Left In Lowell

Will any allegation ever be bad enough for this Congress to investigate this president and his White House? It is, though, nice to know that some reporters are still out there doing their job (gotta love Murray Waas). I mean, this isn’t a surprise, per se, but it’s definitely a surprise that it’s getting any coverage (bold mine):

Cheney, Libby Blocked Papers To Senate Intelligence Panel
By Murray Waas, special to National Journal
© National Journal Group Inc.
Thursday, Oct. 27, 2005

Vice President Cheney and his chief of staff, I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, overruling advice from some White House political staffers and lawyers, decided to withhold crucial documents from the Senate Intelligence Committee in 2004 when the panel was investigating the use of pre-war intelligence that erroneously concluded Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, according to Bush administration and congressional sources.

Among the White House materials withheld from the committee were Libby-authored passages in drafts of a speech that then-Secretary of State Colin L. Powell delivered to the United Nations in February 2003 to argue the Bush administration’s case for war with Iraq, according to congressional and administration sources. The withheld documents also included intelligence data that Cheney’s office — and Libby in particular — pushed to be included in Powell’s speech, the sources said.
…
Had the withheld information been turned over, according to administration and congressional sources, it likely would have shifted a portion of the blame away from the intelligence agencies to the Bush administration as to who was responsible for the erroneous information being presented to the American public, Congress, and the international community.

In April 2004, the Intelligence Committee released a report that concluded that “much of the information provided or cleared by the Central Intelligence Agency for inclusion in Secretary Powell’s [United Nation’s] speech was overstated, misleading, or incorrect.”

Both Republicans and Democrats on the committee say that their investigation was hampered by the refusal of the White House to turn over key documents, although Republicans said the documents were not as central to the investigation. [Of course they would.]

“According to Bush administration and congressional sources…” says Waas…do you think they’re getting ready to scapegoat Cheney if they have to in regards to the Plame affair?

[Via dailykos.com]