Patterico's Pontifications

7/12/2010

Swiss Deny Polanski Extradition Request; Director Is a Free Man

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 7:07 am



I have told people privately for some time that this would happen. But I didn’t think the reasoning would be this transparently ridiculous:

The justice ministry of Switzerland said on Monday that it had denied a request to extradite the director Roman Polanski to the United States, where he has been a fugitive since 1978 after pleading guilty to having sex with a 13-year-old girl, and that he was no longer under house arrest.

In rejecting the extradition request from the United States, the Swiss ministry cited two factors: first, the Swiss said, the U.S. had failed to provide the records of a January hearing in Los Angeles County Superior Court that would have shown the judge in charge of the Polanski case in 1977 agreed that “the 42 days of detention spent by Roman Polanski in the psychiatric unit of a Californian prison represented the whole term of imprisonment he was condemned to.”

Second, the Swiss said, when Mr. Polanski traveled in September 2009 to the Zurich Film Festival where he was arrested as he arrived at the airport, he did so in “good faith” that “the journey would not entail any legal disadvantages for him.” The Swiss justice ministry noted that Mr. Polanski had been staying regularly in Switzerland since 2006, and though “he was registered in the Swiss registry of wanted persons, he was never controlled by the Swiss authorities.”

The judge never agreed that 42 days would be his entire sentence. At most, he said that 48 additional days (on top of the original 42) would be the full sentence — if Polanski agreed to certain illegal conditions that he never agreed to.

As for his good faith belief he would not be arrested: so what?

He plied a 13 year-old with drugs and anally raped her, and was confined to a Swiss chalet.

Travesty.

311 Responses to “Swiss Deny Polanski Extradition Request; Director Is a Free Man”

  1. Yes, he will never be able to come to the US again, I would imagine….even if he wishes to do so. I consider THAT a plus.

    What a nasty little man. Talent, apparently, excuses vile acts by vile people.

    Charlotte (dad663)

  2. Money does too, unfortunately.

    Chris Hooten (c34512)

  3. Different rules for the rich and (in)famous, yet again. The girl was no one important, I guess, nor does this person’s history of sex with underaged girls (and his comments upon same) matter. This gives new meaning to the expression that justice is blind.

    Eric Blair (167add)

  4. maybe its lost in translation, but did they really say that because we didn’t provide evidence exhonerating him, or at least saying he didn’t owe us any more time, that he should be free?

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  5. We should send them many, many packets of Swiss Miss cocoa in protest.

    Eric Blair (d9926c)

  6. eric

    justice isn’t blind. justice is stupid. worst of all, all the “right” people will assert that justice prevailed.

    Just remember who called for his release next time they try to lecture us about their superiority.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  7. So he was in the Swiss registry of wanted persons, but we will let him go because he had a good faith belief he would not be arrested.

    OK then.

    Patterico (72b32c)

  8. I guess I’m going for conspiracy theory, but why does this feel like a put-job with Holder’s DOJ?

    SPQR (26be8b)

  9. I wonder if that girl had a good faith belief she would not get anally raped.

    Nuke Riding Cowboy (b8d4be)

  10. Wonder if Dog the Bounty Hunter would bring Polanski in?

    PCD (1d8b6d)

  11. no kidding…

    No-bs! (0a0bcb)

  12. PCD

    i think legally he can’t but i confess to alot of ignorance on extradition law.

    personally, if it was my daughter, i would go to wherever he jets off to (probably france) and shoot the bastard. In the groin. Problem solved.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  13. Btw, Patterico, i know you don’t necessarily speak for the LA DA’s office on this (though is suspect the rest of the office equally pissed), but if you get an official response from them, i for one would love to hear it.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  14. I also suspect that there was a lot of behind the scenes influence exerted by the French, both because of his French citizenship and because of his personal relationships with the Sarkozys.

    nk (db4a41)

  15. “F*cking Swiss bastards!” would be my guess for what the unofficial response is.

    Chris Hooten (c34512)

  16. Chris Hooten is a supporter of child assrapists. That is all.

    JD (51bb94)

  17. Guess we can say that there are different sets of rules for the rich and famous.

    No-bs! (42ba30)

  18. “because of his personal relationships with the Sarkozys.

    Comment by nk”

    I hate Hollywood mostly because of crap like this. Societies shouldn’t be ruled by people who actually like Roman Polanski, but the people have decided to worship this vain and nearly useless world of rather horrible people.

    Also, wasn’t there some other French kid who was raped by Roman? And her government probably did work hard to keep the rapist free. He never stopped before, so I wouldn’t bet on him stopping now. It’s a shame that more women will not come forward.

    Of course, Roman used a legal tactic of ruining his victim’s life to get her to drop charges. I’m sure it’s scary for his other victims, who I would bet are pretty numerous.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  19. Looks like the judge had no criminal experience also is someone looks to be very independent so I sont know if this is just her own sense of opinion or a government decision

    wrong wither way – totally wrong

    EricPWJohnson (cedf1d)

  20. Say, what is the status of Polanski’s US copyrights?

    Kevin Murphy (5ae73e)

  21. Three words: John Wayne Bobbitt

    Kevin Murphy (5ae73e)

  22. Well, if you were a judge, who would you curry favor with: the riff-raff or the glitterati?

    Kevin Murphy (5ae73e)

  23. btw, patterico, this will infuriate you.

    http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1202463439289&Polanski_Free_After_Swiss_Reject_US_Extradition_Request

    This is an AP article, and contains gems like saying he was “charged” with rape. um, no, convicted is the word.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  24. Now that I know that Switzerland intends to be a haven for child molestors and rapists, I will strike them off my list of vacation destinations for August.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  25. Great, now all the guys on Perverted Justice/To Catch a Predator can use this in their defense. “I went to the girl’s house in good faith that the journey would not entail any legal disadvantages for me.”

    Or I guess Dateline just can’t film in Switzerland.

    Brian (cd6722)

  26. Looks like Steve Cooley’s going to have to find another “issue” to get hismelf elected Attorney General.

    Meanwhile Polanski can get back to making superb documentaries like “The Ghostwriter.”

    David Ehrenstein (2550d9)

  27. SPQR, just go to Switzerland in good faith that the vacation will not entail supporting a country that frees rapists.

    I think there’s some kind of law there about it, and they will have to lock Roman up again

    … in a Chalet, whatever the hell that is (sounds pretty awesome).

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  28. What was truly disappointing, although not surprising, was the number of current Hollywood luminaries who spoke out in defense of this POS. Harrison Ford, I hardly knew ye.

    wright (8a7bfe)

  29. “The Swiss government said it had sought confidential testimony given on Jan. 26 by Roger Gunson, the Los Angeles attorney in charge of the original prosecution against Polanski. Washington rejected the request.”–AP

    IOW, the Obama administration made sure he walked.

    Big surprise.

    Dave Surls (5da709)

  30. Is this any surprise? Consider the Swiss: Nazis rampaging through Europe in the 30s and 40s and the country remains steadfastly neutral. If that moral question was a tough one, we can hardly expect them to find any purchase on this one. The comment by SPQR (#25, above) seems right to me, but I would add that anyone outraged by this should do what I plan to do this morning: send an e-mail to the Swiss ambassador in D.C., saying that I will no longer travel to Switzerland or buy its products.

    Kevin Stafford (abdb87)

  31. Kevin, Thanks for the inspiration. I did some contract work for StorageTek and UBS. I’m going to appraise the Swiss Ambassador of this and tell them if UBS gets into Deep Scheiss, I’m not going to come to their rescue. Those data bunkers can go silent and useless.

    PCD (1d8b6d)

  32. Oregon’s Gerber makes better multi-tools. Japan makes much better watches.

    On the other hand, if you’re a criminal and need to protect your wealth or your person, I don’t think you can beat the Swiss.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  33. Comment by wright — 7/12/2010 @ 8:48 am
    since when did actors become a standard for right and wrong?

    No-bs! (e304f6)

  34. Hmmm, I wonder how we can get one of the radical (aren’t they all) Imam’s to issue a fatwa on little Roman the Rapist. Now thast would be fun the watch.

    scr_north (6ae2d1)

  35. Nothing to see here, folks. Move along.

    Frank Drebbin (8096f2)

  36. 34 scr_north, pass the word Polanski raped a 13 year old muslim, took naked photographs of her, and produce a tape of him yuking it up with Mohammad jokes as he’s a**-raping her, voila! You’ll see more fatwas than Carter’s have liver pills.

    PCD (1d8b6d)

  37. The Culture of Corruption wins another one.

    tyree (63c76f)

  38. Comment by PCD — 7/12/2010 @ 10:31 am

    No, all that would happen is that the Imam’s would demand to know the identity of the girl so that her family could regain its honor by killing her for submitting to a rape.

    Once again, the law “protects” the Little People!

    It’s too bad Polanski’s victim wasn’t an Israeli;
    this all could have been handled by the Mossad.

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  39. I am a little curious, what was the deal with the documentation that the Swiss wanted? Was it something completely out of line or what? And what was the reason for not sending it? And did the Swiss warn the State Department that without it, there would be no extradition?

    eirik (9e08a9)

  40. AD @ #38: Spot on. Gabriel Allon would know how to handle this.

    Old Coot (082c44)

  41. Wish I had the addresses of the “swiss justice ministry” (an oxymoron if you hadn’t noticed).

    I’d like to sent them a 5 gallon can of Vaseline in case Polansky chooses to hang out with them.

    What do you expect from a country who’s major industry relies on secrecy and has never fought for anything in modern times.

    Rick (d430ea)

  42. 39, the document in question does not exist. It is a fabrication of Polanski’s lawyers.

    PCD (1d8b6d)

  43. Is this a partial pay-back for the IRS’ attack against Swiss Bank Secrecy Laws?

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  44. 43

    no, I dont think so otherwise they may just have come out ad said it the Swiss, at times, are foolishly arrogant, many organizations are rethinking having operations in the industrial regions as the workforce is becoming more and more unstable

    EricPWJohnson (cedf1d)

  45. Let’s see, (1) what are the chances that Obama didn’t want to offend the rich, white Hollywood types who rallied to Polanski’s defense? (2)Holder is Obama’s lapdog and doesn’t give a rip about justice. 1+2 = Polanski goes free.

    in_awe (44fed5)

  46. One note, Poalanski raped the girl vaginally before anally.

    jim2 (a9ab88)

  47. Ugh, I hate to know the details of these things.

    What a piece of garbage Polanski is. We’re just chipping away at society when we let justice be administered so terribly. No one thinks an average schmuck would have been left in house arrest and freed when it’s well known he’s committed this kind of crime.

    And firstly, I blame the Los Angeles justice system of Polanksi’s era. From the start, this wasn’t justice.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  48. Isn’t the international section of the airport, a kind of neutral zone, which is not Switzerland or France, and can Interpol Police arrest him when in that zone?

    JamesSix (c0f570)

  49. Dustin: What blame does the L.A. justice system of 20+ years ago have in this?
    He was prosecuted, he pled guilty to a plea bargain that was in the interest of the victim, and he fled while out on bail.
    Other than Polanski, who was to blame for these events?

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  50. Xavi Alonso from Spain got worse treatment just for trying to field a soccer ball near Holland’s defensive center midfielders.
    Maybe next time we can have Holland’s team over to the lawn at Polanski’s chalet for a bit of a knock around and I can feed him a weak pass between Von Bommel and de Jong

    My outrage meter would be a little more pegged if the young lady hadn’t accepted a settlement and issued her forgiveness.
    Hopefully Polanski will see this as OJ style vindication and he’ll do something stupid(er)

    SteveG (ce5f07)

  51. AD, are you familiar with the terms of Polanksi’s plea bargain?

    I agree, it’s hard to blame the lawyers and judge for Polanksi actually fleeing (I would not have granted him bail, but I realize I’m an outlier for that).

    But I think the idea that he would have seen justice had he not escaped is ridiculous. I think some of the behavior of the prosecutor and the judge don’t make much sense. I’m not saying you’re wrong to blame the actual fleeing perpetrator of the rape, either.

    One other issue about this case that has always disturbed me is how the victim has been played like a puppet. I guess I could go on all day, but it’s just no secret that in this part of the world, a certain group of people are above the law. There may be some semblance of law, but it’s not the law that applies to me when I’m in LA.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  52. okay, you have heard me say this before… but this is off topic, but really funny and sharp as satire.

    http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NzBkMWEzYzZhYWFmMjBiNGM0ZDZiMTUzOWU2YWViZWI=

    its a link to an onion piece mocking how we always think there is some kind of regulatory fix to every problem.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (b1db52)

  53. AW…it’s the “There Ought To Be A Law” syndrome!

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  54. Comment by Dustin — 7/12/2010 @ 12:18 pm

    My take on that is that he lied to the doc crew, not that he lied in Court.
    If that is the case, Where’s the Beef?

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  55. AD

    Well put! and i gotta credit the onion. they have been funnier recently.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (b1db52)

  56. Comment by Aaron Worthing (A.W.) — 7/12/2010 @ 12:36 pm

    Unfortunately, too many of our legislators (and it is not strictly a Progressive ailment) suffer from “There Ought To Be A Law” syndrome.

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  57. Sorry about the (essentially) double post, it got lost momentarily in the ether.

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  58. AD,

    I don’t know what to believe from that guy. My point was that he’s not the kind of prosecutor the people deserved.

    My point, my beef, is that the plea agreement was contrary to justice. And the prosecutor was obviously a complete jackass. And I could criticize the judge, but he’s not available to defend himself from the many attacks on him and I’m not trying to pin this one any particular person when the problem is so widespread.

    What do you think of the justice that would have been served had Polanksi been a good defendant and taken his sentence? There may be some ambiguity as to how much penalty he was facing, but we know basically that he was headed for a slap on the wrist.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  59. Boycott Helvetica

    Neo (7830e6)

  60. Dustin, if you think back, you’ll recall that our “Criminal Justice System” in the eighties was infected with some very perverse pathologies.
    Among them was the ability to find “Child Abuse” in the most innocent of situations (the McMartin Scandal comes to mind, there were others in Northern California, Washington State, and in New England IIRC).
    Part of this was a wish to shield victims from further “abuse” in the press and public, which I think fueled the manner in which this rape victim was handled.
    They went after her abuser, but because of her desire (whether expressed or implied) to not appear in court, they offered Polanski a deal that involved the potential for jail time (which would satisfy the victim lobby), but would not be as severe as he would face in a full-court press, probably using a few winks and nods that it might be as little as a stay in a hospital-like environment for psychological counselling/etc.
    I don’t know if it was the best deal that The People of California could have gotten in the matter, all I know is that Polanski agreed to it, and then went on the lam –
    which to me means all deals are off, and the controlling fact in the case is that he pleaded GUILTY to a sex crime, and has to serve the time,
    plus the time for Interstate/International Flight To Avoid Prosecution!
    Unfortunately, it seems that the only way that this DoJ will pursue this matter is that if the victim were a minority (Black).
    Shame on them for shirking their duty before the Law!

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  61. Comment by Neo — 7/12/2010 @ 12:57 pm

    And Times New Roman!

