Tuesday Quick Hits and Open Thread

 

"First Few Desperate Hours" - Mountain Goats

Have to justify my existence at work today, but thought I would say a quick hello and mention that which had caught my eye.

-- This made me happy. 

- And this made me laugh.  And scoff.  Whatever drugs Newt Gingrich is taking must be really good. 

- David Brooks is a fucking joke -- and a bad fucking joke at that. (Actually the linked column by Jonathan Cohn is quite clever.)   

- More appallingly accurate self-hatred from Yglesias.  You'll never really make it in this town kid if you don't acknowledge that Israel is the linchpin of all good things -- not to mention the deeply-hoped-for fiery ending of the world. 

- The most compelling argument for a 50% marginal tax rate I have heard to date.  

Alright, must get back to it.  It's your turn now. 

Comments

[kathy a.]

linking again: DADT is over!

also, the georgia board has denied troy davis' petition for clemency, despite very substantial evidence undermining the verdict. and meanwhile, SCOTUS recently stayed another man's execution because race was injected intentionally into the sentencing process. here's a piece on why we fight for equal justice. long read, but here's a nugget:

Here we have a fundamental disconnect between the pro- and anti-death penalty sides. Contrary to what you might otherwise hear, it is both possible and intellectually consistent to be glad that a court has stayed the execution of a condemned man without necessarily being sympathetic to the man himself or disrespectful to his victims. It is possible to see the vindication of rights -- or at least a good-faith effort by judges to vindicate rights -- as a victory in and of itself in our nation's constant struggle for justice under the law. It is possible to separate the sins of the condemned from the subsequent sins of the justice system, and to demand more of the latter than of the former. Indeed, this goes to the very heart of the age-old notion of bringing a measure of dispassionate justice to high and low alike.

[kathy a.]

hitting another low note, the house GOP may vote against disaster aid, and thus shut down government since this is part of a larger funding bill .

way to show your compassion and leadership, dudes.

[nancy]

Here's a book review from the Times which echoes some of the discussions here recently about the current state of the Left.

As to the Troy Davis decision, I am saddened and shamed. I'm of the opinion that as horrific as these crimes are, each application of the death penalty, even when there is no doubt of guilt, diminishes us as human beings. Ted Bundy was an exception for me because of the responsibility of the state to protect us from monstrousness -- he escaped from custody at least three times I believe. So for me, it's not blanket. Unfortunately, the work of The Innocence Project isn't likely to be finished any time soon in our current climate. Thank you for the link, kathy.

[kathy a.]

more on troy davis, from time: the failure of a legal safety valve.

[nancy]

Here is another action to take . Phone lines are jammed.

[krubozumo nyankoye]

"therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls,
it tolls for thee."

The death penality is of course biblical in derivation, an eye for an eye, a life for a life. That is probably overly simplistic but arguing theology is like arguing garden fairyism.

There is no argument as far as I can see with respect to efficiency. Putting someone to death generally costs more than encarcerating them until death. Both methods have the same result, the individual judged guilty of crimes is removed from society.

And there is a benefit, encarceration is revocable. It is or should be well known that Justice is not infallible. The wrongly convicted, if still alive, may yet one day walk free. The dead can't walk free or otherwise.

That's the deal behind the war on drugs, keep the good stuff for the plutocrats and to hell with the hoi polloi. Newt is probably getting an IV of some kind of exotic amphibian hormone. Most of us would not like it.

I couldn't follow most of the links so there is nothing much else I can say.

[Sir Charles]

kathy and KN,

It seems to me that anyone who has been involved in the legal system -- even on the civil side as I have been -- understands that the system is not perfect and not perfectable, run as it is by human beings.

To me the notion that an innocent person might be executed is unthinkable. And yet anyone who supports the death penalty is essentially willing to accept such a possibility.

[MR Bill]

The Atlanta Media market tv news is mostly playing this as "some witnesses have recanted" (haven't heard the number discussed), and the family (the police office's widow and elderly German accented mother) want "justice and closure": that is to say, they are convinced of Davis' guilt.
The DA has said in interviews "there is nothing wrong with this case", and he probably does well to take that attitude, as police intimidation and jailhouse snitches have been said to the order of the day in Savannah and and Davis case is pretty much the tip of an ugly iceberg. We couldn't have a review of all that.
And a policeman died, so someone has to pay the price..
I'm depressed and headed out to work. I've also been called for jury duty the first week of Oct. The last time I served it was a civil case. It was a mess, shoulda been on Jerry Springer instead of a court. The comic aspects of it were, well, the only thing that made the experience tolerable. I shudder to think how a death penalty case would be tried.
For the death penalty advocate, the people we execute are, if not guilty of the charge we are killing them for, guilty of something (for otherwise why would they be charged) and we shouldn't worry our beautiful minds about such as Troy Davis...

