Bravely Bold Sir Dubya

Time decided to do some reporting about the final days in the Bush bunker, particularly about Dick Cheney's efforts to extract a pardon for his pal Scooter Libby. It's clearly from Bush's perspective, but nevertheless it's a pretty fascinating article just for seeing how the Bush loyalists spin the tale.

Petitions for pardons are usually sent in writing to the White House counsel's office or a specially designated attorney at the Department of Justice. In Libby's case, Cheney simply carried the message directly to Bush, as he had with so many other issues in the past, pressing the President in one-on-one meetings or in larger settings. A White House veteran was struck by his "extraordinary level of attention" to the case. Cheney's persistence became nearly as big an issue as the pardon itself. "Cheney really got in the President's face," says a longtime Bush-family source. "He just wouldn't give it up."

And there was a darker possibility. As a former Bush senior aide explains, "I'm sure the President and [chief of staff] Josh [Bolten] and Fred had a concern that somewhere, deep in there, there was a cover-up." It had been an article of faith among Cheney's critics that the Vice President wanted a pardon for Libby because Libby had taken the fall for him in the Fitzgerald probe. In his grand-jury testimony reviewed by TIME, Libby denied three times that Cheney had directed him to leak Plame's CIA identity in mid-2003. Though his recollection of other events in the same time frame was lucid and detailed, on at least 20 occasions, Libby could not recall details of his talks with Cheney about Plame's place of employment or questions the Vice President raised privately about Wilson's credibility. Some Bush officials wondered whether Libby was covering up for Cheney's involvement in the leak of Plame's identity.

That makes it seem like Bush just wanted to separate himself from the Libby case altogether, despite the fact that Libby was a special adviser to the President, not the Vice President, and he was protecting both Bush and Cheney. It makes sense for Bush to compartmentalize the Libby leak, as if he were an innocent bystander, and refusing to pardon obviously helps him in that case. But it's not true at all. Marcy Wheeler has a lot more on this.

But this just blew me away. After Cheney lays out the case for a pardon, repeatedly, incessantly, for weeks:

A few days later, about a week before they would become private citizens, Bush pulled Cheney aside after a morning meeting and told him there would be no pardon. Cheney looked stricken. Most officials respond to a presidential rebuff with a polite thanks for considering the request in the first place. But Cheney, an observer says, "expressed his disappointment and disagreement with the decision ... He didn't take it well."

Two days after that, Libby, who hadn't previously lobbied on his own behalf, telephoned Bolten's office. He wanted an audience with Bush to argue his case in person. To Libby, a presidential pardon was a practical as well as symbolic prize: among other things, it would allow him to practice law again. Bolten once more kicked the matter to the lawyers, agreeing to arrange a meeting with Fielding. On Saturday, Jan. 17, with less than 72 hours left in the Bush presidency, Libby and Fielding and a deputy met for lunch at a seafood restaurant three blocks from the White House. Again Libby insisted on his innocence. No one's memory is perfect, he argued; to convict me for not remembering something precisely was unfair. Fielding kept listening for signs of remorse. But none came. Fielding reported the conversation to Bush.

OK, is it normal for the subject of a possible Presidential pardon to personally lobby for it on his own behalf? Has that ever happened before? If it has, I don't recall it.

The article is decent enough, but don't start to drink a glass of water when you read this part, or you're in for a surefire spit-take:

While packing boxes in the upstairs residence, according to his associates, Bush noted that he was again under pressure from Cheney to pardon Libby. He characterized Cheney as a friend and a good Vice President but said his pardon request had little internal support. If the presidential staff were polled, the result would be 100 to 1 against a pardon, Bush joked. Then he turned to Sharp. "What's the bottom line here? Did this guy lie or not?"

The lawyer, who had followed the case very closely, replied affirmatively.

Bush indicated that he had already come to that conclusion too.

"O.K., that's it," Bush said.

Yes, that moral paragon, truth-teller extraordinaire, George W. Bush, Honest George I think they called him, comes down firmly on the side of truth in virtually every circumstance. History will judge him as the most forthright human who ever bestrode the earth. A colossus among men.

Incidentally, the man, Jim Sharp, that Bush is talking with here? It's his own defense attorney.

... you have to love Cheney's response to the story. I guess the Bush loyalists got under his skin.

Wahhmbulance for Fourthbranch Emeritus

Dick Cheney wants the world to know, through his chief fluffer Stephen Hayes, that Scooter Libby should have received his pardon.

Asked for his reaction to Bush's decision Cheney said: "Scooter Libby is one of the most capable and honorable men I've ever known. He's been an outstanding public servant throughout his career. He was the victim of a serious miscarriage of justice, and I strongly believe that he deserved a presidential pardon. Obviously, I disagree with President Bush's decision."

Emptywheel is the go-to on reactions to this one.

I wonder whether Cheney is worried that his firewall might not hold tight as Libby faces the rest of his life as a felon? Or perhaps Dick is just aghast that Bush--who after all asked Libby to stick his neck in a meat grinder--didn't return the favor by sacrificing a little of his scarce posterity to thank Libby for his work protecting Bush?

In any case, I do hope Cheney's mood about Bush remains contentious and sour. There is little I'd like more than to see Bush and Cheney take each other out during their retirement.

That WOULD be exciting. Of course, Bush is both solicitous of keeping himself clean (pardoning Scooter would have opened him up to public testimony) and unsolicitous of anyone else's feelings or concerns, so that's probably the explanation here.

At Least He Doesn't Say "I Don't Recall" A Lot!

