The quote of the day from the Philadelphia Inquirer’s Dick Polman, writing on his blog:
So Bush had to show loyalty to the few (shaky) supporters he still has. And, of course, he had to show continued loyalty to his constituency of one, Libby’s ex-boss, the sole occupant of the mythical fourth branch of government. The Associated Press, reporting last night on the decision to commute Libby’s sentence, deadpanned: “White House officials…would not say what advice Cheney had given to the president.â€
Cheney’s public standing is equally abysmal, but Bush is long past caring what most Americans think. His support among swing-voting independents is now at 18 percent, and there’s nothing he can do to win them back. So, in a sense, it’s probably liberating to be a maligned lame duck. Perhaps the best way to assess his Libby decision is to invoke the lyrics of Kris Kristofferson:
“Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.â€
Read his entire piece.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.