Libby pardon debate begins

With the conviction of Scooter Libby on four counts yesterday, the media focus on the trial is quickly shifting to a partisan debate over the merits of a pardon.

Democrats are already calling on President Bush to promise not to pardon Libby, as in this statement from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid:

Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader, issued a statement calling on Mr. Bush to promise that he would not “pardon Libby for his criminal conduct.”

The White House is stalling, with spokeswoman Dana Perino saying that "I'm aware of no such request for a pardon. And as is afforded to all Americans, there is a process that is followed in which to apply for a pardon... I don't think that speculating on a wildly hypothetical situation at this time is appropriate."

But the conservative movement is making a strong push for a pardon. National Review issued an editorial just a few hours after the verdict calling for a pardon, and today's Wall Street Journal includes not one but two pieces calling for a pardon -- an editorial and an op-ed by Ronald D. Rotunda.

Will Libby be the next Casper Weinberger, the Iran-Contra figure who President George H.W. Bush pardoned in December 1992? Washington Post columnist Al Kamen has announced a contest to guess Libby's pardon date -- send in your entries today!

Update 3/8 6:35 AM: A New York Times story on the pardon debate includes an interesting tidbit - the prediction markets are already putting the odds of a pardon at 63 percent:

Meanwhile, the online futures exchange Intrade.com has offered Libby pardon futures.

“There’s good interest in the market already,” John Delaney, the Intrade chief executive, said by telephone from Dublin. He said traders so far had collectively predicted a 23 percent chance of a pardon by the end of 2007 and 63 percent by the end of President Bush’s term.

Comments

[Mick Stockinger]

Let's face it, Libby was prosecuted for being a Republican official. The existence of the presidential pardon exists to rectify travesties of justice like this--not by the way to bail out campaign contributors like Marc Rich.

[travelite]

Mick,

Ironic, don't you think, that Libby negotiated Marc Rich's pardon? Some officials do need prosecution, sadly.

Cheers,
travelite

[Josef]

Hey,

I don't know if Libby should be pardoned or not; it's a tough call. But I would like to point out to anyone who doesn't know yet that someone put PardonLibby.org up for sale on eBay. I wonder what it'll go for. Here's the address:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=003&sspagename=STRK%3AMESE%3AIT&viewitem=&item=130088305011&rd=1&rd=1