The letters submitted to the Judge in favor of Scooter Libby are linked at The Smoking Gun web site .
Scooter Libby Love Letters - June 5, 2007 (http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2007/0605071libby1.html)

David Frum at David Frum's Diary on National Review Online (http://frum.nationalreview.com/post/?q=YjAxYWVlMGVmOWRjYzg2ZTY4YmU0YTAwMmRmNTc5OWQ=)ma kes an interesting observation about the letter sent by Paul Wolfowitz .

I also remember how Mr. Libby offered his services pro bono or at reduced costs after he had returned to private law practice - to help former colleagues and friends with legal issues. In one case he helped a public official defend himself against libelous accusations, something that is extremely difficult to do for anyone in public office. The official in question was Richard Armitage :eek: who more recently served as - Deputy Secretary of State.

As we have learned from the trial . Not only was Richard Armitage the leaker that Plame worked for the CIA ,but both he an former Sec. State Colin Powell were aware of that fact at the beginning of the investigation.To add further to this misjustice ;prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald was aware of this fact before he even began to question Scooter Libby .

That Armitage and Powell remained silent during this whole affair shows how low they were willing to wallow to get Vice President Cheney .Powell has permanenty soiled his previously fine reputation in my book .Armitage proved he is just pond scum p.o.s. for throwing someone who gave him a hand under the bus.

I can see this isn't a very popular subject, tom. So not only did Libby work on Marc Rich's defense while Fitzgerald prosecuted, he defended the real leaker against "libelous accusations" as a favor. Is there anything about this that was about anything of substance?

Brian Carney wrote an excellent piece (http://www.commentarymagazine.com/cm/main/viewArticle.html?id=10870&page=all) I believe explains it all rather well. Here is his conclusion:


If there was a conspiracy, then, it was a conspiracy of dunces. At every stage where a top administration official could have exercised authority to ameliorate the problem caused by Wilson’s op-ed and Armitage’s indiscretion, that official failed to do so.

If a lesson about the Bush administration lies buried in this tale, it is close to the opposite of the accepted one. It is a lesson about an administration caught in an uncomfortable position as a result of one State Department official’s indiscreet remark to a skilled columnist, an administration straining to appear to be doing the right thing even at the expense of actually doing anything right. But the real lesson here has nothing to do with the Bush administration, any more than it has to do with prewar intelligence or with the First and Fifth Amendment rights of CIA officers.

The modern American government is a vast and largely self-sustaining bureaucracy. That bureaucracy acts, first and foremost, in its own interest, and not necessarily in the interests of its putative but temporary political bosses. The CIA, its intelligence having been challenged, sold out the White House on the sixteen words—even though that intelligence would later be upheld. The State Department, faced with the knowledge that one of its own was responsible for the Valerie Wilson leak, preferred keeping the White House in the dark to revealing what it knew. The Justice Department did what prosecutors do when ordered to investigate, which is to charge people with crimes.

In other words, the Republican party’s alleged “full control” of government prior to the 2006 midterm elections was more myth than reality. The Bush administration lost control of the Wilson story almost from the beginning, and while on a number of occasions it failed to exercise the control available to it, it was also denied the opportunity to control its fate by entrenched interests that no elected administration can ever fully master without the consent of the bureaucracy that supposedly serves it.

The President, however, does still hold one trump card, left in the hands of the chief executive by the founding fathers. The only unchecked power held by any single person in the federal government is the power to grant a pardon. That power is nothing more than the authority to restore personal liberty to another person—that is, to release a man or woman from the grip of the state.

Within hours of Libby’s conviction, Democrats, led by the Senate majority leader Harry Reid, called on President Bush to preclude the possibility of a pardon. This the President has of course refused to do. Neither has he yet offered a pardon. But there are good reasons, partly political and partly personal, for delay.

A pardon, it is generally agreed and the Supreme Court has ruled, carries with it the taint of guilt, and its acceptance an acknowledgment of guilt. This is something that Libby may yet hope to avoid. While he is due to be sentenced in June, his lawyers have announced their intention to appeal the conviction.

A pardon, whether it comes now or later, will inevitably occasion another round of scab-pulling about the case for the war and the administration’s commitment to the rule of law. It was partly out of a wholly unjustified fear of such criticisms that Libby was put in his current position in the first place. Before the President leaves office, it would be a rough sort of justice to defy those criticisms, and those who level them, by setting him free.

What's one more round of "scab-pulling" at this stage?

Steve ;this article by Carney is the best summary of the whole sordid affair I have read to date and spells out what has been pissing me off about the whole thing

At every stage where a top administration official could have exercised authority to ameliorate the problem caused by Wilson's op-ed and Armitage's indiscretion, that official failed to do so.

