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March 6, 2007 - Rush Limbaugh Program
36:47
March 6, 2007, Tuesday, Hour #1
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Welcome to today's edition of the Rush 24-7 podcast.
And greetings to you, music lovers, thrill seekers, conversationalists, Rush Limbaugh, the EIB Network.
Full three hours of broadcast excellence straight ahead.
The Scooter Libby verdicts were just announced.
He's guilty on four of the five counts.
So he's looking at 20 to 30 years in prison for this if he gets the maximum sentence on these counts.
4-5, Scooter Libby guilty.
Very, very strange, too, because the jury just this morning sent the judge a note basically telling that we're not sure what he's accused of doing here.
You would think that would happen 10 days ago or eight days ago when they started deliberations.
And I've been doing instant message flashes back and forth with friends who were alternately trying to read the tea leaves on what these juror questions meant.
And it's just impossible to do.
I mean, most people would conclude if the jury on day 10 here is still trying to figure out what Libby did, that there wouldn't be anywhere near unanimity on the jury for guilt.
But it apparently is just the opposite.
And that's why it's difficult to read these things.
This whole case, to me, has been a travesty.
Obstruction of justice is a catch-all charge that the prosecution is like a giant umbrella that can capture somebody for doing virtually anything.
This has nothing to do with Valerie Plame.
It has nothing to do with leaking her name.
It has nothing to do with whether she was covert.
It has everything to do with Patrick Fitzgerald having to justify his office and his appointment as a special prosecutor.
Richard Armitage leaked her name.
That was never part of the prosecution.
The judge would not even allow the jury to know whether or not Valerie Plame was covert, which I think is erroneous, a huge error.
If the judge had allowed the jury to know whether she was covert or not, who knows how this would have played out.
But if you ask me, this is just a wild guess here, and we won't know until we hear the jurors.
And remember, this is a D.C. jury, and there's probably a lot of Bush hatred on the jury.
It is never know.
But remember the Martha Stewart case, ladies and gentlemen, she was charged with something and convicted by the jury of something totally different.
She was, the jury just engaged in a little class envy and got Martha Stewart.
Basically, when you listen to the jurors come out of the courtroom and explain how what she did hurt the little guys insider trading, that's not what she was charged with.
She, too, was charged with a process crime.
And it'll be interesting to me to hear how many of these jurors think that Libby outed Valerie Plame or that Libby engaged in an effort to uncover her covert status since that's how this case was constantly presented, even after the trial had begun, when that had nothing to do with the substance of the case.
It's still how the drive-by media continued to portray it.
So Scooter Libby guilty on four of five counts in the CIA leak trial.
And I remember, you know, this is, it goes without saying, but I'm going to say it anyway.
You can never ever predict how these things are going to turn out when you watch the trial and read analysis of the trial day by day.
I can remember reading so many blogs, so many bloggers daily during the course of this trial.
And had I believed it all or had a well, it's not the look.
I did believe it all.
But the problem with these bloggers is that they're much smarter than the average juror is.
And their take on what happened in court, especially if you get a lawyer or two on these blogs, their take about what's happening in here, such as the numerous days that it was written on blogs that Fitzgerald had a lousy day.
The prosecution was really stumped today.
Their witnesses can't remember anything.
This is a trial about lying, and the prosecution's witnesses can't remember diddly squat.
Well, people blogging this intentionally, unintentionally, don't know, left the impression the prosecution's case wasn't doing all that well.
But as it turns out, it was just the opposite.
So here we have poor old Scooter Libby.
Try to put yourself in his shoes.
The verdicts here would seem to me to be able to cement the notion that it's been happening in American politics for a long time that you can criminalize policy.
This was basically the administration trying to fight back against a bunch of lies being told by Joseph Wilson, who was never brought under oath.
The prosecution never questioned or doubted what Joseph Wilson or his wife were saying about this.
So if you're in the habit of watching the drive-bys, the afternoon or evening on cable, be prepared because, ladies and gentlemen, there's going to be an orgy of delight on virtually all of these programs.
