IOW it's not immoral for a country to let its citizens go into bankruptcy due to medical debt.

And it's not immoral that thousands of people a year die due to lack of adequate insurance, or no insurance at all.

I thought liberals weren't into legislating morality.

The first talking point is particularly bizarre, though. It switches from arguing that people shouldn't be denied medical care because they can't afford it to arguing that people who get medical care shouldn't be expected to pay for it before being allowed to spend anybody else's money on it.

The whole thing was, beyond any doubt, a partisan witch hunt, and Starr was the most partisan of partisan hacks, the furthest thing from an "independent" truth-seeker

The impression I'm about to convey is more one of Zeitgeist than conscious strategy. But I have the sense that Republican leaders after Watergate and Iran/Contra saw the Clinton years as an opportunity for payback. (Henry Hyde's attitude is relevant here; he was a major GOP player in the Iran/Contra hearings).

IOW: Here was Nixon, and little-loved as Nixon was by many in the old-guard GOP, he had the Kissinger shuttle diplomacy and the visits to China and Russia and any number of conservative legislative achievements to his credit, winning re-election in a landslide, and the Democrats hounded him from office over WHAT? Some clowns with wirecutters breaking into some time-server's office?

And to compound that, Ronald Reagan: brought the hostages home from Iran, stood tall against the Evil Empire, initiated tax breaks that got every Scrooge McDuck in America swimming in his money bin again, stood tall against terrorists. And the Democrats were hounding him for WHAT? Being patriotic enough to support freedom-fighters in Nicaragua?

Now, this wasn't every Republican by any means. A fair number of leaders who had seen enough of Washington to have things in perspective realized that Nixon and Reagan both committed some serious abuses of executive power (which were also stupid and unnecessary from a policy perspective). Barry Goldwater is a notable example: he was the one who finally told Nixon he had to go, and he was mighty unimpressed by Iran/Contra.

But it seems to me a fair number of younger and/or more blinkered Republicans came through the years from Watergate to Iran/Contra thinking that that's just how you play things in DC: you hammer the opposition President over some piddly stuff till he staggers back into his own corner not knowing where the next punch is coming from. If you can't even find piddly stuff, keep hammering, as Steve notes above, and something will crack.

Bill Clinton was never convicted of perjury by any legally constituted authority. Period. Not by the court in the Jones trial nor by the Senate of the US Congress.

The first claim is a lame attempt at a red herring. In this country, we have procedures; judges can't just go around convicting people of crimes. Since the Jones case was a civil trial for sexual harassment, the judge did not have the option of "convicting" Clinton of anything, so the judge's failure to do so is no more relevant than the U.N. Security Council's failure to do so would be. The judge in the Jones trial did find, however, that Clinton had lied about material facts under oath, and as a result, held him in contempt. He chose not to appeal that finding. She further referred him to the bar for disciplinary proceedings; he agreed to a surrender of his law license as a sanction.

True, the Senate failed to convict him. Whether that was because they didn't believe he was guilty, didn't believe that impeachment was a proper punishment/remedy for his guilt, or didn't care because of partisanship, we'll never fully know.

And let's just say that Steve ought to leave the political comedy to Stephen Colbert and the legal analysis to lawyers, because his "explanation" of the impeachment fails as both. It manages to omit the role of the Attorney General in the independent counsel statute, the difference between a special prosecutor and independent counsel, the legal standard for an independent counsel, the actual reason for the referral of the Lewinsky matter to the OIC, the role of Clinton in expanding the FRE so as to make the issue relevant, among many other things, while inventing bizarre descriptions of people (what on earth is a "bipartisan" person? Starr as a partisan hack?) and events ("arm-twisting" of federal judges?)

Yet again you offer up vagueness with no specifics. Please specify where I've been historically inaccurate; I've obviously been less than exhaustive in just a few paragraphs.

You know damn well what I meant (you so frequently pretend to be confused by semantics when we all know you aren't) when I dashed off the description of Fiske as "bipartisan." Obviously the accurate term would be "nonpartisan" to describe Fiske, and such a term would be the least possibly accurate term to describe Starr.

And the arm-twisting of Judge David Sentelle by Helms and Faircloth is the furthest thing from an invention of mine.

But it seems to me a fair number of younger and/or more blinkered Republicans came through the years from Watergate to Iran/Contra thinking that that's just how you play things in DC: you hammer the opposition President over some piddly stuff till he staggers back into his own corner not knowing where the next punch is coming from. If you can't even find piddly stuff, keep hammering, as Steve notes above, and something will crack.

And several commentators have seen it as the co-opting by the right of tactics pioneered and developed by Thurgood Marshall and the Civil Rights movement: exploiting the legal system in service of political ends unachievable within the legislative/electoral realm.

And several commentators have seen it as the co-opting by the right of tactics pioneered and developed by Thurgood Marshall and the Civil Rights movement: exploiting the legal system in service of political ends unachievable within the legislative/electoral realm.

And for eight solid years they had one big advantage that Marshall didn't have: a president whose sole criterion in appointing judges was ideological affinity. For them to win cases in the Roberts court is about as tough as it is for Tom Brady to get a free meal at Hooters.

Life is crude and could be offensive to some.


I find it amusing that many of the same people that don't have a problem talking about teabaggers, have previously acted on this site as if using "Democrat party" instead of "Democratic party" was the equivalent of burning a cross outside an NAACP meeting.

Clinton lied about being able to keep it in his pants. His impeachment had nothing to do with true moral outrage or fitness to be President (some of the great leaders in world history were womanizers), it was about neutering the impact of a moderate Democratic President who might weaken the power of the Republican party if he proved too popular. He passed welfare reform and NAFTA, helped Phil Gramm and company weaken regulations whose absences subsequently contributed to our recent economic crisises, and did many other things designed to appeal to moderates rather than liberals (laws Reagan and Bush weren't able to pass because they didn't have Republican majorities). Intentionally pissing off your base on purpose to draw more support overall is now commonly known as a "Sister Soulja moment" because of Clinton. He was a moderate who did almost nothing liberal during his two terms.

It's the same thing on health care reform, Republicans are opposed en masse not because of any grand or small philosophical reasons. They're opposed because real health reform would help Americans and those people would be more likely to vote Democrat instead of Republican out of gratitude. That and all the money the insurance companies are giving them to keep things the same. All the talk about taking my money to give it to someone else is just bullshite only libertarians actually believe.

We did. Last November. We won.

More amusement. It's amazing how much this line has appeared this election cycle by people who would demand congressional hearings if Bush farted loudly.

I find it amusing that many of the same people that don't have a problem talking about teabaggers, have previously acted on this site as if using "Democrat party" instead of "Democratic party" was the equivalent of burning a cross outside an NAACP meeting.

Two differences:
1)Democrat party is grammatically incorrect, teabaggers isn't.
2)Afaik, no one in the Democratic party ever called it the Democrat party before Republicans started doing it (I have heard a number of blue dogs do it in the last few years so that no longer applies), whereas you can find hundreds of media stories from before July of the Tea Partiers calling themselves "teabaggers", before liberal blogs started making fun of them for not knowing what it meant.


edit:

More amusement. It's amazing how much this line has appeared this election cycle by people who would demand congressional hearings if Bush farted loudly.

One of Obama's major campaign platforms was health care reform (as it was for many House and Senate members). Bush never ran on invading Iraq or torturing prisoners or even Social Security reform (which he tried to push through immediately after the inauguration in 2005).

And the arm-twisting of Judge David Sentelle by Helms and Faircloth is the furthest thing from an invention of mine.

