They can’t spin it, they can’t excuse it, they can’t hide it. It’s a payoff for taking the fall for the big guys. And Bush’s very history spells it out.

In the six years that Bush was governor of Texas, he commuted a single death sentence and allowed 152 executions to proceed. He also pardoned 20 people charged with lesser crimes, said Maria Ramirez, the state’s clemency administrator. That was fewer than any Texas governor since the 1940s.

As president, Bush has commuted three sentences in addition to Libby’s and denied more than 4,000 requests, said Margaret Colgate Love, the pardon lawyer at the Justice Department for most of the 1990s. He has also issued 113 pardons and denied more than 1,000 requests.”His grant rate is very low compared to other presidents,” she said.

In commuting Libby’s sentence, Bush said he had found it excessive. If Bush employed a similar calculus in Texas capital cases, he did not say so. Even in cases involving juvenile offenders and mentally retarded people, Bush allowed executions to proceed, saying that he was satisfied of the inmates’ guilt and that they had received a fair hearing.

This whole case just makes the obstruction of justice charge that much more pertinent. There have been a number of articles out in the past week showing that Libby’s sentence wasn’t even out of line with the crimes he was convicted of. But the commuted sentence is in line with Bush Administration guidelines on Accountability. From the top down, nobody in this administration pays the piper on accountability, not politically, not criminally, not morally. It’s time for them to go…America cannot afford to let this President and this Vice-President serve out their terms. At the rate they are going, there wont be much left of American Ideals left when they are finished…

Source: Libby decision at odds with Bush’s clemency history | Chron.com – Houston Chronicle