“I beg your pardon you promised me in the Rose Garden”

Gaetz-gate, the gift that keeps on giving, opens the prospect of possible, if not probable, presidential secret pardons. How many and to whom did the former guy promise his friends, family and (of course) himself?

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96 thoughts on ““I beg your pardon you promised me in the Rose Garden””

  1. marketwatch:

    Rep. Matt Gaetz sought a blanket pardon for himself and others during the waning weeks of the Trump administration, the New York Times reported late Tuesday.

    Citing two people familiar with the discussions, the Times reported Gaetz asked the White House for blanket pre-emptive pardons for himself and unidentified allies for any crimes they may have committed. The Times said it was unclear at the time whether Gaetz knew the Justice Department had already opened a probe into his actions.

    [continues]

  2. thanks to our trail friend pogo who last night inspired this thread topic by commenting:

    So according to  Michael Schmidt, Matt Gaetz (asshole) sought a blanket pardon from Dumbass as the end of the Dumbass “administration” drew near.  No charges pending, no knowledge at the time of the FBI investigation.  Just wanted a pardon for anything he happened to have done illegal in his past – like underage sex trafficking perhaps?  How’d that Dumbass sycophancy work out for you?  Too fucking rich for words.

  3. from january 20, 2021 fact check story

    Could Trump Have Issued Secret Presidential Pardons? | Snopes.com

    It is possible for a president to issue secret pardons, but it has never been documented before, and legal experts frequently differ on how to interpret the validity of a secret pardon.
    The clause in the Constitution granting presidential clemency power does not explicitly restrict the president from issuing secret pardons. It simply says, “he shall have Power to Grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.” 
    […]
    Jeffrey Crouch, assistant professor of American politics at American University, wrote in The Washington Post:

    The very concept of a pardon is that it is a public act, granting mercy to the recipient. An ordinary pardon would have no force or meaning if it were kept secret. Moreover, a pardon kept from public view would frustrate an essential element of the otherwise absolute pardon power: public accountability through political consequences. Without knowledge of a president’s pardoning decisions, neither Congress nor the public may effectively check their clemency actions.

    “If a secret pardon were allowed, it could cause chaos in the courts. There would be no way to know when or if a secret pardon might emerge and wreak havoc with a long-running investigation. The result would be to undermine the predictability of the judicial process.”
    Given that the president is not explicitly prohibited from issuing secret pardons; that we cannot determine at the moment if Trump has done so himself; that such pardons could be found invalid in court; and that there is no precedent for addressing such an issue, we rate this claim as “Unproven.”

  4. SCAM-slime as well as scum-slime given some of its currently-in-the-news residents

     

  5. Secret pardons?  

     “he shall have Power to Grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States…”
    Does sex trafficking and statutory rape fall into that category?   What about use of illicit drugs?  

    Why hasn’t the ~godly, conservative~ Republican Party called for the resignation of this disgusting, little creep?

  6. a bit of another version from Spoof last summer

    Melania Trump Sings for Her Husband from the Rose Garden | The Spoof

    We beg your pardon, we never promised you a rose garden.
    Along with the sunshine, there’s got to be a lot of death sometimes.
    When a pandemic strikes you got to die and let go!
    “It is what it is,” ‘cause Donald never promised you a rose garden.

    We could sing you a tune and promise you a Wall
    But if that’s what it takes to hold you
    (We’d just as soon let Bannon defraud you).
    But there’s one thing we want you to know–
    You better look before you leap, and still BE BEST!
    ‘Cause there won’t always be someone there when you check out—
    And you know what we’re talking about.

    So smile for a while and let’s be jolly!
    Death shouldn’t be so melancholy!
    Come along and share the good times while you’re still here!

    We beg your pardon, we never promised you a rose garden.
    Along with the sunshine, there’s got to be a lot of death sometimes.

