The Libby Pardon (Bush: Should he or shouldn't he).

[Edward Teach]

I hope Bush pardons him.

1) To further demonstrate what hypocrites the Bushies are.

2) For the irony of it all.

Clinton pardoned Marc Rich, who had fled the US and was living in Switzerland, and the Bushies launched an investigation into it. Wanted to see if Clinton had committed a crime. Guess who was front and center on the Democrat’s witness list? Scooter Libby. Yeah, Dick Cheney’s Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby.

Why? Because Scooter Libby had repersented Marc Rich for over 15 years, ’85 – ’00 and had asserted publicly that Rich had not broken any laws and should not have been dogged and prosecuted by – ready?

Rudy Giuliani when ol Rudy was a US Attorney in NYC.

IIRC, Scooter had publicly stated that Rich was innocent and implied that what Rudy was really after was publicity to build his name recognition. Seems Giuliani had some political ambitions back when he was a US Attroney.

In the hearings before Congress, Scooter would not repeat his earlier assertions that Rich should never have been prosecuted or that Clinton should have pardoned him or that Rich had had no choice but to leave the country. He just squirmed for a couple of days and dodged the hard balls.

One of the things Rich had been accused of was dealing arms to Iran during the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Remember Bush the Greater’s Problems with the Iran/Countra affair.

Seems Marc Rich was maybe the middle man who made the arms deal happen for the Reaganites. And, when the shit hit the fan, they were scrambling to find scapegoats and/or ways to shut people up, hence Guiliani going after Rich, even charging him with RICO (organized crime) Statute violations when the original tax evasion charges began to dissolve.

For Bush to pardon Libby would make the ironies here worthy of the Guinness Book.


Edward the Benelovent

.

 

[shereads]

I hope Bush pardons him.

1) To further demonstrate what hypocrites the Bushies are.

2) For the irony of it all.

Clinton pardoned Marc Rich, who had fled the US and was living in Switzerland, and the Bushies launched an investigation into it. Wanted to see if Clinton had committed a crime. Guess who was front and center on the Democrat’s witness list? Scooter Libby. Yeah, Dick Cheney’s Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby.

Why? Because Scooter Libby had repersented Marc Rich for over 15 years, ’85 – ’00 and had asserted publicly that Rich had not broken any laws and should not have been dogged and prosecuted by – ready?

Rudy Giuliani when ol Rudy was a US Attorney in NYC.

IIRC, Scooter had publicly stated that Rich was innocent and implied that what Rudy was really after was publicity to build his name recognition. Seems Giuliani had some political ambitions back when he was a US Attroney.

In the hearings before Congress, Scooter would not repeat his earlier assertions that Rich should never have been prosecuted or that Clinton should have pardoned him or that Rich had had no choice but to leave the country. He just squirmed for a couple of days and dodged the hard balls.

One of the things Rich had been accused of was dealing arms to Iran during the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Remember Bush the Greater’s Problems with the Iran/Countra affair.

Seems Marc Rich was maybe the middle man who made the arms deal happen for the Reaganites. And, when the shit hit the fan, they were scrambling to find scapegoats and/or ways to shut people up, hence Guiliani going after Rich, even charging him with RICO (organized crime) Statute violations when the original tax evasion charges began to dissolve.

For Bush to pardon Libby would make the ironies here worthy of the Guinness Book.


Edward the Benelovent

.

<cue Disney orchestra >

"It's the circle of life..."

Thank you for this, Teach. As a connoissuer of Bush-era ironies, I had somehow managed to miss this fine vintage. It's on the dry side, which is rare for anything labeled "Scooter."






"It's like bronze-y, but with iron."

~ Baldrick

 

[shereads]

Nope.

This is a political hanging and the boy is looking towards Bushie and Co. thinking "These mofos are going to leave me hanging!"

I suspect that top-echelon political scapegoats are handsomely compensated for their devotion to duty.

 

[Pure]

Reply to Carnevil.

I mentioned utter lack of accountability of members of GWB's admin.

You countered with Clinton's 140 pardons. Further it was suggested, without evidence, that the pardons were bought.

Thanks for posting the list; most of it's small potatoes, and it gives the lie to all the accusations of administration corruption; further i don't that the odometer tamperers or unregistered firearms persons had enough funds seriously to corrupt the Democratic Pary or DOJ. I suspect it's some unfortunate punk offspring of well connected Arkansans (pals of Clinton).


