Bush commutes Libby...
So, what do you think of Bush's decision to commute Scooter Libby's sentence so he won't face a couple years in the big house?
In an unprecedented but not surprising maneuver, President Bush on Monday commuted former vice presidential chief of staff Libby's prison sentence for obstruction of justice.
Bush said he respected the jury's finding against Libby, but thought a prison sentence was too harsh. LIbby will still pay a fine and face probation, but he'll avoid a cell with a roommate not of his choosing.
Some people -- including most Democrats and a fair number of Republicans -- immediately suggested that Bush has a bizarre way of showing respect for America's system of justice. Rather, they believe Bush has shown a disregard for the rule of law.
Still, it was a politically shrewd move. The commutation shores up Bush's conservative base. As for the majority already opposed to Bush, well, let 'em stew.
But enough from me. What do you all think about it?
posted by Patrick Rice @ 4:45 PM
44 Comments
44 Comments:
He should never have been convicted in the first place. Period
Why not. A Mr Armitage outed the CIA person and we didn't see him punished at all. Libby still is on probation and has to pay a fine. Anyhow, the President wanted to give 12-20 million illegal aliens ( all criminals for entering our country without permission) so why not toss some amnesty around to an American. And that is about what the President probably believes is just, commute one American and let countless millions of illegal aliens off.
Just one more notch in the "Jack Booted Thugs" category in which this administration so luxuriously wallows.
For some reason, I admire Bush's "the polls can't go any lower" attitude. At least he doesn't run away when bullied, like some people out there.
Libby gets off--no surprise. David Fleet serves part of his time for lying, how about tough guy libby. And some people believe it is ok to do this-commute his sentence. Probation is an inconvenience. From a retired P.O.--Partisan
"Excuse....me, for being an ordinary citizen and thinking that when you break the law...You Should Pay...well I am sure that"Poor Scooter Libbey", will have a fund somewhere that will come up with the fine...and once again our President has acted like a King of old, and not our President ...of the people, for the people....Disgusted is what I am.....
If you don’t like it too bad! There’s not a %#%^$ thing you can do about it. The only thing you can do is whine, cry, gripe and complain. And the more you people whine, cry, gripe and complain the more I laugh. The louder you whine, cry, gripe and complain the louder I laugh. So go ahead and whine, cry, gripe and complain some more. I can use another hearty laugh at you expense.
If Libby was smart he would have took a chance and made a donation to his presidential library, that was the price of a pardon in the last administration, so who knows.
It’s funny that after Democrats just tried to pardon millions with 70% of Senate Democrats voting for Kennedy’s amnesty bill for illegals you people have the nerve to complain about this.
I don't see the big deal. Personally, I think he should have received a full pardon. Why? As long as Sandy Berger walks around free, Libby should be free as well. Oh, maybe some of you don't remember, but Berger tore out and took with him in his socks, belt, etc. highly classified documents from the National Archives. He finally admitted it, but would not tell anyone what was in them.
Thomas Paine wrote in 1786 - "The sovereignty of a despotic monarch assumes the power of making wrong right or right wrong, as he pleases or as it suits him. The sovereignty in a republic is exercised to keep right and wrong in their proper and distinct places, and never suffer the one to ursurp the place of the other. A republic, properly understood, is a sovereignty of justice in contradiction to a sovereignty of will." The president's action and Sam Patti have defined the Republican Idea better than anything. We'd be better off if neither was privledged with free publicity.
Truthfully, presidential pardons are always going to be controversial, as were the 140 or so Clinton did, particularly the ones just before he left office. I guess the question is, are the pardons a way of balancing justice when political forces play too great a role in a conviction?
HOORAY!!!! What an unfair sentence imposed on Mr. Libby. The whole "CIA LEAK" case was simply swept under the rug except for Mr. Libby's lie to a prosecutor. His reputation has been ruined forever, not counting the half million dollar fine he has to pay. I certainly think that is enough punishment for a statement he made in a case that did not even come to trial!!! Also, the Clintons would be advised to "hush their mouths" with all the pardoning Mr. Clinton did (and I'm sure Hillary had a hand in all he did) and the SANDY BERGER case reflecting on the Clintons (Berger is their man....Can stealing secret information from the government be compared to a lie in a case that led nowhere.
As you stated Pat "no surprise." Anyone that thought for a minute that Libby would serve even a minute in jail was a dreamer. The president is a nut case, he has circumvented the US Constitution on several occasions and I think actually believes he is King George. The months can not pass swiftly enought for this administraton to be over.
Let’s see democrats want to create a so called fairness doctrine to regulate free speech and Obama is attacking freedom of religion. Yet some idiots think the President is a threat to the constitution.
566 days. How much more damage can he do to the Constitution? I guess when you have a Democratice Congress that has no spine, you can get away with anything. It's time to impeach.
