The Conyers hearing on the Libby commutation is over, and it appears to have been an essentially useless exercise. The chairman began by running down a number of questions he hoped would be answered during the session but which everyone already knew the answers to. Was the Libby commutation routine? No. Were Justice Department pardon officials consulted beforehand? No. Was the outing of Valerie Plame the result of a conspiracy? No. (That didn’t have anything to do with pardons, but the chairman can discuss what he chooses.)

After Joseph Wilson’s citation of “I. Libbis Lewey,” the only interesting, or at least amusing, portion of the hearing came from wild-card Democratic freshman Rep. Steve Cohen, who wondered whether the Libby pardon should be the stimulus for a constitutional amendment limiting the president’s pardon power. Cohen suggested that once the president proposes to pardon someone, the pardon go to the Supreme Court, where if six of the nine justices objected, then the pardon would not be issued. The somewhat surprised witnesses answered that yes, the Constitution could conceivably be amended in many ways, but they politely offered no opinion of Cohen’s idea.