Well, it's an invention of somebody, because neither Sentelle nor Helms nor Faircloth ever said any such thing. Basically, they were seen having lunch together once, and this was spun into an elaborate conspiracy theory. (Never mind that the two other judges on the panel were not present, and did not dissent from the appointment.)

As for Fiske, bipartisan and non-partisan are very different things, and I don't know what made Fiske either.

As for "specifics," very little of what you presented was facts, as opposed to your tendentious claims about what people were thinking or what their motives were. But you fail to mention the actual reason for the referral -- something which Janet Reno, not "Republicans" of any sort, had to decide to do: namely, the role of Vernon Jordan in both Whitewater and the Lewinsky affair. In both instances, Clinton was accused of using Jordan to buy off a witness against him; that was the basis for investigating Clinton's behavior in the latter. You also fail to mention that the Lewinsky questions from Starr occurred only after Clinton had already lied under oath about them in the Jones case, so claiming that the only purpose was to get him to lie makes no sense. If he hadn't done anything with Lewinsky, he could have truthfully said so; otherwise, he had already committed a crime by lying about it, and the purpose of the questions was to explore that.

The first claim is a lame attempt at a red herring. In this country, we have procedures; judges can't just go around convicting people of crimes.

That’s right. Judges can’t just go around convicting people of crimes, and that was my exact point. I’m relieved you concede that at least. People here, and everywhere, though make this claim—that Clinton was a perjurer. Perjury is a crime, and a person must be convicted in a court of law of it under an expressed statute. It’s not just a lay term to be bandy around like creationist calling natural selection “just a theory”. The tie doesn't go to the runner.

Clinton was never convicted of perjury. That is fact. That is the first thing that needs to be noted when addressing that claim. Of course, like the teabagger you are, you are not interested in fact. Facts mean nothing to you, though, and neither does fair play.

And you know what? If people nevertheless insist on talking about it in those discredited terms, that makes them liars. You don't attack the whistleblower. Now, the mouthpieces, like you, who simply attack the whistleblower with smoke and mirror rhetoric without ever acceding to the underlying claim—well, I revert to my Michael Corlene analogy--I feel like I'm walking barefoot on rotten fruit. I guess you’re just merely corrupt. But keeping talking about morality.

You should be ashamed of yourself to engage in such low, transparent, sophistries, especially since you claim to be a lawyer. Aren’t you? Is that what you’d tell a court if someone said, your honor, the DA is wrong, my client has nver been convicted of perjury? You'd tell him that's immaterial? Is that how you were told to handle it in your ethics and professionalism courses? It takes a special species of gall to say someone is lame when that person addresses the exact issue raised, as it was raised, referencing it exactly as it was raised. I mean, can your world get any more worthlessly trivial and absurd? Can you be any more corrupt? Any more hostage to ideology?

Since the Jones case was a civil trial for sexual harassment, the judge did not have the option of "convicting" Clinton of anything,

So quit using the term then. And disabuse those who do, not those who correctly point out their mistake.

But, actually (sir-prise, sir-prise), you’re wrong. The crime of perjury applies to civil as well as criminal cases. You’re just doing frenetic hand waving in hopes of misdirecting attention. You’re the one doing that old dance, the red herring semaphore hustle.

Perjury

While the crime of perjury can be committed in both civil and criminal cases, perjury prosecutions arising from civil lawsuits are extremely rare.

So, you're solution to when there is no reason to prosectute someone on an expressed law, is do it on a vague and general claim. That he didn't actually break any law just makes him more guilty in your eyes? That's cute. And you take umbrage if someone campares you to Joe McCarthy and witch-hunting? That's not politcs.

That’s right. Judges can’t just go around convicting people of crimes, and that was my exact point. I’m relieved you concede that at least. People here, and everywhere, though make this claim—that Clinton was a perjurer. Perjury is a crime, and a person must be convicted in a court of law of it under an expressed statute. It’s not just a lay term to be bandy around like creationist calling natural selection “just a theory”. The tie doesn't go to the runner.

A person has to be convicted of it in a court of law in order to be punished. A person does not need to be convicted of it in order for us to judge him guilty of it. Clinton committed perjury. OJ Simpson was a murderer. Notwithstanding the lack of a criminal verdict.

Either you're too stupid to realize this, or too dishonest. I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume the latter.

But, actually (sir-prise, sir-prise), you’re wrong. The crime of perjury applies to civil as well as criminal cases. You’re just doing frenetic hand waving in hopes of misdirecting attention. You’re the one doing that old dance, the red herring semaphore hustle.

I'm not wrong; you're just yet another dumbass playing internet lawyer. I never said anything to suggest that the crime of perjury doesn't apply to civil as well as criminal cases. I said that Judge Wright did not have the option of convicting Clinton of perjury.

Not because one can't commit perjury in a civil case, but because one can't be convicted of a crime by a judge hearing a civil case against you.

I find it amusing that many of the same people that don't have a problem talking about teabaggers, have previously acted on this site as if using "Democrat party" instead of "Democratic party" was the equivalent of burning a cross outside an NAACP meeting.

As Shalimar notes, Tea Party participants were using "teabaggers" BEFORE anyone else. In any case, this is a term that's at most a few months old, and many of us had no idea that anyone would find the term per se to be offensive. As soon as it was pointed out, I stopped using it, and won't use it again.

And with that as a guide, I'm sure that never again will we be reading "Democrat Party" from any of our Tea Party fans on this site.

Is that how you were told to handle it in your ethics and professionalism courses?

Maybe my law school was unusual, but my Ethics class was mostly an opportunity for a handful of students to ask thousands of questions designed to figure out what kind of immoral (and generally predatory towards clients) activities they could get away with without getting in trouble with the bar. Not that David was necessarily that type of student just because his arguing style reminds me of them.

1)Democrat party is grammatically incorrect, teabaggers isn't.


That's quite a dedication to grammar.

And it's not grammatically incorrect anyway, because party does not have to only be preceded with an adjective.

You should be ashamed of yourself to engage in such low, transparent, sophistries, especially since you claim to be a lawyer. Aren’t you? Is that what you’d tell a court if someone said, your honor, the DA is wrong, my client has nver been convicted of perjury? You'd tell him that's immaterial?

I'd tell him it was immaterial if the actual question we were addressing was whether the person had actually committed perjury.

EDIT: Do you think that OJ's lawyers, when being sued by the Goldmans and Browns for killing their relatives, said, "Your honor, OJ has never been convicted of killing anybody"?

If the law allows it then it must be okay seems to be a common viewpoint.

> The "reason" is simple: it's immoral to say, "I want this, but I can't afford to pay for it, so you should be forced to."

Perfect. A more model example of creationist rewind and replay one couldn't ask for. A more perfect example of that creationist mindset could not be more forthcoming. We've spent 1400 posts about answering this in numerous ways--that you never come back and address. You just lie low, like the good little fundamentalist you are, and come back once the dust settles and simply reassert that which was repudiated extensively as if nothing has been said.

The only thing to do is what Nieporent does, which is simply nakedly assert: No, it isn't immoral at all and leave it at that. That's all he deserves.

But, of course, we can't do that for the same the Dawkinses and the Dennetts can't. That's what that bullying mentality counts on. It's not about epistemology; it's about politics through theocracy. It's about them getting their way any old way. (It has to be so because I just know it is right--that's all there is to it.)

You are born with obligation. Thus it is, thus it always was so, thus it will be.

