Carly Simon Gets Bush To Pardon Rapper

One of the few pardons that President Bush gave this week was bestowed on a rapper and one-time backup singer for Carly Simon and producer for the Fugees. John Forte has already served eight years in prison for smuggling $1.4 million in liquid cocaine through the Newark airport. Forte also was a graduate of the Exeter Academy, where he befriended Simon’s son. Simon pled for his pardon to a ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, Senator Orrin Hatch, one of whose songs she recorded. Hatch arranged for Forte to have his guitar in jail and then pushed Bush to pardon him. Bush, a graduate of rival Phillips Andover Academy, granted mercy on the prep school coke user.