The Political Chase

Just how dense is the pro-Scooter Libby crowd

Ever since Scooter Libby achieved Republican neocon martyrdom status Tuesday, I have heard wingnut after wingnut whine that Libby was unjustifiably charged. This thick-headed group has said ad nauseam that no criminal charges directly related to leaking Valerie Plame Wilson were filed, therefore there was no basis to charge Scooter Libby. They have pounded Patrick Fitzgerald relentlessly - calling him a zealot and other unjustified, childish names.

Today, the esteemed Mr. Charles Krauthammer joins the rest of the nitwits. Playing his cry-me-a-river violin and with all the melodrama he can muster up, he sings the refrain:

Why [should Libby have never been charged]? Because on his essential charge as special prosecutor — find and punish who had leaked Valerie Plame’s name — he had nothing. No conspiracy, no felony, no crime, not even the claim that she was a covert agent covered by the nondisclosure law.

Weeping, Krauthammer transitions to the next verse about the charges brought against Libby:

Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald chose to make Libby’s misstatements about the timing of the receipt of one piece of information — Mrs. Wilson’s identity — the great white whale of his multimillion-dollar prosecutorial juggernaut.

Pray tell, what is the IQ threshold level, where the logic and results of the Scooter Libby trial are no longer a distortion of reality?

OK, Mr. Krauthammer, listen carefully. No criminal charges were filed for leaking Valerie Plame’s name because Scooter Libby, and arguably others, obstructed justice, which illegally kept Fitzgerald, or any other prosecutor, from being able to effectively investigate and charge those responsible for leaking Valerie Plame. Got it? Remember, Fitzgerald plainly stated multiple times, it’s like a baseball game; Libby threw sand in his eyes and he was unable to play the game effectively. Lying and trying to cover your butt are not legal. Got it?

Moving along…Fitzgerald presented his case to a grand jury and the grand jury decided, not Fitzgerald, Mr. Libby should be charged for throwing sand in the eyes of the prosecutor and the investigators.

Next, Mr. Libby was tried before a jury of his peers, which all eleven of them decided Libby was guilty. The jury decided the validity of Fitzgerald’s charges and convicted Libby, not Fitzgerald.

Furthermore, if Mr. Libby was so profoundly innocent as Krauthammer and the rest of the wingnuts proclaim, why did he not simply get on the witness stand and tell a mere eleven people he was innocent? If Mr. Libby was  innocent and wrongfully charged, why didn’t one or both of his bosses, Dick Cheney and George Bush, rush to his aid and testify under oath how and why Libby was innocent? If Libby was so innocent, why couldn’t two of the best lawyers in the country easily convince the jury of his innocence?

Mr. Krauthammer, until you and the rest of your melodramatic ideologues provide truthful and exonerating answers to my questions, just remain quiet. You’re acting like a bunch of cry babies. Get over it and be glad that Fitzgerald didn’t take Cheney, Rove, and Bush down.