Posted on 06/22/2007 5:45:36 PM PDT by STARWISE
I find myself in unusual company, and I am always so careful about the company I keep. Nonetheless, here I am arguing on the same side as Washington Post columnist and ritualistic liberal Richard Cohen and Christopher Hitchens.
At least Hitchens, a columnist for Vanity Fair and Slate, is an independent man of the left. Yet here I am on their side arguing for leniency for Vice President Richard Cheney's former chief of staff, Scooter Libby.
Having been found guilty of lying under oath, he is about to be sent to prison before his appeal is considered. In fact his prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, has urged he be sent to prison immediately because of his failure to express remorse; though if he were to express remorse what grounds would he have for an appeal?
Fitzgerald is what is called a "tough" prosecutor. I would call him something else, either a failed logician or a brute.
*snip*
Yet we doubt that Libby lied. In fact, I have long doubted that Libby is stupid enough to tell the particular lie that he has been found guilty of. It meant he lied about a long-ago telephone call with the journalist Tim Russert. What is more, it meant that Libby assumed Russert would somehow pick up on the lie and repeat it when asked about the conversation in court, thus making himself a perjurer.
What actually happened is that Russert remembered the conversation differently, said so in court, and cooked Libby's goose. As Hitchens puts it, "If Scooter Libby goes to jail, it will be because he made a telephone call to Tim Russert and because Tim Russert has a different recollection of the conversation."
*snip*
Well, thought I, the jury will sort things out. Unfortunately the brute prevailed, faulty logic and all.
(Excerpt) Read more at spectator.org ...
See post #18
Nixon was never convicted of anything...Ford still pardoned him. Bush’s refusal to pardon Libby is indecent.
Bush has at his disposal the legal “respiteâ€, which is a delay in imposition of sentence. Woodrow Wilson used this effectively to delay sentence of a subordinate until the end of his term, when the underling was pardoned.
Says you.
From what I understand Libby has ecellent prospects on appeal. It would be so much better if the conviction were overturned than if the Prsident pardoned him. It’s worth the wait to see if he can be vindicated on appeal as opposed to a pardon.
Well, OK, except his name is G Gordon Liddy.
That is why my response ended with a question mark. Didn’t know for sure. Thanks for the info.
He’s not in jail yet, so .... I think there are more options that are yet to play out.
Because Libby can and will win his case on appeal.
If Bush pardons Libby, then Libby can no longer clear his name. He will be tarnished for eternity.
A pardon suggests guilt. He has the appeal process to handle the injustice that has been done to him. To pardon him now, before the appeal has run its course, would short circuit the system. The only way a pardon would be good at this point is if the judge does not let him remain free pending the appeal. This judge has been anything but fair to Libby from day one and the only reason I can think of that he would not let Libby remain free pending appeal is that he has it out for Libby and knows if he’s going to get him it’s got to be before the appeal can wipe out the conviction.
This has got to be the single worst example of injustice that I have ever seen. It was never even proved that there was crime to begin with and yet Fitzgerald pushed on for two years or more and finally charged Libby with something that came down to absolutely nothing more than the two people remembered a phone conversation two years earlier. A conversation during which neither party took notes.
“and, FatTimmy: how DO you sleep at night?”
Probably like a baby (that he is), on his big, oversized pillow.
Boy, if Sandy Berger is still running around free after stealing from the National Archive, admitting it, etc ... how can Libby ever be put in jail ... this is absolutely amazing.
"III. Exclusion of the Testimony of Andrea Mitchell
At trial, defendant sought to impeach Tim Russert's testimony that he did not tell defendant that Mr. Wilson's wife worked at the CIA (2/7/07 PMTr.22,26) purportedly by showing that Ms. Mitchell knew of Ms. Wilson's CIA-employment prior to the publication of Robert Novak's column and may have conveyed that information to Mr. Russert.
Ms. Mitchell had made an out-of-court-statement which defendant argued indicated that she knew that Mrs. Wilson worked at the CIa prior to the publication of Mr. Novak's column, and prior to defendant's conversation with Mr. Russert.
As the district court found, however, the prior statement was at best ambiguous, and the interpretation defendant was pressing had been publicly refuted by Ms. Mitchell on numerous occasions (((WHEN SHE THEN LIED TO COVER UP HER PREVIOUS STATEMENTS!!!).
Thus, it was clear defendant's sold purpose in calling Ms. Mitchell was to put the October 3, 2003 statement before the jury.
As the district court correctly held, the October 3, 2003 statement was not admissible as substantive evidence, and calling Ms. Mitchell as subterfuge to place her otherwise-inadmissible statement before the jury violated not only well-settled authority in the D.C. Circuit, but also authority from other jurisdictions. .................
~~~~~
fifi, I don't understand this footnote .. that defense turned down the option of questioning Mitchell?:
The defense requested and was granted an opportunity to question ms. Mitchell; however, defense counsel declined the court's offer to allow questioning under oath and outside the presence of the jury. 2/13/07 AM Tr. 18-23. See also 475 F. Supp. 2d at 82, n.8. Defendant thus waived the claim that Ms. Mitchell's account would differ from her attorney's representation had she been placed under oath.
