They gathered in Chicago Sunday. On Monday, "30 former death row prisoners took part in a 37-mile relay walk from a state correctional center near Joliet to downtown Chicago, the latest in two days of activities designed to call attention to flaws in the state's capital punishment system."
About 30 former inmates, each marching a separate leg of the trip with sympathizers, carried a letter that was later delivered to Gov. George Ryan, who is considering clemency petitions of more than 140 death row inmates. The letter urges Ryan to commute all death sentences to life in prison without."
"Seven former death row inmates from Illinois also marched, as well as ex-prisoners from other states including Florida, Louisiana, Texas and New Mexico."
Here is the transcript of Trent Lott's interview Monday on BET in which he expressed his across the board support for affirmative action.
Representative John Lewis (D-Ga) is ready to give Trent Lott another chance:
"Lott also said he had reached out to several lawmakers to push forward an agenda he said would help minorities, including talking with Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., about setting up a task force on reconciliation and with Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, about setting up an African-American summit."
"Lewis, a veteran civil rights leader, said Lott was ``sincere'' in their Monday conversation and he suggested that the Mississippi senator join him an annual civil rights tour in March through places like Selma, Ala., where police badly beaten him during the 1960s civil rights struggle."
``I'd like to come down on his side, giving him a chance,'' Lewis said. ``I'm not one of those calling for him to step down and give up his leadership post. We all make mistakes, we all make blunders. It's very much keeping with the philosophy and discipline of nonviolence to forgive and move on.''
The GOP will decide Lott's fate on January 6. The Bush Administration has said it won't resist a leadership change.
Link via Drudge to Newsday: Gary Condit has sued writer Dominick Dunne for $11 million -- for slander over comments Dunne made on tv and elsewhere during the Chandra Levy disappearance.
" Former Rep. Gary Condit sued Dominick Dunne for $11 million on Monday, claiming the author slandered him in interviews about the Chandra Levy case. Dunne "made false and defamatory statements accusing (Condit) of involvement in the crimes of kidnapping and murder," said the lawsuit filed in federal court in Manhattan."
"The suit cited radio, television and newspaper interviews in which Dunne linked Condit to the disappearance of Levy. Dunne "transformed an allegation of sexual misconduct into criminal accusations," said Condit's attorney, L. Lin Wood."
Lin Wood is the excellent Atlanta libel attorney who has been representing John and Patsy Ramsey in their civil suits--successfully, we might add.
Who will represent Dunne? Dan Petrocelli, who successfully sued OJ in the (civil) wrongful death case? Maybe, but then again, maybe not as he later represented ex-cop Steve Thomas who wrote a book accusing the Ramseys of killing their daughter and Lin Wood prevailed and got a settlement from Thomas (paid by his publisher) in that case. From the Denver Post on August 9, 2002:
"The libel suit brought by John and Patsy Ramsey against former Boulder police detective Steve Thomas is over. The case, which was settled in May, was formally dismissed on Wednesday, said Ramsey attorney Lin Wood. 'Obviously, the Ramseys are pleased with the settlement and are glad the case was successfully resolved in their favor,' Wood said."
"John and Patsy Ramsey sued Thomas for libel and defamation in March 2001 in U.S. District Court in Atlanta. The civil suit said Thomas made false claims about the couple in a book he co-wrote titled 'JonBenet: Inside the Ramsey Murder Investigation' and during interviews promoting the book. Publisher St. Martin's Press and co-author Don Davis were part of the settlement, Wood said."
"The lawsuit sought $ 80 million in damages, but Wood declined to disclose the amount paid. 'The terms of the settlement, including the amount, are confidential,' he said. The book theorized that Patsy Ramsey killed 6-year-old JonBenet during a fit of rage in their Boulder home on Dec. 26, 1996, and that John Ramsey helped his wife cover it up by making the death look like a botched kidnapping. Thomas, who left the Boulder Police Department in 1998 over frustrations with the unsolved case, could not be reached for comment."
"His attorney, Dan Petrocelli of Los Angeles, who won a $ 30 million civil verdict against O.J. Simpson after Simpson was acquitted in the slayings of his ex-wife, Nicole, and a friend, Ron Goldman, also could not be reached for comment Thursday."
We'll stay on top of this as more details come out. Findlaw will undoubtedly have the full text of the Condit/Dunne suit up shortly. Look for it here.
"Talk Left.While I'm jocking leftist bloggers, let me give some much-due praise to Talk Left, who will make the leap to "Blood on the Tracks" next time I update my blogroll.
Reasoned, unzealous, and always insightful. Unlike most leftist ranters, these guys almost always back up agument with evidence.
I of course don't agree with them on everything, but their civil liberties stuff is dead-on..... "
Thanks, Radley.
Jeanne D'Arc of Body and Soul has outdone herself today (no small feat) in her masterful post Lady Sings The Dixiecrat Double Entendre Blues --mixing Billie Holiday with Trent Lott (via a song named "Strange Fruit" that Ms. Holliday used to sing sometimes, and only sometimes because she tended to throw up afterwards, as it was about lynching,) racism, and the interpretation of words.
