Posted on 12/02/2009 3:23:20 PM PST by TheFreedomPoster
The senseless and savage slaying of 4 police officers in Lakewood, Washington has raised many questions as to why the alleged murderer was even on the streets. My name has figured prominently in many of the stories because I commuted his 108 year sentence to a term of 47 years back in 2000. I take full responsibility for my decision then. Unfortunately, many of my fellow conservatives don’t seem to want to take responsibility for the facts surrounding the case.
The Maurice Clemmons presented in a commutation request in the year 2000 was much different than the one who is being sought for the killings of the police officers. The case before me was of a 16 year old who received a disproportionate sentence of 108 years for burglary and robbery charges. He had already served 11 years in Arkansas prison by that time, which is more time actually served than most similar cases would have netted in sentencing alone.
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So he's going to pay to raise all the kids and pay the bills for the widows?
What’s relevent is the fact that he is an egalitarian socialist liar. He is a close friend to Bill Clinton, and definitely more liberal; Clinton refused to parole the killer, after Huck commuted the sentence, making him eligible.
The more the silver tongued snake says, the more he shows his true twisted serpintine character. Little wonder politicans are so disliked. His corrupt, convoluted logic is beyond description.
I can only speak for myself; I think he is a huckster. His conservatism (or lack of it) is unimportant. Wouldn’t trust him as far as I could throw him, although I would like to give that a try.
Give it up, Huck. Your talking too much.
Yes, he very much is a huckster, to put it lightly.
“It’s starting to make me wonder if Free Republic is not what I thought.”
What did you think FR was? It is not the RNC.
It is apparently in the Newspeak lexicon that when cops and soldiers are murdered, it’s a ‘tragedy’, but when abortionists are murdered, it’s an ‘outrage’. Sad to see Huckabee subscribing to Newspeak; it can only mean that he’s gone over.
Huck really liked him, before he didn’t.
Yes its a large pitch fork used on the farm!!
Now if only Mitt Romney would go away.
I am not a Huckabee fan, but based on the original convictions, the perps age at the time of the original sentencing and the fact that his murders of the four cops was nine years later, Huckabee is not mainly to blame for the events of last week. There were LOTS of people who screwed up in handling him in the nine years after the commutation.
On the other hand, it would have helpd his credibility if he had not referred to himself as a conservative.
You can tell it really pains him to see his Presidential aspirations go down the toilet. He wanted this SOOO bad.
Bye bye, Huckabubba!
According to what Huckabee said on O’Reilly the other night, Clemmons’ actual release from prison came when someone else failed to file the paperwork which might have prevented it. Huckabee erred in judgment and deserves some of the blame, but I would put more on the judges in Washington state who let Clemmons out on low bail recently.
Someone needs to take the Dukakis in the tank picture and substitute Mike Huckabee.
I’d have a LOT more respect for Huckabee if, instead of trying to justify his tragic error in judgement, he said something like, “I made a horrible mistake. I let a maniac out of prison and he murdered 4 police officers. I was trying to be ‘compassionate’, but looking back, I was foolish, and my foolishness has caused unspeakable pain to many people. I humbly beg your forgiveness.”
The fact that hs is justifying his outrageous decision indicates that, if given the opportunity, he would make similar foolish decisions, that would cost more innocent lives.
To read this arrogant, self-serving piece, you’d think those “conservative talkers” were responsible for the murder of the police officers.
You’re right. Not much conservatism or intellectual honesty on display on this thread.
We're pretty up front around here. This is a conservative website dedicated to promoting conservative causes and conservative activism. It's not that Huckabee isn't conservative enough, it's that he's not conservative at all.
But it appears that the Huckster had you fooled.
As for the excuses, that this poor boy was sentenced to a longer term than adults would be, why commute the sentence to 47 years? Why not just free the young man who'd been in jail for 11 years? Could it be because the young man, before he was convicted of the crimes that netted him 108 years, had a long, violent juvvie record?
It is Christian to forgive the sinner and condemn the sin. For me, forgiveness can only come when he accepts what his actions did, that he, alone, stands responsible for that young man being let out of prison in the first place. No other power in the state had the ability to retroactively change the prison sentence, and the Huckster's action set in motion the chain of events that resulted in at least five more deaths.
There's a lot of blame to be shared, however. He was paroled, not once, but twice. He was let out on bail, at least once, possibly twice, the last time a scant week before the killings.
But none of these other people would have had the opportunity to make these bad decisions if the Huckster hadn't first commuted the sentence. And just as we'd blame a judge if they overturned a decision of a jury and a sentencing judge, we blame the Huckster for what he has done.
There is only one person responsible for these horrific crimes, and that’s Clemmons.
“If I could’ve known nine years ago, looked into the future, would I have acted favorably upon the parole board’s recommendation?” Huckabee told Fox News Radio on Monday. “Of course not.”
Many years ago a young man began a life of crime. From his teens till he was 20 he was in and out of jail for one thing or another. By the time he was 20 he found himself doing hardtime for armed robbery at a state prison. The young man was granted parole when he was 23. In a conversation many years later, Johnny Cash said he didn’t remember Haggard being “on the bill” at a concert in San Quentin prison. To that Merle Haggard replied, “I was in the audience Johnny”. The young man convicted of armed robbery.
Haggard was given a chance to change and turn his life around. He did so, and Hag and all of us are the better for it.
Clemmons was given that same chance in 2000. He is responsible for the life he has chosen since then.
In light of his failure to change his ways and the direction of his life, after being arrested in the state of Washington and committing serveral felonys, he certainly should not have been released again.
We all grieve for the families and victims who have suffered for what this man has done.
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