Word: pardons
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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President Clinton's eleventh-hour pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich has sparked a firestorm of controversy, launching investigations in both houses of Congress and igniting fierce protest from both Democrats and Republicans. The U.S. House and Senate have issued a rash of subpoenas calling for witnesses as well as financial records, as the House Government Reform Committee continued its hearings and the Senate Judiciary Committee geared up for its own proceedings...
...Thursday, the controversy took another step forward - no, we're not at impeachment yet, but it's been suggested - when federal prosecutors in New York officially opened a criminal investigation into whether Rich did indeed buy his pardon with his ex-wife Denise's pointed largesse to the First Couple and the Democratic party...
...with almost everything relating to the former president, the Marc Rich pardon case raises a lot of questions. Some answers will surface only after all the Capitol Hill witnesses are heard and the U.S. Attorney's office does its thing. Others, happily, we can answer here...
...legal terms, a pardon in an exemption from punishment for a criminal conviction. Presidential pardons are granted unilaterally and cannot be reversed...
...Some are calling the inquiries a field day for die-hard Clinton-haters. But most see this as a source of bipartisan outrage. Republicans and Democrats alike were dumbstruck by the Rich pardon. The federal prosecutors who indicted Rich are especially livid, particularly because, by definition, Rich appears to be ineligible for a pardon: He never took responsibility for his actions or served any sentence...