In Yugoslavia they'd put an innocent person in prison just for
political reasons. In the U.S. they'd let an obvious murderer
walk for the same - political reasons. That makes the U.S. a
better place to live for those with entrepreneurial spirit.
I couldn't stand not to give my comment on the free-market styled
monster process that this country has been obsessed with for the
past fifteen months. Stalin tried to make his monster processes
short and inexpensive and they all ended with the inevitable
victory of the people." The capitalist version of the monster
process is lengthy, hugely expensive soap opera where the villain
becomes the hero and than walks away putting his fans in trance,
so they go to bookstores and buy (consume) all books written
about the case in past 15 months. Total? $35 million. Plus $ 10
millions that "the people" spent to prosecute Simpson, plus money
they spent to keep him in prison and to keep jurors sequestered.
Lawyers, writers, publishers, journalists, various specialists,
professionals, limo-drivers and houseguests made profit. Tons of
people made money on $50+ million O.J. Industries, Inc. People
lost.
Sheepish fans were standing outside of the courtroom preparing to
launch the riot while LAPD was taping them row by row. Somehow
they were lead to believe that their whole race would be better
off if their idol was acquitted. How much did they loose? First -
anyone of them who bought any item connected with this circus
lost the money he or she spent on buying that item. Second, since
they will never be able to spend $ 20,000 a day to hire Johnny
Cochran and to orchestrate the intercontinental attention, they
are not going to become more racially equal after this happened.
On the contrary, LAPD will revenge on ghetto-blacks for this
defeat it survived in the courtroom, probably stating ironically
to the next Rodney King: "well, what do you complain about; we
let o.j. walk."
This country has 70% of all of the world's lawyers. It became
gridlocked in unending litigation process between them, costing
ordinary people billions of dollars every year and increasing
nations deficit (thus costing future generations even more). The
lawyers have the grip on power (almost entire Clinton's cabinet
consists of lawyers and both he and his wife are lawyers) here
now as the Party had it in the communist block, or like the
Catholic church had it in 13th century Europe. Almost nothing can
be done any more without a lawyer. They create jobs for
themselves and squeeze huge percentages out of any deal. Should
that not change SOON, this country will have the fate of the
communist block, too.
It would be so much easier if he was convicted: a classic crime
of passion - jealous husband killed his wife and her lover. That
happens every day, that happened millions of times in history -
among all nations, races and colors. In 19th century France, or
even today in some Latin American countries Simpson would be
tried leniently, because his lost honor would be given serious
consideration. In ancient Rome there would be no trial: a
husband, pater familias, had a legal right to take his wife's
life if he found her having sex with other guy. And Simpson is a
passionate, jealous, choleric, high-on-hormones man - after all
he was a football star. He beat his women. There was also
overwhelming evidence presented to support that he actually did
it: blood all over right places. But the evidence was mostly
presented by a bad guy, a racist cop, and jury decided "not
guilty" (as if we don't know that LAPD is a bunch of racist, but
they had a riot about that already, didn't they? - and did
anything change?).
The "not guilty" verdict in the O.J. case however is very difficult to stomach
because of its posterior implications:
- if he is actually guilty, but was declared not guilty by the
jury simply because he was accused by a racist cop, then
jury made its decision out of political opinion, not out of
legal arguments - which jeopardizes the entire American
judicial system which places "trial by jury" as its
cornerstone: the signal is JURIES ARE NOT TO BE BELIEVED.
They are prejudiced as the rest of the society. Or to put it
in other words: ordinary citizens are not fit to judge their
peers. Maybe that would lead to "professional jurors" in the
future (some of the country's vast army of lawyers who would
have problems finding jobs in shrinking economy).
- if he really is not guilty, then somebody else has to be
guilty. But LAPD already refused to continue investigating
implying that they still think that OJ is guilty). So, is
that murder going to become another of "unsolved mysteries"
or some future "x-files"? If he is not guilty, then
obviously detective Fuhrman did plant the glove, and then
obviously there was a wide conspiracy behind, which sounds
to me almost like Muslims bombing themselves in Sarajevo.
And indeed the same "everybody is against us" perception of
life that may be found in many Serbs, may be found in many
American blacks, too. Serbs, after all, say they are killing Muslims today to avenge
themselves for five centuries of slavery under Muslim Ottoman Turks. Such a wide conspiracy
would signal
that we already live in a worst type of corrupt police state
imaginable. It implicates police as a possible murder
accomplice. Also, such a scenario would include collecting
of types of blood, tainting different objects with blood and
planting those objects in different places. Anybody
who would plan such a thing would never use Fuhrman as
executor because of his obvious previous racist convictions.
Yet, corrupt police states are invariably unintelligent.
- Unfortunately, there is no third option.
Those options carved deep in our collective subconscious. This
trial will leave a long scar on American society. Most of blacks
really believe he is innocent, and everything is done by a racist
cop. Most of whites think that's bullshit. Which means majority
of population is upset. And the division is clearly racial. This
won't help racial peace and equality in the U.S.
Darden's & Shapiro's behavior seems to be little above the
other lawyers. Anyway, I believe that trials should involve only
two counsels (one prosecutor and one defense) and that same caps
should be put on spending on both prosecution and defense similar
to caps in political campaigning. Ten million dollars case is
injustice itself: it is unjust to all those poor people who do
not get the limelight and who go to serve long prison sentences
for minor crimes in California, the land of prisons, home of
injustice.
Limitation on number of counsels and caps on their possible
income will probably curb their numbers, and kids would think
twice before going to law schools.
Since CNN dedicated itself to be the Simpson Case Headline News,
I had to learn about attempted assassination of Macedonian
president Kiro Gligorov from ITN. Terrorists in Balkans proved
again their proficiency of American culture, society and media.
They knew that on the day of Simpson's verdict, they may count on
American media almost absolute black-out of other world events. And they
planted a 40 lbs car-bomb into Gligorov's car. Bomb killed the
chauffeur, and seriously wounded Gligorov fracturing his skull.
Gligorov is older than Bob Dole (78) and his survival chances are
slight. Gligorov faced raising opposition of the nationalist
element in his country, because of the recent compromises he made
to meet Greek demands in order to stop the boycott that Greece
and Serbia imposed on Macedonia. He was hated by Macedonian
nationalists and Albanian minority (who probably believed that he
is a nationalist), and also by Serb and Greek minority. Yet, most
of the citizens of Skopje realize that his smarts saved Macedonia
from becoming another Bosnia so far. Gligorov just recently
reached an agreement with Greece to change the flag, and then
before the attack, he was with Serbia's president Milosevic
putting together a trade agreement. With Gligorov gone, the
situation in Macedonia might be rather rowdy.
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