Murray Waas has a new article up on the National Journal's site called The Libby-Cheney Connection in which he speculates that if Libby is convicted Patrick Fitzgerald will next go after Cheney. More promisingly, Fitzgerald's grilling of Libby during the grand jury testimony points to his suspicions of a Cheney coverup. More after the jump.
I will not quote Waas's article extensively to avoid copyright infringement, but the key quote is
If Libby is found guilty, investigators are likely to probe further to determine if Libby devised what they consider a cover story in an effort to shield Cheney. They want to know whether Cheney might have known about the leaks ahead of time or had even encouraged Libby to provide information to reporters about Plame's CIA status, the same sources said.
Waas notes that Fitzgerald grilled Libby on what Libby and Cheney discussed regarding the Russert cover story. Some excerpts:
Fitzgerald then pressed Libby: "What did you understand from his gesture or reaction in tilting his head?"
Libby responded: "That the Tim Russert part caught his attention. You know, that he- he reacted as if he didn't know about the Tim Russert thing or he was rehearing it, or reconsidering it or something like that... New, new sort of information. Not something he had been thinking about."
Fitzgerald asked: "And did he at any time tell you, 'Well, you didn't learn it from Tim Russert, you learned it from me? Back in June you and I talked about the wife working at the CIA?'"
"No," Libby responded.
"Did he indicate any concern that you had done anything wrong by telling reporters what you had learned?" Fitzgerald asked.
"No," Libby responded.
As I said, there's more, but Murray Waas thinks the case is pointing to Fitzgerald coming after Cheney next. My take, based on the George Ryan prosecution, is this would be consistent with Fitzgerald's past prosecutions.