Scooter Libby, Jack Abramoff, and Michael Brown are three scapegoats for major Republican scandals. Libby lied to Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald about White House efforts to undermine the covert status of an undercover CIA agent. Abramoff bribed a number of Republican officials at all levels of the federal government. And Brown presided over FEMA while the federal government basically lost the city of New Orleans. These guys didn't act alone. Their misdeeds were part of a much larger web of corruption, both legal and moral. They're not innocent by any stretch of the imagination. But at the end of the day, they're scapegoats. And they don't seem to be too happy with their respective positions.

Libby:

Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby, testified to a federal grand jury that he had been "authorized" by Cheney and other White House "superiors" in the summer of 2003 to disclose classified information to journalists to defend the Bush administration's use of prewar intelligence in making the case to go to war with Iraq, according to attorneys familiar with the matter, and to court records. ...

Beyond what was stated in the court paper, say people with firsthand knowledge of the matter, Libby also indicated what he will offer as a broad defense during his upcoming criminal trial: that Vice President Cheney and other senior Bush administration officials had earlier encouraged and authorized him to share classified information with journalists to build public support for going to war. Later, after the war began in 2003, Cheney authorized Libby to release additional classified information, including details of the NIE, to defend the administration's use of prewar intelligence in making the case for war.

Abramoff:

Jack Abramoff says in newly disclosed e-mail messages that he met President Bush "almost a dozen" times, challenging Mr. Bush's contention that he barely knew the disgraced lobbyist at the center of a Washington corruption scandal.

"The guy saw me in almost a dozen settings, and joked with me about a bunch of things, including details of my kids. Perhaps he has forgotten everything, who knows," Abramoff wrote in an e-mail to Kim Eisler, national editor of the Washingtonian magazine.

Abramoff added that Mr. Bush "has one of the best memories of any politician I have ever met ... though of course he can't recall that he has a great memory!"

Brown:

Brown also told Senate investigators that the Bush administration's sluggish response to Katrina was blamed in part on what he called a clash of cultures between preventing terrorism and preparing for other disasters.

Brown's appearance in front of the Senate investigative panel came as new documents reveal that 28 federal, state and local agencies -- including the White House -- reported levee failures on Aug. 29, according to a timeline of e-mails, situation updates and weather reports.

That litany was at odds with the administration's contention that it didn't know the extent of the problem until much later. At the time, President Bush said, "I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees."

And here I'd expected each of these guys to fall on his sword for the President. Then again, these are every man for himself Republicans we're dealing with here. If they're unwilling to give up a few dollars in tax cuts to save their kids from dealing with a massive fiscal crisis in the future, why should anyone expect them to happily take the fall for endemic Republican corruption?