You have good Republican sex with a woman (that means it lasts about 15 seconds, just long enough). She assures you that she's taken precautions so as not to become pregnant--she's taken double, triple precautions (pill, tubes tied, infertile). She becomes pregnant. Is it immoral to say you owe child support?

You don't have a car. Don't believe in them. Is it immoral to make you pay road taxes?

A military? Is it immoral to make you pay for that if you're a pacifist? If you just don't like what the government is doing with that army?

You just throw that morality stuff around so you don't have to think, you don't have to consider your role in a social context? It's your way of marking the cards and stacking he deck. That's all it is. And it has no justification in history or in nature. It's just your brand of creationist pie in the sky. It's what Dennett would call your "skyhook".

The "reason" is simple: it's immoral to say, "I want this, but I can't afford to pay for it, so you should be forced to."

If I live next door to Bill Gates, there may be a lot of "wealth, resources available in our" neighborhood, but it isn't mine; it's his.

You're not addressing the point. It's not that he can't afford health insurance. It's that no company in America will give it to him because of a preexisting condition. Yes, I understand what insurance is. This is an ineffective system; wrong right to its core.

Still, let's say you do support that aspect of the current system. Do you also support him marrying a woman he does not love in order to access her insurance? Insurance she gets as a student? Insurance she wouldn't have if she had not married him? That being because she would not be able to receive financial aide without being listed as independent of her parents, status she could only earn through marriage? You have to admit, it was a rather ingenious solution. Downright libertarian in its tenacity. The system got him down, but he went ahead and out thought it. So *what* if he's married to a girl that he doesn't love? It's not like you could or should get into any legal trouble for cheating on your wife. <chuckle> That's absurd.

You are born with obligation. Thus it is, thus it always was so, thus it will be.

Lucky you don't just "simply nakedly assert"!!


EDIT: And since you've previously established that your only position is "might makes right," I don't see that there's much fruit in discussing it with you. But, like rain on your wedding day, you're probably not the person to be whining about "bullying."

You're not addressing the point. It's not that he can't afford health insurance. It's that no company in America will give it to him because of a preexisting condition. Yes, I understand what insurance is. This is an ineffective system; wrong right to its core.

He doesn't need health insurance; he needs health care. And it's that that I was referring to when I said "can't afford to pay for it."

(Anyway, when health insurance companies are allowed to properly set rates, they'll sell insurance to anyone (perhaps at a price that someone can't afford, however.))

Still, let's say you do support that aspect of the current system. Do you also support him marrying a woman he does not love in order to access her insurance? Insurance she gets as a student? Insurance she wouldn't have if she had not married him? That being because she would not be able to receive financial aide without being listed as independent of her parents, status she could only earn through marriage? You have to admit, it was a rather ingenious solution. Downright libertarian in its tenacity. The system got him down, but he went ahead and out thought it. So *what* if he's married to a girl that he doesn't love? It's not like you could or should get into any legal trouble for cheating on your wife. <chuckle> That's absurd.

Do I support him making some compromises, rather then engaging in theft? Sure. Assuming he's not lying to the insurance company and she's not lying to the relevant financial aid people, sure. People enter into marriages of convenience all the time.

But I have the sense that Republican leaders after Watergate and Iran/Contra saw the Clinton years as an opportunity for payback.

Of course. There's is entirely a bizzaro mindset. Vietnam, the cold war in general, Nixon debacle, Reagan humiliation over Iran-Contra, Clinton 'triangulating' his way into the white house, then showing he was tougher than they, the sciences, the arts--it's all negative mindset bent on self-destruction while taking as many down with them as they can because modernity has left them behind. All they have left is their sense that they have the state of the art sensibilities. State of the art? Sure, just listen to them; they're just right, you're just wrong. That's all there is to it. The mumpsimus with AK-47 as hero who insists on his divine separatist self, that ”the self that is an island" dogmatism.

Do I support him making some compromises, rather then engaging in theft? Sure. Assuming he's not lying to the insurance company and she's not lying to the relevant financial aid people, sure.

Your systems of logic and morality are truly remarkable. I guess there's nothing more to say. You think this is right. I think this is wrong. In most First World nations, he would not be obligated to commit what is, in my opinion, an immoral act. That is, of course, except for the most wealthy.

I admit, I'm breaking my code, here. I'm all for people thinking whatever they wish, so long as it doesn't hurt people. Your political attitude quite clearly hurts a lot of people. Mine is only one example.

People enter into marriages of convenience all the time.

Such as the Clintons? And heckfire knows that such things always work out for the best? Riiiiight? Or are marriages of convenience only cool if you openly sleep with other people? I mean brazenly. No lying to save face. Brazen actually works in other countries (example: Berlusconi, et al.). But for my friend, in *this* country, such things have a tendency to come back to haunt.

A person has to be convicted of it in a court of law in order to be punished. A person does not need to be convicted of it in order for us to judge him guilty of it. Clinton committed perjury. OJ Simpson was a murderer. Notwithstanding the lack of a criminal verdict.

You heard it here first, folks. Clinton committed perjury one or another. Let's not get too technical about it. Just string him up. Forget about institutional process. We just know. Nieporent, you're a f*cktard.

I'd tell him it was immaterial if the actual question we were addressing was whether the person had actually committed perjury.

So you're backpedalling. You know, I simply addressed initially the appropriateness of using a legal term of art like it was being used. If you were going to just come around to agreeing with me, you could have said that to begin with. Instead, you said that was immaterial, a red herring. What a maroon.

A person has to be convicted of it in a court of law in order to be punished.

No, a person as to be convicted of it in a court of law (or Congress) in order to be a perjurer. Period. Punishment is apart from the definition. Use another word. Do strive to have just the minnimum of integrity.

You heard it here first, folks. Clinton committed perjury one or another.

First? Somehow I don't think I'm the first person to make this assertion.

Let's not get too technical about it. Just string him up. Forget about institutional process. We just know. Nieporent, you're a f*cktard.

Coming from you, that wounds me greatly. But please stop being a dumbass, and learn about the difference between being convicted of a crime and having committed a crime. You know, like OJ killing his ex-wife and a waiter.

No, a person as to be convicted of it in a court of law (or Congress) in order to be a perjurer. Period. Punishment is apart from the definition. Use another word. Do try and have just the minnimum of integrity.

Apparently I was wrong in 1521 when I assumed the latter. You really are that dumb. The definition of perjurer is not "someone who has been convicted of perjury." It's "someone who has committed perjury." (That's why we can talk about someone being a "convicted perjurer." If the former were an element of the latter, then the phrase would be redundant.)

Not because one can't commit perjury in a civil case, but because one can't be convicted of a crime by a judge hearing a civil case against you.

scramble scramble. First, you don't think through what you say, now you're going to scramble until you have to go off to lie low in ignominy, then you'll come back and start the whole charade again.

scramble scramble. First, you don't think through what you say, now you're going to scramble until you have to go off to lie low in ignominy, then you'll come back and start the whole charade again.

You really are an #######, aren't you? I have neither scrambled nor changed what I have said. You don't understand the law, so you misunderstood what I said. Instead of apologizing when I explained your misinterpretation, you attack me. #######.


EDIT:

So you're backpedalling. You know, I simply addressed initially the appropriateness of using a legal term of art like it was being used. If you were going to just come around to agreeing with me, you could have said that to begin with. Instead, you said that was immaterial, a red herring. What a maroon.

No, I never backpedaled, and I never agreed with you. Nor are you correct when you now claim that perjurer is a "legal term of art"; it's also a common everyday word.

