What can I say about Patrick Fitzgerald other than “DO NOT EVER PLAY POKER WITH THAT MAN.”
The man displayed no tea leaves whatsoever. The only hint he gave about anything was that he was anxious to get home and was annoyed the investigation took two years. You can read that as an indication that he is not interested in keeping this investigation going, or you can read that as a threat that he going to really resent any further stonewalling.
I have no idea what is going on behind the scenes. But Scooter Libby has about zero chance of beating this case. He is facing a possible 30 years sentence (although I doubt he would get anywhere near that).
Either Bush plans to pardon him, or Libby is almost going to HAVE to make a deal. And I don’t think agreeing to plead to lesser charges is likely to do much for him. He needs to give up Cheney to have any hope of avoiding jail.
I see a pardon coming.
Sorry to be a dunce but I’ve had to be away from computer and media most of the day — got an offer to buy my house.
I’m unclear. Has the grand jury been extended? Will there be a new one? Is this it? Do we know yet?
Thanks.
The people that sat on the grand jury are now free to go home, and they will never hear any new evidence in this case.
However, a new grand jury will be available for Fitz to handle any new information that comes into his office.
Fitz refused to hint about anything about any remaining issues and he intentionally tried to dampen speculation.
We just don’t know.
He said all that while his Deputy was in the background trying to keep a straight face. Certain people in the White House had immediate bowell problems as Fitz ‘artlessly’ allwed as he had judge approved access to another sitting Grand Jury, and refused to close the door on getting a new one of his own. It ain’t over.
Elliot Ness is funny and one hell of a poker player.
Thanks.
TPM has a great insight into the indictment that was filed:
Oh yeah…. They knew.
Ongoing investigations, eh?
They stepped in it big time.
Sounds like Libby’s planning a fight. He just released a statement (read on CNN) that he intends to be fully exonerated. To that I say: bring it on!
what a joke. The trial is a slam-dunk. Hah.
Memo to everyone. Always plead Not Guilty. Always issue a statement you expect to be fully exonerated. Deal from you best position no matter how bad.
of it. I would not want Fitzgerald coming after me. This man is THOROUGH. The evidence sounds pretty firm to me. The only way that Libby can get off is if other people perjured themselves–a lot of people.
is arraigned and when the trial date will be set. All shenanigans from his defense lawyer will start around that time.
Fitz is a straight arrow if ever I saw one. I was impressed. Libby won’t be cutting any deals with Fitz because he has George’s assurance that he will be getting a pardon. Why would he make any deals?
Boo,
Why don’t you think Scooter will do the time to keep Cheney out of trouble? I am sure that is the Administration’s priority right now, making sure this goes no further. Who knows what they’d offer him to take the fall…
because he is facing four five-year counts and a 10 year count, and he will be found guilty of at least the 4 5-year counts, and probably of all counts.
Who would willingly accept 10-15 years in jail?
Not a man like Libby. He will be pardoned, and he doesn’t get assurances to that effect, he will have to give up some very valuable information to substantially reduce his sentence.
Do you think they have already considered how much “political capital” it will cost giving this guy a pardon? And has he? I bet he is not thinking too well at the moment and is going “oh please oh please oh please”, just like we did hoping there WOULD be indictments only he is now scared shitless (I hope). And if he delivered Cheney to Fitz, how much time do you think he would have to serve? And could he, even, do that?
Hmm, a pardon under the guise that everything is excusable if it’s in the interest of furthering GWOT, right? But it’s okay to have low level people take the fall for torture at Abu Ghraib. I suppose that would not be surprising if it came to pass.
I hope you are not too disappointed about the frog-marching substitution, BooMan:
Irving Libby in place of Karl Rove.(thus far)
But you were not wrong in your establishment of this blog based on a frog-march out of the White House.
I wonder of Karl Rove outmaneuvered Fitzgerald at the last moment. He may have corrected his statements during one of his many visits to the Grand Jury, thus avoiding the perjury charge.
I thought that Fitzgerald’s little speech about the damage done to the recruiting of future CIA agents was excellent. It came at a time when many Repub spokespeople are attempting to trivialize the ‘outing of the CIA agent.’