From Jeanne:
"Try to imagine Lady Day in an evening gown, a white gardenia tucked in her hair, on stage in a nightclub, singing a graphic song about lynching, while her audience sipped champagne. It's impossible, grotesque. And in fact, Billie was generally reluctant to sing the song, partly because, as you can imagine, it took a lot out of her. In her autobiography she says she threw up every time she had to sing it. But she also had mixed feelings about the song because her audiences so often missed the point. She'd sometimes get bizarre requests to sing the "sexy" song about "black bodies," which unnerved her to say the least. Proof, if you need any, that as often as not, even the most eloquent voice is not heard."
Somehow, and it makes total sense when you read it, Jeanne moves in one linear sequence from Lott to Reagan, to Ashcroft and Southern Partisan magazine. We are truly impressed--not to mention envious, of Jeanne's immense writing talent.
We picked this off the comments on Daily Kos, so we don't know if it's real or not, but we did see the news at the gym today which reported Trent Lott has come out for affirmative action. So maybe the following is for real:
"Asked for his views on affirmative action policies, Lott said, "I'm for that," even though he has voted against affirmative action legislation.
"Across the board?" Gordon asked.
"Absolutely," Lott said.
"Would you be willing to clean out Al Sharpton's toilet with your tongue?" Gordon also asked.
"Absolutely. When does he want me to start?" Lott replied."
If it's true, and Lott is trying to make amends to the African-American republican voters (and let's face it, how many are there besides J.C. Watts?), our assessment is "Too little, too late."
That being said, we stand by one of our earlier comments on the possibility of Lott's forced resignation
"We haven't taken a position of whether Trent Lott should stay or go, we kind of feel like what's the difference if he goes, another one will just take his place, and what if it's one who hides in sheep's clothing? The voters knew who Lott was when they elected him and they elected him anyway. We think Lott should be outed and ostracized, which he has been, but we'd rather see pundits and politicians move on after that and focus on opposing the Bush Administration's proposals, like war. Like on civil liberties."
Although, with each passing day, he seems to be digging himself into a deeper hole, we have to wonder: If he stays, will his profile be so high that he is forced to vote fairly, just to show he isn't the racist his remarks implied he was? Will the Democrats and minorities be better off if he stays now that he has been outed and has repented and promised to reform his neanderthal views?
We tend to believe, but we're not positive yet, so don't quote us later if we change our mind, that Lott might be better right now than Nickles or the other GOP drones--remember that saying, "The Devil you know is better than...."--and we think that this devil has been effectively neutered, for our purposes.
The Washington Post joins us in reporting that Don Nickle's voting record on civil liberties issues is almost identical to that of Trent Lott:
Our earlier post
Hey, it doesn't happen (and this may be the first time) we've scooped the mainstream media, we should be able to show our pride for at least five minutes!
The ACLU has confirmed i t will represent everyone arrested in the Racine, Wisconsin raid in which hundreds were issued 'disorderly' house citations at the November 2nd Uptown Theatre fundraising party which featured techno music. The ACLU today issued a press release urging the city of Racine to drop the charges.
"Electronic music concerts provide a critical arena for artistic expression for the hired performers and audience members. The First Amendment stands as a clear barrier to any governmental effort to silence musical artists and to prevent their audience from participating in expressive association with them", stated Attorney Micabil Diaz, Legal Director for the ACLU of Wisconsin."
"We urge that the Racine City Attorney, to save the city the time and expense in prosecuting tickets that serve no purpose in any legitimate effort to curb drug abuse - tickets that because they were issued unconstitutionally - may even be counter productive", added Chris Ahmuty, Executive Director of the ACLU of Wisconsin."
Also posted is the ACLU's letter to the City of Racine (scroll down).
Pete Karas' Progressive Racine blog is an excellent source of updates on the raid. Information is also available at The Haunted Theatre.
Some of our prior posts on the Racine Raids are here and here. Instapundit has been all over the story as well-- here is one of his more recent posts that contains links to his earlier ones.
The New York Times yesterday reported on the emerging Ambulance-Homicide Theory, as to why the murder rate is falling in some places. It seems that the correlation to lower homicides may not have anything to do with policing but rather, how close the attack takes place to a high-tech emergency room.
"for all the theoretical talk of ''broken windows'' and ''zero tolerance'' policing that has dominated the public discourse on crime during the past decade, research published this year suggests that the most significant factor in keeping the homicide rate down is something much more practical: faster ambulances and better care in the emergency room. That, in any case, is the intellectual hand grenade that Anthony Harris, director of the Criminal Justice Program at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, has thrown into the polarized debate over crime prevention."
There is a discussion of this going on in the comments section of our post yesterday about the drug war catching minnows instead of big fishes.
Kevin Connors points out this article by libertarian Lew Rockwell. PG (BertramRussell) contributes as well.
The official cite to Anthony Harris' report is:
Murder and Medicine: The Lethality of Criminal Assault, 1960–1999, Homicide Studies, May 2002, Vol. 6, No. 2, pp. 128–166, by Anthony R. Harris, PhD Department of Sociology, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Stephen H. Thomas, MD MPH Division of Emergency Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Gene A. Fisher, PhD Department of Sociology, University of Massachusetts Amherst, and David J. Hirsch, BS Emergency Medical Services, Lawrence Massachusetts.