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  62. Very well said AD. Communicated my point better than I was going to.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  63. btw, another off topic link. NAACP to denounce pretty much the whole tea party movement as racist.

    http://www.kansascity.com/2010/07/11/2076909/naacp-takes-critical-look-at-tea.html

    Btw, have they denounced the black panthers yet. oh, they probably did if only to try to maintain their power base.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  64. Woulda, coulda, shoulda….
    We just don’t know what the Judge in this matter would have done absent Polanski’s flight.
    All Plea Bargains are a crap-shoot as far as the public is concerned.
    You just hope that the sentance has some semblance to the severity of the crime, and that it impresses upon the perpetrator that society does not approve of their actions.
    Otherwise, we just lock up a lot of prisoners for a lot of time, which is what we ended up with due to “Three Strikes” since the previous system was not evidently working.
    It is very frustrating.

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  65. Some points need to be made here:

    1. The plea deal was that Polanski would agree to submit to evaluation by the CDC as a candidate for additional incarceration, and if the report concluded in the negative, then he would walk with time served + probation.

    Polanski so agreed, went into the joint for the evaluation, and the evaluation said “no more”. The Judge then engaged in improper ex-parte communications with a prosecutor and said he would not follow the bargain.

    2. The Swiss, in my opinion, are still bristling from the fact that the US DOJ muscled them into violating their own banking secrecy laws to agree to cough up the names of 4,000 US citizens holding numbered accounts. This was rammed up the ass of the Swiss, who today said “no more”.

    3. Los Angeles in 1978, and in particular the 50 square feet that was ground zero to Jack Nicholson’s hot tub, was a very different place then it is today. So were the criminal justice system and its attitude toward sex with minors.

    Today what could expose a 40 year old man to 30 years was often disposed of with county time and probation.

    4. The victim in this case, who is now herself over 40, has repeatedly formally insisted (through counsel in court filings and in interviews) that Polanski has been punished enough and that she wants all charges to be dismissed.

    Under the circumstances, who can say that this outcome is a travesty of justice?

    StephenG (be043d)

  66. I can see all the High 5’s in hollyweird now. And RapeRape Whoopsi must be ecstatic!

    SteveCan (72a7f6)

  67. Well, at least now he’s free to search for the real rapist at all the best parties…

    Frank Drebbin (8096f2)

  68. On the other hand, if you’re a criminal and need to protect your wealth or your person, I don’t think you can beat the Swiss.

    Or if you’ve somehow come into the possession of millions of dollar’s worth of assets via the burning of millions of Jews, that’s A – OK by the Swiss. The US rabble just isn’t sophisticated enough to understand the nuances of Euro attitudes regarding child rape.

    Dmac (52f1e4)

  69. The Prosecutor…Roger Gunson…was a sell-out. He had a clearly guilty criminal who he allowed to plead down, and let the Judge decide decide the sentence, then somehow he think that discussion inside chambers are operative, and somehow what is decided in court is not the record.

    Yes, Rittenband did ask they argue a specific way prior to him being sentenced to the 90 day evaluation. But this was because there was agreement between the parties in chambers. Polanski’s lawyer willing did this because he thought it was an advantage to his client.

    It was indeed Rittenband notion to say he would sentence Polanski to only 90 more days. He said this on record at a press conference after Polanski had fled the country. However nothing is set in stone until the hearing is done in open court.

    Polanski’s lawyers want to blame the judge, but they were playing the judge in their moves. Polanski’s lawyers managed the outcome, they now want to complain about.

    Here is the key point, is that the other charges against Polanski were never dropped by the DA. They are all still active. The DA only agreed to drop them if Polanski was sentenced. He never was. Gunson want to say the 90 day evaluation should not be used as punishment. Granted. But if you read the letter of the law, it was used entirely appropriately.

    The DA ask the judge to remove the plea bargain, as clearly Polanski broke the deal. And charge Polanski on all counts. There is so much of a track record on the case, they can prove it.

    Gunson the prosecutor was co-opted by the defense. As a prosecutor he never was concerned enough about the girl or society to go after the case to generate a conviction. If he had concerns about the Judge, he could have raised them up and left the case, he never did.

    JamesSix (c0f570)

  70. This is very dissapointing to hear. Time does not make a crime dissapear! And I don’t even care if the victim doesn’t want him prosecuted now. It’s not about her, it’s about the sovereignty of our justice system; it is disgusting that a celebrity can get of the hook for a crime like this, no matter how long ago it occured. Justice should know no time limits!

    Jim (51b784)

  71. ” The victim in this case, who is now herself over 40, has repeatedly formally insisted (through counsel in court filings and in interviews) that Polanski has been punished enough and that she wants all charges to be dismissed.

    Under the circumstances, who can say that this outcome is a travesty of justice?”

    I reject that part of your otherwise well thought out argument.

    The victim was coerced in the extreme. Much of my outrage is around how the rape victim is used as a shield now for Roman. Let’s make no mistake: Roman and his counsel were going to ruin her life if she didn’t obey her rapist.

    AD is right that ultimately, we know there is one man to blame, Roman Polanski. And I am glad that some aspects of the justice system are much better now. But you can’t pay attention to this part of the world, LA, without seeing that we still have a long way to go.

    I don’t expect much out of the Swiss. I expect more out of Americans.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  72. “It’s Chinatown, Jake!”

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  73. Second, the Swiss said, when Mr. Polanski traveled in September 2009 to the Zurich Film Festival where he was arrested as he arrived at the airport, he did so in “good faith” that “the journey would not entail any legal disadvantages for him.” The Swiss justice ministry noted that Mr. Polanski had been staying regularly in Switzerland since 2006, and though “he was registered in the Swiss registry of wanted persons, he was never controlled by the Swiss authorities.”

    Sounds kinda like the Obama’s DOJ suit against Arizona: Under the current administration, there was an understanding that there would be no substantive enforcement of federal immigration statutes, so nobody else ought to step in to address their dereliction of duty.

    L.N. Smithee (f4315b)

  74. L.N….You’re never supposed to show up the Boss!

    AD - RtR/OS! (809c7f)

  75. The tragic downside to staying out of the affairs of other nations. “Not my problem” ends up looking like “I don’t care”.

    Icy Texan (7c414b)

  76. StephenG: Your facts are simply wrong.

    You can read the plea deal in full detail, its on TheSmokinggun.com website.

    The plea deal was ONLY for dropping the other charges, that was only promise. Polanski was told clearly it would only be the judge who would decide his sentence. Yes the judge would receive additional information, but the judge never relinquished his duty to determine the sentence.

    You can see where the DA tell him it will be the judge deciding, and that no additonal promises are made. You can READ where the DA makes Polanski say “The Judge will” when ask whom will make the decision.

    It’s myth that promises were made by the Judge about the sentence. The DA was tweaked out because he did not expect the judge to use the 90 day evaluation option. But this was an option available to the judge.

    The fact is that Polanski fled before he was sentenced. He never was promised in court of anything. He was actually told it would be singularly the judge determining his sentence and no one else.

    The sequence was.
    1. Rape,
    2. Charges,
    3. Full denial until semen stained panties placed into evidence.
    4. Plea deal,
    5. Mandatory evaluation if he was a chronic sexual molestor by psychiatrist and probation report,
    6. Judge states the probation report is a whitewash of the facts of the case, put him on a 90 day evaluation, as the law allowed him
    7. grants Polanski bail to work on a movie, discovers that Polanski was partying in Germany with his underage Kinski toy.
    8. Judge finds out that he was imposed upon, because Polanski lied about the work he needed to do to be allowed out on bail.
    9. Judge finds out the movie is not funded, written or shooting, so there was no basis for the request for 90 days.
    10. Requires Polanski to come back for a hearing. Polanski is asked about his affairs with underaged Natasha Kinski, but Judge stops the line of questioning.
    11. Allows Polanski to stay out for the remainder of the 90 days
    12. Polanski comes back and immediately goes into Chino for evaluation,
    13. He is let out after 45 days,
    14. A court date for sentence is days later
    15. A meeting with defense and prosecution reveal to them that the judge intends his sentence for rape of a child aged 13 will be 90 days.
    16. Polanski finds out from his lawyers that his sentence will be 90 days in jail, Polanski fleas the country.

    Polanski was never promised a specific sentence, and if his lawyers think they thought they heard something of a promise, it was likely creative fabricated notions. The defense lawyers always knew that off the record in chambers conversations with the judge were never to be construed as a sentencing or legally binding.

    Trying to make off the record conversation after a judge has died is now the current approach of the defense.

    It was NEVER the photo of him with the young girls in Munich, it was that the defense lied about the Movie and why he needed to be out on bail. It was not that he was partying for one night, but rather he had no work to do at all, it was not even funded.

    JamesSix (c0f570)

  77. I wonder how Harrison Ford’s “Witness” co-star — herself a rape victim — Kelly McGillis feels about him right now.

    Icy Texan (7c414b)

  78. I assume that somewhere there is a letter or document of come sort that has this decision on it, and I assume there is a signature on it. Perhaps he/she should get a letter or two daily asking how he can look at him/herself in the nirror each day, for a lomg time.

    MD in Philly (3d3f72)

  79. While what Jamessix says is true, and I realize he’s not trying to argue against me, I just want to note that with the charges that were dropped, it was simply clear Polanski was getting a slap on the wrist. He fled because even that was too much for him. He was willing to ruin a very young girl’s life (more than one girl), but he couldn’t take even the slightest punishment.

    And not only did he get a slap on the wrist, but professionals in his field have continued to elevate him as some kind of example. He lives an amazing life. I’m not much for class warfare, but he lives a fairy tale when he deserves a dungeon.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  80. “(more than one girl)”

    Like who? Charlotte Lewis? He gave her the female lead in Pirates. The fact that her career has gone up the psout is surely not Polanski’s fault.

    Or are you going to claim that he conspired against her? Hey she got a Seinfeld episode you know.

    Nastassja Kinski? She told me herself how much she adored him, and felt the whole episode was a set-up. I agree.

    But I’m sure that’s like spitting on the Bible around here.

    David Ehrenstein (2550d9)

  81. Dustin: We agree…I think this Roger Gunson is a real shame. He agreed to a plea deal without having his own desired goal of jail time. He left that to the Judge. When the Judge was faced with a probation report that reads like a fan glowing about the subject of their affection….he asked for a further evaluation.

    Lets please remember, that Polanski violated his probation because continued relationships with underaged girl, SPECIFICALLY Natasha Kinski.

    Since he was in violation of his probation, as recommended by this probation report. Polanski should be exposed to the consequences of violation probation. Instead he simply fled the coutry. This explains him fleeing a bit more. Because it was not the jail sentence, but the prospect of the probation rules, and having his lifestyle of having “consensual sex” with young children, stopped.

    I still believe that as a matter of law, that because the record clearly states the only promise by the DA was the charges would be dropped AFTER sentencing, and the sentencing was stop when Polanski fled the country. That all the charges are still in play, and he can still be held responsible for all of them.

    The old judge was never bound to any obligation of sentence by the plea agreement (which there is a clear record of in the transripts)….a new judge is not obligating to accept the broken plea deal, and can send the entire thing back to court.

    JamesSix (c0f570)

  82. The plea deal was that Polanski would agree to submit to evaluation by the CDC as a candidate for additional incarceration, and if the report concluded in the negative, then he would walk with time served + probation.

    Wrong.

    Re-read the plea transcript.

    Patterico (72b32c)

  83. I am not at all familiar with extradition law, but is it usual for the country being asked to extradite to examine the technicalities of the case on its own authority? In my innocence, I always thought the two basic requirements were a treaty or agreement between the two countries on the subject of extradition, and presentation of a legally valid arrest warrant or similar document.

    As it is, Thailand, for all that it is a hot spot of sex tourism, is tougher on child molesters than Switzerland. If you’re not familiar with the case, search for recent news about the Russian pianist Mikhail Pletnev, who was arrested a week or two ago in Thailand for having sex with a 14 year old boy.

    kishnevi (0e3a73)

  84. kishnevi say Look!…
    squirrel! typical tactic
    dishonors leftwing

    ColonelHaiku (9cf017)

  85. Patterico -why were the records of the January hearing in LA not provided to the Swiss? Who made this decision and why?
    (May not have made a difference but seems curious – why hand the Swiss an “out”?)

    Bruce (b4ee1c)

  86. Wow. I think I’ll just jump into this snakepit as a devil’s advocate and see what happens. Before anyone starts screaming and threatening me – I did think the man did something wrong, but if one were to put their criminal attorney hat on – you’d find there are a number of facts that make this case difficult to prosecute. To prosecute as rape that is.

    To those who feel it is rape because she was underage then there is no argument that would convince them otherwise – it is and always will be rape to them. But I do think there is some grey area here. If a willing teenager sleeps with a man over 18 and you consider that rape, then don’t read it on, it will only upset you. And yes, he was 44 and that adds some creep points to the situation. But it is unfair to compare consensual sex with a young teenager to the violent and brutal sexual attack. The definitive text on this is Susan Brownmiller’s AGAINST OUR WILL – which describes rape not as a sexual act, but an act of violence against women. And it’s pretty convincing.

    Here are some facts that are often overlooked.

    1. He is not a convicted child rapist. He agreed to the charge of consensual sex with a minor. Had the D.A. tried for more, had he gone for rape, then Polanski would have fought it, and it would have gone to trial. And then you’d get his side of the story, which no one really seems to care about. And he would have had a lawyer cross examine his accusor.

    2. Deny it? I read that he didn’t deny it to the arresting officer, that he was surprised it was illegal.

    3. He drugged her. She was no stranger to drugs, and in fact had tried Quaaludes before “when I was real little”. This was her testimony.

    4. He gave her 1/4 of a Quaalude – which isn’t very much. She was around 100 lbs. It is doubtful this would have had much of an effect, if any effect at all, but in all fairness she had been drinking champagne too. How much? Don’t know.

    5. This was her second visit to Polanski’s house, the second photo shoot.

    6. Her mom dropped her off.

    7. She tesitifed that she never cried in front of Polanski. She said she cried when he left the room and stopped crying before he returned. This seems weirdly convenient.

    8. She testified that she said “no” – a number of times – but never tried to fight him off. Never got up and left the room. Never called out for help. She just said “no”. Is that enough? I don’t think so – I would need to know the tone of no, and what else was going on. This is difficult to discuss in non-graphic terms on a political website (but it could get steamy) the point is when a woman says “No” – sometimes it really means no, but if they’re breathing hard, excited, naked, groping you, kissing you, in the throes of passion etc. (and more) then “no” isn’t really no.

    9. There was someone else in the house at the time and they didn’t hear anything weird or any protestations.

    10. When he dropped her off at her house, she went in and did not tell her mother what happened. Nor did she mention it to her father or her sister. She did mention something (and I don’t know the context in which it was conveyed – I had sex, or he raped me or…?) to her boyfriend. Her sister overheard and told her mother.

    Anal sex. Okay, it’s worse than regular in the vagina sex. But it is more commonly practiced in europe and not uncommon as a form of birth control. (which is more or less her testimony – that she was not on birth control, so he went to the naughty place).

    I do think there was something fishy going on. Only because there are weird gaps in the facts of the case. The mother was an aspiring actress, and I suspect an amibtious one willing to use her daughter as bait. I suspect she told her daughter not to have sex with Polanski, and when it happened, well, it is possible, even credible that the girl packaged it as rape to not upset her mother. We only have her testimony go go on -and it’s got a number of issues. Polanski never defended himself in a trial, which means he never had an attorney cross examine her. Even her own testimony seems to contradict itself – perfect recall on some issues, but then she would say she couldn’t remember something because she was so groggy. Interesting how in court if someone had a few drinks – their testimony could be dismissed as unreliable. I suspect she wasn’t all that groggy. (did she go home and pass out? No.