There may have been 5-10 stinky items on the list, but most are of this ilk:

{excerpts from carnevil's list}

BANE, Scott Lynn Mahomet, Illinois Unlawful distribution of marijuana

BARGON, Peggy Ann Monticello, Illinois Violation of the Lacey Act (receipt of animal skins), violation of the Bald Eagle Protection Act

BOREL, Arthur David Little Rock, Arkansas Odometer rollback

BURLESON, Delores Caroylene, aka Delores Cox Burleson Hanna, Oklahoma Possession of marijuana

CAMPBELL, Mary Louise Ruleville, Mississippi Aiding and abetting the unauthorized use and transfer of food stamps

CUNNINGHAM, Rickey Lee Amarillo, Texas Possession with intent to distribute marijuana

DUNCAN, Larry Lee Branson, Missouri Altering an automobile odometer

LUACES, Jose Julio Ft. Lauderdale, Florida Possession of an unregistered firearm

RAY, William Clyde Altus, Oklahoma Fraud using a telephone

RIDDLE, Howard Winfield Mt. Crested Butte, Colorado Violation of the Lacey Act (receipt of illegally imported animal skins)

RUTHERFORD, Bettye June Albuquerque, New Mexico Possession of marijuana with intent to distribute

SMITH, Dennis Joseph Redby, Minnesota 1. Unauthorized absence 2. Failure to obey off-limits instructions

WELLS, Donald William Phenix City, Alabama Possession of an unregistered firearm

WOOD, Mitchell Couey Sherwood, Arkansas Conspiracy to possess and to distribute cocaine

YINGLING, William Stanley Interstate transportation of stolen vehicle

YOUNG, Phillip David Little Rock, Arkansas Interstate transportation and sale of fish and wildlife

 

[Carnevil9]

Hey, don't call ME the hypocrite. I'm the one that brought up the fact that both parties do it, and that it is a time-honored tradition going all the way back to the original George W, as in George Washington. Right or wrong is another issue altogether.

It's the righteous indignation and slanted rhetoric of the left over the possibility of it happening now, when THEIR OWN PARTY does it as well, that pisses me off......Carney

 

[Pure]

Clinton's explanation, I find rather convincing; here's the first part

THE CLINTON PARDONS
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, The, Feb 20, 2001 by WILLIAM JEFFERSON CLINTON
THE CLINTON PARDONS

Legal, foreign policy factors drove decision

By WILLIAM JEFFERSON CLINTON

Tuesday, February 20, 2001

Chappaqua, N.Y. -- Because of the intense scrutiny and criticism of the pardons of Marc Rich and his partner Pincus Green and because legitimate concerns have been raised, I want to explain what I did and why.

First, I want to make some general comments about pardons and commutations of sentences.


Article II of the Constitution gives the president broad and unreviewable power to grant "Reprieves and Pardons" for all offenses against the United States. The Supreme Court has ruled that the pardon power is granted "(t)o the (president) . . . and it is granted without limit" (United States vs. Klein). Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes declared that "(a) pardon . . . is . . . the determination of the ultimate authority that the public welfare will be better served by (the pardon) . . ." (Biddle v. Perovich).

A president may conclude a pardon or commutation is warranted for several reasons: the desire to restore full citizenship rights, including voting, to people who have served their sentences and lived within the law since; a belief that a sentence was excessive or unjust; personal circumstances that warrant compassion; or other unique circumstances.

The exercise of executive clemency is inherently controversial. The reason the framers of our Constitution vested this broad power in the executive branch was to assure that the president would have the freedom to do what he deemed to be the right thing, regardless of how unpopular a decision might be.


Some of the uses of the power have been extremely controversial, such as President Washington's pardons of leaders of the Whiskey Rebellion, President Harding's commutation of the sentence of Eugene Debs, President Nixon's commutation of the sentence of James Hoffa, President Ford's pardon of Nixon, President Carter's pardon of Vietnam War draft resisters, and President Bush's 1992 pardon of six Iran-contra defendants, including former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, which assured the end of that investigation.