  7. the NYT story as reported in orlando sentinel:

    WASHINGTON — Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., was one of President Donald Trump’s most vocal allies during his term, publicly pledging loyalty and even signing a letter nominating the president for the Nobel Peace Prize.
    In the final weeks of Trump’s term, Gaetz sought something in return. He privately asked the White House for blanket preemptive pardons for himself and unidentified congressional allies for any crimes they may have committed, according to two people told of the discussions.
    Around that time, Gaetz was also publicly calling for broad pardons from Trump to thwart what he termed the “bloodlust” of their political opponents. But Justice Department investigators had begun questioning Gaetz’s associates about his conduct, including whether he had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old that violated sex trafficking laws, in an inquiry that grew out of the case of an indicted associate in Florida.
    It was unclear whether Gaetz or the White House knew at the time about the inquiry, or who else he sought pardons for. Gaetz did not tell White House aides that he was under investigation for potential sex trafficking violations when he made the request. But top White House lawyers and officials viewed the request for a preemptive pardon as a nonstarter that would set a bad precedent, the people said.
    Aides told Trump of the request, though it is unclear whether Gaetz discussed the matter directly with the president. Trump ultimately pardoned dozens of allies and others in the final months of his presidency, highlighting his willingness to wield his power to help close supporters and lash out against the criminal justice system.
    In recent days, some Trump associates have speculated that Gaetz’s request for a group pardon was an attempt to camouflage his own potential criminal exposure.
    […]

    Two weeks after Trump lost reelection, Gaetz called on him to “pardon everyone” before he left office or they would be targeted by the “radical left.”

    [continues]

  9. Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O’Donnell discuss the breaking news from the NYT that Rep. Gaetz asked the Trump White House for “blanket pre-emptive pardons for himself and unidentified congressional allies for any crimes they may have committed.” Aired on 04/07/2021.

  10. really?  can you imagine what SNL will do with a lineup like this?

    Matt Gaetz will speak at pro-Trump Women for America First’s ‘Save America Summit’ – The Washington Post

    Now, Gaetz is planning to take center stage later this week as a keynote speaker at a conservative women’s group’s conference at former president Donald Trump’s Miami golf course.
    Women for America First, a nonprofit organization of Trump loyalists, orchestrated and publicized a rally on Jan. 6 before the deadly insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, and also led bus tours nationwide spreading unfounded claims of election fraud.
    […]
    The event, called the “Save America Summit,” begins Thursday at Trump’s Doral golf resort and also includes appearances from Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Tex.).
    […]
    Women for America First called Gaetz a “fearless leader in DC” in a tweet Tuesday announcing his appearance at the conference. Kremer suggested the allegations against Gaetz were a partisan plot.
    […]
    Kremer’s group organized a “Stop the Steal” rally in the Washington in November that drew thousands. In December, it planned a “March for Trump” in D.C., that devolved into violence as extremist groups, including the Proud Boys, brawled with anti-Trump protesters. By the end of the night, there were four stabbings and nearly three dozen arrests.

    In the weeks leading up to the Jan. 6 insurrection, Women for America First held a cross-country bus tour. During the stops in 20 cities, the group held rallies where speakers repeated Trump’s false claims of a stolen election, according to a BuzzFeed News investigation.

  11. Not the biggest part of this Gaetz story but the fake ids his buddy was making really puzzles me, don’t get how this helped him commit commercial sex crimes: “Greenberg also created fake driver’s licenses featuring his face but the personal information of others — including a man with a Puerto Rico driver’s license — that he used “to facilitate his efforts to engage in commercial sex acts,” the indictment says. In Florida, people can surrender defunct or out-of-state licenses to tax collectors who have the power to issue new IDs. The old IDs are supposed to be destroyed.” Politico

  12. meanwhile lawsuits against that former guy are blossoming and hopefully will bear fruit.  one will according to this oped from lawrence tribe.

