Blogs and Stories
The Case for Pardons
Ron Edmonds/AP
From Martha Stewart to anyone ever convicted by Eliot Spitzer, why Bush—the compassionate conservative—should be more liberal about letting felons off the hook.
Congressional Democrats are starting to worry that George W. Bush might get away with it. A few, including New York congressman Jerry Nadler, have convinced themselves that in the next six weeks Bush will preemptively pardon members of his administration who may have committed crimes.
Nadler and his fellow Bush haters can relax. Bush won't do any such thing. Unfortunately.
How do we know this? Because Bush hates pardons. Though he recently described himself “as somebody who liberated 50 million people,” he wasn't referring to his fellow Americans. Over the past eight years, Bush has granted a total of just 171 pardons, far fewer than any modern two-term president. Bill Clinton, by contrast, pardoned 140 people on a single day at the end of his last term.
A pardon is the least they owe Scooter Libby. Also, it would drive Paul Krugman even crazier than he is now.
Which is precisely the problem: Clinton went to one extreme – accepting favors to exonerate Marc Rich, pardoning Puerto Rican terrorists. Bush responded by going to the other. Typical political overcorrection, but a shame nonetheless. Pardons aren't illegitimate. They're constitutional (Article II, Section 2). They're also compassionate. We need more of them.
Who should get pardoned? Contrary to myth, there aren't a lot of innocent people on death row. But there are a quite a few guilty people who ought to be forgiven. Last week, for example, Bush pardoned a 50-year-old Missouri farmer named Leslie Owen Collier. In 1995, Collier accidentally poisoned three bald eagles. An indisputably solid citizen, Collier was horrified by the birds’ death. Some self-aggrandizing prosecutor went after him anyway, and he wound up a felon. The conviction overshadowed Collier’s life. Bush fixed it in an instant.
There are thousands of Leslie Colliers out there. The trick is bringing them to the attention of the White House. That’s not easy. Typically, you've got to know someone who knows someone.
Consider the case of imprisoned rapper John Forte, whose sentence Bush recently commuted. In 2000, Forte, who had produced albums for the Fugees and once toured with Wyclef Jean, was busted at Newark Airport carrying 31 pounds of cocaine. He wound up with 14-year prison term. He'd likely still be there, but for the fact he'd gone to Exeter with Carly Simon’s son, Ben, and had visited the Simon family spread on Martha’s Vineyard .
A few years ago, Ben’s mom collaborated on a country song with Sen. Orrin Hatch and told him about Forte’s case. Hatch called the White House. Forte was sprung.
So because your boarding school friend’s mom finds herself in a recording studio with a U.S. senator, you get out of jail early. Whatever else it is, that’s not an efficient way to dispense justice. The incoming president ought to set up a well-staffed office of investigators at the Justice Department whose only task is to find felons worthy of pardon.
The Right Dumps Carrie
Jacob Bernstein is a senior reporter at The Daily Beast. Previously, he was a features writer at WWD and W Magazine. He has also written for New York magazine, Paper, and The Huffington Post.
What's Joe's Problem?
Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
Geithner's Stock Plummeting
Jeff Madrick is a contributor to the New York Review of Books and a former economics columnist for the New York Times. He is editor of Challenge Magazine, visiting professor of humanities at Cooper Union, and senior fellow at the New School's Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis. He is the author of Taking America, The End of Affluence (Random House) and The Case for Big Government.
Why the White House Bullies Fox
Tucker Carlson is a contributor to the Fox News Channel. He previously hosted The Situation with Tucker Carlson and Tucker on MSNBC after working for CNN.
A Man on His Way to Bitterness
Tucker Carlson is a contributor to the Fox News Channel. He previously hosted The Situation with Tucker Carlson and Tucker on MSNBC after working for CNN.
How Jon Stewart Went Bad
Tucker Carlson is a contributor to the Fox News Channel. He previously hosted The Situation with Tucker Carlson and Tucker on MSNBC after working for CNN.
How about "every person who owes or owed money to the IRS" Want to stimulate the economy? Clear the slate for the millions of regular Americans who've fallen behind. Yes, it would wind up including a few CEOs with billions in the bank - but on the other hand it would clear Willie Nelson, too. I can't think of a better pardon than that.
as always another great piece...you're the man
I was just delighted to see Willie on the Colbert show. He is cheerfully unrepentant, hopelessly talented, and still the same hippie outlaw after all these years. I don't think he is going to be rehabilitated, deterred, or otherwise altered one iota by anything any governmental institution might be tossing in his direction. I vote to give him a pardon, forgive any amounts the IRS might still be trying to collect from his stash, and just let the old coot go live out his remaining years in a blissful smoky haze with Woody Harrelson and the rest of the hemp crowd.