On Jan. 20, 2001, I granted 140 pardons and issued 36 commutations. During my presidency, I issued a total of approximately 450 pardons and commutations, compared to 406 issued by President Reagan during his two terms. During his four years, Carter issued 566 pardons and commutations, while in the same length of time Bush granted 77. Ford issued 409 during the slightly more than two years he was president.

The vast majority of my Jan. 20 pardons and reprieves went to people who are not well known.

Some had been sentenced pursuant to mandatory-sentencing drug laws, and I felt that they had served long enough, given the particular circumstances of the individual cases. Many of these were first-time non-violent offenders with no previous criminal records; in some cases, co-defendants had received significantly shorter sentences. At the attorney general's request, I commuted one death sentence because the defendant's principal accuser later changed his testimony, casting doubt on the defendant's guilt.

In some cases, I granted pardons because I felt the individuals had been unfairly treated and punished pursuant to the independent counsel statute then in existence.

The remainder of the pardons and commutations were granted for a wide variety of fact-based reasons, but the common denominator was that the cases, like that of Patricia Hearst, seemed to me deserving of executive clemency. Overwhelmingly, the pardons went to people who had been convicted and served their time, so the impact of the pardon was principally to restore the person's civil rights.

Many of these, including some of the more controversial, had vigorous bipartisan support.

The pardons that have attracted the most criticism have been the pardons of Rich and Green, who were indicted in 1983 on charges of racketeering and mail and wire fraud, arising out of their oil business.

Ordinarily, I would have denied pardons in this case simply because these men did not return to the U.S. to face the charges against them. However, I decided to grant the pardons in this unusual case for the following legal and foreign policy reasons:

1) I understood that the other oil companies that had structured transactions like those on which Rich and Green were indicted were instead sued civilly by the government.

2) I was informed that, in 1985, in a related case against a trading partner of Rich and Green, the Energy Department, which was responsible for enforcing the governing law, found that the manner in which the Rich/Green companies had accounted for these transactions was proper.

3) Two highly regarded tax experts, Bernard Wolfman of Harvard Law School and Martin Ginsburg of Georgetown University Law Center, reviewed the transactions in question and concluded that the companies "were correct in their U.S. income tax treatment of all the items in question, and (that) there was no unreported federal income or additional tax liability attributable to any of the (challenged) transactions."

 

[Stella_Omega]

Hey, don't call ME the hypocrite. I'm the one that brought up the fact that both parties do it, and that it is a time-honored tradition going all the way back to the original George W, as in George Washington. Right or wrong is another issue altogether.

It's the righteous indignation and slanted rhetoric of the left over the possibility of it happening now, when THEIR OWN PARTY does it as well, that pisses me off......Carney

Oh, no no no! You've got it all wrong!

Most of us on the left are hoping GWB does, in fact, pardon Scooter.

aside from that, Carney, methinks you threw your observation out there in a way that could be construed as a particular argument, and once folks take the bait you can deny that there was any bait there.

because if that's all you meant-- that it's an old tradition-- then it it looks as if there was at least one very important sentence missing from your post. And I know you are a careful poster when you mean to be.

uh-huh, uh-huh...

 

[Boxlicker101]

I hope Bush pardons him.

1) To further demonstrate what hypocrites the Bushies are.

2) For the irony of it all.

Clinton pardoned Marc Rich, who had fled the US and was living in Switzerland, and the Bushies launched an investigation into it. Wanted to see if Clinton had committed a crime. Guess who was front and center on the Democrat’s witness list? Scooter Libby. Yeah, Dick Cheney’s Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby.

Why? Because Scooter Libby had repersented Marc Rich for over 15 years, ’85 – ’00 and had asserted publicly that Rich had not broken any laws and should not have been dogged and prosecuted by – ready?

Rudy Giuliani when ol Rudy was a US Attorney in NYC.

IIRC, Scooter had publicly stated that Rich was innocent and implied that what Rudy was really after was publicity to build his name recognition. Seems Giuliani had some political ambitions back when he was a US Attroney.

In the hearings before Congress, Scooter would not repeat his earlier assertions that Rich should never have been prosecuted or that Clinton should have pardoned him or that Rich had had no choice but to leave the country. He just squirmed for a couple of days and dodged the hard balls.

One of the things Rich had been accused of was dealing arms to Iran during the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Remember Bush the Greater’s Problems with the Iran/Countra affair.