    Capitol police have the best case against Trump for the insurrection – The Boston Globe

    […]
    The lawsuits filed by Representatives Eric Swalwell and Bennie Thompson, pleading claims under a Civil War-era statute enacted to counter the rise of the then-nascent KKK, provide one promising pathway to holding the former president accountable. Yet it is a no-frills lawsuit filed March 30 by two Capitol Police officers who stood their ground against the insurrectionists, and paid a heavy physical and psychological toll for doing so, that holds perhaps the greatest promise of making Trump pay for directing the violent mob that stormed the Capitol on his command.
    The strength of the suit by Officers James Blassingame and Sidney Hemby is in its time-tested simplicity. Not relying on any act of Congress but merely invoking common-law principles buttressed by Washington, D.C., code provisions prohibiting incitement to riot and provocation of violence, their suit centers on claims that Trump directed, aided, and abetted the garden-variety torts of assault and battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress. These are the kinds of tort claims pleaded every day in courts across the country, tracing their roots to the most foundational precepts of the English common law. The complaint alleges that Trump was guilty of “intentional, wanton and reckless conduct” as he “spurred” a violent crowd “already primed by his months of inflammatory rhetoric” to cause grave damage and injury to property and persons, including the two Capitol Officers.
    The jurisdiction invoked by this straightforward complaint harkens back to our country’s earliest law creating federal trial courts: Under the Judiciary Act of 1789, empowering those trial courts to serve as neutral umpires in controversies between citizens of different states, the police officers as citizens of Maryland are suing Trump as a citizen of Florida, thereby creating the requisite “diversity of citizenship.” And, although seeking “punitive damages” sufficient to punish Trump for his tortious conduct and to deter future presidents from engaging in similar behavior, they avoid adorning their complaint with estimates of compensatory damages in the millions or billions of dollars.
    The suit’s bare-bones minimalism offers pragmatic benefits. Its claims can be easily understood by a jury of non-lawyers, leaving more of the focus at trial for the damning details of Trump’s conduct and the horror of the bloody riot itself rather than legalistic prolixity. The more complex Swalwell and Thompson suits are also potentially more vulnerable to defensive technicalities, including dubious claims that individual members of Congress, even if personally terrorized, lack the legal “standing” required to sue for harm done to Congress as a whole.
    The poetic justice is impossible to miss: In the days leading up to the insurrection, a Twitter follower of Trump’s marching orders screeched online that “Cops don’t have standing if they’re laying on the ground in a pool of their own blood.” In a tragic twist, Blassingame and Hemby did indeed bleed and were beaten to the ground, erasing any possible doubt about their standing to make the claims underlying their lawsuit.
    […]
    But the suit’s real power lies with the officers’ visceral, gut-wrenching accounts of that harrowing day. The jury will surely be moved by the sheer brutality and terror to which the officers were subjected by being savagely beaten, slammed against stone columns, and crushed against the Capitol doors and walls, just for doing their best to protect the nation’s Capitol and those who do the public’s business. All this while being sprayed with chemicals and peppered with innumerable verbal assaults. Blassingame, for one, was called the n-word so often that he lost count.
    [continues]

  15. BOOK OF THE WEEK:
    I NEVER PROMISED YOU A ROSE GARDEN,  by Hannah Green, aka Joanne Greenberg; a book which detailed Ms Greenberg’s trip thru schizophrenia.    1964

  16. The character of Dr. Fried is based closely on Greenberg’s real doctor Frieda Fromm-Reichmann, and the hospital on Chestnut Lodge in Rockville, Maryland. While at Chestnut Lodge, Greenberg described a fantasy world called Iria to her doctors, quoting poetry in the Irian language. However, some of Greenberg’s doctors felt that this was not a true delusion but rather something Greenberg had made up on the spot to impress her psychiatrist. One doctor went so far as to state that Irian was not an actual language, but was a form of bastardized Armenian.[2] Fromm-Reichmann wrote glowing reports focusing on Greenberg’s genius and creativity, which she saw as signs of Greenberg’s innate health, indicating that she had every chance of recovering from her mental illness.
    Similar to what occurred in the novel, Greenberg was diagnosed with schizophrenia. At that time though, undifferentiated schizophrenia was often a vague diagnosis given to a patient or to medical records department for essentially non-medical reasons, which could have covered any number of mental illnesses from anxiety to depression.
    Two psychiatrists who examined the book’s description of protagonist Deborah Blau say that she was not schizophrenic, but rather suffered from extreme depression and somatization disorder.