[paula b]

Hello friends,
We're in Columbia, in the US colony of South Carolina, on our way to Atlanta. Haven't heard from Mr Bill, but wanted to check in anyway to ask if there's anything we should absolutely not miss in Atlanta. I will be at Morehouse all day Friday, but have this afternoon and part of tomorrow to explore the area. Then, it's off to Nashville, for a date with Dolly Parton. All this frivolity cannot compare, of course, with being home worrying about floods or the frost killing our tomatoes, the possibility of government shut down, the GOP asking the Federal Reserve to wreck the economy for them, the threat of no FEMA money for the Northeast (even though that's where most usable federal dollars come from), Obama's attitude or lack thereof, etc. Instead, we're both basking in a balmy respite from reality. Keep up the good work!

[jeanne marie]

To me the notion that an innocent person might be executed is unthinkable. And yet anyone who supports the death penalty is essentially willing to accept such a possibility.

That's the argument I find most persuasive in discussions with pro-death penalty advocates. But it astonishes me that they are not swayed by the notion that killing is killing (and that murder is intrinsically immoral). Or even that these murders are not effective in preventing crimes. They don't seem to care. It's all about vengeance. I just don't get the vengeance thing.

[Sir Charles]

MR Bill,

A whole lot of bad lawyering goes on in the U.S. (I've benefitted from it from time to time -- hey, a win is a win in the civil realm.)

I was shocked when my firm took on a death penalty case to see how slipshod the defense work was. I've put more time and energy into cases involving a written warning to an employee. Fortunately in our case we actually got the Supreme Court to stay the execution 48 hours before it was to occur and then reverse on the merits. But such wins are rare indeed.

Paula,

Enjoy your time.

Jeanne Marie,

That's the other thing -- once you can sentence someone to life without parole, the only argument for the death penalty is a cold form of revenge. It's ugly in its own right.

[Anonymous Lawyer]

I don't talk about my work publicly, but the Davis case hits close to home since my work is death penalty defense.

MR Bill is correct, that many capital cases are tried badly. They are far more complex than ordinary criminal cases, and many defense lawyers are simply not equipped for those challenges. The prosecution tends to employ scorched-earth tactics to win at all costs, and they certainly appeal to the vengeance that Jeanne Marie mentions, as well as the fears of jurors.

My first trial-level client was mentally retarded, and raised under the most horrific circumstances. One of his juries sentenced him to life without the possibility of parole; another (in a badly-handled trial) sentenced him to death, and he was executed a few years before SCOTUS ruled that execution of mentally retarded persons is unconstitutional. I spent that awful night with his family; their suffering haunts me still.

My second client had severe PTSD from his service in VietNam; he snapped, and killed a family member who had been abusive throughout his life and another. There was a huge legal issue which his courts ignored; another client later won on the identical issue. This client, too, was executed. He sent me a change of address card listing his new address as heaven, and called an hour before he was killed to thank me for standing by him.

I've got cases where I do not believe my guy was involved at all. There are cases where my guy was neither the killer nor did he intend to kill, but there he is on the row. Then there are cases where there is not a lot of question about guilt, but strong reasons he should not have been sentenced to death. Every single capital case I have ever seen or heard about in over two decades has had serious legal problems.

Justice Ginsburg's remarks last week about the unreliability of the process were true, and encouraging to those of us in the trenches. So is the trend toward abolition of capital punishment, which has picked up speed with the work of the Innocence Project, the work of student journalists who helped free a number of people from Illinois' death row, the work of scientists who have carefully shown that most forensic evidence (fingerprints, tool marks, hair comparisons, handwriting, arson investigation, etc.) does not meet scientific standards for reliability, and the work of others showing the unreliability of eyewitness identifications, of coerced confessions, of jailhouse "snitch" testimony, etc.

[paula]

AL, thanks for contributing to the discussion and for doing what you do.

[MR Bill]

Paula, emailed you.. thought I had a day or two..

[Anonymous Lawyer]

The Los Angeles Times posted an editorial today, decrying the Davis execution. Here is part of what they had to say:

If the U.S. justice system has failed Davis, it may be because it's so difficult to overturn capital convictions. A Georgia jury found him guilty, despite the lack of a murder weapon or any other physical evidence linking him to the shooting, based on witness testimony that later proved to be unreliable. Seven of the nine prosecution witnesses recanted their testimony after the trial, with some claiming it was coerced by police, and some witnesses have identified another man as MacPhail's killer. Yet appeals courts have opted not to reverse the jury's decision because even with all the troubling new details, defense attorneys haven't been able to prove by clear and convincing evidence that Davis is innocent. That's a different burden of proof than is required at trial, where prosecutors need to demonstrate guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. This means that even when new testimony raises doubts about the original verdict, it's sometimes not enough to save a defendant's life.

Jurors have the comfort of knowing that someone else will review their decision. Judges have the comfort of knowing that a jury made the decision in the first place. Prosecutors have the comfort of knowing they won. There is not much comfort left for the rest of us, in whose name the killing proceeds.