So here’s all you need to know about the indictment of Lewis "Scooter" Libby last Friday. Scooter got his nickname because of the speed with which he ran errands for Vice President Dick Cheney. Cheney himself has no nickname since "The Prince of Darkness" is already taken by columnist Robert Novak. Scooter also hopes his nickname will be very apt if he is able to beat the charges of lying to a grand jury and obstruction of justice.
The Right Wing chorus is already in full-throated song defending Mr. Libby. Larry Clayman of Judicial Watch, who wanted so badly to torch Bill Clinton’s presidency because he lied about sex to a grand jury, sees Scooter’s indictment as a "lynching." (Columnist’s note: The Right Wing tends to use the word "lynching" on a very select basis. If you’re Clarence Thomas and your nomination for the Supreme Court is being questioned, it is a "high-tech lynching." If you were a black man hung from a magnolia tree in the South in the ’50s, it was called "States Rights"). Fox’s Tony Snow went on HBO with Bill Maher that very night and characterized the Libby indictment as guilty – for "talking to reporters."
Suddenly lying to the grand jury about investigating the outing of a CIA agent is trivial compared to a president lying about a pathetic sexcapade with an intern (your columnist is the model of consistency, having viewed both as reason for getting heaved out of the White House posthaste). I’m told Ann Coulter on CNN the morning of the indictment was already spinning the story as a kind of a win for the Bush presidency because Karl Rove did not make the net.
Just a few days before, the Right was not being so kind to the president. They were in an uproar about his puzzling choice of Harriet Miers for the Supreme Court. It was all about competence, they said, from Rush Limbaugh to George Will. Or was it that Miers had spoken on behalf of minority rights on more than a few occasions or that she could not prove her bona fides on the abortion question? Whatever it was, the Miers nomination had seemingly brought the respectable Right (the nutcakes still favored Miers because she went to the right church) to its senses. They immediately forgot their disillusionment that Bush was running big deficits and favored cronies over competence and had gotten us into an ill-advised war in Iraq. But then, in a master stroke of political acumen, the day before the indictment was scheduled to come down, Miers – with no doubt an NRA-approved weapon pointed squarely at her temple- "voluntarily" withdrew her nomination. And the sensible Right swooned at opportunity regained.
With a Supreme Court nomination hanging in the balance, the indictment of a top White House official with national security implications became small potatoes. One thing you can say about Clayman, Coulter, Snow and the others is at least their loyalty wasn’t purchased on the cheap by this White House.
Here are the questions that beg answers: Why did an experienced pro such as Libby lie about who told him the identity of CIA agent Valerie Plame? We know from the Bill of Indictments it was Cheney, not three journalists, who gave up Plame to Libby. And why did the vice president remain silent the last two years while Libby knowingly misled the grand jury and the American public? Did Cheney tell Libby to destroy Ambassador Joe Wilson by outing his wife? What does all of this have to do with the real motives for misleading Colin Powell and the nation into war?
Prediction: Scooter Libby will take one for Team Bush. He will plead "guilty" to a reduced sentence and avoid a trial that would prove embarrassing to the administration. Rove and Cheney will be able to sleep well. Meanwhile, forget the fact the Iraqi Constitution was approved. The real story is that this war is over for America as both the clamor of the Left and the Right will begin bringing the troops home. The Right will have its Supreme Court justice. The president will have his legacy and three years left on his term to get his presidential library in Crawford, Texas, ready.
And, eventually, when Iraq descends into civil war, the blame game will begin. Who lost Iraq? Why, Rush and company already have their answer ready – Valerie Plame, of course.