Seems Marc Rich was maybe the middle man who made the arms deal happen for the Reaganites. And, when the shit hit the fan, they were scrambling to find scapegoats and/or ways to shut people up, hence Guiliani going after Rich, even charging him with RICO (organized crime) Statute violations when the original tax evasion charges began to dissolve.

For Bush to pardon Libby would make the ironies here worthy of the Guinness Book.


Edward the Benelovent

.

ALL successful politicians are hypocrites. They say one thing and believe another. If they didn't do this, they wouldn't be successful, and they probably wouldn't be politicians either.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

The Bush White House undoubtedly has a stack of pardons about the size of Lord Of The Rings or maybe The King James Bible. What difference does one more name make?

Right - there were a handful of unused ones found in a drawer when the previous adminstration left (most of them had been used in the final weeks you may recall). Anyway all they have to do is photocopy the form and they'll have plenty for their final few weeks.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19058717/

I think this is my first political thread.

For myself, I hope Bush does it for a couple of reasons.

1. Would do some interesting things to the political landscape if he did so.

You mean like, increase Bush's unpopularity rating or something?

 

[PMI]

my two cents

speaking as a bureaucrat - I decide what I do, based upon my morals and beliefs. No one should be able to hide behind a crime because they were acting as someone's lackey. I took a hit, a few years back, for something I did not do. It took it's toll on us, and believe me, it is no fun to be under the scrutiny of the political machine, a heartless, soul-less, entity that has no capacity for common sense or reason. I was only vindicated because I could prove that I was, in fact not there, on a six-month family leave of absence. However, if I had done that for which I was accused, I would have done the time. We each have to take responsibilty for our own actions, regardless of what our superiors wish for us to do. I would not want to be Scooter, but then, I have not risen far in the government. This b##sh$% sends the wrong message. As a mother of children, I want them to learn better things from life than this sorry parable.

 

[Pure]

ya know what's odd? the repugs have always said of Clinton "but he lied to Congress" * although no crime was committed with Monica.

now Libby lied to Federal investigators, even though he did not violate the law against revealing CIA folks [or at least wasn't charged]. but that's different.

oh.

*possibly in court also, mr box reminds me.

 

[Boxlicker101]

ya know what's odd? the repugs have always said of Clinton "but he lied to Congress" although no crime was committed with Monica.

now Libby lied to Federal investigators, even though he did not violate the law against revealing CIA folks [or at least wasn't charged]. but that's different.

oh.

Clinton not only lied to Congress, he lied in court while under oath, in other words, he committed perjury. However, he was never sentenced to thirty months in prison.

If Hillary is elected president, I wonder if she will pardon her husband.

 

[Pure]

surely, box, from your pov, the question is whether hillary will pardon the alqaeda attackers and give Osama a Freedom medal.

 

[shereads]

Clinton not only lied to Congress, he lied in court while under oath, in other words, he committed perjury. However, he was never sentenced to thirty months in prison.

If Hillary is elected president, I wonder if she will pardon her husband.

Clinton was subjected to an unwarranted witch hunt, and let himself be entrapped. Under Republican standards, lying is okay as long as it's not under oath, so Starr finagled a situation where the president could be made angry enough about the invasion of his private life, that he would lie under oath.

As punishment, he became the second president in U.S. history to be subjected to impeachment hearings. He was sanctioned by the Senate, stripped of his law license, and endured along with his family a global outing of his personal life. This, after the investigation itself, during which Starr targeted everyone close to the Clintons for threats, depositions and jail time, when they failed to tell him what he wanted to hear.

Clinton's punishment began long before there was a crime.

Libby, on the other hand, was questioned as part of a long-postponed investigation of a crime that put lives in danger. If not Valerie Plame's life, then the lives of CIA operatives and informants who had prior involvement with her, when she was working under cover.

You Republicans amaze me with your twisted standards. The OATH is all that matters; the technicality. Which is why your president refused to swear an oath - and got away with it! - when he was asked to testify before the 9/11 commission. Not one of you here questioned his honor; on the contrary, I suspect you admired him for protecting his own pale ass at the expense of the truth.

Clinton and Libby both perjured themselves. In Clinton's situation, he would never have been asked the question if his enemies hadn't been morally deficient.

