Guilty!!!
“I’m not surprised (about the Scooter Libby guilty verdict). I think it’s an indicator that once again we see an administration that’s more interested in politics and discrediting its critics than it is in getting the job done. There’s some parallels to the developing scandal now where you have senators and representatives calling prosecutors to influence cases and you have coverups over what was going on in the Walter Reed scandal.
This is an administration which is reminding me of the Nixon administration where the president himself and others have become more obsessed with their critics than doing their jobs and America is suffering.”
– Howard Dean
The biggest difference I see now compared to the Nixon era, is the rot extends much deeper into the entire Republic party now than it did then.
– Anon
Tags: Bush's FUBAR War
Great! Now when’s Sandy Burgler gonna be convicted?
Yeah. How can Libby go to jail for this while Armitage and Sandy Burglar run free?
How can Libby go to jail for this while Armitage and Sandy Burglar run free?
Yeah! Heads should roll in the Justice Department!
… oh wait, they already did. Somebody’s going to jail for that too.
FSP – At least Hube prefaced his dumbassitude with the acknowledgment that the Libby verdict is a win for Democracy.
You just dove for the Sandy “Burgler” mention like a crack whore diving for a dollar bill blowing down the sidewalk.
I don’t see how Libby’s verdict is a win for anyone, except for those who want to attach some sort of higher meaning to it.
Forgive me for being surprised at this outcome. I thought the precedent was set in the 90’s that perjury wasn’t really all that bad…
This was a political show trial, and partisans of Joe Wilson will use the guilty verdict to declare vindication. But along the way we learned that virtually all the claims Wilson and his supporters made were false:
-On his trip to Niger, Wilson found no evidence that contradicted the famous “16 words” in President Bush’s 2003 State of the Union Address, contrary to his New York Times op-ed claim.
-Plame, his wife, who worked for the CIA, did recommend him for the Niger junket, contrary to Wilson’s denials.
-Plame was not a covert agent under the definition of the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, contrary to Wilson’s insinuations, which many of his backers, including in the press, presented as fact.
-No one from the White House “leaked” Plame’s identity as a CIA functionary to Robert Novak, who received the information from Richard Armitage at the State Department.
Libby stands convicted of lying in the course of Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation of the Valerie Plame kerfuffle–but that investigation was undertaken on the basis of a tissue of lies. When Fitzgerald began the case, in 2003, no one had committed any crime in connection with the kerfuffle, and that was fairly easy to ascertain, given that Plame was not a covert agent and Armitage had already owned up to the so-called leak. Fitzgerald looks like an overzealous prosecutor, one who was more interested in getting a scalp than in getting to the truth of the matter.
Of course, Libby could have avoided indictment and conviction if he had simply said “I don’t remember” a lot more during the course of the investigation. Therein lies a lesson for witnesses in future such investigations–which may make it harder for prosecutors to do their jobs when pursuing actual crimes.
There IS a higher meaning to the Libby conviction. It means there is a cancer on the Vice Presidency.
Shorter happycon:
Lie about a blow job = impeachment
Lie to prop up the Bush Junta and undermine our national security = “kerfuffle”
Sir, you are a true patriot.
On his trip to Niger, Wilson found no evidence that contradicted the famous “16 words” in President Bush’s 2003 State of the Union Address, contrary to his New York Times op-ed claim.
This is false. Wilson’s findings directly contradicted Bush’s “16 words”. That is why the office of the VP was out to get him, and why Libby leaked Plame’s name to the press on 18 occasions.
Do try to keep up Happycon. Treason might seem to be a “kerfuffle” to you, but many of us take it quite seriously.
Sorry DelLibs, Joe Wilson is the liar in this story – the only thing Niger has to export is yellowcake, and as hard as he tried, Wilson was unable to disprove the claim that Hussein was trying to get his hands on it. Now, I’m going to surprise you here and say that Richard Armitage should not be prosecuted, for the simple reason that Valerie Plame was not a covert agent, and revealing her identity as a CIA analyst was not a crime. If Libby intentionally lied under oath about who told what to whom and when, then he’s guilty. If President Bush has a single hair on his ass, he will issue a pardon before Libby spends a day in jail, and before one single taxpayer dollar is wasted in appeals and all the rest of that legalistic goat roping. What, like he’s worried about his approval rating? FREE SCOOTER!!!
And anon, as far as “Heads should roll in the Justice Department!” you’d be wise to remember that Clinton fired every US attorney appointed by Bush 41 as soon as he took office. Bush 43 was quite magnanimous by comparison.
