Pardon Me?

 There are rumors that Trump is going to throw pardons around like paper towels in a disaster zone. Meanwhile, sentient herpes sore, Matt Gaetz, has suggested Trump self-pardon in order to own the libs.

Presidential pardons are largely unchecked, except by violations of state law. Trump can't pardon people who have been convicted or indicted for state crimes. That includes himself. The NY Attorney General apparently has charges ready to go, but so does the Southern District of the US Attorney General's office. Pardoning Flynn, Stone, Manafort and others is - sadly - within the president's power. 

When creating the pardon power, the Framers suggested that if a president were to pardon those close to him, who were possibly co-conspirators or witnesses against him, that would be worthy of impeachment. If the past 25 years have taught us anything, it's that impeachment is functionally dead as a means of controlling an outlaw presidency. Whether Congress could pass and Biden could sign a bill preventing presidents from pardoning people in their own orbits and then have it pass constitutional muster is an open question. This is yet another example of Trump violating norms that have proven to be insufficient to restrain an out-of-control executive. Any bill limiting the pardon power could not be applied retroactively to Trump, but it's still worth doing.

Self-pardoning is quite likely to fail, but you would hate to wager whether Roberts, Gorsuch and either Barrett or Kavanaugh would embrace a decision that might result in a GOP President facing legal jeopardy. In Trump's case, self-pardoning would also be pre-emptive pardoning, since he's not been indicted or convicted of anything. Yet. However, pardons for his brood and minions are on the table.

It's Gaetz's hackery that deserves commentary, because it's a pure distillation of what the Republican Party has become. Gaetz is arguing that everything - including the objective commission of crimes - is a partisan issue. Trump shouldn't pardon people because there has been a miscarriage of justice or a penalty out of proportion to the crime. He should do it because liberals are mean stinkypants. 

That's it. That's the reason.

The President of the United States should take his one really monarchical power and abuse it to anger those who want to see lawbreakers brought to justice. The same party caterwauling about law and order when the window of a Starbucks gets shattered wants Trump to pardon people who actively embezzled millions, worked with America's enemies and committed sundry acts of fraud that have crippled the efficacy of the American state and robbed taxpayers.

The Republican Party once billed itself as the "Party of Ideas." That was 40 years ago, and that idea was mostly immiserating the poor and minorities to feed the rich. Nowadays, they can't even claim that.