5 Myths About Scooter and the Slammer

Those e-mails may contain interesting stuff, but for now, it's rank speculation to suggest that they hold information about the Plame case or would have pushed Fitzgerald to charge Rove with perjury. Fitzgerald told the court just that. He was exercising standard prosecutorial discretion when he decided not to charge Rove, according to sources close to the investigation. He didn't think he had a strong enough case to prove that Rove had intentionally lied to investigators (though some FBI agents disagreed).

3. Libby didn't leak Plame's identity.

Oh, brother, am I tired of this one. Libby wasn't charged with the crime of knowingly leaking classified information about Plame; he was charged with lying to investigators. But the overwhelming weight of the evidence at the trial -- including reporters' notes of their interviews with Libby -- showed that Libby had indeed leaked classified information about Plame's identity, even though that wasn't what put him in the dock. The jury agreed that Libby lied when he said that he'd been telling reporters only what other reporters had told him about Plame's role at the CIA.

What is unclear is whether Libby knew she was a covert CIA agent at the time he discussed her with reporters -- a key point in determining whether this was an illegal leak. But Walton said that Libby "had a unique and special obligation" to keep such secrets, well, secret.

4. Bad press doesn't get under Cheney's skin.

The most powerful vice president in U.S. history is usually described as a tough customer who shrugs off media criticism. But if he had been that immune to (as one of his predecessors put it) "the nattering nabobs of negativism," he never would have told his top aide to talk about Joe Wilson, and none of this would have happened.

After all, did you hear Cathie Martin describe at trial what it was like to be the vice president's communications director during the spring and summer of 2003? Twice, Cheney dictated talking points for her about how to bat down Wilson's allegations that the administration had twisted the intelligence about Iraq's nuclear ambitions. Cheney also ordered her to start monitoring all television reports on the Niger controversy and arranged a luncheon for conservative columnists to help get out his take on everything.

And that's not all. According to Libby's testimony, Cheney arranged to have Bush declassify passages from the National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq's weapons programs -- the first time Libby had ever heard of such a thing happening -- and pass them to Judith Miller, a New York Times reporter whom the administration saw as sympathetic.

5. The White House would fire any administration official who leaked classified information about Plame.

When the investigation began, the president said he hated leaks and would hold leakers of classified information accountable. But he has not sacked anyone over the case.

Libby resigned the day he was indicted in October 2005. Two other officials who gave reporters information about Plame, former deputy secretary of state Richard L. Armitage and former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer, left government before Fitzgerald's inquiry concluded. And Rove, who first told Time magazine reporter Matt Cooper about Plame's CIA identity, remains in the White House.

leonnigc@washpost.com

Carol D. Leonnig covers federal courts for

The Washington Post.