  17. Funny how stuff comes up……..I read that thing in 1967 on 1/2 hour lunch breaks with greasy hands while a pipefitter (Shop 54) at The Naval Shipyard.   

  21. CC –
    Never read a word of Hemingway
    Hemingway  chasing submarines with his drinking buddies  out of Cuba , what a plot twist.
     

  22. I’ve read everything I could track down that he ever wrote…..and everything i could track down which was written ABOUT him.     It spread to Fitzgerald, of course, even an attempt at Stein…..Led to Dos Passos, those two poet characters, Joan Miro, bullfighting,  there were others……I became a long-distance aficianado de los toros.

    Book of the Day: DEATH IN THE AFTERNOON, Non-fiction.

    “It’s not a sport, it’s a tragedy.”

  23. Well, I got to blow Mathew the “Grub Farm”  manager’s mind today. 
    Cold called him this morning , and just paid for 6 cu yds of compost . 
    $32 a yd. 

  25. Yeah, my brother’s got that same bug, that’s where we used to plant the blue corns……….

  26. The GQP cares a lot more about roads than the elderly, the disabled or clean water. They don’t care much for medical mfg, either, which seems really obtuse.

  27. Joe Biden is the greatest POTUS of my lifetime.    

    That must really stick in Moscow Mitch’s craw.

  32. As they used to scream at us in Coastie Boot Camp:   “Move with SPEED, JACK!!”

  33. i read Hemingway too young so i didn’t realize the “war injury” was a case of missing penis😦

    (spoiler alert)

  34. “really puzzles me, don’t get how this helped him commit commercial sex crimes” -CC

    …that’s because you don’t think like a criminal(which is a good thing👍)

  35. …visited with a buddy for the first time in forever.  Ate at a restaurant and even used the restroom and THERE WAS A GUY POOPING IN THERE.  i was so scared.

  36. CBS has had a crew working in Guatemala , the conditions there are dire.
    Manual Bajorgus is making his bones on this assignment. 
    His reporting confirms what I have “carped” about.  And what the D.O.D.  has called a threat multiplier .
    We have a chain of failing states made up of farmers , and bingo 2 Cat 5’s show-up ten days apart, and just 30 miles apart. 
    Manual Bajorgus put his finger on this with his latest report this morning. 
    It’s really very good.  I’ll go look for it.  I’m sure Nora will run it tonight. 

  38. These are “Climate Refugees” ,  whether we grasp that fact or not.  We just saw how well fences work as a solution , with a night vision clip of two toddlers being dropped over a very tall wall. 
    Murders and rapists don’t come in the form of 2 and 4 years old sisters. 
    And parents don’t send their young away alone lightly. 
    We are looking at this problem like Stalin , we need more Bucky Fuller. 

  39. What they need in Central America, is private investment from US companies.  

    Much of the despair that folks leaving home because they have nothing (and no hope) could be solved with jobs.
     
     It would also be a burr under China’s saddle.  

    And, if goods  aren’t being transported as far, it reduces the impact to to the climate.  

    It’s  not a perfect fix, but it would reduce stressors in a lot of areas. 

  40. One last Climate article .
    16 years ago , this entire idea was unknown , ………….. rivers, streams and lakes on the Greenland ice sheet –
    Now a new paper  about this new system that has developed . This study started 6 years ago.
    There is a clip from NASA  about this field work , the images are beautiful, and scary as well.  
    There is now a system of flowing water over ice sheet  that runs until it hits a crack in the ice , there the water bores a hole down into the ice sheet .
    ( Remember , there are thousands of these now. )
    The lakes that form can drain overnight .
    These pulses of melt water into the base of the ice , “jack the glacier up”, and a few hours later it dumps a surge of ice into the sea.
    The NASA clip is 11:46 min long  it is well worth the time …………..
    New Study Changes Understanding of How Greenland’s Ice Melts
     
    https://www.ecowatch.com/greenland-ice-sheet-melt-study-2651382155.html#toggle-gdpr
     
     
     
     

  55. Funny how all his friends end up under that bus. 
    It would make a great cartoon , Trump as a bus driver, arms and legs propping-up  the bus , so the wheels  are off the pavement.
    You throw enough people under the bus , and pretty soon you are going nowhere.  

