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Author Topic: The "Real" Double Standard: Democrats/Republicans
Reshpeckobiggle
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Leave aside your personal feelings about Ann Coulter and tell me what you think about this:

quote:
From Coulter's website:

Lewis Libby has now been found guilty of perjury and obstruction of justice for lies that had absolutely no legal consequence.

It was not a crime to reveal Valerie Plame's name because she was not a covert agent. If it had been a crime, Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald could have wrapped up his investigation with an indictment of the State Department's Richard Armitage on the first day of his investigation since it was Armitage who revealed her name and Fitzgerald knew it.

With no crime to investigate, Fitzgerald pursued a pointless investigation into nothing, getting a lot of White House officials to make statements under oath and hoping some of their recollections would end up conflicting with other witness recollections, so he could charge some Republican with "perjury" and enjoy the fawning media attention.

As a result, Libby is now a convicted felon for having a faulty memory of the person who first told him that Joe Wilson was a delusional boob who lied about his wife sending him to Niger.

This makes it official: It's illegal to be Republican.

Since Teddy Kennedy walked away from a dead girl with only a wrist slap (which was knocked down to a mild talking-to, plus time served: zero), Democrats have apparently become a protected class in America, immune from criminal prosecution no matter what they do.

As a result, Democrats have run wild, accepting bribes, destroying classified information, lying under oath, molesting interns, driving under the influence, obstructing justice and engaging in sex with underage girls, among other things.

Meanwhile, conservatives of any importance constantly have to spend millions of dollars defending themselves from utterly frivolous criminal prosecutions. Everything is illegal, but only Republicans get prosecuted.

Conservative radio personality Rush Limbaugh was subjected to a three-year criminal investigation for allegedly buying prescription drugs illegally to treat chronic back pain. Despite the witch-hunt, Democrat prosecutor Barry E. Krischer never turned up a crime.

Even if he had, to quote liberal Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz: "Generally, people who illegally buy prescription drugs are not prosecuted." Unless they're Republicans.

The vindictive prosecution of Limbaugh finally ended last year with a plea bargain in which Limbaugh did not admit guilt. Gosh, don't you feel safer now? I know I do.

In another prescription drug case with a different result, last year, Rep. Patrick Kennedy (Democrat), apparently high as a kite on prescription drugs, crashed a car on Capitol Hill at 3 a.m. That's abuse of prescription drugs plus a DUI offense. Result: no charges whatsoever and one day of press on Fox News Channel.

I suppose one could argue those were different jurisdictions. How about the same jurisdiction?

In 2006, Democrat and major Clinton contributor Jeffrey Epstein was nabbed in Palm Beach in a massive police investigation into his hiring of local underage schoolgirls for sex, which I'm told used to be a violation of some kind of statute in the Palm Beach area.

The police presented Limbaugh prosecutor Krischer with boatloads of evidence, including the videotaped statements of five of Epstein's alleged victims, the procurer of the girls for Epstein and 16 other witnesses.

But the same prosecutor who spent three years maniacally investigating Limbaugh's alleged misuse of back-pain pills refused to bring statutory rape charges against a Clinton contributor. Enraging the police, who had spent months on the investigation, Krischer let Epstein off after a few hours on a single count of solicitation of prostitution. The Clinton supporter walked, and his victims were branded as whores.

The Republican former House Whip Tom DeLay is currently under indictment for a minor campaign finance violation. Democratic prosecutor Ronnie Earle had to empanel six grand juries before he could find one to indict DeLay on these pathetic charges — and this is in Austin, Texas (the Upper West Side with better-looking people).

That final grand jury was so eager to indict DeLay that it indicted him on one charge that was not even a crime — and which has since been tossed out by the courts.

After winning his primary despite the indictment, DeLay decided to withdraw from the race rather than campaign under a cloud of suspicion, and Republicans lost one of their strongest champions in Congress.

Compare DeLay's case with that of Rep. William "The Refrigerator" Jefferson, Democrat. Two years ago, an FBI investigation caught Jefferson on videotape taking $100,000 in bribe money. When the FBI searched Jefferson's house, they found $90,000 in cash stuffed in his freezer. Two people have already pleaded guilty to paying Jefferson the bribe money.

Two years later, Bush's Justice Department still has taken no action against Jefferson. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi recently put Rep. William Jefferson on the Homeland Security Committee.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Democrat, engaged in a complicated land swindle, buying a parcel of land for $400,000 and selling it for over $1 million a few years later. (At least it wasn't cattle futures!)