The media is going to proud itself or pat itself on the back, be very proud of themselves for making this happen, for causing this to be the case, for being able to influence the outcome of this.
And of course, it's a big slap at the Bush administration, which they'll enjoy and dig.
But I just put myself in Scooter Libby's position, and here we are in a throes of a process crime that had nothing to do with the original charge and the original reason for the investigation.
And, you know, when you count like count five is perjury, lying to the grand jury and lying to the FBI, those are serious charges.
But, you know, Scooter said it was just his faulty memory.
He wasn't sure which, all these things going on during the day he conducts his job every day.
And it is what it is.
It's unfortunate and sad.
He's not a bad guy at all.
And it looks like we've got the successful criminalization of politics.
I don't know, status of appeals and that sort of thing.
What'll happen here?
Probably some basis for it.
We'll have to wait and see what the lawyers say.
Anyway, here's the telephone number if you want to be on the program today: 800-282-2882.
The email address rush at EIBnet.com.
John Edwards, this is literally a tidbit here what's headed up on the program today.
John Edwards, I think that Jesus would be disappointed in our ignoring the plight of those around us who are suffering and our focus on our own selfish short-term needs.
I think he'd be appalled, actually.
Yeah, this is not playing well.
John Edwards, Jesus would be appalled at our ignoring the plight of those around us.
At rushlimbaugh.com, ladies and gentlemen, we have two pictures.
Posted them prior to the program.
We have John Edwards' massive brand new mansion in North Carolina, and it has just been uncovered by the Carolina Journal, photos by Don Carrington.
He's got a beach house.
He's got a beach house.
A 2,800 square foot beach house on exclusive and gated Figure 8 Island near Wilmington.
The latest tax valuation on this beach house is $2.6 million.
The whole island is gated.
And he's got John's lounge, a room in his 28,000 square foot home in Orange County near Chapel Hill.
John Edwards thinks Jesus would be appalled at the selfishness of Americans these days and their lack of concern for the poor and less fortunate.
He said this, by the way, to the Christian website, BeliefNet.com.
And of course, it's going to be hard for former Senator Edwards to avoid the hypocrisy of this massive, conspicuous consumption, the obvious indications of his wealth, while he's out talking about how we don't do enough for the poor and don't have enough concern for the less fortunate.
Also, if you heard about this from the lifestyle stack, in the state of Washington, some high school sporting officials want to ban booing at high school games because it's just not sportsmanlike.
We'll have details on this.
Lots of other things coming up today on the EIB network.
El Rush Boat, telephone number 800-282-2882.
We've got great audio sound bites.
Ann Coulter Kerfuffle continues.
Drive-by media trying to make as much of it as they can naturally.
We're going to go back to the archives, ladies and gentlemen.
Remember John Kerry making comments about Vice President Cheney's daughter being a lesbian during a presidential debate with George W. Bush?
And you may have forgotten Elizabeth Edwards chiming in on this about how Mrs. Cheney acted ashamed and so forth.
Left trying to make it look like the we on the right are just nothing but a bunch of gay bashers, racists, sexist bigots, homophobes, and so forth.
And yet it was shameless what Kerry and Edwards did during the 2004 presidential campaign regarding the privacy of the Cheney family.
Then again, we have the Andrew Giuliani story yesterday, the New York Times.
Yeah, my dad's a dud, but I think he'd be a great president.
Remember the zone of privacy that the drive-bys all respected for Chelsea Clinton.
Leave her out of this, Nick Clinton said.
And the drive-bys dutifully conform to that demand or that request.
Anyway, lots of stuff to do today.
Plus, your phone calls.
We'll take a brief time out here.
Come back and continue right after this.
Now, this is unbelievable.
I knew the drive-bys are going to have orgasms out there over the Libby verdicts today, guilty on four of the five counts.
I'm watching television here.
I saw a little crawl go by.
I got the closed captioning on.
Chris Matthews of Hardball actually said that the verdict has to do with Cheney taking the country into war.
It has nothing to do with what this case was.
