1 Boring Old Man

The Crazy Man Above the Garage
By: emptywheel
August 18, 2009

… Gellman provides the following weird two paragraphs, which provide the great drama of the story.

^{The depths of Cheney’s distress about another close friend, his former chief of staff and alter ego I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, have only recently become clear. Bush refused a pardon after Libby’s felony convictions in 2007 for perjury and obstruction of an investigation of the leak of a clandestine CIA officer’s identity. Cheney tried mightily to prevent Libby’s fall, scrawling in a note made public at trial that he would not let anyone “sacrifice the guy that was asked to stick his neck in the meat grinder.” Cheney never explained the allusion, but grand jury transcripts — and independent counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald — suggested that Libby’s false statements aimed above all to protect the vice president.}
^{Last month, an account in Time magazine, based on close access to Bush’s personal lawyer and White House counsel, described Cheney’s desperate end-of-term efforts to change Bush’s mind about a pardon. Cheney, who has spent a professional lifetime ignoring unflattering stories, issued a quietly furious reply. In the most explicit terms, he accused Bush of abandoning “an innocent man” who had served the president with honor and then become the “victim of a severe miscarriage of justice.” Cheney now says privately that his memoir, expected to be published in spring 2011, will describe their heated arguments in full.}

 This bit–which is what stuck in my craw–deserves some really close unpacking.

^{Cheney tried mightily to prevent Libby’s fall, scrawling in a note made public at trial that he would not let anyone “sacrifice the guy that was asked to stick his neck in the meat grinder.” Cheney never explained the allusion, but grand jury transcripts — and independent counsel Patrick J. Fitzgerald — suggested that Libby’s false statements aimed above all to protect the vice president.} 

Now, Gellman is ostensibly talking about Cheney’s efforts to get Bush to pardon Libby, actions that started in 2007 (and which, at the earliest, he might have first contemplated in 2005, when Judy Miller testified to the grand jury). But as his proof that “Cheney tried mightily to prevent Libby’s fall,” Gellman raises the meat-grinder note. And that note–written around October 4, 2003–had absolutely nothing to do with preventing Libby’s “fall” referred to here–his conviction for perjury and obstruction of justice. Hell, it was written before the perjury (and false statements) occurred!! Rather, the reference to “not going to protect one staffer and sacrifice the guy the Pres that was asked to stick his neck in the meat grinder,” had to do with protecting Libby from speculation in the press about his involvement in leaking Plame’s identity. Now, that is a sort of attempt to prevent Libby’s fall, but it’s not the one Gellman describes in this context. 

In the most explicit terms, he accused Bush of abandoning “an innocent man” who had served the president with honor and then become the “victim of a severe miscarriage of justice.” Cheney now says privately that his memoir, expected to be published in spring 2011, will describe their heated arguments in full.