The other possible headline is “Bush to rule of law: drop dead.” Either applies to the politically craven but desired by the Beltway Courtier class (and GOP-lock Fred Thompson)result… to wit, Bush commuted Scooter Libby’s 30-month sentence to zero— no time– thereby undoing years of work by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, and telling a jury and a federal judge (and indeed, a federal court of appeals) to go screw themselves.
Well, why not? Poppy Bush pardoned a number of players implicated in Iran-Contra. Ford pardoned Nixon. Clinton pardoned Mark Rich (who was then represented by none other than Scooter Libby). Bush commuted Scooter’s sentence, obviously saving the full pardon for around 18 months from now, when he is safely on his way out the door.
The message should be lost on no one: like the French monarchy before that country’s revolution, Bush believes “L’Etat C’est Moi”. The nobility, whether in feudal France, or neo-feudal America, are simply exempt from the laws that apply to everyone else: loyal courtiers who lie to the FBI and obstruct justice and investigations to determine who may have burned a covert intelligence operative… may not be held to account… zay ar lo-yalle, ar zay not!
You have to admire the cojones of Bush (and clearly, those of the unquestionably-not-irrelevant Dick Cheney)… at the lowest approval rating of his term, he has no problem doing something that polls indicate most Americans strongly oppose… then again, we have that whole Iraq thing, don’t we?
In some sense, while Reid and Pelosi can bitch about this all they want, it was their genius move before the mid-term Congressional elections to announce “impeachment is off the table”, as if that helped them! Having taken the only thing the President fears will make him accountable “off the table”… is it any wonder the President behaves as if, well, “L’Etat C’est moi?” Elections– and stupid campaign promises– have consequences indeed. The President has now injected himself as a co-conspirator to the burning of a covert American agent that may well have resulted in the deaths of other operatives. And there will be no consequences for it. None.
This has been… “Bush to America: In your face!”
tdog
The problem with impeaching the President can be summarized by saying “President Voldemort–I mean, Cheney”.
Who says we can’t impeach THEM BOTH?
Pelosi in 2007!
I think this was a bit of a bad move for bush, I was expecting him to commute but not before the election. If the dems have any common sense, they can take this to the bank.
Cheney needs to be impeached first.
I don’t see any impeachment proceedings happening. I DO see a Bush/Cheney coup coming after a late summer “terrorist” attack, however.
Mixter
Pelosi in 2007? You put your faith in the poor person’s Hilary?