self-delete

[DemsUnited]

[clydefrand]

1. Didn't Fitz say that Libby was the first "known" person to tell

a reporter? I heard and read that last night.

[Noisy Democrat]

2. Yes

Fitzgerald never said Libby was absolutely the first, just the first known.

[DemsUnited]

3. This whole point is irrelevent except as a talking point for Republicans.

Whether or not Libby was the first senior white house official to leak to a reporter has zero impact on perjury, false statements and obstruction of justice.

However, in the interest of "just the facts" during his news Fitzgerald said two things:

1. "In fact, Mr. Libby was the first official known to have told a reporter when he talked to Judith Miller in June of 2003 about Valerie Wilson."

2. "At the end of the day what appears is that Mr. Libby's story that he was at the tail end of a chain of phone calls, passing on from one reporter what he heard from another, was not true.

It was false. He was at the beginning of the chain of phone calls, the first official to disclose this information outside the government to a reporter. And then he lied about it afterwards, under oath and repeatedly."

So, technically, Fitzgerald did use the "known" word in the first statement and said Libby "was at the beginning of the chain" NOT that he was the first link in the second.

None of this at all impacts the facts, dates, and evidence laid out in the official indictment papers. Which, by the way, says not a word about Libby being the first or only leaker to the media.