The defense in US vs. Libby case has stated it will not call either Scooter or his boss big Dick Cheney to the stand.

Now, we all forget things, but most of us aren’t advisors to high-ranking government officials. And most of us, if we’d forgotten a task at work, wouldn’t get off lightly by just laughing and shrugging “oh, that silly memory of mine”. These days, with all the electronic gee-gaws available, in addition to that old standby the pen or pencil, it doesn’t seem to me that “oops, I forgot” is a valid defense in the workplace. My memory is getting as creaky as my joints these days, so I write everything down and keep meticulous records. You would think at as high a level job Libby had he might have jotted down a reminder or two.

(Side note: I find it hard to believe that he wouldn't remember important information from morning to afternoon - unless there is an underlying physiological cause.)

Lawyers claim that Libby had other, more important things on his mind, like the war in Iraq, which is funny in a kind of twisted way, since outing Valerie Plame was an effort to discredit her husband’s opinions that the intelligence leading up to the war was being manipulated (and which has now been proven by the Pentagon investigation).


Did Scooter Libby lie or just “forget” what he’d said? If he "forgot", does that excuse him?

Does the Pentagon report undermine Libby’s defense? Will the report play a role in the US v Libby trial?

This case is a mess. Fitzpatrick handled this poorly from the outset looking to go after a bigger fish even when he KNEW he had Armitage. This perjury indictment is CYA. The fact that the Judge has disallowed the jury to know whether Plame was actually undercover at the time she was outed is making this look like a bit of a railroading especially in light of the fact that Fitzpatrick made public statements about the CIA and the safety of operatives BEFORE this case was brought forward.

Now the above only applies if you are willing to believe what we're being told. If you think there's a darker more sinister cabal move going on then none of the above matters.

As for the questions:

Libby has probably forgotten some facts and may have lied about others. The Pentagon report probably won't play much of a role.

Making an incorrect statement because the declarant "forgot" a truthful aspect of the statement is a legal defense because scienter (knowledge/awareness) is a requirement of proof of the prosecution. So, if the jury believes that a Libby statement was factually incorrect, it must also believe that he made the statement under oath, and knew it was incorrect when he made it in order for a "guilty" finding.

Now, besides or regardless of all the legalities -
Patrick Fitzgerald was entrusted with the job of ascertaining who first "leaked" the name of Valerie Plame to the media, and if any such act violated any laws - nothing more. We now know that the first leak was performed by a Bush opponent, Richard Armitage, and that Fitzgerald was informed of that fact on the first day he took the job. It has also been shown by events and abject refusal to even address the question by Fitz, that such act violated no law, which Fitz must have known on the second day of his job. His job should have over at that point, and all he has done since then is to conjure up an unrelated "offense," such as the administrative one charged against Libby which was superfluous in order to justify his existence and lord knows what other sinister purpose. It is all a pig-in-a-poke instigated when the Wilsons entered the political ring and lied like dogs to the press about what the preening Joe IV learned when he was in Africa (as set out chapter & verse by the 9/11 Commission) while auditioning for a job (he was without at the time) with the next Democrat President-in-waiting (he thought, wrongly) in public. Wilson played dirty by alleging facts which he knew could not be publicly refuted for security reasons then, and he got a dirty response as a result. It's all in the game the Wilsons picked to play in public. No harm; no foul.

Does the Pentagon report undermine Libby’s defense? Will the report play a role in the US v Libby trial?

I do not know the "Pentagon Report" that well. Does it cover the oral report of Joe Wilson IV to the CIA, when he reported that a former high-ranking official of Zaire told Wilson that the Iraqis were attempting to establish trade with the country, and that the only thing they had to trade was yellow-cake? If so, that should be admissable, but the pattern of the judge in charge would indicate it will not be.