I believe that the whole prosecution was a fraud from start to finish. Valerie Plame was no more a covert agent than I am. The prosecutor knew at the beginning that Richard Armitage was the leaker but continued with this investigation wasting time and money. This increasing criminalization of politics has to stop.
It also shows the sainted Colin Powell to be just a beltway politician. He knew the truth from the beginning and didn't inform the president who had appointed him.
I also believe that the appointment of special prosecutors should be unconstitutional. Criminal investigation are the job of the Justice dept. If they can't handle it, the Attorney General should be fired and a new one appointed.
I have mixed feelings about this.
On the one hand he was convicted by a jury of his peers and sentenced by a judge that was appointed by GW Bush.
On the other, I feel everyone should always lie to agents of this out-of-control Big Federal Government.
Don
Did you have a headline about Sandy Berger's slap on the wrist for a REAL crime? Oh, I forgot, democrats are above the law.
I'll be glad when this bunch of Republican crooks is replaced by a bunch of Democratic crooks...
I know that the Daily News editor and the editors of the Washington Post and the New York Times are very upset over the actions of the president.
HOORAY FOR PRESIDENT BUSH!!!!!!
Lets see if William Jefferson, the Democrat who hid a stash of cash in his freezer, will ever spend a day in jail.
Who really cares? He "lied" to a lawyer. How would a lawyer know the difference? They all lie so much none of them can be trusted or believed. We even elect them to public office where they can commit treason and play at sexual deviancy - but these are only a little high crimes and misdemeanors.
In the last days of the Clinton Administration, Clinton signed a bunch of pardons including Mark Rich, a fugitive who fled while being prosecuted and was living in Switzerland. Rich was being tried for making oil deals with
Iran during the hostage crisis and tax evasion. So on balance Libby vs Rich? Libby wasn't prosecuted for anything other than politics. Yet, when Rich was pardoned, Democrats didn't say a word. So to those like Obama and Harry
Reid, sit down and hush or criticize both.
Just politics as usual from the talker, who is not a thinker or doer. Bush commuted and did not pardon, YET, but on Jan 19, 2009 , I bet anything that liar Libby goes free of everything.Bush senior pardoned alot of drug dealers , thugs, terrorists when he ended his term. Caspar 'the ghost' Weinberger--pardoned, Ollie sliko Northy big time so called patriot, and all Iran contra gate offenders. Partisan
Yes, Marc Rich was pardoned by former President Clinton. Who was Rich's lawyer? Scooter Libby...
The irony of "Sandy Berger didn't serve a day" defense from the Bushies is just so rich.
The "alleged" crimes of Mr. Berger occurred when President Bush controlled all of the Congress, the Justice Dept., the FBI, the courts, etc. But somehow President Bush is powerless to take on this "traitor of the USA".
Mr. Liddy, however, was prosecuted by a Republican prosecutor, found guility of those crimes by a jury of his peers presided over by a Bush appointed federal judge, and sentenced in accords with sentencing quidelines that same Bush appointee.
Mr. Liddy has powerful friends, such as VP Cheney and Sen. Fred Thompson among others, who easily raise 5 million dollars for Mr. Libby's appeal. Those same powerful friends will likely pay Mr. Liddy's 250 thousand dollar fine and set him up in a "conservative think tank" with a huge salary to allow him to remain wealthy for the rest of his life.
The hypocrisy of the Liddy/Bush defenders is unbounded.
He should be returned to office. How else will he be able to pay the fine!
What was "unprecedented" about a president exercising a derivative of his Constitutional pardon power, a commutation of a portion of a sentence while maintaining the guily verdict AND fine? Yet another example of this editor saying something untrue to further erode people's opinion of their president. Care to explain what was a first in this regard? Or do I not understand the word "unprecedented"?
Bush's payback for Liddy's coverup of VP Cheney's and WH Chief of Staff Karl Rove involvement in the leaking of CIA agent Valerie Plame.
The GOP, party of Law and Order, except not when they get caught and convicted.
The cost of President Clinton's investigation - approximately $77,000,000. Scooter's - several millions (not ever actually released) and the investigations is not over yet. Knowing screwball Bush has less than a year and a half left as president -priceless.
As usual, we're hearing mostly from the partisan fools whose sole purpose in life is to whack away at the other party's ill-conceived talking points instead of engaging in good, honest debate on any issue.
I've never liked the idea of presidents pardoning people or commuting their sentences. Commanders-in-chief ought to have enough respect for the law to not throw out God knows how many years of courtroom hearings just because a buddy is involved, and commuting sentences should be left to the courts, which, even if we sometimes disagree with their decisions, base their rulings on case law, etc.
It was wrong for Clinton to pardon Marc Rich, and Bush needs to accept that Libby was convicted and that several appeals judges felt the sentence should be served right away. Pardoning Libby would send entirely the wrong message, as did Clinton pardoning Rich. And, God rest his soul, I don't know what Gerald Ford was thinking when he pardoned Richard Nixon.
