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itshappening
02-15-2013, 05:40 AM
I see the liberals are finally taking notice of his dismal record with regard to presidential pardons.

-
Chance a prisoner seeking a commutation of sentence under President Clinton received one: 1 in 90

• Under George W. Bush: 1 in 780

• Under Barack Obama: 1 in 6,631
-

(source DailyKos).

The DOJ have a website and encourage people to submit pardon requests. They probably get thousands a year with plenty of worthy cases of stupid prosecutions or ridiculous sentences handed out but Obama aint interested.

I'd like to see one for Irwin Schiff. The guy is 84 years old and should be a prime candidate to be released on compassionate grounds.

kathy88
02-15-2013, 05:48 AM
Oh yes. Schiff needs to go home.

itshappening
02-15-2013, 05:51 AM
Oh yes. Schiff needs to go home.

Sadly, compassion doesn't exist in the justice system. It's disgraceful.

tod evans
02-15-2013, 06:03 AM
I'd like to see every drug and tax case pardoned...

itshappening
02-15-2013, 06:12 AM
I'd like to see every drug and tax case pardoned...

Like it will ever happen but there's probably loads of cases sitting on the DOJ's pardon desk of kids given mandatory 20 year sentences for pot possession and they won't do a thing about it. Because they don't care. They take their lead from Obama and Holder.

Young lives ruined and their progressive-authoritarian champion doesn't give a damn. Keep hammering it and maybe one day they will wake up!

Lucille
02-15-2013, 02:45 PM
They knew when they voted for him that he is a police statist of the highest order.

Turkeys Gobbler, Cobbler Only Recipients of Presidential Pardons This Year
http://reason.com/blog/2012/11/22/turkeys-gobbler-cobbler-only-recipients


Exit polls on election day saw Obama losing on issues like the economy but winning huge leads on “empathy” and “caring,” which makes it a pity that the president’s chosen to wield his constitutional power to pardon this year exclusively on the turkeys. The U.S. prison population remains the largest in the world, irrespective of who looks like they care. Happy Thanksgiving!


Barack the Unmerciful
Obama's amazingly stingy clemency record
http://reason.com/archives/2013/01/09/barack-the-unmerciful


December, a traditional season for presidential clemency, has come and gone, and still Obama has granted just one commutation (which shortens a prisoner’s sentence) and 22 pardons (which clear people’s records, typically after they've completed their sentences). Barring a last-minute flurry of clemency actions, his first-term record looks weaker than those of all but a few previous presidents.
[...]
With the exception of Washington's first term, then, Obama so far has been stingier with pardons and commutations than any other president, especially when you take into account the growth of the federal penal system during the last century, the elimination of parole, the proliferation of mandatory minimums, and the concomitant increase in petitions. This is a remarkable development for a man who proclaims that "life is all about second chances" and who has repeatedly described our criminal justice system as excessively harsh.
[...]
More generally, Obama has granted clemency petitions at a lower rate than all of his recent predecessors. The odds of winning a pardon from Obama so far are 1 in 59, compared to 1 in 2 under Richard Nixon, 1 in 3 under Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter, 1 in 5 under Ronald Reagan, 1 in 10 under George H.W. Bush, 1 in 5 under Bill Clinton, and 1 in 13 under George W. Bush, per Ruckman's calculations. The odds for commutation are even longer: 1 in 6,631 under Obama, compared to probabilities under the seven preceding presidents ranging from 1 in 15 (Nixon) to 1 in 779 (Bush II).

As Obama embarks upon a second term, he deserves credit for this amazing accomplishment: He has made Richard Nixon look like a softie.

By comparison: Outgoing Czech President Vaclav Klaus Pardons Almost One Third of Prisoners (http://reason.com/blog/2013/01/04/outgoing-czech-president-vaclav-klaus-pa)


Almost one third of Czech prisoners have been granted amnesty by outgoing president Vaclav Klaus. The pardons will not affect prisoners serving sentences longer than 10 years.

Mr. Klaus defended the move saying, “This is a gesture aimed at giving a fresh chance to those citizens who may have broken the law but who are not repeat offenders.”
[...]
Judges are preparing to work overtime to implement the pardon, which was partly motivated by the need to ease overcrowding in Czech prisons. The Czech Republic has a prison population of around 23,000 in a prison system that is designed to hold a little over 21,000, and has an incarceration rate of 219 prisoners per 100,000 people. The U.S. has an incarceration rate of over 700 prisoners per 100,000 people.

Despite the move causing some worry in the Czech Republic perhaps American officials could take some inspiration from Klaus’ mass pardon.

Given that almost half of the inmates in our federal prisons are serving time for drug offenses, many of which involved no victim, I can’t help but think a mass pardon on this side of the Atlantic would do society some good.

Pericles
02-15-2013, 03:43 PM
Convict some people in the DoJ for Fast & Furious and see how fast the pardons arrive.