I don’t need to defend the Rich pardon. I’m glad the prosecutors had a coronary over it – I don’t blame them – that’s their job. As long as it can’t be proven that the President is selling pardons for personal gain (and despite the innuendos, there is no real proof that occurred here) then the President can pardon any damn one he wants no matter how guilty they are and how indefensible it is to pardon them. The only remedy is to impeach the President and even that can’t be done on the last day of the term. The is the President’s power under the constitution and he doesn’t have to defend it or justify it to anyone except the voters.
If I recall the original transactions that got Rich into trouble they were complicated overseas income shifting type schemes over which reasonable people might differ – I gather that Rich thought he was doing somewhat aggressive but legal tax planning and it apparently crossed over the line into what the feds thought was criminal tax evasion – he didn’t kill anyone. This sounds like a suitable use of the pardon power to me.
I’d like all Presidents, Republican and Democrat to retain their constitutional prerogatives and any “inquiry” into the exercise of the pardon power and the tarring of anyone who has participated in the pardon process is a bad idea in my book even if it is exercised for a good cause (keeping Obama far from the Oval Office). I don’t want Libby’s commutation (and I hope G.W.B. pardons him fully on his last day of office) questioned either, for the same reason.
