Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: July 22, 2008 9:21:22 PM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: "Pardon Me, John" -- Is Bush Counting on McCain Being HIS
"Gerald Ford"?
Conservative Lawyers Urge Bush to Issue ‘Pre-Emptive Pardons’ to
Officials Involved in Illegal Programs»
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/07/21/bush-preemptive-pardons/
The New York Times reported this weekend that “[f]elons are asking
President Bush for pardons and commutations at historic levels as he
nears his final months in office, a time when many other presidents
have granted a flurry of clemency requests.” However the Times noted
that despite commuting Scooter Libby’s prison sentence, applicants
“should expect to be disappointed” because Bush “has made little use
of his clemency power” compared to past presidents.
Except perhaps if you participated in any illegal activity involving
the Bush administration’s controversial counterterrorism programs.
According to the Times, “several members of the conservative legal
community” in Washington D.C. are urging Bush to issue “pre-emptive
pardons” to those involved so as to “not be exposed even to the risk
of an investigation and expensive legal bills”:
Such a pardon would reduce the risk that a future administration
might undertake a criminal investigation of operatives or policy
makers involved in programs that administration lawyers have said
were legal but that critics say violated laws regarding torture and
surveillance.
Some legal analysts said Mr. Bush might be reluctant to issue such
pardons because they could be construed as an implicit admission of
guilt. […]
“The president should pre-empt any long-term investigations,” said
Victoria Toensing, who was a Justice Department counterterrorism
official in the Reagan administration. “If we don’t protect these
people who are proceeding in good faith, no one will ever take
chances.”
Stuart Taylor, Jr., a constitutional law fellow at Brookings,
agrees, saying in a recent Newsweek column that investigations into
the Bush administration’s “high level ‘war crimes’” are a “bad idea”
and instead called for a “truth commission“:
A criminal investigation would only hinder efforts to determine the
truth, and preclude any apologies. It would spur those who know the
most to take the Fifth. Any prosecutions would also touch off years
of partisan warfare. […]
Absent pardons, pressure to go after GOP “war criminals” would make
it very hard to unite Americans of all stripes behind solutions to
the many economic and social challenges facing the country.
In fact, the conservative D.C. lawyer circuit may just get its wish.
The White House “would not say whether the administration was
considering pre-emptive pardons, nor whether it would rule them
out.” (HT: Dan Froomkin)
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