But see, that's what I meant about this being somewhat similar to a Martha Stewart verdict.
She was actually convicted of things by the jury that she was not charged with.
And you can chalk that jury up just class envy.
Little guys taking an opportunity to get even with a big, rich person who's a constant celebrity and knock her down to size.
D.C. jury, anti-Bush.
The odds of that are pretty good, no matter how you parse the jury and no matter how you set them up.
It's just a shame, but this is, you better get ready, folks.
You're now going to have people speculating, well, this could invigorate the independent counsel, Patrick Fitzgerald.
He could now decide to go even further since this jury found Libby guilty.
Why, let's go up the chain.
Let's see what else we can find.
It's possible, folks.
It's possible a verdict like this could empower and encourage the prosecutor to try to get some even bigger ducks in a row.
We got some people who want to talk about this.
Jim in Raleigh, let's start with you here on the EIB Network, sir.
Nice to have you with us and welcome to the program.
Thank you so much.
Good afternoon, Rush.
I thank you for your service to our American society.
I wanted to start out by arguing with you about your fears about this jury.
But while I was on hold, the verdict came in, and so I bow to your superior intellect.
I was going to argue that because of the three questions that the jurors had asked the judge, that perhaps they were focusing on the charge and not the periphery of the case, and that the judge in steering the focus towards the case and maybe not allowing the issue of whether she was covert or not, maybe they were actually focusing on the charge.
But once again, you've proved that you have more insight than 99.9% of us.
Well, that's why I'm host and others aren't.
But, you know, look at it.
I want to take you back to the instant mail, instant messages that I was flashing with people back and forth today.
A lot of people assume that these questions that the jury had just three hours ago, we can't, judge, we can't figure out what he's charged with.
We can't figure out what he did wrong here.
And people were looking at that and think, what a mockery.
This is an absolute joke.
A jury asking that kind of question on day 10, and it was just a couple days ago that they asked for a definition of reasonable doubt.
And all of this led court watchers to do something that's very risky and then start trying to interpret or interpret what all this means, because you never know.
You just, it's not predictable.
And I myself found myself chuckling.
I mean, this is an absolute joke.
And I said, Fitzfong cannot possibly be happy to hear this question from the jury on day 10.
Judge, we can't figure out what Libby is accused of doing wrong.
And then three hours later, he's guilty on four of the five counts.
I defy anybody to make any sense of this.
And we won't not these jurors speak if they do.
You know, with Americans as desirous of fame these days, they probably will.
But I speculated, well, don't get your hopes up on this.
It could mean that there are just one or two in there that are holding out, and that's the question.
Somebody said to me, no, The judge will not entertain questions from a jury.
Just one or two people have a question.
The whole jury has to basically be undecided about something for these questions to have any merit and dealt with by the judge.
So you get a question three hours ago, Judge, we can't figure out what Libby even did wrong.
And then you go guilty on four of the five counts.
It just defies all explanation, which to me, much of this case does.
Saluda, Virginia.
This is Ken, and welcome to the EIB Network.
Hi, Rush.
Thanks for taking my call.
Yes, sir.
I wanted to ask you what you thought about the possibility of a presidential pardon for Scooter Libby.
Well, that's another thing.
I can't, I really, I have no way of even giving you an end.
I have no gut sense on that sense myself.
If there is to be a pardon of Scooter Libby, it won't happen until Bush's last week in office.
If there is, but he's not going to do it now.
There's too much going on.
He needs Congress on a rock.
He needs as much help as he can get with the war on terror.
And he's not going to, I wouldn't look for that anytime soon.
As to whether Bush would do this upon leaving office, 50-50, best I could give you.
Entirely possible.
Thank you.
You bet.
Jack in Boston, you're next.
The EIB network in El Rushbo.
Hello, sir.
Yeah, Rush, I have one comment, and that's, and Sandy Berger goes free?
Yep.
And the prosecutor, well, the Justice Department didn't even pursue Sandy Burglar.
He got community service, and I think a fine.
He also lost his security clearance.
But guess what?
