This is what a real newspaper looks like.
Politicians often are accused of being irrelevant. But rarely has a group of them been so intent on proving that charge than the senators who voted last week for the "The Matthew Shepard Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007."
This bill is supposed to be a brave and pioneering piece of legislation. According to the Human Rights Campaign, a gay-rights organization, "Congress has taken an historic step forward and moved our country closer to the realization that all Americans, including the GLBT [gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender] community, are part of the fabric of our nation."
The bill, passed by the Senate on Thursday, is named for a gay man beaten to death in Wyoming in 1998. In explaining the need for this bill, cosponsor Sen. Gordon Smith, R-Ore., declared, "What happened to Matthew should happen to no one."
You know what? He's right. Which is why murder is against the law, even
in Wyoming, and why Shepard's attackers are serving sentences (life in prison) that would not be any longer if this law had been in effect then.
Emphasis mine. The point highlighted above is the main reason that Conservatives oppose "hate crimes" legislation. Another good reason is this.
It targets crimes based on a host of illegitimate factors, including the
victim's race, religion or national origin, as well as "gender, sexual
orientation, gender identity, or disability." Some of the latter categories have
earned the bill the fervent denunciation of the Traditional Values Coalition for
allegedly "catering to the homosexual/drag queen lobby."
That may win it the endorsement of Rudy Giuliani and John Travolta, but
the bill has other shortcomings. The first is the defining defect of hate-crimes
bills: It is intended to provide extra penalties for criminals who think
incorrect thoughts.
Emphasis again mine. It is already illegal to kill, maim, assualt or steal from someone. Adding extra punishment for "thought" is antithetical to everything our Founding Fathers believed in. However, Mr. Chapman hits on a point that I had forgotten about. This kind of legislation has already been ruled as "Unconstitutional" by the Supreme Court.
Back in 2000, the Supreme Court struck down a major part of another high-minded statute, the Violence Against Women Act, which allowed anyone attacked because of her gender to sue the attacker in federal court. The reason the court gave for overturning the law was simple: The Constitution doesn't give Congress the power to legislate against crimes of a purely local nature.
Said the court, "We can think of no better example of the police power, which the founders denied the national government and reposed in the states, than the suppression of violent crime and the vindication of its victims." Only if such crimes are clearly connected to interstate commerce -- which is rarely -- can Washington intervene.
So if Congress can't legislate on violence against women, how can it legislate on violence against women, gays, lesbians, bisexuals, transvestites, transsexuals and the disabled? The truth is, it can't -- except when such offenses are connected in some way to interstate commerce.
I grew up with the Chicago Tribune. While many in Chicago may say that there is a "bias" in the editorial pages, the bias does not leak into the news pages as blatently as it does in the Star Tribune. It is honest and thoughful commentary like this that has earned the Chicago Tribune the laurels it has earned in it's 160 year history. I hope that the new owners of the Star Tribune will continue to publish more balanced commentary like this in the future.
Labels: Journalists and Media, Media Bias
3 Comments:
So if someone accidentally hits your child with his SUV, he should get the same punishment as the person who runs down your child intentionally?
The only difference is the state of mind of the driver, isn't it? Don't we punish the latter more harshly simply because of what he was thinking? The child is just as injured, the harm just as awful. The only difference berween the situations is the "bad thoughts" of the driver, but the law doesn't treat them the same.
By Anonymous, at 10:44 AM
Nice try dear - there are already laws on the books for that.
Murder is murder is murder.....there is NO love in murder...only hate.
LL
By The Lady Logician, at 1:01 PM
I'm glad you like Steve Chapman. I do too. By the way, he is also against the war in Iraq! He is also against the Patriot Act and holding Gitmo detainees indefinitely without trials!!
By Skipper60601, at 3:26 PM
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