So while the Senate was legalizing warrantless wiretapping and granting Bush and the telecoms immunity yesterday, that nice Mr. Mukasey had a meeting with the Judiciary Committee on the Hill. Thought you'd like to know what he said:

• He wouldn't admit that Alberto Gonzales politicized the Department of Justice, contradicting his own agency's recent Inspector General report that has put former DoJ officials in so much trouble that independent organizations are trying to get them disbarred. He also refused to allow for any accountability to those officials, probably because he wouldn't admit they did anything wrong.

• He argued that those Administration officials who authorized and directed torture at Guantanamo Bay and throughout US detention sites worldwide "cannot and should not be prosecuted," nor should any CIA agents who participated in the torture.

• He didn't want to involve himself in the investigation over Karl Rove's involvement in the prosecution of Don Siegelman, and appeared to deny that the Office of Professional Repsonsibility had any role in such an investigation, even though it was reported just yesterday that the OPR contacted the Siegelman camp for documents in the probe.

• He decided, essentially, that it was okay for Fourthbranch Cheney to have outed Valerie Plame, and that he wouldn't step into that investigation either. He's already risking a contempt citation from the House Oversight Committee for refusing to turn over Cheney's FBI interview transcripts.

But, you know, Sens. Feinstein and Schumer are right, this guy IS an improvement over Alberto Gonzales!

Did These Walls Just Get Closer Together?

I think some White House lawyers got a phone call today.

President Bush's former spokesman, Scott McClellan, will testify before a House committee next week about whether Vice President Dick Cheney ordered him to make misleading public statements about the leaking of CIA agent Valerie Plame's identity.

McClellan will testify publicly and under oath before the House Judiciary Committee on June 20 about the White House's role in the leak and its response, his attorneys, Michael and Jane Tigar, said on Monday.

In his new book, "What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception," McClellan said he was misled by others, possibly including Cheney, about the role of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby in the leak. McClellan has said publicly that Bush and Cheney "directed me to go out there and exonerate Scooter Libby."

The statements prompted House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., to invite McClellan to the hearing "concerning reported attempts to cover up the involvement of White House officials in the leak of" Plame's identity.

Village reporters are already leaking that the White House is freaked out by McClellan testifying, and the potential that Patrick Fitzgerald could follow him. The Press Secretary in particular has a lot of secrets, and the Plame case is one that Bush and company don't want reopened.

Nor does the Administration want to hear any more about Jack Abramoff, but that's rearing its ugly head today as well:

The White House had stronger ties to disgraced superlobbyist Jack Abramoff than it has publicly admitted, according to a draft congressional report released Monday.

President Bush met Abramoff on at least four occasions the White House has yet to acknowledge, according to the draft report by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

And White House officials appeared as comfortable going to Abramoff and his lobbyists seeking tickets to sporting and entertainment events, as they did seeking input on personnel picks for plum jobs, the report found.

President Bush himself met Abramoff on at least six occasions, the report said, citing White House documents; the White House had previously acknowledged only two.

Amusing that McClellan was the front man for those particular lies. That's conveniently left out of his book.

To the extent that any of this derails the late-term policy agenda of the Bush Administration - immunity, permanent bases in Iraq, and bombing Iran - it's very significant.

UPDATE: Oh yeah, and Dennis Kucinich is introducing articles of impeachment on the House floor as we speak. Anything we can do to throw these guys off their game.

Closing In

Karl Rove has been extremely slippery with what he was able to get away with while in service at the White House, but over the past couple weeks events have probably made him gulp and pull the collar away from his neck a couple times. Same with his former bosses.

First you have Scott McClellan basically admitting that Bush and Cheney gave the go-ahead to Scooter Libby to selectively leak contents of the 2002 Iraq NIE, and in the process the identity of Valerie Plame. Henry Waxman, upon hearing this, immediately set to work.

New revelations by former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan raise additional questions about the actions of the President and the Vice President. Mr. McClellan has stated that "[t]he President and Vice President directed me to go out there and exonerate Scooter Libby." He has also asserted that "the top White House officials who knew the truth - including Rove, Libby, and possibly Vice President Cheney - allowed me, even encouraged me, to repeat a lie." It would be a major breach of trust if the Vice President personally directed Mr. McClellan to mislead the public [...]

In his interview with the FBI, Mr. Libby stated that it was "possible" that Vice President Cheney instructed him to disseminate information about Ambassador Wilson's wife to the press. This is a significant revelation and, if true, a serious matter. It cannot be responsibly investigated without access to the Vice President's FBI interview.

The interviews with senior White House officials also raise other questions about the involvement of the Vice President. It appears from the interview reports that Vice President Cheney personally may have been the source of the information that Ms. Wilson worked for the CIA. Mr. Libby specifically identified the Vice President as the source of his information about Ms. Wilson. None of the other White House officials could remember how they learned this information [...]

In his FBI interview, Mr. McClellan told the FBI about discussions he had with the President and the Vice President. These passages, however, were redacted from the copies made available to the Committee. Similar passages were also redacted from other interviews.

There are no sound reasons for you to withhold the interviews with the President and the Vice President from the Committee or to redact passages like Mr. McClellan's discussions with the President and the Vice President. Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation is closed and he has indicated that it would be appropriate to share these records with the Committee. There has been no assertion of executive privilege.

Well sure, when you line it all up like that, it looks like a conspiracy.

What's more, Marcy Wheeler thinks Patrick Fitzgerald, who prosecuted the Plame case, might be ready to talk about allegations about his potential firing that came out during the investigation into the US Attorneys scandal.

Later in the Rezko trial, two witnesses said that Rezko told them not to worry about the criminal investigation, because the Republicans—Rove and Kjellander—would get rid of Fitzgerald. Hastert would install a friendly federal puppy who wouldn't bother the Combine, according to the testimony. "The federal prosecutor will no longer be the same federal prosecutor," testified Elie Maloof, a Rezko associate who is now a cooperating witness.

