Atelier 12, article 2


© William Safire :
New York Times, March 6, 2001

                                  This Pardon Fuss Will Go Away 
                                                              by William Safire

                                  Inside the Chappaqua, New York It took a blizzard to get
                                  people to shut up about my pardons. My everybody-did-it
                                  defense wasn't doing the trick, and blaming the Jews for the Rich
                                  pardon kind of backfired. So now we just have to keep
                                  hammering away at old Bush's pardon of that wealthy commie
                                  Armand Hammer.

                                  Wasn't Beth Dozoretz a knockout in that blue cashmere outfit
                                  when she took the Fifth for me? Burton dragged her before his
                                  committee to guarantee front-page pictures because the tabloids
                                  were getting tired of Denise Rich. I'm not worried about Denise's
                                  immunity deal with my U.S. attorney in New York, who's a good
                                  ol' slowpoke. Denise has a good forgettery and if they rough her
                                  up, she'll pop for another half-million to my library. Smart of her to
                                  hire a press agent to say she pleaded with me because Marc only
                                  wanted a pardon so he could visit his daughter's grave.

                                  Of course, Rich is the slimy sort who wouldn't take the chance to
                                  come to visit his kid when she was dying. But neither his character
                                  nor fugitive standing influenced me on the pardon. I did it on the
                                  merits, and the main merit was that I owed Jack Quinn a favor that
                                  would make him a quick quarter-million bucks.

                                  That's the reality liberals now bad-mouthing me can't seem to get
                                  through their heads. The power to pardon is the final presidential
                                  power of patronage. It has little to do with the felon but everything
                                  to do with repaying the loyalty of intermediaries. That's not true in
                                  every case. I pardoned my friend Henry Cisneros - all he did was
                                  lie to the FBI about supporting a girlfriend - so he can run for
                                  governor of Texas. Then I pardoned her so she wouldn't give him
                                  a hard time in the campaign. Now Henry can make his comeback
                                  and determine how Texas votes at the next Democratic
                                  convention. Now about those two hoods that Hugh Rodham
                                  represented: I never gave a hoot about them. It was Hillary's
                                  brother who got two nice chunks of patronage from me, and
                                  what's so terrible about a lawyer charging 200 Gs apiece for new
                                  leases on life?

                                  Hillary panicked and to get the heat off her told him to give back
                                  the fee, but maybe not all the return checks will be cashed. I'll
                                  stand by her story that her brother never mentioned his pardon
                                  contingency fee while he was living with us at the end, and I'll
                                  cover for her on getting votes for pardoning those Hasidic crooks,
                                  but if she ever rats on me to boost the sales of her $8 million
                                  memoir ... I delivered for Harry and Linda Thomason, pushing for
                                  a couple of Arkansas felons on behalf of a third party. Years ago I
                                  tried to help Harry make a buck by sic-ing the FBI on the travel
                                  office people; then I got my buddy who runs CBS to be nice and
                                  pay Harry a million dollars; and now I made good his pardon
                                  contract. All because he and Linda are my friends. Someday
                                  they'll deliver for me on a multimillion-dollar film deal because I'm
                                  their friend. That's what friends are for.

                                  Pardons are for getting even with independent counsels, too. The
                                  guys from Tyson Foods, my first big-money benefactor, and
                                  where Hillary got her excellent commodity advice, are now clean.
                                  They'd been convicted for giving illegal gratuities to my agriculture
                                  secretary. There's tens of millions of dollars could come my
                                  library's way from the Tysons and nobody could ever prove a quid
                                  pro quo. Friends help friends, is all.

                                  Bush is lucky - he won't need to pardon supporters convicted by
                                  independent counsels. At Justice, Ashcroft is holding over the
                                  bureaucrats who protected me and the DNC in the Riady
                                  investigation. Somebody in Bush's White House has the smarts;
                                  that same old crowd at Justice will drag a foot for Bush whenever
                                  he gets in trouble just as they did for me. To those who ask "How
                                  could you do it?" I reply: Because I could. If it ain't provably
                                  criminal, it ain't all that wrong. Beth Nolan, the team player Jack
                                  Quinn got me to appoint White House counsel, got it right: "The
                                  president is the president."

                                  The pardon fuss will be forgotten. I'll just hunker down and read
                                  the life of Jimmy Walker, "Night Mayor" of New York. 

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