'JUSTICE' AT ITS WORST
NEW YORK POST
Editorial
January 18, 2007
Former vice presidential chief of staff Lewis "Scooter" Libby is finally going on trial - after three years of investigations by a run-amok prosecutor, costing millions of taxpayer dollars - for a case in which, it is now conceded, no crime was committed.
And that's the important point to remember, as a who's who of prominent witnesses - including "Meet the Press" host Tim Russert and even Vice President Dick Cheney - testifies at the trial.
To repeat: The crime that was ostensibly under investigation never occurred.
Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald had set out to uncover who leaked FBI agent Valerie Plame's name to columnist Robert Novak, a possible felony.
Back then, conventional wisdom had it that the Bush White House deliberately "outed" Plame to discredit her already-less-than-credible husband, Joseph Wilson, who'd accused the president of lying about Iraq's nuclear ambitions.
But it turns out that there was no White House conspiracy - as the left-wing bloggers had insisted, causing some Democrats to start making impeachment plans.
In fact, Plame was outed by Richard Armitage, a former deputy secretary of state (who opposed the Iraq war) in an offhand remark.
Indeed, Armitage acknowledged his role to the FBI as early as October 2003. So why wasn't it until last September that this news was made public - and then only through a book by two Washington journalists?
Libby is the only person indicted by Fitzgerald's grand jury - for allegedly lying to investigators, though not directly about the Plame leak. And it's far from clear that his statement constitutes perjury.
Yet Fitzgerald zealously expanded his investigation, deliberately allowing it to envelop the White House when he knew how the leak had actually happened.
The Libby trial may make for compelling theater, with big-name witnesses - but it constitutes American justice at its worst. President Bush should have pardoned Libby long before this case reached the trial stage.
As for Fitzgerald, it's time to let his overblown probe die a natural death. He's done enough damage.
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