Action Alert from the National Coalition Against the Death Penalty ( NCADP):
NCADP URGES CLEMENCY CAMPAIGN FOR OKLAHOMA MAN SET FOR EXECUTION
GOVERNOR IS IGNORING QUESTION OF INNOCENCE; BOARD VOTED UNANIMOUSLY FOR COMMUTATION
Dec. 16, 2002 - The National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty is urging its members to contact the office of Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating and ask him to change his mind and grant clemency for an Oklahoma man scheduled for execution Tuesday evening.
Ernest Carter was convicted in the 1990 robbery-murder of Eugene Manowski. Carter's defense attorney has argued that despite the conviction, his client was not guilty of the crime beyond a moral certainty. The Oklahoma Board of Pardons ands agrees with this assessment, and unanimously voted to recommend that Gov. Frank Keating commute Carter's sentence to life in prison without. On Sunday, Gov. Keating indicated he will not comply with the board's recommendation.
"Executive clemency exists as the final safeguard to prevent an innocent person from being executed," said Steven W. Hawkins, NCADP executive director. "In a speech last year at the National Press Club, Governor Keating himself said that although he favors the death penalty, the state must not execute anyone unless there is a 'moral certainty' that that person is guilty. In this case, the threshold of 'moral certainty' simply has not been met."
Since Gov. Keating took office in 1995, the Oklahoma Board of Pardons ands has recommended clemency for four people on death row. Gov. Keating has accepted only one of those recommendations. This is despite the fact that nationwide, at least 102 people have been freed from death row due to actual innocence, including seven people from Oklahoma. Oklahoma is tied with Texas for third place in the number of innocent people exonerated, behind Florida and Illinois.
"In the past quarter century, Oklahoma has executed 54 people and seen seven people walk off of death row due to actual innocence," Hawkins said. "This is a clearly unacceptable margin of error. Oklahoma's death penalty cases simply are not receiving the level of scrutiny necessary to prevent the ultimate, unacceptable miscarriage of justice from occurring - the execution of a person who is quite possibly innocent. Governor Keating must step in immediately and commute Mr. Carter's sentence."
NCADP is urging its members to contact Gov. Keating's office and let their views be heard. Phone number is 405-521-2342; fax is 405-521-3353. Gov. Keating's
email address is governor@gov.state.ok.us
The execution is scheduled for 6 p.m. CST Tuesday, Dec. 17.
I've been waiting for something to happen For a week or a month or a year
With the blood in the ink of the headlines
And the sound of the crowd in my ear
You might ask what it takes to remember
When you know that you've seen it before
Where a government lies to a people
And a country is drifting to war
And there's a shadow on the faces
Of the men who send the guns
To the wars that are fought in places
Where their business interest runs
On the radio talk shows and the T.V.
You hear one thing again and again
How the U.S.A. stands for freedom
And we come to the aid of a friend
But who are the ones that we call our friends--
These governments killing their own?
Or the people who finally can't take any more
And they pick up a gun or a brick or a stone
There are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire
There's a shadow on the faces
Of the men who fan the flames
Of the wars that are fought in places
Where we can't even say the names
They sell us the President the same way
They sell us our clothes and our cars
They sell us every thing from youth to religion
The same
Released February 19, 1986, Elektra/Asylum Records
(link via What Really Happened)
The Associated Press reports that the number of inmates sentenced to death for their crimes fell sharply in 2001:
"A total of 155 inmates in the United States received a death sentence in 2001, the smallest number in 28 years, according to a Justice Department report released on Sunday. The third straight annual decline occurred at a time of growing national debate about capital punishment, sparked in part by recent exonerations of death-row inmates because of DNA evidence and calls for more state moratoriums on executions."
"The report by the department's Bureau of Justice Statistics found a steady decline in the number of inmates who received a death sentence, with 304 in 1998, 282 in 1999 and 229 in 2000."
"The number put on death row last year represented the lowest figure since the 1973 total of 44 inmates."
Oklahoma executed the most people in 2001, with 18, followed by 17 put to death in Texas and seven in Missouri. Preliminary statistics for this year show that Texas conducted 33 of the 68 executions nationwide.
Other statistics from the report:
Three states housed 40 percent of all death row inmates at the end of 2001: California, with 603; Texas, 453; and Florida, 372. New Hampshire was the only capital punishment state with no one on death row.
The youngest person on death row in 2001 was 19, the oldest 86.
Some states still authorize, in certain circumstances, electrocution, use of gas, hanging and -- in Idaho, Oklahoma and Utah -- death by firing squad.
Ninety people had their death sentences removed or overturned by the courts in 2001, with Florida leading the way with 11. Of the 90, 46 inmates now are serving life sentences, and most of the others were awaiting new trials or sentencing hearings.
Seven inmates had death sentences commuted. Nineteen death row inmates died while awaiting execution.
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