Murray Waas has another incredible scoop on the Scooter Libby/Valerie Plame leak investigation.

In today's installment:

"Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff has testified that President Bush authorized him to disclose the contents of a highly classified intelligence assessment to the media to defend the Bush administration's decision to go to war with Iraq, according to papers filed in federal court on Tuesday by Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor in the CIA leak case.

"I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby testified to a federal grand jury that he had received 'approval from the President through the Vice President' to divulge portions of a National Intelligence Estimate regarding Saddam Hussein's purported efforts to develop nuclear weapons, according to the court papers. Libby was said to have testified that such presidential authorization to disclose classified information was 'unique in his recollection,' the court papers further said.

"Libby also testified that an administration lawyer told him that Bush, by authorizing the disclosure of classified information, had in effect declassified the information. Legal experts disagree on whether the president has the authority to declassify information on his own."

Wonder if this is enough news for the Washington Post or someone else to start picking up the narrative thread. Dan Froomkin has been quite critical of the lack of follow-up, but the Post seems pretty steadfast in its refusal to cover more.