And a state pension board lawyer who has already pleaded guilty told grand jurors that Cellini told him "Bob Kjellander's job is to take care of the U.S. attorney." [...]

"If I owe a response [about the putsch to remove him from his job], I owe it to Congress, first," Fitzgerald said when asked about all this after the verdict.

But that's not all. As pressure grew on Rove for answers about the railroading of former Alabama governor Don Siegelman, prosecutors
abruptly dropped their appeal that sought longer sentences for him and former HealthSouth CEO Richard Scrushy in the "bribery" case, also known as "a politician appointing an ally to a board." And 54 former state attorneys general from across the country filed a brief on Siegelman's behalf with the appellate court where he is contesting his conviction, asking that it be overturned. And now the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility is investigating.

The US Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) is investigating the conduct of at least two specific US Attorneys in the “selective prosecution” of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, sitting Mississippi Supreme Court Justice Oliver E. Diaz Jr., and Mississippi attorney Paul Minor, according to attorneys close to the investigation.

In a May 5 letter sent to House Judiciary Committee chairman John Conyers (D-MI), OPR Director H. Marshall Jarrett wrote that OPR “currently has pending investigations involving, among others, allegations of selective prosecution relating to the prosecutions of Don Siegelman, Georgia Thompson, Oliver Diaz and Paul Minor.”

RAW STORY has confirmed that Leura Canary (above right), the US Attorney for the Middle District of Alabama, and Dunnica Lampton, the US Attorney for the Southern District of Mississippi , are under investigation. Their offices are also being probed.

This leads back to Rove - the Siegelman case, the politicization of US Attorney positions, firing prosecutors who wouldn't play ball, leaking classified information in the Plame case. Rove is a slippery creature. But there are a lot of investigations all happening at once.

The Scottie Show

Well, I never thought that the name "Scott McCllelan" would return to the lips of every American, particularly because he was a lying hack as a Press Secretary who decided to release a book which, as Jonathan Landay and Warren Strobel note, isn't news. But as I've also said, what's news is the defensive posture taken by the Administration and the news media about their conduct in the run-up to war, as Landay and Strobel have also noted.

Bush loyalists have responded in three ways:

1) Scott, how could you? This conveniently ignores the issue of what Bush did or didn't know and do about intelligence on Iraq, converting the story line into that of wounded leader and treasonous former aide. (That canard was the sole focus of a CBS news radio report Wednesday night).

2) Invading Iraq was the right thing to do. Okay. When do Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, et al *not* say that? Dog bites man.

3) It was an intelligence failure. The CIA gave us bad dope on WMD and, well, they're the experts. More on this in a second.

The news media have been, if anything, even more craven than the administration has been in defending its failure to investigate Bush's case for war in Iraq before the war.

Here's ABC News' Charles Gibson: "I think the questions were asked. It was just a drumbeat of support from the administration. It is not our job to debate them. It is our job to ask the questions.” And “I’m not sure we would have asked anything differently."

Really?

Or this from NBC's Brian Williams: “Sadly, we saw fellow Americans — in some cases floating past facedown (after Katrina). We knew what had just happened. We weren’t allowed that kind of proximity with the weapons inspectors [in Iraq]. I was in Kuwait for the buildup to the war, and, yes, we heard from the Pentagon, on my cell phone, the minute they heard us report something that they didn’t like. The tone of that time was quite extraordinary.” And this: "“It’s tough to go back, to put ourselves in the mind-set. It was post-9/11 America."

So the Pentagon tells the media what kind of reporting is in- and out-of-bounds?

Hogwash. Hogwash! HOGWASH.

That's a damn good blog post.

I think most notable of all the vituperative responses comes from both a Republican and a commentator, Bob Dole, who was raised from the crypt to bare his fangs at Scottie.

"There are miserable creatures like you in every administration who don’t have the guts to speak up or quit if there are disagreements with the boss or colleagues," Dole wrote in the personal e-mail. "No, your type soaks up the benefits of power, revels in the limelight for years, then quits, and spurred on by greed, cashes in with a scathing critique." [...]

Dole, the former Senate Majority Leader and 1996 Republican presidential nominee, also tells McClellan he is likely looking to "clean up" as "the liberal anti-Bush press will promote your belated concerns with wild enthusiasm."

"When the money starts rolling in you should donate it to a worthy cause, something like, 'Biting The Hand That Fed Me,'" he wrote. "Another thought is to weasel your way back into the White House if a Democrat is elected. That would provide a good set up for a second book deal in a few years."

Dole also made clear he has no plans to read the book.

"I have no intention of reading your 'exposé' because if all these awful things were happening, and perhaps some may have been, you should have spoken up publicly like a man, or quit your cushy, high profile job," he wrote. "That would have taken integrity and courage but then you would have had credibility and your complaints could have been aired objectively."

Pretty awesome that the guy who defended Nixon during Watergate is now talking about someone not having the guts to speak up about malfeasance when it occurs.

The thing is, though, that there is some actual news in the book. McClellan admits that the President authorized the leak of the NIE on Iraq in 2003, selectively, to rebut charges made by Joe Wilson in his op-ed. Marcy Wheeler explains the importance.

Now, though Scottie refers, obliquely, to "this information," he explicitly refers only to the NIE. But as I've described over and over again, it's not just the NIE Bush authorized Dick to order Libby to leak.

As a review, here's what Libby's NIE lies are all about. This is all documented in this post, and here is the court transcript in which most of this is revealed.