What you were doing was using a true statement -- that the Jones court hadn't convicted Clinton of perjury -- to make a false implication -- that Clinton hadn't committed perjury. But the Jones court had no ability to convict Clinton of perjury, so the fact that it failed to do so was irrelevant.

Lucky you don't just "simply nakedly assert"!!

Mind is completely and fully substantiated by history and everything we know about reality.

Yours...?

you fail to mention the actual reason for the referral -- something which Janet Reno, not "Republicans" of any sort, had to decide to do: namely, the role of Vernon Jordan in both Whitewater and the Lewinsky affair. In both instances, Clinton was accused of using Jordan to buy off a witness against him; that was the basis for investigating Clinton's behavior in the latter. You also fail to mention that the Lewinsky questions from Starr occurred only after Clinton had already lied under oath about them in the Jones case, so claiming that the only purpose was to get him to lie makes no sense. If he hadn't done anything with Lewinsky, he could have truthfully said so; otherwise, he had already committed a crime by lying about it, and the purpose of the questions was to explore that

Well, that certainly made the foundations of the Republic quiver.

And so, armed with a lie about whether he'd had oral sex with a young woman, unearthed in the course of various dead-end attempts to find anything impeachable, the House Republicans impeach a President.

A few years later, Bush & Cheney lie about reasons for waging a war that kills tens of thousands of people and costs unimaginable sums. They lie about torture. They practice extraconstitutional detainment of people who don't seem to be protected by any law or Constitution or treaty. (Frankly, DMN, if you think Guantanamo was a good idea, I don't know how to make sense of your philosophy.) They order extremely dubious domestic surveillance and intelligence-gathering.

And the Democrats, even after gaining control of Congress, essentially don't utter a peep for years and years. Oh, a few crazy old farts like Murtha and Byrd make some speeches, but basically, it's "wartime" and anything short of rolling yourself up in the flag is treasonous.

There is something unbalanced about this scenario.

Do you think that OJ's lawyers, when being sued by the Goldmans and Browns for killing their relatives, said, "Your honor, OJ has never been convicted of killing anybody"?

I'm actually asking a legitimate legal-strategy question here: shouldn't they? I mean, if I've been acquitted of doing something and somebody sues me for doing that something, wouldn't it be a good idea to bring up the acquittal?

I say this while being happy to call OJ a murderer and Clinton a perjurer, BTW. I take the point that if you did something, you did it.

Well, that certainly made the foundations of the Republic quiver.

And so, armed with a lie about whether he'd had oral sex with a young woman, unearthed in the course of various dead-end attempts to find anything impeachable, the House Republicans impeach a President.

Bob, Starr's job was not to decide whether to impeach Clinton. It was to investigate whether he had broken the law. In the course of that investigation, he came across evidence that Clinton had committed perjury and had obstructed justice to get away with it. He approached Janet Reno with this information, who authorized a referral to the judicial panel; they authorized Starr to look into it. What should they have done, shrugged and said, "Maybe he committed perjury and obstructed justice? No big deal."? Should Starr have said that? Should the House have said that?

Serious question: you come across evidence that the president has committed a felony. Do you ignore it because it wasn't related to his official duties? Does the president just get a pass on any crime he commits in his private life? Does he get a pass only on minor crimes he has committed in his private life? (And are perjury/obstruction of justice really minor? Only if they relate to something we don't care about?) (Maybe there's a policy argument that these should be tolled until after he leaves office, but that's not what the law currently says. And is that really a good policy? Shouldn't politicians be held to a higher standard, not a lower one?)

I hope it's been mentioned before, but the use of Bill Gates to exemplify the poor, pilfered privileged is rather ironic. He is one of the biggest proponents for centralized health care. Naturally, Microsoft would be more than happy to collect all your medical data...

A person has to be convicted of it in a court of law in order to be punished.

No, a person as to be convicted of it in a court of law (or Congress) in order to be a perjurer. Period.

No, but thanks for playing.

You and Steve really are putting on a show. Unintentional comedy at its finest. And no need to even get off the couch or pay admission.

I'm actually asking a legitimate legal-strategy question here: shouldn't they? I mean, if I've been acquitted of doing something and somebody sues me for doing that something, wouldn't it be a good idea to bring up the acquittal?

It depends on the context of the statements, obviously, but the basic point is that an acquittal isn't actually considered evidence. Obviously if someone tried to claim that you had been convicted, or to treat you as having been convicted, then one could remind the court that one hadn't been; I'm not saying one could never make the argument. But one can't cite the acquittal as a reason why one hasn't actually committed the act.

Mind is completely and fully substantiated by history and everything we know about reality.

Okay, confess: you stole this shtick from Ayn Rand.

But please stop being a dumbass, and learn about the difference between being convicted of a crime and having committed a crime. You know, like OJ killing his ex-wife and a waiter.

Yes, and we all know that evolution is just a theory, so let's impeach Darwin.

That's a mindset that assumes to be true that which has to be proven.

To be a perjurer, one must be found guilty of perjury in a court of law. Those are legal terms of art. If you not found guilty, you are not the thing and you have not committed the crime. How absurd to say, you ain't the criminal, but you committed the crime. If you disagree with judgment, that is something else and don't mean jack as to the legal aspect, which was what the Clinton thing was all about. Same applies to murder. OJ was not convicted of murder. He is not a murderer. Whether you or I think he is, is not material to that. A lawyer who doesn't get rules? Man.

When you say OJ is a murderer, or Clinton is a perjurer, you are confounding two different realms. You want to use it in a way that derogates from law, but that still carries the legal weight. Nice trick. There was no crime as it applied to Bill Clinton, or OJ Simpson. That's the rules. The law, it's substance and process, determines whether a crime has been committed. Your lay theology doesn't. You can think that right or wrong. But it is what it is--the law. You're confounding two different universes, self-servingly picking what you like from each like you're selecting from Chinese menu. I guess you think you are justified in thinking either team won the World Series, too? I guess, in a way, you could. But one has a panoply of things that flows from it's actually winning, and the other doesn't. Same with Clinton. Try to quit mind-screwing yourself.

What you were doing was using a true statement -- that the Jones court hadn't convicted Clinton of perjury -- to make a false implication -- that Clinton hadn't committed perjury. But the Jones court had no ability to convict Clinton of perjury, so the fact that it failed to do so was irrelevant.

What is not irrelevant is what I simply and originally said: that he has never been convicted of perjury (or tried) by any legal institution, and that therefore he cannot be a perjurer. You can have your own lexicon; that doesn't give it any weight in legal proceedings. And in the political proceeding, he was not convicted of perjury there either. So what's left? Your opinion, which, in effect, was rejected, by your representative institution.

Starr's job was not to decide whether to impeach Clinton

Sure, but I'm talking about the House Republicans. I mean, the Iran/Contra hearings broadcast the facts that Ronald Reagan (or at least his top advisers, clearly under his watch) had broken the law (the Boland Amendent) and done surreptitious arms deals with folks who had terrorized our Embassy and called us the Great Satan. And the House Democrats did ... like, nothing. (And perhaps were right to do nothing, given the awesomeness of the impeachment power. Maybe even illegal cowboy "policy-making" is not impeachable in a sane republic.)

So was impeaching Clinton because of a lie about a blow job, um, judicious? Whatever about Starr, OK, he can't help himself, he uncovers something embarrassing, he's duty-bound to pursue it, I'll even concede that point. But supposedly lucid and unretarded Congressmen actually brought articles of impeachment about that? This is where I agree with Toobin: future generations, unless some kind of Handmaid's Tale culture comes to power someday, are going to look at that and wonder what kind of morons got elected in the 1990s.

hello boys!!!

how are all yall?

