The group met weekly in the Situation Room. Among the regular participants were Karl Rove, the president's senior political adviser; communications strategists Karen Hughes, Mary Matalin and James R. Wilkinson; legislative liaison Nicholas E. Calio; and policy advisers led by Rice and her deputy, Stephen J. Hadley, along with I. Lewis Libby, Cheney's chief of staff.

One thing I haven't seen addressed is why Viveca hired a criminal defense attorney on her own before telling Time. Did she think she might have criminal exposure for tipping off Luskin? She's married to a lawyer. Did he tell her that given the way Time forked over Cooper's e-mails despite his desire to hold out meant that if she told Time, they would get her a lawyer who had Time's interests, rather than her's at heart? Was there other information Viveca wanted to keep from Time? Was it her lawyer who recommended she not tell Time until after she debriefed with Fitzgerald? I can't imagine she wouldn't have discussed that with him.

Also, we've been told Rove testified four times to the grand jury, but no one seems to know the date of the second (added: or was it third)time. The first was in February, 2004, the third in October, 2004 and the fourth in October, 2005. When was his second appearance? Why has no one written about that? In July, 2005, Luskin said:

Rove's attorney, Robert Luskin, said his client answered all the questions prosecutors asked during three grand jury appearances, never invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination or the president's executive privilege guaranteeing confidential advice from aides.

I have never bought that Rove's October, 2005 grand jury testimony was just to clear up issues about welfare reform and other details of his conversation with Cooper. I thought at the time that Rove went back to the grand jury to provide last minute testimony against others, such as Libby and Cheney, and for all we know, Hadley. Murray Waas reported as much.

He will also be questioned regarding contacts with other senior administration officials, such as then-deputy National Security advisor Stephen J. Hadley and I. Lewis Libby, the chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney in the critical week before the publication of columnist Robert Novak's column on July 14, 2003, which outed Plame as a covert CIA operative.

I'd like to bring up one final point which is not going to sit well with those anxious for an indictment charging Rove with perjury. But, I've been of the opinion for months that Rove knows he is going down for at least a false statement charge for his October, 2003 pre-grand jury statements to investigators, and what Luskin has been trying to do is get Fitz to hold off on the perjury charge, which would almost certainly put him in a jail time range, even with a cooperation reduction at sentencing.

We don't know when Luskin turned over the Hadley e-mail. All we know is that Rove testified about his conversation with Cooper, saying that the discovery of the e-mail jogged his memory, in October, 2004. Everyone seems to be making the assumption that because he didn't go back to the grand jury until October, 2004, that he didn't turn over the Hadley e-mail until days or a week or so before then. [Later clarification]: The Washington Post reported Luskin turned it over "shortly before" Rove's appearance, but it doesn't state a date.]

For example, when Luskin sent Rove back to the grand jury in October, 2005, it was as a result of an offer he had made to Fitzgerald to so back in July, 2005, after Cooper testified. Fitzgerald didn't contact Luskin accepting his offer until October, 2005.

For all we know, Luskin turned over the Hadley e-mail in the summer of 2004, and Fitz didn't give him an opportunity to go back to the grand jury until October, 2004. I'm not sure it follows that because Rove didn't testify about Cooper until October, 2004, Luskin must only have told Fitz about it days before.

I summed up a lot of the Rove contradictions last month in Rove Then vs. Rove Now.

And I'm still intrigued by why Bob Woodward gave his exclusive story on why his source came forward to Viveca Novak on November 18 instead of to his own paper? Did she call him to commiserate and tell him she had done the same thing -- keep information from her editors the way he had kept information from his editors at the Washington Post-- so they had something in common? Or were they just drinking buddies too?