US - Why is Fitzgerald lying?

The New York Times says Armitage has now admitted he leaked Plame's name to the media.

In the accounts by the lawyer and associates, Mr. Armitage disclosed casually to Mr. Novak that Ms. Wilson worked for the C.I.A. at the end of an interview in his State Department office.

I like the way the media and Bush's other critics are now constantly characterising the disclosure as "casual". If it was so casual, how do you explain that Armitage also leaked her name to another reporter.

He was also the source for another journalist about Ms. Wilson, a reporter who did not write about her. The lawyers and associates said Mr. Armitage also told Bob Woodward, assistant managing editor of The Washington Post and a well-known author, of her identity in June 2003.

Here's where Fitzgerald's problems start.

The Justice Department was quickly informed, and Mr. Armitage disclosed his talks with Mr. Novak in subsequent interviews with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, even before Mr. Fitzgerald’s appointment.

So, the FBI knew before Fitzgerald's appointment that a government official had talked to reporters and revealed Plame's status as a CIA operative. And yet here's what Fitz had to say at his press conference.

Valerie Wilson's cover was blown in July 2003. The first sign of her cover being blown was that Mr. Novak published a column on July 14th 2003. But Mr. Novak was not the first reporter to be told that Wilson's wife, Valerie Wilson, Ambassador Wilson's wife, Valerie, worked at the CIA. Several other reporters were told. In fact, Mr. Libby was the first official known to have told a reporter when he talked with Judith Miller in June of 2003 about Valerie Wilson.

We now know that that is an outright lie. Armitage himself, a government official, told the FBI he talked to a reporter before Fitz took the case. Why is Fitzgerald lying?

Here's the press release in PDF.

Why isn't the media, who had two of its members imprisoned, all over Fitzgerald for this outright lie? Here's why.

MSM were at the forefront calling for someone in the White House to be arrested over the affair and were even willing to let their reporters go to jail to get what they wanted. Now that the baloon is burst, MSM is in cover up mode. Take this for example from the Times article.

The identification of Mr. Armitage as the original leaker to Mr. Novak ends what has been a tantalizing mystery. In recent months, however, Mr. Armitage’s role had become clear to many, and it was recently reported by Newsweek magazine and The Washington Post.

You see? As soon as they found out the truth MSM did their duty and reported it. There's just one problem. The blogsphere has been reporting Armitage as the soruce for nearly a year. Since that didn't fit their anti-Bush agenda, they didn't investiage. Or, if they did, they covered it up.

UPDATE

Tom Maguire disagrees and says Fitzgerald may not have had that information at the time he made those statments. Ok fine. But Fitzgerald knew pretty soon that Libby wasn't the leak so why the witch hunt?