Reid also received more than four times as much money from Jack Abramoff (nearly $70,000) as Tom DeLay ($15,000). DeLay returned the money; Reid refuses to do so. Why should he? He's a Democrat.

Former Clinton national security adviser Sandy Berger literally received a sentence of community service for stuffing classified national security documents in his pants and then destroying them — big, fat federal felonies.

But Scooter Libby is facing real prison time for forgetting who told him about some bozo's wife.

Bill Clinton was not even prosecuted for obstruction of justice offenses so egregious that the entire Supreme Court staged a historic boycott of his State of the Union address in 2000.

By contrast, Linda Tripp, whose only mistake was befriending the office hosebag and then declining to perjure herself, spent millions on lawyers to defend a harassment prosecution based on far-fetched interpretations of state wiretapping laws.

Liberal law professors currently warning about the "high price" of pursuing terrorists under the Patriot Act had nothing but blood lust for Tripp one year after Clinton was impeached (Steven Lubet, "Linda Tripp Deserves to be Prosecuted," New York Times, 8/25/99).

Criminal prosecution is a surrogate for political warfare, but in this war, Republicans are gutless appeasers.

Bush has got to pardon Libby.

Is she leaving out any important information? A bunch of Democrats who have been prosecuted as severely as Republicans, or Republicans getting a pass for breaking the law? I'm sure someone can point out some examples.
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Dagonee
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No, Bush has got to let the appeals process proceed. There's one serious issue on appeal that might be a winner (and maybe should be) was the failure of the judge to allow admission of footage showing that Tim Russert had reported three times that grand jury testimony is secret. He testified at trial that he did not know that, and the mistake is admissible evidence of a faulty memory. Since the entirety of at least one count comes down to Russert's recollection of a specific conversation, failure to admit evidence that he forgets facts in the course of his reporting might be reversible error.
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Samprimary
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Her rhetorical devices have descended into gibberish. The conclusion that "It's illegal to be Republican" appears to be an egregious default on the fact that she refuses, throughout her entire article, to recognize the established and obvious illegality involved in perjuring yourself, or that Libby is guilty of this.

She also gives Libby the benefit of the doubt by concluding assuredly that Libby simply 'forgot' -- or, in his own words, "misremembered." She's apparently such a dunce that she forgot that this was Libby's defense through the trial, and that a court of law found this fully implausible.

She also decided that now was another perfect time to trot out comparisons to Ted Kennedy's legal situation. This is a tired and useless juxtapositioning device that was essentially worn out since before I was born, and it looks painfully grasping.

Of course, it wouldn't be a Coulter article if it wasn't summarily hammed up with errant and fully general declarations, like the idea that Democratic behavior is the result of prosecutorial immunity, and their present state is riotous and immoral and can be blamed on this fact.

I also happen to remember the Dershowitz quotes and recognize that she's cherrypicking quotes to make statements that contradict the actual reasoning of the authors involved. It's all par for the course.

There is actually a story to be had on the issue of potential partisan imbalance in legal immunities and prosecutions. There's also the continuing story of the appeals process and what Libby's actual end guilt is going to be. Coulter is simply reinforcing the fact that she's far from being capable of decently respecting this issue enough to make a claim worth reading. The only way I could recommend moving forward with this topic is to forget Coulter's take on it entirely and to from scratch with a question.

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ClaudiaTherese
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quote:
Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle:
I'm sure someone can point out some examples.

What would you do if someone did? (Honest question.)
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Launchywiggin
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Leaving aside my personal feelings about Ann Coulter pretty much contradicts one of my first priorities when reading anything: credibility of the source.
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Reshpeckobiggle
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quote:
Originally posted by ClaudiaTherese:
quote:
Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle:
I'm sure someone can point out some examples.

What would you do if someone did? (Honest question.)
Honest answer: I'd read it. Just looking for some responses.

I understand Launchywiggins sentiment about credibility of the source, and Samprimary makes good arguments. It just seems to me that Coulter may be on to something here. I'd like to think she's flat wrong, but I've been looking into it and I can't find a whole lot of fault with her over-arching point. By the way, Sam, Kennedy did get away with manslaughter, and all the other things Coulter mentions did happen (or not happen). So I think it's a legitimate concern, this apparent double standard.

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ClaudiaTherese
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Fair enough. Thanks for the response.

