down under the old guidelines. and those, of course, apply to thousands of people. today, our normally pardon-shy president fixed that problem for eight specific people, in a gesture that is hugely sequential for those eight specific people and their families, but at this point, it's basically just a symbolic gesture for the thousands of other people who are trapped in their same situation. the president explained today in a statement that he feels the eight people who he ordered freed from prison were, quote, sentenced under an unfair system, but then he said this. quote, three years ago, i signed the bipartisan fair sentencing act, which dramatically narrowed the disparity between penalties for crack and powder cocaine offenses. this law begins to right a decades-old injustice. but for thousands of inmates, it came too late. if they had been sentenced under the current law, many of them would have already served their time and paid their debt to society. instead, because of a law that is now recognized as unjust, they remain in prison, separated from their families and their communities, at a cost of millions of taxpayers dollars