Thursday, March 08, 2007

Pardon the Interruption



So little Scootie may be going to jail... and already the editorial pages are abuzz with presidential pardon fever. Will he? Won't he? Tony Snow says "there is a process"... Dubya says he's "sad"... Maureen Dowd somehow managed to turn the topic into yet another ditty on her love life.

The NYT had this to say:

Debate Over Pardon Follows the Libby Verdict


Of course my favorite part of the article is the reference that Intrade, a prediction market, has the odds of a presidential pardon by the end of 2007 at 23%, by the end of Bush's term, 63%. But I digress...

One juror who convicted the Scootster even said she thinks he deserves a pardon (?!) Democrats say Bush must not pardon. The WSJ and other 'conservative' rags demand a pardon, and now!

Debate The Libby Travesty


It's an interesting idea, that Scoots could just get off the hook after all the hullabaloo - after all he wasn't the real focus of the investigation... And 25 years seems like an awfully long time to go without 18 holes...

So if Libby get's the good ole wink and nod from Bush, what was the end result of the whole Plamegate fiasco? Bush and Cheney are still illin... (literally.) Valerie and Robert are a-ok. Patrick Fitzgerald, presumably, is on vacation.

So who suffered? The NYT says the media... and I have to agree, although the trial didn't make us out to be the most sympathetic characters.

After Libby Trial, New Era for Government and Press


Fitzgerald's tactics proved effective and for the first time (according to NYT) two major media institutions differed on a fundamental question of journalism ethics... Now, Josh Wilson, the poor vlogger from San Francisco, is behind bars and I'm sure many more to come.

At the Libby trial, 10 of 19 witnesses were journalists... 3 of them helped secure Libby's indictment. I remember reading something about journalists not allowing themselves to become an arm of law enforcement... but I must be mistaken.

...Pardon me?

LT

(And yes, much like the Fox masterpiece on 'reefer', I was looking for as many conjugations of Scooter as possible.)

2 Comments:

At Friday, March 09, 2007, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Oh, LT, you just love blogs, don't you.

I think the media lost, but poor little "fall guy" Scootie lost more. It's funny, as soon as I found out the verdict, my first thought was presidential pardon. I guess it was the first thought of the media as well, given the profuse disucussions on prime-time cable news shows.

It wouldn't be the worst outcome if he gets a pardon. The crime he committed was perjury, not conspiracy. It's a serious crime, but 25 years? Please. Besides I don't think Bush is going to care what people think when he's out of office in 2008, so he has nothing to lose by granting Mr. Libby a "get out of jail free card."

JK

 
At Friday, March 09, 2007, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Just read my comment again, and I don't mean to minimize the seriousness of perjury. It just seemed in this case that little Libby was confused, not conniving.

word up,
JK

 

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