Robert Wexler is a great Congressman - and one of my heroes from his outstanding efforts to count every vote in Palm Beach in 2000 - but this is a terrible move:

Congressman wants to censure Bush over Libby commutation 

Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Fla., plans to introduce a resolution that would censure President Bush over his decision to commute the prison sentence faced by former vice presidential aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the congressman said Thursday.

"This presidential intervention is an unconscionable abuse of authority by George W. Bush, and Congress must step forward and express the disgust that Americans rightfully feel toward this contemptible decision," Wexler said in a statement released by his congressional office.

Wexler, who sits on the House Judiciary Committee, plans to introduce his resolution when Congress returns from its Independence Day recess next week.

The five-term congressman said Bush's decision was "nothing short of [a] political quid pro quo, and Congress must go on record in strong opposition."

The resolution is likely to be introduced first for consideration by the Judiciary Committee before it would be considered by the full House, a Palm Beach Post blog reported Thursday morning. The non-binding resolution simply expresses the sense of the House that Bush acted improperly and does not carry any other penalty.

In other words, this is barely a slap on the wrist. It's more like the sound of one hand clapping.

If it was a quid pro quo, then it wasn't just improper - it was corrupt. And it was part of a 4-year-old Oval Office conspiracy - in which Bush and Cheney personally participated - to treasonously "out" a covert CIA operative to punish her husband for exposing a pre-war lie, and then abuse Presidential power to evade punishment. And of course that was just part of a 6-year-old Oval Office conspiracy to invade Iraq in defiance of U.S. law and the U.N. Charter, using lies to defraud Congress into consent.

It's long past time for Congress to confront these Oval Office conspiracies - both the small one involving Valerie Plame and the much larger one involving the whole Iraq invasion.

Call Robert Wexler's office at (202) 225-3001 with a simple message: Obstruction of Justice needs far more than a slap on the wrist - we need hearings, subpoenas, and Articles of Impeachment.

Update Thursday 4 p.m.: I spoke with Rep. Wexler's chief of staff who was very sympathetic and promised to discuss my objections with Rep. Wexler.

Update 2: Marcy Wheeler nails it:

Punishing Bush’s commutation of Libby’s sentence with censure would be like punishing Libby’s obstruction of justice with just 400 hours of community service. It would simply reinforce the notion that Bush’s Administration is above the law. It would be a punishment wholly unfit for the crime that has been committed: Obstruction of Justice. Bush’s obstruction of justice piled up on top of Libby’s obstruction of justice, all to prevent the American justice system from holding this Administration accountable for its actions.

I love Swopa. But I am astounded that he misses this fact: in a post arguing against getting lost in the minutiae, he presents the issue as one of Bush “coddling criminals,” and not as one of Bush using his pardon power to hide his own (and Cheney’s) involvement in a crime. It was not Libby who came up with the idea of leaking Valerie Wilson’s identity to Judy Miller, it was Cheney, and he did so with the authorization of Bush...

Given that Wexler has such a clear understanding of the issue here, it is unfortunate that he stops at censure. Sure, it’d make for bad press for the President. On Tuesday. But by Thursday, Bush could rest easy that he had ended all scrutiny into his actions, once and for all. Censure would amount to a closing off of inquiry; it would provide a way for the Republicans to defeat any effort to get the grand jury materials that Fitzgerald and his team spent so much effort putting together. It would end this thing, at precisely the moment when the country is finally beginning to understand the magnitude of what Bush and Cheney did.

Update 3: Kagro X cites the overturn of the ACLU lawsuit over illegal wiretapping:

The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit has ordered the ACLU's lawsuit seeking to end the NSA's warrantless domestic surveillance program remanded to Judge Anna Diggs Taylor -- who had ruled the program unconstitutional in August of last year -- with instructions to dismiss the case for lack of standing.

Is the program still unconstitutional? Yes, but only in theory. Because the 6th Circuit says the ACLU didn't prove it was directly injured by the violation, and therefore has no standing to bring the suit in the first place.

Sorry, everyone!

Hope some nice censure fixes your Constitution for you!

And remember, if the subpoenas don't work, there's always the courts, right?

Right?