by Marie-Therese Belisle Nweke
Monday, December 2, 2024 at 3:46 PM
During the four years that President Donald Trump was in the White House, he granted 237 acts of clemency, which included 143 pardons and 94 commutations. These created some controversy due to their nature. Those benefitting from Trump’s largesse either had “a personal or political connection to the president”. He was also accused of circumventing the formal process through which clemency requests are typically considered.
One of those pardoned was his daughter’s father-in-law, Charles Kushner, who, among his various crimes, was also guilty of witness tampering in the most despicable manner. Kushner, who is Jewish, was also disbarred from practicing law by three states after spending time in a federal jail for two years. Now, Trump has just named his ex-jail-bird in-law as America’s ambassador to France, a leading NATO and EU nation and a permanent member of the UN Security Council.
With no apparent thought of history, Trump has ignored the fact that this position was once held by the revered inventor and scientist, Benjamin Franklin, and also by Thomas Jefferson — America’s third president and the writer of the draft of the Declaration of American Independence. Both men are among the seven Founding Fathers of the US.
President Joe Biden has just pardoned his son, Hunter, in the nick of time, thus saving him from going to jail. Hunter Biden’s sentencing was to be in a fortnight’s time, that is, December 12. Previously, Biden did say that if his son were to be given a jail sentence, he would not pardon him. Well, he has prevented him from being the first child of a sitting American president to go to jail with this pardon. Until now, Biden had granted just 26 pardons.
As for the cases and sentencing concerning Donald Trump, who is the first convicted felon to become president of the USA, all these have been swept aside recently and are now in frozen mode. As farfetched as it may seem, no one should be taken aback when Trump pardons himself while in the oval office.
Americans often sing this patriotic song and invocation written by Irving Berlin and released in 1939. When I was a youngster growing up in Old Belize, it also used to be sung by PUP faithfuls at political meetings in Belize City, as well as during PUP marches through Belize City. This was because George Price, the PUP’s legendary leader, was particularly anti-British and far better disposed to America. Price, a devout Catholic and former Catholic seminarian, had among his friends Jesuit priests in Belize who were generally Irish, German and Italian Americans who traditionally are no lovers of the English. The Irving Berlin song is:
“God bless America,
Land that I love,
Stand beside her and guide her Through the night with a light from above;
From the mountains, to the prairies,
To the oceans white with foam,
God bless America,
My home, sweet home.
God bless America,
My home, sweet home…”
But how can anyone honestly expect blessings in the face of double standards, a two-tier justice system—when “Lady Justice” is supposed to be “blind”, but there is a sense of self entitlement and exceptionalism? All these are in stark relief for the world to see! The American living in the Projects in New York, or even in Chicago’s Gold Coast, who has no strings to pull in the White House, or within the corridors of power, is more than pitifully aware today that there are two Americas. One, where only the very well-connected or the wealthy, or both, can break every law in the book, and still continue to fly sky high. And, then there is this other America, where, because you are a nobody, and do not know those who are the movers and shakers, the law will indeed deal with you and mightily too.