I don't have to. I believe the OLC has already done that for me.

Assuming you mean the Office of Legal Counsel and not the Ohio Library Council...

In the words of the great John McEnroe "You CANNOT be serious!"

The OLC is an arm of the Department of Justice, which is part of the executive. Are you really saying the OLC is the ultimate arbiter of whether the president has committed a crime? The executive is the check and balance on...the executive?

Lemme ask you: if Clinton's OLC had issued a memorandum declaring that Clinton did nothing illegal in the Paula Jones (re: Lewinski) case, do actually believe that would have precluded impeachment proceedings? Or Clinton's subsequent disbarment by a federal judge for making false statements in that case?

Do you really seriously believe that? Because, dude, sometimes you post things here that make it sound like you have a functioning cerebrum, but this one is just...off the charts.

Good piece, as usual, couldn't agree more.

I have one question about a choice of word, though. You wrote:

not because of his actual sin of hypocrisy as a former persecutor of prostitution rings

Are you sure you don't mean Spitzer, as NYS attorney general, was a prosecutor, and not a persecutor of prostitution?

I believe that to persecute is generally understood to oppressively harass a group based not so much on their activity or behavior but their identity, i.e., religion, race, ethnicity.

But I am asking, because I'm not familiar with Spitzer's actions as A.G. towards prostitution rings (and it's a little hard to Google at this point!). I have no doubt that if he prosecuted them, he did it quite zealously. But did he persecute them?

Not to take issue with your point - what hypocrisy. I wish prostitution was legal and well-regulated in my jurisdiction. I've never prosecuted a prostitution case and God willing, never will.

"Victimless crime" is a technical term in criminal justice. That has a very specific meaning: no civilian complainant witness is needed to swear out a criminal complaint against the defendant.

It doesn't mean that there aren't people who are harmed by the act. It's like DWI, or sale or possession of illegal drugs - both the seller and buyer can be charged, the same way the hooker and the john are chargeable.

Silda Spitzer and their kids simply are simply not "victims" of Spitzer's "crime" in any legally recognizable respect.

It seems to me that any actionable intelligence they may have had tucked in their noggins would have been pretty stale within a few days or weeks after they were dissappeared and thus, even if they knew something when grabbed, that something was probably of negligible value by the time they gave it up (if they did).

You raise an excellent point. At my office (district attorney) we sometimes sign up confidential informants (as does NYPD).

But if the proffer process drags on more than a week or so, the deal is dead - the reasoning being precisely as you surmise: the intelligence being offered is presumed stale.

Shouldn't they include Cheney?

The Daily Dish and Unclaimed Territory are far and away my favorite political blogs, my only two Required Daily Reading.

The dialogue between you and Andrew today - as always - is, in tone and content, classy, respectful, thoughtful and exceedingly well-reasoned.

Even though you appear to be disagreeing today, I agree with practically everything you both say, because I find nothing irreconciliable between you.

I can't commend the two of you strongly enough for your work. Thank you.

* When Bush has been pushed to confront a legal difficulty, he's done the right thing.

I actually laughed out loud when I read that one.

That option has the advantage of insulating Obama from responsibility for overseeing any investigations and ensuring that it is treated purely as a criminal, not a political, matter.

It may be wishful thinking to believe that Obama - who will bear sole responsibility for the very existence of the investigation - will be politically insulated merely because he appointed an independent, Republican prosecutor. There will be considerable outrage, especially if top Bush admin officials do prison time, and Obama would have to weather substantial blowback. Let's not kid ourselves about this, Glenn.

Also - Fitzgerald appropriately treated the Plame as a purely criminal, not political matter, but that wasn't how it always perceived.

As a practical reality, the largest barrier to any route to prosecution -- including this one -- is that the Congressional Democratic leadership was complicit, to varying degrees, in the illegal programs.

I think the largest barrier is Barack's lack of political capital. That's assuming he has the inclination to prosecute the preceding admin, and nothing that he's shown me thus far suggests that he does.

But of all the various ways investigations could be pursued, the appointment of a fearless prosecutor with a proven record of independence (and who is a Republican to boot) would be the most effective.

I agree with that much. But Obama strikes me as an astute student of the Clinton years, and is well aware of the political price GOP leadership paid for investigating Clinton via "independent prosecutor". (Yes, I'm aware of the differences, and I'm not sure Obama cares.)

This is not to say I don't favor investigations per se (I do), or even that I hope Obama doesn't pursue it for fear that backlash will cause him to be defeated after one term. I don't have an opinion yet on what he should do, only on what I think is Obama's evaluation of the political setting.