Up Next for Libby: How to Get Pardoned

The pressing question for Scooter Libby, now that he’s been convicted on four of the five counts against him and faces 25 years in prison, is how to get off the hook. Who will pardon him and when? The answer to the first question is Bush, probably, but would W. really do it in the middle of the 2008 presidential campaign? That would surely sink the already rickety Republican ship.

Libby is to be sentenced in June and cynical professionals in Washington don’t expect him to do any jail time. They know he’ll get off one way or another. Key pardons of the past:

— James Ridgeway