Someone no one ever heard of indicted

Oh my God, they busted Scooter Libby!!!

Who?

        Vice presidential adviser I. Lewis "Scooter' Libby Jr. was indicted Friday on charges of obstruction of justice, making a false statement and perjury in the CIA leak case.

Karl Rove, President Bush's closest adviser, escaped indictment Friday but remained under investigation, his legal status a looming political problem for the White House.

The indictments stem from a two-year investigation by special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald into whether Rove, Libby or any other administration officials knowingly revealed the identity of CIA agent Valerie Plame or lied about their involvement to investigators.

The five-count indictment accuses Libby of lying about how and when he learned about CIA official Valerie Plane's identity in 2003 and then told reporters about it. The information was classified. (emphasis added)

No, it wasn't.

• CPS Corporate & Public Strategy Advisory Group bio of Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson, IV

  He is married to the former Valerie Plame and has two sons and two daughters.

  Cached by Archive.org Feb. 08, 2003 (Still available online)
• EPIC Iraq Forum 2003 bio of Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson, IV

  He is married to the former Valerie Plame and has four children.

  Dated June 14, 2003, cached by Archive.org Nov. 18, 2004 (Still available online)
• The Middle East Institute bio of Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson, IV

  He is married to the former Valerie Plame and has two sons and two daughters.

  Copyright 2002, cached by Archive.org July 20, 2003 (Available online until October 1, 2003)
  

But thanks to the AP, we now have all we need to know about why Democrats are making such a big deal about this:

Any trial would shine a spotlight on the secret deliberations of Bush and his team as they built the case for war against Iraq.

... Libby, 55, is considered Cheney's alter ego, a chief architect of the war with Iraq. A trial would give the public a rare glimpse into Cheney's influential role in the West Wing and his behind-the-scenes lobbying for war.

Though Libby has worked in relative obscurity, he is one of the administration's influential advisers because of his proximity to Cheney, one of the most powerful vice presidents in history. (emphasis added)

Well duh, guys.  Didn't everybody know that he was the one running everything all along?

Seriously, didn't I say all along that this case was solely about "proving" that an eeeeevil Rove-Cheney uber-conspiracy was really at the helm of our government?  And didn't I say that this was about trying to lay the grounds for President Bush's impeachment?  Glad to know I'm right.

First, though, the Democrats are going to have to convince the rest of us that perjury, obstruction of justice, and making false statements are really crimes.

(Paul at WizBang makes another point worth considering here: how many personal attacks has the Republican party launched against the prosecutor in this case, Patrick Fitzgerald?  Zero.  Compare that to the continual foaming-at-the-mouth rantings of James Carville and other Clinton administration officials about how obsessive, lawless, evil, and worthless Kenneth Starr was.)

Here's the obligatory link to the Malkin roundup.  She says keep on checking Just One Minute too.
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A serious post-script to this story ...

The PDF file of the Libby indictments is here.  The false statements charge is spelled out beginning with point #32 on page 11.  The other charges are similar in nature.

I still believe that the effort to set the record straight on Joseph Wilson's trip to Niger (which involved pointing out that his wife got him approved to go, not Vice President Cheney, as Wilson himself claimed) was a legitimate damage-control tactic by the White House.  It's unfortunate -- if these indictments are true -- that Scooter Libby felt that he had to lie to the grand jury about what he did.  (For the Democrats: yes, perjury, obstruction of justice, and making false statements are crimes, and if Libby is guilty then he should be punished accordingly.)

PS #2: Listening to talk radio this afternoon, it seems like the conservative spin on the Libby indictment is, "there should have been no indictment, because the investigation should have stopped when Fitzgerald concluded that Valerie Plame Wilson was not a 'covert agent,' and that her identity was never secret," which sounds strangely Clintonian.  Fitzgerald doesn't seem to be a partisan hack; it is doubtful that he continued the investigation for any other reason than the fact that he felt like Libby (and possibly others) weren't telling him the truth.

John at PowerLine writes,

I can't imagine how Libby could have been foolish enough to lie to the grand jury, if indeed that is what happened. As a long-time Washington insider, he must have realized how grindingly thorough this kind of investigation is. How could Libby not have foreseen that his story would be contradicted by every other executive branch employee who was interviewed by the FBI? And how could he not have realized that perjury would be far worse than the original alleged offense? Indeed, Fitzgerald appears to have concluded that Plame was not, in fact, a covert agent, since there is no count in the indictment alleging violation of the Intelligence Identities Protection Act.  So if Libby had told the truth, it appears that he would have been fine.

And Paul at PowerLine writes,

The impression one gets from reading the indictment is that there was massive cooperation on the part of administration employees and officials. This looks like the anti-Watergate -- a president ordering everyone to cooperate and the absence of any organized cover-up. (emphasis added)

Comments

[An American]

Merry Fitzmas to you.