January 20, 2025
Biden Issues Last-Minute Pardons
As of noon today, Joe Biden is no longer president. On his way out, Biden issued pre-emptive pardons to people like members of the January 6th select committee, some of his extended family, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley, and Dr. Anthony Fauci. He expressly declared that the pardons were not any sort of admission of guilt or crimes committed, but an attempt to shield them from any sort of retribution from his successor. In a statement, Biden said, “These public servants have served our nation with honor and distinction and do not deserve to be the targets of unjustified and politically motivated prosecutions.”
For his family, Biden issued pardons to his siblings, James Biden, Frank Biden, and Valerie Biden Owens, as well as their spouses, again to protect them from potential politically-motivated hounding. “My family has been subjected to unrelenting attacks and threats, motivated solely by a desire to hurt me — the worst kind of partisan politics,” Biden said. “Unfortunately, I have no reason to believe these attacks will end.”
Biden also commuted the life sentence for Native American activist Leonard Peltier, who has been imprisoned for nearly half a century for the 1975 killings of two FBI agents. Peltier, who is 80 years old and has maintained his innocence, has been in declining health in recent years, and will spend his remaining days in home confinement.
Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day
I can’t think of much else to write today, so I’ll close with quotes from the man whose name adorns this date in the calendar: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
“The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically.”
“You must decide to speak for yourself; nobody else can speak for you.”
We cannot preserve self without being concerned about preserving other selves.”
Be good to yourselves and the people around you, my friends.
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