by Damozel | Suddenly, for reasons best known to himself, Bush is so worried about "the appearance of impropriety" that he took back a pardon he'd already granted! It says so here:
President Bush took the remarkable step yesterday of reversing a pardon that he granted the day before to a Brooklyn, N.Y., real estate developer, whose relatives contributed more than $40,000 to Republicans before his clemency petition was filed with the White House.
White House press secretary Dana Perino said neither Bush nor counsel Fred Fielding was aware of the GOP contributions from the father of Isaac Robert Toussie, who had been convicted of mail fraud and of making false statements to the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Perino said Bush had also been unaware of other aspects of the Toussie case that were revealed in news reports yesterday.(WaPo)
Let's review the facts of the case. Or rather, let's let Wonkette do it!
What’s shocking is that the Bush Administration is suddenly sensitive to a flood of outraged blog posts and news stories about whatever corrupt thing the Bush Administration just pulled. They weren’t bothered by the outrage over Iraq or domestic spying or Halliburton or Katrina or Abu Ghraib or Enron or Waterboarding or … jesus christ, do we really want to list all this stuff, again?
More soberly, The Washington Post says:
Toussie pleaded guilty to mail fraud and lying to HUD, admitting that he falsified finances of prospective home buyers seeking HUD mortgages, and was sentenced to five months in prison and five months' house arrest in July 2003. The New York Daily News also noted that hundreds of former customers filed a federal lawsuit against Toussie, accusing him of luring poor, minority home buyers into agreeing to overpriced mortgages with hidden costs.
Federal election records show $37,700 in donations to Republicans this year by Toussie's father, developer Robert Toussie, including a $28,500 donation in April to the presidential campaign of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). The elder Toussie's wife, Laura, also gave $2,300 each to GOP Sens. Norm Coleman of Minnesota and Gordon Smith of Oregon, records show.
The power to grant pardons, which are absolute and can be given for no reason at all, has proven politically problematic for many presidents. Bill Clinton was sharply criticized for issuing dozens of pardons in his final days that included fugitive financier Marc Rich, while Bush's father came under fire for forgiving Caspar Weinberger and others involved in the Iran-contra affair.
Some people are questioning whether Bush can do this. While revoking a pardon is not without precedent, the circumstances in this case do seem a bit special.
Daniel de Groot remarks:
Yeah, if only. Since when, in any case, has Bush ever considered himself bound by any law or precedent?
But he continues:
If this is allowed to stand, Bush may think he just expanded the office again with another creative (stupid) constitutional interpretation, but instead he has essentially gutted the power of pardons, since your successor can just reverse them.
I'm not sure how I feel about this. I generally hate the pardon power as currently construed because it creates an enormous loophole where the President can order subordinates to commit crimes, and guarantee they won't testify against him by pardoning them. He can effectively run a criminal empire far better than any mafia don with a Judge or two in his pocket ever could.
However, there obviously is some sense to having some kind of Pardon mechanism to alleviate unjust applications of the law, or to reward people who really did redeem themselves in deeds after conviction.
I hope Toussie fights this in court, this kind of major precedent should not simply exist in the realm of whatever Bush's White House Counsel thinks or Bush apologists are able to convince a credulous gullible media of.
Bush is trying to change the understood meaning of the constitution. Just because the founders didn't include "no erasies" at the end of the pardon clause doesn't mean it wasn't implied, and a Court should rule on that (one way or the other).
What I really hope for is that this creates such a mess of the pardon power that it builds the impetus for a constitutional amendment to fix and limit the pardon power (leaving what that might be for another day). (Open Left)
I agree with this.
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