If Mark Rich was a Clinton hater like Richard Melon Scaife, he would not be a fugitive today, and that is the only scandal that reasonable people see. To be sure, there are thousands of worthy pardon candidates in the United States who did not receive any attention at all, and given the time, there is no reason to believe that a workaholic like Bill Clinton would have acknowledged every single one of them. In retrospect, pardoning Marc Rich was a courageous and independent decision which has clearly betrayed the hypocricy and ignorance at the heart of every so-called Clinton scandal. Former President Bill Clinton is currently being denounced because the decision to pardon Marc Rich was made on the merits rather than upon the delusions that reside in the minds of people like Dan Burton and Arlen Specter, and that makes President Clinton look very good indeed. And now that Attorney General John Ashcroft welcomes and encourages these delusions, the worst fears of Ashcroft's critics have proven to be legitimate concerns and Janet Reno's capacity to restrain the abuse of Justice Department power, is already missed.
History is the only memory that maintains objectivity.
President Bill Clinton was denied the opportunity to pardon victims like Jim McDougal, and in the context of this anti-Clinton Inquisition, the pardon of Marc Rich was essentially poetic justice. To be sure, Marc Rich is called a traitor, but he minded his own business when Republican operatives like Bill Casey were in Iran, delaying the release of American hostages for the sake of denying President Carter the opportunity to claim the credit. The non-stop media campaign which seeks establish the fact that Marc Rich is the unpardonable traitor from hell has certainly dominated the news, but these are the same people who have been calling Bill Clinton a traitor since the day he entered the White House. To be sure, when Republicans seek to create the impression that they are objective, they quote Democrats who echo the charge that Marc Rich is an unpardonable bum. They should be careful.