From Scooter Libby’s lawyers’ response [PDF] to federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald’s sentencing memo, in which he reasserted that Valerie Plame Wilson was indeed an undercover CIA agent:
First, the government claims that its “investigators were given access to
Ms. Wilson’s classified file.”….This is tantamount to
asking the Court and Mr. Libby to take the government’s word on Ms. Wilson’s status,
based on secret evidence, without affording Mr. Libby an opportunity to rebut it. Such a
request offends traditional notions of fairness and due process.
Where to begin on this one? The irony of a former aide to Dick “You Can’t Handle the Truth” Cheney questioning the government’s word—its classified word, no less? (However, the government in this case is the CIA, which neocons know is a bunch of untrustworthy wusses.) But what really stands out here is that the legal protection that Libby is claiming, the right to see and confront secret evidence, is the very right the White House—the Office of the Vice President in particular—has spent five years denying to Guantanamo detainees. But wait—I thought we can’t take the intelligence community at its word, especially when a man’s freedom is on the line. Makes your head hurt, don’t it? (Extra bonus points: Libby’s law firm also represents Gitmo detainees.)
