If there was anything new, I didn't learn it. If he had a point, I didn't get it.

I've been getting that feeling about Wells' cross throughout, and maybe even his trial prep.  It isn't focused.  It's like hitting with a hand with the fingers spread wide - diffuse, poking, and weak - rather than a clenched fist - concentrated and able to do damage.  This is, IMHO and based on the limited amount we've seen so far, more likely that he's been served a sh*t sandwich for a case, and he's trying to make it something more palatable.  Also, we don't know what high cards Wells has in his own hand for the defense case - whether and to what extent they've been able to prep Deadeye for his proposed testimony is question number one in my mind there.  I have no doubt Scooter will loudly and clearly proclaim his absolute lack of criminal intent, which only makes for a jury question.

Looking back, it seems to me that when his proposed memory expert didn't remember Fitz, it foretold troubles for the defense case.  $3 mil worth of lawyers' and spinmeisters' fees should have bought trial prep and prep of a proposed expert which would have brought up to the expert - prior to testifying - that the attorney doing the cross on that expert had done so before.

Ari was a polished pro.  . . . Ari used communicator type words, to say he was "horrified" that he might have a role in exposing Plame.  . . . Rather than directing his answers to Zeidenberg or Jeffress, he turned to the jury and spoke to them directly, gesturing with his hands.

In an odd way, this helps his credibility.  Ari was being himself, and being true to himself.  He's a PR and communications man, he's one of the best going - he has to be, to be the Press Secretary for the Preznit.  He's communicating - textbook.  I strongly believe in the old saying:  "What you are screams so loudly I cannot hear what you are saying".  You don't dress a hod carrier in Brooks Brothers and expect his testimony to be believed (esp. if he's claiming poverty....)

In this case, what Ari is and what he's saying are congruent and this makes him stronger as a witness.  As to his speaking directly to the jury, I wonder whether (and doubt) there was any preparatory instruction from the prosecution or whether it was simply unconscious behavior on his part.  I'd bet the latter.  Since, IIRC, Walton has tied counsel to the podium, this is not one of those situations where by moving around the courtroom one can force the witness to address the jury (by counsel questioning while standing at the downstream end of the box), or look away from them (by standing in an opposite corner).  You're absolutely right about asking the judge to compel the witness to look at the questioner, but it's hard to get that done before the jury without looking like a tool for wanting the witness not to look at them, and even harder if the witness is being compliant (which it seems Ari was)....  

He also was unshakable in his assertion that Scooter Libby told him at lunch on July 7th, the day he left for Africa, that Wilson's wife suggested him for the Africa trip and that she worked in the CIA's counterproliferation division. He said Libby told him this was "hush-hush" and on the QT.

If you only ever had lunch with a guy once, and the guy tells you strange stuff (or uses strange words) during that lunch - it's going to stick in memory, and you will not be shaken on that.  I'd opine the best the defense could have done with that "Hush-hush, QT" tidbit (which is all over all the evening news shows, along with Danny DeVito/"LA Confidential" references on blogs) would have been to let it pass and not ask any questions about it.  I'm led to wonder how forthcoming Scooter was in his sessions with his attorneys if they didn't see that coming (even without interviewing Ari).

the inference being, that maybe Russert really heard about Plame from Gregory while Dickenson may have been the person who told Matthew Cooper. But, it was a balloon that didn't take off. I expect they will return to this theory during Russert and Coopers' testimony.

For this line of questioning to work implies (and requires) (a) that Russert and Gregory talk, and that Dickenson and Cooper talk, (b) that these pairs talked in the relevant time frame, and (c) that Gregory and Dickenson both chose to share information which was either (i) seen as irrelevant idle gossip shared in a boring off moment of a foreign trip, (ii) ironic, ephemeral trivia, (iii) identified immediately as a transparent hit-job, or (iv) hot stuff.  We don't know (yet) the nature of the relationships among these pairs of competitive, top-of-the-game reporters, nor do we know how the recipients of the information saw it.  My preference is towards (ii) or (iii), followed by (i).  If it was (iv), I can't see these reporters just "sharing", at least without a quid pro quo or trade of something.

Cheney former counsel David Addington, now his Chief of Staff, took the stand. He was friendly, not hostile yet seemed to bury Libby.

He explained Dan Bartlett's statement to him on Air Force One about Wilson's wife being behind the Niger mission and working for the CIA as an extemporaneous utterance by Bartlett, not particularly directed at him. Ari was more interested in the document he was reading at the time, and didn't pay much attention to Bartlett, since he had heard this before -- from Libby.

I was following Marcy's fabulous liveblogging when that came up and was floored. What a dis.
The president's office v the VP.

I was very impressed with how Ari put it. He is an extremely skilled actor with great talent. Answering questions is his craft.  As much as I hated his lying BS answers then as press sec at least I could watch it.

Way better than watching Tony Snow, skilled with no talent and really mean to boot. I could only stand to watch him for his first four or five press conferences before I decided it that it was a waste of time.

I missed this though:

Libby asked him [Addington] if the President could order material declassified and whether there would be a paper trail if a CIA employee's spouse went on a trip. He also said that at one point in the conversation, Libby used his hands to gesture him to speaklower.

what in the world is going on with libby's defense team?

have they concluded that he does not have  a prayer and are trying to extort help or pardon from the whitehouse?

if so, revealing the white house m.operandi doesn't seem a very good way of going about this.

if i were libby i'd be pissed and scared at my lawyers' spineless defense.

are they just trying to keep a low profile and play down the prosecution's strong points right now and not make too much of them in front of the jury?

The point that keeps coming to me is that Libby/Wells did not take a deal.  Not at the start, not after the indictment, and not after the November  2006 elections/Rumsfeld's resignation - at which point a pardon prior to 2009 became much less likely.

So either they have something to base their defense upon.  Or their plan is to make the trial so ugly that Bush issues a pre-emptive pardon.  But the latter strategy is so risky I don't see how they could chance it.