Carol D. Leonnig and Jim VandeHei write in today’s Washington Post that the big announcement will be made on Friday.

The prosecutor in the CIA leak investigation presented a summary of his case to a federal grand jury yesterday and is expected to announce a final decision on charges in the two-year-long probe tomorrow, according to people familiar with the case.

The reporters say it is unlikely he will fake us out and extend the grand jury’s term, which expires tomorrow:

Should he need more time to finish the investigation, Fitzgerald could seek to empanel a new group of grand jurors to consider the case. But sources familiar with the prosecutor’s work said he has indicated he is eager to avoid that route. The term of the current grand jury has been extended once and cannot be lengthened again, according to federal rules.

Whenever I feel impatient, I remind myself that the wait must be torture for Karl Rove. Happy thoughts!

Even as Special Counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald wrapped up his case, the legal team of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove has been engaged in a furious effort to convince the prosecutor that Rove did not commit perjury during the course of the investigation, according to people close to the aide. The sources, who indicated that the effort intensified in recent weeks, said Rove still did not know last night whether he would be indicted.

And here’s another happy thought:

A new USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup poll reminded the White House of the damage the CIA leak case has already inflicted: Eight in ten people surveyed said that aides had either broken the law or acted unethically.

Over at the Los Angeles Times, Doyle McManus, Warren Vieth and Mary Curtius discuss how the White House might react to indictments.

The basic plan is familiar to anyone who has watched earlier presidents contend with scandal: Keep the problem at arm’s length, let allies outside the White House do the talking, and try to change the subject to something — anything — else.

The White House doesn’t plan to attack Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor in the CIA leak investigation — at least not directly, several GOP officials said. Instead, expect Bush to unveil a flurry of proposals on subjects from immigration and tax reform to Arab-Israeli peace talks.

Oh, yes, that’ll work. When the press hears the President is going to make a tax reform proposal, they’ll scamper away from the courthouse and come runnin’ to the White House.

Or maybe not.

Republicans outside the White House are pleading with Bush to act quickly and decisively if aides are indicted. “What is of most concern is that the president handle it properly — that he ask [officials who are indicted] to step down; that he not vacillate, not equivocate; that he be decisive,” said Rep. Christopher Shays (R-Conn.), a leading Republican moderate.

“Changing the subject will not work,” said David Gergen, a former aide to Presidents Reagan and Clinton. “Giving more speeches about Iraq or the state of the economy doesn’t have the weight that action does…. It’s dangerous for the country to have a disabled president for three years, and we’re getting close to seeing that happen. I worry that they [Bush and his aides] are in denial.”

And GOP pollster David Winston warned that discontent among Republicans in Congress was rising. “This is not the environment that Republicans want to run in next year,” Winston said.

The Bushies actually seem to think the story will go away.

White House officials and allies are hoping that intensive news coverage of the Fitzgerald investigation will be short-lived. On Nov. 7, they predicted, attention would shift to the Senate confirmation hearings of Supreme Court nominee Harriet E. Miers.

“Let’s say something happens in the next 48 hours,” said one official. “It will dominate the news cycle until the 7th of November. Then a new cycle begins: Harriet will be the news.”

Once the controversy begins to subside, they argued, Bush will have an opening to change the subject and call public attention to Iraq and the domestic economy, where the administration says there is good news.

“Because all this other snap, crackle and pop is occurring, it’s harder to tell the story of the progress being made on the foreign policy front and the economic front,” another strategist said. “When some of these other stories expire, it will be easier to get back on those issues.”

Others disagree.

[David] Gergen said problems went deeper than the CIA case. “This story’s going to have legs if somebody gets indicted,” he said. “I think the president has to lance the boil directly…. It starts with facing reality, accepting your share of responsibility without blinking.”

Kenneth M. Duberstein, who served as chief of staff to Reagan after his White House was shaken by a scandal over secret weapons sales to Iran, said his old boss “cleaned house and appointed…. a very strong management team. There are lessons to follow there.”

Yes, but this is George W. Bush we’re talking about. He’s not capable of facing reality without blinking, accepting responsibility, or starting over with a new team any more than pigs can fly.

