It is always interesting to see who gets the "get outta jail" card. Clinton had his picks...but I always find the Bush/Reagan bunch funniest, so far. Bargaining with the Hezbolla and sending arms to Iran, the enemy of Israel , to get the hostages back.

...President Bill Clinton's final day pardons of fugitive commodities dealer Marc Rich and others were front-page news for several weeks after Clinton left office, but Congress and the news media soon shifted their sights to other topics.

Ford, Bush, and Clinton weren't worried about rebellions when they issued their famous pardons, although Ford did say he pardoned Nixon in order to avert a prosecution of the ex-president that would have divided the nation.

Recent presidents have used the pardon power to do justice as they saw it.

Pardons in Iran-contra affair
In 1992, Bush's father President George H.W. Bush granted Christmas Eve pardons to former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger and five other former officials for their roles in the Iran-Contra affair.

In that mid-1980s episode, now mostly forgotten, Reagan administration officials arranged for weapons to be shipped to Iran in exchange for the release of U.S. hostages held by the Hezbollah militants in Lebanon.

But Bush said of Weinberger and the others accused in the Iran-contra episode, "their motivation "? whether their actions were right or wrong "? was patriotism."?

And he said those he pardoned "have already paid a price "? in depleted savings, lost careers, anguished families "? grossly disproportionate to any misdeeds or errors of judgment they may have committed."?

As contentious as the Iran-contra affair seemed in 1992, Bush was taking a step to make it history, to relegate it to place where...http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27996904/page/2/