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Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.

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This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

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In my day, never was longer.

“woke” is the new caravan.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

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Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!

Dear Washington Post, you are the darkness now.

Consistently wrong since 2002

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

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They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

If a good thing happens for a bad reason, it’s still a good thing.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

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The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it’s not glory.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Biden Pardons 39, Commutes Sentences of 1500

Biden Pardons 39, Commutes Sentences of 1500

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Some good news:

Joe Biden has carried out the largest act of presidential clemency on a single day in modern US history, commuting the sentences of almost 1,500 people and pardoning 39 Americans convicted of non-violent crimes.

In a statement issued on Thursday, the White House said that Biden’s sweeping act of clemency was designed to “help reunite families, strengthen communities, and reintegrate individuals back into society”.

The almost 1,500 commutations ordered by the president all relate to people who were released from prisons and placed in home confinement during the Covid pandemic. Thousands of prisoners were released to their homes as an emergency measure under the Cares Act to prevent the rapid spread of coronavirus through federal prisons.

Each individual included in the new commutations had been serving their sentences at home for at least a year and had shown they were reunited with their families and were committed to rehabilitation, the White House said.

[…]

Under the commutations, the almost 1,500 Americans will retain their convictions but have their sentences reduced. The 39 people pardoned by Biden have had their guilty verdicts wholly erased.

The White House said the 39 were all individuals convicted of non-violent crimes, including drug offenses. Among them were a woman who led emergency response teams during natural disasters; a church deacon who had worked as an addiction and youth counsellor; a doctoral student in molecular biosciences; and a decorated military veteran.

Keep ’em coming!

Reader Interactions

49Comments

  1. 1.

    Horatius

    Note the nugget that only 2 in 10 Americans approve of the pardons. Biden should just tell the American electorate to go fuck themselves and pardon anybody and everybody he so chooses.

    While he’s at it, commute every convict on death row to life in prison citing that he doesn’t believe Donnie is mentally fit to make life or death decisions.

  4. 4.

    KatKapCC

    From Jeff Tiedrich:

    let’s take a look at who’s among the fifteen hundred. most of the people granted clemency were prisoners who were released and placed in home confinement during the covid pandemic.

    during the height of the pandemic, prisons were pestholes of plague. just try social distancing in a crowded cell. one in five prisoners contracted covid. so officials did the pragmatic thing — they sent as many nonviolent prisoners as they could home, where they served out their sentences under confinement.

    so, why commute their already-completed sentences? because Republicans are heartless bastards, that’s why:

    Some Republicans, who are set to take control of Congress next month, have tried to push legislation that would have forced those people to return to prison.

    why send nonviolent offenders who have already served out their sentences back to prison? because fuck you, that’s why. because cruelty, as always, is the point.

  8. 8.

    Chris

    @Horatius:

    Most Americans didn’t want Nixon or the Iran-contra criminals pardoned either.  If Republicans can tell them to go fuck themselves when it comes to this, so can we.  Good for Joe.

  9. 9.

    Betty

    @Horatius: Definitely do the death sentence pardons. Trump and his crew and the Supreme Court will not show mercy to these people. Catholic Joe should take the Pope’s advice on this.

  10. 10.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Chris: Nixon should have died in prison for what he did.

    I hope Joe listened to Francis and commuted all the pending death sentences to life in prison instead.

  11. 11.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @KatKapCC:

    Some Republicans, who are set to take control of Congress next month, have tried to push legislation that would have forced those people to return to prison.

    why send nonviolent offenders who have already served out their sentences back to prison? because fuck you, that’s why. because cruelty, as always, is the point.

    I think this is exactly what happened to Michael Cohen.

  12. 12.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    @Chris: I was thinking about Nixon this morning and remembering everyone with bumper stickers that said, “Don’t blame me. I voted Democratic.” Like hell they did. Nixon beat McGovern in a landslide. Anyway, I hope we see that slogan again.