Sandy Burglar gets his security clearance back just in time to rejoin the Hillary Clinton administration in 2009.
I mean, what Sandy Burglar did was a thousand times, a million times more serious than the Scooter Libby thing.
Well, yes, on the surface it is.
But if you, the one thing that you should take away from this, I make this comment regardless of the Scooter Libby verdicts here and what he did or didn't do.
If the feds ever come calling on you, if the FBI or anybody ever comes calling on you to ask you questions about something, do one of two things.
Call a lawyer and don't talk to them until you've gotten advice from a lawyer.
Or number two, do not lie to them.
Prosecutors, like anybody else, they'll take the route of the least resistance in order to get a conviction.
It's what these people are all about.
Prosecutors don't go to court for any other reason, and they don't pursue people to find them innocent.
They pursue people to find them guilty.
Don't lie to them because the same thing can happen.
You can end up, it's what Martha Stewart did.
She didn't get a lawyer.
She thought she was scoring points by cooperating.
It turned out that they got her on lying, and that's what she, but that's not what she was convicted of, if you listen to the jurors in her trial.
So, I mean, there's Libby walking out of the courtroom now.
Now, my reason for saying this is because when you start lying, when the FBI and the feds come calling and they're conducting an investigation into anything, you start lying, and here comes that giant umbrella called obstruction of justice.
And that basically means if you send them on a wild goose chase, if you lie to them about things and it causes them to go investigate anything, they will bring the hammer down on you like you can't believe it.
You got true believers here.
And some of these prosecutors, some of these federal prosecutors, some of these U.S. attorneys are some of the best lawyers in the country.
And they come out of law school, they're gung-ho.
And they all believe in the sanctity of federal investigations.
And you lie to them, and they come get you.
Now, I know you're saying, well, what about Clinton?
Clinton lied under oath, grand jury testimony.
Yes.
And he was found in contempt by a federal judge, and he lost his law license for a while, but he didn't get any jail time over it, which probably because he's president of the United States.
And don't forget that Ken Starr, the independent counsel there, didn't really bring any charges of any substance.
So just a little piece of advice, and that's what they got Libby on, and that's what they were pursuing him on, because they had nothing else in this case.
Back in just a sec.
Your guiding lights, trying times of confusion, murkiness, tumult, chaos, injustice, torture, humiliation, global warming, panics in hysteria, and even the good times.
We're here at the Limbaugh Institute for Advanced Conservative Studies.
One of the questions, one of the questions the jury came out and asked this morning was, Judge, is it a crime if Libby lied to Matt Cooper, who's a judge, a journalist, a reporter at the time for Time magazine?
And the judge said, well, for better or worse, it's not a crime to lie to a journalist.
And yet that's one of the guilty counts that he lied to the FBI about his conversations with Matt Cooper.
And he also lied to the FBI about his conversations with Tim Russert.
Now, Libby's defense attorney, Ted Wells, took to the microphone mere moments ago and said they're going to do two things.
They're going to make a motion for a new trial on the basis that these verdicts make no sense with what questions the jurors were asking and the testimony.
And then when that fails, and it will, I mean, they got to ask this judge to basically do a new trial.
And the judge is not going to say, yeah, you know, I agree with you.
This thing was a travesty.
Because then the judge is saying, I should have stopped it earlier.
So that motion will fail.
And they'll go to the appeal.
And both of these, you know, the idea they have a new trial, throw it out, won't happen.
Of course, in this case, who knows?
An appeal, obviously, you get an appeal on this, but the grounds, you have to have the opportunity for an appeal.
And the grounds here will be there's jurors that had no clue what they were deciding.
They were just based on the questions that they were asking.
These jurors were just, they were spinning in there.
They didn't even know what this case was about.
It has to be retried.
They'll probably say something about the judge's jury instructions weren't good.
And they'll probably point out that, you know, Libby wanted a lot of documents that the government has entered into evidence and the government wouldn't let them.
And the judge sided with the government.
There are some grounds here for an appeal.
