Some observers perceive a double standard in how the Republican Party of today trumpets the righteousness of President Bush’s commutation of Scooter Libby’s sentence compared to their prior zeal for impeaching Bill Clinton when he was President. Obviously they are missing the point
Bill Clinton was a hard working life long public servant who had never been in trouble with the law before the Republicans in Congress impeached him for lying under oath. There was no underlying crime involved, just a lapse in personal morality for which no one was ever charged. But Clinton lying under oath then, in the eyes of the Republican Party, was reason enough to bring down a government and nullify a national election in which the voters of our nation chose Bill Clinton as their President. "Sorry voters", said the Republicans, "but no one is above the law; Bill Clinton lied under oath so he can’t remain your President. We must spend hundreds of millions of dollars and months of Congress’s time seeking Clinton’s removal from office, because lying under oath must have consequences. This isn’t about a blow job; it’s about the rule of law."
Now, with Scooter Libby spared from spending a single night sleeping in a jail cell, it’s important to realize that this isn’t about intentionally taking America into war under false pretences. Nor is it about illegally outing a C.I.A. agent out of partisan political vindictiveness, because no charges on that were ever brought. No, the commutation of Libby’s prison sentence is about mercy for a hard working life long public servant who had never been in trouble with the law before, and it is about the pursuit of justice, because making Scooter Libby spend as many hours in jail for his conviction on obstruction of justice, as Paris Hilton did for evading court imposed restrictions on her driving, would have been a miscarriage of justice, verging on cruel and unusual punishment for a man who was only following the wishes of his President when he committed his crime.
Fortunately for Scooter Libby, he served an activist President who felt free to disregard legally established sentencing guidelines, and empowered to overrule a strict interpretationist judge and jury to substitute instead his own enlightened understanding of justice for the rote rule of law that our judicial system slavishly attempts to impose equally on all Americans.
Fortunately for Scooter Libby, George W. Bush is in the mainstream of today’s Republican Party, which rejects a firm moral compass with rigid definitions of right and wrong. Instead the modern G.O.P. enthusiastically embraces relativism, which is what allowed them to rise up against our Commander in Chief during America’s war in Kosovo, while Bill Clinton was President, without forfeiting their freedom to condemn dissent against our current Commander in Chief, George W. Bush, as unpatriotic and verging on treasonous during this time of war inside Iraq.
Rejecting the straight jacket of strict constructionism, the free thinkers of today’s Republican Party understand that our Constitution is a living Constitution. They know that the founders of this great nation could not possibly have anticipated the circumstances that prevail in the 21st century back when they drafted the Bill of Rights, with it’s simplistic prohibitions against government surveillance on citizens without due process and court supervision. Though the founding fathers may have been familiar with the Barbary pirates, modern Republicans assert, how could they ever have foreseen the rise of Al Qaeda?
The relativistic Republican Party of today understands that consistency of values in the pursuit of power is not a virtue, and blatant hypocrisy in the defense of a goal is not a vice. When entrenched Democratic politicians ruled Congress, term limits were heralded as an essential remedy to restore good government. Once Republicans seized Congress term limits were a hindrance to the long term exercise of power by a Party which believes, in its heart of hearts, that unlike Democrats they actually know what is best for our nation. This modern G.O.P. can effortlessly draw distinctions between highly irresponsible and dangerous Democratic budget deficits, and enlightened beneficial Republican budget deficits. They appreciate the value of an appropriate double standard.
Examples of flexible thinking in today’s Republican Party are almost too numerous to mention. Freed from the tether of a firm ideological anchor, Republicans today are able to pursue common sense wherever their professed faith takes them. States Rights provides a valuable check on excessive Federal Power, but concentrated Federal Power is the most effective weapon available to suppress local immorality, such as State sanctioned gay and lesbian marriages. The relativistic Republican Party of today believes the best way to prevent abuses of power is to see to it that power is always concentrated in the right hands, not in ideologically pre-determined "right places", using whatever legal means necessary to do so. For Law, today’s relativistic Republican Party also understands, exists to restrain the bad, not to hobble the good. Thus it makes no more sense to apply the rule of law equally to all citizens than it would to grant police and suspected criminals similar legal rights.
And clearly George Bush, as the ideal representative of the modern Republican Party, is a President who sees that it makes no more sense to send a good public servant like Scooter Libby to jail, because of the blind mechanical workings of some impartial legal system, than it would to release a bad potential terrorist from Gitmo, because of the blind mechanical workings of some impartial legal system. Blind Justice? Not good enough. Blind justice is incapable of seeing what the G.O.P. senses must be done.