Representation, Not Redemption

Usually, the uniquely American tendency to insist on a menu of "inalienable rights" beyond any Constitutional regimen comes from progressive quarters, with the significant exception of guns on the right and free expression generally from libertarians.  Recently, some more-right-of-center sources have been a bit more preachy about the Sixth and Eighth Amendments than one might expect on behalf of some particularly monstrous defendants, as if the system would not be working if their ostensible constitutional protections weren't given in direct proportion to their alleged offenses.

Musing in hindsight about granting Jeffrey Epstein bail, or about the perils of the "justice by denunciation" in Epstein's (or any) criminal case isn't remotely worthy of condemnation as,  say, Dave Chappelle's dual declaration that Michael Jackson was innnocent, or, alternatively, that his victims somehow brought it on themselves.  However, even salient points aren't necessarily advisable.  

In musing that Epstein might be alive today had he been granted bail, some key points--both widely known and less known--about the defendant are glossed over.  Epstein's unlimited financial and private transporation resources were widely known; his range of international connections and the depth of domestic officialdom (more than) allegdly in his pocket were not; all that and common sense would mandate remand. The editorial muses that the then ostensibly "excessive" bail mandated that he receive the requisite protection in prison, which he obviously didn't get.  However, his lack of protection in jail had nothing to do with the eighth amendment, but rather a function of a series of bureaucratic snafus.  If one considers that Epstein might have actually paid off people to look the other way, the case against home confinement is infinitely strengthened.

Conrad Black has every reason to rage against an incompetent and malevolent justice system; however that should leas him raging against Acosta's incompetence for going for a result, rather than defending him for getting that "best result" and pretending it was the most just one available.  Epstein's sojourn in jail in Florida further indicates that more could have been done and that local law enforcement at several levels just weren't even trying, and that they knew it. Black also should consider that mob justice often produces the one victim who can bring down the predator: consider what just happened with Epstein at a court hearing where several victims testified after the suicide; Larry Nassar's multiple victims coming forward during his trial and compounding his charges; and the Cosby and Weinstein cases.  Where there is a mob of victims--as there seem to be in all of those cases--mob justice is a prosaic as it is poetic.

Similarly, during the sentencing phase of the Nassar trial, Judge Aquilina came under criticism from some quarters from disallowing Nassar to read his letter, and for essentially deeming him irredeemable.   Some accused her of applying ostensible "liberal" tenets in her denunciations of Nassar and her willingness to express what she hoped would happen to him in prison.  This was/is nonsense, and any conservative should be ashamed to tar such a unique moment in upholding law and order.  

The question asked "Under what conditions does a convict forfeit their dignity?" sounds a lot more like an ostensible "liberal" paints about the mistreatment about "justice involved persons" rather than a theoretically conservative critique of judicial excess.  A conservative should champion a withering condemnation of offensive conduct from the bench, particulary conduct as egregiously beyond the pale as Nassar's.  Aquilina should have been celebrated in conservative quarters. 

Furthermore, any law and order conservative who complains that a "claim that Nassar is beyond rehabilitation was an affront to the dignity unique to every person" forgets that the death penalty does exactly that: determines that a person's continuing threat to public order outweighs any potential redemption.  Some were willing to even afford the Pittsburgh shooter that chance at "rehabilitiation" and were perturbed by the decision to seek the death penalty; but those pleas did not come from conservative quarters.  Furthermore, as most conservative philosophies have very strong links with various theologies, most classical theologies are replete with examples of those "unsaved" and "damned", metaphysically and otherwise, so a conservative refusal to see that some people are beyond redemption would present a further irony.

The Constitution provides for a criminal defendant's representation, and legal ethics demand that said representation be zealous.  It does not automatically provide a defense, and it certainly does not mandate that everyone has a shot at rehabilitation or redemption.  

Offenders have lawyers to "defend" them so that we don't have to.

Essential Loyals

Paul Findley died at 98 this past week.  The former Republican Representative from Illinois was nicknamed "Arafat's Best Friend in Congress" after a 1978 meeting with the archterrorist in Damascus seduced Findley into rethinking his previously mainstream political positions.  Findley forever blamed AIPAC and the Jews for his 1982 election loss to Dick Durbin until the day he died; he became and remained one the the most ardent anti-zionists in the US.

