VOTE HERE.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The Scooter Libby Trial is to law what Seinfeld was to TV– a trial about nothing. Bob Novack who was told by State’s Bush hata Richard Armitage concurs here.

Rich Lowry of National Review has the spot on analysis, “this is a classic case of criminalizing politics.”

Libby’s attorneys say they will file a motion for a new trial.
**Addition on Thursday with a thanks to Andy. Read this article from Bill Gertz from 2004 about Valerie Plame’s identity. It means very little now but is instructive to the clowns who persist in the fiction that Plame was “classified” (as Fitzgerald put it–which means nothing by the way) or “covert” (the correct term).

Here’s some of the info from the trial:
WASHINGTON – Former White House aide I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby was convicted Tuesday of obstruction, perjury and lying to the FBI in an investigation into the leak of a CIA operative’s identity.
Libby, the former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, was accused of lying and obstructing the investigation into the 2003 leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame’s identity to reporters.
He was acquitted of one count of lying to the FBI.

He wasn’t accused of leaking Valerie Plame’s identity because that was no crime. He was convicted of telling one story to the FBI and Grand Jury that differed from the stories told by reporters. Very strange. Consistently the reporters called in this case couldn’t remember details of their meetings with LIbby and others but Libby wasn’t allowed the same dispensation by the jury. In fact the jury in this case at one point asked the judge if it was against the law to lie to a journalist. This is the point on which Judge Andrew Napolitano says Libby’s attorney could appeal because it appears the jurors were confused.

Senator Harry Reid says the verdict proves the White House manipulated intelligence on the war. That wasn’t at issue here and of course Reid makes a political leap to make that point, a point which has been thoroughly debunked. In fact it’s clear that the person who made the allegation about the veracity of the intelligence, Joe Wilson, the man who really outed his wife, Valerie Plame, was the person who had lied about the yellow cake. See previous posts here and here and here and here and here

Victoria Toensing, the former prosecutor and author of the law under which Libby was found guilty, says the jury’s decision was not consistent vis a vis differing stories Libby told to FBI and Grand Jury.

Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald says (and these are practically direct quotes) the truth is what drives the judicial system and if someone knowingly tells a lie under oath then it’s a serious matter. The nature of any person telling a lie to a grand jury and to have an important figure do that on a matter of national security makes it unacceptable. He says he does not expect to file any further charges.

Interestingly political that answer is. An issue of national security? The status of Valerie Plame was never brought up in trial because she wasn’t “outed” as a CIA agent and so there was no national security concern. From the git go Fitzgerald knew the leaker was Bush hata Richard Armitage who was part of the calcified apparatus at foggy bottom. No charges against him were brought because leaking Valerie Plame’s identity wasn’t a crime. Joe Wilson had also been outed as a liar on the yellow cake issue.

Libby was convicted of “misremembering” discussions with reporters to the FBI and the Grand Jury. It was a case of dueling memories on an issue of an inconsequential nature.

Late ad: Fitzgerald says Plame’s status was “classified” and about that there is no dispute. Why didn’t he bring this as part of the case, then? Because the only thing that matters was if she was COVERT (under cover) and of course she wasn’t. THAT’S the real national security issue, isn’t it?

The Jury member said “there was a tremendous amount of sympathy for Mr. Libby but we kept asking ourselves ‘where’s Rove?’ We felt Libby was a fall guy. We never saw any evidence that [Vice President] Cheney told him what to say.
“We thought hey we might see President Bush here!”
On the issue of Libby not testifying the juror said, “We had eight hours of grand jury testimony from Libby it was good.”
It’s been noted that this juror, Denis Collins is a journalist and the author of a book called Spying: The Secret History of History. How did he get on the jury again? A JOURNALIST when journalists are part and parcel of the story? An author of a SPY BOOK when part of the trial was about a purported SPY?

From the AP: Libby’s defense team said he learned about plame from Cheney, forgot about it, then learned it against a month later from NBC newsman Tim Russert. Anything he told reporters about Plame, Libby said, was just chatter and rumors, not official government information.

Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald said that was a lie. But Libby’s defense team had argued that it would be unfair to convict Libby in a case where so many witnesses changed their stories or had memory problems.

What was the crime again?

Check out Mark Levin’s reaction here. Hear Mark Levin on KPAM AM 860 3-5pm right before my show. Here’s a nugget: This morning the jury didn’t understand two of the counts. Yesterday it didn’t understand what was meant by reasonable doubt. Let me suggest that in the end it still didn’t understand the two counts or reasonable doubt.
There has been considerable damage done to traditional Justice Department procedures, the free press, and the political system by this nothing-burger of a case.

And of course Mark’s right. There’s been a serious blow dealt to journalists. Who will ever want to be a source for anything ever again?

What happens if you lie to a grand jury? David Frum has some real life examples here.