Thirty Months And $250,000

by hilzoy

From the Washington Post:

"I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, former chief of staff to Vice President Cheney, was sentenced today to 30 months in prison and fined $250,000 for lying to investigators about his role in leaking the identity of an undercover CIA officer.

The federal judge who presided over the case indicated that he may not be sympathetic to allowing Libby to remain free pending appeal, but scheduled a hearing on the matter for next week.

"Evidence in this case overwhelmingly indicated Mr. Libby's culpability," U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton said moments before he handed out the sentence. The judge said he was sentencing Libby "with a sense of sadness. I have the highest respect for people who take positions in our government and appreciate tremendously efforts they bring to bear to protect this country."

At the same time, Walton said, "I also think it is important we expect and demand a lot from people who put themselves in those positions. Mr. Libby failed to meet the bar. For whatever reason, he got off course.""

Good. People who break the law should do the time.

There's also this gem:

"Cheney released a statement this afternoon lauding Libby's long public service and expressing hope that his conviction will be overturned. "Scooter is also a friend, and on a personal level Lynne and I remain deeply saddened by this tragedy and its effect on his wife, Harriet, and their young children," Cheney said. "The defense has indicated it plans to appeal the conviction in the case. Speaking as friends, we hope that our system will return a final result consistent with what we know of this fine man.""

I believe that Libby lied to protect Cheney. If so, then however "saddened" Cheney might be, he wasn't concerned enough about Libby to step up to the plate himself. It's a bit rich for him to expect the legal system to make up for his deficiencies as a human being.

Salon has posted the letters that people wrote on Libby's behalf. I haven't read them all, but most of the ones I have read go on about how completely out of character the crimes he has been convicted of are. He is a person of unimpeachable integrity, a man of honor, a person of high principle, even, according to Gen. Richard Myers, "a man of integrity who always put our national security first." (I didn't know it was possible to put our national security first while outing a CIA agent. Live and learn.)

Oddly, none of the letter-writers go on to ask how someone of such honor and principle could have found himself, inexplicably, committing perjury and obstruction of justice. A brain spasm? A sort of anti-miracle? Inquiring minds want to know. Unfortunately, none of those inquiring minds belong to the people who wrote these letters. Funny thing, that.

One more note below the fold.

In comments, rilkefan noted this piece by Bill Kristol:

"I FEEL TERRIBLE for Scooter Libby's family. Millions of Americans feel terrible for Scooter Libby's family. But we can't do anything about the injustice that has been done. Nor can we do anything to avert a further injustice looming on the horizon--Judge Reggie Walton seems inclined not to let Libby remain free pending appeal.

Unlike the rest of us, however, George W. Bush is president. Article II, Section Two of the Constitution gives him the pardon power. George W. Bush can do something to begin to make up for the injustice a prosecutor appointed by his own administration brought down on Scooter Libby. And he can do something to avert the further injustice of a prison term.

Will Bush pardon Libby? Apparently not--even if it means a man who worked closely with him and sought tirelessly to do what was right for the country goes to prison. Bush spokeswoman Dana Perino, noting that the appeals process was underway, said, "Given that and in keeping with what we have said in the past, the president has not intervened so far in any other criminal matter and he is going to decline to do so now."

So much for loyalty, or decency, or courage. For President Bush, loyalty is apparently a one-way street; decency is something he's for as long as he doesn't have to take any risks in its behalf; and courage--well, that's nowhere to be seen. Many of us used to respect President Bush. Can one respect him still?"

I thought it would be fun to compare this to Kristol on Clinton. (Oh, I see that others have begun doing this. But this article from Newsweek, via Lexis/Nexis, takes the cake, imho.)

"LAST WEEK, THE PRESIDENT'S LAWYERS DEFENDED THEIR man before the House Judiciary Committee. Or did they? Bill Clinton's team spent an awful lot of time acknowledging that his deeds are indefensible. Just look at the censure resolution proposed by Democrats on the Judiciary Committee, and more or less endorsed by the White House. It declares that the president "made false statements concerning his reprehensible conduct" and "wrongly took steps to delay discovery of the truth." Through these actions, the president "dishonored" his office and "violated the trust of the American people." All true enough. So why not impeach him? After all, in The Federalist No. 65, Alexander Hamilton argued that impeachment by the House and trial in the Senate is precisely the proper remedy for "the abuse or violation of some public trust."

