Obama pardons a man who was convicted of mutilating coins in 1963.

Why? Why does that win the attention of the President of the United States? The pardoned man, Ronald Lee Foster of Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, received probation and a $20 fine. This was one of 9 pardons, the first set of pardons by President Obama. The NYT characterized all the pardoned crimes as "small-scale offenses committed many years ago," but 4 of the cases involved cocaine. Maybe the coin-mutilating is in there to make cocaine look small scale.

I wonder what, exactly, Ronald Lee Foster did to coins? From CoinTalk:

I looked but can not find out anything about what he did to coins. I wonder if he is the first person to produce the infamous "Lincoln looks at Kennedy" pennies? There was a guy back in the 1960's who used a machine to shave pennies to the size of dimes and passed them in vending machines. Now what is "mutilation of coins" and what did this guy do?

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In 1963, he was earning $82 a month as a Marine at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, when he says he and 16 others hatched a scheme to cut pennies into dimes so they could use them in vending machines. But the Secret Service caught them....

Hmmm, that reminds me. We used to try to turn quarters — back when they were silver — into rings. Step 1 was banging on the edge with a spoon to flatten and broaden it. No one ever got to step 2, which would have required some drilling.