ROGER STONE

ROGER STONE

2019 and 2020 in the Years of Our Lord:

— — In January 2019, Special Counsel Robert Mueller indicted Roger Stone with one count of obstruction, five counts of false statements, and one count of witness tampering.

— — Federal prosecutors said Stone attempted to undermine the Mueller investigation in order to protect President Donald Trump; Stone had been found guilty of all seven charges brought against him on November 15, 2019.

— — U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson sentenced Stone on Thursday, February 20, 2020 to forty months in prison.

— — President Donald Trump officially commuted the prison sentence of Stone on Friday, July 10, 2020

— — Trump pardoned Stone on Wednesday, December 23, 2020

A president’s pardon authority under the Constitution is expansive, and ordinarily not subject to the approval of any other part of government.

Some scholars of the law have argued that the corrupt use of the pardon power — for example, in response to a bribe, or to obstruct justice — is, in fact a crime, but there has been no formal legal precedent to either support or challenge this thesis.

Historically, the small number of presidential pardons granted to those who had not been convicted, were dispensed in an effort to help tamp down a controversial national event — like the Vietnam War or the Nixon presidency — and put it behind the country.

Presidents have made extensive use of clemency power in their final days in office, sometimes benefiting political allies or people close to them.

After losing re-election in 1992, President George H. W. Bush pardoned former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and five others, targeted by prosecutors in the Iran-contra scandal.

It seemed Bush was convinced that a new indictment against Weinberger, questioning the president’s account of his own actions, issued days before the election, helped seal his defeat.

The independent counsel, Lawrence E. Walsh, accused Mr. Bush of a “cover-up.”

On Bill Clinton’s last day in office in 2001, he pardoned or commuted the sentences of more than 175 people, including his half-brother Roger Clinton, who had been convicted on drug charges, and his former Whitewater business partner Susan H. McDougal, who was locked up for refusing to cooperate with Ken Starr’s team investigating the president.

[Sidebar: Ken Starr: another beaut; see Baylor University, circa 2010–2016.]

Clinton came under especially sharp criticism for his pardon of Marc Rich, a financier who fled the United States to avoid tax charges, and whose ex-wife donated generously to Mr. Clinton’s future presidential library.

Such actions were characterized — and chastised — as abuses of power, and in Mr. Clinton’s case, even investigated for evidence of wrongdoing.

Fast forward to one Donald J. Trump, who went hog-wild with respect to abusing his pardon and commutation power, doling out clemency as if he was tossing confetti.

Michael Flynn.

Paul Manafort.

Charles Kushner.

Duncan D. Hunter.

Margaret Hunter.

Trump’s use of his powers to grant clemency to allies and supporters — of the first wave of his 65 pardons and commutations, 60 went to petitioners with a personal link to Mr. Trump, or to his political backers — drew widespread ire, even from some Republicans, remarkably enough.

Volunteered Senator Ben Sasse (R-Nebraska) at the time, “This is rotten to the core.”

Then there is the case of Roger J. Stone Jr., who was convicted in 2019 on seven counts of lying to Congress under oath, witness tampering, and obstructing the House inquiry into possible Trump campaign coordination with Russia.

You wanna talk, ‘rotten to the core?’

Roger Jason Stone is an American conservative political consultant, lobbyist and felon.

Since the 1970s, Stone has worked on the campaigns of Republican politicians, including Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Jack Kemp, Bob Dole, George W. Bush, Tom Kean and Trump.

In addition to frequently serving as a campaign advisor, in 1980 he co-founded a D.C.-based lobbying firm with Manafort, among others, and built it into a powerhouse in the field, leveraging its White House connections to attract high-paying clients — U.S. corporations and trade associations as well as foreign governments.

Stone is the poster boy for self-aggrandisement.

He is a self-proclaimed “dirty trickster,” a moniker steeped in personal history.

“It’s rare,” he told the New Yorker in 2008, “that I’m accused of something that I’m not guilty of.”

“Admit nothing, deny everything, launch counterattack.”

“The only thing worse in politics than being wrong is being boring.”

“Politics is not about uniting people. It’s about dividing people. And getting your fifty-one percent.”

“Attack, attack attack — never defend.”

The media has portrayed him as everything from a “state-of-the-art sleazeball” to a dangerous conspirator.

And most of whatever else represents the unflattering, lurking in between.

Stone’s response?

“I revel in your hatred, because if I weren’t effective you wouldn’t hate me.”

The man has no shame.

As for being a ‘dirty trickster’ and his personal history, the 50-year Republican operative has long treated politics and campaigning as a battle to be won at any cost.

As a junior in high school and vice-president of the student government, he forced out the president and succeeded him.

“I built alliances and put all my serious challengers on my ticket,” he told the New York Times in 1999.

“Then I recruited the most unpopular guy in the school to run against me.

You think that’s mean? No, it’s smart.”

Notably, Stone has remained an unapologetic Nixon supporter to this day.

Perfectly consistent with his character — or lack of same.

After working for Nixon’s campaign in the 1970s, he maintained a close relationship with the president and regularly dined with him at his Saddle River, N.J. home, during the years following his resignation.

He has a tattoo of the 37th president’s face on his back.

He represents the less discussed but still vigorous legacy of Nixon, whose politics reflected a curious and interesting admixture of anti-Communism, social moderation and tactical thuggery.

Stone has maintained that Trump shares an important characteristic with Nixon — tenacity laced with hate.

It was his preoccupation with ‘toughness’ that led to his enduring affection for Nixon.

“The reason I’m a Nixonite is because of his indestructibility and resilience,” Stone said.

“He never quit. His whole career was all built around his personal resentment of elitism. It was the poor-me syndrome.

John F. Kennedy’s father bought him his House seat, his Senate seat, and the Presidency.

No one bought Nixon anything.

Nixon resented that.

He was very class-conscious. He identified with the people who ate TV dinners, watched Lawrence Welk, and loved their country.”

Look where it got ’em.

All of ’em.

And it wasn’t always lovey-dovey between Stone and Trump.

In 2008, Trump called Stone a “stone-cold loser,” — I’m certain there was no intended pun — telling the New Yorker that, “he always takes credit for things he never did.”

Trump also disapproved of a 2007 ploy linked to Stone, related to his unyielding desire to humiliate former N.Y. Attorney General and Governor Eliot Spitzer, a form of entertainment to him.

“I thought Spitzer was [a] punk, and I wanted to fuck with him any way I could,” he boasted.

Taunting Spitzer’s 83-year-old father in a profanity-laden message left on the man’s office answering machine regarding a possible investigation of loans made by the elder Spitzer to his son’s campaigns, the call was easily traced to Stone’s wife’s telephone.

‘Deny, deny…’ didn’t cut it.

As a result of the controversy, Stone had to relinquish his position with the State Senate Republicans.

Offered Trump at the time, “They caught Roger red-handed lying. What he did was ridiculous and stupid.

I lost respect for Eliot Spitzer when he didn’t sue Roger Stone for doing that to his father, who is a wonderful man.”

Suffice to say that Stone reveled in Spitzer’s surprise March 2008 resignation in the wake of a prostitution scandal, taking all the credit he could.

Typical.

“I like English tailoring, I like Italian shoes.

[He prefers going sockless.]

I like French wine. I like vodka martinis with an olive, please. I like to keep physically fit.”

I happen to like some of those things too.

I also like looking in the mirror and being satisfied with my reflection.

Good luck with that, Roger Stone.

Then again, he’s been a bit of a pompous, self-absorbed delusional faker, gazing into a circus mirror, for nearly 69 years.

[Editor’s Note: This piece was written by Mr. Kaplan in February 2021.]