Anthony Levandowski Pardoned • Hacker News Board

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#731

Post by anonu » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:26 PM UTC

simonh wrote: post #417

WalterBright wrote: post #111

It's important to note the reason the President has the power to pardon anyone for any reason is it's one of the checks and balances, the Constitution is full of them. It's meant as a check to blunt overzealous prosecutions. Note that the President does not have the corresponding power to convict anyone. An interesting set of pardons was when Andrew Johnson pardoned all the rebels in the Confederacy, including Jeffer…

Sorry to break it to you, but as with many things in the US constitution, the reason the President can pardon people is because it's a modified copy of the British constitutional system of the time. The House is Parliament, the Senate is the House of Lords, and the president can pardon people because King George III could and the office of the presidency is a limited term elected kingship. Executive orders are Royal…

> it's one of the checks and balances

> it's a modified copy of the British constitutional system. [...] Executive orders are Royal decrees

Those things are not mutually exclusive. In other words, sure, you can look at the latest batch of pardons and think they are overzealous - but it doesn't mean the action does not have place in the US checks & balances system.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#732

Post by boringg » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:27 PM UTC

lokar wrote: post #649

perfmode wrote: post #605

Earlier quoted context omitted.

link?

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/17/us/politics/trump-pardons... Sorry, it was 100k, 50 up front: "A onetime top adviser to the Trump campaign was paid $50,000 to help seek a pardon for John Kiriakou, a former C.I.A. officer convicted of illegally disclosing classified information, and agreed to a $50,000 bonus if the president granted it, according to a copy of an agreement." And this is not to trump, but rather to h…

I also heard that Rudy's aide float $2M ... it's got to be the aides/close confidents who were trying to milk power.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#733

Post by fleshdaddy » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:27 PM UTC

mlazos wrote: post #653

staunch wrote: post #541

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The blame for what he was forced to do belongs with the officials that were violating the constitution. They should be exiled for failing to uphold their oaths. Instead, Snowden is in exile. Snowden was just the first honorable American to come across the information and he did his best to expose it safely, by giving it to journalists to release, after consulting with the government. We can't expect whistle blowers t…

HN loves Snowden so much it makes no sense to me. He could’ve gone to the Senate/House intelligence committees, and not been in trouble. Worst case nothing would’ve gotten done, but since they were lied to, I don’t think he would’ve been ignored.

Your comment displays a bit of naivety on how power structures work in this country. There’s a reason thousands of people knew about these programs, including his superiors, and it took Snowden going to the press. You believe a no name, low level, intelligence contractor can just walk into the intelligence committee and tell them they’re spying on their own people? The same committee that despite knowing about it know hasn’t made serious efforts to curtail these operations? I might have a bridge to sell you.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#734

Post by libria » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:28 PM UTC

simonh wrote: post #417

WalterBright wrote: post #111

It's important to note the reason the President has the power to pardon anyone for any reason is it's one of the checks and balances, the Constitution is full of them. It's meant as a check to blunt overzealous prosecutions. Note that the President does not have the corresponding power to convict anyone. An interesting set of pardons was when Andrew Johnson pardoned all the rebels in the Confederacy, including Jeffer…

Sorry to break it to you, but as with many things in the US constitution, the reason the President can pardon people is because it's a modified copy of the British constitutional system of the time. The House is Parliament, the Senate is the House of Lords, and the president can pardon people because King George III could and the office of the presidency is a limited term elected kingship. Executive orders are Royal…

Origins for the creation of a practice need not be the reasons it continues to exist today, unless we're mindless lemmings just copying what every previous administration did. (That may well be the case though)

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#735

Post by amanaplanacanal » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:28 PM UTC

imbnwa wrote: post #647

simonh wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry to break it to you, but as with many things in the US constitution, the reason the President can pardon people is because it's a modified copy of the British constitutional system of the time. The House is Parliament, the Senate is the House of Lords, and the president can pardon people because King George III could and the office of the presidency is a limited term elected kingship. Executive orders are Royal…

Constitution also grants the power to suspend the constitution

I thought I’d read the constitution, but I don’t remember that. Where is it?

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#736

Post by rat87 » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:28 PM UTC

heelix wrote: post #651

pavlov wrote: post #402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last night Trump also revoked his own 2017 executive order that prevented federal administration officials from becoming lobbyists after leaving government: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-lobbying-execu... This had been one of his only practical actions towards keeping his campaign promise of "draining the swamp."

The nice thing about executive orders is they can be added by the next guy. Would be nice to see this as actual law, and not an executive order -- but if Trump cancels anything on his last day, Biden can re-do it on his first day.

But it won't apply to former Trump administration workers. That's the point, I'm sure Biden will have a better ethics policy but it can't be retroactive

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#737

Post by tsycho » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

thesausageking wrote: post #583

NelsonMinar wrote: post #519

It's weird to see the Republican party embrace intellectual property theft. Levandowski stole from his employer and his colleagues at Google to enrich himself at Uber. Why would that possibly be worth a pardon?

They're not justifying it. Thiel was a big supporter of Trump and lobbied to get Levandowski a pardon, so Trump is returning the favor.

What's Thiel getting out of it though? How does pardoning Levandowski help him?

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#738

Post by jshevek » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

sn_master wrote: post #587

NelsonMinar wrote: post #519

It's weird to see the Republican party embrace intellectual property theft. Levandowski stole from his employer and his colleagues at Google to enrich himself at Uber. Why would that possibly be worth a pardon?

I can say similar things about many of the Obama pardons, but I'll get downvoted into oblivion if I do so. Pardon is by definition an admission of guilt, and Levandowski has already paid a steep price for what he did.

You may be correct, but complaining that you will be down voted often leads to additional downvotes.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#739

Post by rat87 » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

zzleeper wrote: post #440

pavlov wrote: post #402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last night Trump also revoked his own 2017 executive order that prevented federal administration officials from becoming lobbyists after leaving government: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-lobbying-execu... This had been one of his only practical actions towards keeping his campaign promise of "draining the swamp."

I wonder how all the Trump supporters on HNs (maybe 30% or so of commenters, no idea about lurkers) are reacting to this. Levadowski pardon, the spy, the swamp, etc.

I mean Trump has always been incredibly corrupt, way more corrupt then "old washington"

Drain the Swamp simply meant get rid of anyone against Trump, including goverment ethics watchdogs

Re: Anthony Levandowski Pardoned

#740

Post by war1025 » Wed, Jan 20, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

freewilly1040 wrote: post #691

ISL wrote: post #506

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I strongly disagree. A check and balance has been on great display in recent weeks. A President has stated, "the election was a fraud, I should get another term". Congress has stated, "the election was correct. Moreover, we may choose to prevent you from holding office ever again." The judiciary agrees. That Congress is likely to deadlock is arguably a feature, not a bug. (That voters don't demand better from their c…

> Is adding states too easy? There are three million US citizens in Puerto Rico without representation in Congress. "Statehood is too easy" is probably the wrong critique. The problem is that there is not clear enough guidelines for enforcing some criteria for what constitutes a new state. Thus we have a false positive like Wyoming, which shouldn't be a state with its minuscule population, and we a false negative in…

> don't think the original senate had states that had 80X the representation by population, as we have today between CA and WY.

I would argue the "false-positive" state that in this case is California.

Imagine if the entire Eastern seaboard was divided into three States. That would be equally imbalanced.