What ever happened with that “sealed Vs sealed”
matter that was mentioned as an aside to the
live blogging of the trial?

It’s still sealed. I check all the time.

Jep@95
I always thought that the fact that they tried to smear Joe Wilson with the contention that his trip didn’t matter, wasn’t real, because his “wife” sent him revealed a certain old fashioned worldview. I thought that it particularly pointed to a much older brain for it’s genesis, one that doesn’t get that in todays’ world women are valued and respected for the work they do, and that the men married to them wouldn’t necessarily feel emasculated by being seen to do something their wife asked them to do. I think Cheney must have been surprised that everyone focused on the fact that “the wifes” important work was focused on, and the damage that had been done to her and to the Nat’l Security, rather than the damage to his critics’ masculinity.

Interesting. Now we’re in Maureen Dowd territory, but I’m fine with that. Wonder how hard it frosts him to have a black woman as Sec . of State? Deep freeze I’m guessing.

Don’t you think that if Fitzgerald had wanted Cheney, he would have done so by now? He had all this Cheney evidence back when he indicted Libby. It’s not going to happen.

As has been brought up in discussions before: Libby provides Cheney’s best shield. If he can first be convicted of being a liar and obstructor of justice he cannot provide Cheney that shield. Taking Libby out is (quite likely) a necessary step in getting to the real person responsible. I have the feeling (after this case is put to bed) that Fitz’s next step will be to bring Cheney back to a GJ for under-oath testimony.

I don’t think, from the way he used his closing, that he is satisfied that justice has been done at one person being convicted for obstruction. The obstruction must be removed for justice to proceed.

Please remember that Jeralyn left the courthouse during the middle of Fitz’s summation, to catch an airplane. Perhaps she did not see that Wells had an emotional breakdown and kept his head in his hands, without looking up, for Fitz’s entire summation. This goes way beyond Wells being passionate in defense of his client. Wells was disengaged and did not participate apparently even in a sidebar conference. This display, along with his 20 minute SELF-defense at the beginning of the defense summation shows to me that he was clearly concerned that he, Wells, has failed in his lawyering, rather than being driven to tears out of genuine love for his client. I suspect that the jurors will also view his theatrics that way.

I left at 4:30. I heard both Wells and the first half hour of Fitz. I thought Fitz talked too fast — faster than the jury could listen. I thought Wells was genuine in his outrage and his frustration and in his tear. But then, I’m a criminal defense lawyer and I know how personally we take trials and how we bond with our clients.

We’re a whole different breed than prosecutors and even most ex-prosectutors who later become defense lawyers.

I agree Wells was off his game, I said his argument was unfocused and scattered. I criticized him for reading off his powerpoint slides.

But I’d bet the emotion in it reached at least one juror. Whether it’s enough to overcome the Government’s logic is something we’ll all find out soon.

Don’t you think that if Fitzgerald had wanted Cheney, he would have done so by now? He had all this Cheney evidence back when he indicted Libby. It’s not going to happen.

A reasonable person might think that by stripping Cheney of his best alibi (Libby) Fitz has actually opened Chrnry to prosecution. Liars aren’t considered good witnesses.

*xyz @
49

I have to say that I am disappointed with this type of analysis from Jeralyn:

“Ted Wells’ closing was unfocused and meandering. But, he was emotional. The jury had to sense, as I did, that he believed with his whole heart in his argument. I think that will go a long way with the jury. William Jeffress more than adequately established the memory problems of all the witnesses in the case. The bottom line is, who’s to say Libby’s faulty recollections were a lie while the faulty recollections of the other witnesses were innocent mistakes?”

1. Of course the defense attorney appears to believe in his own argument. That’s why they pay him the big bucks. And others have contradicted Jeralyn somewhat, pointing out that the crying seemed fake and Wells’ generally came across as over-the-top. I wasn’t there, so I can’t say. Also, I’ve heard that Fitzgerald was pretty emotional too – doesn’t that count for anything? It would, if this was an acting contest, which it is not.