Woodward last night was emphatic in saying that there was no damage to the CIA whatsoever. AND he called the discussions of the Wilsons in the White House as innocent gossip. What a toady!
An astute commenter over at dKos made notice of the fact that if Bush is inolved in a conspiracy, and pardons one of the co-conspirators (say, in a Ford-like blanket pardon), that the pardoned co-conspirator could then be forced to testify against Bush (or Cheney) in any GJ proceedings or trials that might arise.
Why? Because in pardoning the co-conspirator, he has been absolved of all criminal wrongdoing in the conspiracy and thus cannot use the fifth amendment as grounds not to testify (self-incrimination). So it’s either testify or go to jail for contempt of court (which is NOT pardonable, although I assume his jail term would be limited to the duration of the GJ or court proceeding).
ALthough, if Libby’s willing to attempt a chance at 30 years in prison, I’m sure he’d be willign to stay in jail for a while during a Cheney trial.
Just something to mull over.
I think the broken foot was the ‘reminder’ to Libby that there are worse things than ten years hard time.
Why the crutches?
It has also been reported that the reason Libby has been seen on crutches lately is because of visits from Bush and Cheney associates discussing strategy and how Libby should testify in the future trial.
A source close to the Bush family said that “If he knows what’s good for him’n his family Libby’ll keep his mouth closed tighter than a Young Republican when a military recruiter is askin’ for volunteers. Bush’n Cheney is like family, see? An’ we always take care of family.”
lol, I joked about that earlier in the FBC…
See…
I knew it couldn’t be as easy as that. Do you think Fitzgerald would be wasting his time just so the guy that gets indicted and found guilty will be pardoned?
Anyway, now that I am thinking about all these legal intricacies, what’s the difference b/w perjury and making false statements?
I haven’t looked at Federal statutes involved, but I heard a Federal prosecutor saying the false statements are a much easier crime to prove. Perjury — under oath, knowing false. False statements — not necessarity under oath (lies to FBI investigators), perhaps a lesser standard of knowledge.
Yes, that is true. What is worse is that the perjury statute gives no guidance as to the level of proof to “impeach” the witness. It just says “beyond a reasonable doubt” and puts no qualifications on the number of witnesses, types of evidence, etc, etc. So it’s completely up to the jury as to whether the statements arise to the level of perjury. Unless the statements are self-contradictory.
The evidence presented in the indictment for the perjury count regarding testimony vis-a-vis discussions with Cooper seems stronger, IMHO, since Libby multiple times repeats the lie that he told Cooper that he only heard of Plame’s identity from reporters (there is a lot of objective evidence and testimony to prove otherwise).
The Russert count is a tougher nut to crack, since it’s a he-said/he-said situation. The indictment alleges Libby told the GJ that Russert asked if he had heard that Joe Wilson’s wife works at CIA and that Russert proceeded to say that this is common knowledge among the reporters.
Russert testified that he said no such thing, and that Libby only called him to complain about some MSNBC correspondent’s reporting about Joe Wilson’s column that had recently come out. But, we don’t know if that’s the whole truth either. And, as emptywheel points out on the next hurrah, what a bizzare cover story to have, especially since Russert was the first (and initially only) reporter Libby gave a personal waiver to. Was he expecting Russert to say something else? Or maybe he thought he could beat a perjury charge there. (which he still might)
That’s about what I heard today. False Statements = Lies, while Perjury = Lies Under Oath. The latter is much more severe, obviously.
I took a gander at freeperville today to see their reaction. Much was “get that Wilson asshole and his whore wife”. But some, surprisingly, seemed to remember that Perjury is exactly the crime for which they acused Clinton and that, gee, if it was that bad then, it must be bad now too.
While this seemed rather intelligent on their part, I couldn’t help but wonder why they aren’t equally pissed at the chimp for lying, time after time after time. So much for my thoery that there are some smart freepers! :>)
Yes, it’s what I expected, but it’s telling–calling his wife a whore for (and I hate to shout)
DOING HER JOB FOR HER COUNTRY.
She’s given +20 years of service–and friggin dangerous work at that–for her country and all these stupid, blow-up doll buying asshats on wingnut sites can do is call her a whore.
No there’s a whore, and his name is Dick Cheney. Lying and selling out your country to cash in–there’s nothing honorable about that.
