At the heart of the remaining investigation into Mr. Rove are the circumstances surrounding a July 11, 2003, telephone conversation between Mr. Rove and Mr. Cooper....In his testimony to the grand jury in February 2004, Mr. Rove did not disclose the conversation with Mr. Cooper, saying later that he did not recall it among the hundreds of calls he received on a daily basis. But there was a record of the call. Mr. Rove had sent an e-mail message to Stephen J. Hadley, the deputy national security adviser, which confirmed the conversation.

[Rove associates] said Mr. Rove never intended to withhold details of a conversation with a reporter from Mr. Fitzgerald, noting that Mr. Rove had signed a waiver to allow reporters to reveal to prosecutors their discuskeptical of Mr. Rove's account because the message was not discovered until the fall of 2004. It was at about the same time that Mr. Fitzgerald had begun to compel reporters to cooperate with his inquiry, among them Mr. Cooper. Associates of Mr. Rove said the e-mail message was not incriminating and was turned over immediately after it was found at the White House. ...In addition, they said, Mr. Rove testified fully about his conversation with Mr. Cooper -- long before Mr. Cooper did -- acknowledging that it was possible that the subject of Mr. Wilson's trip had come up.

Then there is this interesting note:

Mr. Fitzgerald did not learn of the Cooper conversation until months later when a search of Mr. Rove's e-mails uncovered the e-mail that he had sent to Mr. Hadley. ''

This seems to be the Rove version: Rove testifies in February, 2004 and does not remember Cooper. Cooper gets subpoenaed about Libby in May, 2004, and Viveca Novak says something about Libby being Cooper's source that jogs Luskin's memory about Rove. In the fall of 2004, he finds the Hadley e-mail and on October 15, 2004, sends Rove back to testify and correct the record -- which just happens to be two days after Matt Cooper was held in contempt for refusing to testify against Rove.

Rove can say since he was the first one to come forward with the disclosure of the Cooper call, he gets to assert recantation to avoid being charged with perjury in the fall of 2004.

(d) Where, in the same continuous court or grand jury proceeding in which a declaration is made, the person making the declaration admits such declaration to be false, such admission shall bar prosecution under this section if, at the time the admission is made, the declaration has not substantially affected the proceeding, or it has not become manifest that such falsity has been or will be exposed.

I think Rove is still trying to squirm his way out of a perjury and/or obstruction charge and convince Fitzgerald to charge him only with making a false statement to investigators, which with a decent 5k reduction, might get him down to a range of probation or home detention.

But what do you think?