Lame Duck

President Ben Holden sat in the oval office behind the desk that so many others before him had used. The chair was his original one since the day he first took office eight years ago. It had been a good chair. He had used it to ponder many important decisions. It would be taken to storage until the day his Presidential Library would open in Austin, Texas. He would never sit in it again. He felt sadness, useless and most of all lonely. Nothing he would do these last few days would matter to the world. He hated the term lame duck, but that is just what he was. The lame part was okay with him, but the duck part made him think he was some kind of silly animal.

He had several requests lying on his desk in front of him for consideration. Most of them were nothing that mattered much, except the request from different legal organizations for Presidential pardons. In the last days of every President's term since Washington people had requested pardons for crimes. He knew from meetings with his legal advisers that it was his duty to pardon some of these people. He could not be held liable for any of them. No matter if the crime was embezzlement or murder he could just sign the pardon and it would set the person free. Some he knew the infractions of the law very well. They had been in the media at the time they were hot stories. Others were not quite so well known. The media had it's agenda to make money and the best spin on the stories could bring in millions of dollars.

There had been some of the requests that were accompanied with some unwritten favors if the pardon was signed. Even the offer of several amounts of untraceable money that would eventually find it's way into the President's coffers. The favors included business deals and offers for speech making for large payoffs and even a few that offered free travel and sexual favors. He felt disgusted that such dealings would be accepted by the American public which would not know anything about it. The only ones that would make a big deal of it was some watchdog groups, but the stories would be easily buried by the media spin that the uncaring public would not know what happened or even care.

One case that caught his eye was the two border guards that had been sentenced to prison for shooting and wounding an illegal alien drug dealer. The case was big in the Southwestern part of the USA. It also made the national news and a couple of congresspeople had lobbied hard for him to pardon them at the time of sentencing . He had been warned at the time by his legal advisers that if he interfered with the case that it would cause his political party some embarrassment. It would hurt the chances of the next person running for his office from his party a great deal of trouble. He laughed and thought to himself that the man had lost the election anyway without this little tid bit of embarrassment as they called it. The two border guards had been railroaded and everyone involved knew it. He had been warned again that it would hurt him outside the office if he even thought of signing the pardons.

He took his pen and without thinking of the repercussions he signed both of these men to freedom. He knew he would suffer from his actions. He knew that his families lives had been threatened. He knew that people involved were very powerful people. They could even have a President killed. He thought about putting the papers in the shredder. He stopped himself. He called in his secretary and gave her the papers.

"Please hand walk these through the system. Make copies and send them to all the major news organizations. Do it yourself," the President gave her the papers.

She looked them over before speaking, "Mr. President are you sure you want to do this?"

He nodded his head up and down, "Yes, I am sure."

With tears in her eyes she put her hand on his. They had worked closely together for eight years. The two of them had a relationship that went beyond employer and employee. They were friends with a great deal of mutual respect.

"I know now why you have had this job for two terms. You have a good heart. The job has not given you cold blood. i will always think of you as the special man that sat behind a special desk with dignity," she took the pardons and left the office.

He took the other pardons and stamped denied on each one. His job was done. He had upheld his oath for one last time.