It's Only an Outrage when Republicans Do It

Come now the Democrats in high dudgeon, waxing wroth at the temerity of the President in commuting the jail sentence – though not the fine or the probation – of "Scooter" Libby, he convicted of a wholly-manufactured crime in the Valerie Plame kerfuffle.

First, Congressman William Pascrell, whose statement BlueJersey quotes as follows:

"In September of 2003 President Bush claimed that there are too many leaks in Washington. He stated that if someone in his Administration had leaked information and violated the law that such a person would be 'taken care of.' He lied. The President's action is damaging to any remaining credibility that this Administration has with the public. It is another black eye to the ideals of equal justice under the law."

Alas, the Democrats, being without shame, display a carelessness, nay, recklessness, with language, bordering on the contemptuous.

Bush asserted, on repeated occasions, that someone who leaked information would be immediately fired and would not serve in his Administration. Unfortunately for the Democrats, the source of the leak was NOT a high ranking administrative official, but a State Department Aide named Richard Armitage.

Libby never faced charges of leaking; neither he, nor any other Bush White House official was the source of the leak. Pascrell knows this, so one can only assume that his present "outrage" is a deliberate attempt at obfuscation.

In less polite terms, a deliberate misrepresentation of the facts, a/k/a a lie.

The President said that if anyone leaked information, they would not work in his administration. That happened. Hence, the assertion by Pascrell, that the President "lied", is, in and of itself, a lie.

And the Congressman, if he were capable of shame, would be ashamed of such flagrant misrepresentation.

In fact, the entire Fitzgerald affair represents a patent travesty of justice. At the time of his appointment, the identity of the leaker was already known. The correct course of action for an ethical prosecutor to undertake was: make a report, "case solved", fold up your tent, and go home. Instead, countless tens of millions of dollars were spent to investigate ... nothing.

Libby fell into what the pros call a "perjury trap". While falling into such a trap – assuming for the moment same to have been intentional – is inexcusable (lying under oath is NEVER acceptable ... unless, of course, you’re a Democrat who happens to be the President and it’s only about sex), a trap sprung in an investigation which never should have taken place is outrageous. Fitzgerald also threw a reporter in jail for refusing to reveal a source, despite the fact that he already knew the source of the leak he was hired to investigate. Again, inexcusable.

Rush Holt, the rocket scientist, gets into the act, too, asserting:

"This is an act of appalling arrogance. Mr. Libby should get his punishment just like a less privileged citizen. Although he was convicted of lying to a grand jury, everyone knows this was part of an effort to attack a national security official for politically partisan reasons. That makes this commutation of sentence all the more reprehensible."

Ah, so "everyone knows" that a crime that was never asserted, never proved, and for which precisely no evidence exists, must have occurred. This must be the scientific method at work: "everyone knows" it – perhaps everyone at the DNC – so it must, perforce be true.

We’ll call this the Tinker Bell scientific method: we all close our eyes, clap our hands, and chant that we do believe in fairies – or, at least, fairy tales – and that will make it so.

Now, just for kicks, I did a quick Google search on the reactions of our two esteemed Congressman to truly outrageous pardons, like those issued by Bill Clinton to REAL criminals, like Marc Rich. And the politically connected Henry Cisneros. You can find a list of Clinton’s pardons here. Curiously, our two intrepid Congressman seem to have been strangely silent about pardons then, but, perhaps, they might correct that impression by citing to a suitably outraged, contemporaneous press release or floor statement.

Now, it’s entirely possible to object to Presidential pardons, even for crassly political purposes. But if one wishes to be crassly political, one should say so. Imagine a simple press release:

"The President today commuted the sentence of Scooter Libby convicted of lying under oath. Just as I voted for the impeachment of Bill Clinton for lying under oath, I oppose this commutation of this sentence. Democrats and Republicans must be held to the same high standards of honesty and integrity. Even though the entire Fitzgerald investigation was nothing more than a cruel farce, and the crime of which Libby was convicted was manufactured out of thin air, lying is still inexcusable."

But, then, I suppose, this would require that one take lying under oath seriously, and neither Congressman displayed the slightest problem with perjury when one of their own committed it.

I confess to being agnostic on the commutation. Yes, Fitzgerald set a perjury trap; yes, the investigation was a joke. And, yes, 30 months of one’s life for lying in a wholly artificial investigation – looking for a "crime" which the Prosecutor knew never occurred – strikes me as patently absurd.

But, crucially, a jury found that Libby lied, a factor which simply cannot be ignored. Unlike Holt and Pascrell, I believe that lying under oath REALLY matters, and should be consistently condemned.