• Scooter Libby has instructions in his notes to leak something to Judy Miller on July 8, 2003

• When questioned about the notation, Libby claimed the instructions related to the NIE

• Libby went further to make certain claims about the NIE leak--that the leak was authorized by Dick Cheney and George Bush, that such an authorization was totally unique in his career, and that Libby was so worried about leaking the NIE to Judy that he double checked to make sure he was authorized to do so

• Libby later made claims that directly contradicted these assertions--most importantly, even though Libby claims the Judy leak was totally unique in his career, he also leaked the NIE to three other people: Bob Woodward, a journalist [David Sanger] on July 2, and the WSJ

• Also, in spite of the fact that Libby says he was really worried about getting authorization to leak the NIE to Judy, he's not really sure whether he was authorized to leak the NIE to Woodward; his concern about the leak to Judy only extended to whatever he leaked to Judy

In short, Libby is almost certainly lying about what he was authorized to leak to Judy on July 8, 2003, in a meeting where Judy Miller admits he talked about Valerie Plame, and where Libby tried to get her to falsely attribute the story.

At this point, Scottie McC is still accepting Scooter Libby's lies, though I suspect he sees the dangerous frailty of them. With Bush's clear admission to Scottie that he was in the loop, and the evidence that, subsequent to receiving an order from Cheney (authorized by Bush) to leak classified information to Judy Miller, Libby leaked Valerie Wilson's identity, the circumstantial evidence shows the President was directly involved in the deliberate outing of a CIA spy. The only question now is whether Bush realized he authorized the leak of Valerie's identity, in addition to a bunch of other classified documents.

The White House has so far not denied the allegation of a Bush-to-Libby leak of Plame's identity. And McClellan, for his part, has said he'd be happy to testify before Congress about the remarks. What you have here is the President of the United States, by commuting the sentence of Scooter Libby, indirectly pardoning himself for federal crimes. That's a big deal - and while the circus is about other parts of the book, this should be the central point.

Yeah, That's The Ticket

This Karl Rove spin didn't pass anyone's smell test:



You can "hear about" an actual prosecution from the paper and still be involved in the getting of that prosecution. I think that's pretty clear to everyone. Rove needs to stop going on these shows and he really shouldn't even be in the country, considering the mess he's in, between the Siegelman case and Scott McClellan's charges of deception in the CIA leak case. But it's really the Siegelman case where Rove has major vulnerabilities, as evidenced in that media appearance. Here's Josh Marshall.

There's never been any doubt in my mind that Siegelman was the victim of selective prosecution. Even the government's theory of the main case against him amounted to something that is standard in contemporary American politics and actually much less worse than lots of other stuff that no one thinks twice about. Cracking the nut of White House involvement has always been more difficult; but the evidence for it is substantial.

If Siegelman's and Alabama GOP lawyer Jill Simpson's stories are true, that would make this case the centerpiece example of the corruption of the DOJ revealed by the US Attorney firing scandal. In fact, it would make most of what we know now seem minor by comparison.

Good luck staying out of jail, Karl.

Release The Memoirs!

RELEASE THE MEMOIRS!... There was a hint last November that Scott McClellan's memoir was going to be unrelenting on George Bush, Karl Rove and the gang, but that was quickly dismissed as overhyped. The book is now on the verge of being released, and in fact was on sale over the weekend at D.C.-area bookstores. So Mike Allen picked up a copy, and the revelations appear to be as originally advertised:

Among the most explosive revelations in the 341-page book, titled “What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington’s Culture of Deception” (Public Affairs, $27.95):

• McClellan charges that Bush relied on “propaganda” to sell the war.

• He says the White House press corps was too easy on the administration during the run-up to the war.

• He admits that some of his own assertions from the briefing room podium turned out to be “badly misguided.”

• The longtime Bush loyalist also suggests that two top aides held a secret West Wing meeting to get their story straight about the CIA leak case at a time when federal prosecutors were after them — and McClellan was continuing to defend them despite mounting evidence they had not given him all the facts.

• McClellan asserts that the aides — Karl Rove, the president’s senior adviser, and I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, the vice president’s chief of staff — “had at best misled” him about their role in the disclosure of former CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity.

This could be cherry-picking as well for the sake of selling some hardcovers. But that's not a phenomenon that will be limited to Scott McClellan (and who knew he had this in him, huh?). The spate of memoirs that always roll out near the end of an Administration will take on an even greater "every-man-for-himself" quality in this one. From the lowest-level staffer to his personal food-taster, Bush will see half of his underlings or more trash him to every publisher in the country. If someone like McClellan, who was at Bush's side from the Texas days, is willing to go nuclear to preserve his own reputation, it'll be a free-for-all.

Dog Whistle

President Bush called his decision to commute the sentence of Scooter Libby "fair and balanced" today for a very specific reason. He wanted to let the base know that their best interests were at heart, and that he'll be extremely likely to pardon Libby on his way out the door. This language of "fair and balanced" is extremely evocative and everyone knew what he was talking about. He was saying it was a fair decision in the way that Fox News is a fair network. He's admitting that the fix was in and giving a wink to his pals by letting them know that they would be protected too. It was the verbal equivalent of his smirk, and as far as I'm concerned it's a direct admission of obstruction of justice, or at least as direct as you're going to get with him.

One way to counteract this is to say to the President that, as long as he's being fair and balanced, he must immediately sequester himself in a room and take a look at all of these other federal sentences of similiar value, and decide if they need to be commuted as well. It's the only fair and balanced thing to do. And this should be said with a mocking tone, along the order of OJ looking for the real killers. "The President is holed up right now with the list of all federal perjury felons, scrupulously weighing the evidence like Solon and determining who must stay in jail and who must leave. Such wisdom and such essential fairness! We may need another President to step in while Bush undergoes this Herculean undertaking... oh wait, we've got someone handling that.

