Scooter
Just now, on the news, Kelly O'Donnell said (almost verbatim): "'Scooter' Libby . . . the highest ranking White House official to be convicted of a crime since the Reagan era and Iran-Contra." Hmm. Maybe all that longing for Reagan at the CPAC last weekend will find some satisfaction in the verdict . . . or not. Probably not.
Dan Balz says "Libby likely will pay a significant price for what happened in the summer of 2003 as the administration saw its Iraq policy under serious attack for the first time. But his is part of a much larger story that is still being written as the country wrestles with the most unpopular war since Vietnam."
But who will write that story?
posted by Number Three @ 7:02 PM
2 Comments:
I doubt Libby will pay a significant price unless the government can get through the appeals process before November of 2008 and send him to jail for at least a bit of time. Once the election is over, I would be very surprised if a pardon weren't granted -- surely it has been in the works all along as a part of the original strategy (in that sense the Iran-Contra analogy is particularly apt). Of course the conservatives have raised a ton of cash for any fine Libby will receive, so at this point I don't see him rolling on Cheney -- he and his lawyers will just try to run out the clock on the appeals process until November of 2008.
Really unbelievable how the right is already spinning this -- "no crime was committed, Valerie Plame was not a NOC, jury was confused..." Fitz couldn't prove the crime cause they conspired to obstruct justice, which by the way was one of the counts 11/11 jurors thought Libby committed. Fitz sensibly didn't bring up Plame's NOC status because it would have led to government secrets problems and would have distracted from the easier charge, but he made it crystal clear in his comments after the verdict that she was a NOC and her cover was blown. As for the jury, they spent a week mapping out the evidence, were sympathetic to Libby as fall guy, yet they had to do their duty.
Despite all of this damning evidence, Faux news and others continue to just plain lie and mislead the America public on these points. This is the more serious problem. Several segments of the media have now become mere apparatuses of the Republican party whose job is to vomit party-line lies and narratives.
Speaking of the media, did you see the egregious Washington Post editorial on the subject? As you say, Paul, "party-line lies."
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