2. “who’s to say Libby’s faulty recollections were a lie while the faulty recollections of the other witnesses were innocent mistakes?”
Well, the jury is to say. That’s their job. They can look at motive. And they can look at the odds. It is Libby’s word against over a half-dozen witnesses.

Jeralyn is simply saying that a not-unreasonable case can be made for faulty memory in here, and it’s likely that one out of 12 jurors will see things that way. On the other hand, people tend to go with their feelings and to use logic to justify what they feel rather than vice versa. It’s hard to have much sympathy for the slimy conspiracy in which the defendant was involved (but is not now charged), his lawyer theatrics not withstanding.

That said, I would not bet against Jeralyn in this case.

Remember that the memory defense has to rely on all EIGHT of the prosecution witnesses being wrong in their recollections of events. If any single one is given credit with their memories for any single count then it falls apart.

It would have helped Libby to bring forward one of those individuals he “told” that “all the reporters knew” in the days after the Russert conversation to demoinstrate that he, in fact, attributed that to Russert.

Remember that Libby asserted to the GJ that he had told Rove and Cheney about Russert – neither were brought forward to establish this. But he claims not only to recall the Russert converstaion but also these statements to others that Russert told him.

That’s the theory. At the end of the day, however, jury trials are all about storytelling. Two narratives of events are presented, and the jury decides which is more plausible. Juries are composed of people, and people don’t like uncertainty. The defense can spend all day poking holes in the prosecution’s narrative, but if they can’t sketch some alternate version of events, it’s unlikely to get them very far.

That’s what makes the defense summation so interesting. They hammered away on the theme of the presumption of innocence. They went into detail showcasing the problems with witnesses, including Russert, Miller, and Fleischer. But what they didn’t do was present a compelling alternate narrative. Rather, they presented several.

(1) The first presumes that the maximum number of people are lying. Libby has a couple of conversations early on about Plame’s identity, and promptly forgets them. His later conversations simply didn’t happen the way the prosecution alleges. Fleischer lied to collect immunity. Judy has no actual memory, just some cryptic notes. Then Scooter talks to Russert, and learns about Plame anew. Russert is lying about (or falsely reconstructing) his account either because his memory is spotty or because he has it in for Scooter.

(2) Our second theory is more generous to the prosecution witnesses. Perhaps, Wells suggests, many of them are telling the truth, or at least the truth as they remember it. But memory is fallible. Are any of their individual accounts so compelling that we can be sure that events unfolded as they describe, and not as Libby remembers? In this theory, the only witness who needs to be thoroughly discredited is Russert.

(3) Our third theory (and really, it’s the most breathtakingly audacious) is that every prosecution witness is telling the truth – even Russert! Wells want us to believe that Scooter may have misremembered each individual conversation. The prosecution, he notes, has no direct evidence of deliberate lying – no conversation in which Libby announces his intention to obstruct justice into a recording device, and no memorandum detailing his strategy of prevarication. Wells would like the jury to disregard the mountain of indirect and circumstantial evidence, arguing that none of it proves that this was more than a string of innocent errors.

And that’s why the jury will convict (on most, if not all, of the charges). In their effort to force the jury to confront the presumption of innocence, Wells and Jeffress have undermined their own account of the case. When they conceded, even rhetorically, the possibility that every prosecution witness testified accurately and truthfully, they undid two weeks of careful attacks against the credibility of those witnesses. I think we have to regard it as a Hail Mary – that the defense team concluded that they had no alternate theory of the case that the jury might buy, and that its last, best bet was convincing at least one juror that the situation is to muddled to overcome the presumption of innocence. But it won’t work – after spending two weeks on a case, these jurors are going to have their theories of what actually happened. “I just can’t conclusively tell” isn’t likely to wash. And Scooter is going to go to jail.

It shouldn’t be allowed in ANY trial. Pure mumbo jumbo.