    Lastly, this was the ’70s, which was a pretty permissive experimental time. Having sex, or desiring sex with a child is consdiered a mental disorder. Being attracted to females who have hit puberty – is not considered a psychological disorder. When Polanski said something to the effect that all men are attracted to young girl – he didn’t mean children, but very young women. Is it immoral? It is certainly illegal. But is it immoral to feel that attraction? No. Can you control being attracted? No. Can you control your actions? Yes. It is only immoral to act on it? What he did was wrong, but in context of the times and the culture he was in, a little less wrong. This cuts both ways, she was in a world that was more persmissive, her mother was extremely impressed by Polanski (he was a huge and influential director – pure catnip to aspiring actresses) and this man was showering her with attention.

    Now, I’ve read here that Patterico would dismiss the the fact that she was sexually active. If one were arguing that non-consensual rape is far worse than consensual sex with a minor, I think it does muddy the waters a little bit. Someone protecting themselves against sex, vs someone who is experimenting at a young age.

    To those who want to somehow blame liberals keep in mind that thre is plenty of deviant behavior to go around that crosses party lines.

    So, I apologize if you’re offended, this really is borderline stuff and I’m sure it crosses the lines with some of you.

    As far as his talent giving him some kind of immunity, it doesn’t and it shouldn’t. But it does make it more tragic. And the fact that his past in Nazi Germany shouldn’t give a pass for bad behavior – it shouldn’t.

    Mr. Anonymous (219c8d)

  87. “Before anyone starts screaming and threatening me”

    Oh, well, aren’t you Mr sensible.

    Please link at least one example of a threat on this blog in the past 30 days.

    The fact that the victim was raped is not up for debate. Most of your ‘facts’ are either completely wrong or irrelevant. That you think it’s not immoral to want to have sex with 13 year old girls doesn’t matter. That her mom dropped her off at a location without knowing she would be drugged and raped isn’t relevant. That you lie about how effective Quaalude and alcohol are at making a weak child defenseless isn’t relevant. You say she didn’t fight enough, and you say she wasn’t drugged enough.

    But what’s really funny is that you use the argument that he hasn’t been convicted yet we know he’s guilty. That’s like whining that the Menendex brothers are orphans.

    You say his talent doesn’t give him immunity. You’re wrong again, it seems. He’s free today despite the completely proven fact that he brutally drugged and raped a girl who begged him to stop.

    It’s a good thing you’re anonymous. You’re judging the commenters here as violent, yet you’re forgiving someone for raping someone who didn’t fight “enough”.

    Probably troll bait. I have to admit, it’s very good troll bait, but you’re a good example of the people, almost all liberal democrats, who say exactly what you’re saying.

    You even throw out the ‘plenty of pervs across party lines’ meme. Of course, that’s pretty stupid. You know that only those from the left are making the argument that this is OK. You’re making so many claims about why a person should keep having sex with a 13 year old girl they just drugged who is begging for the rape to stop. As long as their mom knows what address the victim is, and she’s not fighting too hard, and you’re using European attitudes about anal sex, this is OK to some liberals like you.

    You can’t pretend this is a non-partisan problem. This is absolutely the fault of liberals. We can and should blame them for rapes because you indeed were motivated to work hard and defend it. Also, the reason Patterico will dismiss the ‘she was a slut’ claims you make is because it truly isn’t relevant to whether or not she consented to her rape, and it’s transparently one of the many ways rape defenders have bullied victims to avoid the justice system.

    Of course, you’ll now just deny the nature of your comment, but I’m very glad some liberals are so inspired to honestly admit they are completely OK with their celeb rulers raping peasants.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  88. I don’t want to tell anyone their business, but it might be nice to delete Post #86. The troll who wrote it might end up feeling badly he wrote what did, later. It is a very, very repugnant bit of writing.

    Others may disagree.

    Dustin, this was very, very sick troll bait.

    Eric Blair (02a138)

  89. Very sick, Eric. I can’t understand the mindset if he’s just joking around, even though I realize that’s very likely.

    And yet, this is very accurate in describing a mindset that is out there. Some people look at this circumstance and are not horrified. They pose as wise and tell us that it’s natural to want to do what Roman did.

    It’s a good think that commenter is anonymous, because those comments are outrageous. He knows he needs to hide in shame while posing as the wise teacher of morality.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  90. And I wouldn’t delete the comments. I’d put them on the front page as their own post.

    The reason society long ago came to reject that garbage is because it was eventually discussed thoughtfully. I think we need more of that.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  91. Prior to the return date of the Polanski motion in state court to unseal the former prosecutor’s testimony, the Swiss justice ministry indicated that they had no interest in that testimony.

    In fact, the District Attorney cited those very Swiss press releases expressing disinterest in its opposition to the unsealing of the testimony. Now, the LA Court’s order, entirely consistent with its procedural rules regarding conditional testimony, constitutes the basis for the extradition denial. That’s scandalous on the part of the Swiss. And they know it, or they would not have cited extraneous grounds for the denial (for example, he made it safe to his chalet, so why can’t he go to a film festival?)

    I want Elian Gonzalez back, if this is how we’re all going to play.

    State’s opposition to the unsealing request:
    http://www.scribd.com/full/31058289?access_key=key-16f2o46e5jxoisgvf6lz

    weffie (1f11b4)

  92. #86

    Okay I’ll bite. I don’t believe in deletion, but instead in straightening slow people out.

    > To those who feel it is rape because she was underage then there is no argument that would convince them otherwise – it is and always will be rape to them

    This is a criminal attorney argument? No. Because the criminal attorney argument is, “well, we are f—ed because the statute is pretty clear on this point. 14 is rape.” Seriously the correct answer in that situation is to mitigate, but not to pretend that your client isn’t guilty.

    Seriously, a good criminal attorney knows that if his client is caught dead to rights, the correct answer is to tell your client to throw himself on the mercy of the court and do all he can to mitigate the crime.

    > But it is unfair to compare consensual sex with a young teenager to the violent and brutal sexual attack.

    Actually the law agrees to a degree, which is why the charge for mere “statutory” rape is less than, say, forcible rape in most states, and it factors into the decision. Of course by “willing” you mean she was plied with drugs and alcohol…

    For instance, in Kennedy v. Louisiana a man raped his own 8 year old daughter. But it wasn’t the mere fact he raped her, but also that it was a forcible act that made it so he was eligible for the death penalty. Of course in that case the supreme court said stunningly that it would be cruel and unusual to execute him under those circumstances.

    > The definitive text on this is Susan Brownmiller’s AGAINST OUR WILL – which describes rape not as a sexual act, but an act of violence against women.

    Yeah, I always thought that anyone who didn’t think of rape as a sexual act couldn’t have a penis.

    > He is not a convicted child rapist.

    He has plead guilty to raping a child. so, yes, he is. It is tautologically true.

    > And then you’d get his side of the story, which no one really seems to care about. And he would have had a lawyer cross examine his accusor.

    Well, they found his semen in her panties, so statory rape was really a given. Maybe they would have been able to prove more but as you note, a lawyer would have been able to cross examine her, a 14 year old girl, at a time when the protection for women on the stand was pretty much non-existent.

    > I read that he didn’t deny it to the arresting officer, that he was surprised it was illegal.

    Which shows you how f—ed his morality is. Go find a picture of her at that age. She was just a little girl. For instance, when describing when he performed oral sex she called it “cuddliness” a heartbreaking malapropism of cunnilingus. The more you actually pay attention to the victim as she was at that age, the more you realize how evil what he did was.

    As a survivor of the holocaust himself, Polanski should know that some things are wrong, even if legal. Having sex with that little girl was wrong, even if the law said he was right. His morality should have stopped him, if not the law. Having sex with that girl is malum in se.

    > She was no stranger to drugs

    So?

    > which isn’t very much. She was around 100 lbs. It is doubtful this would have had much of an effect, if any effect at all, but in all fairness she had been drinking champagne too. How much? Don’t know.

    If he didn’t think this would help him get what he wanted out of her, why did he give it to her?

    As for #5, #6, objection, relevance?

    > She tesitifed that she never cried in front of Polanski.

    Yeah, her testimony made it pretty clear that she had been trying to get away from him the whole time, trying to keep it from happening, that she was physically afraid of him.

    I have dealt with how women reacted to rape in that time. For instance, I know someone who went to college at 16 in the 1960s. She went out with a man who proceeded to rape her. She felt she was ruined for all other men as a result of not being a virgin, and thus proceeded to remain “willingly” with that man. That is his initial forcible rape had the effect of “claiming” her, and she even said yes to sex, not because she wanted it but considered him to be her man, now. He refused to use protection and eventually she got pregnant, then he ran off, leaving her with child. She dropped out of school and gave birth and had to give the baby away.

    Now, before everyone gets too depressed, when she came back to college she met a new, wonderful man and they married and have been married some ridiculous number of years and had a goodly number of children. In short she lived reasonably happily ever after although she has had some trust issues ever since.

    But let’s go back to her behavior with this first guy. To this day, she couldn’t believe how stupid and irrational she was. But that’s how things were back then and in the context of the time, her behavior made sense to her.

    So any oddness in the victim’s behavior I chalk up to the fact that we are talking a long time ago and we are talking a 14 year old girl. None of this is even all that unusual in rape cases.

    > She testified that she said “no” – a number of times – but never tried to fight him off.

    Wow, what a completely piggish attitude. So a 14 year old 100 lbs girl was supposed to get in a fist-fight with him?

    > “no” isn’t really no.

    If you have sex with a 14 year old girl who is drugged and drunk, and saying no, and trying to get away from you, guess what? It means no.

    As for when a woman “says no” but really wants it I say this. You proceed at your own risk. And if she comes back later and says she was raped, well, then I guess you go off to jail. And if you don’t like it, ahem, fly solo. But as far as I am concerned, if she says no at the time and calls it rape later, I don’t care what your excuse is.

    > When he dropped her off at her house, she went in and did not tell her mother what happened.

    Yeah, imagine that. its like she is ashamed of it or something. *rolls eyes*

    > But it is more commonly practiced in Europe

    Oh, please tell me you aren’t about to plead a cultural difference.

    > The mother was an aspiring actress, and I suspect an amibtious one willing to use her daughter as bait.

    Even if true, that would only make her mother guilty as well; it would not exonerate the pedophile.

    > Polanski never defended himself in a trial, which means he never had an attorney cross examine her

    I’m not sure that is true, and in any case, he had every opportunity to do so when she sued him over it, or for that matter in criminal court.

    > Interesting how in court if someone had a few drinks – their testimony could be dismissed as unreliable.

    There is no rule of evidence that you cannot testify about what happens to you when you are drunk.

    > Lastly, this was the ’70s, which was a pretty permissive experimental time.

    Ah, so this was a science experiment. I am sure he wrote an excellent paper entitled “effect of drug and alcohol-induced anal rape on 14 year old girls: a very personal study.”

    Again, some things are wrong no matter what.

    > he didn’t mean children

    Given that he had sex with two children THAT WE KNOW OF, its hard to understand how you can pretend to know that.

    > But is it immoral to feel that attraction?

    Desire is not immoral, necessarily. Action is. Get it?

    I mean seriously, imagine if Jeffrey Dahmer felt the desire to murder and eat people, but resisted it his whole life. If anything, in a weird way, that would be almost noble, to say, “sure, I want to do evil, but I will resist.”

    I mean for instance I am married. Which means it is wrong for me to have sex with any person but my wife. But I don’t stop being attracted to other women. And contrary to Carter’s whining on the subject, I don’t think there is anything wrong with that.

    > As far as his talent giving him some kind of immunity, it doesn’t

    Do you really think the swiss would have released Joe Polanski, a small time plumber?

    Lord I hope not.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  93. Btw, slightly off topic, but not completely…

    Whoopi Goldberg says that Mel Gibson is not a “racist racist” or something like that.

    http://www.mediaite.com/online/whoopi-goldberg-comes-to-mel-gibsons-defense/

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  94. It’s the same s**t Hollywood self-centered, libertine culture closing ranks around one of their own, A.W..

    Why do we give them our money for (mostly) garbage?

    The last Roman Polanski movie I saw was “Pirates”, a long time ago. The last Mel Gibson movie I saw was Lethal Weapon (1), also a long time ago.

    The hell with these [bad people].

    nk (db4a41)

  95. A.W., I appreciate your long post. I doubt we will see that particular poster again. It was classic trollery, by definition itself. The problem is that the troll took some very unsavory positions that are, um, self contradictory. Which is what trolls do.

    I felt the comment should be deleted for two reasons. First, it was disgusting (“no doesn’t always mean no” is a great example of why I feel that way about the post). But secondly, if the poster did have his identity revealed, then that post could be used by people meaning that troll ill, in terms of employment or otherwise.

    The internet is forever, and I am eternally surprised by what students I know will post, unthinking.

    Eric Blair (02a138)

  96. I would like to add my vote to elevating comment #86 to a post all its own, so the whole world can see this kind of warped disgusting thinking.

    Well done, A.W.

    JD (08bae5)

  97. This is just maintaining consistency with my personal position against deleting and banning. Making asshattery very public is a far better disinfectant.

    JD (08bae5)

  98. nk

    well, to be fair, braveheart was an amazing movie. And I know people have accused it of all kinds of bad things, but I thought at the time that “The Passion of the Christ” was a beautiful movie and even after his anti-semitic rant I went back searching for anything anti-semitic in it, and it wasn’t there. I mean maybe its in arameic, or something, but if I can’t understand it, what can I do with that.

    Which is a dilemma. I think its pretty clear that Gibson was given to prejudices, that he tended to judge entire groups of people, and he was anti-semitic back when, but was he when he made passion? i could see two possibilities.

    The first is maybe Gibson didn’t hate jews when he made the passion, but developed it afterward. I mean I can’t tell you how many times people just outright lied about the movie. For instance, one person wrote that every identifiable jew in the movie was depicted negatively. That is objectively untrue. The only person called a jew in the movie was simon of cyrene (sp?) and he was portrayed as being downright heroic. Now others are arguably identified as jewish by their clothing, etc. and they aren’t so positively portrayed, but really I never caught Gibson saying or doing anything with identifiable jews that was anti-semitic. I mean look at how he portrayed the English in Braveheart. The whole rebellion starts when one tries to rape Wallace’s wife, licking her like a perv, and implying that he was also having sex with his own daughter. The local noble exercises the right of primus nuptum—that is the right to rape a new bride on the first night of their marriage. And the King of England is portrayed as a ruthless practitioner of genocide and proves otherwise machiavellian (in a “the Prince” sort of way). And in Passion, the Romans, i.e. Italians are almost always portrayed pretty badly. The men whipping Christ make faces demonstrating that they were enjoying it, for instance.

    By comparison the jews were portrayed in an extremely matter of fact way. I know some writers saw them as “hook-nosed” but bluntly I couldn’t see that, and it made me wonder about the people leveling the accusation. The only one who comes off as bad is Caiaphas, and jesus then personally forgives him, without prompting. Really as implied above, a modern Italian has more cause to complain that Gibson smeared his group than jews.