Anyhow, presidential pardons kinda obliterate the whole point of separation of powers, too. Pesky details.
Yep, no surprise here. King George has ruled.
Most of the "Rah!Rah! Rah! You Go, George!" comments are no surprise either in this Republican-infested-good-old-boys county.
The Thomas Paine excerpt was superb.
Me thinks I shall re-register as a Libertarian. Both Dems & Repubs are stinky!
I think he should have fired the special procecutor when it was found out the he (Fitsgerarl) knew the leaker within a month of starting his investigation. It was prosecutorial misconduct to keep digging and empowering a grand jury to try to trap people into process crimes when the answer was already at hand. What?? Two and a half years and millions of tax payer dollars to satisfy a procecutor's ego.
The democrat sychophant Bush haters will of course not support this exercise of executive power.
Mrs. Bill Clinton’s comments on President Bush pardoning Scooter Libby proves that today’s democrat politicians don’t think America’s voters are stupid—they’re absolutely counting on it.
Mrs Clinton, soon to be President Clinton, compliments of the Bush administration, is relying on the the voters being stupid. She has the past 6 1/2 years to proove it. Not only did president duh steal the first election, he actually got 52 percent of the American voters to give him a second term. Progressive partisan you hit the nail on the head, the voting public is stupid, if you need another example, just look at our elected county commission. You sir or madam are truly progressive and well ahead of your peers in this area. Good on you!
Convicted terrorists, international criminals, organized crime figures, and even a dope- dealing brother were among the nearly 500 campaign donors pardoned by the ex-president. This gives him a right to criticize President Bush’s removing Libby’s prison sentence.
Considering what a drunken Ted Kennedy got for killing someone andd fleeing the scene, 2 years for not being able to remember exactly what you said 2 years ago does seem extreme. Even to this yellow dog.
I think it's sad that we might get the Clintons back in the White House and have even more of this. Who can we vote for at this point? The Republicans used to have more integrity, but Bush is stooping down to the Democrats' level. He has lost touch completely. Brownback seems like one of the few decent men left.
After this has been front-page news for months the democrats now have the nerve to say Al Gore’s family’s criminal behavior should be a private affair. Sounds like the double talk democrats are asking for a double standard.
The President acted within his authority when he commuted the sentence. If you have a problem with that it’s just that, your problem, and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it so quit your idiotic incessant whining and get over it.
It's not whining when you are worried about the direction the country is taking. I will never vote for the Democrats, because they have no respect for life at all, but I am deeply disappointed in this president and if you think what he does is not our business, I wonder if you realize that we are living in the United States of America, not some banana republic or dictatorship.
It figured. This administration has played fast and loose - especially since the 2004 fiasco that kept the engine running. A lot of Shrub adherents bring up the Clinton pardon of Marc Rich - who was Rich's lawyer? Scooter Libby! Guess it really is "who you know." Martha Stewart went to jail. Lil Kim went to jail. Even clueless Paris Hilton went to jail. But Scooter will probably "go to Disneyland!"
If he was going to pardon Libby he should have done it on the way out of office, like Clinton did. As a lifelong Replublican I am so dissappointed in my party. Once again they find a way to take a bad situation and make it worse. Why should Libby be pardoned at this point in time?
Are the Republicans trying to stack the deck so that none of them can get elected? While Bush may be thinking that his poll numbers cant get any worse he still has to remember there is going to be a Republican party trying to run for office after he is gone.
Blind partisanship is so uncool...not good for a true democracy, either.
What are y'all so wound up about? Did you honestly think the "Good old boy" system only existed here in Okaloosa county?
It figures the answers that you would get localy. Bush is divinely appointed and approved by Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. The other two sons of God. Bill Clinton is at fault and 911 is the reason. A very typical Fox News only non reading illiterate Red Neck local answer. If Bill Clinton had been caught pitching in the Greyhound Bus station, it would still be more honest and not as bad as Bush killing so many Americans in Iraq and blaming it on Bill Clinton and 911. Clinton is a thousand times a better more honest man than King Bush.
Bill Clinton bold faced lied to a Grand Jury, got caught, and didn't serve any time. Anyone remember that? Why does this paper have such an obsession with Libby anyway? Why not ask "Why did Bill Clinton Pardon so many drug dealers and people related to scandals he was investigated for?" Libby got tripped up in a bogus investigation and turned out to be a fall guy for a prosecutor trying to get someone higher up the food chain. After years of investigation and millions of wasted taxpayer dollars, this is the best he could do? Where’s the prosecution of the real crime, leaking a CIA agent’s name? Democrats are just pissed because Slick Willy was impeached and now they are looking for payback. It’s that simple.
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