House committee looks into LIbby pardon

[Stonehenge]

House committee opens hearings on Libby's case
SILENCE IS GOLDEN: Hearings beginning tomorrow will explore the possibility that if Libby had served time, he may have implicated others in the Bush administration

AP, WASHINGTON
Tuesday, Jul 10, 2007, Page 7

"What we have here ... is that the suspicion was that if Mr. Libby went to prison, he might further implicate other people in the White House."

John Conyers, House Judiciary Committee chairman
The chief Democrat probing US President George W. Bush's decision to erase the prison sentence of a former White House aide says there is "the suspicion" the aide might have implicated others in the Bush administration if he served time.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers spoke of "the general impression" that Bush last week commuted I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby's two-and-half-year sentence in the CIA leak case to keep Libby quiet. The White House said Conyers' claim was baseless.

Conyers has scheduled a committee hearing tomorrow on the matter.

Bush contended Libby's sentence was too harsh. Libby was convicted of lying and obstructing justice in an investigation into the leak of a CIA officer's identity. The former operative said the White House was trying to discredit her husband, a critic of Bush's Iraq policy.

Conyers said the hearings would include pardons made by President Bill Clinton, president George H.W. Bush and possibly other past presidents. In the closing hours of his presidency, Clinton pardoned 140 people, including fugitive financier Marc Rich.

[Stonehenge]

Here we have a president who wants to take away judge's power to decide sentences with minimum mandatories and yet he commuted a sentence which was half the average given in obstruction cases. Many people think it was to buy Libby's silence. Libby could have implicated many administration officials including Cheney

Poll: Bush Move Unpopular in Libby Case
Associated Press 07.10.07, 7:28 PM ET

President Bush's commutation of a prison term for a former aide to Vice President Cheney did not play well with the public or even Republicans, a survey found.

In a USA Today-Gallup poll released on Tuesday, 66 percent said Bush should not have intervened in the case of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, whose sentence for obstructing justice in the CIA leak case included a 2 1/2-year prison term.

Thirteen percent said the president's move was correct, and 6 percent said Bush should have given Libby a full pardon.

Bush didn't even receive much of a boost in support from Republicans. Among them, 44 percent said Bush should not have taken action in the case. Ten percent said he should have pardoned Libby while only 26 percent said Bush did the correct thing.

Bush said Libby's sentence was overly harsh, despite federal court records showing it was less than half as long as the average sentence in obstruction cases. The sentence was also within the federal sentencing guidelines, which the Bush administration wants to make mandatory so judges cannot show leniency for criminals.

Libby is the highest White House official convicted in a government scandal since the Iran-Contra affair. He was convicted of lying about how he learned that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA and whom he told. Plame was outed in a newspaper column after her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, began criticizing the Bush administration's war policies.

Libby's commutation has touched of a flurry of criticism on Capitol Hill much like President Clinton when he pardoned 140 people, including fugitive financier Marc Rich, in the closing hours of the presidency.

Democrats are planning hearings on the Libby commutation Wednesday.