    So maybe he didn’t hate the jews back then, but the reaction to the film made him hateful. Because bluntly some jewish groups didn’t exactly cover themselves in glory denouncing him, for instance denouncing the movie before even seeing it. Now one classic example of the bigoted mind at work is to be mugged by one black man and then generalize that bad experience into all black people; like I have had stuff stolen from me by a black person, but I don’t judge all black people by her behavior—but a man like Gibson probably would. even if I was in gibson’s shoes, I wouldn’t turn anti-semitc. But if Gibson is given to bigoted thoughts, then maybe the reaction to his film triggered that bigotry. That is possibility number 1.

    So possibility 1: he was not anti-semitic when he made passion, but became so later.

    Possibility number 2, however is kind of implied by that short hand metaphor. A non-bigoted person can get mugged by a black person and won’t take that to imply anything else about other black people (yes, that applies even if you are yourself black; its worth noting that Jessie Jackson has confessed to feeling safer when white people are around). A bigoted person on the other hand, takes that mugging as indictment on the whole race.

    So about 2000 years ago, in my beliefs, a bunch of jews and romans murdered my savior. Those individuals involved probably endangered their immortal souls so that while I do not believe that one has to believe in Christ to get to heaven, I do believe that helping to kill Christ puts you in serious danger of going to hell. But that’s just them. I don’t imply their guilt to all jews living at the time, or to all romans; or to all jews living today, or even all romans/Italians. This is true even if the persons in question are the direct blood descendants of those jews and romans who murdered Christ. They bear no responsibility.

    But… if you are inclined to bigotry, you won’t think that way. For the bigot, all you have to say is, “I was mugged by a black man” and in your mind you have indicted the entire black race, when in the mind of non-bigots, you have only indicted the mugger. So Mel Gibson shows jesus being “mugged” by some romans and jews, 2000 some odd years ago. to me, I isolate blame to them. But maybe in Gibson’s mind, merely pointing out that jews participated in the killing of Christ is a reason to hate them. So if Gibson was out to indict the jews, a simple portrayal of them as responsible for Christ’s murder is enough. He doesn’t have to stack the deck, just say, people who were jewish killed Christ and Gibson would think he was teaching us to hate jews, when in my mind I am thinking nothing of the sort.

    I don’t know. The whole thing is hard to process.

    And as for Polanski, well, Chinatown was a great movie. and I hear the pianist was amazing as well. I saw Chinatown before I knew about any of this. And I would own Chinatown as a classic, and I would at least rent the pianist. But not after what I have learned about the man. I mean its sort of like the same reason why I wouldn’t buy Michael jackson’s albums until literally after he died. Because I thought, geez, what am I funding?

    Will I boycott either man’s movies. Well, I am less enthusiastic about Gibson now, for sure, but there is a difference between watching a Polanski movie and a Gibson movie. if you watch a Gibson movie, you are watching a movie by a man with attitudes you don’t like. But if you watch a Polanski movie you may very well be enabling the man to commit acts that are evil. So the Polanski example is much easier than the Gibson example, in my mind.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (b1db52)

  99. Eric

    Well, just because I disagree with you doesn’t mean I am not thinking “but he kind of has a point.” That “no is not always no” part was downright creepy. I wonder if the “to catch a predator” show ever checks blogs like this?

    If there is ever a case for banning, deleting, that is it.

    JD

    The asshattery line will never be as popular as the phrase “sunshine is the best disinfectant” but it’s a hell of a lot funnier.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (b1db52)

  100. It is a gift, A.W., or a curse.

    JD (08bae5)

  101. When you use the term asshattery in real life, people look at you funny.

    JD (08bae5)

  102. The troll’s points are being made continuously over at the Polanski pages of Wikipedia (and mostly being shut down, which is a pleasant surprise.) Except that I don’t want to give him attention (which would be feeding the troll), I’d say to promote both the comment and A.W.’s excellent response.

    I really think that this is about the Swiss money laws; what we sent around has come around, with the consequence that he’s not extradited. Perhaps he’ll be foolish enough to come to Hollywood.

    htom (412a17)

  103. Small correction to my long post above responding to 86. Added words in uppercase, on the subject of whether “statutory” rape is as bad as, say, forcible rape:

    > Actually the law agrees to a degree, which is why the charge for mere “statutory” rape is less than, say, forcible rape in most states, and it factors into the decision OF HOW MUCH PUNISHMENT TO GIVE.

    I mean if the age of consent is 18, and the girl is 17 but she says yes, or maybe even seduces the adult, obviously that isn’t nearly as bad as, say, the defendant in Kennedy v. Louisiana who raped his own 8 year old daughter so violently that he ruptured the wall between her anus and vagina, and she is so damaged she will never have children. I don’t think any rational person debates that. just as we might say that the guy who counterfeits a person’s credit card and uses it to run up 12,000 in charges is not as bad as the guy who points a gun in a man’s face and takes his $12,000 car from him. Even if the crime was not officially enhanced by the use of the gun (I think virtually every state does enhance larceny based on that), you can expect the carjacker to get more time in prison.

    So as bad as Polanski is, there are worse people in the world. While I am outraged that the defendand in Kennedy v. Louisiana is not eligible for the death penalty, I don’t want that punishment for Polanski. And its probably a pretty common feeling even for those who despise Polanski. Maybe at most they want him spayed.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  104. I don’t want to overstate the case against Mel Gibson, so I’ll leave it alone.

    I hope he straightens himself out, forgets at least the hatred of his girlfriend, and tries to raise his little girl.

    nk (db4a41)

  105. A.W., I don’t mind that you and I disagree. I just think that some people talk sooperdooper tough on the internet…and it might cause them trouble down the line.

    Who knows what the troll thinks? I suspect, like all trolls, it was about getting people upset (the “no doesn’t always mean no” meme juxtaposed with the feminist reference was a big hint). But I meant what I wrote: is it worth potentially destroying the troll’s employment (trolls usually think they are far more anonymous than they are)? He may not even believe any of that nonsense he wrote.

    As for Mel Gibson, wow. I don’t know what to say, but the real question is did he actually assault his wife? I haven’t seen the police report with the broken teeth she claims.

    I’m not defending any of this. But I remember how Alec Baldwin got played by Kim Basinger (remember that awful telephone call?). The good news there is that Baldwin mended fences with his daughter.

    Family should be much more important than anything else.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  106. What I would really like is that he had abandoned his taste for thirteen-year-old girls when he turned fourteen, like I did. Can’t have that, so I’d like him convicted of the six felony counts, please, sentenced to some long term with deportation after serving, thank you very much, and through some paperwork SNAFU accidentally deported after a couple of months of additional detention waiting to begin serving the sentences. Almost what the status quo is, except certain prison if he ever comes back.

    htom (412a17)

  107. Mel Gibson is a very talented actor and director . . .

    . . . and an extremely unhappy, narcissistic, hate-filled human being.

    Icy Texan (4a2bd8)

  108. Eric

    As for Mr. Anonymous, yeah, let’s hope words don’t translate into action.

    as for my off topic stuff, kind of hard for gibson to deny the abuse since he more or less admitted it, saying she deserved it.

    the whole thing is so depressing. its like when you read a speech by lincoln and suddenly he says somethign horrifyingly racist. you can’t even get angry, you just feel so profoundly disappointed in him. kind of the same with gibson, you are like, “ah, man why did you have to do all that? i liked you, man, thought you were an okay, regular guy…” sigh.

    which of course is not the same. my theory with lincoln is weirdly the opposite of my mugger example. you see, frederick douglass is on record saying that lincoln was the first man he ever talked to who saw him just as a man and not as a black man. now presuming that douglass is right, how do you reconcile it with the fact that lincoln said really racist things at times?

    Here’s my theory. he hated black people in groups, but not one at a time. in other words he thought black people in general were inferior, etc. but he was always open to the idea that an individual was an exception. weird, but that’s my theory.

    did i mention i am a bit of a history geek?

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  109. Not at all, AW. People are the product of their times and mores. My father says the most racist nonsense, yet as a firefighter, he has literally saved dozens of minority lives, delivered quite a few minority babies, and so forth.

    People are complicated. Despite my father’s racist statements, he despised people judging others on the basis of appearance.

    As you say, some of it is weird verbiage, and other parts of are judgements of groups.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  110. eric

    Well, people are not entirely products of their time. I invite you to read Ralph Korngold’s biography of Thaddeus Stevens, subtitled something like, “A Being Darkly Wise and Rudely Great.” Stevens is sort of a forgotten hero in american history; he had for years been painted as the villain of reconstruction for years. I joke that D. W. Griffith paid Stevens the ultimate compliment by making a fictional version of him, named Arthur Stoneman, the “villain” in Birth of a Nation.

    But Stevens was absolutely hard core on issues of equality. He declared as early as 1839 the only difference between black people and white people can be traced more or less to upbringing, when arguing against a measure in Pennsylvania that would rob black people of the right to vote. And he meant it. He was the father of the 14th Amendment. His military reconstruction act gave black people the right to vote, and he proposed the original 15th amendment to make that rule unrepealable. But probably the most impressive thing is he practiced what he preached. For instance, in his will he gave his wealth to found an orphanage that would be desegregated by race and religion and when he had learned that he had purchased a grave in a segregated cemetery, he sold it and had himself buried in a desegregated one. In that day in time, of course, desegregated still meant “majority black.” And he wrote an inscription for his tombstone that said that he did so to demonstrate in death the principles he fought for in death: “equality of man before his creator.”

    And that’s only scratching the surface. He fought against discrimination against the Chinese and suggested that our soldiers in the west should protect the natives from the white settlers, rather than the other way around. And he even fought against using the word “male” in Section 2 of the 14th Amendment, saying that his fellow republicans should not “fear the rivalry of women” the way democrats “feared the rivalry of the negro.”

    So people can transcend their times. Which isn’t to be too hard on your pa. first, he didn’t discriminate when it counted, which makes his issue more of one of thought than actions. I mean its like Lincoln did almost everything that needed to be done. so what is even the relevance of Lincoln’s racism, you know? Sounds similar with your pa. And obviously its not easy to transcend your times, given the fact that so few people do it.

    And of course I think its safe to say just about every white person, maybe every person period, has racists in the family at least 2 generations back. my grandparents were conscious racists, with only one possible exception. (I never heard my maternal grandfather say anything racist, but maybe he was just keeping it to himself.) I think my parents bear some of the residue of that, but they don’t want to be racist at all, they know it is wrong, and they have been nothing less than wonderful with my non-white wife.

    Regardless, Korngold’s book is a classic and worth a read. That book tells you truths about the era that every historian knows but no one talks about. The big downside is its out of print and hard to get a copy of.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  111. And this is why blogs are important: we get to learn new things, despite the occasional trollage or blog-fights.

    Thank you, A.W.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  112. Wow, AW, that was an exhaustive and excellent reply.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  113. Shorter version: “The bitch had it comin’…”

    Frank Drebbin (8096f2)

  114. For the record, when faced with an extreme argument, we saw several thoughtful replies, and hopes from all that Mr Anonymous isn’t harmed… even professionally. Every possible benefit of the doubt is rendered him.

    But next time he’s here, I’m pretty sure he will once again announce ‘before you all start threatening me and screaming at me’.

    He has to feign oppression.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  115. Post 86 is a the standard pedophile defense. Right off the NAMBLA homepage.

    1. The woman has said just years ago, that it was not consensual. She has always maintained it was not consensual.
    2. Unlawful sex is defined by age. It is only unlawful because the person is underage. This is why it is rape. The charge he plead guilty to is statutory rape.
    3. Polanski said under oath, that he knew she was 13, and that he knew that on the day of the rape.
    4. Vogue magazine denied Polanski was working for them, making this all the more like a “casting couch” play. The proverbial, have sex with me and I will make you a star. Remember item 1, she did not consent.
    5. The victim was drugged with Quaaludes and alcohol. What did you expect her to do as far as protests? She plead with him to stop, he was a man on top of her.
    6. Nobody denies that Polanski took child pornographic pictures of the 13 year old. Is that fine and dandy to you too?

    JamesSix (c0f570)

  116. james

    maybe the correct response would be a clip from south park dealing with nambla. the head of nambla would make all these flowery arguments about freedom and tolerance and kyle would respond by saying, over and over, “but dude, you sleep with children!”

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  117. Let’s send all our child molesters to Switzerland. It’s cheaper than prison.

    tehag (d34de8)

  118. maybe the correct response would be a clip from south park dealing with nambla. the head of nambla would make all these flowery arguments about freedom and tolerance and kyle would respond by saying, over and over, “but dude, you sleep with rape children!”

    Let’s call it what it is.

    Dana (1e5ad4)

  119. polanski free he
    free to bugger you and me
    hollywood happy?

    ColonelHaiku (9cf017)

  120. Hm. I can see nearly every point I made was twisted. So much for reason.

    I was hoping for a challenging discussion, instead of the usual angry blather.

    to 115

    1. The woman has said just years ago, that it was not consensual. She has always maintained it was not consensual.

    I never said otherwise, this is what Polanski said. What would have come out in an actual case might be damaging to him, or it might be damaging to her claims.

    And I was pointing out weakness in the testimony.

    2. Unlawful sex is defined by age. It is only unlawful because the person is underage. This is why it is rape. The charge he plead guilty to is statutory rape.

    No. Check the facts. The Grand Jury went forward with that charge, yes, but in a plea bargina, he pleaded guilty to Unlawful Sexual Intercourse. (pretty much the same thing – sex with a minor).

    3. “The proverbial, have sex with me and I will make you a star.” Well, maybe that’s how Hollywood works to you,

    …but remember item 1, she did not consent.

    That was her testimony. There was no trial. YOu might be comfortable with one side of he truth, but there is a reason why we have courts and a system of justice that would entitle Polanski to a virgous defense.

    As to what really happened? There are two many loose ends. If she was raped (in which case No meant NO) – I find it hard to believe she would take the stance she is taking now. Don’t know about you, but when someone has done me wrong, I remember it for years. And I don’t forgive bad behavior. Why would she?

    5. The victim was drugged with Quaaludes and alcohol. What did you expect her to do as far as protests?

    You’re twisting th facts. She had a fragment of a Quaalude. And we don’t know how drunk she was or wasn’t. Was she tested for alcohol? Or drugs?

    6. Nobody denies that Polanski took child pornographic pictures of the 13 year old.

    Pornographic pictures? Have you seen the pictures? I don’t think anyone knows that. Nor did she say that. She was topless. Have ou seen Jock Sturges photography? That is not considered pornography. And the girls are naked and younger.

    Mr. Anonymous (219c8d)

  121. Mr Anonymous, you called us violent. Why?

    And now you whine about twisting all your ‘points’.

    LOL. You said rape was OK if the victim doesn’t fight hard enough and it’s natural to want to rape little kids.

    There’s no twisting… you’re transparently saying terrible things. I don’t really care if you believe it or are parodying the kind of liberal who still loves Roman Polanski. It’s good that you came and were clearly and intelligently repudiated.

    It’s no surprise that you’re too much of a coward to admit that you were treated with plenty of respect and a careful rebuttal. No one expected any different.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  122. #120,
    #3,”If she was raped (in which case No meant NO) – I find it hard to believe she would take the stance she is taking now. Don’t know about you, but when someone has done me wrong, I remember it for years. And I don’t forgive bad behavior. Why would she? ”

    –Perhaps at this point in her life she does not want people like you smearing her to defend your pervert friend?