Abuse the public trust Bill Clinton certainly did, in ways small and large. The lies he told under oath, in his Jan. 17 deposition in the Paula Jones case and his grand-jury testimony on Aug. 17, are perhaps individually small. But they were real, and purposeful, and premeditated. On Jan. 17. Clinton claimed not to remember any specific private encounter he had with Monica Lewinsky. Only three weeks before, he and Lewinsky had met alone for the final time, discussed her cover story and then engaged in a "passionate" kiss in a doorway to the Oval Office. The claim by the president that he could not recall being alone with Lewinsky was a perjury. The White House did not even try to prove otherwise in its nearly 200-page defense to the Judiciary Committee.

One could go on -- and on -- enumerating Bill Clinton's lies under oath; together they amount to an abuse of the public trust, because together they amount to a concerted attempt to undermine the legal process. But Clinton has abused the public trust in a more fundamental way, too. He engaged in a shameless and sustained attempt, from Jan. 21 on, to lie to the American people, to conceal, to obstruct all efforts to uncover the truth. These efforts reflect an utter lack of concern for the nation's well-being. Bill Clinton has acted for the past year on his deepest beliefs: that law is merely politics, that the truth is merely spin, that an oath is merely rhetoric, that justice is merely power. These doctrines are deeply corrosive of free government. They corrupt us and degrade our constitutional order in a profound way. This fundamental disdain for his presidential oath is Bill Clinton's highest crime and misdemeanor. And the remedy for high crimes and misdemeanors is impeachment. (...)

The only response to this particularly insidious abuse of the public trust is impeachment. Only impeachment, and a subsequent Senate trial, can remedy the damage this president has so recklessly and selfishly inflicted on the nation. Such a trial need not last long. It need not be a "horror." It will undoubtedly have its awkward moments. But it is the only way to reassert the rule of law and the primacy of the constitutional order.

Only the solemn deliberations of United States senators, in a trial of impeachment, can now repair the damage done to our politics by a man who, entrusted with the greatest honor an American can have, thought nothing of violating his oath as a citizen to tell the truth, and thought nothing of mocking his oath as president to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution."

If you lie about sex, only impeachment can remedy the damage you have done. If you lie about outing a CIA officer and are convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice, on the other hand, there will be no lectures for you about violating your oath as a citizen to tell the truth, or about how "a concerted attempt to undermine the legal process" amounts to "an abuse of the public trust." No: you will have suffered an injustice, not perpetrated one, and the only remedy for that injustice is a full pardon.

Comments

[rilkefan]

jkrudis: "You have a committment to your spouse and family, and if you can't even be trusted within your closest circle of responsibility, why should you be trusted outside it?"

People have different ideas about what sorts of trusts they're willing to break. Maybe a man who'll make a pun will pick your pocket, but maybe not.

[Gary Farber]

"You have a committment to your spouse and family, and if you can't even be trusted within your closest circle of responsibility, why should you be trusted outside it?"

Probably because people's beliefs as to what they've committed to and how strongly they've committed vary wildly from one category of commitment to the next.

Insisting that people regard all of their committments and obligations -- particularly as seen by someone else -- as of identical seriousness, and that people always act on that basis, is clearly factually in error. Most people don't actu in that way.

Therefore acting on a basis of a factually incorrect assumption is of questionable usefulness.

Holding the opinion that people should act that way, in your opinion, isn't the same as accurately describing how people behave.

In point of fact, most adulterers are not also embezzlers, thieves, or otherwise particularly untrustworthy. If you have factual evidence to prove, or even indicate, otherwise, please do put it forward.

Otherwise, you're free to act on your preferences, but your stated reasoning seems to lead to factually incorrect conclusions.

Out of curiosity, may I ask if you've ever told someone something that wasn't entirely true (lied, proving you are untrustworthy in all situations forever thereafter), or have you ever taken home a pencil or pen or some Post-It notes from work (you're a thief, and can't ever be trusted to not steal everyhing)?

If your answers are "no," that's admirable, but I think you'll find that if that's the standard, some 90%+ of the human race is untrustworthy by your standard.

[Jesurgislac]

jrudkis, FWIW, when I ask someone to recommend an attorney or an accountant, I want them to recommend based on their professional skills and behavior, not their private life. Your admission that for you their private life takes priority over their professional skills suggests that no one should ever ask you for a professional recommendation.

And I still want to know if you just never recommend or hire women as accountants or attorneys, or if you consider that a woman can be unfaithful to her spouse without it affecting your opinion of her honesty.

How is this any different from any hostile work place claim, where those performing sexual favors get professional benefits that others do not?

First, you'd have to prove that Lewinsky wouldn't have had the access or connections she had if she'd not been having an affair with the President. Somehow I doubt you can do that, but if you've got the evidence, feel free to cite it.

On topic: I thought I'd read that today was the day we find out if Libby is going to jail or if he gets to remain free until Bush pardons him, uh, until he finishes the appeals process.