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Saturday, June 20, 2009

The dumbest comment on the McFly affair to date

by folkbum

And I'm proud to say it was made right here in the comments section of this very blog!

Regular (and blogger in his own right) Dad29 came by last night to say, "Frankly the biggest story is 'who sent the letters/emails?'--unanswered by Bice." (Original Bice story here, for the one or two of you who haven't read it yet.)

This is dumb for two reasons: One, it suggests that somehow evidence of a transgression (and a Class E felony!) is somehow more important than the transgression itself.

Two, and this is the key, the statement perfectly encapsulates everything that went wrong with the treatment of (alleged) lawbreaking by the Bush administration in the last decade. Wiretaps being done without a warrant in violation of the law? Who told you that? CIA black sites scattered across Eastern Europe? Let's get that reporter's notes! There are photographs out there showing detainee abuse? Stop their release!

Well, okay, the last one also applies to the current administration.

But this is, perhaps, the most frustrating thing for me in considering the way in which government, at many levels, has been running lately, and the way in which people who ought to be (for want of a better term) watchdogging it are falling down on the job. So much attention is paid to the evidence or consequences of the evidence of wrongdoing that no one ever gets around to prosecuting the criminals.

This is not, in any way, to say that McFly should be prosecuted. It's just that this dodge--who leaked the evidence?--is so irritating to me that I have to comment on the larger pattern, using this minor matter as the catalyst.

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Updated to add: Jessica McBride has made me popular again (according to SiteMeter's graphy thingy):

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