We note the story that came out today, hot on the heels of Bush's pardon announcements of yesterday, that he has decided to revoke the pardon of Mr. Toussie, a convicted real-estate scammer from Long Island.  It came out in today's NYC papers that Toussie was being sued by literally hundreds of people who'd been defrauded by him.  They also reported that he'd only been convicted in 2003 and got a very light sentence - 5 months and no restitution - for his crimes, and that might not have met the "having completed your sentence more than 5 years ago" criterion for pardons.  Most importantly and most egregiously, though was the one thing everyone caught onto right off - that his father had made the first political contribution of his life beginning in April of this year, followed by the petition for pardon hitting the desks at DoJ (I originally typed D'Oh - go figure) in August of this year.

The contribution was some $28,500 and made to the Republican National Committee.

Turns out Toussie scammed Suffolk County out of $5 million along with all the homeowners he abused, on the way to becoming the largest landowner in Long Island.

I like the way the NY Daily News lead editorial characterized it:

either cheaply bought political favoritism or the work of a tone-deaf moron, Bush, and  "an example of why the U.S. electorate has been so desperate to foreclose on his presidency."

Well, the visions of Marc Rich (and payback for Marc Rich) dancing in pols' heads seem to have been short-lived.  Bush announced he's pulling Toussie's pardon back.  This raises two important questions: (1) can he do that, and (2) what effect will that have on his henchmen and their lust for pardons, not to mention the politics and optics for Obama.

The New York Times, as cited in Josh Marshall's piece over at TPM, states that Bush had sent a particular document, called a Master Warrant for Pardons, to the Pardon Attorney at DoJ, for the Pardon Attorney to execute.  This supposedly had all 19 pardons on it.  The story continues that the Pardon Attorney had not yet executed it and that the President had directed him not to execute it.

Ok.  The simple version would be: if a document is un-executed by the person who is supposed to execute it, it has no force and effect.  It is, in effect, a draft document which can be changed or modified without any legal rights or obligations arising at all.  It's no different than an unsigned contract, or an unsigned will, or an unsigned judgment.

Let's hope that where it is, and that that's where it ends.  Because if it goes further, it gets a lot more complicated, interesting and dangerous.  It's a nice, neutral principle everyone can agree on.

Of course, this being Bushworld, that is probably the last thing they want.

The first thing which makes this matter more interesting is this: that the pardon came to the President not through ordinary channels, but through Mr. Obstruction himself, White House Counsel Fred Fielding.  The Times reports:

    The White House said in a statement that the pardon had resulted from a recommendation from Fred F. Fielding, the White House counsel.
        "With respect to the case of Mr. Isaac R. Toussie, the counsel to the president reviewed the application and believed, based on the information known to him at the time, that it was a meritorious application," the statement said. "He so advised the president, who accepted the recommendation."

        In the statement, the White House said that the Justice Department's pardon attorney, Ronald L. Rodgers, had not made a recommendation in Mr. Toussie's case.

This raises a big red flag in my mind, for a lot of reasons I'll elaborate on.

First, the normal flow of pardons and commutations is supposed to be that a petition for a pardon goes to the Pardon Attorney.  (That gate was bypassed here.) If it's less than five years after the completion of sentence, it's too early and won't get looked at.  (That gate was bypassed here.)  Once it hits the Pardon Attorney's office, it is to be investigated by the Pardon Attorney's office.  This includes checking with the prosecutors who prosecuted the case, and to look at the case record and a myriad of other aspects, to determine whether to recommend a pardon, whether the person is sufficiently reformed, and a plethora of other issues.  (The only investigation here seems to have been meeting Fielding's approval.)

Needless to say, if there was litigation pending against the person seeking the pardon over the transactions or occurrences which led to the conviction, as appears to be the case here - and in spades - that litigation would necessarily have to have been looked at.  Again, that gate seems to have been bypassed.

But the Pardon Attorney was bypassed entirely on this one, it would seem, seeing as how the White House Counsel proposed it to the President.  I can only think of two other, similar events which played out this way.  The more recent was I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby's commutation of sentence.  The older one was Obama's AG Designate Holder pushing the March Rich pardon through the Clinton White House in much the same way - bypassing the Pardon Attorney and getting it under the President's nose.  

So, it would seem, someone with a lot of juice managed to get in touch with the right person, who managed to get it under the President's nose.  Being the largest landowner in Long Island tells me you've likely got that kind of access.

Libby's case was pretty much sui generis, but one has to remember that it was a political exercise.  At the time, I diaried that Libby - and his knowledge -  had successfully blackmailed the President and Vice-President and made Bush and the USG his b*tches).  In