I hate lunatic zealots…
Everyone assumes the ones OVER THERE are worse than the ones OVER HERE.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5842216/
I have noticed lately that the police do not have suspects any longer, they have a “person of interest.”
Oh, brother.
Person of interest: someone that can be “detained” indefinitely because “he is a suspect or is likely to know something useful and is a flight risk”.
“and would look good stacked up naked with a hood on his/her head”
“and would look good stacked up naked with a hood on his/her head”
Speaking of which, I read an article saying how the guy in Iraq who blew the whistle on the prison atrocity is under police protection (at home in the US) after having his life threatened several times. Who’s the bad guy here, anyway?
Tony
A person of interest is when you have no evidence of any sort but you’ve found somebody you’d really like to pin the crime on. If you can’t get them convicted in court you can at least get them convicted in the press.
There are still many people who believe that poor schmuck was guilty of planting bombs during the Atlanta olympics back in '96 - about seven years after he was absolutely proven innocent.
If you’re really lucky then the press will do such a good job of tainting the jury pool you’ll later be able to charge and prosecute the “person of interest” even without evidence - just ask Scott Peterson.
On in the news, “suspect” is often used to mean “perpetrator”–stupidly enough.
For example, “After shooting a teller and a guard, the suspect rushed out of the bank and jumped into a waiting car.”
In fact, it was not a “suspect” that did this–they don’t even have a suspect at this stage. It was the actual bank robber. But the news organizations are afraid to even use words like “criminal” anymore. Anyone want to bet that ten years from now, “suspect” will have come to mean “criminal”, and calling someone a suspect will get you sued? And ten years after that, “person of interest” will have reached that point.
It just shows how far fear of litigation can push us. The other night, my son noted a dog food commercial that showed a dog walking along and steadily losing weight (or some such thing). There was a disclaimer on the screen, saying something like, “This was a simulation. Your dog won’t actually lose weight at such a fast rate.”
My son said, “Surely they don’t think anyone is stupid enough to think that that was a real event?”, but I can just imagine the lawyers talking to the ad writers, “You can’t imply that our product will do that. People will feed it to their dogs, and when they don’t lose weight within seconds, they’ll sue us for false advertising. We’ll need a disclaimer.”
(Shifts like the change in the meaning of “suspect” are actually a common phenomenon in language. Japanese has often replaced its polite personal pronouns whenever the current crop became too common-sounding, losing their polite edge.)
Well I am not all that well up on this Litigation business,but over here,in England-Within the British Legal System-a man is innocent until he is proven Black or Irish.
If he fulfills both criteria,he’s Fu&£%*.
Many are the Cases which can be proven,but that’s another story.
Slan,
D.
“still doing time, for being Irish in the wrong place and at the wrong time”
idiocy, quite plainly, has no relationship to ethnicity.
Tell that to the English Police and you will find yourself locked up for being an agitator,
Trust me Emm,
I live here.
Slan,
D.
Well, it’s obvious that a whistler can’t be a bad guy, so it must all the rest.
Having undergone both interrogation training and PW-handling training, it’s obvious to me that the whole thing reveals incompetence at quite a few levels–including some of the highest.
Of course, nothing that may be true of higher levels of the chain of command can excuse what the troops at the lowest levels did. A very basic principle that I was taught as part of my own military training is that it is illegal to obey an illegal order. A related idea is that ignorance of the law is generally not a valid excuse for breaking the law.
What bothers me the most, though, is what I perceive as an undercurrent of feeling on the part of many that war really justifies all actions–though you may have to be careful not to get caught.
This attitude seems to be vaguely similar to that behind the idea that a US citizen can somehow forfeit his or her constitutional protections–and that elected officials somehow have the power to make such a determination.
I don’t like it. I think it’s one of those slippery slopes we hear so much about. It’s all very well when the rights that are being taken away belong to someone else, but what do you do when the same logic is applied to you? We see similar arguments from various governments who lock up opposition politicians and even Supreme Court justices for treason, with no need to demonstrate a case against them.
The arguments are very legalistic, about who gets to claim the protection of some document, like the Constitution, or the Geneva Convention, with little thought for the foundation of those documents in the “unalienable rights” and common humanity of all persons.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the Declaration of Independence doesn’t say, “…all US citizens are created equal…they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights…”
Still less does it say “…all US citizens who are not believed to have ever done anything wrong are created equal…they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights…”
I’ve failed to find that part of the Constitution that says, “No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation. In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence, unless the President doesn’t feel like it.”