...About pardoning his friends and those who might write bad things about his Administration in future if he doesn't pardon them. Witness the pardon, err, "commutation" of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby from his likely sentence of 30 months in minimum-security lock-up. Vice President Dick "Boss" Cheney's former assistant got nailed in a perjury rap over the Valerie Plame CIA-outing case. Now the guy who had to fall on his sword for Cheney and/or Karl Rove won't feel quite so pained. Tony Snow had the unenviable task of going be fore the White House Press Corps and trying to explain how this commutation fits in with Bush's long-standing get tough policy on criminal acts. I watched Snow that morning trying make it sound to the media jockeys like this commutation wasn't a political move.
Yeah, right. I don't know what Snow is getting for his flack job but he's underpaid. Look at some of the transcript from the briefing on the commutation:
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"REPORTER: Why do you say that the President did not take politics into account, and if he had he would not have lifted a finger?
"SNOW: Because you take a look at the polls ... the polls indicate that ... they've been recited ... people say, well, if you take a look at the polls, they wish he would have done nothing. So that's my reading of it.
"REPORTER: That he would have done nothing because he's already so ... why?
"SNOW: No, because, again, if you're taking politics into consideration, what you're saying is somebody trying to figure out politically what is going to be advantageous and popular with the American public. What the President thought in this ... what the President's approach was ... and I think you know him well enough to understand this ... is what is consistent with the dictates of justice? It is not something where he was consulting public opinion polls or asking what's going to play politically.
"If you take a look at what has happened with some on the conservative side, they've been unhappy because they wanted a full pardon. The President thought that it was inappropriate to vacate the finding of the jury in this case. He ... after a long deliberation, they found Scooter Libby guilty of obstruction and perjury, and he thought it appropriate to maintain those convictions. He just thought that the punishment leveled by the court was excessive. You can take a look at Tim Noah's piece on Slate today where he also has taken ... he's gone through and read what the sentencing commission had to say and they seem to agree. So there's ... the President feels strongly that Scooter Libby's punishment was excessive, but on the other hand, he is also not willing to say, I'm going to forget the fact that you were convicted of a serious crime by a jury of your peers.
"REPORTER: So why would he still be considering ... why wouldn't he rule out a pardon?
"SNOW: Because all he's doing is ... he's not ruling anything in or out. But on the other hand, if you take a look at what he has said, he said that he is perfectly content ... not content ... he did the right thing. And there is still an option, people can always approach the pardon attorney. But the President thinks he's done the right thing.
"REPORTER: If he thinks it's so important to keep jury deliberations and their rulings in effect, why does he ever pardon anybody?
"SNOW: Well, there are some times when, obviously, there are some cases that may not be of sufficient gravity where he thinks that, in fact, a pardon would be called for."
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I haven't seen dancing around like that since Charles Durning did the "Little Side Step" in that Burt Reynolds-Dolly Parton musical, "The Best Little Whore House in Texas", the one shining moment in that movie for my money.
Usually our Presidents don't start handing off the questionable "get out of jail free" cards until their terms are nearly up. George HW Bush pardoned Max Gomez (aka Felix Rodriguez), a CIA guy who was up to his neck in the turgid Iran-Contra affair at the end of his term in 1988-89. And Cap Weinberger got a pass on much the same issue, too. As some in the media have already pointed out, Clinton made some really questionable pardons, but like Bush I, they also came late in the game of his last term. You might remember that he pardoned Mark Rich, a fugitive ex-financier/embezzler whose ex-wife was a big contributor to Friends of Bill. In an odd twist, one of Mr. Rich's lawyers representing his interests in a quest for justice was none other than...don't get ahead of me now...
I. Lewis Libby!
http://archives.cnn.com/2001/ALLPOLITICS/03/02/clinton.library/
Methinks the Washington Power Club really is a smaller place than the pundits and campaign strategists would have us believe.
Bush is way ahead of his dad and Bill Clinton in getting to the "who gives a damn?" point in his presidency. He's got 500-some days to go and he's already ready to start telling his moderate and independent supporters to go pound sand. Could it have something to do with the lack of support his Immigration bill got from the GOP in the Senate, coupled with the fact that a handful of Republican Senators--from Dick Lugar to Pete Domenici--have now abandoned their once-steadfast support for an open-ended role for US ground troops in Iraq?
I guess when your poll numbers are the worst a President has earned maybe since Dick Nixon at Endgame, 1974, and you have a land war in Asia you're stuck in and your best mate is the crouchy Dick "Boss" Cheney (who makes Spiro Agnew look like a warm and fuzzy populist) well, you just don't give so much of a damn anymore.
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