Mercy . . . the right gift for the right people

"I didn't meet with Larry King
either when he came down
for it. I watched his interview
with [Tucker], though.
He asked her real difficult
questions, like, 'What would
you say to Governor Bush?'"

"What was her answer?"
I wonder.

"Please," Bush whimpers,
his lips pursed in mock
desperation, "don't kill me."


IT COULD NOT BE MORE OBVIOUS that -- to the Bush Administration and to those who shape our society -- the application of mercy is wholly dependent on who you were before you did the crime, not the person you become in its wake.

I guess it takes a "fine Christian man" in the White House to really turn the gospel on its head.

Lewis "Scooter" Libby was chief of staff to Vice-President Dick Cheney, and he got caught lying like a rug to those investigating who brought then-CIA spy Valerie Plame in from the cold. Through no choice of her own, nor of the CIA.

After Libby's trial, conviction and 30-month sentence, President Bush now has decided that's too tough for "the right kind" of miscreant. Scooter was loyal. Scooter was urbane. Scooter's a lawyer. Scooter was on the case of Bush's enemies. Scooter did his and Cheney's dirty work.

Said the president:

Mr. Libby was sentenced to thirty months of prison, two years of probation, and a $250,000 fine. In making the sentencing decision, the district court rejected the advice of the probation office, which recommended a lesser sentence and the consideration of factors that could have led to a sentence of home confinement or probation.

I respect the jury's verdict. But I have concluded that the prison sentence given to Mr. Libby is excessive. Therefore, I am commuting the portion of Mr. Libby's sentence that required him to spend thirty months in prison.

My decision to commute his prison sentence leaves in place a harsh punishment for Mr. Libby. The reputation he gained through his years of public service and professional work in the legal community is forever damaged. His wife and young children have also suffered immensely. He will remain on probation. The significant fines imposed by the judge will remain in effect. The consequences of his felony conviction on his former life as a lawyer, public servant, and private citizen will be long-lasting.

ON THE OTHER HAND, death is a lot longer lasting.

Karla Faye Tucker, after spending one day in 1983 getting stoned out of her mind, went with a couple of biker friends to steal her ex-lover's motorcycle. In the attempt, she helped kill the guy and his girlfriend with a pickax.

A jury convicted Tucker and Danny Garrett. They got death. Only Karla Faye Tucker lived long enough in prison to face her execution date.

Funny thing happened on the way to the lethal injection, though. In 1985, Karla Faye Tucker found Jesus in prison. And she spent the next 12 years praising God, witnessing to inmates and . . . becoming a preacher's wife.

She married the prison chaplain by proxy.

NOW, NO ONE WANTED to give Karla Faye Tucker a "Get Out of Jail Free" card like "Scooter" Libby got. All anyone wanted -- including Tucker -- was for her not to die, but instead spend life in jail.

Maybe it would have worked out better for her that fateful day in 1998 if she had been a Bible-thumping daughter of privilege before she got doped up and picked up that pickax, instead of a drugged-out biker chick who had been abused as a child and escaped to become a rock 'n' roll groupie. Before she became a biker chick.

To "the right kind of people" -- especially in Washington -- if you're born poor white trash and find Jesus, that merely bumps you up to "poor, uneducated and easy to command." And if you find Jesus on death row, that barely bumps you up to some politician's phony expression of regret when the warden kills your ass, already.

Kind of like this one, from Texas Gov. George W. Bush:

When I was sworn in as the governor of Texas I took an oath of office to uphold the laws of our state, including the death penalty. My responsibility is to ensure our laws are enforced fairly and evenly without preference or special treatment.

Many people have contacted my office about this execution. I respect the strong convictions which have prompted some to call for mercy and others to emphasize accountability and consequences.

Like many touched by this case, I have sought guidance through prayer. I have concluded judgment about the heart and soul of an individual on death row are best left to a higher authority. . . .

The state must make sure each individual sentenced to death has opportunity for access to the court and a thorough legal review. The courts, including the United States Supreme Court, have reviewed the legal issues in this case, and therefore I will not grant a 30-day stay.

May God bless Karla Faye Tucker and may God bless her victims and their families.

WHAT BUSH MEANT TO SAY, he said to Tucker Carlson the next year during his presidential campaign, in a now-infamous interview for Talk magazine:

Bush's brand of forthright `tough-guy` populism can be appealing, and it has played well in Texas. Yet occasionally there are flashes of meanness visible beneath it. While driving back from the speech later that day, Bush mentions Karla Faye Tucker, a double murderer who was executed in Texas last year. In the weeks before the execution, Bush says, Bianca Jagger and a number of other protesters came to Austin to demand clemency for Tucker. "Did you meet with any of them?" I ask.

Bush whips around and stares at me. "No, I didn't meet with any of them," he snaps, as though I've just asked the dumbest, most offensive question ever posed. "I didn't meet with Larry King either when he came down for it. I watched his interview with [Tucker], though. He asked her real difficult questions, like, 'What would you say to Governor Bush?'"

"What was her answer?" I wonder.

"Please," Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, "don't kill me."

I must look shocked - ridiculing the pleas of a condemned prisoner who has since been executed seems odd and cruel, even for someone as militantly anticrime as Bush – because he immediately stops smirking. "It's tough stuff," Bush says, suddenly somber, "but my job is to enforce the law." As it turns out, the Larry King- Karla Faye Tucker exchange Bush recounted never took place, at least not on television. During her interview with King, however, Tucker did imply that Bush was succumbing to `election-year` pressure from `pro-death` penalty voters. Apparently Bush forgot it. He has a long memory for slights.

APART FROM NAZI WAR CRIMINALS and al Qaida terrorists, what kind of man mocks a dead person? A dead person whose doom he sealed.

A man we elected president, that's who.

I never forgot that interview because it troubled me so at the time. Obviously, it didn't trouble me enough -- I voted for Bush twice.

I thought about casting a protest vote both times. I didn't, because I -- and people like me -- thought Bush was The Lesser Evil (TM) and that the ends justified the means, so long as the ends involved outlawing abortion someday.

That's what so many of us Christians have been about in casting our votes, you know, though we won't admit it. The ends justifying the means.

WE HOLD OUR NOSES and tell ourselves comforting lies, and then we start to warp our faith to ease our conscience. The sadist who mocked an executed sister in Christ? "He's pro-life."

The guy who won't "uphold the law" on immigration if that's going to hurt the bottom line of the captains of industry? "He's pro-life."

The enabler of "enhanced interrogation methods"? "He's pro-life. And 9/11 happened."

The guy who started a war because . . . I'll have to get back to you on that one. . . . "He's pro-life. And 9/11 happened."

George W. Bush, as it turns out, is merely "pro-the-right-kind-of-life." Silver-spoon-sucking life like his . . . and "Scooter" Libby's.

Karla Faye Tucker could just go to hell. And so can we. We who are ass-deep and sinking in all those means we ignored in our holy quest for still-unrealized ends.