Libby Sentenced To Prison

Former White House aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison Tuesday for lying and obstructing the CIA leak investigation.

A decision has not been made as to whether he will be allowed to remain free pending his appeal. Hopefully he will be required to report to prison immediately. As it was recently reported again, Valerie Plame was indeed a covert agent at the time her cover was blown by this administration. A quick background on this story was that her husband was sent to Africa to examine reports that Saddam Hussein had tried to buy yellow cake uranium from Niger and discovered the allegations were false. He further reported these findings to the CIA yet President Bush in his State of the Union Address in 2003 went on to state this as fact. This was the first reason for the war in Iraq.

What should not be lost in this discussion is the fate of those who worked with Ms. Plame around the world. Her outing certainly damaged national security and put those that she worked with at great risk. How can an administration that claims to call homeland security its number one priority willfully disclose the identification of a covert CIA agent? It should also not be forgotten that her undercover work for the CIA was involved with stopping the spread of weapons of mass destruction. This is a criminal administration that will do anything, including putting a covert agents life on the line, to further its political agenda.

So how soon will the pardon come? If he is sentenced to start serving his time immediately the call for a pardon will be intense among Libby's supporters. He broke the law and damaged national security 2.5 years sounds like a light sentence to me.