Holder and the Marc Rich Pardon

America just elected 4 more years! The neocons are surely thrilled:

"Eric Holder (Barack Obama's choice for Attorney General), on the question of whether unlawful combatants captured in the war on terror are entitled to prisoner-of-war status under the Geneva Convention. From an interview on CNN, January 2002:

One of the things we clearly want to do with these prisoners is to have an ability to interrogate them and find out what their future plans might be, where other cells are located; under the Geneva Convention that you are really limited in the amount of information that you can elicit from people.

It seems to me that given the way in which they have conducted themselves, however, that they are not, in fact, people entitled to the protection of the Geneva Convention. They are not prisoners of war. If, for instance, Mohamed Atta had survived the attack on the World Trade Center, would we now be calling him a prisoner of war? I think not. Should Zacarias Moussaoui be called a prisoner of war? Again, I think not."

Holder has had a visible DOJ career since the Reagan years. He was prominent during both Republican and Democratic administrations and seems to be admired and respected on both sides of the aisle.

The only negative thing I have read about him has to do with the Rich pardon. I guess I think that was a mistake but it is a moment in this long impressive career. Obama seems to have chosen him because he believes he has the skills and experience to clean up the horrendous mess the Bush administration has made and restore constitutional balance again. I can hardly complain about that.

I meant Holder's involvement with the pardon of Rich. Of course, it was Clinton who pardoned, not Holder as second deputy in the attorney general's office.

Marc Rich was represented by Scooter Libby. Imagine that.

Why would Obama chant "change" for 21 months and then pick nothing but a bunch of sleazy Clinton retreads? Go figure.

Unfortunately, the presidential pardon has an extensive history of misuse. Such as Gerald Ford pardoning his predecessor, Nixon, of the Watergate crimes and George W. Bush's pardons for high level Iran Contra conspirators. Holder's pardon of Rich pales in comparison, contrary to the hyperbole of Lardner's NYT piece.

I'm an Obama supporter who was really distrubed by the Times article Jake discusses above. The Rich pardon was an abuse of process and decency and I I'm not happy that Obama has chosen someone who had anything to do with it. The pardons rank among the sleaziest moments of the Clinton administration.

The Bush Justice Department is a cesspool of political hacks and cronies. The recent dislosures about the hatchet job that a supposedly "recused" U.S. Attorney helped pull on the former Governor of Alabama are disgusting.

We need someone with clean hands to get the Department back on the right track. I don't think Holder's the guy. Obama would have been better off putting Governor Napolitano at Justice.

Why didn't we elect Hillary Clinton. She will run the show. I did not vote for her but now I wish I had. Go Hillary - you ran Bill and run Obama - you can do it just as you did for 8 years. Just blame the right-wing, 137 times in your book, everything will be okay - just keep doing it and Obama's presidency will be great. It looks like he is going to have to have you to get anything done because he is clueless.

Mr. Holder was only doing the dirty work of a person we all know. He had nothing to gain personally from the pardon, he was not a politician. He would have had to be a saint to go against what his boss wanted. I wish he is a saint.

No doubt Republicans will throw any good will out the window and take up the role they so lambasted the Democrats for playing the last eight years; the disloyal and deconstructive opposition.

It is okay if he is a Democrat. If he had been a Republican, then and only then would it have been frowned on by the liberal idiots! Obama is already surrounded by scum bags and sleazy criminals; whats a few more or less
going to matter anyway??? Obama... the scummiest president elect in the history of our nation!!

A far more egregious pardon would be the GWB blanket pardons on torturers, which in theory, could cover thousands including the administration. But then it would be a moot pardon since Obama has stated he wouldn't prosecute.

The campaign is over. The Republicans lost. We can stop the guilt-by-association now.

Former Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder would make a fine Attorney General and every objective person knows it...

I am a little surprised that this place is still infested with anti-Obama conservatives. I would suggest a string of technical science stories to scare off these cockroaches.

Will you Republicans stop this hypocricy.

Is this worst than Vice President Cheney and Defense Secretary Rumsfield lieing to send us to war and give Haliburton billions of dollars worth of contracts, resulting in the deaths of more than 4,000 Americans?

Holder quid pro quo my hinnie?

Cheney and Rumsfeld should be in jail now.

re:
"He brokered one of the most unjustifiable pardons that an American president has ever granted."

Excuse me, but I find it far more unjustifiable when Presidents pardon people IN THEIR OWN ADMINISTRATION, a la Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, George HW Bush, and George W. Bush.

As usual, the Clintons are held to a higher standard than any Republican ever.

I would also like to ask...
Marc Rich was indicted.
That doesn't really count.
What are his convictions?

Otherwise, like Ken Starr with Bill Clinton, the "indictments" could be politically motivated. Especially if, like Ken Starr, a Grand Jury refuses to back them up.

I guess George W. Bush isn't going to be able to pardon Scooter after all.

"Mr. Holder also asked Mr. Quinn to consider hiring two former aides, one of whom had already contacted Mr. Quinn on Jan. 2 'at Holder’s suggestion.'

The help me, I will help you is something that is dangerous.

That article is BS. The president has the authority to unilaterally grant pardons for federal crimes. Even if he seeks the advice from the AG's office, he ultimately has the authority to do what he wants to do. And Clinton did what he wanted to do which was grant the pardon for Rich.

The author is right on one point though. The pardon issue is extremely complicated. Because while he seeks to implicate Holder in a greater role in the pardon, other people with knowledge of the events have said that Holder's role was minimal. So maybe people should put down their pitch forks and torches and look to more sources.

I just can't get that excited about it. Our country is in deep doo doo so IMO Holder should come clean on this and let's move on.

Meet the new corrupt boss, same as the old corrupt boss. Why do you think he's surrounded himself with the corrupt Clintonistas???

To the person who said "it won't be covered by the Media anyway" ... do you realize how stupid that comment is? Where are you commenting? ABC News. What is Jake linking to? New York Times. This is "the media." This "won't be covered" paranoia is almost as annoying and ridiculous as Jake's use of "PEBO."