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While Scooter Libby packs his toothbrush, and maintenance crews resurface the tennis courts at Allenwood Prison Farm in preparation for a distinguished class of incoming freshmen, the news industry speculates on when a presidential pardon might be forthcoming. This speculation is discussed with such conscientious ardor that news-consumers might be excused if they mistake it for fact.
The fact is that Libby, under a sentence of imprisonment, is a potential witness against the very president who is supposedly poised to pardon him. Pardoning such a witness, though within the authority of the president, would also be a crime, and that's a fact. If Bush is not ready to commit obstruction of justice in public, he won't pardon a witness against him.
We can presume that Bush and Cheney are getting counsel to that effect even as we purr our satisfaction at Libby's reversal of fortune. You don't have to be a legal scholar (a commodity that's in critically short supply among the government's current stable of lawyers) to appreciate the possibilities when a racketeer begins serving a prison sentence. Especially when all the other racketeers are drinking martinis at home. Even the least sophisticated Law & Order viewer knows what happens now.
But this is real life, the journalist might argue. In real life, there are no rules. The commercial media seem to take this for granted, even as they feed us fiction that contradicts their argument on every point. If they are trying to keep us ignorant and easy to exploit, they're failing.
The fiction may be that Bush and Cheney are all-powerful and can do as they please without regard to law. The fact is that there are insurmountable impediments to the designs of their rapidly dissolving criminal cabal.
Stopped in Iraq and points east by coalitions of patriots and religious zealots in tacit alliance with a decidedly un-military voting public, they know that all is lost in their various military adventures. We know, too, that all is lost, even though our commercial media won't confirm our convictions. Soon (but not soon enough for the hapless soldiers and civilians who will perish in the meantime), the adventure will be stopped altogether by lack of funds.
Stopped in the corruption of science and thought by a few spunky scholars and stopped in the corruption of law by a few principled lawyers (including Libby's judge), the conspirators have credibility now only with their shills in the commercial news media. Suddenly we found that we'd lost two wars. Suddenly we became aware that climate change could doom our grandchildren. Suddenly we discovered that our federal prosecutorial function was politicized. All forces were arrayed to keep us from these truths, but we saw anyway. Only the commercial news-mongers continue to cling to the fiction that, except for Muslim terrorists, things are basically OK.
The racketeers were stopped, too, in the corruption of politics and the legislative branch by the actions of voters, who had to overcome, with vast numbers, the advantages of a cheating, lawless election system, still under the control of the racketeers in 2006. Not that the process of corruption has been reversed. It hasn't, and our elections are still subject to manipulation and cheating, but the public has caught on to the scam, and citizens may be ready to do something about it.
The only place the racketeers haven't been stopped is in the mass media. They rule supreme there. Censorship is everywhere. NPR is not particularly reliable. New York Times is a government mouthpiece. USA Today prints all the news that will fit. Cable and network news render entertainment tonight and every night. They think if they divert us from what's really happening, we won't notice we're being robbed. We'll see.
Notice that the news-mongers don't speculate on whether Libby will sing. If McCoy were prosecuting the case, the writers would expend considerable dialog on the prospect of some testimony from this key conspirator. The TV press (whose scripts are no less polished than the words of the fictional ADA himself) neglects this topic. McCoy's creators would argue that you don't loosen Libby's tongue by leaving him at liberty. Their colleagues at NBC news avoid the topic altogether.
Particularly interesting is that this discussion of pardon in the press may narrow the range of possibilities for Libby's judge. The judge can presume that this talk is not confined to people at the networks. More likely the pardon issue is also a topic of conversation among the leaders themselves, who typically feed the press, so that the press can feed the public, so that the spinners can measure public reaction, so that a decision can be made on whether to void the judge's sentence.
Judges don't like to have their sentences voided. If this judge thinks there's a chance his sentence will be invalidated, but not for a couple of years, he'll see that Libby is locked up forthwith. If he thinks the press is paving the way for a pardon, he won't be very sympathetic to a bail motion. And then it will be up to Libby, when they welcome him to the joint, to decide who his tennis partners will be.
From Current Invective * www.currentinvective.com
Also in this issue: "Congress Under Totalitarianism"
If you like these rants, give the gift of outrage to your progressive correspondents and let me add your email list to mine. Same contact, with "emails" on the subject line.