  14. 14.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: ​
     

    I was thinking about Nixon this morning and remembering everyone with bumper stickers that said, “Don’t blame me. I voted Democratic.” Like hell they did. Nixon beat McGovern in a landslide. Anyway, I hope we see that slogan again.

    I don’t remember that one, just the “Don’t blame me, I’m from Massachusetts” sticker, MA being the only state that gave its electoral votes to McGovern. McGovern also won DC (still not a state, dammit).

    At any rate, McGovern still won 40% of the vote nationwide, and 40% is still a hell of a lot of people. So there’s no reason to think they were bullshitting anyone.

  17. 17.

    lowtechcyclist

    In other news, I see Time Magazine just named Trump as their Person of the Year for 2024.

    It’s worth remembering that the standard for the award, if that it be, is that it is supposed to go to the person who made the most difference in the world, for good or ill.  Some of us surely remember that the Ayatollah Khomeini was Time’s person of the year for 1979, though they received enough negative fallout from that that in 2001, they chickened out and named Rudy Ghouliani rather than Osama bin Laden, who was the obvious choice.

    I personally think Vladimir Putin was the logical choice for 2024, between the progress of his war in Ukraine and the sudden regress of his war in Syria.  Not to mention, he’s the real winner of the U.S. election.

  18. 18.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Baud:

    Almost impossible to get less than 40%.

    True. But my point is, that’s still a hell of a lot of people who could have truthfully put that bumper sticker on their cars.  Contra DAW, I don’t think they had to be lying. That’s all I was saying.

    ETA: Turns out that McGovern managed that near-impossible feat. He got 37.5% of the vote.  But still, more than enough to populate a shitload of cars with those bumper stickers.

  20. 20.

    tam1MI

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:  I was thinking about Nixon this morning and remembering everyone with bumper stickers that said, “Don’t blame me. I voted Democratic.” Like hell they did. Nixon beat McGovern in a landslide. Anyway, I hope we see that slogan again.

    I am a Gen-Xer, so the bumper sticker I always saw was, “Don’t blame me, I voted for Bill the Cat”.

  22. 22.

    E.

    Please let Leonard Peltier die outside, at his home. I’m going to be really disappointed if Biden doesn’t do that. And the death row commutations seem like a very very obvious one to me. Trump will kill all of them if he can.

  26. 26.

    Ohio Mom

    Poor Time magazine, trying hard to still stay relevant. Do they not understand that most everyone is going to see this as a congratulations to and endorsement of Trump.

  27. 27.

    Chris

    @lowtechcyclist:

    Jesus fucking Christ.

    If they were going to be too chicken to make it Osama Bin Laden, they could have at least made it George W. Bush.  Giuliani, fucking Christ.  If there’s a better example of that “view of the world from 9th avenue” mentality at work, I can’t think of it.

  28. 28.

    VeniceRiley

    Biden should issue a blanket pardon for every illegal border crosser not otherwise involved in any crime, and drop the effing mic.

  29. 29.

    KatKapCC

    @lowtechcyclist:

    It’s worth remembering that the standard for the award, if that it be, is that it is supposed to go to the person who made the most difference in the world, for good or ill.

    Yeah, but TPTB at the magazine know that almost no one will see it that way and they never have. “_____ Of The Year” is always used in praise. Think of award shows like the Grammys. Song Of The Year, Album Of The Year, etc. The phrasing and putting the person on the cover is always going to be seen as positive, despite their mewling attempts to insist otherwise.

  30. 30.

    glory b

    @tam1MI: No, anyone voting for Bill the Cat was to blame too.

    They were being too cute by half & were also pretty sure the outcome wouldn’t hurt them, just screw over THOSE people.

  31. 31.

    Belafon

    @KatKapCC: Yes, people misunderstood, because people don’t want to get nuance.

    One of my favorite lines in Harry Potter is the wand maker talking about Voldemort, where he say “You know who has done great things, terrible things yes, but great things” something like that, separating the scale from the consequences.

  32. 32.

    JoeyJoeJoe

    @lowtechcyclist: Time Magazine has said, in the past, that in a presidential election year, they will automatically give the title to the winner of the presidential election.  No other person is considered, no matter what they do

  33. 33.

