{"id":10761,"date":"2007-07-02T18:43:21","date_gmt":"2007-07-03T01:43:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2007\/07\/02\/the-law-order-party.html"},"modified":"2007-07-02T18:43:21","modified_gmt":"2007-07-03T01:43:21","slug":"the_law_order_party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2007\/07\/02\/the_law_order_party.html","title":{"rendered":"The Law & Order Party"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bush commutes Scooter Libby’s sentence<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\n

President Bush commuted Monday the prison term of former White House aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, facing 30 months in prison after a federal court convicted him of perjury, obstruction of justice and lying to investigators.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Note that some folks on the GOP wanted to kick Clinton out of the White House for doing less.<\/p>\n

Now, to be sure, a commutation is not a pardon.  The conviction is still on Libby’s record, and he still owes $250K in fines (any bets as to whether there will be fundraising to help him out?).<\/p>\n

\n

In a written statement commuting the jail sentence, issued hours after Monday’s ruling, Bush called the sentence “excessive,” and suggested that Libby will pay a big enough price for his conviction.<\/p>\n

“The consequences of his felony conviction on his former life as a lawyer, public servant, and private citizen will be long-lasting,” Bush said.  He said Libby was given “a harsh sentence based in part on allegations never presented to the jury.”<\/p>\n

But the commutation does nothing to prevent Libby from appealing his conviction. And if the appeal fails or is still in process at the end of Bush’s term, there is nothing to prevent the President from granting Libby a full pardon before he leaves office.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

There’s an old saying, “Caesar’s wife must be beyond reproach.”  The idea is that not only should the leadership avoid out-and-out visible corruption, but must go a few extra steps beyond to be “cleaner than clean.”<\/p>\n

By commuting the sentence of an administration insider still in the appeals process, Bush has more than failed that test.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bush commutes Scooter Libby’s sentence.  President Bush commuted Monday the prison term of former White House aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, facing 30 months in prison after a federal court…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics-law"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10749,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2007\/07\/06\/and_just_so_that_i_get_my.html","url_meta":{"origin":10761,"position":0},"title":"And just so that I get my daily dose of politics thrown in there …","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 6-Jul-07 12:33pm","format":false,"excerpt":"BD -- who will be the first to agree with me that he is much further, ah, left than I am on a single-axis political spectrum -- posts a fine...","rel":"","context":"In "Politics & Law"","block_context":{"text":"Politics & Law","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":10757,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2007\/07\/05\/scooting.html","url_meta":{"origin":10761,"position":1},"title":"Scooting","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 5-Jul-07 8:46am","format":false,"excerpt":"The more I keep pondering on the whole Scooter Libby \"clemency,\" the more it keeps irking. I have to quote from a Kung Fu Monkey link Marn\u00a0cited\u00a0commented in my original...","rel":"","context":"In "Elections 2008"","block_context":{"text":"Elections 2008","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/elections-2008"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9044,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2006\/02\/27\/political_maneu.html","url_meta":{"origin":10761,"position":2},"title":"Political maneuvers","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 27-Feb-06 10:14pm","format":false,"excerpt":"There may be a certain amount of \"wishful thinking\" or \"trial ballooning\" in this story, which touts the likelihood that Dick Cheney will step down from being VP after the...","rel":"","context":"In "Elections 2008"","block_context":{"text":"Elections 2008","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/elections-2008"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":134451,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/08\/26\/pardons-commutations-oh-yeah-first-arguments.html","url_meta":{"origin":10761,"position":3},"title":"On Pardons and Commutations and “Oh Yeah, He Did It First!” arguments","author":"***Dave","date":"Sat 26-Aug-17 2:31pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Despite slipstreaming the Joe Arpaio pardon into a Friday night news dump that includes a major natural disaster, it's still engendered a fair amount of comment. I wanted to pull over into one of my own posts a couple of lengthy comments I wrote elsewhere, because otherwise I will never\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/joe-arpaio-donald-trump-01-ap-jc-170801_4x3_9925B15D.jpgimgmax%3D660.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/joe-arpaio-donald-trump-01-ap-jc-170801_4x3_9925B15D.jpgimgmax%3D660.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/joe-arpaio-donald-trump-01-ap-jc-170801_4x3_9925B15D.jpgimgmax%3D660.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x"},"classes":[]},{"id":26529,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/02\/19\/voter-suppression-conviction-nets-a-whole-thirty-days-of-home-detention.html","url_meta":{"origin":10761,"position":4},"title":"Voter suppression conviction nets a whole thirty days of home detention","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 19-Feb-12 9:29pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Whoop-di-doo.Imagine the vitriol and outrage and demands for a multi-year sentence if this guy had been, say, a former ACORN member who cast a single vote fraudulently. Instead, at this guys behest, 110K mostly-black voters got a call saying that they didn't need to go out and vote, the Democratic\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":18655,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2010\/09\/21\/more-on-the-don-armstrong-felony-thief-for-now-case.html","url_meta":{"origin":10761,"position":5},"title":"More on the Don Armstrong (felony thief, for now) case","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 21-Sep-10 8:29am","format":false,"excerpt":"After a few days, a few more stories in the news illuminating how the\u00a0 Don Armstrong case went from 20-odd felony theft indictments by the grand jury to \"no contest\" on one felony theft and one misdemeanor theft case. First off, the Colorado Springs Gazette: As part of the agreement,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Crime & Punishment"","block_context":{"text":"Crime & Punishment","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/crime-punishment"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/09\/don-armstrong-laughter-300x199.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10761"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10761\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}