152:1
As governor of Texas, George Bush didn’t see fit to commute any of the 152 death sentences brought before him. (Wikipedia)
Good thing Scooter Libby ain’t no poor Texan, because if he was, Bush wouldn’t have ruined his law and order record.
(Noted at Discourse.net.)
Update: 6 days later, the New York Times notes that “For Libby, Bush Seemed to Alter His Texas Policy,” and that I was wrong: Bush did commute one of the 152 Texas death sentences. Sorry.
Beh. Clinton issued 459 reprieves, commutations, and remissions, including 16 Puerto Rican terrorists who were part of an orgnization responsible for over 100 bombings, some killing Americans. Oh, he also pardoned Marc Rich, whose beautiful wife just happened to have donated immensesums of money to Clinton campaigns and the Clinton Library.
Libby at worst was guilty of a faulty memory. Note that pivotal witness Tim Russert said things in an interview that differed from what he said under oath. Why isn’t Russert in jail? The answer is simple: this was a politically motivated trial and the prosecutor wanted a scalp from the Bush administration.
Joseph Wilson changed his story on Iraq’s attempts to buy uranium from Niger. Indeed, Wilson’s report on Niger reported the exact same thing that Bush said in his famous State of the Union speech: there was evidence that Iraq tried to buy uranium from Niger. Not only that, but Wilson lied when he said that his supposedly covert wife did not recommend him for the trip to Niger. Why isn’t Joseph Wilson in jail?
No one from the administration “outed” Valerie Plame. The “outer” was Richard Armitage of the State Department, and Special Prosecutor Fitzegerald knew the leaker weeks before Libby’s trial began. By the way, I am close friends with someone who worked directly for Armitage for many years and Armitage is no conservative. Why isn’t Armitage in jail?
Plame and Wilson filed a civil suit in 2006 against Cheney, Libby, Rove, and other White House officials for leaking her name to the press. These folks are going to take Plame and Wilson to the cleaners, and rightfully so.
I like your blog but I hope that you do better fact-checking at your job than you do in your posts.
I’m glad you like the blog. I’m not sure what facts are unchecked here. Bush failed to commute 152 death sentences as Governor, saying he respected the opinions of the juries.
Incidentally, do you know who Mark Rich’s lawyer was? Hint: at least he’s consistent.
“the President of the United States has the unrestrained Power of granting Pardon for Treason; which may be sometimes exercised to screen from Punishment those whom he had secretly instigated to commit the Crime, and thereby prevent a Discovery of his own guilt.” — George Mason
via Balkinization
My understanding is that in the one case where commutation occurred, it was done at the behest of the Texas Parole and Pardons Board. I do not know if Bush as Guv would have to rubber-stamp it, but it was they who ordered it. The irony, of course, is that Bush twisted arms to make them order it (even he, seemingly, understood that a man could not commit murder if he was in another state at the time). The article I read was unclear on whether Bush actually put his name to anything in this one instance, so I am holding out hope that his record in TX is indeed “clean”.