And the Libby lawyer said that, of course, as all lawyers do who lose, said that he's totally confident that Libby in time will be vindicated.
Peter in Rochester, New York, welcome, sir, to the EIB network.
Hello.
Oh, hi, Rush.
Thank God you got your hearing.
Listen, I believe that Scooter Libby got what he deserved, and I don't think that he's a good guy.
If you remember, he was on the defense team who defended Mark Rich going way back.
And Mark Rich was really kind of a disgusting person.
Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute, that's not how the justice system works.
And I'm not sure he defended Rich or if he represented Rich in his appeal to Clinton for a pardon, but that's not how the justice system.
See, you would have made a good juror in this case because you're saying, okay, Libby is a scoundrel.
He works for Cheney.
He works for Bush.
And he helped Mark Rich guilty.
The other thing is...
No, no, no, no.
You need to be embarrassed about.
Peter, you really can't mean what you just said to me.
Why?
Well, because that's not how the justice system works.
Sadly, I guess it does.
But you, you want to convict karma?
No, you want to convict Libby based on zero evidence in the case.
You think Libby got what he deserved, and you cited things have nothing to do with this case.
Well, in a sense, you're right.
I'm talking in a general sense about karma.
You know, that he defended, in the general term of karma, Scooter Libby defended a skunk, and now he himself got himself in jail.
And wouldn't it be ironic if just as Rich was pardoned by Clinton, Bush pardoned Libby, who defended Rich?
I guess if it'd be karmatic, it could be ironic.
But you're getting into things metaphysical here, and this course is about facts and so forth.
And your call is fascinating to me because we could have had 10 or 12 people or 10 or 11 people just like you on this jury.
You sound like a Martha Stewart juror.
He deserves to get this because karma needs to come in.
This is their roots in this.
Don't seek vengeance.
Let higher powers take care of that for you.
And there are all kinds of rationalizations.
But this is why the criminal justice system...
Ah, there's Fitzfong speaking.
We're not going to jip it.
We'll find out what he said if it's any import cookies rolling on all this, and we'll have soundbites for you as the afternoon progresses.
Reno, Nevada, hell.
Hal, you're next.
It's great to have you with us.
Yes, Rush.
During her 98 grand jury testimony, Hillary Clinton answered under oath, I don't remember at least 250 times.
Where's the prosecution?
Look at the difference here.
Yeah, I know.
I absolutely know.
But there's some things about the criminal justice system you have to know.
It's against the law to be a Republican.
In Washington, it is.
With a D.C. jury and a Bush administration and a drive-by media that's been trying to drum him out of office for four or five years, you're damn right.
It's against the law to be a Republican in the eyes of many people.
You know, Hillary, you know, she had all kinds of protection.
Libby didn't testify.
I wonder if they're rethinking that.
Libby did not testify in this case, but it boils down here to the jury was made to believe that there was some giant cover-up here to protect people higher up in the Bush administration, and this is as close as they could get.
And as I mentioned earlier, if Fitzpatrick wants to, he could take this verdict and look at it as red meat and say, man, I mean, I've got all kinds of possibilities and potential here if he thinks that there are other things to pursue.
Vero Beach.
Vero Beach.
This Florida?
Vero Beach.
Yeah.
Hi, Jim.
Welcome to the program.
Hello?
Yes, sir.
Jim, you're on the EIB network.
Your big showbiz break.
Hey, I've got a problem with all this.
This whole case is costing us millions of dollars.
And I love the president.
I truly do.
Why doesn't anyone stand up and say, hey, and just come out and say, like you do, and say the truth?
Say, well, you know, this is all about nothing.
It's costing you, the taxpayers, a fortune for absolutely nothing.
I'll tell you why.
I'll tell you that's a great question.
You're asking why the administration didn't pipe him to say something?
Yes.
They're scared of the prosecutor.
Why?
Because he could come after them.
This guy could do anything.
These guys have limitless power.
Federal prosecutors have more money than the people in this administration combined.
