Lots of outrage this week over Bush’s decision to commute Libby’s sentence. Lots of wailing and gnashing of teeth from the Demcratic side of the spectrum. Former campaign manager for Bill Clinton, Dick Morris offers up some counter balance to the issue on vote.com. One of the more damning bits:
Then, of course, there was also Marc Rich, the fugitive oil broker who renounced his American citizenship. Rich was illegally buying oil from Iran during the American trade embargo and hid the $200 million in trading (and over $100 million in profits) with Iraq using dummy transactions in off-shore corporations.Ironically, Scooter Libby was one of Rich’s lawyers, while Rudy Giuliani was the U.S. Attorney who brought the indictment. Amazingly, the U.S. Attorney’s Office was never contacted by the White House for input into the pardon decision. Here’s what the prosecuting attorney had to say about the pardon:
“I cannot imagine two people that were less suited for a presidential pardon than Marc Rich and Pincus Green[the co-defendant]. It is inconceivable that President Clinton chose to pardon the two biggest tax cheats in the history of the United States who had renounced their citizenship, been fugitives for seventeen years, and who had traded with the Iranians during the hostage crisis. While I do not know what motivated President Clinton to pardon Rich and Green, I can state that it is implausible that those pardons were based on his evaluation of the merits of the case…” [http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/pardonsex8.htm]
Interestingly, Rich’s wife bought furniture for the Clinton’s Chappaqua home and contributed at least $450,000 to the Clinton Library.
In the same article there’s also comparison of Bil Clinton’s lying under oath which led to his last minute plea bargain and charges of selling pardons. The full story is here.
Political finger pointing aside, it does make one wonder why the president has these powers in the first place. I can almost buy into it in the sense that the President is head of the Executive Branch charged with enforcing and executing the laws of the country and therefore should have the power to correct errors and flaws in the execution of justice thsat he presides over. And yet it does seem like it’s ripe for abuse.
I have mixed feelings about the Libby commutation. On the one hand, I don’t believe any nonviolent criminals should go to prison, and I can’t get too worked up about someone avoiding a penalty that I think is far too harsh.
On the other hand, Bush seems to be sending a message that he’s tough on crime, except when one of his pals does it. And that’s repulsive. The Rich pardon was equally repulsive. What really annoys me is people on either end of the political spectrum who try to hand-wave one or the other. I’m no political expert but they seem like very similar abuses of power to me.
For the record, I agree. They are similar abuses of power, in principle. The fracas and finger-pointing is largely a debate about who’s the worst abuser of this power.