    #5,
    So how much Quaalude and alcohol is an acceptable amount to give a 13 year old girl before you rape her? What effect does this mixture have on a child?

    #6,
    Topless pictures you take of a 13 year old girl before you rape her are not art by any decent or civilized standard. Sorry if that seems provincial. I’ve been accused here of having an “archaic antebellum idea of honor”. It just pops out in these situations.

    Like Dustin I would like to know why you called us violent?

    Machinist (497786)

  123. “I was hoping for a challenging discussion”

    Why would you have expected that given the unsupported, equivocating twaddle you posted? Seriously, get a grip.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  124. You know, daley, sooner or later, like that BradBlog defender of Polanski (you don’t suppose), this character will go too far. Anonymity isn’t what he thinks it is.

    He does kind of sound like that guy, doesn’t he?

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  125. Eric – I just hope he comes back to have a challenging discussion, but it seems like he is lacking the testicular fortitude for such an endeavor.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  126. Well, when someone actually uses the argument that “no doesn’t always mean no,” and that giving a thirteen year old girl alcohol and “part” of a Quaalude isn’t really a big deal…well, I guess that they use a very different “dictionary of ethics” than I do.

    Just a troll, daley, trying to play games. And I’ll bet he is that weirdo from BradBlog. Remember how he kept defending Polanski? I don’t care to look back, but he might be using the same phrasing. Trolls are seldom as bright as they think they are.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  127. So I don’t know if the ever-vigilant Stashiu3 is watching this thread, but perhaps “Mr. Anonymous” is an old friend?

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  128. 5. The victim was drugged with Quaaludes and alcohol. What did you expect her to do as far as protests?

    You’re twisting th facts. She had a fragment of a Quaalude. And we don’t know how drunk she was or wasn’t. Was she tested for alcohol? Or drugs?

    I don’t know why, but I really get a kick out of this.

    Someone states facts plainly: the very young little girl was given alcohol and Quaalude. And the whiner says that’s twisting, while proceeding to twist this ridiculously. ‘We don’t know how drunk she was when she said ‘no’ to her rapist!’.

    It’s a very clever way of getting to the heart of just how thoroughly horrible Roman Polanski was to the countless girls he raped. Who gets a 13 year old girl naked, feeds her booze, feeds her some roofies, has sex with her while she says no, has their lawyers threaten her repeatedly into a transparent need to just get past the issue, and then uses that ‘I don’t want to deal with this anymore’ as a vindication that the entire affair wasn’t so bad?

    Roman Polanski, that’s who.

    I realize the entire point of the troll is to get people like me angry. He is practically begging us to threaten him, for whatever reason.

    But he went to an awful lot of effort here. Pretty damn disturbing character.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  129. Eric – That Polanski apologist was from Huffpo I believe. He had written several posts about him there.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  130. You mean this fine fellow, daley:

    http://citizenjeff.com/2010/01/polanski-to-hate-or-not-to-hate-him/#more-966

    Hmm.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  131. First of all, what lack of imagination, does it take
    to come up with a handle to post, I take mine, from
    a spy in a British science fiction series, second how do you find it possible to excuse a rapist, it
    can’t be consensual under those conditions

    ian cormac (d28167)

  132. Mr Anonymous is just another child assrapist apologist. He led with a lie, and then followed it up with his defense of drugging a young girl and then taking topless photos of her prior to assraping her. His faux-civility and lamentations as to our expected violence and dishonest discourse are par for the course for its ilk. Mr Anonymous buggers goats.

    JD (3567dc)

  133. Mr. Anonymous idiot

    > I never said [it was consensual], this is what Polanski said.

    Actually when you said that no doesn’t always mean no, that is EXACTLY what you are saying. Otherwise, why talk about it in the context of defending Polanski?

    As for the claim that it was “just” unlawful sex with a minor, and thus not rape, let’s deconstruct that.

    Why is it illegal to have sex with a minor? Because legally, she cannot consent. Therefore it is sex without consent, and we are somehow unfair to label that rape? Um, no.

    > That was her testimony. There was no trial.

    Actually there was a trial, in a civil suit. If memory serves, he didn’t testify and eventually settled out of court.

    > YOu might be comfortable with one side of he truth, but there is a reason why we have courts and a system of justice that would entitle Polanski to a virgous defense.

    Yes, Polanski was entitled to a give his side of the story and he chose not to. So the claim that we have only heard her side is because of Polanski’s decisions. Saying we have only heard her side of the story is a bit like pleading for leniency for a man who has killed his parents on the ground that he is an orphan. Its not quite as ballsy as the defendant himself making the claim, but its not much more sensible.

    > If she was raped (in which case No meant NO) – I find it hard to believe she would take the stance she is taking now. Don’t know about you, but when someone has done me wrong, I remember it for years. And I don’t forgive bad behavior. Why would she?

    People do in fact forgive horrible crimes all the time. To impugn her credibility based on that is more than a little insane.

    > She had a fragment of a Quaalude. And we don’t know how drunk she was or wasn’t.

    Again, if his intent wasn’t to use the drugs to ply her, why did he give them to her?

    > Pornographic pictures? Have you seen the pictures?

    The description says it all. They are topless pictures of a child.

    Btw, here is my threat, since you seem so eager to get one. If I see you anywhere near my nieces or nephews, I will castrate you.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  134. Polanski had a certain degree of talent, but consider that it was clouded by projection and self destructiveness, the lynch pin to ChinaTown, is that really twisted slur directed at Mulholland, trying to seemingly inpugn the entire Southern
    California environs

    ian cormac (d28167)

  135. On second thought, that might have been Robert Towne’s invention, but it does foreshadow what Polanksi would later do, much like Curtis Hanson
    got back at the people who ‘blacklisted’ his father in LA Confidential

    ian cormac (d28167)

  136. Polanski is a child molester and a fugitive from US justice. Period.

    Mel Gibson 1)has a father who is openly and publicly anti-Semitic 2)belongs to a breakaway group of Catholics who believe the modern Roman Catholic Church is too liberal and that everything from Vatican II onwards is illegitimate, and that among the changes they focus on is the changed attitude to Jews which began with Vatican II and 3)when making Passion included the sections of the Gospel narratives which fed Christian anti-Semitism for 1600 years.

    Those facts, even if one ignores his famous drunken rant, are enough to make many people, including me, believe he at least leans heavily towards anti-Semitism, although he’s not as blatant about it as, for instance, the folks at Westboro Baptist. [See a website called JewsKilledJesus dot-com. You may want to put on a hazmat suit before entering.]

    kishnevi (6273ad)

  137. Kish

    first, the gospel is not anti-semitic. And I would like you to point at which parts are supposedly the case.

    what fed the anti-semitism is the bigoted mindset of the people who looked at it. they saw people who happened to be jewish participate in the murder of Christ and took that as an indictment on all jews. Its wrong, but you can’t expect Christians to deny their faith because some people in the past have misinterpreted it.

    There is not one word in that entire movie, in English, that is anti-semitic. There is not one image that incites hatred toward jews. In fact several scenes depict jews in a positive light, such as simon helping jesus to carry the cross. He is one of the few jewish characters referred to as a jew.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  138. By the way, this article states that the DOJ was behind the screw up. That the LA DA never even knew they were asking for that stuff.

    http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/flub_freed_polanski_H04tNrasYpXZzuiPKsaa5I

    mind you, even if that was the case, you’re telling me the Swiss couldn’t send a second or third request. That they HAD to free him immediately?

    Give me a break. and the citation of the claim that he had a good faith belief he could come here without being arrested only bolsters that. But it gave them cover, to point the finger at us.

    I would love to hear Patterico’s two cents, even if it is just him linking to an official press release or something.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  139. the LA DA never even knew they were asking for that stuff.

    That’s just disgusting.

    I also don’t think it’s a legit request, though. We have a treaty and it’s a valid warrant. Polanski didn’t flee because he was being oppressed… he fled because he was guilty and didn’t want to serve even his wristslap penalty.

    I don’t know why the DOJ would screw this up, but I’d be more surprised if they didn’t screw something up.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  140. Dustin

    Agreed, it was bullsh–, but they gave them the feces to do it with.

    I myself am surprised that the DOJ is such a clusterfrak these days. I mean if there is one thing Obama knows is lawyering, so shouldn’t they at least get the lawyering stuff straightened out? That means obama is a true incompetent in management. Which, um, isn’t totally surprising.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  141. It wasn’t a screw up, the new cousel Weingarten, is a long time friend of Holder, just like Gorelick negotiated the BP deal, Craig will smooth it out with Goldman

    ian cormac (d28167)

  142. Aaron–the episode in which the crowd chooses Barabbas and exclaimes “his blood be upon us” has been used to justify Christian anti-Semitism from the very start. The Gospels put the blame for Jesus’s death on the Jewish authorities and downplayed the responsibility of the Roman authorities, despite the fact that it was, after all the Romans who put Jesus to death, and the Gospel presentation persuaded medieval Christians–who after all, were not familiar with how things went in 1st Century Roman occupied lands, and so didn’t realize that events could not have played out in the way the Gospels said they did–that it was the Jews were responsible. Nor did they notice that the various anti-Jewish statements which are found particularly in the Gospel of John are actually polemical rhetoric aimed at what was by the time of the Gospel’s writing a hostile rival religious community. But we now know that much of the details in the Gospel regarding the arrest, trial and execution of Jesus could not have happened that way. For one thing, Pilate would not have offered the crowd a choice of prisoner to be freed–especially not when the choice was between two men who were each seen as focus for opposition to Roman rule. That wasn’t his way, or the way any other Roman procurator did things. Pilate would have put both men to death.

    the bigoted mindset of the people who looked at it

    which unfortunately was the mindset of almost all of Christianity from about the year 500 CE until well past 1800 CE–and in most cases, up through at least World War II.

    Did you know that Passion Week was the favorite time of the year for Christians to start riots that ended in destruction of Jewish homes and property, and to kill Jews?

    Gibson might have made a Passion film that instead of presenting the Gospel narrative as fact, could have presented the arrest and trial of Jesus in a way consistent with how Romans did things back then. He chose not to. Part of that may be his religious views–rejection of modern scholarship as modernist heresy. But whatever his reason, he presented as true a narrative modern scholarship has demonstrated to be, if not false, at least unreliable on most details. And he presented that narrative despite its use for over a millenia and a half as a justification for killing Jews.

    kishnevi (fb6ec3)

  143. BTW, the most specific passage in John used to justify anti-Semitism was John 8:44-47, in which Jesus supposedly says the Jews are “of your father the Devil” and “you are not of God”.

    kishnevi (fb6ec3)

  144. Kish

    “his blood be upon us?” I will review the movie tonight, but I don’t believe that line was stated in the movie.

    And even if so, again its like my metaphor above. If a black person mugs me, I don’t think that implies anything about all black people. Those people, who happened to be jews, “mugged” jesus. So?

    > downplayed the responsibility of the Roman authorities

    Well, as I said before, you can make a better case that The Passion was bigoted toward the romans. When those romans whipped jesus they had demented glee in their eyes. The jews were much more matter of fact.

    Then you go on to say that things couldn’t have actually happened that way. so your real problem is with the bible itself, which you would think you’d notice what a useless argument it is.

    And pilate would have put those men to death? how on earth can you pretend to know what exactly he would do in a given situation?

    > the mindset of almost all of Christianity

    Now it comes out. Under the guise of protecting people from the anti-semites, you reveal yourself to be a religious bigot yourself. Ant-christian bigotry is no prettier than anti-jewish bigotry.

    > Gibson might have made a Passion film that instead of presenting the Gospel narrative as fact, could have presented the arrest and trial of Jesus in a way consistent with how Romans did things back then

    In short, Gibson could have denied basic tenants and stories in the Christian faith. good to know.

    As for John 8, Jesus was speaking to specific people. He did not condemn all jews everywhere.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  145. You know, I could make an argument that the Torah couldn’t have possible happened that way, either. I mean, the oceans do not part just because we need them to, and Elijah doesn’t really ride into the sky, and snakes don’t actually talk to people.

    Religious claims wouldn’t be religious claims if they were explainable without faith.

    And I agree with AW that Jesus wasn’t speaking about all Jews when he spoke to the Pharisees who wanted him dead. Sure, people can interpret that to be racists, which is sad, but Jesus is the inspiration for racial tolerance around the world. He broke ranks with Jews to praise Samaritans, tell people they should look to their character and love rather than trivialities like their nationality or ethnicity. Things that may seem trite today, at least to people lucky enough to live in the modern world.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  146. Aaron, the Crucifixion and the statements attributed to Jesus in John have been used by Christians to justify anti-Semitic acts since about the time Christians got into the seats of power. Anti-Semitism was endemic in Christian countries up until World War II. Very few people had your attitude on the subject for most of Christian history.

    I am not an anti-Christian bigot. I am, however, a Jew. That means that when I talk about the Bible, I mean the collection of writings that starts with Bereshit (Genesis) and ends with Divrei Hayyamin (Chronicles). It’s not exactly the same as what you call the Old Testament–you’ll notice, for instance, that the order of the individual books is different. And what you call the New Testament has no special authority for me, anymore than other works of the period such as Tacitus and Josephus. And just like those two gentleman wrote of events that didn’t actually happen the way they said they did, so with the New Testament.

    kishnevi (fb6ec3)

  147. Kish

    > the episode in which the crowd chooses Barabbas and exclaimes “his blood be upon us” has been used to justify Christian anti-Semitism from the very start.

    I have reviewed the movie. The line is not there, or if it is, its not in English, meaning for clarity it is not translated via subtitles.

    Now I won’t call you a liar. My guess is bluntly, you have been lied to. There have been a lot of lies told about this movie, and its gotten to the point that I can’t blame any individual for believing something about the movie that isn’t true.

    And I would add that any theory that he is trying to drum up hate really, truly is missing the point.

    Watch the movie and see what it is really saying about the death of Christ. The first thing to get is that it is more like “suicide by police” than a murder. A pivotal scene on this point early on is when Peter denounces Jesus three times, as in “I don’t know this man! I swear, I don’t.” He was quite humanly scared that he would be killed, too. And then he hears the rooster crow and he remembers that Jesus told him the night before that before the rooster crowed he would denounce him three times. And Peter realizes that Jesus knew all of this was going to happen.

    Have you ever seen the movie Minority Report. That movie involved people who could see the future like I can see my living room right now. And in one key scene, Tom Cruise is carrying one of these psychics and trying to escape some other people. I forgot why. And the psychic says “stop here” and he does and just then the bad guys go by on a level above and can’t see him because he just happens to be standing where a bunch of balloons were blocking their field of vision. And then she says, “grab an umbrella” and he does and then runs out the door and it starts to rain, and he opens the umbrella, just as about 50 people do, all carrying identical black umbrellas, again just at the moment when the bad guys were looking down in their direction. That kind of thing happens like 5 times, the psychic clearly predicting exactly when to act to avoid capture.

    The point is, if you can see the future that clearly, you can escape anything and anyone. So Jesus saw them coming for him even before they knew they were going to go after him. He probably knew his whole life that this night as coming. And he doesn’t run. He gives himself willingly. And that is what Peter realizes in that moment. And the reason why Jesus willingly lets himself die is because it is necessary to save us.