    ArchTeryx

    @Horatius: The American electorate can go fuck itself. I’m concentrating on my immediate friends and family, many of whom are under immediate threat because of the “American Electorate” – particularly the white electorate.

    Biden should give them all the finger and do what’s right, because “what’s right” and “what’s popular” seem to have zero overlap when it comes to the voting booth.

  34. 34.

    Suzanne

    @lowtechcyclist:

    At any rate, McGovern still won 40% of the vote nationwide, and 40% is still a hell of a lot of people. So there’s no reason to think they were bullshitting anyone.

    It’s funny how we perceive percentages. Like, it’s a frequent topic of discussion around here that “white women voted for Trump”. In 2020, that was about 53% Trump/47% Biden, and from what I have read, it was a similar point spread this year for Trump and Harris. But that stat is not really too far from 50/50. (And I will note that we seem to much less frequently lament the votes of white men specifically, for a reason I simply cannot comprehend.)

    Like, 40% of people voting for McGovern…. that’s a lot! In most other contexts, 60/40 is a pretty close outcome.

    What’s the joke about “close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades”? Was I the only one brought up with that? Is that why I’m competitive?

  35. 35.

    wenchacha

    Is there anything to the stuff on Twitter regarding election interference in Canada and Romania? People talking Article 4 and 5 from NATO, saying they can make links to Russian interference, as well as foreign ( non-Canadian Musk) money being involved.

    I am too old to hope for any rescue, but I see lots of discussion that doesn’t seem entirely pipedreams.

  37. 37.

    laura

    What a good and decent action to take. I so hope that Biden pardons Leonard Pelletier before he leaves office.

  38. 38.

    Emily B.

    @wenchacha: Not sure what you are seeing on Twitter, but last week Romania’s constitutional court threw out the results of the country’s first election round because of alleged Russian interference. From the BBC: “The court’s decision comes after intelligence documents were declassified, suggesting Georgescu benefitted from a mass influence operation – conducted from abroad – to interfere with the result of the vote.”

  39. 39.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @Suzanne: I was also brought up with that, and then the engineering culture in undergrad was “you don’t get partial credit if the bridge falls down” which I knew about even as a physics major instead of engineering major. Science we did get more partial credit, but we also got shown the Tacoma Narrows Bridge freshman year as an example of Not Getting It Correct = Massive Failure. And reading the Vorkosigan saga in law school, where scientist heroine Countess Cordelia Naismith Vorkosigan was always “when you choose an action, you choose the consequences of that action”. Bujold’s father was an engineering professor.

  43. 43.

    Geminid

    @wenchacha: I haven’t read that much about Romania, but I saw a report that German Chancellor Scholz has asked for a vote of No-Confidence December 16. This will trigger elections to be held in February. The Christian Democratic Party is expected to win handily.

  47. 47.

    wenchacha

    @Emily B.:  “Canada getting ready to release its Report on Foreign Election interference on the 20th.

    After 8 years of Canadian intelligence agencies watching, 4 Canadian political parties finally share what they know about treason with Pierre Poilievre.”

    And mentions many GOP names who fiddled with Canada’s elections, committing treason against an American ally.

    So, I dunno. It sounds promising, but I no longer trust everything I read.

  48. 48.

    sab

    @laura: My ex (25 years since divorce) was from Minneapolis and his father had a bar with a lot of Native American customers.

    The old man always said that from what he heard in the bar Pelletier was innocent, because he knew who did it. He would never say who and he died twenty years ago.

    So I hope there os a pardon.

  49. 49.

    mvr

    I’m just chiming in lat to say I will be pissed if he doesn’t pardon everyone on death row, Leonard Peltier, and at least 1,000 other people still incarcerated. He can blame the Peltier pardon on outgoing FBI director Wray’s prospective resignation if he wants.

    And if he wants to sow division in the opposition, he should pardon one of Trump’s kids so that the rest of the family will be suspicious.

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