Happycon, you need to stop embarassing yourself with the old talking points. This stuff is no longer controversial, but let me pick out my favorite one:
Plame was not a covert agent under the definition of the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, contrary to Wilson’s insinuations, which many of his backers, including in the press, presented as fact.
Here is the thing. No one can invoke the protections if the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, except for the Intellegence agencies. In order to do that, they have to say: 1) that specific assets have been compromised; 2) those assets were definitely secret; 3) and that someone illegally compromised those assets. It was the CIA in its referral to the DoJ who admitted that Ms. Plame was covert. Even Bob Novak tells that as he was trying to confirm the story of Ms. Plame’s status that he was told specifically by his CIA source that Ms. Plame was covert and that releasing her name to the media would destroy her career.
Game Over.
Oeddie, the CIA thinks everything they do is a state secret. I’ll remind you that Victoria Toensing, who helped write the protection act, says Plame wasn’t covered.
Game over to you.
“Lie about a blow job = impeachment
Lie to prop up the Bush Junta and undermine our national security = “kerfuffle””
So perjury is okay, depending on the subject matter?
At least Hube prefaced his dumbassitude with the acknowledgment that the Libby verdict is a win for Democracy.
Translation: Hube is 100% correct that Burger running around scot free is a travesty, despite the Libby verdict.
“So perjury is okay, depending on the subject matter?”
That is exactly what Happycon is saying, not me.
Trial by jury is the foundation of our legal system and Mr.Libby will have to appeal if he wants to avoid jail.
Still, I see Presidential Pardon in late 2008 in my crystal ball.
Mike Protack
Sorry, cons, Joe Wilson’s job wasn’t to find something that would “disprove” the allegation. He was sent to find out if anything supported the allegation, which came from a suspect document that was in fact found to be a forgery. Some of you conservatives are misplacing the burden of proof.
Hube: “Someone on your side did it first” is a fairly lame way of treating any subject. Do you have anything substantive to add, or are you going to be content to provide snarky comments from under the bridge?
FSP: Oh, so now perjury ISN’T a big deal? There are some of us who thought it was then, and think it is now. That’s without even going into the differences in what was being lied about.
For the record, G Rex, your gal Vicky is now contradicting her stance of eight years ago; she thought perjury was a big deal then, but not now. No surprise there. FWIW, I think she’s right about the Plame outing not being illegal. But it is pretty scummy, no? Not even the “was this a junket?” note on the column?
Of course, the story here isn’t what was or wasn’t legal; it’s the behavior of the VP that’s now on the record, which contradicts the so-often-repeated claim that he was a disinterested bystander who was simply pressing the CIA for better intelligence analysis.
Al,
You are wrong about no crime having been committed. Plame worked for a CIA cover company called Brewster Jennings. When her cover was blown by Libby/Cheney the whole Brewster Jennings operation (to track WMD’s) was blown. This was a direct attack on our security for political reasons.
As far as the chain of events that led up to the crime, the discovery phase of the trial established that:
1) Cheney asked the CIA to verify the Niger claim.
2) The CIA went to someone with a background in WMDs and overseas experience (i.e. Plame) to verify the claim.
3) Plame said something like “hey, my husband (Joe Wilson) used to be the General Services Officer in Niger. He’s still got some contacts over there. He could go and ask some questions.”
4) He goes, finds nothing, comes home, tells his story.
5) It works its way up the chain of command where the guys at the top ignore him.
6) He gets pissed and tells everybody.
The crime was then committted when President Cheney got pissed at Wilson for trying to throw cold water on his Iraq invasion and the rest is history.
“Oh, so now perjury ISN’T a big deal? There are some of us who thought it was then, and think it is now. That’s without even going into the differences in what was being lied about.”
You might want to go back and read what I said again.
the CIA thinks everything they do is a state secret. I’ll remind you that Victoria Toensing, who helped write the protection act, says Plame wasn’t covered.
So sorry. The CIA does not think that everything they do is a state secret. That is why they function largely under two divisions — one covert, the other not.
Vicky Toensing has been one of the real leaders of the disinformation here. She is explicitly contradicted by the CIA referral to the DoJ, and explicitly contradicted by Novak’s sworn testimony as to the confirmation of her status by his CIA source.
Vicky Toensing lying about whatever she’s been tasked to lie about today just continues to embarass those who need to cling to something to believe their guy is right.
But you keep playing that bad hand.
Right, facts are bad if they don’t bring down the administration. Joe Wilson had tea and crumpets with some functionary in Ouagadougu or somewhere and decided that was good enough for him. A regular James Bond, that guy.