STILL arguing over the same stuff? glad to hear it.

question - when i look up the word "perjury" in dictionary.com it says "the deliberate giving of false, misleading or incomplete testimony under oath."

so please explain how bill clinton did not commit perjury because i am not understanding that. i do get that he was not prosecuted or convicted of it, but how can anyone actually claim that he did not lie under oath? the word "perjury" best i can find, doesn't see to make any room to differentiate about WHAT the lie is.

- also, as a registered democrat, i would like someone to explain to me why the non-democrats saying "democrat party" is an insult to democrats.

thank you

I can help you with Democrat party. The traditional usages have been Democratic party and Republican party. Some Republicans decided about 15 years ago that Democratic party was easily confused with the democratic process and made democrats seem more associated with democracy than they deserved to be. Thus, they changed it to Democrat party to de-emphasize that connection. And many democrats get pissed about it because it isn't traditional usage and is intended as an insult. Yes, it seems silly, but what about our politics isn't these days.

so please explain how bill clinton did not commit perjury

Who says that which you quote applies to him? He was not convicted of doing that which you quote.

so morty,

do you believe that a crime has not been committed if no one is convicted of it?

are you not aware that prosecutors do not prosecute every crime?

shalimar,

that right there explains why i hate politics and politicians

I'm actually asking a legitimate legal-strategy question here: shouldn't they? I mean, if I've been acquitted of doing something and somebody sues me for doing that something, wouldn't it be a good idea to bring up the acquittal?

It depends on the context of the statements, obviously, but the basic point is that an acquittal isn't actually considered evidence. Obviously if someone tried to claim that you had been convicted, or to treat you as having been convicted, then one could remind the court that one hadn't been; I'm not saying one could never make the argument. But one can't cite the acquittal as a reason why one hasn't actually committed the act.

It's a "greater/lessor" thing.

Just because someone can't beat you in running the mile doesn't mean they can beat you in the 100-yard dash. The criminal trial is like a marathon; the civil is like a sprint. Different rules, of procedure and evidence, not to mention different strategy and tactics. Having an evidentiary standard of "preponderance of the evidence" in civil suits compared to "beyond a reasonable doubt" makes all the difference.

so please explain how bill clinton did not commit perjury because i am not understanding that. i do get that he was not prosecuted or convicted of it, but how can anyone actually claim that he did not lie under oath? the word "perjury" best i can find, doesn't see to make any room to differentiate about WHAT the lie is.

Of course he committed perjury. The somewhat relevant question is why anyone other than Hillary, Chelsea, and a gossip columnist should ever have been interested in his relations with Monica Lewinsky in the first place. On one level Clinton had nobody but himself to blame for his troubles, but on a more serious level the House of Representatives made a complete jackass of itself.

- also, as a registered democrat, i would like someone to explain to me why the non-democrats saying "democrat party" is an insult to democrats.

Because it's ungrammatical. "Democrat" is not an adjective, although many nominally educated Republicans seem not to notice this. And since it plays to their base, they keep on doing it.

EDIT: FYI, Shalimar, that "Democrat Party" riff was invented more or less simultaneously by Joe McCarthy and Richard Nixon well over 50 years ago, and has been used pretty much steadily ever since. It didn't begin with Newt.

EDIT II: I now discover that the first prominent Republican to use the term was Herbert Hoover back in 1932, and Harold Stassen took it up in 1940. But McCarthy and Nixon were really the first ones to make the term stick.

do you believe that a crime has not been committed if no one is convicted of it?

There could be a crime. There very well might be a crime. But, a person who has not been convicted can't be called the criminal as to that crime, though, especially if he is tried and found not guilty, or if he could have been but was not. Unless one is just engaged in rank speculation--in which case, make that clear--but that's not what the predicate was in the original statements about Clinton being guilty of perjury. He wasn't found guilty of perjury. Holding what Nieporent holds, having a little of this and a little of that, using terms this now, that wahy then, just contorts things into meaninglessness.

As, I believe, Jocko Conlon, famous umpire once said when he was late on a call and the player asked what it was--safe or out? "It ain't nothing until I call it."

andy

as i understand it, the opposition was trying to pin SOMETHING on him and they did have him cold on lying under oath.

i have a real hard time getting indignant because it is what politicians of both parties do no matter WHAT the subject is

- the non-democrats being ungrammatical is an insult to dems???

i have a real hard time getting indignant about that too because the word "democrat" is not an insulting term (unless you are not a dem)

To be a perjurer, one must be found guilty of perjury in a court of law.

Wrong. False. Untrue. Not right.

Those are legal terms of art.

They're also words in common speech, which need not be used in a technical legal sense. However, even in a technical legal sense, "perjurer" is not defined as "someone convicted of perjury."

If you not found guilty, you are not the thing and you have not committed the crime.

Wrong. False. Untrue. Not right.

How absurd to say, you ain't the criminal, but you committed the crime.

There's nothing "absurd" about that at all. Lawyers discuss the difference between factual guilt and legal guilt all the time. In fact, you can often be sentenced by a court for committing the crime even after you've been acquitted of it!

If you disagree with judgment, that is something else and don't mean jack as to the legal aspect, which was what the Clinton thing was all about. Same applies to murder. OJ was not convicted of murder. He is not a murderer. Whether you or I think he is, is not material to that. A lawyer who doesn't get rules? Man.

The problem is, these aren't "rules"; these are just your personal idiosyncrasies.

Personally, I think that Bill Clinton committed perjury. That said, it was over a big pile of nothing. The context won the day for this particular case. This is not uncommon in law. That's why we have judges and not Verdict Bots.

andy

as i understand it, the opposition was trying to pin SOMETHING on him and they did have him cold on lying under oath.

You're absolutely correct, Lisa, and if you didn't mind the country's wasting over a year, and countless millions of dollars proving that he lied about a blow job, then I guess we can just say it was all highly entertaining and blow the whole thing off.

- the non-democrats being ungrammatical is an insult to dems???

i have a real hard time getting indignant about that too because the word "democrat" is not an insulting term (unless you are not a dem)

Well on a certain level I admit it is kind of silly to get indignant about it. Sort of like waxing indignant about "teabaggers" or "negroes." People shouldn't be so quick to take offense if no offense was intended.

so morty

if i shoot someone in cold blood, witnessed by 50 people, got on video, i confessed BUT something happens (legally) so that i have to be found not-guilty in court and can't be tried again because of that's the law, are you going to insist that i did not murder or even kill anyone?

and actually

i personally know of a case of child abuse that was not prosecuted - person confessed because of physical evidence. BUT they also had the perp cold on weapons/drug charges and there was a plea bargain for a lot of time in exchange for no prosecution on the abuse

you gonna tell me that the person didn't commit the child abuse?

There could be a crime. There very well might be a crime. But, a person who has not been convicted can't be called the criminal as to that crime, though, especially if he is tried and found not guilty, or if he could have been but was not.

This is complete nonsense. It's childish. It's not part of any serious discussion.

Personally, I think that Bill Clinton committed perjury. That said, it was over a big pile of nothing. The context won the day for this particular case. This is not uncommon in law. That's why we have judges and not Verdict Bots.

Yep.

They're also words in common speech, which need not be used in a technical legal sense.

Yes, I noted that's what you were doing in explicit detail, and I said why you were doing it.

