Trump's pardons aren't just political; more importantly, they're transactional

By Aaron Blake, CNN Analysis: So much of the coverage of US President Donald Trump's pardons is focused on how political they are. And they are certainly political - extraordinarily so. But as Trump's latest batch of pardons reinforces, that's only half the story. The more ominous trend is not just that he's pardoning political allies; it's that he's pardoning allies in very transactional ways. He's pardoning lots and lots of people who helped Trump, specifically. After previously dangling pardo