In Libby's case, the question would never have been asked if the crime had not been so serious that a Republican White House, Justice Department and Congress could not ignore it forever, no matter that they seemed determnined to do so.

Personally, I make no moral distinction between Libby lying under oath and Libby's handllers lying as a matter of habit, on matters of life and death.

If Bush, for example, hadn't lied in his State of the Union address about the uranium letter - already debunked by Ambassador Wilson - there would have been no need to expose his lie, in the letter Wilson wrote to the New York Times, and no subsequent desire by Cheney and/or Karl Rove to punish Wilson, using his wife.

Libby wouldn't have been in a position to lie, if the president hadn't lied. The greater lie is the one that should be prosecuted, but never will be.


BTW, if you've ever cheated just a teeeensy little bit on your federal income tax, you have committed perjury.

 

[shereads]

You mean like, increase Bush's unpopularity rating or something?

As Stephen Colbert pointed out during his stirring tribute to the president at last year's White House Press Corps dinner.

So what if only one-third of Americans approve of the job the president is doing? That means that two-thirds of Americans approve of the job he is not doing.

 

[shereads]

ALL successful politicians are hypocrites. They say one thing and believe another. If they didn't do this, they wouldn't be successful, and they probably wouldn't be politicians either.

Bullshit. There are a few good, moral people in politics, who win re-relection without losing their ethics. Paul Wellstone was one.

"They all do it" has become the mantra of the right wing, whenever you find yourselves attempting to defend the indefensible. It's a way of denying that you are responsible for having elected some of the most morally respreshensible, criminally brazen presidents this country has ever endured - and very often, elected them ostensibly because of their superior "values."

Values? Ha. When your party produces a man of Paul Wellstone's moral stature, you can credibly talk about values. Until then, you'll be the party of Watergate, the Enemies List, Arms-for-Hostages, CIA-trained torturers in Latin America, Reagan's protection of Saddam Hussein after he gassed Iranian soldiers...So, our guy got a blow job and refused to brag about it just to give Ken Starr something to think about when he touches himself. He paid a terrible price, and so did the country. Get over it.

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

Historically, the president hands out pardons on the last day of his administration going all the way back to Dwight D. However, during that fifty years a presidential pardon has only been handed out once where the convicted served fewer than five years in prison. The single exception was Ford's pardon of Tricky Dick Nixon.

Interestingly, Ford said on Charlie Rose one night, that was the defining moment in the decline of his administration, but, give the same circumstances, he would do the same thing again as it was unfitting for a sitting or previous president to be incarcerated for crimes committed while in office.

So, the real question is this - Should Bush break with fifty years of tradition and grant a pardon to Libby, possibly even before Libby serves a single day in prison?

Personally, I believe GW is way too worried about how history will see his administration. He believes himself to be, in his words, "A War President." The fact that he and his cronies started the war and lied to do so is beside the point. For junior to pardon Libby would do nothing historically but shed light on the sleezy crap committed by himself and the members of his inner circle.

So, was Libby the fall guy to protect Rove and Chaney? It's pretty clear that he was. Does that mean GW will play his last card and pardon him? I don't think so. For him to pardon Libby would bring rightous indignation from the Democrats and very likely a witch hunt to entangle Rove and Chaney for the shanagangs they've pulled. With Bush out of the White House and a Democrate in the president's office, none of them can pull "Executive Privilage" and just fry. Therefore, Libby fries in their place.

 

[Edward Teach]

I hope Bush pardons him.

1) To further demonstrate what hypocrites the Bushies are.

2) For the irony of it all.

Clinton pardoned Marc Rich, who had fled the US and was living in Switzerland, ...

One of the things Rich had been accused of was dealing arms to Iran during the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Remember Bush the Greater’s Problems with the Iran/Countra affair.

Seems Marc Rich was maybe the middle man who made the arms deal happen for the Reaganites. And, when the shit hit the fan, they were scrambling to find scapegoats and/or ways to shut people up, hence Guiliani going after Rich, even charging him with RICO (organized crime) Statute violations when the original tax evasion charges began to dissolve.

For Bush to pardon Libby would make the ironies here worthy of the Guinness Book.


Edward the Benelovent

.

My statement that Rich was accused of dealing /arms/ to Iran is incorrect. He made /oil/ deals with Iran during the Iran Hostage Crisis.