Very simply, the reason I pushed this with Nieporent is that his last refuge will always be to go back to confound his personal views and objective rules. Always wanting his way, he has to make his sensibilities the law. Whether that is Clinton being a perjurer (when he acknowledges all that means is he thinks Clinton is a perjurer, not that Clinton has been adjudged by the the proper authority to have been a perjurer) or that Health Care for everyone is immoral. He believes the two are the same; thus it is so. He tries to give himself wiggle room by falling back on claiming there's a lay definition, but wants to justfiy the consequences of the legal flowing to the lay. Definitionally, he's doing the medieval equivalent to determining if you are a witch. But, yeah, it's not legal. You're just still dead.

andy

grinning

my party registration can change depending on exactly what district i am in every 2 years because it is extremely important for the local primaries - some years bout everyone is repub, some years, dem

sigh

man my baseball club is teh absolute SUKC and the manager is an absolute democrat party

man my baseball club is teh absolute SUKC and the manager is an absolute democrat party

Well, at least you could say "Democrat Party" so ol' Cecil doesn't think you're the teabagging daughter of that pink tea poet e.e. cummings.

the opposition was trying to pin SOMETHING on him and they did have him cold on lying under oath.

i have a real hard time getting indignant because it is what politicians of both parties do no matter WHAT the subject is

No, Lisa. This is why I brought up the Starr office and the Clinton impeachment: the historical record over the past several decades, and especially over the past 15 years, is that is just isn't the case that this sort of scorched-earth attack politics has been practiced equally by Republicans and Democrats. It just isn't. And so when people attempt to defend criticisms of right wing character assassination campaigns by saying, well, the left wing does it just as much, they need to be called on it, as we've done in this thread. The left wing and the Democratic party DOESN'T do it just as much.

The two major parties are NOT just mirror images of one another. Their recent historical records DON'T contain equal amounts of ignominy. It's important to understand this and not allow defenders of the side with the worst record in this regard to get away with saying otherwise.

I also missed where this Democratic Party thing was interpreted as an insult. I'm sensing it's one comment from one person that's being beaten like a dead horse.

As, I believe, Jocko Conlon, famous umpire once said when he was late on a call and the player asked what it was--safe or out? "It ain't nothing until I call it."

Yes, that's one school of legal thought -- legal realism. There are others. (The famous legal joke is: One umpire says, "I call them as I see them." A second umpire says, "I call them as they are." A third umpire says, "Ain't nothing til I call them.")

steve

i am not defending anyone in either party doing anything of the sort

trust me on this

because the R has done a better job than the D at this crap doesn't mean either one of them are exactly saintly

the R got a whole lot of milage out of the vicious attack dog thing and in the end that kind of stuff come back to bite you in the ass and they are basically self destructing.

i'll tell you though steve, that actually scares me
because i don't want one huge giant majority party and one small increasingly angry hateful and violent party left over.


i don't want tyrrany on either side and i know only too well that justice is the will of the stronger party

I also missed where this Democratic Party thing was interpreted as an insult. I'm sensing it's one comment from one person that's being beaten like a dead horse.

Not exactly. The term has a long history. But if you or Lisa have a few minutes to spare, here it is:

Wiki on the history of the 'Democrat' Party.

For some reason the direct link doesn't work, but the second google entry on the page gets you to it.

if i shoot someone in cold blood, witnessed by 50 people, got on video, i confessed BUT something happens (legally) so that i have to be found not-guilty in court and can't be tried again because of that's the law, are you going to insist that i did not murder or even kill anyone?

This was my original post:

Bill Clinton was never convicted of perjury by any legally constituted authority. Period. Not by the court in the Jones trial nor by the Senate of the US Congress.

No one has denied that what I wrote there is true. They just want to insist they can nevertheless say he committed perjury and is perjurer. You can say whatever you want about that, but the fact is, as to law and as to the impeachment as I state it. When you play a game, there are rules.

And it would apply in the same way to eveyone.

Now, you. If someone wanted to impeach you from an office because you committed murder, I would first start with the fact that you have not been adjudged a murderer in law. And if, perchance, the rules of impeachment as they applied to your office were that you could only be impeached if you were a murderer in law, I would say that they can’t impeach you for that reason. Not for that reason.

Or, to put it another way, under the three-strikes you’re out punishment guidelines rules, it very much matters if you were convicted of two felonies but not of the third, even if “everyone knows you did that third one.”

Now, that doesn’t mean you aren’t a bad person, but it means that speaking with legal precision, you aren’t a murderer because you have not been convicted of having committed a murder. If we confound meaning a "universe" like that, there's no end to problems you'll have. See Clinton impeachment.

That’s the thing with term of art precision in all professions, whether that is law, engineering, science, you name it. It exists for a reason. So that there is not abuse, and so that we have a better idea what we’re considering and what effects of that consideration are called for. And if you don't adhere to the rules with precision, you are asking for not only conceptual clusterfxck, you'll get irrational and inequitable application.

Ray and David are not about that sort of precision—as to Clinton. It’s all the same to them. It’s all the same if you are just voting for him, but it’s not if you’re having a proceeding with legal consequences. If you want to say in some other sense you are indeed a murderer, or Clinton is perjurer, fine, then make that clear and keep the realms of meaning separate, and especially their effects separate. Language has a way of doing that--meanings shift and transform from one venue to another. But, that's no reason to just throw you're hands up and say it doesn't matter. A atrium might mean something in medicine it doesn't in architecture. I bet no one would say it doesn't matter if we keep the meanings clear and intact in their respective frames of reference.

That’s not what happens when people discuss Clinton, though. Ray said Clinton committed perjury. ???? What’s his authority for that? He has none. It’s just opinion. That's an important distinction to make. I'm frankly surprised no one here, esp. lawyers, think it's important to preserve that distinction. It’s as if fact-finding and legal-finding don’t matter to some people even if it is a legal proceeding. And of course sometimes it doesn't. There are examples of that. Bad examples.

Yes, that's one school of legal thought -- legal realism. There are others. (The famous legal joke is: One umpire says, "I call them as I see them." A second umpire says, "I call them as they are." A third umpire says, "Ain't nothing til I call them.")

There's nothing necessarily wrong with any of these philosphies. Just as long as they are used consistently where appropriate and we have notice which is being used at any given time. That is not the case with Clinton. Elements of all three, to say with your joke, are used, confound often within the same utterance.

the R got a whole lot of milage out of the vicious attack dog thing and in the end that kind of stuff come back to bite you in the ass and they are basically self destructing.

i'll tell you though steve, that actually scares me
because i don't want one huge giant majority party and one small increasingly angry hateful and violent party left over.

Agreed. What history demonstrates, however, is that holding "one huge giant majority party" together for any sustained period is extremely difficult. The Democrats struggle with their big-tent coalition as it is (for example, the often-heard misstatement that because they have 60 Democrats in the Senate, they have 60 solid votes; this health care issue vividly demonstrates that they don't), and if one imagines the scenario of the Democrats gaining a significant portion of independents and moderate Republicans joining their ranks, one should also imagine even more pressure on the fracture line between liberals and centrists within the Democratic party.

If indeed the Republicans continue along their current path of getting more reactionary, they will, as you say, get smaller. But what that might open up is the first real opportunity in a very long time for a viable third party to emerge within the US: a fiscally conservative, socially moderate/libertarian bloc that doesn't find itself comfortable any longer within the GOP, but doesn't feel at home within the Democratic party either. I'm not predicting that this will come to pass, but it does present itself as a reasonably plausible scenario.

Wiki on the history of the 'Democrat' Party.

