Around the blogroll: Scooter Libby edition

Posts you must read:

John Rogers at Kung fu Monkey: "We are faced with utterly shameless men. Cheney and the rest are looking our representatives right in the eye and saying 'You don't have the balls to take down a government. You don't have the sheer testicular fortitude to call us lying sonuvabitches when we lie, to stop us from kicking the rule of law and the Constitution in the ass. You just don't. What's beyond that abyss -- what that would do to our government and our identity as a nation -- terrifies you too much. So get the fuck out of our way.'"

Christy Hardin Smith at Firedoglake: "For months and months, I have sat here at my laptop, tap, tap, tapping away at article after article illustrating your utter disregard for the law, your disregard of the principles on which this nation was founded, and your failure to recognize that there are higher laws than what George Bush wants at the moment. With one commutation of sentence, W, you just handed us the next election — the White House, a much stronger hand in Congress, and a club to beat your party with for years to come: you think you are better than the rest of us, and that the laws don’t apply to you." (For the record: I think Christy is overestimating both the American people and the process if she thinks this is a slam-dunk for the Democrats in 2008.)

Pierre Tristam at Candide's Notebooks: "The symbolic temptation is to think that by pardoning Libby, Bush is pardoning himself of whatever crimes he committed. But that would presume a sense of justice at the core of the president’s thinking. What the pardon shows in as stark a light as any aborting of justice Bush has orchestrated is his utter contempt for the law, for the very system he defends but has never upheld. But if he and Cheney have been so easily amused at making buffalo chips of due process in their so-called global war on terror, in Guantanamo, in Afghanistan, in Iraq, what should, what could keep them from doing the same at home?"

Andy Ostroy, the Ostroy Report, falling into the "gift to the Democrats trap: "So why am I celebrating? Because this decision by Bush is the nail in his political coffin...and with it his legacy. He will forever be known as the president who not only committed the worst military/foreign policy blunder in our nation's history, but the one who defiled and made a constant mockery of our sacred Constitution. I am happy because it really doesn't matter anymore whether Libby served time, does it? He's a convicted felon who committed egregious crimes against freedom and free speech, and he's done his job quite well in tarnishing his vile bosses' reputations. But the greater benefit through all this is that it cements Bush's legacy as a de facto criminal himself."

Praise be to the Goddess: Hubris Sonic, Jesse "Doc" Wendel, and Lower Manhattanite, late of subbing at The News Blog, have decided to be the keepers of the Gilliard flame with the Group News Blog (now on our blogroll). Sayeth LM: "Bush has forever branded himself, and much to the GOP's old-guard kingmakers chagrin--the whole party, especially post-their hounding of Clinton and jailing of Susan McDougal (who did her fucking time) as punk-assed, special-treatment addicted crooks. Broderella, Tweety, The Crotch Sniffer and their ilk will tut-tut and disagree...but that walk/run, and the hiding in the attic as the phone beep-beep-beeps off its hook speaks volumes."

Digby: "Bush has just slapped a jury, four Republican judges, and the American people right in the face and blatantly instigated a cover-up of his illegal acts by giving his former aid amnesty. And the hits just keep on coming."

Stephen at The Thinkery: "Libbey was charged with THE EXACT SAME THING AS BILL CLINTON, you amoral, hypocritical assholes!@! Lying under oath during a federal investigation, even if it's not technically part of the investigation, is supposed to be the worst offense a person could ever commit. All the self-righteous, smug, power-hungry, disconnected, elitist assholes who have been moaning and groaning their eternal love for Scooter Libby and his delightful way with children - not only his! but others too! - were the exact same people who screamed and stomped and yelled and pushed and declared the end of the world if Bill Clinton was not impeached, impeached I tell you! and declared guilty, removed from office in disgrace, never to sully the fine, fine reputation of that town again."

Avedon Carol: "By commuting Libby's sentence, Bush has not only made clear that there is one law for He and a different law for thee, but he has announced that any attempt to hold accountable anyone whose transgressions touch upon the White House will be nullified if investigations imperil George Walker Bush or Richard Bruce Cheney."

Glenn Greenwald: "The only crime recognized by official Washington is using impetuous or excessively irreverent language to object to the lawbreaking and radicalism of the Leader, or acting too aggressively to investigate it. That is the only crime that triggers their outrage."

Bob Cesca at AlterNet (via Melissa): "in the president's universe -- shared by his thinning brigade of dittoheads (see above blog comments) -- the excessive punishments are reserved exclusively for people like Terry Washington: a man who lacked the ability to control his actions and communicate at a normal level; a man who was unable to comprehend what was going on around him. In other words, a man who was clearly more competent than the president. "

And on an unrelated topic, but while we're on the subject of scumbags, Melina relates to us an account of Joe Lieberman at a swim club in Westport. Try not to think about Jackie Earle Haley in Little Children when you read it. It's all there, other than screaming women pulling their children out of the pool. Though if they thought about how Holy Joe wants their kids to die for George W. Bush, Holy Joe's ego, and some lunatic idea that bombing Iran is somehow Good for Israel, perhaps they would.