I don't know if Bush thinks he dodged the bullet by letting Libby sink or swim on his own but I think it is disgraceful for a man who places so much emphasis on personal loyalty to a fault; who took stubborn positions in defense of Rumsfeld ;Harriet Meirs ,and Alberto Gonzales to not do the right thing in this case (and so far I see no indication he intends to pardon Libby).

To think that Libby is going down to feed the blood lust of that scum Schmuck Shumer is almost too much to stomach .

To think that Libby is going down to feed the blood lust of that scum Schmuck Shumer is almost too much to stomach .

Now that does suck. And you're absolutely right about summing up the clincher, people could have cleared this up but they didn't. Wasn't it you that said you've lost a lot of respect for Colin Powell in this? Anyway, so have I.

By the way, you're dog's a beauty... and I see you've thrown your support behind Thompson.

Thanks I'll try to zoom in on his face a little closer.

Yeah I like Fred a lot . Can't find much to disagree with so far . I think McCain is the odd man out (espeically with this weeks immigration bill),and of the 3... Fred ,Rudy ,or Romney ,2 will be on the ticket.

Steve found this compromise solution in the Washington Compost by William Otis

washingtonpost.com (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/06/AR2007060602292.html?hpid=opinionsbox1)

Commute his sentence to match Berger's

UPDATE

The judge refused to allow Libby bond while he goes through the appeals process.

This decision makes worse what is already a miscarriage of justice. Libby's options are few . He will appeal the decision with the U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Columbia and ask for them the expedite the appeal. But there is no guarantee that the court will add it to the docket before he is scheduled to report to jail.

The President needs to step into the process. He doesn't have to pardon Libby . He could commute the sentence as described above. But that may not be even necessary . If the verdict is sustained throughout the appeals process then perhaps the chips should fall where they may. The President should in the interest of fairness order a respite of the execution of the sentence until all the legal options are played out. It is in his authority and he should use it.

Hello tom:

Well, my marriage with you right wingers was short and sweet. I loved being a right winger. I got to run around and yell, WE'RE THE LAW AND ORDER PARTY! But, when I found out that you're really not the law and order party, I quit.

Libby lied to a grand jury. Libby is going down. How can you possibly rail about ALL the judges and the BAD defense lawyers, and the SAD state of affairs our judicial system is in, but then it's OK to lie to a grand jury?

I see through you. You don't even make it hard.

In the real world of crime, (drugs for example) there are lots of people involved in conspiracies. Some are charged. Some snitch. Some can't be convicted. Some get stiff sentences. Some get off. None of that makes any difference to the guy who DID get convicted, and I don't see you supporting him.

Libby got convicted for what he did. It doesn't matter why. It doesn't matter who else did it. It doesn't matter who told him to lie. It doesn't matter who told bigger lies. Ok, yes it does, but it DOESN'T matter to Libby.

My convictions weren't fair. There were other people involved who got away. Did that make me less guilty? Does the Wolverine think I should have been cut loose cause of that? No, of course not. But, I'll bet he thinks Libby should.

Like I said, you guys are transparent. I'm glad I'm not a right winger any more. I'd be embarrassed. You're not??

excon

I never claimed to be from the "law and order party" but I am getting used to getting labeled .In fact I do not have any party affiliation . I am concerned about justice and I do not think it would be just for Libby to be in jail while awaiting for a decision on appeal since I think his conviction itself is a miscarriage of justice . I do not know the details of your case or any of the others you mentioned .I do know the details of this case and they stink. He was convicted on the faulty memory(read lie) of the prosecution's main witnesses Tim Russert .

I'm surprised that the actions of an overzealous prosecutor does not bother you.

Federal trial judges do not automatically throw every convicted defendant in prison pending appeal. Why is that? Although they obviously believe they ruled properly on matters of law, they are willing to let other judges ; judges who will hear the appeal anyway ; review the challenged aspects of the case first, especially where you have a defendant who is neither dangerous nor a flight risk. There are legitimate reasons to question Judge Walton's judgment, in my view, including even his childish comments about the dozen ideologically diverse law professors who had the audacity to file a brief in support of Libby. [He said the brief was “not persuasive” and “not something I would expect from a first-year law student.”].Included in this first-year law student exercise was a 900 page opinion by Professor Kmiec of Pepperdine Law school (no fan of either the Iraq war or the Bush administration ) that questioned the constitutionality of Patrick Fitgerald's appointment as prosecutor in the first place.

I do not think a respite is circumventing the process either since it is in the President's authority to do so and a respite of execution of the sentence is something that Presidents have done since George Washington delayed the execution of two men who fought in the Whiskey Rebellion ; both of whom were eventually pardoned .As I said above ;once his appeals are run through and he is still found guilty then let the chips fall where they may.