Showing posts with label crime. Show all posts
Showing posts with label crime. Show all posts
Aug 20, 2009
O. J. Simpson got his book title all wrong
He should have taken a lesson from Tom Ridge and called it I Considered Not Doing It.
Dec 14, 2008
12 years later, I am not surprised
I voted for a Republican for any legislative office, or for any federal or state office, exactly once. And it was because I couldn't pinch my nose with a big enough clothespin to be able to vote for his opponent. The Democrat really looked that sleazy.
It was in 1996, when I lived in Chicago. My district was heavily Democratic, but my US Representative was a Republican, Michael Patrick Flanagan. The only reason he had been elected 2 years earlier was that he had run against Dan Rostenkowski, who was indicted (and soon to be convicted) for mail fraud. I had no reason to vote for him other than that he seemed a lesser evil than his opponent.
The opponent's name? Rod Blagojevich.
Of course, Blagojevich won, with something like 2/3 of the vote, which is why I should file this under "I-told-you-so".
It was in 1996, when I lived in Chicago. My district was heavily Democratic, but my US Representative was a Republican, Michael Patrick Flanagan. The only reason he had been elected 2 years earlier was that he had run against Dan Rostenkowski, who was indicted (and soon to be convicted) for mail fraud. I had no reason to vote for him other than that he seemed a lesser evil than his opponent.
The opponent's name? Rod Blagojevich.
Of course, Blagojevich won, with something like 2/3 of the vote, which is why I should file this under "I-told-you-so".
Aug 3, 2008
Police right to wait for sermon to end?
A few corrections and second thoughts about the Rev. Hannibal Lecter:
1. I used the ubiquitous, but wrong, spelling of the infamous name in the title of that post. I should have written "Usama bin Ladin".
2. To avoid misunderstanding: I think the police should generally do their work rationally, and that includes minimizing the possibility of riot or other risk of injury, particularly to innocent bystanders, when making arrests. However, I also feel it is extremely important that all people be equal before the law; therefore, the arrest procedure must not depend on the occupation or social status of the accused. Discrimination based on race, sex, or religion, is particularly pernicious.
3. Testimony in blog comments from former law enforcement officers (in whose identification or words I have no reason not to believe) has convinced me that I was likely wrong in assuming that the police would have behaved differently if the accused had not been a preacher. My tentative conclusion is that I might have overlooked the, let's call it, "man bites dog" bias in news reporting. While there are many reports of police brutality and haste in arresting criminal suspects, the total number of arrests is far greater. It is quite likely that the spectacular raids and high-speed chases we read about are anomalous, and that they make news because they are exceptional.
4. That said, there have also been blog comment testimonies for the opposite view - that theatrical and dangerous arrests are the norm. Incidentally, all those testimonies seem to be about drug-related arrests. That's disturbing. While I can understand that drug arrests present special challenges for gathering evidence (if the police aren't quick, the suspects can get rid of the drug), something is profoundly unjust in a system that, by design, puts suspects of non-violent drug offenses at greater risk of injury during arrest than murder suspects.
5. I think that people who use the "innocent until proven guilty" principle as the main justification for the police waiting until the end of Hopkins' sermon to make the arrest are seriously misunderstanding what that principle means and how it is applied.
1. I used the ubiquitous, but wrong, spelling of the infamous name in the title of that post. I should have written "Usama bin Ladin".
2. To avoid misunderstanding: I think the police should generally do their work rationally, and that includes minimizing the possibility of riot or other risk of injury, particularly to innocent bystanders, when making arrests. However, I also feel it is extremely important that all people be equal before the law; therefore, the arrest procedure must not depend on the occupation or social status of the accused. Discrimination based on race, sex, or religion, is particularly pernicious.
3. Testimony in blog comments from former law enforcement officers (in whose identification or words I have no reason not to believe) has convinced me that I was likely wrong in assuming that the police would have behaved differently if the accused had not been a preacher. My tentative conclusion is that I might have overlooked the, let's call it, "man bites dog" bias in news reporting. While there are many reports of police brutality and haste in arresting criminal suspects, the total number of arrests is far greater. It is quite likely that the spectacular raids and high-speed chases we read about are anomalous, and that they make news because they are exceptional.
4. That said, there have also been blog comment testimonies for the opposite view - that theatrical and dangerous arrests are the norm. Incidentally, all those testimonies seem to be about drug-related arrests. That's disturbing. While I can understand that drug arrests present special challenges for gathering evidence (if the police aren't quick, the suspects can get rid of the drug), something is profoundly unjust in a system that, by design, puts suspects of non-violent drug offenses at greater risk of injury during arrest than murder suspects.
5. I think that people who use the "innocent until proven guilty" principle as the main justification for the police waiting until the end of Hopkins' sermon to make the arrest are seriously misunderstanding what that principle means and how it is applied.
Jul 29, 2008
Terrorism: right here, right now
Let's be clear: walking into a church with a shotgun and 76 cartridges, and shooting people because their congregation welcomes gays and because most people in it are liberal, is terrorism by any known definition of the word. There is no essential difference between Adkisson and a suicide bomber who blows himself up in a cafe because he believes the patrons' country shouldn't exist. That equivalence does not depend on Adkisson's sanity; many terrorists may be insane to various degrees.
So how do we fight this battle in the "War on Terror"? Do we send Rush Limbaugh to Guantanamo? Do we waterboard Ann Coulter? Do we listen to phone conversations of every subscriber to the National Review? The absurdity of those propositions is not out of line with current policies. The concept of a war against terrorism has always been absurd.
Terrorists are dangerous criminals and we need to approach them as such. At the same time, we also have to work on building a society that is not conducive to breeding and fostering terrorism. That's not a war, but a quest.
So how do we fight this battle in the "War on Terror"? Do we send Rush Limbaugh to Guantanamo? Do we waterboard Ann Coulter? Do we listen to phone conversations of every subscriber to the National Review? The absurdity of those propositions is not out of line with current policies. The concept of a war against terrorism has always been absurd.
Terrorists are dangerous criminals and we need to approach them as such. At the same time, we also have to work on building a society that is not conducive to breeding and fostering terrorism. That's not a war, but a quest.
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