President Obama Pardons 'Courage' The Turkey
By CSPANJunkie Wednesday Nov 25, 2009 3:00pm
November 25, 2009 CNN
November 25, 2009 CNN
July 23, 2009 MSNBC
SCHULTZ: Welcome back to THE ED SHOW.
Dick Cheney pleaded, cajoled, and even pestered President Bush to pardon convicted former chief of staff Scooter Libby. Cheney argued, "We don`t want to leave anyone on the battlefield."
The president wouldn`t do it. "TIME" magazine has an explosive front- cover story showing just how much Dick Cheney put on the line for Scooter.
It was "... a crusade for Cheney, who seemed prepared to push his nine-year-old relationship with Bush to the breaking point and perhaps past it."
Joining me now is Michael Weisskopf. He co-wrote the story and is a senior correspondent for "TIME" magazine.
Mr. Weisskopf, good to have you with us tonight.
As a journalist, this had to be kind of a fun story to do, wasn`t it?
MICHAEL WEISSKOPF, SR. CORRESPONDENT, "TIME": Dealing with the Bush administration has always been like chipping rock, Ed. And so it was a hard story to get, and -- but it was gratifying.
SCHULTZ: What was the most startling piece of information that you came across that you think is going to be a real interesting point for the American people who are fascinated with exactly how that administration was run, the nuts and bolts of it?
In the waning days of the Bush administration, Vice President Dick Cheney launched a last-ditch campaign to persuade his boss to pardon Lewis (Scooter) Libby - and was furious when President George W. Bush wouldn't budge.
Sources close to Cheney told the Daily News the former vice president repeatedly pressed Bush to pardon Libby, arguing his ex-chief of staff and longtime alter ego deserved a full exoneration - even though Bush had already kept Libby out of jail by commuting his 30-month prison sentence.
"He tried to make it happen right up until the very end," one Cheney associate said.
The craziest thing of all is that, despite a conviction by his peers on four felony counts, Dick Cheney still doesn't believe he did anything wrong. Stunning indeed. Perrspectives has more...
Update: And whenever you talk about these guys, another story about the DOJ firings comes out.
The Big Stone Wall: Nine Bush-Era Officials Refused To Cooperate With DOJ Probes
From The Onion:
The pardon assures that Libby will not face any more repercussions for his role in the Valerie Plame scandal or be eaten on Thanksgiving.
I was looking at that awful video of Sarah Palin babbling cluelessly while that turkey geeker lops off bloody heads in the background, and I realized... I've seen that guy before. So I looked through my photo archives and sure enough, he's ruined several other Republican photo-ops:


From Countdown Nov. 20, 2008, David Shuster brings us Sarah Palin's extremely creepy turkey pardoning and post-pardoning interview from Wasilla, Alaska. The whole thing plays like something out of the Twilight Zone or the latter stages of Fargo. As a couple of my fellow C&L'ers pointed out after watching this, if Sarah Palin is a "friend to all creatures great and small" someone needs to let the wolves and polar bears know about that change of heart...lol. Images of Palin and "creatures" are more likely to be those of high powered rifles and helicopters than any sort of compassion in my book. And she does seem to use those family members selectively for what's politically convenient at the time doesn't she?