The assertion that he /may/ have been the middle man in the Iran/Contra affair was a widely circulated rumor and may not be true although someone certainly had to do the job. A trusted middle man with the proper contacts, knowledge of who to bribe, etc., is necessary to make such a deal happen.

Marc Rich was an interntional deal maker. I read a lot about it at the time but am not going to take the time to research it for this post.

Ed

 

[Edward Teach]

Clinton not only lied to Congress, he lied in court while under oath, in other words, he committed perjury. However, he was never sentenced to thirty months in prison.

If Hillary is elected president, I wonder if she will pardon her husband.

Box, Clinton wasn't charged with lying to Congress and I don't believe there is any record of him having done so.

Further, he was never convicted of anything.

He was accused of lying under oath in a Paula Jones deposition and of obstruction of justice.

To commit perjury, a person has to knowingly lie about a /material/ fact. As I recall, Clinton's attorneys argued that Clinton's relations with other women was not material to the Jones civil suit for sexual harrassment when he was Governor of Arkansas.

Before making a ruling, the judge ordered Clinton to answer the questions about /sexual relations/ leaving the question of whether it would be admissible later.

Suspecting that the Lewinski matter might come up during the Paula Jones deposition, Clinton's attorneys got Jones' attorneys to agree to some specific language concerning "sexual relations". Clinton denied having had "sexual relations" later saying that "sexual relations" meant sexual intercourse.

Further it could easily be argued that Clinton's having had "sexual relations" with Monica was not /material/ to his sexual harrassment lawsuit with Paula Jones. If it was not /material/ then it doesn't matter whether he lied, under oath or not.

The Jones suit was dismissed by the Judge, then appealed and settled out of court. The admissiblity of the "sexual relations" never was ruled upon.

The judge later found Clinton in /civil contempt of court/ for having given /misleading testimony/ and he accepted the 5 year suspension of his license rather than go through an appeal and more publicity.

So, if Hillary is elected, all she will be pardoning him for is /civil contempt of court.

If Bush had an ounce of decency, he would issue the pardon himself.

Ed

 

[Boxlicker101]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Boxlicker101
ALL successful politicians are hypocrites. They say one thing and believe another. If they didn't do this, they wouldn't be successful, and they probably wouldn't be politicians either.

Bullshit. There are a few good, moral people in politics, who win re-relection without losing their ethics. Paul Wellstone was one.

"They all do it" has become the mantra of the right wing, whenever you find yourselves attempting to defend the indefensible. It's a way of denying that you are responsible for having elected some of the most morally respreshensible, criminally brazen presidents this country has ever endured - and very often, elected them ostensibly because of their superior "values."

Values? Ha. When your party produces a man of Paul Wellstone's moral stature, you can credibly talk about values. Until then, you'll be the party of Watergate, the Enemies List, Arms-for-Hostages, CIA-trained torturers in Latin America, Reagan's protection of Saddam Hussein after he gassed Iranian soldiers...So, our guy got a blow job and refused to brag about it just to give Ken Starr something to think about when he touches himself. He paid a terrible price, and so did the country. Get over it.

Sher, perhaps you didn't notice it, but I'm not defending anybody. I'm attacking everybody.

I don't know much about Paul Wellstone, but I would be willing to bet there were times he compromised his morals, and voted in a way he knew his supporters wanted, even though he believed it was wrong.

I don't actually belong to any party, although I am a registered voter. I might be registered as a Republican, but I change now and then, so I might be a member of the party of the Roosevelt court packing scheme, isolationism in the thirties, unpreparedness at Pearl Harbor, the giveaway of Eastern Europe to Stalin, the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, The Bay of Pigs, the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, the Iranian hostage crisis, sexual harassment, and lusting in my

 

[Boxlicker101]

Historically, the president hands out pardons on the last day of his administration going all the way back to Dwight D. However, during that fifty years a presidential pardon has only been handed out once where the convicted served fewer than five years in prison. The single exception was Ford's pardon of Tricky Dick Nixon.

Interestingly, Ford said on Charlie Rose one night, that was the defining moment in the decline of his administration, but, give the same circumstances, he would do the same thing again as it was unfitting for a sitting or previous president to be incarcerated for crimes committed while in office.

So, the real question is this - Should Bush break with fifty years of tradition and grant a pardon to Libby, possibly even before Libby serves a single day in prison?

