Sunday, July 12, 2020
Sunday Reflection: On Hating Roger Stone
Predictably, I'm getting a lot of calls about President Trump's commutation of Roger Stone's sentence at about 8 pm on Friday-- an odd time to do anything a president feels is worthy of public scrutiny. You can see some of my thoughts on it here and here.
Is it corrupt? Absolutely, in the sense that Trump is rewarding with freedom someone who was literally convicted of lying to protect the President. Mitt Romney, actually, was pretty eloquent in setting this out, "tweeting "Unprecedented, historic corruption: an American president commutes the sentence of a person convicted by a jury of lying to shield that very president."
My primary take on this, again, is that the bigger problem in this administration (like the one before it, and the one before that, and the one before that...) isn't too much clemency-- it is not enough. No, Trump shouldn't use this crucial constitutional tool to insulate his friends from punishment when they lie to protect him. That's terrible. But a 67-year-old guy not going to a COVID-threatened prison isn't terrible in and of itself. The bigger problem is that so many other people-- tens of thousands, just in the federal system-- are not given the same consideration even though they have equities in their favor.
It is a delicate balance, but one that is spiritually required: We must condemn corruption without falling victim to the poison of retributionism and hate. Don't be infected by the same thing that led people to hate draft evaders, and drug users, and marijuana sellers; it never takes us to a good place.
It is hardest to turn away from retribution when the person in the dock is someone we truly, deeply dislike-- but that is when it is most important to do so. Jesus didn't command us to "love thine friend," after all; that hardly needs saying.
We Christians signed up for a tougher challenge than that.
