Posted on 07/07/2007 5:20:38 AM PDT by kellynla
Anybody who watched presidential spokesman Tony Snow face a pack of snarling White House press corps correspondents following President Bush's commutation of Scooter Libby's prison sentence will understand the meaning of the word hypocrisy.
These are the very same media hacks who turned a blind eye to Clintonista Sandy Berger stuffing national security documents in his socks, stealing them from the National Archives and destroying them and then getting nothing more in the way of punishment than a mere slap on the wrist.
Then there was Mrs. Hillary Clinton, who had the gall to issue a statement saying, "Today's decision is yet another example that this administration simply considers itself above the law. This case arose from the administration's politicization of national security intelligence and its efforts to punish those who spoke out against its policies.
"Four years into the Iraq war, Americans are still living with the consequences of this White House's efforts to quell dissent. This commutation sends the clear signal that in this administration, cronyism and ideology trump competence and justice."
Said Tony Snow: "I don't know what Arkansan is for chutzpah, but this is a gigantic case of it."
Here, after all, is the wife of a president who all but peddled pardons to an assortment of felons and miscreants including one malodorous fugitive from justice who had renounced his American citizenship.
Doesn't this woman recall that on her husband's last day in the White House he signed 140 pardons and several commutations?
Among the beneficiaries of Clinton's compassion, according to Wikipedia:
Melvin J. Reynolds, a Democratic congressman from Illinois, who was convicted of bank fraud, 12 counts of sexual assault, obstruction of justice and solicitation of child pornography. Clinton commuted the sentence on the bank fraud and Reynolds was allowed to serve the final months under the auspices of a halfway house.
His half-brother, Roger Clinton, on drug charges after having served the entire sentence more than a decade earlier. Marc Rich, a fugitive who had renounced his U.S. citizenship, was pardoned for tax evasion charges. Denise Rich, Marc's former wife, was a close friend of the Clintons and had made substantial donations to both Clinton's library and Hillary's Senate campaign. Clinton agreed to a pardon that required Marc Rich to pay a $100,000,000 fine before he could return to the United States. According to Paul Volcker's independent investigation of the U.N. oil-for-food kickback schemes, Rich was a middleman for several suspect Iraqi oil deals involving more than 4 million barrels of oil.
Carlos A. Vignali, who had his sentence for cocaine trafficking commuted after serving 6 of 15 years in federal prison.
Almon Gledd Braswell was pardoned for his convictions for perjury and mail fraud, even while a federal investigation was underway regarding additional money laundering and tax evasion charges. Braswell and Vignali each paid approximately $200,000 to Hillary Clinton's brother, Hugh Rodham, to represent their respective cases for clemency. Hugh Rodham returned the payments after they were disclosed to the public. Braswell would later invoke the Fifth Amendment at a Senate Committee hearing in 2001, when questioned about allegations of his having systematically defrauded senior citizens of millions of dollars.
In March 2000, Bill Clinton pardoned Edgar and Vonna Jo Gregory, owners of United Shows International, for bank fraud charges from a 1982 conviction. (They were already out of jail, but the prior conviction prevented them from doing business in certain states.) Hillary Clinton's youngest brother, Tony, was an acquaintance of the Gregorys, and had lobbied Clinton on their behalf. In the wake of the pardons the Federal prosecutor in New York, Mary Jo White, was appointed to investigate what the media was calling "pardongate." She was replaced by James Comey, who obligingly cleared Clinton of any wrongdoing.
This same James Comey was later responsible for the appointment of Patrick Fitzgerald as the special prosecutor who indicted Libby.
They are becoming more of a joke with each passing day.
I have no sympathy for Bush on this. He is the one who let the Clintons and Berger off the hook. He is the one who thumbed his nose at all of us while surrendering his entire domestic agenda to Teddy Kennedy on education, prescription drugs, and amnesty for illegals.
Only now, seven years later, is he starting to realize that the Dems have always hated him and will always hate him. And at this point, most of us conservatives can’t stand him either. We’re pretty much all counting off his last days with anticipation. Too bad the majority of FReepers seem to think that lawyer/lobbyist/actor CFR Republican moderate Fred Thompson is somehow the cure to this nonsense and not just another one world order socialist.
By the way, Tony, I’m not sure what the D.C. term is for Chutzpah, but you sure showed it this last month went you went before the American people and insulted our intelligence by arguing for Bush’s amnesty sellout. I won’t miss you, either.
What’s even more amazing is that Americans elected & reelected her husband a three time draft dodger to be POTUS.
Shows you how stupid and unappreciative of veterans and their families the American electorate is. The electorate might as well have spit in the face of every veteran dead or alive and their families!!!
How about Clinton himself committing perjury—and never facing criminal charges????
If there is any hypocrisy at all in this it lies with the President and the fact that Scooter Libby is waking up this morning in his own bed while former members of the Border Patrol are in solitary confinement for their own protection, convicted on charges every bit as lame as the ones Libby got nailed with.
What's surprising about that? We elected one vice-president.
And let us not forget the Marines who have been locked up in the brig for months now without even being convicted of a crime and for many months before they were even indicted!!!
Too bad we treat terrorists in Gitmo better than we treat United States Marines and United States Border Patrol Agents.
shaking my head...
“What’s surprising about that? We elected one vice-president?”
who was that?
Cheney.
A thread about the Clinton’s turns into a Bush bashing thread ... ~shocker~
“Cheney?”
I don’t know where you get your information but you are dead wrong.
Dick Cheney was NEVER DRAFTED.
Unlike Bill Clinton who was drafted not once, not twice but THREE TIMES and never showed up!
and before I leave you to your non-amazement;
if you can’t find the fact that Americans elected & reelected a three time draft dodger POTUS outrageous then you are unconscious. Good day!
Amen, my sons an active duty MARINE out at CP. I have to say whatever they may or may not have done, the disgraceful way the left and the MSM treats our troops gives them all a pass in my book.
Don’t let Non-sensical waste your time. He lets facts get in the way of a good whine.
Oops. “NEVER” lets facts get in the way.
Damn hangover!
Ditto on everything you said with the exception of Fred. My verdict is still out on him.
Late last night I was channel-surfing trying to get past a bout of insomnia, and caught part of a rerun of H&C on Fox. I couldn’t believe my eyes and ears—the undead-looking Colmes was insisting that all of Clinton’s pardons were legitimate, while this one for Libby wasn’t. The “balance” side of it, some columnist whose name escapes me, wasn’t very convincing, or wasn’t before I moved on to one of the many infomercials for relief. But while I watched, not ONE word about the fact that Libby’s trial and conviction smelled rotten in the first place, let alone the punishment being for a crime he wasn’t even accused of.
Honestly, folks, I just don’t know this country any more.
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