I would hand-deliver petitions for redress from hundreds of perjury felons to the White House in the interest of fairness and balance. I would convene "mock grand juries" on the Capitol steps and lie to them with impunity, since the President is honor-bound to study and commute my sentence. I would put up a graphic of the two sides of the balance sheet with respect to Libby: "On the one hand, he lied to a federal grand jury and FBI investigators and obstructed an investigation into outing a CIA covert operative which reached up to the OVP and possibly the President himself. On the other hand, he's a friend."

Let's tie this "fair and balanced" theme right around the President's neck. It's already seen in liberal and even independent circles as not so much a phrase but a punchline. Time to roll it out. We can play dog-whistle politics too.

UPDATE: The usage of "fair and balanced" to give this dog whistle was so clumsy and obvious that many liberals may shrug it off, much like Catherine Tremell in Basic Instinct writes a book about a murderer who uses ice picks, so how could she possibly be doing the same kind of murdering. Only an idiot would be so blatantly obvious!

As I was saying....

Bang The Gavel

There were a couple Congressional hearings today of import, both of which deal essentially with the view of executive power and how this White House has consistently acted above the law.

First, White House political director and Rove protege Sara Taylor had a quiet day of testimony where she refused to answer the most pressing questions about the President's involvement in the firing of 8 US Attorneys late last year. By the way, the GOP talking point on this is always that US Attorneys "serve at the pleasure of the President," so how could Bush NOT be involved?

A former senior White House aide told the Senate Judiciary Committee today that she never spoke or met with President Bush about plans to fire a group of U.S. attorneys last year.

Sara M. Taylor, who left her job as the White House political director two months ago, also testified that she had no knowledge that Bush was involved in the dismissals at all.

"I did not speak to the president about removing U.S. attorneys," Taylor said. "I did not attend any meetings with the president where that matter was discussed."

In addition, if Bush was not involved in the firings at all, how can you claim executive privilege in refusing to talk about the firings? The whole basis for the claim is that a President must be able to receive candid advice from aides without it being disclosed to Congress and the public. Um, she's saying that she NEVER GAVE HIM ANY ADVICE on this matter!

I suppose executive privilege now means "anybody talking to the President, or anyone in the executive branch, or anyone related to anyone in the executive branch, and everyone they had sex with, and so on, and so on." It's the Pert Shampoo commercial theory of executive power.

Oh yeah, and when Taylor did manage to answer, she apparently revealed that she doesn't know shit about anything, as if we needed a reminder. Another former aide, Harriet Miers, is supposed to appear tomorrow, but Bush just ordered her not appear (I guess because she's not done memorizing the phrase "I don't recall").
The White House is turning the GOP into the Know-Nothing Party, in the literal sense of the term. And this in large part is because they all feel there will be no forthcoming sanctions on them, so why not act above the law and thumb their noses at investigators? Bush has a pardon pen and he's not afraid to use it.

Speaking of which, the House is holding a hearing today on the commuted sentence of Scooter Libby and Presidential clemency power. Joe Wilson gave a stirring address to kick off the hearing:

President Bush promised that if any member of the White House staff were engaged in this matter, it would be a firing offense. However, the trial of Scooter Libby has proved conclusively that Karl Rove was involved, and although he escaped indictment, he still works at the White House. We also know as a result of evidence introduced in the trial that President Bush himself selectively declassified national security material to attempt to support the false rationale for war. The President’s broken promise and his own involvement in this unseemly smear campaign reveal a chief executive willing to subvert the rule of law and system of justice that has undergirded this great republic of ours for over 200 years.

Make no mistake, the President’s actions last week cast a pall of suspicion over his office and Vice President Cheney. Mr. Libby was convicted of, among other crimes, obstruction of justice – a legal term used to describe a cover-up. The Justice Department’s Special Counsel, Patrick Fitzgerald, has said repeatedly that Mr. Libby’s blatant lying had been the equivalent of “throwing sand in the eyes of the umpire”, thereby ensuring that the umpire, the system of justice, cannot ascertain the whole truth. As a result, Fitzgerald has said, “a cloud remains over the Vice President.” In commuting Mr. Libby’s sentence, the President has removed any incentive for Mr. Libby to cooperate with the prosecutor. The obstruction of justice is ongoing and now the President has emerged as its greatest protector. The President’s explanation for his commutation that Mr. Libby’s sentence was excessive turns out to be yet another falsehood because the sentence was quite normal, as Special Counsel Fitzgerald noted. The President, at the very least, owes the American people a full and honest explanation of his actions and those of other senior administration officials in this matter, including, but not limited to the Vice President [...]

I would like the committee members and all Americans to think about this matter in this way: If senior American officials take time from their busy schedules to meet with a foreign military attaché for the purpose of compromising the identity of a CIA covert officer, what would we call that? Although that scenario is hypothetical, the end result is no different from what happened in this case – the betrayal of our national security.

There's a good thread on the hearing at Daily Kos.

UYPDATE: Brilliant:

"I took an oath the president, and I take that oath very seriously," Sara Taylor said in answer to a question early in the hearing.

And right after a break, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) asked her if she was sure about that. "Did you mean, perhaps, you took an oath to the Constitution?" Leahy asked. It was a telling exchange.

"I know that the president refers to the government being his government -- it's not," Leahy reminded her.

They really don't know anything about this country.

The Libby Follies

So the White House asserted the desire to have the supervised release and probation stand for Scooter Libby, even though the law clearly denotes that such a sentence can only come after time has been served. Since all sides are in agreement and executive clemency is pretty absolute, it's likely that Judge Walton will rule that the probation can stand. Last week Jeralyn Merritt had some thoughts on what that probation can look like:

Let’s assume for the sake of argument that the Judge finds Libby can be put on supervised release even though his prison sentence was commuted. What does it mean for him? How does it affect his life?

