Obama's former White House counsel visits Don Siegelman, working on his appeal

[annabanana]

http://blog.al.com/wire/2013/07/former_white_house_counsel_for.html

MONTGOMERY, Alabama --- President Barack Obama's former White House counsel visited Don Siegelman in prison in the last few weeks, and the law firm he works for is taking over part of the former governor's appeal of his bribery conviction.

Gregory B. Craig, who was White House counsel from January 2009 to January 2010, visited Siegelman at the federal detention center in Oakdale, La., according to Siegelman's son, Joseph Siegelman, and Peter Sissman, who has worked on the former governor's case for four years.

Tell me.. Does this come under the category of "Better Late than Never"

or

"Too little too late"?

[byeya]

1. Why did he only work a year? Get fed up with Rahm?

Why isn't Obama's current counsel working to free Siegleman? Why doesn't Obama sign the pardon?

[graham4anything]

4. a person needs to admit guilt and apologize before a President can give a pardon legally.

Possibly commute the sentence, but not pardon.

and I don't think Siegelman ever admitted to being guilty.

[Coyotl]

8. I'd like to see where it says that!

[graham4anything]

10. Every single person the President has pardoned has said they were sorry.

Bush might have done things different, but historically 42 others were not Bush.

amnesty is NOT a pardon.
pardon is a pardon
commutation of sentence is commutation

if one is found guilty, they are guilty unless an appeal overturns it legally. However, if something is in a legal appeal,
I don't believe a President would circumvent the process

I am not a lawyer, so will wait for a lawyer to give the correct quote

It's much like Smith vs. Maryland already decided the NSA issue way back in 1979.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

29. Same here. He just made that up.

[bullwinkle428]

11. Where did the article say one word about a pardon?

You realize that Siegelman is in prison at the behest of one particularly powerful slimeball named Karl Rove? Why are you on Karl Rove's side?

[Doctor_J]

13. He's on Rove's side because Obama is on Rove's side in this one

[graham4anything]

15. Post #1 whined about not getting a pardon. Your response is irrelevant to the legal process.

To get a pardon, one needs to say they are sorry for the crime.

As Siegelman is saying he is 100% not guilty, he can't get a pardon and as it is under appeal, why blame the President?
His hands are tied by the legal system.

President Obama plays by the rules as he is not W Bush.

What would Mitt or McCain do?NOTHING.

[KittyWampus]

23. Poster was replying to previous poster's questions "Why doesn't Obama sign the pardon?

I have no idea about the terminology.

[hootinholler]

26. What bullshit!

Nixon admitted zero guilt.

[sabrina 1]

28. Oh stop it, a great Democrat was politically assassinated by

Karl Rove and his minions, and yes there is no doubt about this, it is SHAMEFUL that while Republican Ted Stevens Conviction was overturned by this DOJ, Siegelman who everyone KNOWS was INNOCENT, was ignored despite all the evidence that this was a political assassination.

He should NOT 'admit guilt' because he is NOT and has maintained his innocence from the start which has been backed up even by Republicans.

There should have been a thorough investigation of who was behind that crime, especially after witnesses came forward, including Republicans, and the DOJ refused to do so.

It's better late than never, I suppose but a great Democrat's life along with his family's has been totally destroyed.

NOW let's have that investigation, because until the real perps are exposed AND jailed, Siegelman will always be guilty in the eyes of some.

Get Karl Rove out of the shadows, this is what I thought we were electing Democrats to do, to stop these criminals from destroying this country, instead the stand up for a Republican who WAS guilty, and let a Democrat go to jail. Another huge disappointment.

[starroute]

31. There's a backstory on Craig and it's not pretty

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2009/11/16/the-assassination-of-greg-craig.html

Nov 16, 2009

The White House counsel was done in by a scurrilous leaks campaign. So much for the Obama team's pledge to be transparent, forthright and accountable for their actions. . . .