Also: Congratulations to Chicago and the White Sox. The fellow pictured on the baseball card above, John Collins, played first base for the Sox ca. 1912.

First item–Hurricane Wilma is tearing across Florida. Hang in there, Florida!

Second item — some guy named Ben Bernanke has been tagged to succeed Alan Greenspan as Federal Reserve Chairman. I know absolutely nothing about Bernanke, but Brad DeLong says he’s a good choice. I’ll post other comments from people who know stuff about economics as soon as I find some.

Third item–tonight Patrick Fitzgerald is makin’ a list and checkin’ it twice. Pretty soon we’ll find out who’s naughty and who’s nice.

As I keyboard some guy on MSNBC is saying that Libby and Rove have bothed been advised they are in “legal jeopardy.” I think we may have heard that already.

Jason Leopold and Larisa Alexandrovna of Raw Story have posted what they call a more detailed account of how Valerie Plame was uncovered.

Those close to the investigation say that Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has been told that David Wurmser, then a Middle East adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney on loan from the office of then-Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs John Bolton, met with Cheney and his chief of staff I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby in June 2003 and told Libby that Plame set up the Wilson trip. He asserted that it was a boondoggle, the sources said.

Libby then shared the information with Karl Rove, President Bush’s deputy chief of staff, the sources said. Wurmser also passed on the same information about Wilson to then-Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley and then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, they added.

The “boondoggle” claim was bogus, of course, but it is significant because tracing how that story was spread could have provided some solid evidence into a conspiracy and who might have been part of it. Be sure to read all of the Raw Story report for the juicy details.

More proof the Apocalypse is at hand–A diarist of RedState.Org named reddstaty posted a suggestion that Karl Rove and Scooter Libby should resign no matter what; should have resigned already, in fact.

Karl Rove and Scooter Libby should both resign immediately. In fact, they should have both resigned as soon as the identity of Plame passed from their lips to the reporters they were speaking to.

It is by now pretty obvious that both Rove and Libby passed Plame’s identity to reporters (Rove to Matt Cooper and Libby to Judith Miller; we apparently still don’t know who passed it on to Bob Novak and others), knowing that it was highly likely to be printed in national newspapers and magazines (if not guaranteed, if they told enough people).

It is also pretty obvious that she was an undercover agent who was entitled to not have her identity splashed all over the pages of a national newspaper. If she was not under some kind of cover, it is not likely that the CIA would have forwarded the investigation to the DOJ, that the DOJ would have pursued the investigation as long as they did, and that the judges overseeing Fitzgerald would have allowed him to expand his investigation as quickly as they did (that is, if she wasn’t undercover, this investigation would have ended long ago).

This means that Rove and Libby outed an undercover CIA agent.

I’m sure the last thing reddstaty needs is approval from me. Commenters are giving him a hard enough time already. But I was moved. And notice the commenters can’t address specific facts, especially “If she was not under some kind of cover, it is not likely that the CIA would have forwarded the investigation to the DOJ, that the DOJ would have pursued the investigation as long as they did, and that the judges overseeing Fitzgerald would have allowed him to expand his investigation as quickly as they did.” Of course if the CIA would not have pursued this case unless the CIA believed someone had done something wrong. Makes sense.

Anyway–best antidote to the nonsense coming from the clueless rightie commenters–Media Matters Plame FAQ and the Think Progress Right-Wing Plame Myth page.

I apologize for not updating Traitorgate news yesterday, but Dan Froomkin tells you everything you need to know

The revelation du jour is from Murray Waas:

New York Times reporter Judith Miller told the federal grand jury in the CIA leak case that she might have met with I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby on June 23, 2003 only after prosecutors showed her Secret Service logs that indicated she and Libby had indeed met that day in the Executive Office Building adjacent to the White House, according to attorneys familiar with her testimony.

When a prosecutor first questioned Miller during her initial grand jury appearance on September 30, 2005 sources said, she did not bring up the June 23 meeting in recounting her various contacts with Libby, the chief of staff to Vice President Cheney. Pressed by prosecutors who then brought up the specific date of the meeting, Miller testified that she still could not recall the June meeting with Libby, in which they discussed a controversial CIA-sponsored mission to Africa by former Ambassador Joe Wilson, or the fact that his wife, Valerie Plame, worked for the CIA.

