I see that Prof. Blanchard beat me to the punch regarding the Obama-Clinton-Peltier triangle. Apparently David Geffen has a sore spot in Bill Clinton's decision to pardon Leonard Peltier, an American Indian Movement activist who killed FBI agents Ron Williams and Jack Coler in 1975 on Pine Ridge. In my mind, the evidence for Peltier's innocence doesn't stack up too well. You can read more about the situation here (along with relevant court documents). Of course, Peter Matthiessen's famous In the Spirit of Crazy Horse is an attempt to demonstrate Peltier's innocence. Peltier was moved to a Pennsylvania prison a year or so ago and is awaiting a parole hearing scheduled for December 2008.
Perhaps an even greater question now looms in light of this event: has Obama promised to pardon Peltier?
UPDATE: SDWC has thoughts here and here regarding the issue. And he also makes the same observation I did: "[I]t's legitimate to ask if a promise has been extracted from the Obama people that he will pardon Leonard Peltier in exchange for Geffen's support."
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