Libby trial strategy and "intrigue"

NY Times:

The assertion by lawyers for I. Lewis Libby Jr. that White House aides had sacrificed him to protect Karl Rove, the senior political adviser, appears to be based primarily on Mr. Libby’s own sense that the administration had failed to defend him adequately as the C.I.A. leak case unfolded.

But there is little known evidence to buttress the suggestion by Mr. Libby’s defense team in his obstruction and perjury trial that unnamed White House officials were deliberately setting Mr. Libby up to be a scapegoat.

Mr. Libby’s lawyers said in an opening statement on Tuesday that he felt so abandoned by the White House as the leak investigation intensified in the fall of 2003 that he appealed to his boss, Vice President Dick Cheney. Mr. Cheney subsequently wrote, according to the defense’s opening statement: “Not going to protect one staffer + sacrifice the guy who was asked to stick his neck in the meatgrinder because of the incompetence of others.”

The defense team’s statements set off a debate across Washington about whether they were part of a legal gambit to divert attention from the underlying charge that Mr. Libby lied to F.B.I. agents and the grand jury or whether his lawyers had evidence of an effort within the White House to focus the blame on Mr. Libby.

Even if the assertion is shown to be true, it is not clear how it would help refute the charges that Mr. Libby had perjured himself.

...

No evidence to support the theory has made its way into the public record. What is more likely happening is a defense ploy to play on the prejudices of jurors who are Democrats. Democrats, and particularly the kook fringe Dems in the blogs have been demonstrating their paranoia about Rove and the White House team since the story first broke and this defense theory of the case plays into their prejudices in a way that makes them think of their client as a victim. It is not clear to me why the Times writer did not comprehend the "victim" theory of the case play. It is an appeal to the emotions more than the intellect of the jurors.

I still think Joe Wilson is the bad guy in this case and I hope Libby's defense team gets an opportunity to demonstrate that.