I spoke to Gregory Craig in the summer when the first leaks began to break. While he suspected they were driven by someone in the White House who was frustrated with the slow progress on shuttering GITMO, Craig did not know who was out to get him. He had no idea.

But the sustained nature of the leaks—and the fact that they ultimately proved to be true—indicates something quite disappointing for anyone who had hoped that the Obama White House would operate more transparently and honestly than the Bush team had. . . .

NPR’s Nina Totenberg puts the finger on White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. “There doesn’t seem to be much doubt that these leaks came at least indirectly from Rahm Emanuel,” she reported. “What is the cause of the friction? It's very hard to say. Was it Rahm not wanting to have another power center? Was it their personalities? Was it Rahm seeing the GITMO stuff as a distraction from the president's agenda?"

[byeya]

37. Thanks very much for that.

[90-percent]

2. Rovian

I'm amazed Karl had the power to get our government to imprison his political enemy.

Don is simply a political prisoner. I thought the good ole' US of A didn't do such nasty Stalinist things?

I hope the "authorities" that caused this are some day held to account. At least an occasional judge that gets kickbacks from private prisons for prodigious unjust sentencing gets tried and jailed now and then.

-90% Jimmy

[graham4anything]

3. Yet another anti-Obama slant on something. Would President Romney or Bush even listen?

And Siegelman would have to apologize and admit a guilt, isn't that the correct way to get a pardon?

I suppose a commutation of the sentence like the one for Libby could be done without atonement. But not a pardon.

[Doctor_J]

6. He's not guilty of anything, and there is nothing to apologize for

You really think the president would sign a pardon if Siegelman were to phony up an apology?

Get real

[graham4anything]

7. Then he can't get a pardon. There are rules, and there are Bush rules.

Which is important?

Freedom or cause?

He could commute the sentence like Bush did for libby

but he cannot pardon.

[Doctor_J]

17. then commute the sentence. Today

get him out of jail, then have Skeeter Holder appoint a task force to look into the entire affair. Rove, not Siegelman, is the one who belongs in prison. Why is the president afraid of him?

[graham4anything]

19. Leakers should be in jail, yet Rove never was found to be in violation by the special prosecutor.

You would need to ask Pat Fitz. why Rove wasn't for leaking the classified info on Valerie Plame.
Libby was found guilty and Bush commuted that sentence, but the guilty verdict stuck

If Siegleman is appealing, then there cannot be a commutation or pardon while that happens I have been told by legal experts.

If a lawyer poster is around, perhaps it can be cleared up legally.

[Doctor_J]

5. Yippee. An appeal so the Governor can sit in jail for another 2 years

this administration is like a bad satire of incompetence.

[Coyotl]

9. Yes, everything is Obama's fault.

[Doctor_J]

12. No, but there are some things that he alone can deal with

this is one of them. Pardoning a political prisoner of karl Rove should be a slam dunk, and it's now been 4 and a half years since Obama should have taken of it. why do you insist that he is completely powerless? And since you believe that, why did you vote for him?

[byeya]

14. Good reply. The President should have pardoned him the first week in office.

[graham4anything]

16. he could commute, but he cannot pardon.

and it appeas Siegleman doesn't want a commutation of his sentence, as he insists he is innocent.
Therefore he cannot be pardones under the rules (W doesn't count in rules, but all the others).

[AnotherMcIntosh]

30. Actually, Article II, section 2 of the Constitution authorizes the President "to grant Reprieves and

Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment" (the "Pardon Clause&quot .

It's in the Constitution.

In Ex Parte Garland, 71 U.S. (4 Wall.) 333 (1866), the Supreme Court summarized the reach of a presidential pardon as follows:

A pardon reaches both the punishment prescribed for the offence and the guilt of the offender; and when the pardon is full, it releases the punishment and blots out of existence the guilt, so that in the eye of the law the offender is as innocent as if he had never committed the offence. If granted before conviction, it prevents . . . the penalties and disabilities consequent upon conviction from attaching; if granted after conviction, it removes the penalties and disabilities, and restores him to all his civil rights; it makes him, as it were, a new man, and gives him a new credit and capacity.

http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/71/333/case.html

Your up-thread representation that Siegleman must admit guilt and appologize as a condition of the law for receiving a pardon is absolute bullshit.

