Nov 10 2008
On the Death Penalty, Partisanship and the Rape of Children: Part Two
I think it’s worthwhile to take a moment and look at the definition of partisan:
partisan[1,noun]
Main Entry:
1par·ti·san
Variant(s):
also par·ti·zan \ˈpär-tə-zən, -sən, -ˌzan, chiefly British ˌpär-tə-ˈzan\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
Middle French partisan, from north Italian dialect partiźan, from part part, party, from Latin part-, pars part
Date:
15551: a firm adherent to a party, faction, cause, or person; especially : one exhibiting blind, prejudiced, and unreasoning allegiance
In a post I put up earlier this week, I was rather snarkily harrassed for displaying the second half of the definition above…and fascinatingly enough, I was harrassed again today in a different post, for failing to display it. Now, clearly I’m either partisan or I’m not…there isn’t any gray area in terms of blind, prejudiced unreason. I am happy to report that in fact, not only do I not fit the second half of the definition, I don’t even fit the first. (Which I would have thought would have been a much more logical conclusion–the hypothesis that I must then be neither, rather than that I must be both! but hey. Diff’rent strokes for diff’rent folks.)
Now, don’t get me wrong; I’m a registered Democrat, have been since the age of 20 and am reasonably content with it. However, I have no emotional investment in the fact. If I felt sufficiently motivated, I’d go register as a Republican, or a Green, or as nothing at all. I do not feel any particular loyalty toward or love for the Democratic party as an entity. In the same way, I feel no hatred toward the Republican party as an entity. Basically, I see them as two “clubs,” and really the only games in town if you actually want to do something that has any real effect in the great game that is American politics–if that is what you want, you have to “belong” to one of the clubs. So I picked the one that has as its stated goals…I’d prefer to say achieved or even vigorously pursued but I think I must stick to the much more accurate stated…ideals that are closest to the ones I want to be ascendant in the world in which I must live.
Because I fail at blind, prejudiced and unreasoning allegiance to the one club (and therefore blind, prejudiced and unreasoning rejection of the other) I am capable of two great (I may be injecting a little sarcasm into that adjective) feats. One, I do not fail to see the flaws, hypocrisies, inconsistencies and artificialities displayed by any individual(s) representing my chosen club; and two, I am able to perceive it when a member or four of the other club has something worthwhile, important, true or valid to say. Even more delicately, I am able to successfully interpret slanting of information by both sides, even regardless of the direction of the slant.
I find rational thought a relief. Don’t you?
Not to say I don’t make misjudgements ranging from minor to spectacular, just like everybody else does. I do. But honestly, I strive very hard not to do it; it’s important to me to know the reality of any situation I am involved in, peripherally or otherwise. And in these particular cases, I believe I succeeded.
To wit: Am I worshipping mindlessly at the Obama altar? Or conversely, am I watching from the wings nitpicking his every move ’cause he beat out my preferred Dem candidate for president?
Answer: no.
Or: Do I reject any news story offered by Faux News or any other right-leaning source solely based upon the fact that that is the source? Or am I unable to detect when they do their damnedest to twist everything to make anybody or anything left-leaning look or sound as bad as possible?
Answer: no.
In regards specifically to James Fagan, I must take all facts into account. And these are they:
1. This incident has only been reported by right-leaning sources. When the story is clearly a smear job (the purported Michelle Obama tapes, for example), left-leaning sources pillory it to death. When the story is genuinely defensible, left-leaning sources defend it. When the story is neither, they are ominously silent. This is equally true when the incident is reported by left-leaning sources and right-leaning sources maintain the same frozen quiet on the subject.
2. There is a video of the speech, and what he is reported saying, he incontrovertibly said on the video.
3. The only part of his statement that was cut out was the opening phrase: “Let me tell you why it’s so wrong, It’s so wrong because in these situations . . . that 6-year-old is going to sit in front of me, or somebody far worse than me and.” This in no way changes anything he said subsequently, other than that instead of specifying that only he was going to do what he described, other lawyers were going to as well as himself.
I do not categorize him; he has categorized himself.
He and others like him are the reason that rape shield laws have been passed.
Let’s discuss the other argument that has been made, now that we have disposed of the “hypothetical lawyer” defense: that he and other lawyers like himself, having nothing to lose and everything to gain when mandatory minimums would be imposed on his client, would go after the child victim like rabid hounds (as opposed to the kinder, gentler way they go about it now?) to help said client avoid jail time–also putting the child originally in that much more danger of getting killed because the molester would feel like he had nothing to lose.
To assess the validity of this argument, we need to turn to both the Massachusetts sentencing guidelines and a description of the version of “Jessica’s Law” being pushed in Massachusetts. First, the sentencing guidelines:
Forcible rape of a child, first offense: 8 to 12 years
Forcible rape of a child, second offense: 9 to 13.5 years
The legislation that Rep. Fagan was protesting asks for a mandatory minimum 15 year sentence for the first offense and a 20 year sentence for repeat offenders.
The Massachusetts guideline for murder is life in prison.
Can you really put these all together, shake them up and come up with sufficient incentive for lawyers to either start “ripping apart” 8-year-olds on the witness stand to “save” their client, or a child molester doing greater harm to any child when the difference in doing less harm is a few years, but the difference in doing greater is life?
Partisanship appears to be saying yes, but I think we have to conclude that reason says no.
Next up: Child rape, always a fun topic.