~~~~~~~
The district court's evidentiary determination that the probative value of ms. Mitchell's testimony was minimal at best (as the jury would be asked to draw a string of speculative inferences), and was substantially outweighed by the risk of confusion and unfair prejudice, is entitled to substantial deference.
Moreover, any error in excluding Ms. Mitchell's testimony is harmless, especially in light of the overwhelming evidence of defendant's guilt.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
HORSE PUCKEY !!!
Since Bush is notoriously loyal to his cronies, the question is somewhat problematic. Based on his history, though, I can make one guess and that is that Libby is significantly more competent at what he does than is George. Bush’s loyalties are strongest toward those that can’t make that claim — i.e. Gonzalez, “Brownie”, Mineta (now there was a REAL jewel) Chertoff, Miers, etc.
I thought that Mrs. Greenspan had written an article, under her name Andrea Mitchell, where she mentioned that the ambassador was sent on the mission by CIA operatives (or some such thing). That article was published prior to Novak’s. I’m curious why the defense didn’t introduce it, or discuss it, as it was also relevant to Andrea’s (aka the drunk, due to her IMUS statemet) knowledge of what was going on.
NBC in the names of the spitter (Matthews), the crybaby (Gregory), the fat dim one (Russert) and the drunk (Mitchell) are all intimately involved in this. Not to mention, their great reporter (Schuster, or is it Scheister?) who got more of this story wrong than anyone else.
This whole case is NBC against the White House; to this day when this subject is discussed on NBC, they somehow forget to mention that the LEAKER WAS RICHARD ARMITAGE.
I will look forward to reading the take on Fitzy’s filing at JOM. I think Team Libby’s response to this filing is due on Tuesday, next week. The I guess a date will be set for a hearing?
What a lie. Do they think we can't see this. How does one obstruct an investigation where they already know the answers. I've been a lawyer for many years. When you hear anyone ssy we are a nation of laws, not of men, throw eggs, boo and hiss, realize it is not true and we only pay lip service to it.
The judge was going to permit limited questioning outside the jury’s presence. Not quite the same thing as a full examination before the jury.(At least not in this country.)
Karma has begun!
NBC News is turning into a joke- first the anti-American crap, and especially since this million dollar/Paris Hilton nonsense.
It also gives me great pause in my faith that the justice system works as the Founding Fathers intended it to. If a person at that level and with that access to excellent legal services can be convicted in a case where no crime was committed in the first place and then be incarcerated before even his first level of appeal then what chance do you and I stand?
...Now, an odd burp of a story is floating around the Internet about a question from Andrea Mitchell to James Risen on the possibility that CNN reporter Christiane Amanpour was the subject of a government wiretap. The place to start here in The Moderate Voice, where Joe Gandelman has some good analysis and lots of links to get you around. Be prepared for the typical responses in the comments from the usual suspects. Bush backers will say something on the order of, "Well, there must have been a good reason," while anti-Bush people will be throwing I-told-you-sos amidst the predictions or hope of an early impeachment. And let's not forgo the obvious Nixon parallels. In a nut shell, Mitchell, in interviewing Risen, gave the impression that she was aware that the administration was bugging Amanpour's communications. NBC killed the transcript and issued an oddly phrased statement that implied that NBC thought that the charge was credible but wasn't ready to break the story, which, whether this ends up being true or hooey, is the right thing to do. 39 posted on 01/06/2006 9:39:46 AM PST by Cboldt | To 1...* Jamie Rubin (former State Department Clintonista) and Christiane Amanpour (CNN war slut) [are married]-- 51 posted on 05/22/2004 1:31:22 PM PDT by Miss Marple
* Tim Russert & Andrea Mitchell : Russert clearly remembered first reading about Mrs. Wilson in the Novak column. “I said, Wow, look at this, this is really significant, this is big,” he testified. “I went to work and began to ask people I was working with what we knew about what, why we didn’t have the story, because to me it was a significant development in the story.”
NBC's Andrea Mitchell reported three days before the Novak column that Wilson was sent to Africa by the CIA according to a CIA informant. I wonder why no one ever asked Mitchell who her informant was. Obviously, Russert is lying here.---------32 posted on 02/08/2007 6:47:24 PM PST by Hoodat | To 1* Andrea Mitchell : A question for you or anyone else who might know. When was the Vanity Fair spread on the Wilson's released? When was the interview and photo shoot for this spread? It was mentioned last week that [Tim] Russert's wife works for Vanity Fair. In addition, Andrea Mitchell said that those reporters who cover the CIA knew about Plame before Novak's column. If Andrea Mitchell knew, the suggestion was that her Bureau Chief - Russert - also knew about Plame. How does the Vanity Fair article on the Wilson's fit into the timeline? Or is this just a red herring? 38 posted on 11/07/2005 7:49:02 AM PST by pieces of time | To 23
It was mentioned last week that [Tim] Russert's wife works for Vanity Fair.----38 posted on 11/07/2005 7:49:02 AM PST by pieces of time | To 23
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