Merged Trump Pardons Arpaio

It is sad to see people making excuses for Arpaio -- he's an old man, he was only doing his job -- as reasons why he shouldn't have been convicted in the first place. The reality is different. He was acting as a public official who was violating citizens' Constitutional rights and refusing to stop after being ordered to do so by a federal court. Below is a passage from an Andy Semotiuk column in Forbes business magazine.
Because of its unusual character, Trump's pardon is not only a political act, but also a challenge to the legal system...This decision sets a dangerous precedent in that it undermines the predictability of the legal system. The predictability of how the law will be applied is a hallmark of a free society and what differentiates it from a tyranny...For immigrants in the United States...t signals to them that those who take improper measures to remove immigrants from the United States will be immune from the law. Link
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Semotiuk thinks this issue will touch off a bit of a Constitutional crisis in the United States. That the president has put himself -- and by extension, people whose politics he happens to like -- above the law. As Semotiuk writes,
For America to work as a country it is necessary for the President to respect and abide by the rulings of the judicial system. In the days ahead we can expect a great deal of debate on this theme.
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Brainster said:
The guy's 85 years old. I've been sick of his shenanigans for years, but there's no real purpose in putting him in prison.
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Exactly there should never be any consequence for the police when they violating peoples rights. Blue lives matter!
 
mikado said:
Is he the one who had a prisoner die of dehydration?
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Possibly but the Milwaukee country sheriff who's book trump was promoting and who trump gave a homeland security job to is the one with 4 deaths in 2 years of prisoners in his "care".
 
3point14 said:
This would seem to give a pass to any octogenarian to do what they like regardless of the law.

"Hey, I'm over 80, they won't put me in jail" is not, I think, the attitude one wants to engender.
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Of course it is, next they will be actually locking up that cop who killed the guy in the movie theater.
 
ddt said:
Wow, just wow. I'm missing the tally of his victims and the tally of the money he wasted.

Why was he never prosecuted for homicide in his self-described concentration camp?
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Because we have no history of holding authorities accountable for their actions, why else all the outrage of the manslaughter charges in michigan over Flints water?

In conservative politics personal responsibility is only to apply to the poor not to those in power.
 
dudalb said:
Judas (in the bibilical story) sold out Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.
Benedict Arnold sold out his country for a few thousand pounds and a commission in the British Army.
Many in the GOP are willing to sell out the basic principals of their country for a damn tax cut.
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The only part of the bill of rights they ever cared about was the 2nd amendment.
 
Norman Alexander said:
It would seem that Trump has pardoned Arpiao for the current conviction only, i.e. the contempt of court. So while Trump's action is reprehensible, it does not stop Arpiao being charged and convicted in the near future of other crimes he has committed. I gather there is a laundry list of these, enough to keep him in court for years, and even in jail to prevent him fleeing justice. So Sheriff Joe is not out of the woods yet.
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Depends on how trump wrote the pardon, he could certainly clear him of any crimes he has ever committed. See the preemptive pardon of Nixon.
 
Keep to the topic of this thread - which is not each other.
Replying to this modbox in thread will be off topic  Posted By: Darat
 
Bob001 said:
We will never see the full bill if Trump gives advance pardons to everybody who could give up the goods.
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Someone needs to litigate the question of "blanket" pardons. Arpaio committed a specific wrong (Contempt of Court). What Trump (well, his surrogates at least) is proposing is absolution for crime in general.

That is problematic.
 
Argumemnon said:
I wouldn't say nobody, but I have to agree with you on the general sentiment.
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That cynical statement has been made for years: "It's only wrong when the other side does it."

That being said, examining specifics is the proper way to go, because no set of legal or moral circumstances is "generic".
 
And Trump has rescinded the Obama controls on police getting US surplus military equipment,and had ridiculed the idea that heavily armed police might make a situation worse.
Having spat on the Hispanics Friday, he spits on Afro Americans today. His bigotry is now clear for all to see.
 
ChristianProgressive said:
Someone needs to litigate the question of "blanket" pardons. Arpaio committed a specific wrong (Contempt of Court). What Trump (well, his surrogates at least) is proposing is absolution for crime in general.

That is problematic.
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There's nothing to litigate. The President's power of pardon is just about absolute. If he was judged to be abusing it blatantly -- by, say, selling pardons -- he could be impeached, but there's no restriction on who or when he can pardon. Nixon was never charged, let alone prosecuted and convicted. Trump could say "Enough of this. I pardon everybody!," and not much could be done about it.
 
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