Edited to add: (I don't agree, but I definitely appreciate understanding your perspective.)

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Reshpeckobiggle
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Well, why don't you agree? That's what I'm here for. And I know that if you and I start on this topic, it will probably be a very pleasant discussion that doesn't spiral down into a pissing contest. I could use a breather from all that.
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Humean316
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In my mind, Ann Coulter isn't wrong because her argument is misguided (though I think it is--how is it illegal to be a republican you republican minx?), its wrong because of the rhetoric and the division that the argument is designed to create. Forget that she basically assumes that Libby's defense was correct and that the prosecution was biased against republicans (which is kinda what she was trying to prove--oops), what really gets me is that the main thesis of this argument is to reveal a general bias against republicans, such that, we can then dismiss all of these arguments as wrong without actually studying the argument. In other words, its the easy way out, its the way those who dont want to even deal with the other side argue so that they dont even have to listen to other side, but more than that, its an argument designed to create division, its designed to create a scenario where liberal means biased and always wrong.

Of course, thats a method of argument not just confined to Ann Coulter or the conservative right, its something that the liberal left does too, and honestly, I think that right there is the biggest problem with politics in America today. Nobody is automatically wrong because they are conservative and the same goes for liberals, this isnt supposed to be a country that is so divided, this isnt a country where people are so easily placed into categories, but thats what happens when people are polarized to the point they are today. And thats a product of the extreme and radical politics of those who scream the loudest and seek to divide America. Ann Coulter falls into that category as do many others, and in that sense, we can speak about the invalidity of the argument but whats more important is what that argument is meant to do and the rhetoric behind it.

Dont get me wrong, I am not advocating that we simply ignore the argument Coulter presents, if im going to say that you cant be wrong simply by being a conservative or liberal, then I also have to say that you cant be wrong simply because you are an extremist, but I am saying that there is something more sinister going on here than the argument itself.

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Boothby171
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Of course, the Republicans/Conservatives always rant and rant on about how Ted Kennedy "got away with manslaughter." (Really, most say "got away with murder")

But what they always ignore (whether intentionally or purely out of ignorance) is:

SO DID LAURA BUSH!

http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/laura.asp

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Laura_Bush_police_report.jpg

quote:
On November 6, 1963, two days after she turned 17, Bush (then Laura Welch) was driving her Chevrolet sedan with her classmate Judy Dyke. It was shortly after 8 p.m. on a clear night when Welch entered the intersection of State Highway 349 and Texas Farm Road 868 (now a four lane highway). Welch drove through the intersection's stop sign and collided with a Chevrolet Corvair sedan killing classmate Michael Dutton Douglas, also 17. Welch and Dyke sustained minor injuries; Douglas was later pronounced dead on arrival at Midland Memorial Hospital. Welch was not criminally charged in connection with the collision. In May 2000, a two-page police report about the car crash was made public, following a Freedom of Information Act request by journalists, due to the refusal of Midland officials to release the information. To this day, she does not talk publicly about the accident.

Just want to make sure that if stupid, dead-horse allegations are made against the Dems, that similar ones (even better, since they're true) are made against the Repubicans.
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Chris Bridges
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I think that partisan politics, appointed prosecutors and regulatory committees with no teeth, and ol' boy networks keep the majority of all politicians and their friends out of jail, whatever the affiliation.

Here's a list of American political scandals. There seems to be representation from both parties, doesn't there?

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Reshpeckobiggle
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Boothby, the two don't even compare, and not by virtue of one being true and one being false. The truth is that Kennedy was driving, completely wasted, and crashed his car into a river. He got out; his female passenger did not and promptly drowned. He went home, and the first thing he did was call his lawyer. After discussing it for four hours, his lawyer finally confinced him that the best thing to do was notify the authorities. Look that up on Snopes. Besides, Laura Bush at the time was not a Bush, and probably not even a Republican. She was a rich white girl whose father probably had some pull with the local officials.

No kidding, Humean, that Coulter's article is designed to be divisive. But then, it's an article that is written for her fans and people looking for something to argue with her about, which she welcomes. It's her trade. This is why I said try and put aside your opinions of the author and just talk about her point. Is there a real double standard there? I haven't seen any serious refutations yet.