It means he’s under the supervision of a probation officer and he has to follow rules and conditions set by the officer and the court. If he’s charged with violating these rules, he gets a hearing. If the Court finds at the hearing that he was in violation of the conditions, he is subject to having his supervised release revoked and being sent to jail. Or, the Judge could continue his supervised release but impose additional conditions, like home detention and electronic monitoring [...]

Libby’s terms of supervised release were set and announced by the Judge on the day he was sentenced. The Order is here (pdf). In addition to the general terms applicable to everyone, the Judge added two special conditions:

He shall maintain full-time employment, the circumstances of which shall be in the discretion of the Probation Department, subject to the court’s review.

He shall perform 400 hours of community service, “as approved and directed by the Probation Department.”

The standard conditions Libby will have to abide by include these:

the defendant shall not leave the judicial district without the permission of the court or probation officer;
the defendant shall report to the probation officer and shall submit a truthful and complete written report within the first five days of each month;
the defendant shall answer truthfully all inquiries by the probation officer and follow the instructions of the probation officer;
the defendant shall refrain from excessive use of alcohol and shall not purchase, possess, use, distribute, or administer any controlled substance or any paraphernalia related to any controlled substances, except as prescribed by a physician;
the defendant shall not associate with any persons engaged in criminal activity and shall not associate with any person convicted of a felony, unless granted permission to do so by the probation officer;
the defendant shall permit a probation officer to visit him or her at any time at home or elsewhere
the defendant shall provide access to any requested financial information.

As you can see, supervised release is no walk in the park. It’s a lot better than jail, but there are significant restrictions on your freedom.

Given that there was no penalty for breaking the law the first time, I don't expect much of a penalty if any of these rules were broken. But it's something that everyone should be keeping their eye on as Libby no doubt hits the lecture circuit to whine and cry about his awful treatment.

Meanwhile, the House and Senate are ramping up efforts to investigate the commutation. John Conyers will convene a hearing on Wednesday, with Joseph Wilson and a host of attorneys with experience in the pardon process, to see if established rules were broken in association with the Libby decision (short answer: yes). Meanwhile, the Senate is setting its sights higher:

The Senate Judiciary Committee may seek testimony from controversial prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald about the obstruction of justice case against vice presidential aide Lewis "Scooter" Libby, two senators said on Sunday.

Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, the ranking Republican member of the committee, said he wanted to hear from Fitzgerald because, "I still haven't figured out what that case is all about." [...]

Sen. Patrick Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who chairs the Judiciary Committee, said that with Specter's blessing, Fitzgerald would likely be called.

"If he has no objection to Mr. Fitzgerald coming forward, I think you may very well see Mr. Fitzgerald before the Senate Judiciary Committee," Leahy said on the same CNN program.

Specter is lying through his teeth with the whole "no underlying crime" argument, lying to federal prosecutors is a crime in and of itself, and furthermore Libby's leaks and Armitage's (and Rove's and everyone else's in the excecutive and fourth branches) were concurrent and wide-reaching. AND, this came out in open court:

In his closing argument, Bill Jeffress (the DEFENSE lawyer) described the events surrounding Libby's July 8 meeting with Judy as a "secret mission" known only to Bush, Cheney, and Libby.

The prosecution has focused on this July 8th meeting with Judith Miller at the St. Regis Hotel. They said, could Mr. Libby, how, if he was so busy, did he have two hours to go out and have lunch with Ms. Miller on July 8th. The reason he took two hours to have lunch with Ms. Miller is that Mr. Libby understood that the Vice President of the United States had directed him to go meet with Ms. Miller and that the President, President Bush was behind it too.

[snip]

I mean this is basically a secret mission that three people in the world know, President Bush, Vice President Cheney and Scooter Libby. Because he goes and does what he is asked to do by the President and the Vice President and meets with her for two hours, suddenly they're trying to find something bad in that because, in Ms. Miller’s notes at the lunch, she’s got the word WINPAC. [my emphasis]

The President and Vice President directed Scooter Libby to meet Judith Miller and release her information that includes covert CIA agent Valerie Plame's identity, and there's no underlying crime? Mind you, that was the DEFENSE lawyer talking. There was other information in the classified NIE that was possibly leaked at that meeting as well, which Libby claims the Vice President declassified (for explicitly political reasons, mind you). But the nature of that declassification, indeed the nature of that meeting, was exactly what Libby lied about, claiming he only heard about Plame from Tim Russert. He was trying to cover up the details of a secret meeting, still not fully known, authorized by the President and the Vice President. He was throwing sand in the eyes of the umpire and deliberately obstructing the investigation at the highest levels.

Meanwhile, Rep. Robert Wexler is moving forward in the House with a motion to censure the President for his actions in commuting Libby's sentence. It's a feel-good measure, but Wexler is certainly being bold about it.

Finally, this is an all-timer of a quote, but not for the reason Fred Thompson thinks it is:

"If nothing else, we've apparently convinced the Clintons that it really is a bad thing to lie under oath."

So Fred Thompson just admitted that he spent a year of his life defending and raising money for a convicted felon named Scooter Libby, who he admits lied under oath. And he's proud of it. He is dumb as hell, isn't he?

Hail To The Victors

You really need to watch David Shuster, subbing for Tweety on Hardball, just annihilate neoconservative fraud Fouad Ajami, who had the gall to liken Scooter Libby to a fallen soldier serving in Iraq who needed to be rescued. Shuster actually reported on the Plame case, he was actually in the courthouse, and unlike these idiot made-for-TV pundits and hosts he actually has a command of the facts of the case. So he absolutely wasn't going to let Ajami get away with nonsense like "Libby didn't leak anything to anybody" for a second. It's a hell of a moment, seeing a host dispense with the "he said/she said" game that characterizes our modern media, and actually enter the fray and referee on the side of truth and honesty.

