I’m not surprised, except for the part about him being convicted on one of the Cooper charges (lying to the grand jury) while being acquitted on the other (lying to the FBI). (NOTE: The parentheticals in that sentence were erroneously reversed before. They’re correct now.) Either his account of the conversation with Cooper was a lie or it wasn’t, one would think. But as I said when the indictment came down, the obstruction charge was pretty strong. The Russert charge by itself wasn’t that strong (Libby said they discussed Wilson, Russert said they didn’t), but I suppose it’s not surprising that the Russert-charge convictions were part of the package since the most damning piece of the obstruction charge was something Libby said about the Russert conversation (he said was surprised to hear about Wilson’s wife working at the CIA — when the evidence showed he’d discussed that in nine conversations prior to talking with Russert).

UPDATE: Andy McCarthy clears up why Libby would be acquitted on the lying-to-the-FBI-about-Cooper count while being convicted on the lying-to-the-grand-jury-about-Cooper count:

The FBI’s procedure is to take notes of interviews, not record them. In the grand jury, there is always at least a stenographer, and sometimes a videotape. Juries will often give the benefit of the doubt to a defendant on false statements, especially if the agents notes or independent recollection are not thorough. It looks like that’s what happened here on the acquitted count. By contrast, in the grand jury, there is not uncertainty about what words were said (although there may be lots of uncertainty about meaning and intent).