Libby's Conviction A Symptom Of A Rotten Core

Today in washingtonpost.com, Peter Baker could have taken this opportunity to review the Bush Administration attacks on rule of law, he does little more than lament the controversy and wonder what the outcome is. It's nauseating. The Bush/Cheney henchmen have been particularly bellicose in their bullying of government staffers from the CIA, DoD, and the Justice Department, gagged whistleblowers with false claims of "national security" to cover up, and gutting habius corpus, turning Guantanamo and other military bases into a gulags for torture and extra-judicial punishments. Then WaPo' Baker wonders if Libby can lie, maybe the Iraq War was based on lies??
While Clinton was impeachable for sexual inpropriety, a president who circumvented the Constitution he's sworn to protect is protected only by a shield called a "war time president" in a war that has no end. Doesn't the press see the implications for our way of life?
Are we content to have the Fourth Reich unfold in our midst out of concern about terrorism? Shame on us for our complacency, for our press corps intimidated to silence, for our lost democracy.

Shortly before he was inaugurated for his second term, President Bush was asked why no one was held responsible for the mistakes of the first. "We had an accountability moment," he replied, "and that's called the 2004 elections."


Two years and a stinging midterm election later, Bush is having another accountability moment, but this one isn't working out as well. The conviction of former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby has coincided with a string of investigations into the mistreatment of injured soldiers and the purge of federal prosecutors, putting the operations of his administration into harsh relief.


[..]If Libby lied about his role in the CIA leak case, critics eagerly used that to reinforce their argument that Bush led the nation to war on false pretenses, in effect attacking the centerpiece of his presidency.


"This verdict brings accountability at last for official deception and the politics of smear and fear," said Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), Bush's Democratic challenger in 2004.


[..]No senior officials were fired for the missing weapons in Iraq or the Abu Ghraib abuse. Three officials blamed by some for mishandling Iraq were given Medals of Freedom.


[..]"Justice demands that Bush issue a pardon and lower the curtain on an embarrassing drama that shouldn't have lasted beyond its opening act," National Review said within hours of the verdict.