You make the assumption that a prosecution could have proven Nixon guilty of something. That's not certain even today, and it's been a while.

I think you're selling Ford short, tbh.

i honestly think that notion, as plausible, true to the constitution, and just as it may sound, does not really carry too much actual political weight. most people were already aware (and these days are probably more so than ever) that normal rules simply don't apply to presidents and their allies.

i also don't think that the "bad precedent for the pardoning power" is a particularly good one, considering the widespread public backlash and disapproval ford received for it. if anything, it proved that there is at least a political price to pay for its blatant misuse.

don't get me wrong, i totally agree with you that it was the wrong thing to do, and that it clearly demonstrated there's not even a semblance of justice for probably the biggest political scandals of the country to that day, but i don't think it was as shocking or genuinely surprising, as much as it was disillusioning and confirming what the average american already suspected and knew about their two tier justice system.

This post was edited by fender on May 19 2020 10:26pm

I actually haven't done any of that. My posts on this subject have consisted of "Ford pardoned Nixon" , "the president can pardon federal offenses" and "Does that mean you think most pardons are illegitimate?" I haven't held anything sacrosanct, I haven't tarred and feathered somebody, I haven't made any claims of somebody doing something untoward.

Trying to put words in other people's mouths seems to be something you do pretty often, and it harms your communication.

You might have an issue with me saying the president can pardon federal offenses, but that's the current state of affairs.

This post was edited by Thor123422 on May 19 2020 10:21pm

Absolutely correct, I was out of line 100%.

The point does still stand though that the pardoning power as described by the Constitution is directed specifically regarding crimes against the United States. That would indicate treason. I can even see some logic behind it, given that some job descriptions require actions that could be seen as treason (just ask the CIA) in carrying out. If you're infiltrating Al-Qaeda for instance, you may have to do some things that'll harm the US. Should you be hanged as a traitor for that? Probably not. Hence the pardoning power.

How pardoning is used now could easily be challenged at the Supreme Court level, and be overturned. Petty criminals, political allies, famous people, it's all mostly horse shit. The one valid use of the pardon that I've seen in recent years was Chelsea Manning, even if I vehemently disagree with the pardon itself.

Edit: Depending on who Trump pardons, I could see a potential for challenge that would destroy the traditional use of presidential pardons. But it'd have to be something severe. I kind of expected it with Joe Arpaio's contempt of court pardon. Can only imagine that if it wasn't used for Sheriff Joe, it'd have to be pretty extreme.

This post was edited by InsaneBobb on May 20 2020 04:29pm

I disagree with the interpretation that it only includes treason. "Crime against the United States" is pretty vague. For instance if I intend to defraud the federal government, that's pretty clearly a crime against the United States without being treason. There's also a good argument to be made that since the founders explicitly defined treason in the constitution that they wouldn't have had an issue with saying "treason" instead of "crimes against the United States".

That's a fair point. Notice how your example showed a crime that was against the United States though. It didn't include something like a murdering a private citizen or a drug charge or some other crime that isn't really a crime against the United States, merely a crime against social order or some other specific individual.

I could maybe make the argument that the pardoning of Sheriff Joe was probably legit, based on that interpretation, given that the only crime he was convicted of was Contempt of Court, and that would be a crime against the United States, since the federal court represents the United States.

As I said, it'd depend on the "who" and the "why" for the Supreme Court challenge to succeed. There have been a few challenges, (such as Chelsea Manning) that failed. But they were guaranteed to fail. The thing to prove was that it was not a crime against the United States.

The president can only pardon federal crimes. Crimes of violence, like random murder, are like 99% of the time tried at the state level, such as the You would have to have a specific reason for it to go federal, like if it was after a federal employee.

Obama and Trump both pardoned murderers. Obama pardoned a drug user.

Go through the list of pardons, and you'll find quite a few that wouldn't qualify as "crimes against the US". If they were challenged. I think part of the issue is the precedent. If one of Trump's pardons is challenged and the Supreme Court is forced to more clearly define what a "Crime against the United States" is, then neither side will be able to pardon some people they may otherwise wish to pardon.

we have reached the point where the pale pasty privileged candidate is saying stuff like this



https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/22/joe-biden-breakfast-club-interview-274490
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/499128-biden-tells-charlamagne-tha-god-if-you-dont-support-me-then-you-aint-black

This post was edited by excellence on May 22 2020 08:15am

What did he even mean by that