Ignorance of the law is no excuse.

[graham4anything]

34. But he is not guilty so therefore the above don't apply. Spiegelman did not admit his guilt.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

35. Quite frankly, I think that you are only pretending to be ignorant and stupid.

You say, contrary to the Constitution, that a person must be guilty in order to receive a pardon.

That's not in the Constitution, any statute, or any court opinion.

You have already been informed by another poster - if you didn't know it already - that President Ford pardoned ex-President Nixon without Nixon ever admitting his guilt.

Do you have a factual basis for implicitly claiming to believe that only guilty people can receive pardons? Did somebody other than you post this absurdity?

Since Nixon never admitted his guilt and never was convicted, you should already know that the Nixon example is contrary to your claimed belief.

I know that people can be disingenuous and pretend to not know what they obviously do know, but give it a break.

[graham4anything]

36. So you are using a Bushfamily member as an example? There is Bush, there is what 42 others have done

This Bush does it, therefore is wrong.

And if he is appealing, then the process is in process, and nothing can be done.

Yes, Bush and Ford did it.
Ford of course was on the Warren commission.

so using Ford (who never was elected President or VP) is not a good example.

The only example that I can think of but it don't apply because it wasn't a pardon it was amnesty that Carter did for those in Canada.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

38. No. The plain language of the Constitution's Pardon Provision remains the same regardless

of what language that you use with respect to Ford, Nixon, Bush, or anyone else.

[Freddie Stubbs]

22. Does anyone actually think that President Obama would let Seligman sit in prison for one day if

he believed that he was a 'political prisoner?'

[byeya]

25. A whole lot of former US and Ass't US Attornys believe that Siegleman was unfairly treated

and railroaded into prison.
Sounds like a working definition of political prisoner to me, considering Siegleman's place in society.

[Skittles]

41. GET WITH THE PROGRAM, DOCTOR_J

he's only powerless when he doesn't WANT to do something; he has to WANT something to qualify for ass-kissing

[kelliekat44]

18. I think a Presidential pardon is coiming. At least it should be. Petition the WH nt

[Doctor_J]

27. This is a joke, right?

If Obama was going to pardon Siegelman he would have done it his first day in office. He's too afraid of the Republicans to do anything about it. Or he's one of them

[antiquie]

20. Lots of applicable rules,

http://www.justice.gov/pardon/pardon_instructions.htm

[AnotherMcIntosh]

32. Those Administrative rules are not a restriction on the Constitutional power of the President.

Article II, section 2 of the Constitution authorizes the President

"to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment"

In Ex Parte Garland, 71 U.S. (4 Wall.) 333 (1866), the Supreme Court summarized the reach of a presidential pardon as follows:

A pardon reaches both the punishment prescribed for the offence and the guilt of the offender; and when the pardon is full, it releases the punishment and blots out of existence the guilt, so that in the eye of the law the offender is as innocent as if he had never committed the offence. If granted before conviction, it prevents . . . the penalties and disabilities consequent upon conviction from attaching; if granted after conviction, it removes the penalties and disabilities, and restores him to all his civil rights; it makes him, as it were, a new man, and gives him a new credit and capacity.

http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/71/333/case.html

[antiquie]

39. Never thought they were,

just being practical: they are following their rules. I signed the petition long time ago.

[heaven05]

21. about

damn time. He was done wrong! Another Bushmonkey, cheney, rove crime against humanity. Will his true legacy ever stop? Every time something to do with his administration comes up, all I see is dead bodies floating in the water after Katrina. I hope Siegelman is freed one day soon.

[OnyxCollie]

24. K&R. nt

[AnotherMcIntosh]

33. I wonder why. What's the quid pro quo being demanded?

[byeya]

40. Pardon him today before you stop work and call it a day