    And consider other facts. For instance, there is the scene when Jesus is nailed to the cross. And at the very second that the hand is holding the nail as it is hammered in, is that one of the romans? No. its supposed to be one of the romans in the movie, but in real life, it was Gibson’s own hand. Is that the action of a man trying to point the finger at someone? Indeed, I will note that the word “jew” only appears once in the whole movie, directed at Simon of Cyrene, who is depicted as downright heroic.

    And let’s note another thing. the movie makes it clear that the chief architect of Jesus’ death is Caiaphas. And the movie deviates from the Bible and has Caiaphas appear to gloat as Jesus was being crucified. I don’t see anything in the bible that supports that occurrence. And Jesus looks exactly at him and forgives him. The human most responsible for this, and he forgives him, personally. If the man most directly responsible is forgiven, then how can the people who bear less blame be held responsible? If Jesus asks God to forgive Caiaphas, how can God condemn his great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- great- grandson?

    I hate bigotry and discrimination in all its forms. Although I am not Jewish, just because people think my name is “Jewish” I have literally seen anti-Semitism first hand, so I know it exists. I looked for any signs of anti-Semitism in that movie and looked hard. And I looked again after Gibson’s first drunken rant about the Jews. I didn’t see it. I didn’t even see it being about blaming anyone else for it, more just to mourn that it happened. It is a movie that leaves you sad, and moved, and not angry.

    Gibson knows how to make a rousing movie. Who didn’t leave Braveheart wanting to go join the Scotts and kick some English arse? I did, and I AM PART ENGLISH! I guess I should try to kick my own ass, then. 🙂

    Anyone who left that movie wanting to hurt a jew, or even feeling condemnation for any jew, except the specific ones on screen, missed the point.

    One more point, also. I am not catholic, but there were a lot of changes in Vatican II besides the Jewish thing. It’s a pretty big leap and therefore a cheap tactic to suggest that you would only reject Vatican II if you were an anti-semite.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  148. btw, hot air is reporting that… the gibson tapes are doctored?

    http://hotair.com/archives/2010/07/15/oh-my-mel-gibson-tapes-might-have-been-doctored/

    Yeah, I don’t know what to think about that, either.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  149. The story is about the Swiss deciding that the attempt to extradite Polanski did not meet treaty criteria.

    Folks here agree with that? If not, in what way did the Swiss fail to observe the provisions of the treaty?

    jack (559a71)

  150. No doubt, though, that kishnevi has a point that some have abused the message of the Bible to be bigots. True for the Talmud and the New Testament.

    It’s an outright corruption of the basic message Jesus gave us, though. He went out of his way to find a nationality that was hated and show how we should love our fellow people from different nations and ethnicities.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  151. Jack, there is dual criminality, it isn’t political, Polanksi is not a Swiss Citizen, the USA has jurisdiction (California), and there is no chance of execution or torture.

    In short, what in the heck kind of shortcoming are you referring to?

    Open and shut case, except that Polanski is a rich celebrity and loved in Europe.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  152. I have reviewed the movie. The line is not there, or if it is, its not in English, meaning for clarity it is not translated via subtitles.

    Correction accepted. But it should be noted that we know how the Roman and Jewish authorities did things, and the Gospel accounts, in their details, can not be reconciled with what we know. And I won’t go into the problem presented by the fact that in many cases, when the Gospels present claims that a particular prophecy was fulfilled by Jesus, their claim depends on ignoring the actual meaning of the Old Testament text, and sound suspiciously like stories made up to fit the newly invented meaning of prophecy–the birth in Bethlehem and the Flight into Egypt are good examples of that–the supposed prophecies are really references to events already in the past (the origins of King David and the Exodus from Egypt). It doesn’t help that on some things the Gospels don’t even agree with themselves–for instance, the Synoptics have Jesus being crucified on a different day than what John specifies. BTW, historical and anatomical evidence point to the nails being driven into the wrist or forearm for crucifixions, not the hands. For that image of course, tradition has to be blamed : The Gospels obviously don’t say anything on that particular detail.

    It’s a pretty big leap and therefore a cheap tactic to suggest that you would only reject Vatican II if you were an anti-semite.
    Agreed. But I was referring specifically to the group which Gibson himself belongs to. For them the changes regarding the Jews, especially to the Good Friday liturgy (the “reproaches”) seems to be one of their more important grievances. Of course, this is a group that claims to be literally more Catholic than the Pope. But the attitude they represent was not merely common, but almost universal, for much of Christian history. Most Christians would have, to use your phrase, “missed the point”.

    The story is about the Swiss deciding that the attempt to extradite Polanski did not meet treaty criteria.

    Folks here agree with that? If not, in what way did the Swiss fail to observe the provisions of the treaty?

    By not extraditing Polanski. Or more precisely, by using some very bad excuses to not fulfill their obligations under the treaty. In this instance, they are worse than Thailand, a haven of sex tourism, which last week arrested a well known Russian musician for molesting a 14 year old boy.

    kishnevi (8731ef)

  153. BTW, historical and anatomical evidence point to the nails being driven into the wrist or forearm for crucifixions, not the hands. For that image of course, tradition has to be blamed : The Gospels obviously don’t say anything on that particular detail.

    There is a Greek lament that ends “and the most bitter one [nail], drive it into his heart”.

    This nonsense that nails though the palms and ankles cannot hold a crucified man’s weight does not take into account that he could also be tied with ropes onto the cross, along with the nails.

    There’s also some nonsense out there that the crosses (of Christ and the Thieves) were not really crosses. The jackass who made that **** up never heard of Crassus and Spartacus.

    nk (db4a41)

  154. I’ve found all antiSemitism both vicious and illogical, if anything one could see the jews as the vehicle by which the covenant was fulfilled, and blame the Romans since they gave the order

    ian cormac (d28167)

  155. Kish

    > But it should be noted that we know how the Roman and Jewish authorities did things, and the Gospel accounts, in their details, can not be reconciled with what we know.

    You know how it was typically done, which says nothing about particular cases. The fact is that if you accept even a secular version of the account of Jesus’ life, pre-crucifixion, that is a version where he preaches that he is the Son of God, etc., but doesn’t actually walk on water, etc., the man would have been 1) uniquely blasphemous to their faith and 2) a unique threat. Talking about what is typically done does little to address what was done in a unique case, like Jesus did, even if you don’t accept his divinity.

    > And I won’t go into

    Yeah, don’t.

    > It doesn’t help that on some things the Gospels don’t even agree with themselves

    Actually most Christians understand this and understand that some reconciling must go on. We recognize that the apostles were humans and thus susceptible to human failings. Indeed specific parts of the bible has Jesus berating them and of course no one has to belabor the point that at least one of the apostles went waaaay off course for 30 pieces of silver.

    > For them the changes regarding the Jews, especially to the Good Friday liturgy (the “reproaches”) seems to be one of their more important grievances.

    I have seen that repeatedly asserted but never proven.

    > Of course, this is a group that claims to be literally more Catholic than the Pope. But the attitude they represent was not merely common, but almost universal, for much of Christian history.

    Again, not at all. Of course anti-Semitism was much more common in darker times, but you paint with too broad a brush.

    > In this instance, they are worse than Thailand, a haven of sex tourism, which last week arrested a well known Russian musician for molesting a 14 year old boy.

    Well, now don’t force me to defend Switzerland. Yeah, they arrested one guy in Thailand. Good for them. But um, from all I heard the sexual abuse of children is open and notorious there. To the point that I once joked that if an American goes to Bangkok, they should be arrested on principle. Which I don’t literally mean, but you get my point.

    The swiss tolerated one pedo who happened to be a great director. That’s not good but it’s a world away from the completely f—ed up situation in Bangkok.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  156. ian

    dude, it would probably be a BAD thing if you understood it too well. 🙂

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  157. “But it should be noted that we know how the Roman and Jewish authorities did things, and the Gospel accounts, in their details, can not be reconciled with what we know.”

    kishnevi – What is the basis for believing what “we know” about how the Roman and Jewish authorities did things than what is described in the Gospels?

    Thank you for the entertaining anti-Christian bigotry.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  158. The statement issued by the Swiss is poorly worded, but at least it alludes to the key issue, whereas Patterico completely ignores that Polanski is ineligible for extradition because the DOJ and LA County District Attorney failed to prove the defendant is facing six months or more in prison.

    Patterico complains that “good faith” (a reference to Polanski’s belief he was free to visit Switzerland) is irrelevant. But if relevance is the concern, why parrot the victim’s unproven accusations, and why argue that 90 days – not 42 days – is what the sentence might have been?

    With regard to the extradition decision, who cares?

    Our treaty with Switzerland stipulates that nobody is extraditable unless he or she is facing six months or more in prison.

    The great Patterico didn’t even bother to say anything about that little detail.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  159. I would like to thank the POS chicken-man Jeffy for commenting here; it allowed me to use my downloaded script to ignore all his troll-comments.

    John Hitchcock (9e8ad9)

  160. kishnevi – What is the basis for believing what “we know” about how the Roman and Jewish authorities did things than what is described in the Gospels?

    Umm, evidence. Facts. Coins, inscriptions, papyri finds, what Greek and Roman historians wrote, passages of the Mishnah and Talmud, local chronicles. There’s actually a large amount out there. If you want to defend the thesis that the Gospels are accurate, or at leas credible, histories, instead of hagiographies patterned according to a well known genre, you’d do well to familiarize yourself with at least some of it.

    For instance, we have a good idea of how crucifixion was carried out because they’ve found human remains of people who were apparently crucified, including one in Israel who was killed close in time to Jesus; the remains show the nails were driven through the wrist/forearm.

    Most importantly, the whole business of Pilate letting the Jews try a man accused of fomenting sedition against the Romans would not have happened. Pilate would do it himself, very gladly, with no washing of hands. Killing off rebels was part of his job description. And the “trial” before the Sanhedrin is impossible to match with how criminal trials were conducted by the Sanhedrin. For one thing, it would not have been held at night and not until Passover was over. At best it was an informal meeting of the Jewish authorities, arranged for the purpose of agreeing to do what they had already agreed to do, which makes it totally pointless.

    Talking about what is typically done does little to address what was done in a unique case, like Jesus did, even if you don’t accept his divinity.

    He wasn’t particularly unique, even to the claim of being the Son of God (and not everyone thinks he made that claim, btw); those that began to make political trouble for the Romans were invariably killed by the Romans, usually without Jewish help.

    There’s also some nonsense out there that the crosses (of Christ and the Thieves) were not really crosses.

    There are instances where crucifixion seems in practice to have been a form of impalement, in the manner of Vlad Dracul, so it’s possible that any individual case was really impalement; but that was apparently not the standard practice. Otherwise the Romans wouldn’t have called it crucifixion. And there are the bodies that have been discovered with evidence of having been crucified in the usual way, like the one I mentioned above.

    kishnevi (225b9d)

  161. The sole issue of evading arrest is an up to one year penalty in California. And he is evading arrest right now.

    Someone please correct me if wrong, but I though Section VII Article 2 said that this six month provision applies only if sentencing has already occurred.

    Further, it’s well established that Roman was charged with several crimes with various penalties exceeding 6 months. In fact, the freaking DEFENSE claims Roman feared he would be sentenced for some long term he didn’t deserve. I think this is a ridiculous argument. I grant, the Swiss are using this as an excuse.

    But the real point is that the Swiss provision for 6 months is meant to ensure that minor crimes don’t lead to extradition. Is Jeff Norman saying that raping a 13 year old girl is a minor crime? Is Switzerland? Is anyone?

    Did LA County have any idea this demand for proof was made? Does it matter? Switzerland has Google. They know damn well that Roman could have faced a substantial penalty and did not commit a mere minor crime.

    Decent people do not stick up for Roman Polanski.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  162. Our treaty with Switzerland stipulates that nobody is extraditable unless he or she is facing six months or more in prison.

    The great Patterico didn’t even bother to say anything about that little detail.

    Neither did the Swiss, which suggests that either they considered the “six months” proven, or the considered it irrelevant.

    kishnevi (225b9d)

  163. “If you want to defend the thesis that the Gospels are accurate, or at leas credible, histories, instead of hagiographies patterned according to a well known genre, you’d do well to familiarize yourself with at least some of it.”

    kishnevi – No, I wanted you to defend why you feel your information is more accurate. Instead you give me circular reasoning of facts, evidence, etc. What makes your facts, facts and your evidence, evidence?

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  164. Get ready for a blizzard of strawmen with Jeffy Norman around.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  165. Daley, I strongly suggest you get the plug-in I linked to above so you can ignore-by-script Jeffy Norman, the foul fowl.

    John Hitchcock (9e8ad9)

  166. JH – I’m not going to be up much longer, but if he returns, I want to play with him.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  167. Dustin: “The sole issue of evading arrest is an up to one year penalty in California. And he is evading arrest right now.”

    Polanski hasn’t even been charged with fleeing. Ask the great Patterico why not.

    “Further, it’s well established that Roman was charged with several crimes with various penalties exceeding 6 months. In fact, the freaking DEFENSE claims Roman feared he would be sentenced for some long term he didn’t deserve. I think this is a ridiculous argument.”

    No, Dustin. You’re ridiculous. None of what you said has anything to do with the extradition request. Ask the great Patterico.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  168. Norman is back to defend “men” who rape underage girls?
    Why am I shocked?

    Have Blue (854a6e)

  169. kishnevi : “Neither did the Swiss, which suggests that either they considered the ‘six months’ proven, or the considered it irrelevant.”

    Ha! Then why did they say they’re not convinced that Polanski didn’t already serve his sentence?

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  170. Jeffy – Did Polanski’s lawyers get the plea agreement invalidated yet because of the typo in the hearing transcript over the length of the possible sentences for the crimes for which Roman was originally charged? That was your BIG THEORY last time you were dropping turds here.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  171. “No, Dustin. You’re ridiculous. None of what you said has anything to do with the extradition request. Ask the great Patterico.

    Comment by Jeff Norman”

    Oh. Thanks for letting me know. And here I thought I was citing a the provision in the treaty you claimed controlled this issue. What provision of the treaty are you referring to and do you have a link?

    Do you understand that the provision is the ‘minor crime’ exception? Do you have an answer to my question as to whether or not Polanski was charged with a minor crime?

    I guess, to you, this kind of approach is ridiculous.

    You tell me to ask Patterico why Polanski wasn’t charged with fleeing. I do think that’s a very good question, but let’s face it: Patterico is never here. Why don’t you tell me why you think he wasn’t charged.

    At the end of the day, your best argument is that Obama’s DOJ dropped the ball and the Swiss pretended they didn’t know Polanski was on the hook for up to 2 years. You ignore the fact that he never was sentenced, completely avoiding the entire aspect of the treaty, but I admit LA County didn’t know about this information demand because the DOJ didn’t pass the request along.

    I find it irrelevant. Everyone knows this isn’t a minor crime and Polanski could have been … should have been sentenced to far longer than 6 months.

    Strange that you just ignore my questions. Well… no, it’s not strange… you’re the one sticking up for violent rapists of girls sobbing ‘no’ repeatedly. Can’t really say anything from you is surprising, aside from redemption.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  172. btw, my guess is that he wasn’t charged because he wasn’t arrested yet, and that he certainly would be charged as soon as he was apprehended by civilization (which doesn’t include Nazi tolerating Switzerland).

