Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Off on a technicality

Doesn't it seem that the only people who ever get off on technicalities, and aren't the slightest bit ashamed of it, are conservative Republicans? Think about it, they spend their time railing against the 4th amendment (the Republicans in Congress in 1996 once voted down the language of the 4th amendment in a crime bill, arguing that it was anti-law enforcement). They talk about this being a criminal bill of rights, how the Courts have created a right to privacy that doesn't exist, that it only allows criminals to get off on a technicality, all of these other idiotic anti-constitutional things.

Until it applies to them.

I really should start a website dedicated - much like the chickenhawk database of pro-war Republicans who managed to somehow miss serving in the Vietnam War - to crusading Republicans who talk tough on crime and against the Court's protecting people's rights to privacy, while at the same time shamelessly invoking as many of those rights as possible to ensure that their own crimes go unpunished. All so that they can go and rail some more about the system and how it favors criminals who get off on technicalities (like them, but we don't need to mention that now, do we?).

Of the most well-known that roll of my tongue without thinking long and hard, I come up with the classics, like Oliver North and Admiral Poindexter (cases reversed by the same judges who appointed Kenneth Starr as "independent" counsel due to potential tainting of their immunized testimony before Congress), Kay Bailey Hutchison (she had her illegal fundraising case dismissed when the Judge decided to rule on her suppression motion one item at a time, and the prosecution decided not to proceed that way), but none can compete for hubris with Rush Limbaugh.

The latest has Rush making new efforts to derail the prosecution into his doctor shopping case (do you think he'll get 25 years like that other guy in Florida did?). Read the article to find out all of the machinations Rush is using to avoid responsibility for his illegal acts, something he regularly accuses liberals of doing while bashing them on his show.

Do you think he'll ever concede the cognitive dissonance? Don't bet on it. He'll still keep bashing his liberals, and his audience, who still believes that Saddam was responsible for 9/11 and had WMD, will continue to believe Rush is a martyr being unfairly targeted, and that there are too many laws too lenient on criminals (not Rush, though).

Disgusting.

5 comments:

Bennett said...

A recent thread on Patterico has some conservative attempts to denounce the Exclusionary Rule.

http://patterico.com/2005/08/17/3477/my-advice-jerk-it-harder/

The Fourth Amendment seems like a real watershed for exposing conservative hypocrisy on a few different levels:

They act like judicial activists in trying to nullify it.

they are relentlessly pro-government and anti-citizen,

and then they try to useit when they get in trouble.

Anonymous said...

The worst of all is when you win a motion to suppress and the judge apologizes to the cops for ruling against them (This has actually happened in more than one of my cases)!

Windypundit said...

Anon,

You meant to say the judge yelled at the cops for breaking the law, right? I mean, judges are supposed to be all about the law, so that's what he must have done, right?

Anonymous said...

windy,

That's what should have happened, but, well, it's a prime example of why we shouldn't elect judges. They're very afraid of pissing off law enforcement.

Anonymous said...

If you can't tell the difference between recreational drug use and becoming addicted to medicine used to treat pain, then you're a moron.