Just released: Majority Rules a documentary from Michael Burns.
The fact is that Libby, under a sentence of imprisonment, is a potential witness against the very president who is supposedly poised to pardon him. Pardoning such a witness, though within the authority of the president, would also be a crime, and that's a fact. If Bush is not ready to commit obstruction of justice in public, he won't pardon a witness against him.
We can presume that Bush and Cheney are getting counsel to that effect even as we purr our satisfaction at Libby's reversal of fortune. You don't have to be a legal scholar (a commodity that's in critically short supply among the government's current stable of lawyers) to appreciate the possibilities when a racketeer begins serving a prison sentence. Especially when all the other racketeers are drinking martinis at home. Even the least sophisticated Law & Order viewer knows what happens now.
But this is real life, the journalist might argue. In real life, there are no rules. The commercial media seem to take this for granted, even as they feed us fiction that contradicts their argument on every point. If they are trying to keep us ignorant and easy to exploit, they're failing.
The fiction may be that Bush and Cheney are all-powerful and can do as they please without regard to law. The fact is that there are insurmountable impediments to the designs of their rapidly dissolving criminal cabal.
Stopped in Iraq and points east by coalitions of patriots and religious zealots in tacit alliance with a decidedly un-military voting public, they know that all is lost in their various military adventures. We know, too, that all is lost, even though our commercial media won't confirm our convictions. Soon (but not soon enough for the hapless soldiers and civilians who will perish in the meantime), the adventure will be stopped altogether by lack of funds.
Stopped in the corruption of science and thought by a few spunky scholars and stopped in the corruption of law by a few principled lawyers (including Libby's judge), the conspirators have credibility now only with their shills in the commercial news media. Suddenly we found that we'd lost two wars. Suddenly we became aware that climate change could doom our grandchildren. Suddenly we discovered that our federal prosecutorial function was politicized. All forces were arrayed to keep us from these truths, but we saw anyway. Only the commercial news-mongers continue to cling to the fiction that, except for Muslim terrorists, things are basically OK.
The racketeers were stopped, too, in the corruption of politics and the legislative branch by the actions of voters, who had to overcome, with vast numbers, the advantages of a cheating, lawless election system, still under the control of the racketeers in 2006. Not that the process of corruption has been reversed. It hasn't, and our elections are still subject to manipulation and cheating, but the public has caught on to the scam, and citizens may be ready to do something about it.
The only place the racketeers haven't been stopped is in the mass media. They rule supreme there. Censorship is everywhere. NPR is not particularly reliable. New York Times is a government mouthpiece. USA Today prints all the news that will fit. Cable and network news render entertainment tonight and every night. They think if they divert us from what's really happening, we won't notice we're being robbed. We'll see.
Notice that the news-mongers don't speculate on whether Libby will sing. If McCoy were prosecuting the case, the writers would expend considerable dialog on the prospect of some testimony from this key conspirator. The TV press (whose scripts are no less polished than the words of the fictional ADA himself) neglects this topic. McCoy's creators would argue that you don't loosen Libby's tongue by leaving him at liberty. Their colleagues at NBC news avoid the topic altogether.
Particularly interesting is that this discussion of pardon in the press may narrow the range of possibilities for Libby's judge. The judge can presume that this talk is not confined to people at the networks. More likely the pardon issue is also a topic of conversation among the leaders themselves, who typically feed the press, so that the press can feed the public, so that the spinners can measure public reaction, so that a decision can be made on whether to void the judge's sentence.
Judges don't like to have their sentences voided. If this judge thinks there's a chance his sentence will be invalidated, but not for a couple of years, he'll see that Libby is locked up forthwith. If he thinks the press is paving the way for a pardon, he won't be very sympathetic to a bail motion. And then it will be up to Libby, when they welcome him to the joint, to decide who his tennis partners will be.
From Current Invective * www.currentinvective.com
Also in this issue: "Congress Under Totalitarianism"
If you like these rants, give the gift of outrage to your progressive correspondents and let me add your email list to mine. Same contact, with "emails" on the subject line.
Just released: Majority Rules a documentary from Michael Burns.