    So it’s kinda stupid to snark that he wasn’t charged with a crime that he obviously is committing. Maybe there’s some ‘begging the question’ style objection to extraditing people for fleeing, in and of itself. There probably should be. But I realize I’m just talking to a wall. People like this never seem to directly answer questions. They ask a ton, usually irrelevant, such as ‘ask the great patterico!’ stalkerish weirdness. But they don’t answer questions. I guess resolving their arguments is actually contrary to their ‘stir it up’ mission.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  173. Dustin: “You tell me to ask Patterico why Polanski wasn’t charged with fleeing. I do think that’s a very good question, but let’s face it: Patterico is never here. Why don’t you tell me why you think he wasn’t charged.”

    I have no idea. My only point about that is that it’s ridiculous to say, as you did, that Polanski is facing a sentence for nonexistent charges.

    “Do you understand that the provision is the ‘minor crime’ exception?”

    That’s your fantasy. The treaty says only “more than six months.” No mention of it depending on whether or not the crime is major or minor or anything.

    From the treaty:

    “If the extradition request involves a fugitive, it shall be granted only if the remaining sentence to be served is more than six months.”

    Link to treaty: http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CRPT-104erpt32/html/CRPT-104erpt32.htm

    “btw, my guess is that he wasn’t charged because he wasn’t arrested yet, and that he certainly would be charged as soon as he was apprehended by civilization… So it’s kinda stupid to snark that he wasn’t charged with a crime that he obviously is committing.”

    Actually, your assumption is what’s stupid. The country requesting an extradition can’t give one reason for the extradition, and then add on more charges later. If that were lawful, the requesting nation would simply come up with a reason that would please the nation that’s holding the fugitive, and then do what it pleases after the fugitive is extradited. Not kosher. Doesn’t happen.

    You claim I’m ducking your questions, but actually I’m not.

    Now let’s see if the guy who doesn’t think questions should be avoided can answer this one: Where does your “minor crime” theory come from?

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  174. ““Do you understand that the provision is the ‘minor crime’ exception?”

    That’s your fantasy. ”

    No, it’s the treaty’s own language.

    “I have no idea. ”

    And yet you’re sure I’m being ridiculous? And stupid? I read the treaty too. The section you cited says ‘remaining sentence’. Polanski evaded before he was sentenced.

    Here’s the section you skipped

    In order to ensure that extradition is not requested for
    minor offenses, paragraph 1 requires that if the person has
    already been sentenced,
    the person must have at least six
    months of that sentence still to serve.

    See why I’m laughing that you mock me for saying this is about whether or not Polanski committed a minor crime? That’s precisely what’s at issue.

    And you dodged my question. I can understand your failure to read the entire treaty, but do you think Polanski is charged with minor crimes? Do you know how many crimes he is charged with? Why did you ask me to ask Patterico, as though there’s some cryptic reason why Polanski wasn’t charged with fleeing, if you didn’t have any idea or argument based on that?

    Anyway, I think I made the point first that I blame the Americans who originally handled this case more than I blame anyone in Europe. I just don’t expect much out of these Swiss. Polanski’s dead Holocaust family didn’t either. Nor could any of his many rape victims. I find this argumentation completely ridiculous, since they freed a man because of nonresponse to a simple question that could have been answered easily. Over something like an extradition request, the right way to handle that is not to free the confessed rapist, but to pick up the phone and ask why the information didn’t make it across.

    This is just about as stupid as you’re pretending I am.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  175. Oh, and you’re going to need this:

    Expressio Unius

    A canon of construction holding that to express or include one thing implies the exclusion of the other, or the alternative. For example, the rule that “each citizen is entitled to vote” implies that noncitizens are not entitled to vote. Cf. Ejusdem Generis; Noscitur a Sociis. — Black’s Law Dictionary

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  176. Dustin, whether or not Polanski has already been sentenced is in dispute. Regardless of your opinion, surely you know that’s what the whole controversy is about.

    The reference to “minor crime” is not in the applicable article of the treaty. What you cited is merely an explanation of and the reasoning behind that article. In the context of our discussion, it’s irrelevant. In response to an extradition request, there’s no judgment made as to whether or not a crime is minor, and there’s nothing in the treaty that authorizes one thing for minor crimes, and another thing for major crimes.

    So it’s not that I’m ducking your question; it’s that you mistakenly believe the minor/major designation has legal significance with respect to extradition requests. It does not, and it’s impossible for me to tell you whether or not any crime fits into a category that doesn’t really exist.

    You did answer my question, though. Thank you.

    The first link I provided doesn’t take you to the actual treaty. Sorry about that. You can see the whole enchilada at:

    http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=104_cong_documents&docid=f:td009.104.pdf

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  177. why parrot the victim’s unproven accusations[?]

    — The above quote contains everything that anybody EVER needs to know about Jeff Norman. His sarcastic use of the phrase “the great Patterico” is mere icing on the shite cake.

    Icy Texan (016cc3)

  178. Ah, Mr. Norman decided to come back to defend a child rapist/sentence fleer. Let’s give him a fair shake — here’s his brilliant legal mind at work (**WARNING: LINK IS DEFINITELY NSFW**): don’t miss 3:00-3:30 where women react to his highly intellectual and respectful addresses to them on the street.

    I’m not a lawyer so I don’t know about the finer legal points of this case. But I know all about disrespectful treatment of women. Mr. Norman does too, it seems — from the other side, anyway.

    no one you know (63a16f)

  179. He’s yet another fugitive from justice, like Mark Rich, who was able to skate away because of his money and connections, in this case all the way to
    the Atty Gen’s inner circle; Weingarten, The left went after Pinochet, but deign to go after Fidel or Ahmadinejad, and that’s kind of typical

    ian cormac (d28167)

  180. Jeff

    > The statement issued by the Swiss is poorly worded, but at least it alludes to the key issue, whereas Patterico completely ignores that Polanski is ineligible for extradition because the DOJ and LA County District Attorney failed to prove the defendant is facing six months or more in prison.

    And the link I provided above shows that the DOJ received the request for this information, and didn’t pass it on the LA DA.

    But I don’t buy that as an excuse. They were just using that as a fig leaf to cover their determination not to see him freed. that is why they gave an alternate explanation. By providing alternate reasoning, they are literally saying, “even if we had that transcript, we still would have set him free.”

    And I am sorry, but you think the uncontradicted testimony that Polanski is child ass rapist is irrelevant?

    And the 90 days issue is relevant because Polanski was put in that program as part of the statutory 90 days evaluation period. Do please try to pay attention.

    Also you didn’t link to the treaty, you linked to a senate report on the treaty. You might remember that the next time you call someone else stupid. Mistaking a description of the thing for the thing itself is pretty stupid, imho.

    > Dustin, whether or not Polanski has already been sentenced is in dispute

    Actually no. The judge always had the right to change his mind until the formal sentencing order was entered into. So Polanski was never sentenced, even if he was promised a certain sentence. That is indeed POLANSKI’s version. If he was already sentenced, and it could not be changed, then why was he afraid the judge would sentence him to a long time in prison (possibly being raped the same way his victim was). Polanski’s whole explanation rests on the idea that he was not formally sentenced, yet.

    So the LA DA says he was not sentenced, yet. And Polanski admits it, but complains that he was entitled to a certain outcome when it occurred. so there is actually no dispute on this point.

    Kish

    There are several problems with your “Pilate wouldn’t do this” thesis. You say that Pilate would act differently if jesus was fomenting insurrection. Yeah, except he wasn’t.

    And its ludicrous to act as though you can predict with any kind of mathematical certainty what a person would do in a given situation.

    Second, claiming it could never be done during Passover. Sorry, but if the situation is sufficiently alarming, people will very often toss aside tradition.

    Again, talking typicalities says nothing about specific instances.

    Let me give you an example of how fallacious that thinking would be. Imagine if our civilization was destroyed tomorrow, and 10,000 years later archeologists were studying us. A person studying our culture could say, “typically American Presidents were white males.” Then they start to read of a black president. Is it proper for these hypothetical archeologist to then discount the claims that Obama was a black president because it was not typical? No, of course not.

    Same problem with your theory. You pretend that something inherently unpredictable—human behavior—can be predicted.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  181. Pilate was a bureaucrat, he was also a rather obtuse fellow, he was a procurator, not really
    a ‘Governor” in the strict sense of the word, consider his pre and post Jesus intervention:

    http://www.bible-history.com/empires/pilate.html

    He was one who just wanted problems dealt with, andthis doctrinal dispute in the Judean colony was just that

    ian cormac (d28167)

  182. Jeffy is making sh*t up again. Last time it was Polanski’s plea was invalid because there was a typo in the plea bargain hearing transcript. This time it’s that the Swiss refused extradition for a reason they didn’t bother to mention. Jeffy could have been a great legal scholar if he had gone to law school.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  183. NOYK, you continue to make me laugh—great job puncturing that great bag of wind JN. The video shows his serious nature.

    Daley, I think that “Mr. Anonymous” and JN share quite a bit. I couldn’t be wrong, but JN is nothing if not self-promotional.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  184. Aaron, I already mentioned that the first link I provided didn’t go to the treaty, and I provided another one that does. Regardless, the sentence I cited is the pertinent one from the treaty itself, whereas what Dustin cited is not.

    You can insist all you want that the grand jury testimony is relevant, but you haven’t explained how it connects to the treaty or extradition request.

    Likewise, you haven’t explained why the 90-day v. 42-day issue is relevant. You just claim it is. Not persuasive.

    You’re focusing on FORMAL sentencing under California law. But under international law, and in the context of interpreting Article 2 of the treaty, it’s not so simple. Though you avoid this fact, Polanski was subjected to involuntary confinement as the result of a judicial determination. Therefore, it’s the reasonable position of the Swiss that Polanski served part of his sentence, which means the burden on our government was to establish that the defendant had “at least six months of that sentence still to serve.”

    In other words, you’re quibbling over semantics and ignoring the spirit of the treaty. A judge made a decision to deprive Polanski of his freedom, and Polanski was in fact deprived of his freedom. That’s a description of a person being sentenced and then serving a sentence (or part of one anyway), even though formal sentencing hadn’t yet occurred.

    There was no reason to expect the Swiss to interpret it any other way. So maybe the DA and judge shouldn’t have rejected Polanski’s request for a hearing in absentia.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  185. My, but he sounds serious about defending child molesters. But then, as NOYK’s video shows, this is a person with, ah, non-comformist tastes.

    It’s the tone of self-seriousness, given his history, that is so ironic.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  186. Jeff

    > Aaron, I already mentioned that the first link I provided didn’t go to the treaty

    Eventually. So don’t go calling anyone a moron, moron.

    By the way, its not just grand jury testimony. She also sued him and stunningly he was allowed to appear and offer a defense in American courts without actually coming to America.

    As for its relevance, the treaty itself, as you pointed out, makes note of the seriousness of the crime. A child ass rapist should be treated differently than a person merely charged with grand theft auto, you know?

    And the relevance of the 90 day thing is that it is just an evaluation period. It is not the sentence itself, although the time can count against time served.

    As for formal v. informal sentencing, the operative fact is that the judge was free to sentence him for longer than time served, and indeed Polanski fled because he feared he would get the maximum. Polanski’s own defense implicitly relies on the fact that the sentence was not yet set in stone.

    You further try to say that because Polanski was locked up for a time period that he was thus “sentenced” and it was the government’s burden to prove that he had more than six months to serve.

    You are a complete hypocrite on the issue of formalities. You want him freed because supposedly we could not formally prove he had 6 months left to serve in his sentence. But you want to ignore that he was not formally sentenced at all. So which is it? do formalities matter or not?

    And yes, I do expect Swiss authorities to defer to American authorities in the interpretation of American sentencing process.

    Seriously, why do you have such a hard on for defending this child ass rapist? I liked Chinatown, too, but come on.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  187. Well, A.W., I would just add that JN serves or serves on a board with a fellow who has been arrested twice for trying to pick up 13 year olds at Burger Kings back east. The guy was stung twice by police with some quite graphic e-mails sent by JN’s friend.

    So I would say Mr. Norman has enough, um, unusual friends that he should probably avoid even the most minor defense of child molesters.

    Just my opinion.

    Also, the chicken suit does not lend gravitas.

    Eric Blair (d9926c)

  188. Eric

    what board is that?

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  189. What kind of jerk goes up to strangers, mostly drastically younger women, and starts chanting about f–ing some chickens?

    Or posts a video of this, like it’s funny, with bits of footage of an actual chicken being f–ed?

    I … actually … have a specific answer to that question. I’m amazed that kind of behavior doesn’t get you into a fistfight, even in California.

    Do people really derive enjoyment from that?

    Jeff, yes or no, are you Mr Anonymous? Just curious. I guess if you are ashamed but did write it, you should ignore me.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  190. So, some things don’t change.

    Scott Ritter was originally on the board of JN’s “Veterans’ Project,” but is no longer there.

    Scott Ritter’s history:

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/14/scott-ritter-exweapons-in_n_423506.html

    And, of course, check out the comments here, as JN defends Scott Ritter’s extreme skeeviness:

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/14/scott-ritter-exweapons-in_n_423506.html

    Notice the similarities in defense.

    Finis, Mr. Norman. Time to quit defending child molesters in general.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  191. Aaron and Dustin, the law isn’t based on how offended you guys are.

    Aaron, you’re confused about what I supposedly want and what you perceive as my hypocrisy. It’s not about what I want. It’s just that I think the Swiss see Polanski’s involuntary confinement as part of his sentence, and the DA and DOJ mishandled that reality. Enjoy feeling that the timing of formal sentencing should have been the determining factor. As I said, there was never a reason to expect the Swiss would interpret it that way.

    Roman Polanski, if he ever did, no longer poses a threat to the LA community. Steve Cooley and his clowns do pose a threat. If you think it’s more useful to dwell on the former than the latter, knock yourself out.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  192. People unclear on the concept, Exhibit A.

    I think you have established yourself as a serial defender of child molesters. You might think on that for a while.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)


  193. Aaron and Dustin, the law isn’t based on how offended you guys are.”

    Well, not specifically, but yeah, that’s basically what the law is: outrage.

    You question whether Roman Polanski ‘ever’ posed a risk to LA. That’s amazing. You know, for a fact, that he was screwing a child who said no.

    I’ll take your silence on my question as informative, but I respect your anonymity.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  194. Polanski was probably never a threat to the community as such; he was, however, specifically, a threat and a danger to teen-age (and younger?) women. I see no reason to think that that has changed over the years.

    htom (412a17)

  195. Thanks for the NAMBLA p.o.v., there Jeff.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  196. Hey, Jeff, do you think your behavior in that youtube video is criminally obscene? Do you think you’re protected by the first amendment for running up to young ladies and drooling about sex with animals?

    I guess this is SoCal and the entire thing was probably staged, but you probably shouldn’t take that routine to Texas, because it is a crime. And it really should be a crime. Just because something is sexual and you really really really feel an urge to do it doesn’t make it not a crime. I’m still struggling to understand why you’d want to do that to people minding their own business.

    but what’s done is done. I don’t expect to see Roman in a California prison. I hope his raping has subsided with his old age, but it’s a shame he probably hurt a lot of people. We should be very careful releasing anyone pending their sentence, or any of these wealthy flight risks. We aren’t going to get them back if they flee, and Switzerland just made it look like a luxurious party to be a rapist fugitive.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  197. Didn’t he behave similarly against another under age
    actress, on another film, Pirates, I think it was called

    ian cormac (d28167)

  198. Eric

    Well, to be fair to Mr. Norman there are some other reasons to defend those pedos so doggedly. In the case of ritter, you could just be a paranoid dumbfrak. Okay I admit that isn’t a very complimentary defense, but it’s a defense.