If this guy gets his nose out of joint by something that Cheney or Bush might say or anybody else in the administration, I'll guarantee you, people inside the administration have been itching to go public with a whole bunch of things, but they don't dare because there is a natural fear of prosecutors, particularly federal prosecutors.
Who hired him?
Well, Bush did.
The Justice Department did.
But that's what, you know, Bush can't come out and fire the guy.
I mean, he could, but that's, there are too many political ramifications, and Bush has other agenda items that he wants to get done.
Well, I understand the agenda items.
Rush, I guess you don't get it sometimes.
Why do, and I have great respect for the president, but there's so many times it's like he doesn't stand up and say, well, this is how it is.
Just tell us.
I think people would believe him.
And the Democrats, some of the dumbest things.
Look at you.
As I've said before, the president is not leading a movement.
He's a Republican.
He's not a conservative.
He's conservative on certain things, but he doesn't view himself as leading a movement.
And you consider yourself conservative, correct?
Yes.
You consider yourself a movement conservative.
It's what I said yesterday.
One of the reasons so many people are supporting Ann Coulter is because she fights.
She stands up and she responds to some of this stuff that the left throws out.
She's got a lot more defenders than she does detractors, as do I.
But the people of the conservatives in this country are hungering for just the kind of fight you're talking about.
But when you're talking about a legal case and a federal prosecutor, Jim, it ain't going to happen.
There's morbid fear of these people.
How does he lose his power eventually as a prosecutor?
How does he actually, what point is he taken off and no longer is the prosecutor?
Well, in this case, it's all different.
But this is a great argument, the independent counsel law.
The Democrats wanted to get rid of it after the Clinton administration and Bush gets in office.
Now they love the independent counsel law.
In this case, James Comey, who was the acting attorney general when John Ashcroft retired or resigned, granted unlimited authority, gave Patrick Fitzgerald the unlimited authority of the Justice Department to pursue anything he thought relevant to this case.
When a prosecutor has that much power over and above what he normally has in the federal system, people who want to speak up and say things cower, especially after the indictments have come down or come up, depending on your legal preference, and you're not part of it, you shut up.
It's just circle the wagons and protect everybody.
Protect yourselves.
What can we do about it?
What can we, as people?
Judicial system is not up to a vote.
I know.
Just like science isn't.
There's not a whole lot you can do.
You could write Justice Department letters.
It's not going to matter a hill of beans.
In this case, I know that you want to do something about it because you think there's gross injustices going on.
The best thing to do is understand the judicial system and understand that it's all, you know, that people say it's about justice.
In many cases, it's not about justice at all.
It's about politics.
This is purely a political case.
Scooter Libby is as high as Fitzgerald could get.
He wanted Cheney, wanted Rove.
It's as high as he could get.
This is an indictment against the Bush administration, and this is going to be portrayed as a guilty verdict against the Bush administration for politicizing or criminalizing policy.
Fitzgerald is still talking.
I have no clue what he's saying.
I've got to take a break.
I'm going to listen into a little bit of it.
Jim, thanks for the call.
Appreciate it.
A quick timeout.
We'll be back in just a second.
You can sit there and you can say, yeah, Sandy Burglar's walking free.
There's an injustice going on here.
But don't forget Congressman William Jefferson, Democrat Louisiana, $90,000 in cold cash.
All of these rumors of an indictment to come down the pike.
And he's sitting there on the Homeland Security Committee.
The same Justice Department that did not pursue Sandy Burglar doesn't appear to be excited about Congressman William Jefferson, Democrat Louisiana.
Yet they burnt a path to Scooter Libby because Scooter Libby takes the Bush administration.
Fitzgerald has said, this is the only reason I was interested in what he was saying.
The investigation is dormant.
It's inactive.
He has no plans to file any other charges.
John in St. Louis, welcome, sir, to the EIB network.
Hey, good afternoon, Rush.
This is John.
Yes, John.
Pleasure to talk to you.
I know one of the things you like to go back to is that, you know, Libby, or I'm sorry, the claim leaked she wasn't covert, that there's no underlying crime there, and it's a process crime.
