"Corn can't expect justice from a court composed of chickens." African Proverb
August 30, 2017
By: Linda Case Gibbons
Some people set your teeth on edge. Paul Ryan and John McCain are some of those people.
With a meanness of spirit, and a relentlessness worthy of Chuck Schumer, these Establishment fellas don't have time to legislate. They're too busy tripping up Trump.
This week, while the people of Texas were wading through waist-high flood waters, Ryan and McCain took time out to blast Trump.
They didn't like his presidential pardon of Joe Arpaio. They didn't like that he announced it on a Friday, although they never minded when Obama did it. They were insulted, and were proud to be the first two Republicans to say so.
And why wouldn't they? Sheriff Joe believes in enforcing federal immigration laws. And they don't.
"The president has the authority to make this pardon," McCain said, "but doing so at this time undermines his claim for the respect of the rule of law, as Mr. Arpaio has shown no remorse for his actions."
This from a man who defended Huma Abedin from the Senate floor.
But Trump wasn't remorseful, either. He had no reason to be.
"Sheriff Joe is a patriot. Sheriff Joe loves our country. Sheriff Joe protected our borders, and Sheriff Joe was very, very unfairly treated by the Obama administration, especially right before an election, an election he would have won," the president said.
President Trump said the 85-year-old Arpaio was a "worthy candidate" for the pardon after his "life's work of protecting the public from the scourges of crime and illegal immigration."
Since Trump was elected, a lot of things have come to light. Maybe doing it the "Wrong Way," is the "Right Way." With everything.
The "Right Way," the one Ryan and McCain like, includes Obama commuting the prison sentence of treasonous Chelsea Manning, a man and/or woman, who shared classified U.S. intelligence with WikiLeaks.
It included President Clinton's pardon of the FBI Most Wanted List's Marc Rich -- a hedge fund trader who was indicted on federal charges of tax evasion, and for making oil deals with Iran during the Iran hostage crisis -- and 16 members of FALN, a Puerto Rican paramilitary organization that set of 120 bombs in the U.S.
Rich gratefully accepted Clinton's pardon, while on the lam in Switzerland, and after his wife, Denise, made sizeable contributions to the Clinton Library and Hillary's senate run.
Terrorist Oscar Lopez Rivera, a FALN member, did not accept the pardon, and had his sentence commuted by Obama in 2017.
But you've probably heard all this before. Or maybe you didn't.
McCain and Ryan didn't mention the history of presidential pardons, or Sheriff Joe's 55-year career in law enforcement, for that matter. And neither did the Liberal mainstream media.
The Washington Post headline said Trump's pardon was "Rare, but not unprecedented," then went on to quote persons in the Obama administration, who were as insulted as McCain and Ryan.
One, Jonathan Smith, a former Justice Department official who handled the Arpaio case, was stunning. You'll see why.
"There's nothing improper or illegal about it, but it does send a message...that the president is going to permit violation of the rights of not only immigrants, but people who are residents and citizens of the United States. He's sending the message that if you're not white, if you're not Hispanic, that your rights don't matter."
The article also quoted Robert Bauer, a former White House counsel during the Obama administration. It also was stunning. You'll see why.
"An Arpaio pardon would ignore criteria long used to evaluate potential pardons, that a presidential act of mercy should correct some past injustice or oversight, or serve some greater public good."
Of course there is the flip side, the one the Liberal mainstream ignores.
When the president toured hurricane-devastated Texas, we were told about his "lack of compassion" by CNN, and heard jeers about Melania's shoes, but weren't told what presidential historian Doug Wead thought about the Arpaio pardon.
He was all for it.
"He (Arpaio) served for 23 years as sheriff," Wead said. "But before that, for 30 years in the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Agency, where he went after the drug lords, the Mexican drug lords. They put a bounty on his head and on his family's head. He has stood with the victims of crime.
"This is a tragedy, what's happened to him," Wead continued. "He should be in the East Room of the White House, getting the Medal of Freedom put around his neck, not sent to prison to be assassinated and murdered."
True. Obama gave the Medal to Uncle Joe. Why not Sheriff Joe?
But you and I know this is not the kind of thing people like John McCain, Paul Ryan and the Democrats want to hear. To them, like the Liberal mainstream media, it's just fake news.
Hold the line, America.