  57. Ha ha…….dylan was a johnny-come-lately……..I’d already been playing electric guitar in a band since 1956, and nobody got mad at us for it but the neighbors………..

  58. Why is SFB  allowed to use that seal?  Looks too official.
     
    I’ve spent an hour trying to get an appointment.  Still nada.

  62. OK – I finally found the crappy J&J within my area…but corporate hasn’t given them the OK to open it so they can’t make appointments…and I don’t want something that’s barely better than 50/50, anyway. Also, not thrilled with the mishap they had (and caught) in manufacturing. What didn’t they catch?

    Pfizer and Moderna are like damned unicorns in my zip code.

  64. That Isaak feller remembers me to some really good old rockin’ years……..

  68. Blue –
    The world is in “hyperdrive”  to tomorrow, 
    The Texas grid set new records for wind production in March.  Nearly 40%. 

  69. Meanwhile…..back in the jungle…….
    A “home inspector” was caught on Nanny-Cam in the baby’s nursery pleasuring himself with an Elmo Doll.     
    Faces charges.

  70. The Greeks  are sacking 4  brown coal power plants. 
    The world is “stacking” coal plants .
    The 19th century is dying at last. 

  74. Tony –
    Thanks I needed that , I was trying to sell myself on something else. Giant lizards  in supermarkets  has changed my view.   

  75. craig, is he allowed to use the great seal? does a former president fall under the reg exceptions or did he exempt himself by an EO?

    18 U.S. Code § 713 – Use of likenesses of the great seal of the United States, the seals of the President and Vice President, the seal of the United States Senate, the seal of the United States House of Representatives, and the seal of the United States Congress | U.S. Code | US Law | LII / Legal Information Institute (cornell.edu)

    (a)Whoever knowingly displays any printed or other likeness of the great seal of the United States, or of the seals of the President or the Vice President of the United States, or the seal of the United States Senate, or the seal of the United States House of Representatives, or the seal of the United States Congress, or any facsimile thereof, in, or in connection with, any advertisement, poster, circular, book, pamphlet, or other publication, public meeting, play, motion picture, telecast, or other production, or on any building, monument, or stationery, for the purpose of conveying, or in a manner reasonably calculated to convey, a false impression of sponsorship or approval by the Government of the United States or by any department, agency, or instrumentality thereof, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.

    (b)

    Whoever, except as authorized under regulations promulgated by the President and published in the Federal Register, knowingly manufactures, reproduces, sells, or purchases for resale, either separately or appended to any article manufactured or sold, any likeness of the seals of the President or Vice President, or any substantial part thereof, except for manufacture or sale of the article for the official use of the Government of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.
    [continues]

  78. https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/07/opinions/jeff-bezos-is-right-about-raising-taxes-mccaffery/index.html
     

    “There’s a time for everything, including to tax and spend. Jeff Bezos gets it. Wall Street does, too; Goldman Sachs and others have come out with tepid endorsements or at least muted criticisms of the proposed tax hike.
    Most congressional Republicans will still cry wolf, because that is the nature of congressional Republicans. But the wolves of Wall Street know better. If taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society, as Oliver Wendell Holmes once put it, it is well past time to get the richest corporations in the history of civilization to pay some fair share of them, before our civilization crumbles and collapses. Even the man with the most to lose agrees.”

  82. Head injury –
    I landed on my face  going  nearly 40 mph  on my Muerry 3 speed .
    I laid in the road  for an hour , then the bars closed , and I was saved .
    I once swan dived into pav
     

  89. I bought Gardener ‘s  plans  before the web.  And set about making my bike.
    A few years later , I was printing his stickers , and T-shirts . 
    My pay off ,  I printed his “Gold Rush” shirt .
    The world’s fastest bike.

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