And he's a Michigan man, too. Mike Wallace also came from the U-M. And Carole Simpson. Yeah, and Jon Chait too, but we don't get EVERYTHING right. (Actually, I don't mind Chait, except for his mindless establishment "hate the hippies" vibe and the fact that he accepts a paycheck from Marty Peretz every two weeks. Actually, I'd like to see Shuster take on Peretz, who also doesn't know a goddamn thing about the Plame case, and has decided that Republican prosecutors and Republican federal judges are somehow rabidly partisan Bush haters.)

Go Blue.

Imperial Presidency

When you're at 26%, what do you care?

President Bush commuted the sentence of former aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby Monday, sparing him from a 2 1/2-year prison term in the CIA leak case.

Bush left intact a $250,000 fine and two years probation for Libby, according to a senior White House official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the decision had not been announced.

Maybe the AP is getting played, but I don't think so. These guys protect their own.

No man in America is above the law. Keep telling yourself that one.

UPDATE: Wow, here's the statement from the President. He doesn't even really try to explain why he commuted the sentence. It's pretty much "He won't go to jail because I said so." This is the closest thing to a rationale:

Mr. Libby was sentenced to thirty months of prison, two years of probation, and a $250,000 fine. In making the sentencing decision, the district court rejected the advice of the probation office, which recommended a lesser sentence and the consideration of factors that could have led to a sentence of home confinement or probation.

I respect the jury’s verdict. But I have concluded that the prison sentence given to Mr. Libby is excessive. Therefore, I am commuting the portion of Mr. Libby’s sentence that required him to spend thirty months in prison.

This is going to get very bad for the President, though I guess it can't get too much worse that it already is. He won't be able to go out in public anymore without protests. He'll have to hole up in that White House even more. But ultimately, rich and connected people get away with a lot. Even treason.

UPDATE II: Emptywheel is of course right - the Fourthbranch Administration has been pushing for mandatory minimum sentences lately, and Libby's sentence was the minimum required. Of course, that's logical, which means nothing to these guys. And yes, this is obstruction of justice, a hedge against Libby flipping rather than going to jail.

Do Not Pass Go, Do Not Collect $200

Scooter Libby, go directly to jail. You will not be allowed to sip wine at cocktail parties pending appeal.

Expect the collective whine from the Washington pundit set to begin any time now.

RULE-OF-LAW! RULE-OF-LAW!

Conservatives agree: no "amnesty" for Scooter Libby

WASHINGTON (Alternate Universe News) - Conservative activists and politicians fanned out across the country today amidst new developments in the Scooter Libby case, insisting that the President not give the convicted felon what amounts to "amnesty" for his crimes.

"I don't care what you call it, pardon or whatever, this is amnesty," said Duncan Hunter (R-CA), conservative candidate for President. "We cannot tell those who work hard and play by the rules that somebody who broke the laws of this country can simply 'cut the line' and be set free."

Libby, convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice for lying to FBI agents and a grand jury in the outing of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame, has become a cause celebre among "law and order" conservatives, who are demanding that he not be given special treatment.

"What do our laws mean in this country if they are not equally applied," queried Jim Gilchrest, head of the Minuteman Project, an anti-Scooter Libby group. "We have no problem with legal White House officials. It's the ones who break the law that must be stopped, and they certainly can't be given amnesty."

Conservative talk-radio hosts, bloggers, and grassroots organizations were working at a fever pitch to advocate against any amnesty for Libby. The website noamnesty.com is collecting signatures for a petition asking the President to take a "no amnesty" pledge. A crowd rallied in Lafayette Square yesterday, shouting "No Amnesty!" while holding up pictures of the former Chief of Staff to Vice President Dick Cheney. One attendee said, "they should enforce the laws on the books. If you lie to a grand jury, you face the consequences. I didn't lie, why should I have to suffer with having Libby out in the country, taking a job I want to do?"

The White House has been surprised by the fierce reaction from conservatives against the proposed amnesty for Libby, and tried to spin what a Presidential pardon would actually accomplish. "Make no mistake, this would not be amnesty," said White House Press Secretary Tony Snow. "This would be a process whereby someone who was convicted by a jury and sentenced by a federal judge would be set free. I can't see how you call that amnesty in any legitimate way."

Even the President's staunchest allies, conservative editorial boards like the National Review and the Weekly Standard, have been unyielding in their desire not to see amnesty for Libby. In his editorial, Another "No Amnesty" Amnesty for Libby, Mark Kirkorian wrote:

There’s only one way Congress and the president can earn back the public’s trust on Scooter Libby: Enforce the law — comprehensively, confidently, unapologetically. Then, after several years have passed and enforcement mechanisms are in place and working ... Washington will have proven that, this time, it’s not lying about Scooter Libby.

Until then, no deal.

It is unclear what the President will decide to do regarding Libby, but one thing is clear; his conservative base is abandoning him because they are taking a principled stand of no amnesty for people who break the law, no matter who they are.

The Great Scooter Libby Freak-Out

This was hilarious by Digby, but I want to bring up another point. Wolf Blitzer just got done saying, "The pressure's on, Bush has only 6-8 weeks to pardon Libby." Or what? He'll melt? Aren't these the same people laughing that Paris Hilton should take her medicine and not get special treatment to get her out of jail? Now they think this fragile flower Scooter Libby can't spend 10 minutes in the clink and must be saved? Isn't Libby partially responsible for sending Americans into a war zone? He can't bear to don an orange jumpsuit without fainting and slipping into a dementia?

There's no pressure on the President except what's being applied by the right-wing noise machine. These Beltway insiders can't bear to see their friend in the slammer because they know they're just as culpable for the depredations of this Administration. Looking at Libby is like looking into a mirror.

UPDATE: By the way, Hardball really gave voice to the entire political spectrum on today's ruling. You had, on one side, a guy who was hired by and worked for Scooter Libby, and from the left, Pat Buchanan.