Why does anyone who was in possession of 31 pounds of cocaine deserve a pardon? Destroy your own life with cocaine if you wish, but you only need 31 pounds of it if you plan to sell it.
I don't really see the sense in pardoning anyone, no matter what their crime was.....you commit any crime and you suffer the consequences as far as I'm concerned.
Makes the law look like a joke.....go through all the trial process and the time and money involved, absolutely ridiculous....I would say that's something that needs to reversed by Obama...it's a total nonsense!!!
Tuck, when I first started reading your article and you suggested a pardon for Scooter Libby I was ready to condemn your article as just another reason to dislike you however, after finishing the whole piece I found myself nodding in agreement, even about Libby. My only concern is that the truly guilty are never charged; Libby's superiors, Rove, Cheney and some wall street CEO's in particular.
There is something terribly wrong with our court system. While serving as a jury member, I once overheard a judge tell a suspect, who asked to be allowed to tell the truth and asked for some justice: "Truth and justice have nothing to do with the law."
One wonders what connection led to a pardon of John Forte. I'm sure there's a closet door that needs opening in that one.
I have an idea: Put Cheney and Rummy in jail and let out all the rest of the crooked Republicans out. Fair trade, I'd say.
Tucker is awesome. It's really hard to distinguish what he really believes in, from issues he just wants to argue about.
P.S: What about Ramos and Compean?
Well said ,Tucker.
Mr. Carlson, I cannot agree with your suggestion to grant I. Lewis Libby a full pardon. President Bush already used a pathetic half-measure and commuted his jail sentence. The Chief of Staff for the Vice-President willingly participated in the outing of a covert CIA operative's identity, and you think his convictions should be overturned and his ability to lobby and practice law restored? Simply preposterous. Both President Bush and Vice-President Cheney should be impeached by the House and tried in the Senate before they eliminate all evidence of law-breaking from their tenure in the White House.
Sorry, but I don't buy this argument on expanding pardons when it's amply clear that only people with connections make it into the inner circle to be pardoned. Where are the pardons for the poor who get crappy defense because they can't afford a slick/smart lawyer? Why are we over-crowding our prisons with first-time drug offenders who learn enough in prison to become real pros in the drug trade? More presidential pardons -- for whom? This practice subverts American justice, not strengthens it, no matter whether it's the Repugs or Dems who do it. Shame on their choices regarding who gets to walk: cronyism to the very end.
Tucker, Tucker, Tucker. Tsk, Tsk, Tsk. There are probably half a million prisoners in America who should be considered for a pardon. Just cause you throw in Martha does not help your argument. We have more prisoners in this country than China and China has four times our population and China is supposedly TOTALITARIAN. Did you ever consider why that is? It is because of Law & Order Hypocrites like you . Fine, free everybody on your list but work to free 25% of our prison population tomorrow. Not the baby killers and not the gang murderers, and not meth peddlers who are killing our teenagers. But shoplifters who happen to have been black and were discarded in our cement hells because of three strike laws. Or how about check kiters who made off with a few hundred dollars and find themselves sentenced to five years in some hell hole? There should be a commission reviewing 500,000 prisoners and their records and the Executive Pardon Power should be used to issue some real justice.
Now, don't take this the worng way, I think he's a decent enough guy, but can someone please tell me: why does Tucker Carlson have a job? Tina Brown?
And Tucker: why don't you go try to finish that B.A. of yours...?
Tucker,
Don't you ever run out of bad ideas? You're the gift that keeps on "regifting." Insofar as Professor Krugman being "crazy", he just published his 28th book and won the Nobel Prize for Economics. Doesn't that make you feel just a tiny bit, well, insignificant? If not, it should.
Tucker there's a HUGE difference between the example you start with and the people on your list. Yes I believe that otherwise upstanding citizens who have a moment of carelessness (perhaps even negligence), i.e. Owen, should have their cases looked at. Certain behaviour like drunk driving can't be encouraged in any circumstance, but I'm sure there are plenty of examples of people who aren't threats to society locked up and treated as criminals for unintented consequences of a benign action. Some of these people may deserve pardons.
