Soft on Crime?
The Times editorializes on the President's commutation of Libby's jail sentence:
Mr. Libby was convicted of lying to federal agents investigating the leak of the name of a covert C.I.A. operative, Valerie Wilson. Mrs. Wilson's husband, Joseph Wilson, was asked to investigate a central claim in Mr. Bush's drive to war with Iraq whether Iraq tried to purchase uranium from Africa. Mr. Wilson concluded that Iraq had not done that and had the temerity to share those conclusions with the American public.
It seems clear from the record that Vice President *** Cheney organized a campaign to discredit Mr. Wilson. And Mr. Libby, who was Mr. Cheney's chief of staff, was willing to lie to protect his boss.
Read the whole thing...mostly to verify that not once does the Times mention Richard Armitage, the person who actually leaked Plame's identity. One assumes this is because that would make the theory that Libby was lying to protect Cheney look rather silly. Given that it wasn't Cheney's people who leaked Plame's identity, the whole whackjob conspiracy theory that her identity was leaked to "punish" Joe Wilson sort of falls apart.