When a prosecutor presented Miller with copies of the White House-complex visitation logs, she said such a meeting was possible.

And by sheer coincidence (wink) Judy discovered her notes from the July 23 meeting–they must’ve fallen behind the sofa–and turned them over to Fitzgerald. Heh.

Dave Johnston reports in the New York Times that Fitzgerald

… is focusing on whether Karl Rove, the senior White House adviser, and I. Lewis Libby Jr., chief of staff for Vice President Dick Cheney, sought to conceal their actions and mislead prosecutors, lawyers involved in the case said Thursday.

Among the charges that Mr. Fitzgerald is considering are perjury, obstruction of justice and false statement – counts that suggest the prosecutor may believe the evidence presented in a 22-month grand jury inquiry shows that the two White House aides sought to cover up their actions, the lawyers said.

Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby have been advised that they may be in serious legal jeopardy, the lawyers said, but only this week has Mr. Fitzgerald begun to narrow the possible charges. The prosecutor has said he will not make up his mind about any charges until next week, government officials say.

With the term of the grand jury expiring in one week, though, some lawyers in the case said they were persuaded that Mr. Fitzgerald had all but made up his mind to seek indictments. None of the lawyers would speak on the record, citing the prosecutor’s requests not to talk about the case.

(Singing:

Anticipation
Anticipation
Is makin’ me late
Is keepin’ me waitin’

…)

I’m not making predictions, but you know that if Fitzgerald doesn’t bring indictments the righties are going to be insufferable. I don’t even want to think about it. On the other hand, if there are indictments, the explosion of slime and invective the Right will unleash on Fitzgerald will be awesome. The planet will not have seen the like since the Krakatoa eruption of 1883.

Here’s another interesting tidbit from the Johnston article:

But Mr. Rove and Mr. Libby may not be the only people at risk. There may be others in the government who could be charged for violations of the disclosure law or of other statutes, like the espionage act, which makes it a crime to transmit classified information to people not authorized to receive it.

It is still not publicly known who first told the columnist Robert D. Novak the identity of the C.I.A. officer, Valerie Wilson. Mr. Novak identified her in a column on July 14, 2003, using her maiden name, Valerie Plame. Mr. Fitzgerald knows the identity of this source, a person who is not believed to work at the White House, the lawyers said.

Bob “The Reptile” Novak said this of his source:

During a long conversation with a senior administration official, I asked why Wilson was assigned the mission to Niger. He said Wilson had been sent by the CIA’s counterproliferation section at the suggestion of one of its employees, his wife. It was an offhand revelation from this official, who is no partisan gunslinger.”

Make of that what you will.

They’re also anticipatin’ at the White House. At the Washington Post, Jim VandeHei and Peter Baker write “the surreal silence in the Roosevelt Room each morning belies the nervous discussions racing elsewhere around the West Wing.”

Out of the hushed hallway encounters and one-on-one conversations, several scenarios have begun to emerge if Rove or vice presidential chief of staff I. Lewis Libby is indicted and forced out. Senior GOP officials are developing a public relations strategy to defend those accused of crimes and, more importantly, shield Bush from further damage, according to Republicans familiar with the plans. And to help steady a shaken White House, they say, the president might bring in trusted advisers such as budget director Joshua B. Bolten, lobbyist Ed Gillespie or party chairman Ken Mehlman.

This is the part I found most interesting:

These tentative discussions come at a time when White House senior officials are exploring staff changes to address broader structural problems that have bedeviled Bush’s second term, according to Republicans who said they could speak candidly about internal deliberations only if they are not named. But it remains unclear whether Bush agrees that changes are needed and the uncertainty has unsettled his team. …

… Bush implicitly acknowledged the distractions in answer to a reporter’s question during a Rose Garden appearance with visiting Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas yesterday, while reassuring the public that he remained focused on the pressing matters of state facing his White House.

“There’s some background noise here, a lot of chatter, a lot of speculation and opining,” Bush said. “But the American people expect me to do my job, and I’m going to.”

