The Queen of England, Great Britain, Northern Ireland, Canada, and a host of other nice places, is legally sovereign over her realm. She is not bound by any laws, because she is the personal embodiment of the law.
The United States forcibly left the realm in 1776. Their first President faced a choice – try to govern as a defacto monarch, becoming a president for life and setting up his progeny to govern, or be a true republican and step aside when his time was done.
George Washington was the greatest man of his age. When tempted by the allure of perpetual power as a president/king, he stepped aside and let other men govern, setting a precedent for democratic transition that stands to this day. How many lesser men have failed their countries when faced with the same choice in the centuries since then?
President Trump now claims that he is free to pardon himself. To be clear – he is saying that, even if he is the target of a criminal investigation, relating to any activity whatsoever, whether before he came to public office or while in public office, he may simply declare that he is immune from criminal prosecution.
One suspects that if Hillary Clinton had won the election and was being charged with a range of offences relating to her illegal e-mail usage while she was the Secretary of State, Trump would be leading the charge for her full prosecution, and loudly proclaiming that any assertion on her behalf that she could pardon herself as president was an affront to freedom itself! But Clinton did not win, and she is not under criminal investigation. In Trump’s world of Trumpian Exceptionalism, one suspects that his claim to be able to pardon himself as president is unique to him alone. Of course no one else would have this authority, especially a Clinton! (Yes...this sounds nuts…read his Tweets.)
The problem with a president who can pardon himself or herself is obvious. Such a power would place any president beyond the reach of the law – much like the Queen of England, who does understand her role requires that she obey the law. It would be the essential foundation for any evolution in the United States from an office of the president to an office of the new president/monarch.
How many sick sycophants in the US media and academia will hear the clarion call of tyranny emanating from the White House, and rush to the barricades to defend this president’s power to render himself immune from the force of law?
Too many.
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