It just makes me ill. I could just beat the shit out of them. Punks.
This is a really good point. Pardon = no fifth amendment rights = Libby has to testify to everything he knows. How can Bush possibly pardon him now, when som much is still in the air? He’ll have to wait until Fitz’s investigation power runs out at least.
There also have a statement from Dean, and they have some Larry Johnson stuff up that is, of course, already on the BooTrib frontpage in Brad Blogs story.
Of note is that Wolf Blitzer had both Larry Johnson and Pat Lang on. I linked their names to the C&L diaries on those videos if you haven’t seen them yet.
Those guys, as well as Booman, susanhu and catnip should all take a bow for their great work in the last few weeks!
Time to crack a brew!
Think about this. And I know it has probably been said, but I am just getting back and getting caught up.
If you are a prosecutor, or a juror, and you are looking at this case. And assuming that what Fitz says about Libby is true — and I think that is a pretty safe assumption — then you have to ask yourself: Why would Scooter Libby come to a Grand Jury and perjure himself in this war? What was his motive? It wasn’t to protect himself. He had the Fifth Amendment to do that. If he was worried about his own hide, he could have taken the Fifth. No statements. No perjury. It seems to me, to start up the speculation game again, that it is clear that the only practicable motive is to protect someone higher (Cheney, Rove, Libby, Bush, Rummy, Condi) or to protect something bigger (the Aspens, the WHIG Conspiracy, etc.).
So at this point, politically, I don’t know why the Senate and House Dems on Intelligence (and any other committees) need to ramp up the political process. If he perjured himself to protect someone/something, what was it? There is evidence to suggest that it may have been to protect the false case for war. Start banging the political drums on a seperate track from the legal track. Force the public to move the Repubs to make a serious investigation into misuse of intelligence to take us to War. It is a complete abdication of accountability for Congress not to investigate this.
I’d say that pardons and/or several fatal one car accidents (ala Karen Silkwood) might be in the offing going forward.
There are many many faces to this hydra-headed beast of warand empire that’s trying to wreak havoc on the world and Scooter is just one of them. I sure hope fitzgerald is keeping his sword of justice sharp and thew scales in balance, because he’s going to need every advantage he can get if he’s to really bring these shitbirds to justice.
‘When Will Libby Sing?’, and he Will, any Takers!!!
Won’t give up cheney though, Rovie might, but not Scooter!!!
I’m not sure if Libby will be singing but I bet Rove might be spendng a lot more time looking over his own shoulder to see if Libby is behind him preparing to retaliate.
Libby might want to get even with Miller too, for her screwing up her post-jail remarks about him.
And I agree he’ll never out Cheney, (but I bet Wurmser and/or Franklin or Rhodemight).
sign conyers’ letter to shrubya.
No pardons letter
Direct to the letter page at Conyers’ blog. (The link from your blog didn’t work for me.)
I’m one of the few, I can see, that is totally bummed by today’s events. The way I see it, both Dems and Repubs come away happy. The Dems get to point their fingers, while the Repubs get to rule, stack the bench, and continue to enrich themselves.
I have seen Fitzgerald work in Illinois and have been consistently impressed. Today I saw a completely different man.
Think about it. In order to prove that Libby lied he needed to understand the chain of events that led up to the leak. What he discovered was a conspiracy within the WH to out Valerie Plame with Rove and Cheney at the center and Libby as henchman.
So why did everyone but Libby walk? Because these guys hang together better than the amateurs he has been prosecuting in Illinois. In Illinois, everyone has been talking, trying to get out of long jail time. At the WH they simply lied and said “so what”.
To me Fitz looked like a professional prosecutor who knew he was in over his head. He made a choice to go after the low hanging fruit. In the end, he chose to have a future in the Republican Party.
My hope is that I will be proved wrong — and I will be happy post here that I was wrong, that Fitzgerald is a bulldog who will not let go. But I’ve seen Fitz at work for a quite a long time now, and I think I see someone holding back because he saw that the bully is bigger and more powerful than he is.
has a great piece up regarding the “grown-up in the room”. Rude Level – 2 on a scale of 10, he didn’t use the c-word for once 🙂