Personally, I believe GW is way too worried about how history will see his administration. He believes himself to be, in his words, "A War President." The fact that he and his cronies started the war and lied to do so is beside the point. For junior to pardon Libby would do nothing historically but shed light on the sleezy crap committed by himself and the members of his inner circle.

So, was Libby the fall guy to protect Rove and Chaney? It's pretty clear that he was. Does that mean GW will play his last card and pardon him? I don't think so. For him to pardon Libby would bring rightous indignation from the Democrats and very likely a witch hunt to entangle Rove and Chaney for the shanagangs they've pulled. With Bush out of the White House and a Democrate in the president's office, none of them can pull "Executive Privilage" and just fry. Therefore, Libby fries in their place.

Jenny, I'm sure you are aware that Nixon was never convicted of anything, nor was he ever even indicted, so he would not count as an exception either.

Presidents aso hand out pardons on Christmas, and other times when they deem it appropriate. Some of the persons on Clinton's list were convicted of, or at least charged with relatively minor crimes, so I doubt if all of them served at least five years either. Some of Clinton's pardons were given to men on the lam, and they probably did not serve any time either.

 

[Edward Teach]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Boxlicker101
ALL successful politicians are hypocrites. They say one thing and believe another. If they didn't do this, they wouldn't be successful, and they probably wouldn't be politicians either.




Sher, perhaps you didn't notice it, but I'm not defending anybody. I'm attacking everybody.

I don't know much about Paul Wellstone, but I would be willing to bet there were times he compromised his morals, and voted in a way he knew his supporters wanted, even though he believed it was wrong.

I don't actually belong to any party, although I am a registered voter. I might be registered as a Republican, but I change now and then, so I might be a member of the party of the Roosevelt court packing scheme, isolationism in the thirties, unpreparedness at Pearl Harbor, the giveaway of Eastern Europe to Stalin, the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, The Bay of Pigs, the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, the Iranian hostage crisis, sexual harassment, and lusting in my

Box, I think most politicians are good people. They sacrifice a lot to serve. Politicians have to compromise to get things done. If every one of the 435 Representatives refused to compromise, nothing would get done. No budgets would get passed, the government would cease to exist and we would have total anarchy.

My Representative is a Republican whom I usually disagree with but he is an honest, hardworking man. He is eligible for retirement pay from the Coast Guard but refuses to take it because he doesn't believe in "double dipping." He is not a wealthy man.

FWIW, I am not a member of any party either. I am registered "Unafilliated."

Ed

 

[shereads]

speaking as a bureaucrat - I decide what I do, based upon my morals and beliefs. No one should be able to hide behind a crime because they were acting as someone's lackey.

You make being a lackey sound so joyless. I'm glad I've chosen a new career path: toady.

 

[shereads]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Boxlicker101

I don't know much about Paul Wellstone, but I would be willing to bet there were times he compromised his morals, and voted in a way he knew his supporters wanted, even though he believed it was wrong.

I doubt that he compromised his morals. There are honorable ways to compromise; in fact, as Teach said, very little would ever be accomplished without compromise. In Washington, in your workplace, in your kid's playground, in the rhesus monkey exhibit at your local zoo, mammals either cooperate and compromise, or rip each other to pieces.

The problem isn't the need for compromise, but the need for vast amounts of money to even get in the game. Without public funding of election campaigns, and an outright ban on PACS and political contributions - which will never happen, because too many powerful people like things as they are - it will remain all but impossible for anyone to run for high office in this country without first lining up their "sponsors."

Paul Wellstone had the advantage of private wealth. It's ironic that he was able to be a voice for the underdog in Washington, only because he came from privilege. He wasn't for sale, and didn't need to be. When he compromised, as any intelligent person must unless he's alone on an island, you can bet it wasn't at the expense of his core values. What would have been the point?

If wealth did to everyone what it did for Paul Wellstone - made them want to give back, and free to do it without wearing a 'For Sale' sign - we wouldn't be having this debate.

Corruption can happen independently of compromise, and often because the person involved has Paul Wellstone's wealth, but not an iota of his character. I've never heard anyone accuse Dick Cheney of compromising his morals. What morals? And why would he bother, when he's able to brazen his way to whatever he wants without caring what we think?