According to a headline at Raw Story, L. Lewis Libby has testified to a grand jury that President Bush indirectly gave him permission to release sensitive information from a closely-guarded “National Intelligence Estimate” on Iraq to a New York Times reporter in 2003. (The direct authorization came from VP Cheney’s office). This new information comes from an article appearing in today’s New York Sun and is based upon a new court filing from the special prosecutor in the case. This is the first revelation of a direct Bush link.

From the Sun article:

In a court filing late Wednesday responding to requests from Mr. Libby’s attorneys for government records that might aid his defense, Mr. Fitzgerald shed new light on Mr. Libby’s claims that he was authorized to provide sensitive information to the Times reporter, Judith Miller, at a meeting on July 8, 2003.

“Defendant testified that he was specifically authorized in advance of the meeting to disclose the key judgments of the classified NIE to Miller on that occasion because it was thought that the NIE was ‘pretty definitive’ against what Ambassador Wilson had said and that the vice president thought that it was ‘very important’ for the key judgments of the NIE to come out,” Mr. Fitzgerald wrote.

Mr. Libby is said to have testified that “at first” he rebuffed Mr. Cheney’s suggestion to release the information because the estimate was classified. However, according to the vice presidential aide, Mr. Cheney subsequently said he got permission for the release directly from Mr. Bush. “Defendant testified that the vice president later advised him that the president had authorized defendant to disclose the relevant portions of the NIE,” the prosecution filing said.

According to the court filing, a legal counsel to the vice president named David Addington had indicated to Mr. Libby that President Bush’s permission to disclose the estimate “amounted to a declassification of the document.”

According to the Sun, Bush may not have know that Judith Miller would be at the receiving end of the leak, but VP Dick Cheney did.

The court papers filed by Mr. Fitzgerald do not make clear whether Mr. Bush knew the disclosure was destined for Ms. Miller, though they indicate Mr. Cheney knew that fact. Mr. Libby is also said to have testified that five days later Mr. Cheney authorized the release to the press of information about a cable about Mr. Wilson’s trip.

An important question to ask is why the President felt it was important enough to declassify this extremely sensitive information and leak it. And why did Bush (if he knew) or Dick Cheney (who knew) have leaked it to Judith Miller of the New York Times? Doing something just because you can does not relieve anyone - especially the President - of the responsibility to do what is right.

Murray Waas has the story at the National Journal.

At Think Progress, Judd is highly disappointed by the White House press corps’ lack of curiosity (or nerve?) :

When the White House press corps had an opportunity this morning to ask Press Secretary Scott McClellan questions [regarding this story], they didn’t ask him about it.

It’s all over the internet already.

This may cause people to wonder if former Chief of Staff Andrew Card’s resignation didn’t come at just the right time. Bod Woodward has claimed that he had been told about Valerie Plame Wilson’s CIA employment in June of 2003, before any other journalists. Last November, he’d written a Washington Post column about it and identified his source as a “senior administration official”. Raw Story claims it was National Securioty advisor Stephen Hadley, but we must remember that Andrew Card was closely involved with WHIG and he was “leak-proof” (according to Dan Froomkin). Yet, here we have an intentional leak with the blessings of the Oval Office. The White House Iraq Group (WHIG) was formed in summer of 2002 by Andrew Card to publicize the threat posed by Saddam Hussein. WHIG operated out of VP Cheney’s office. Cheney allegedly knew exactly where the leak was going to and did it for the politics of destruction. Libby is fingering Bush as the one who declassified the document and who gave permission to leak information from it. WHIG has become entwined in Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation. Last year , Fitzgerald had subpoenaed the WHIG’s emails and other documents.