As someone who spent seven months of their life on a grand jury, I have mixed feelings on the decision by President Bush to grant Executive Clemency. As big a pile of steaming dung the Fitzmas investigation was, and boy it was, Libby still lied under oath, and that counts for something. He should have gone to prison for a short stint, say six months, then been pardoned or given clemency, whatever. A Paris Hilton sentence in other words.
I agree more with Patterico’s assessment,
You do the crime, you do the time. The jury said Scooter Libby did the crime. He should do the time. The Republican Party is going to pay a huge, huge price for this….Don’t kid yourself: this sort of thing is very significant to swing voters.
than I do with National Review’s,
We have urged President Bush to pardon Lewis “Scooter†Libby from the moment a jury found Vice President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff guilty of perjury and obstruction in the CIA-leak case. Now, the president has acted. He didn’t go as far as we would have liked, choosing to commute Libby’s prison term while leaving his conviction, fine, and probation intact. But his action ensures that Libby will not go to jail, and that’s a good thing.