US News

Harry Hope · Guest

It all started when President George Bush decided to preemptively
attack Iraq on the flawed basis of Saddam Hussein's alleged weapons of
mass destruction.

Bush said in a State of the Union speech that Saddam had been seeking
enriched uranium from Niger.

The CIA sent former ambassador Joe Wilson to Niger to investigate
Bush's claim.

Wilson returned to the states and publicly reported that Saddam had
not approached Niger on the subject of purchasing uranium and that the
reasons for attacking Iraq were bogus.

The Bush Administration responded by going after Joe Wilson.

Why didn't they respond by just admitting the truth?

Why didn't they admit there was little evidence for assuming Iraq had
weapons of mass destruction?

Think about it.

Right before the war, former Secretary of State Colin Powell made his
case before the United Nations Security Council.

He alleged that military trucks had been spotted by military
intelligence tooling around Iraq.

The vehicles were thought to have contained weapons of mass
destruction.

Powell also claimed certain suspicious-looking buildings in Iraq may
have contained WMD.

This evidence was almost laughable then; it's hilarious now.

So the Bush Administration responded to Wilson like a schoolyard
bully.

They kicked Joe Wilson's wife in the shins.

They outed Valerie Plame, a CIA agent.

No one is supposed to know who the individual agents are, because any
one of them could go covert at a moment's notice.

I got that last item of truth from an FBI agent.

So the Bush Administration, with a smirk, appoints Patrick Fitzgerald
to investigate the case of who leaked Valerie Plame's name and
identity to the press.

He needed to look no further than under the nose of Dick Cheney.

Many witnesses were subpoenaed to testify before a federal grand jury.
Libby testified and was found very inconsistent in his testimony.

So he was charged with lying to a grand jury.

Note he wasn't charged with leaking Valerie Plame's name and identity
to the press.

Libby wasn't the original leaker; former Deputy Secretary of State
Richard Armitage was.

Libby was brought to trial on charges of lying to a federal grand jury
and FBI agents (perjury) and obstruction of justice.

The jury didn't buy his weak defense of a faulty memory.

You don't work your way up the ladder to become chief of staff for the
Vice President of the United States by being senile.

Justice was done as was announced today.

Libby's defense will likely keep him out of jail on the appeals.

Fitzgerald announced today that he will not file any more charges for
this case.

http://www.huntingtonnews.net/columns/070307-proebsting-comment.html

March 7, 2007

Libby Conviction: Our Justice System Works

By Tom Proebsting
Special to HNN

Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, former chief of staff for the Vice President,
was convicted on four counts of lying to a grand jury and one count of
obstruction of justice today.

His defense is likely to ask for a new trial and when the judge
refuses, they will likely appeal.

Libby's court case has been as closely followed as was the Watergate
hearings.

___________________________________________________

One of the charges should have been treason.

Harry