Though the clemency granted by George W. Bush to the criminal I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, for his part in illegally covering up the investigation into the unprecedented White House outing of a covert CIA asset, was reprehensible, Bush showed admirable restraint in his issuing of Presidential pardons on his way out the door.
There! Never let it be said we couldn’t come up with something positive to say about his reign! Took us eight years, but there ya go. Even a broken clock is right at least once every eight years.
By way of underscoring his nearly once-in-a-lifetime apparently (accidentally?) good judgment, it’s worth noting that many of Bush’s supporters (such that there still are any) are pissed off that he hadn’t issued a full pardon for Libby before leaving:
Hayes quotes Cheney himself as saying, “…Obviously, I disagree with President Bush’s decision.”
Waytago, Decider! You finally did something right!
As many people have pointed out elsewhere, the downside of issuing a pardon in a case like this, where there is still the danger of further investigations or even criminal prosecutions, is the loss of the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. If you face no possible criminal penalties for what you might say as long as you are truthful, then you have no right to keep silent. This is what immunity agreements are all about. Having someone who knows where all the bodies are buried left without a way to refuse to testify could be extremely inconvenient for certain other people who weren’t pardoned.
If anybody has ever had close contact with an alcoholic…eventually everybody is pissed off at them. I think Bush was drinking heavily after Karl Rove left. Saw him on TV drunk a few times.His face as well as his fathers has a dissapated look. Very red at the last. The redness is from broken small blood vessels and is a diagnostic tool for alcoholism. Bet his liver is huge.
Two things:
1. Bush thinks he has integrity, however distorted his self-assesment may be
2. He boldly proclaimed that anyone found guilty of the leak would be prosecuted
Bush painted himself into a corner on this one but still I am surprised at the lack of a pardon. Bush began to worry about his legacy and the hypocrisy of a pardon would weigh heavily in hostirians minds as a prime example of what many refer to as a “Bush crime family.”
Everyone has some good in them, even criminals. The incredulity of Cheney and others over the failure to pardon is laughable.
Maybe Bush is starting to place blame on “trusted advisers” regarding his legacy. We know that he could never accept responsibility himself for anything that happened. From Bush we always hear something like “who could have seen it coming” or that he regrets that mistakes were made by others (i.e. not him).
The Titanic is sinking and it’s every man for himself. It doesn’t get much better than this. The regrettable political childishness that involved the opposing party is not circumstantial but rather ingrained and habitual…part of their character makeup. They can’t help ravaging one another at this point.
Given his record in Texas Bush never was much for giving pardons.
Pfeh, just because he held off a pardon for a co-traitor he didn’t make do his time or even pay his fine is really, really not impressive. * has set our expectations so low that whenever any of them even mentions doing something right, or even a little right or even just not more wrong — just mentions it, not does it — we are wetting our pants with happiness. We’ve got a mass case of post traumatic mania and we need to sober up.
Anyone surprised by the paucity of pardons hasn’t been paying attention. Like duhbaya gives two poots about anyone else in the world?. That, of course, plus the cold calculus set forth so well in Comment # 1
Olberman pointed out via his interview with someone last night, that presidential pardons do NOT have to be public. Bush might very well have secretly pardoned libby and thousands of other criminals but issued all of the pardons privately, so they could be produced in the event of an actual ‘guity’ verdict at a trial.
I wouldn’t put it past bush to privately pardon libby and the other criminals in his administration.