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TomDavidson
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quote:
Besides, Laura Bush at the time was not a Bush, and probably not even a Republican.
At the time of his accident, Teddy Kennedy wasn't a Bush and probably wasn't even a Republican, either.
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Reshpeckobiggle
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That's an excellent point, Tom.
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Boothby171
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I'm glad to see that at least SOME people recognize that neither thing has anything to do with Ann Coulter or Lewis "Scooter" [a.k.a. the "Scootmeister"] Libby.
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Tresopax
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Coulter's article there may be the least rational argument I've seen in print in a long while...
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Lyrhawn
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Has Coulter never heard of Bill Clinton?

Republicans started off an investigation into perjury, the same thing she's claiming Libby shouldn't be in trouble for, and then they launched a huge multi million dollar probe into every single aspect of his life trying to find wrongdoing. And after years and 10s of millions of dollars spent, they found nothing. Republicans have no room to talk about witch hunts.

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The Rabbit
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quote:
Originally posted by Reshpeckobiggle:
Is she leaving out any important information? A bunch of Democrats who have been prosecuted as severely as Republicans, or Republicans getting a pass for breaking the law? I'm sure someone can point out some examples.

Yes, she's left out all kinds of relevant information regarding Libby's case but also regarding democrats being prosecuted and republicans getting a pass for breaking the law.

Democrats who've been prosecuted.

Jame Guy Tucker (Gov. Arkansas)
D.C. Mayor Marion Barry
Barney Frank
Jim McGreevey
Jim Traficant (D-OH) financial corruption conviction and expulsion from House (2002)
William Jefferson (D-LA) under investigation for bribery after the FBI seized $90,000 of a $100,000 bribery payment from Jefferson's home freezer (August 2005)
Senator Harrison A. Williams, Congressman John Jenrette, Congressman Raymond Lederer, Congressman Michael "Ozzie" Myers, and Congressman Frank Thompson, All convicted during ABSCAM

Republicans who gotten a pass:

Richard Nixon
Caspar Weinberger
Elliott Abrams
Duane R. Clarridge
Alan Fiers
Clair George
Robert C. McFarlane
George W. Bush (Abuse of illegal drugs)

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The Pixiest
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The worst thing about the Jim Guy wikipedia entry is that it doesn't have a link to Say McIntosh. Say is always good for a belly laugh.

My favorite Say McIntosh stunt was when he crucified himself outside the capital building.

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Boothby171
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Lyrhawn,

If I remember correctly, Ken Starr & Co. spent over $72 Million trying to prosecute Bill Clinton (or was that persecute...?), all to no avail.

But, apparently, somehow he's stil oh, so very guilty...

Because let's not forget the URW Conservative consipracy theorists who will swear on a stack of bibles that Clinton had over 82 people killed in order to further his evil plans...

(So, clearly, Ms. Coulter is tame in comparison!)

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The Rabbit
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Some other prominent republicans who gotten the pass.

Neil Bush (Silverado Savings and Loan Scandal)
Jeb Bush (Broward Federal Savings and Loan)

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Samprimary
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quote:
By the way, Sam, Kennedy did get away with manslaughter, and all the other things Coulter mentions did happen (or not happen). So I think it's a legitimate concern, this apparent double standard.
I think it may very well be a legitimate concern, too.

I do not consider any of Coulter's vehement declarations to be legitimate. I do not think that they follow a reasoned interpretation of the facts. They're just overblown rhetoric.

That's why I say that she's taking a potentially real issue and drowning it in partisan polemic and unsustainably over-the-top conclusions. She's too dumb to be worth citing on the issue, since she contributes nothing of worth to a reasoned discussion of the matter.

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Lyrhawn
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Something I just saw on the Colbert Report, which is never the less true:

Number of Federal Investigations between 2001-2006

Democrats: 298
Republicans: 67
Independent: 10

I don't know how many of those led to convictions, but right there it seems to discredit Coulter's point pretty hard.

Also reports are coming in that several US Attorneys were fired last year for not going after Democrats hard enough.

Source

quote:
A study of reported federal investigations of elected officials and candidates shows that the Bush administration’s Justice Department pursues Democrats far more than Republicans. 79 percent of elected officials and candidates who’ve faced a federal investigation (a total of 379) between 2001 and 2006 were Democrats, the study found – only 18 percent were Republicans. During that period, Democrats made up 50 percent of elected officeholders and office seekers during the time period, and 41 percent were Republicans during that period, according to the study.

"The chance of such a heavy Democratic-Republican imbalance occurring at random is 1 in 10,000," according to the study's authors.


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