Don't tell Howard Dean, but 657 coke dealers have had their sentences shortened by President Obama

Brett T. | 5:36 PM on December 22, 2016

It’s good to know that someone else is paying attention to all of those commutations President Obama has been granting in the final months of his second term — more than 1,100 so far and likely to climb.

To be fair, some people probably do deserve that second chance the president is granting them (unilaterally, which seems to be his thing). But few media outlets have bothered to look beyond the White House press releases that accompany each round of pardons and commutations, which note that nonviolent drug dealers by far are the recipients of the president’s efforts.

The Daily Caller reports that nearly 80 percent of the commutations the president has given since August have been granted to cocaine and crack dealers, including Darryl Reed, the “crack king” of Oakland, Calif.

https://twitter.com/PfeifferDC/status/811940686207533056

interesting. I just served on a jury for a first degree murder trial that involved a botched coke deal. Nice..

— SETX (@ExposeDeepState) December 22, 2016

Cocaine’s bad, right? Remember when Howard Dean accused Donald Trump of snorting coke before his first debate with Hillary, whose only known drug of choice is the rejuvenating air and water found in daughter Chelsea’s humble Manhattan apartment?

But #FakeNews made it sound like the commutations are going to guys doing 100yr sentences for holding a joint @PfeifferDC @DailyCaller

— ??Old School?? (@marklindesr) December 22, 2016

And that’s what’s so frustrating, even to noted “fake news” sites like the one you’re reading — “mostly nonviolent drug offenders” sounds like people caught in possession of marijuana, but a scan of those who were granted commutations shows that most intended to distribute harder drugs, including crack, meth, heroin, and so on.

And, as very few in the press seemed to notice or care, a lot of these felons also kept illegal firearms on hand to assist in doing business. Funny how the media presents every NRA member as an unhinged killing machine just waiting to be set off, while crack dealers arrested with illegal drugs and stolen firearms are “mostly nonviolent.”

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Related:

President Obama shortens 98 more 'unduly harsh' drug sentences; Never mind those firearms violations https://t.co/w0lqPAJIoN

— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) October 27, 2016