Progressives and civil libertarians take note: President Obama has shown scant interest in using his office’s unilateral power to grant pardons. In fact, compared to him President George W. Bush is a bleeding heart, according to the current edition of The Nation.

The liberal magazine highlights the case of Weldon Angelos, a California prison inmate whose  55-year term for selling marijuana has made him a cause celebre among the civil rights and drug legalization crowd. But the White House has refused to grant a pardon or otherwise cut his sentence short: