In one of his last acts as president Biden commuted the sentence of Leonard Peltier. After 50 years in jail, at 80 years old, he finally gets to go home. Peltier had a huge network of supporters not just among the native community who have worked tirelessly for years to get to this day. There is much rejoicing among them. There is of course also an outcry from those who believe his release is a miscarriage of justice since he was after all convicted of killing two FBI agents. Please! He served 50 years! The yahoos who tried to overthrow the government served what a year before they got their get-out-of-jail-free cards? Of course Leonard Peltier has maintained his innocence the entire time. I wasn't there, I don't know what happened, but having listened to him tell the story I believe him. Trump's gangs should believe him too, especially when you hear them go on and on about Ruby Ridge, and Waco. I think it's safe to say that in those days the FBI was all about shoot first and don't ask questions.
But let's say for argument's sake that Peltier did actually fire the gun that killed the agents. In the minds of the young native activists of the day they were at war with the United States. We had stolen their land, imprisoned them on reservations, outlawed their religion, and stripped them of their culture. If you look at the events of the occupation at Wounded Knee you'll see like most of these things, it started out as a protest and soon escalated out of hand. You know kind of like when the national guard shot and killed four students at Ohio State just the year before. So it's not a stretch to think that in the minds of these natives they were at war. So when we send our young people to far off places like Vietnam, Afghanistan, or Iraq do we tell them not to kill anyone because killing is illegal and they might get sent to jail? Of course not. Its war. Killing people is what you do in war. (Disclaimer, I am a pacifist and am against all and every war we have had and will ever have.) And how many of our young people that we force to go off to foreign countries and kill brown people have ever been in the position of feeling like they have to fight to protect their home, their families, their very way of life? Can any of us really think we know that that feels like? So can we condemn Leonard Peltier for defending his people's homes while celebrating our soldiers that go and kill on foreign soil as heros? I think not.
But back to Biden. Biden commited what for many was an unforgivable offense when as head of the senate committee overseeing the appointment of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court, he refused to believe Anita Hill and allowed Thomas to join the court. Even if Thomas had gone on to distinguish himself as a justice, the precedent set by the spectacle of Anita Hill being subjected to that kind of humiliation by a bunch of old while men, set back the growth of this country by decades, and set the stage for the just as despicable treatment of Christine Blasey Ford allowing another unqualified sex offender to tarnish the court.
Hey, I thought Biden did a great job as president. Sure he was corrupted by power the same way Ruth Bader Ginsburg was and didn't want to give it up. But he did a lot of good things getting the country back on track. But none of that was enough to make me overlook his mistreatment of Anita Hill and allowing Thomas to pollute our highest court. But by allowing Leonard Peltier to go home at last he has finally redeemed himself. Thank you Joe.