plame Leak investigation, or if he is charged, it will be with a false statement rather than perjury offense. If it's the second scenario, Rove could make a plea deal with Fitzgerald under which he agrees to plead guilty if Fitzgerald agrees to request a sentencing reduction to probation, because of his cooperation against others.

Here's the reasoning:

1. Fitzgerald may decide to give Rove a complete pass if he has cooperated to significant extent, turning on Libby and others in Cheney's office, the White House Iraq Group and perhaps the State or Defense Departments. Under this scenario, Fitzgerald simply would not submit a proposed charge for Rove to the grand jury so there would be no vote on him at all.

The two topics tonight around the blogosphere seem to be Dick Cheney and Karl Rove. As to Cheney:

There have been questions raised about whether Dick Cheney was under oath when he was interviewed by Fitzgerald. The New York Times reported on June 5, 2004 (as TChris noted here) that he was not:

It is not clear when or where Mr. Cheney was interviewed, but he was not questioned under oath and he has not been asked to appear before the grand jury, people officially informed about the case said.

That is unlikely to make a difference. As I noted in the comments over at Firedoglake yesterday:

Raw Story posts that tomorrow's Roll Call will report that Patrick Fitzgerald paid a visit to Robert Luskin, Karl Rove's lawyer, at his Patton Boggs D.C. office today.

Why? Since when do Special Prosecutors make house calls?

Update: I should have figured this our earlier. My speculation: Fitz was probably interviewing the cooperative Rove one more time - and didn't want to have Rove seen at his office or where the grand jury meets.

The Los Angeles Times reports that Fitzgerald's team went out to interview neighbors of Joseph Wilson and Valerie Plame Wilson today to ascertain whether they knew she worked for the CIA.

CNN had more tonight (available on Lexis.com):

A neighbor of Valerie Plame has been interviewed by FBI agents for the second time. The agents asked Marc Lefkowitz on Monday night whether he knew about Plame's work at the CIA before her identity was leaked in a July 2003 column. Lefkowitz told agents he did not, according to his wife, Elise Lefkowitz. ...Lefkowitz said this is the second time FBI agents have asked whether the couple was aware of Plame's CIA work. She said the first interview took place several months ago.

FBI agents are looking into who leaked Plame's name to the press. Federal law makes it a crime to deliberately reveal the identity of a CIA operative, and special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is heading a probe into the matter. (Posted 6:01 p.m.)

Via Crooks and Liars: Today is the third anniversary of Senator Paul Wellstone's death.

I happened to be in St. Paul, Minn. the day he died. It was awful, as I recounted here.

When is another liberal hero going to come along? It can't happen soon enough for me.

This is the last night we'll be left guessing. I'm heading out to the jail to visit a client for a few hours, here's a space for your Plame related thoughts.

All of TalkLeft's coverage of the leak and investigation from 2003 to the present is available here.

Who is going to be indicted? Who flipped? Who walks? And what does it mean for Bush's legacy?

It's past 5pm on the East Coast. The courthouse is closed. Steve Clemons of the Washington Note, however, has this update:

An uber-insider source has just reported the following to TWN:

1. 1-5 indictments are being issued. The source feels that it will be towards the higher end.
2. The targets of indictment have already received their letters.
3. The indictments will be sealed indictments and "filed" tomorrow.
4. A press conference is being scheduled for Thursday.

Tonight should see some of the finest spinning yet from those under Fitzgerald's gun.

Update: Political Wire reports White House officials are turning on each other.

While we're waitng for the other shoe to drop, go read former Senator Gary Hart over at HuffPo on the crime of outing a CIA Agent.

Lexis-Nexis has just issued a press release with the results of its search of court cases involving Harriet Miers. The report is free and available here. (pdf).

Lexis also searched for cases involving others named as potential nominees. According to the LexisNexis database, Miers has been involved 16 cases. The others, it notes, have far more experience. Of course, most of those are judges who write opinions for a living.

What's key here is a reminder of who might be appointed if Ms. Miers' nomination is defeated.

by TChris

Senators who no longer deem it appropriate to rubber stamp unqualified presidential appointees to federal jobs are starting to ask questions. The latest nominee to search for answers is Ellen Sauerbrey, "a Republican loyalist chosen by President Bush to head the State Department's refugee program."

"It doesn't appear that you have very specific experience," said Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., during Sauerbrey's confirmation hearing before the Foreign Relations Committee.

"I don't think we see the requisite experience that we've seen in other nominees" for the job, added Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif.

What experience did Sauerbrey have that motivated the president to nominate her to the post? She ran Bush's 2000 campaign in Maryland.

Many news reports from 1999 have this quote of George Bush at a 1999 news conference. (E.g. AP, 6/8/99, USA Today, 6/11/99, Dallas Morning News, 6/9/99, available on Lexis.com)

Texas Gov. George W. Bush said Tuesday that he would have voted to impeach President Clinton over the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

"I would have voted for it. I thought the man lied," he said in response to a question posed during a news conference.

Memo to President Bush: If you're thinking of reacting to any false statement or perjury charges with a statement that your boys just got confused in their testimony, that dog won't hunt.

Lots of liberals are ticked off today by Nicholas Kristof's column in the New York Times in which he writes:

So I find myself repulsed by the glee that some Democrats show at the possibility of Karl Rove and Mr. Libby being dragged off in handcuffs. It was wrong for prosecutors to cook up borderline and technical indictments during the Clinton administration, and it would be just as wrong today.

Here's Trey Ellis at Huffington Post. Atrios calls Kristof the "wanker of the day."

My favorite is Bourbon Street's author Leonce Gaiter's "Kristof Wants to Be a Virgin." Here's a snippet: