Libby and the Liars


After ten long days of deliberation a jury found Scooter Libby guilty of lying and obstructing justice during an investigation. What were they doing that took them so long to come to that conclusion? Much of what you have been hearing and will continue to hear is the inference of some connection between Libby’s apparent misjudgments of the facts with the initial underlying investigation. Everyone with an agenda will spin this decision in their own favor.

Like President Clinton, lying under oath to investigators is not acceptable. In both cases the underlying facts of the investigation turned up very serious ethical questions but probably no crimes in a legal sense. President Clinton was as fast and loose with the facts under oath as he was with an intern in the oval office. The lie under oath is a crime, the activity in the White House merely immoral. The same applied in the Libby case. The crime was in the lie to investigators. There was no crime in the leak to reporters; just something perhaps a bit depraved.

Patrick Fitzgerald the prosecutor in the Libby case basically brought no charges on what he was charged to investigate. This trial only came to be a magnet for everyone with an ax to grind against the Bush administration because Mr. Libby didn’t tell the truth while under oath. Sound familiar, ala impeachment? The case is justified and Mr. Fitzgerald is correct to say that perjury goes to the heart of the judicial system. People under oath must not be allowed to lie. However, for a prosecutor to hang his hat on that as being the same as having done the job, one he never set out to do, is somewhat indicative of the politically charged times in which we live. Please shout it loud from the mountain tops, there was no leak of a CIA covert operative’s identity. There certainly wasn’t enough evidence to charge anyone. That is what this case was supposed to be about.

If Mr. Libby hadn’t lied there would be no cameras, no salivating political hacks, , no pundants, and no possible attempt by enemies of the administration to link them to a crime that apparently the prosecutor in the case thinks never happened. If some can infer Libby’s conviction means there was a White House strategy to retaliate against Joe Wilson’s wife, then we can equally conclude that no charges brought regarding the C.I. A. identity leak means there was no crime committed. What you've heard publically by some on both sides of the issue is their own tornado-like spinning funnel of lies.

Ms. Plame’s identity regarding being outed or not really was never addressed in court, nor resolved. At this point it is still in contention. Now that question is marred by politics and the corruption that taints both the political and legal arenas. However it is Mr. Fitzgerald’s desire not to have that question answered in the first place which has spurred on the Libby story into something much larger than it really is; it’s just a rallying point for politics on both sides.

The Libby jury person who spoke publicly afterward bemoaning the fact that others from the administration were not on trial too, goes to show that politics and corruption exist in all of our institutions. This warped commentary threatens the very foundations of the legal system that Mr. Fitzgerald and jurors are to hold sacrosanct. There is not supposed to be bias or political agendas in those holding such public trust, but their words and actions speak for themselves. Anyone who tells you differently is lying to you. In today’s political and legal worlds you have graphic examples of the reward for lying. It is really a shame that all lying is not condemned especially that which is wrapped in the guise of justice.