Although he’s generally disinterested in the governing thing, he may get to it any day now.

Many allies blame the insularity of his team for recent missteps, such as the Miers nomination. Even some sympathetic to her believe the vetting process broke down because as White House counsel she was so well known to the president that skeptical questions were not asked.

Some GOP officials outside the White House say they believe the president rejects the idea that there is anything fundamentally wrong with his presidency; others express concern that Bush has strayed so far from where he intended to be that it may require drastic action.

I infer that Bush is not dealing with any of this well. He’s buried his twitchy little head in the sand and hopes the bad things will go away. But indictments or no indictments, if Bush’s second term continues to go south, Capitol Hill Republicans will have to do an intervention to salvage what’s left of it.

The other information in the WaPo article that interested me is that Bush’s ever-shrinking inner circle is burning out.

Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. gets up each day at 4:20 a.m., arrives at his office a little over an hour later, gets home between 8:30 and 9 p.m. and often still takes calls after that; he has been in his pressure-cooker job since Bush was inaugurated, longer than any chief of staff in decades. “He looks totally burned out,” a Republican strategist said.

Others, including Rove, Bolten, counselor Dan Bartlett, senior adviser Michael J. Gerson and press secretary Scott McClellan, have been running at full tilt since 1999, when the Bush team began gearing up in Austin for the first campaign.

Compare/contrast with Bush, who is famous for his extensive vacations and early bedtimes. Bush must be the most well-rested President since William Henry Harrison spent his entire one month in office on his deathbed.

Update: Fitzgerald launches web site! Could it be, as Froomkin suggests, “he’s getting ready to release some new legal documents? Like, maybe, some indictments? It’s certainly not the action of an office about to fold up its tents and go home.”

Fitzgerald’s office won’t say, of course.

It has occurred to me that the Grand Silence coming from Fitzgerald must be more terrifying to the potential targets than a leakier investigation, like Ken Starr’s. If information were leaking out, the Bushies would at least have something to do; they could be busily spinning away every little drop. But there’s nothing the Bushies can do now but wait.

Today’s buzz is that Patrick Fitzgerald is looking into Dick Cheney’s role in the Valerie Plame leak. Bloomberg reports:

The special counsel, Patrick Fitzgerald, has questioned current and former officials of President George W. Bush’s administration about whether Cheney was involved in an effort to discredit the agent’s husband, Iraq war critic and former U.S. diplomat Joseph Wilson, according to the people.

Fitzgerald has questioned Cheney’s communications adviser Catherine Martin and former spokeswoman Jennifer Millerwise and ex-White House aide Jim Wilkinson about the vice president’s knowledge of the anti-Wilson campaign and his dealings on it with Libby, his chief of staff, the people said. The information came from multiple sources, who requested anonymity because of the secrecy and political sensitivity of the investigation. …

… One lawyer intimately involved in the case, who like the others demanded anonymity, said one reason Fitzgerald was willing to send Miller to jail to compel testimony was because he was pursuing evidence the vice president may have been aware of the specifics of the anti-Wilson strategy.

And both U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Hogan and an appellate-court panel — including David Tatel, a First Amendment advocate — said they ruled in Fitzgerald’s favor because of the gravity of the case.

Another juicy bit:

Fitzgerald has told lawyers involved in the case that he hopes to conclude soon — the grand jury’s term expires Oct. 28, although it could be extended — and there is a growing sense among knowledgeable observers that the outcome will involve serious criminal charges. “Fitzgerald is putting together a big case,” Washington attorney Robert Bennett, who represents Miller, said on the ABC-TV program “This Week” yesterday.

World o’ Crap poses a serious constitutional question:

So, if Bush gets impeached for incompetence, Cheney resigns because he’s implicated in a conspiracy that ended up outing a CIA agent, and DeLay has stepped down as Speaker of the House House Majority Leader because of an ongoing corruption investigation, then who becomes the President? (And doesn’t the Constitution specify that, per the “Three Strikes and You’re Out” clause, that this would mean that the party in charge has to retire from the field?)

Maybe we could outsource the federal government?

Meanwhile, Kevin Drum examines a possible John Bolton connection.