I read it. Any liberal objecting to this seems to be playing into a petty ploy to make them look like a baby. Ignoring such an adolescent verbiage strategy makes a lot more sense.

Ignoring such an adolescent verbiage strategy makes a lot more sense.

Concur. It's the epitome of a contentless concern.

Elements of all three, to say with your joke, are used, confound often within the same utterance.

should read

"Elements of all three, to stay with your joke, are used, confounded often within the same utterance."

Now, you. If someone wanted to impeach you from an office because you committed murder, I would first start with the fact that you have not been adjudged a murderer in law. And if, perchance, the rules of impeachment as they applied to your office were that you could only be impeached if you were a murderer in law, I would say that they can’t impeach you for that reason. Not for that reason.

And in a world where those were the rules, that would make sense, but it isn't this world, and in this world, that would be completely wrong. Impeachment is for one's acts, not for one's criminal record. See, e.g., Alcee Hastings, a federal judge who was impeached and removed from office for bribery and perjury despite being acquitted in criminal court of those same charges.

morty

if i watch a video of one person walking up to another person and shooting them dead, far as i am concerned, the shooter is a murderer, regardless of whether or not they are ever caught or convicted

if i read a transcript of bill clinton lying under oath about whatever, the man committed perjury whether or not he is prosecuted for it.

- if you want to believe that a person has not committed a crime regardless of any evidence whatsoever, believe what you want.

steve,

i think that there are a really large number of people who are what i would think of as swing voters - they detest the radical christians as much as the radical muslims, but go to christian church themself - believe in civil rights, gay rights, don't want to continue the pointless war in the middle east, detest the "birthers" etc.

and there are a LOT of people who just do NOT fit neatly into groups. look at this very board - how many liberals are anti-abortion? how many conservatives/libertarians are pro legal abortion?

i don't like the whole idea of parties - to me it is anti-democracy. i don't like the idea of any group in government having power.

i think that there are a really large number of people who are what i would think of as swing voters - they detest the radical christians as much as the radical muslims, but go to christian church themself - believe in civil rights, gay rights, don't want to continue the pointless war in the middle east, detest the "birthers" etc.

and there are a LOT of people who just do NOT fit neatly into groups.

Oh, absolutely. This isn't only true now; this has always been true, and always will. The "groups" are oversimplifications of reality; useful abstract constructs, but limited abstract constructs.

i don't like the whole idea of parties

Few people do; that is few regular, normal people who don't get actively involved in politics.

But the eternal fact is that for those people who do get actively involved in politics, whether as advocates for an issue, or candidates for any office much higher than school board: parties suddenly become crucially important. The world is simply too big and too complicated to accomplish much of anything on your own. If you hope to succeed at all, you must collaborate with others and share resources, and the instant you do that, you've entered the world of party politics.

Thus we have parties, warts and all. They're a fundamental, unavoidable core component of every democracy in the world.

Thus we have parties, warts and all. They're a fundamental, unavoidable core component of every democracy in the world.

Most democracies, though, have more than two. Generally there is the dominant power, but you'll find a pretty good spread of seats across the legislature.

Most democracies, though, have more than two. Generally there is the dominant power, but you'll find a pretty good spread of seats across the legislature.

Well, in parliamentary democracies, obviously there are more than two. And in the US there are of course more than two as well, just that under the US system (as under the British system) the structure of the system strongly tends to result in two large parties and a handful of fringe parties.

There are pros and cons to each approach. The benefit of the two-dominant-party system is that, exactly as we've been discussing, neither party can long afford to tack too strongly away from the center; ceding the "swing voter" to your opponent is a certain path to national defeat. Thus the head-shaking amazement with which reasonable observers perceive the "the hell with you, we'll just become MORE conservative" posture of much of the Republican party as of 2009, and why such a strategy as articulated by the likes of Rush Limbaugh is most assuredly not, despite what a couple of folks in this thread foolishly asserted, a mainstream strategy.

if i watch a video of one person walking up to another person and shooting them dead, far as i am concerned, the shooter is a murderer, regardless of whether or not they are ever caught or convicted

Supposed the killer is insane? I mean, stark, raving mad. Suppose the person he killed was of a group that had kidnapped that person's child and had just told him that since he refused to pay the ransom she was going to phone the other captors to kill the child right now?

- if you want to believe that a person has not committed a crime regardless of any evidence whatsoever, believe what you want.

Thank you. But, I'm not believing anything regardless of evidence. I believe because of evidence (or lack of). It's you who are making judgments without evidence. What you hear or see in the news is not evidence. What you described, with nothing more to consider, makes the person a killer, but not yet a murderer.

See, e.g., Alcee Hastings, a federal judge who was impeached and removed from office for bribery and perjury despite being acquitted in criminal court of those same charges.

Then Hastings is a perjurer. But, still, Clinton is not. That's not what happened to him. He was acquitted by the Senate, and never tried for perjury in any other venue or jurisdiction. What you want the default to be, it seems, is that a person is guilty until he can show he isn’t, to everyone and his dog, and that institutional assessments and actions (or inaction) mean nothing. Where do you get that? Just because someone, anyone, says he's guilty, then he is? That seems to be pretty dangerous.

Here, with Hastings, you pointed to two different constituted authorities, one coming down one way, the other another way. That sure can happen. Remember the Rodney King cops? OJ? (although OJ was not adjudged a murderer in the civil trial) Different jurisdictions, different sovereigns. If you want to say that you and everyone who believes like you is a sovereign in some way, I can see that. The problem is where and how you want your opinion validated. You think that Libyan who was released from the Scottish prison would have been if had had been in an American jail? No. That doesn't mean he's not a free man just because you or I think he shouldn't be a free man. The authority that had jurisdiction gets to decide that. Now, they didn’t decide he wasn’t a murderer after all, but if they had determined a mistake had been made, then he would not be a murderer where it counts. Now, like Rodney King cops, maybe some other jurisdiction would try him and convict him.

My insistence all through this has been what? That we should keep from confusing the various frameworks. Especially when each has very different effects, consequences, and impacts.

As to Hastings, if that's what happened, Hastings has committed bribery and perjury according to the Congress of the United States. He has not according to the court that acquitted him, though. Clinton was not convicted by anybody. Why do you keep calling him a perjurer then? Because you think so? Show me your credentials. Justify your right to label someone so outside of you just thinking he should have been adjudged one by the court or the Congress somehow. He wasn't. And the default isn't, and shouldn't be, well, you know what, he's one anyway. If you like, you can say he should have been one, but not that he is one. Because "is"...well we remember how that went. . . .

An opinion by just anybody is not the same thing as a judgment by a legally constituted authority. Do you understand that? Who's your authority? If you have none, then why are you saying what you are as if it somehow should be in some way legally binding.

Wiki on the history of the 'Democrat' Party.

I read it. Any liberal objecting to this seems to be playing into a petty ploy to make them look like a baby. Ignoring such an adolescent verbiage strategy makes a lot more sense.

Perhaps, but I'd still like to see those who use it challenged on their adolescence whenever they use it, if only to see them sputter and try to explain themselves outside the protective cocoon of their wingnut friends. I've seen it happen a few times, and it makes for an interesting teaching moment.

And of course all the wingnuts who persist in using this adolescent catchphrase have to do to avoid looking like babies---is to stop using it. But evidently that's too much to ask. Mustn't condescend!

