1. On his way out the door, the Kentucky governor issues 428 pardons. One appears suspect – like it might reflect favoritism to supporter's family. Yet the journalists write an article amplifying pro-carceral voices designed to disparage the whole lot.
2. For far too long reporters have depicted clemency – once UTTERLY COMMONPLACE in virtually every state in America – as *presumptively illegitimate.
3. This journalistic approach to clemency is utterly wrongheaded. Clemency is a core gubernatorial function and absolutely central to the proper functioning of any sane criminal justice system. In this sense reporters have helped to fuel mass incarceration.
4. I might add, if, as it appears, favoritism for a donor's family did play a role in ONE of the Kentucky governor's pardons, that would make it consistent with EVERY OTHER ASPECT of contemporary American governance which is bought and paid for by wealthy donors.
5. That doesn't make the one apparently suspect pardon right, but we seem to tolerate that kind of corruption in every other function of governance, so I would caution against seeing it as a failure of the pardon power. It is not. It is a failure of contemporary governance.
6. And the above trash article – which uses a broad brush to paint the governor's 400+ pardons as illegitimate because of one apparently suspect one – is cheap, simplistic and unserious. It is just amplifying pro-carceral politics, not journalism in any meaningful sense.
7. Finally I would ask reporters – and Americans. In a nation that over-punishes people by the millions, why is so much singular outrage directed at the unicorns – the rare case where someone goes improperly under-punished.