Findley's passing led to some musings among friends: is contemporary antizionism and antisemitism really a function of party?  Findley is an exception among Republicans, to be sure--even considering more recent examples like Walter Jones, who got squishy after the Iraq War went south and decided to blame the Jews, and Justin [H]Amash, who didn't really have credible GOP bonafides anyway.  But does anyone remember the 1992 election, with HW Bush and his staffers James Baker III, Brent Scowcroft and John Sununu pushed concerned voters into the Clinton column?  Or how even the otherwise stalwart Reagan administration employed Caspar Weinberger, who couldn't get over his last name and took it out on actual Jews?

However, after further review, the exceptions prove the rule: while there have been antisemites and antizionists in the Republican party--some prominent ones, even--on the whole the party has been solidly Judeophilic and pro-Zionist, institutionally, since at least 1980 if not before.  The Democrats have become the mirror image: while it's possible that even a significant majority of Democrats currently in office and the donor class still harbor Zionist sympathies, the party is philosophically and institutionally heading in the direction of the now fully Corbynized Labour.

It might be dificult to pinpoint when this trend started.  While the 1988 Atlanta DNC had essentially been co-opted by Jesse Jackson and his minions C. Vernon Mason and Alton Maddox, who used the convention floor to showcase the most blatant PLO support seen at the time, that trend proved short lived: the 1992 DNC in New York was exponentially more Jew-friendly (which may have been of a piece with Clinton's effectively sidelining Jackson, not least after the "Sister Souljah moment".)  

One might view the trend of increased sympathy for Palestinians as having become more entrenched starting with the Durban conference in 2001, when the gauntlet was essentially thrown to anyone left of center that their liberal bonafides were contingent upon their hostility to Israel, and 2003, when the antiwar movement--particulary ANSWER and their allies--threw down the same gauntlet.  The Democrats followed: viz. John Kerry, who as Senator had an almost 100% rating from AIPAC before 2002, effectively became a spokesman for Palestinian initiatives as Secretary of State, to the point that even the Israeli left accused him of perfidy and incompetence during the Gaza War of Summer 2014.

The election of Donald Trump to the Presidency and the ongiong hard left socialization of the party's progressives put this trend on steroids, and that has been no more exemplified by the ascendancy of Congresswomen Tlaib and Omar as intersectional heroes, and most recently the lockstep manner in which the Democratic party has reacted to Israel barring them from entry.  On the one hand, there are tweets from Rep. Ted Lieu decrying ostensible double loyalties of GOP politicians both Jewish and Gentile, while not a word about Rep. Tlaib sporting a Palestinian flag; on the other, the Democrats considering some form of censure for Israeli officials for the by citing the historical analog of Saudi Arabia being forced to allow Congressman Henry Waxman to enter that country in 1975 displays their (likely willful) failure to understand history, parallels and analogies.  [And they wonder why the public school system is falling apart.]

The fact the President Trump tweeted at the Israelis accusing them of showing weakness for even considering granting entry to Tlaib and Omar wasn't done to further his own political agenda at the Israelis' expense: it was to provide them cover for what they should have done in the first place.  The mistake of the foreign ministry was in not telling the rest of the Democratic delegation ahead of time that Tlaib and Omar would never be welcome.  Trump's tweet confirmed that the ban was a joint US and Israeli interest; entry was a Democratic party interest, not a national one.  

In fact, Jewish Democrats are the ones doing the cowering.  Witness how Tlaib backed off from her tear-stained request to visit her grandmother when other Palestinians accused her of being a "sellout".  She has nothing to fear from Jewish Democrats: they can't leverage her, and most Jewish progressives don't want to let other Jewish Democrats even try.    As long as they don't demand the most draconian form of censure for Tlaib, Omar and all of their allies, and work singularly toward making them permanently political radioactive, Jewish Democrats have no kick about anything the President has said about disloyalty.  Politically neutralizing the squad is an American interest, never mind a Jewish one.  The Jewish Democrats' dilemma is less Solomonic than meets the eye, and the events of this past week have shown that: if they are more preturbed by the ostensible "insults" to Omar and Tlaib than they are by Omar and Tlaib's ongoing insults to both Americans and Jews, they have shown where their ultimate loyalties lay: with their party, uber alles.