Thank you, Murray Waas! Today, Waas further developed the story of Karl Rove's desperate bid to avoid indictment -- and turned attention to a key player that may help explain that
enigmatic letter from Scooter Libby to Judith Miller. Remember that soggy,
suspicious prose?
[Libby] closed the letter [to Judy Miller] on this personal note (although he wasn't quite right on when autumn begins): "You went into jail in the summer. It is fall now. You will have stories to cover--Iraqi elections and suicide bombers, biological threats and the Iranian nuclear program. Out West, where you vacation, the aspens will already be turning. They turn in clusters, because their roots connect them. Come back to work---and life. Until then, you will remain in my thoughts and prayers."
For those of you who played along last time as we tried to crack the "code," or who want to don a little Reynolds wrap this evening, read on below the fold for a new suspect in the aspen/root puzzle: Stephen J. Hadley.
Remember
the circumstances of that letter from Scooter Libby to Judith Miller: a message from a man about to be frog-marched to the woman who holds his fate in her hands.
It's not unreasonable to speculate that there was a little something extra in that communication: a threat? a promise of safety? a warning?
One key image attracted our attention last time: "aspens" that "will already be turning"; "they turn in clusters because their roots connect them." That's a juicy clue.
So another google -- "Stephen J. Hadley" "Aspen Institute" -- quickly uncovered some very significant Aspen roots: Condaleeza Rice.
Retired Air Force Gen. Brent Scowcroft (who held the post of national security adviser for Gerald Ford, alongside Cheney and Rumsfeld) discovered Rice during the 1980s at the Aspen Institute.
Rooted in Aspen, Rice put together a team of "Vulcans":
Rice not only coordinated Bush's issues papers but kept in line the "Vulcans"--the brain trust of national security experts who periodically assembled to give Bush the benefit of their accumulated wisdom. All the Vulcans (Richard Armitage, Robert Blackwill, Stephen J. Hadley, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Dov Zakheim, Robert Zoellick) went on to important jobs or advisory posts in the Bush administration, and it was hardly surprising that Rice landed as national security adviser.
Stephen J. Hadley became Rice's deputy....
There you have it: a target in the investigation who has roots in Aspen.
Perhaps he "will already be turning."
Anyone else care to speculate?