UPDATE II: I was surprised to hear David Shuster explain very logically and succinctly that Libby does have an easy way out of thae molten fire that is a minimum security prison. He can simply tell the feds what he knows about Dick Cheney's involvement, and he's likely to get leniency in exchange for that information. Everyone shrieking like a maniac that this is a travesty of justice ought to counsel their sainted Jesus that all he has to do is pass a few nuggets about the VP and he can go on the wingnut welfare lecture circuit for the rest of his life.

Off To Jail, Scooter

Sorry, but actions have consequences.

A federal judge said Thursday he will not delay a 2 1/2-year prison sentence for I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby in the CIA leak case, a ruling that could send the former White House aide to prison within weeks.

U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton's decision will send Libby's attorneys rushing to an appeals court to block the sentence and could force President Bush to consider calls from Libby's supporters to pardon the former aide.

No date was set for Libby to report to prison but it's expected to be within six to eight weeks. That will be left up to the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, which will also select a facility.

"Unless the Court of Appeals overturns my ruling, he will have to report," Walton said.

David Broder and Joe Klein just dropped their cocktail glasses.

By the way, Judge Walton is getting threats from those nice defenders of Libby's right to lie. Ah, the comity of conservatism...

Right Between The Eyes

Bill Kristol, last seen getting every single thing wrong about foreign policy since the day he was born, has the gall to criticize someone for not taking risks from the comfort of his penthouse apartment in Manhattan and not on the streets of Baghdad.

Will Bush pardon Libby? Apparently not--even if it means a man who worked closely with him and sought tirelessly to do what was right for the country goes to prison. Bush spokeswoman Dana Perino, noting that the appeals process was underway, said, "Given that and in keeping with what we have said in the past, the president has not intervened so far in any other criminal matter and he is going to decline to do so now."

So much for loyalty, or decency, or courage. For President Bush, loyalty is apparently a one-way street; decency is something he's for as long as he doesn't have to take any risks in its behalf; and courage--well, that's nowhere to be seen. Many of us used to respect President Bush. Can one respect him still?

There's so much that can be said about this, but none of it half as good as what TBogg said.

...here he goes again talking about "courage" and "decency" as if this hump has ever done a courageous or decent thing during his shiftless privileged life. Bill Kristol is worried about his PNAC neocon buddy Scooter when:

More than 4 million Iraqis have now been displaced by violence in the country, the U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday, warning that the figure will continue to rise [...]

These are the consequences of the actions and chest-thumping policies of people like Scooter Libby, Bill Kristol, Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, Dick Cheney, Doug Feith, etc. They play a game where only other people lose, but never themselves. Then they just move on to think tanks and visiting professorships and book contracts where nobody ever points out to them that they fucked up. They fucked up really bad.

If there was a shred of decency or an ounce of courage in any one of them, take your pick, they would each be making an appointment with Mr. Heavy Rope and Mr. Stout Overhead Beam, and their last act on earth would be to pin a note to their shirt that simply states: "I'm sorry. I was wrong."

Amen. TBogg only gets serious about as often as the cicadas come out from underground to terrorize the Midwest, but when he does it's thrilling to watch.

On a related note, Rick Perlstein takes a look at the letters to the court from Libby's band of neocon well-wishers and finds them to be a fascinating study in GOP thinking, where none of their friends can do any wrong, where they're all paragons of virtue or simply misunderstood, where forces conspire against them from simply doing the right thing for them and their families. But:

What's missing from every single one - every one: a single forthright statement about the magnitude of the offense for which he'd already been convicted.

But who cares, Libby loves families!

It's nothing short of enormously gratifying to see this two-bit huckster get everything that's coming to him. And hearing the right-wing noise machine in full bleat tickles me as well.

UPDATE: I should mention that the majority of the Republicans at the debate would pardon Libby if they were President, and the best answer was Mitt Romney's, an encapsulation of his whole campaign really, as he made the principled statement that he's never pardoned anybody because he doesn't believe in overruling juries, but in this case he probably would because that's what he thinks primary voters want him to say.

30 Months, $250,000 Fine

Wow, that's a LONG sentence for white-collar crime.

'Course, for treason, it's practically light. There won't be a hanging or anything.

I guess James Carville doesn't have any weight with this judge.

Now the question becomes, as Jeffrey Toobin said, whether or not George Bush will pardon him. The appeal will probably go down in flames, so the only way to keep Scooter out of jail is if Bush signs the letter. I'm sure that same big list of neocon all-stars will be lobbying at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Won't Need A Nickname For Prison

Scooter Libby faces sentencing today. There's liveblogging on it at Firedoglake. Patrick Fitzgerald apparently said "We're not going to recommend any sentence. I do think the sentence has to make clear and loud that truth matters and one's station in life does not."

Reading around, the legal consensus seems to be that he'll get a year or two. Of course, don't be surprised if it's nada; rich people still get a favorable hand from the long arm of the law.

He won't go to jail immediately, as there will be an appeal... unless the judge decides he has to be jailed pending the appeal.

UPDATE: The Smoking Gun has secured all the letters written by character witnesses asking for leniency in the Libby case. Now here's some character: Don Rumsfeld, Henry Kissinger, Paul Wolfowitz, John Bolton, Mary Matalin and James Carville (!), Richard Myers (former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff), Richard Perle, James Woolsey (ex-CIA director), Douglas Feith, Chris Cox (SEC Chairman) and Nixon's old lawyer Leonard Garment.

With friends like those...

UPDATE II: This is from the Matalin-Carville letter:

I have seen what this trial has done to my own kids, just reading about it.

Usually legal arguments and amicus curaie briefs are must-reading for children. What a bunch of tripe.