And I know that's something you might like to get into, but I think I could demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that she was covert.
There was a television program on PBS Frontline a couple weeks ago.
It's called like News Wars.
In that show, they interviewed an FBI agent that is involved in the investigation of leaks.
There's a division in FBI that does that.
And they had this FBI guy come on and say, we submit a questionnaire to the victim agency.
And if they answer in the affirmative these 11 questions, then there was a crime worth investigating.
Well, the only person that could convey covert status on someone would be the victim agency.
It's not the media or, you know.
I know, but you're heading down the wrong path on this because this is one of the flashpoints of this whole trial is whether or not she was covert.
Nobody knows.
Well, they do.
They don't know.
No, they don't.
Well, but there's no covert status on her, David.
No, but nobody knows publicly.
It's a big, no, she's, you don't know.
I don't know.
The judge said he doesn't know.
When he was talking to the jury, the judge said he doesn't know whether she's covert or not.
But all of this is irrelevant.
The CIA, and I read a piece by Clarice Feldman at theAmericanThinker.com, far more credible to me than PBS and Frontline.
And she said this whole thing has been a bait and switch by the CIA in order to get back at the Bush administration for George Tennett taking it on the chin for weapons and mass destruction.
This whole thing has been politically.
This whole thing is the CIA trying to cover its rear end for its own mistakes about weapons and mass destruction, blaming Bush and trying to get back in internecine Washington politics to the core here.
The fact that they wouldn't say whether she's covert is not indicative of anything.
They're trying to keep it quiet.
But Armitage was the original leaker.
What her status was and whether she was outed was not what the case was about.
Fitzgerald didn't bring one charge on that basis.
He didn't indict anybody on the basis that a covert agent was outed.
But the drive-by media continued to portray that that's what the case was about, totally took up the defense of poor old Valerie Plame and poor old Joe Wilson, who is a proven liar over and over again, who was never brought under oath.
These are the things that upset me about this case.
Wilson was never questioned.
He had a champion in the special prosecutor here, and as did Valerie Plame Wilson herself.
Had the status, in fact, been known and had the judge been able to tell the jury whether she was covert or not.
And if she wasn't, and Victoria Tensing, who wrote the law, by the way, that penalizes and punishes people for outing covert agents, has said this case doesn't even approach the intent or even the outer boundaries of the law.
Doesn't even get anywhere near it, that she's not the kind of agent the law was written to protect.
And she wrote the law.
So the idea here that some great CIA operation was compromised by Scooter Libby is absurd.
If anybody compromised, it was Armitage, who wasn't pursued by the independent counsel or anybody else at all.
You got to understand what this case is about.
This case is about Washington politics getting even.
You don't know, folks, the strife.
You know, when this weapons of mass destruction thing didn't pan out the way everybody had thought based on what the testimony of other people were at the UN and Security Council and so forth, George Tennant was out there taking all kinds of heat.
And the guys at the CIA rallied around there said, we're not taking a heat for this.
We're not going to let this be dumped on us.
And so here came this request pursued by the media, New York Times and others, and the CIA to find out what happened here.
We've had somebody's status or somebody's an employee.
By the way, that's a key word, by the way.
When the CIA asked the Justice Department to look into this, they said a CIA employee, not agent.
A CIA employee status has been compromised, blah, blah, blah.
And that got this whole ball rolling.
So there's so much more to what this is all about.
And you've come up with a jury here that until I hear from the jurors, it's going to be difficult to speculate about what they thought the case was about.
But their notes indicate they were confused.
They were totally confused.
Judge, is it a crime to lie to Matt Cooper?
No, it's not, Jory.
Well, what is it actually Scooter Libby's accused of doing?
That question's three and a half or four hours ago.
I got to go take a break here.
We'll be back in just a second.
The juror is speaking, and he said we had a lot of sympathy for Libby.
And a lot of jurors are saying, what are we doing with this guy?
Where's Rove?
Where's Cheney?
What are we doing with this guy?
The juror speaking right now, by the way, said he's a former reporter.
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