Baseball Chick:

if i watch a video of one person walking up to another person and shooting them dead, far as i am concerned, the shooter is a murderer, regardless of whether or not they are ever caught or convicted

This was your example. I just remembered there was a case in Texas some years ago that was very much like that, except there were three participants: Just as you describe, one person turned to another (this was in public, in a big city with a lot of people around) and shot him dead. Then the shooter started running to his car to get away (it was supposed). A third person sitting his vehicle on the curb saw what happened and with great presence of mind pull his 44 magnum from other his seat (or maybe it was somewhere on his person) and killed the shooter as he fled away from him.

Is that third party a murderer, too, in your opinion?

I just remembered there was a case in Texas some years ago that was very much like that, except there were three participants: Just as you describe, one person turned to another (this was in public, in a big city with a lot of people around) and shot him dead. Then the shooter started running to his car to get away (it was supposed). A third person sitting his vehicle on the curb saw what happened and with great presence of mind pull his 44 magnum from other his seat (or maybe it was somewhere on his person) and killed the shooter as he fled away from him.

Is that third party a murderer, too, in your opinion?

Dunno about that, but YEEEEEEEE-HAW!!!!

morty

do you think that if jack ruby had had a fatal heart attack 5 minutes after shooting oswald that he would not have been a murderer because he couldn't have been tried?

in your example, if the 3rd person was not a LEO, yes that 3rd person most certainly IS a murderer. you can't shoot other people except in self defense. if i am walking down the street and see a man raping a small child, and i pull out my handy dandy 6 shooter all us crazyass texans carry day and night and shoot the evil SOB dead, i am most definitely guilty of murder and i'm going to prison for a long LONG time - that is if i manage to escape death row.

i don't have lisence to act as the law, judge, jury and executioner.



but this discussion is pointless because you believe that no matter what, a person, no matter WHAT he or she did, did not commit a crime unless they were caught, tried and convicted

Dunno about that, but YEEEEEEEE-HAW!!!!

Unfortunately, The Simpsons people (Fox, I guess) police youtube assiduously. I tried to find the episode that had the brainstorming sessions among the Texan, Bob Dole, Dracula, Krusty, at Republican Headuarters, which was Dracula's castle on peak with buzzards flying around it, but no soap.

"The dead have risen and are voting Republican." Bart Simpson

Life is shorter than Dykstra.

but this discussion is pointless because you believe that no matter what, a person, no matter WHAT he or she did, did not commit a crime unless they were caught, tried and convicted

That it is.

I'm probably engaging in too fine distinctions in the wrong place. Anyway, just because I don't think what you decribe as a crime doesn't mean I don't think it horrible, even monstrous and evil. What exactly we define it to be, what we require for us to call something whatever it is we call it, though, will have a lot to do about how and when we give it effect.

That's all.

I can think off about 5000 things I would rather do than argue politics on the weekends with you people. Jeez, get a hobby or something.

I can think off about 5000 things I would rather do than argue politics on the weekends with you people. Jeez, get a hobby or something.

I'm writing dissertation... Hard to get away from the computer, unfortunately.

I can think off about 5000 things I would rather do than argue politics on the weekends with you people.

I presume that ranking high among those 5000 things is "Tell other people on message board how to spend their time".

DB

Then Hastings is a perjurer. But, still, Clinton is not. That's not what happened to him. He was acquitted by the Senate, and never tried for perjury in any other venue or jurisdiction. What you want the default to be, it seems, is that a person is guilty until he can show he isn’t, to everyone and his dog, and that institutional assessments and actions (or inaction) mean nothing. Where do you get that? Just because someone, anyone, says he's guilty, then he is? That seems to be pretty dangerous.

It also seems like a radical interpretation of the text; at no time did I suggest any such thing as "the default," nor did I suggest that Clinton had perjured himself "because someone, anyone, says he" was. (Indeed, the only person whose views I cited at all was Judge Wright's, and she isn't exactly the random "someone anyone" you imply.)

As to Hastings, if that's what happened, Hastings has committed bribery and perjury according to the Congress of the United States.

Then he must be guilty of it.

He has not according to the court that acquitted him, though.

Wait, then he must not be guilty of it! Oh, no, whatever shall we do? Guilty, not guilty. He did it, he didn't do it. How can we tell?!?

Clinton was not convicted by anybody. Why do you keep calling him a perjurer then? Because you think so? Show me your credentials.

Well, I could scan in my birth certificate, but then that hasn't convinced the Birthers about Obama, so I'm not sure what would convince you. What "credentials" do you think one needs in order to review evidence and form a conclusion about something?

Justify your right to label someone so outside of you just thinking he should have been adjudged one by the court or the Congress somehow.

"Congress shall make no law... abridging the freedom of speech..." What other "right" does one need to make an assertion?

He wasn't. And the default isn't, and shouldn't be, well, you know what, he's one anyway. If you like, you can say he should have been one, but not that he is one. Because "is"...well we remember how that went. . . .

Well, I can say that he should have been, but I don't just say that he should have been one; I can say that he is one, and I did, and I continue to do so. So I guess we're at an impasse. Clinton is a perjurer. Not a convicted perjurer (again, a phrase that in your lexicon would be redundant), but a perjurer nonetheless. He'd be a perjurer if he had been convicted, if he had been acquitted, if nobody had ever discovered his perjury and a tree fell in a forest when nobody was around.

An opinion by just anybody is not the same thing as a judgment by a legally constituted authority. Do you understand that? Who's your authority? If you have none, then why are you saying what you are as if it somehow should be in some way legally binding.

At no point did I say that my conclusion should be "legally binding." It isn't the same thing at all. At no point did I suggest that Clinton should go to jail without a conviction in a court of law. You can't point to a single thing I said that suggested it should be, except perhaps for your confusion in thinking that calling someone a murderer/perjurer is an assertion that they were convicted of the offense in question. It isn't.

Next we should argue if Lincoln called blacks the 'N-word' all day long.

I presume that ranking high among those 5000 things is "Tell other people on message board how to spend their time".

Nope, 5001.

I meant, go out, get some sunshine, play golf, grill a steak. Damn people.

I meant, go out, get some sunshine, play golf, grill a steak. Damn people.

I can damn people from right here, thank you very much.

DB

Ah, what the fuck. I'll dedicate this bump to Bernal.

I meant, go out, get some sunshine, play golf, grill a steak. Damn people.

Aw, man. This weekend I provided SAG for my wife's 50-mile bike ride, went on my own bike ride, visited a street fair, went to a party, did my yard work, picked several home-grown tomatoes, peppers, and zucchini, cooked two very nice (if I do say so myself) dinners, had a delightful visit (showing off her car) from a young lady whom I taught to drive this summer, walked my dog and fed my cats, and -- well -- did some serious damage to a nice bottle of Cabernet.

Dude. Where did I go wrong? :-)

I golf played and watched my kids soccer game. And ate Mexican food. I did not ask the workers in the restaurant if they were illegal or not. I will try harder next time.

I prayed. All I can say is, a lot of you people owe me apologies within the next eight days.

Don't hold your breath Davey.

I did not ask the workers in the restaurant if they were illegal or not. I will try harder next time.

See that you do.

The very IDEA!

I know, I should have called INS or ICE or whatever the #### they are called now and had them check but then I would have been supporting big government and that is no good. Why oh why can't a private company take over everything? Things would be so much better.

I know, I should have called INS or ICE or whatever the #### they are called now and had them check but then I would have been supporting big government and that is no good. Why oh why can't a private company take over everything? Things would be so much better.

Less bureaucracy, that much is certain. The market guarantees that all things are done efficiently and to maximum profit.

Who would be paying this private company to haul illegals back to their native country?