Just a quick post to check in and comment on an Elizabeth de la Vega article several of you have mentioned. I was in SF working with the book editor this weekend. We finalized the direction for the book (oooh, it’s going to be good!) Then today I get back on a plane (to Bangkok this time) and when I come back we really hit crash and burn on the book.

We actually talked a lot about pardon this weekend–Jane, Swopa, Jen Nix, and Safir (the editor) and I. And I gotta say, I was in a distinct minority, in simply not knowing whether Bush will pardon Libby before the trial or in January 2009. I understand the need, for the Administration, at least as well as anyone. But I am not convinced that, as de la Vega states,

Because Scooter Libby’s trial strategy is not to have a trial.

At least at the beginning, back when they set up a $5 million fund and hired Ted Wells, they fully intended to have a trial. You hire Ted Wells to go to trial, not to await a presidential pardon. There’s a part of me, too, that thinks the reason Libby’s lies were so bad were to have a nice tidy trial–they were designed to minimize the importance of his machinations with their absurdity. After all, if you were really trying to protect Dick, wouldn’t you have developed some better lies? The crappy quality of Libby’s lies has already minimized the gravity of the obstruction charge in this case.