People who knowingly committed crimes are an entirely different story. I have no sympathy for people that committed crimes to advance a political goal. Leave these people in jail, it's likely we're the masterminds behind these actions will never go to jail, so the only form of discouragement is to throw the book at the deputies and leftenants who are actually getting their hands dirty.
Non violent drug offenders in a lot of cases deserve pardons, but more than that we need to update our drug laws. Maybe pardoning 1000 drug offenders would send the signal that the penalties for certain drug offenses make no sense are disportionately hurt poor minorities who often times are committing no worse substance "crimes" than what hollywood celebrities get a slap on the wrist for.
While I have ZERO sympathy for sex offenders, some states have draconian laws that label people sex offenders who have no business being on that list. These people derseve pardons. Specifically I am referring to states that would punish a 17 (or 18) year old for having consensual sex with someone two - three years younger. In high schools all accross the country, sexual activity is taking place between seniors and sophomores, but every now and then an unlucky senior will get thrown in jail for it and be labelled a sex offender for the rest of his/her life. These people deserve pardons.
TUCKER:
31 lbs of cocaine? Edwin Edwards betrayed a public trust!
Traficant is an idiot! Scooter sold his soul & law license for Chaney, tough luck!
Go back to the bow tie you seem to be choking on your republican values!
Must be a slow news day.
This user is no longer registered.
Non violent drug offenders OK.
Libby should get pardoned when the actual criminals he fell for agree to take his place. The rest of the list sounds like something William Kristol would come up with. That is to say absolute nonsense.
Tucker I think W. should also pardon you for your outrageous envy of Krugman. His Dad didn't get him his job and yours can't ever get you a Nobel prize in anything so I understand you must need to call him crazy, As for Scooter he should rot in the hole along with Cheney, Gonzo, Rummy and W. His loyalty to a corrupt bunch of crooks, liars and profiteers earns him nothing but a bunk in the same club fed.
Wouldn't it be better to encourage "activist" judges to minimize the number of unjust or arbitrary sentences before the fact?
Fortunately for Tucker, operating a keyboard under the influence of multiple delusions isn't a felony. although, given the Browniesqe incompetence Tucker's displayed for judging sanity...
Yes, why don't you just have him free all white-collar criminals? They don't hurt anyone!
"Now, don't take this the worng way, I think he's a decent enough guy, but can someone please tell me: why does Tucker Carlson have a job? Tina Brown?"
From what I can tell, it's because he can say the most ridiculous things ever. That being said, the headline is more inflammatory than the article itself, and he probably didn't write the headline.
Everyone named on that list would only be pardoned as a type of political favor. Scooter Libby for instance, or Webster Huddel, they did nice things for presidents so they should be let off? Isn't pardoning as a political favor kind of, you know, bad? You don't see anything wrong with pardoning friends who have knowingly commited crimes?
Perhaps it's okay so long as the president benefits from those crimes, but personally I don't think the president being above the law is a good thing. It's a very, very thin line, and every time it's crossed it gets moved a few more inches into unethical territory. Every time executive power is used abusively and nobody questions it, the next guy (or gal) knows he can get away with the same thing.
I have to agree with reviewing the cases of a whole lot of non-violent drug offenders though. Possession laws are being enforced in a very random, sometimes flagrantly racist fashion, in every state. There seems to be an unquestioned policy that white young people are kids, kids make mistakes, while black young people are old enough to know better and should pay for their crimes.
It's even worse when it actually involves violent crimes, where one person can get 20 years for manslaughter (weasel-speak for murder) and another gets 4 months probation in an identical case, with some rather suspicious racial correlations. If someone thinks they can walk free after murdering someone, then our system of legal punishment will no longer prevent crimes.
Great Column, Tucker, especially the part about pardoning Scooter Libby. Wasn't your Daddy one of the folks trying to raise money for Libby's defense? Did he approve this column? It makes a great deal of sense to pardon a man who lied to a grand jury and helped out a covert CIA agent so long as you get to annoy Paul Krugman.
Thank you.
As a first time user, your comment has been submitted for review. It can take anywhere from a few hours to a day or two for your comment to be reviewed, depending on the time of week and the volume of comments we receive.
Please log in to leave comments.