    As for Polanski, he did make Chinatown. It makes it so you don’t want to think these bad things about him. I totally get that. I don’t succumb to it, but I get that.

    But then again if he starts telling us some third pedo is innocent, I will start to wonder…

    Jeff

    No, the law is not based on how offended we are. but the law and the actions of officials can and should be influenced by the evilness of the conduct involved. Which hopefully correlates significantly.

    You say you are applying a steady hand in the law, but you disregard every formality that would put him in prison and want us to strictly follow every single one that would set him free, indeed often combining informality to meet the formal requirements of a rule.

    And I never said the timing was critical. I said the finality was. It was the fact that the sentence was at that time utterly undetermined that made that “formality” matter. The judge had the right to change his mind up until that day, and indeed in the eyes of the law hadn’t even decided. If the sentence was not decided on the record and in open court, it would be a violation of Polanski’s due process.

    As for his so-called sentence before it, yeah it was so awful he was able to jet off to Germany to hang out with the girl he had been having sex with since she was 15 and one of her teenage friends. Ah, the poor man, to suffer so!

    And of course Polanski poses little threat to LA. Because if he sets foot in America he will go straight into custody. But if I lived in Europe, I would want them to apply Megan’s law to him.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  199. No, I wanted you to defend why you feel your information is more accurate. Instead you give me circular reasoning of facts, evidence, etc. What makes your facts, facts and your evidence, evidence?

    I was referring to the actual historical evidence about the Roman occupation of the Holy Land, etc. If you want details, sorry, they’re much too long for a blog post, much less a comment in a thread that’s supposedly dealing with a totally different topic. In fact, the details can fill up several library shelves. If you actually are interested in them, that’s where you can start looking.

    You say that Pilate would act differently if jesus was fomenting insurrection. Yeah, except he wasn’t.
    In Roman eyes, he was. True, their definition of rebellion was a little looser than ours, and in this case possibly based on biased information (that depends on how accurate the Gospel depiction of the Pharisees, etc, plotting against Jesus actually was)–but they saw him as a focus of possible rebellion or at least anti-establishment activity, and dealt with him accordingly.
    Second, claiming it could never be done during Passover. Sorry, but if the situation is sufficiently alarming, people will very often toss aside tradition.
    The Sanhedrin, and criminal courts, did not meet at night and did not meet during religious festivals. And there was no emergency involved. Whatever it was, the trial of Jesus was not a judicial proceeding.

    What apparently actually happened is that the Jewish authorities arrested him, and on the way to handing him over the Romans took him to the High Priest for some sort of confrontation.

    You pretend that something inherently unpredictable—human behavior—can be predicted.
    Hmm, that would mean I could not predict that this blog will continue to publish posts critical of Obama’s policies, since that would involve predicting human behavior.

    More to the point, we know how the Romans handled things in cases such as this–and the case of Jesus was far from unique in the Roman Empire. We know of no reasons that would have caused the Romans to treat the case of Jesus differently. Which means that, unless and until evidence that there was a reason to treat him differently turns up, we have no reason to think he was treated differently. (Sorry, being the Second Person of the Trinity doesn’t qualify as a reason.)

    Nota bene: The thread has returned to its original topic, so I don’t intend to say anything more on this subject.

    kishnevi (2c3adb)

  200. Kish

    “actual historical evidence”

    Disregarding of course four eyewitness accounts to the contrary.

    They saw him as a focus of rebellion? Please, you don’t know that. You are just dressing up your conjecture. The records, outside of the Bible, on the crucifixion of Christ are very slender.

    And when pointing out that traditions can be tossed aside, you basically say, “no, no, they will never toss it aside.” Absolutes, when talking about humans, are almost always wrong unless they are a tautology. It is logically impossible for you to rule it out. You are just being irrational.

    And yeah, let me refine that. yes, you can predict that this blog will continue to publish. But you might have thought in 2004 that you could predict that Charles Johnson would have been all over the everyone draw mohammed day thing. But by 2010 he was too busy telling us how much he hated creationists to bother, I guess. And in 2002, you might have predicted that Andrew Sullivan would be supporting the war on terror indefinitely. But these days he is much more interested in investigating Sarah Palin’s girly parts. You can’t be sure what Pilate would have done with Jesus to the point that you can rule out the biblical account and more than I can be sure that Instapundit won’t be the next blogger to the point that I can rule it out. The core premise of your argument that you can predict the exact behavior of a man in any specific situation is just insanity. It can’t be done.

    Your position is illogical. You are pretending to know what cannot possibly be known. You are pretending to rule out what cannot be ruled out. I am sure you fancy yourself as hyper-rational, but in fact your dismissal of the biblical account is not rational at all, but in fact, faith based.

    And “we know how Romans handled things?” Sure, those romans were completely interchangeable. They all think alike, see?

    Seriously, wtf?

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  201. “they’re much too long for a blog post, much less a comment in a thread that’s supposedly dealing with a totally different topic.”

    kishnevi – That’s pretty funny coming from the guy who filled up the thread with so many comments about anti-Christian bigotry.

    “I was referring to the actual historical evidence about the Roman occupation of the Holy Land”

    Eight, and those “actual” historical accounts are not subject to errors of translation or embellishment or omission by the teller or recorder over time as would biblical accounts.

    I’m with A.W., your dismissal of the biblical account is not based on fact at all, but faith based.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  202. “It’s just that I think the Swiss see Polanski’s involuntary confinement as part of his sentence”

    Jeffy – The only problem with your theory is that you have presented no evidence that the Swiss have indeed taken such a position. You can continue repeating the fiction that he was going to be sentenced to the days served for his evaluation through an agreement with the judge, but that does not make it the truth. Absent any evidence to support your position, it is just another Jeff Norman Super Lawyer @ss Pull.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  203. Jeff Norman is a defender of and friend to creeps who drug and assrape underage girls. That is who he is. Oh, and he buggers goats. That is all.

    JD (ab0fe5)

  204. JD, as long as they are his goats, I don’t care.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  205. I’d rather he left the goats alone and went after trolls.

    htom (412a17)

  206. JD, just remember that “Baaaah” means no.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  207. daleyrocks: “The only problem with your theory is that you have presented no evidence that the Swiss have indeed taken such a position.”

    The evidence is that they rejected the extradition request. They wouldn’t be in compliance with the treaty UNLESS they regarded his involuntary confinement as part of his sentence.

    If the Swiss believed Polanski’s time served was NOT part of his sentence, they would been obligated to extradite him, because the penalty for his confessed crime is greater than one year. That’s what makes fugitives extraditable if they have not served part of their sentence.

    I don’t know what kind of evidence you need. It was widely covered that the Swiss were focusing on whether or not Polanski faced six months. It wouldn’t have made any sense at all to consider that issue if they didn’t think he had already begun his sentence. Legal experts would have pointed out that the Swiss were misinterpreting the treaty in that regard. Why do you think that didn’t happen?

    “Swiss extradition laws would only allow him to be sent back to the US if he was going to be required to serve at least six months in prison.”
    http://tinyurl.com/2u2fnsu

    daleyrocks: “You can continue repeating the fiction that he was going to be sentenced to the days served for his evaluation through an agreement with the judge, but that does not make it the truth.”

    Continue repeating? I haven’t made that argument even once. The gap between reality and your rhetoric is widening.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  208. “The evidence is that they rejected the extradition request. They wouldn’t be in compliance with the treaty UNLESS they regarded his involuntary confinement as part of his sentence.”

    Jeffy – Unless you can point me to where the Swiss explicitly make that statement, that remains your theory of why the Swiss rejected the extradition. Sorry.

    “Continue repeating? I haven’t made that argument even once.”

    Jeffy – See the second sentence of this comment. You need to up your game cupcake.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  209. “…The gap between reality and your rhetoric is widening…”

    For a guy who cusses at passer-by in a chicken suit, and has defended two child molesters, you sure talk a “serious journalist” game.

    I mean, really. You take yourself pretty seriously, despite the fact you are nuttier than the proverbial PayDay Bar.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  210. And, by the way, I love you used the same defense for that short-eyes Ritter that you are using for Polanski. Except you added a government conspiracy.

    Why did you take his name off your “Veterans’ Project” website, if Ritter isn’t yet another child molester?

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  211. Finally, I cannot wait for Colonel Haiku’s take on Spiny Norman here.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  212. “Unless you can point me to where the Swiss explicitly make that statement, that remains your theory…”

    Of course it’s my theory. What’s yours?

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  213. That’s pretty funny coming from the guy who filled up the thread with so many comments about anti-Christian bigot

    Pointing out that the Gospels are full of inaccuracies and are not reliable history (no, Aaron, they were not “eyewitness acounts”, they are pseudoepigraphical hagiographies) is not anti-Christian bigotry. It’s merely summarizing modern scholarship, which, I might add, is accepted by almost every major Christian denomination. So if I’m an anti-Christian bigot, then are so are the Presbyterians, Methodists, Episcopalians, Catholics, etc. etc.

    All you are doing is demonstrating your own ignorance about your own religion (I’m assuming you are a believing Christian).

    kishnevi (3a3033)

  214. I think all us have a theory about Mr. Norman.

    Eric Blair (759366)

  215. “Pointing out that the Gospels are full of inaccuracies and are not reliable history is not anti-Christian bigotry.”

    kishnevi – My reference was to your threadjacking to point drone on about the Christian abuse of Jews over the centuries. Your blind spots are interesting.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  216. “Of course it’s my theory. What’s yours?”

    Jeffy – I think the Swiss denied Polanski’s extradition because the U.S. did not provide sufficient information to link him to the disappearance of Natalee Holloway. The Swiss have not explicitly said that, nor have they explicitly said anything about your theory, so from an evidential perspective I think we are equal footing.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  217. You have to admit that JN’s spirited defense of a couple of child molesters is interesting, daley. Why this topic, I wonder?

    By the way, “Mr Anonymous” vanished when the Chicken Guy appeared. Hmmm.

    Eric Blair (759366)

  218. Eric – I think Mr. Anonymous just got embarrassed.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  219. JEffy – have you quit buggering underage goats yet? Why are you compelled to associate yourself and align yourself with child assrapists?

    JD (bbeff0)

  220. Why JD! It is about justice, of course! It has nothing to do with being kind of a skeevy person.

    I still enjoyed reading JN’s defense of Ritter on that HuffPo link. So why isn’t Ritter proudly displayed on JN’s website? I mean, if he was so falsely accused?

    Which brings us back to Polanski. If you can stomach’s JN’s prior defenses of Polanski, I think we can all agree that there is a certain, um, unpleasant thread running through his thinking on this subject of underaged girls.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  221. “The Swiss said that they wanted to know whether Polanski, who was being held in a 33-year-old sex case, had already served his sentence. They asked for transcripts of testimony by the film director’s original prosecutor, Roger Gunson…The Swiss had said from the beginning that their extradition laws allowed Polanski to be sent to the United States only if he was going to be required to serve at least six months in prison. They sought the testimony of original prosecutor Roger Gunson to clarify the matter. The letter added, ‘Under these circumstances it cannot be excluded with certainty that Roman Polanski, who was imprisoned in the Chino State Prison for 42 days, has not already served the sentence imposed on him’.”

    http://tinyurl.com/39xyqsv

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  222. Another conspiracy? And the common thread? Men who like to try to have sex with underaged girls. Again, Mr. Norman, how interesting you are so focused on their defense, when you say yourself that there are so many other issues at hand.

    I think you need to branch out to defend other people besides these two. It makes it look like you have issues in this area.

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  223. Note that Jeff Norman’s own lined piece shows the Swiss have made contradictory statements:

    Adding to the confusion, Swiss Justice Ministry spokesman Folco Galli had said on April 30 that his department wasn’t interested in the testimony. “Such documents are irrelevant for the extradition proceedings,” he had told the AP.

    But the ministry said it then asked U.S. authorities for the transcript only days later because it was believed to contain evidence of paramount importance to the case.

    Asked after Polanksi’s release about what seemed to be an about-turn, the ministry declined to explain itself.

    Didn’t show that, did you Norman?

    SPQR (26be8b)

  224. SPQR: “Didn’t show that, did you Norman?”

    Irrelevant. My point is not that every Swiss official has been consistent in every way. It’s that they think Polanski’s court-ordered confinement was part of the sentence, and they required the US to establish that he faced at least six months in prison to be eligible for extradition. There was never any reason to expect that Polanski would be extradited. Patterico’s incompetent boss fucked it up by opposing the defendant’s request for a hearing in absentia.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  225. “The Swiss said that they wanted to know whether Polanski, who was being held in a 33-year-old sex case, had already served his sentence.”

    Jeffy – It is everyday U.S. policy to request extradition of people who have already served their sentences. As a self-proclaimed international legal expert you should know that. Next theory.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  226. kishnevi – My reference was to your threadjacking to point drone on about the Christian abuse of Jews over the centuries.

    Which came off of Aaron’s introduction of Mel Gibson…
    Though I still fail to see how anything I wrote could be seen as anti-Christian bigotry.

    kishnevi (3a3033)

  227. Pilate dealt ruthlessly with anything that impaired imperial administration, be it Jesus, a riot at the Aqueduct the Samaritans, don’t pretend he would have acted differently

    ian cormac (d28167)

  228. “Though I still fail to see how anything I wrote could be seen as anti-Christian bigotry.”

    As I said, your blind spots are interesting.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  229. Way up at comment 91, weffie provided a link to the State’s opposition to the release of the records now claimed by the Swiss to be an obstacle to the extradition request. As can be seen, the request represents more games playing on the part of Polanski’s attorneys.

    http://www.scribd.com/full/31058289?access_key=key-16f2o46e5jxoisgvf6lz

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  230. Kish, everyone

    I am the one who went off topic first. I dragged mel gibson’s idiocy into it, which made the passion into a legitimate subject and it morphed from there into the credibility of the crucifixion. because Kish felt it was so clearly unbelievable that this central story in the Christian faith shouldn’t have been relied on in Gibson’s movie, I guess, which I think is a bit of a ridiculous argument but it was fairly on the topic where I veered off.

    To Kish only

    > the Gospels are full of inaccuracies and are not reliable history’

    You’re allowed to believe these things, but you can’t prove it. I mean this isn’t even like the creationism thing because we can say that the physical evidence contradicts the biblical account. But we are at the beating a dead horse stage of this argument. You will cling to your theory that the romans and Jews at that time don’t things that way, and I have the reality that you just can’t predict human behavior with the reliability you assign to it.

    I would add one other thought. If you believe in an omnipotent and omniscient God, then even saying something is profoundly out of character doesn’t prove anything. In the story of Exodus, over and over, when Moses made his demands, the bible would say something to the effect of “But God hardened the Pharaoh’s heart.” In other words, God was making the Pharaoh continue to be a stubborn jerk.

    Why, you might say? I have come to consider the story of exodus sort of a performance art, where God set up this drama for our benefit. He wanted it be appropriately dramatic, to be the king of story told for literally centuries later. I would go as far as to say that he was sending a message to America, in part, to give the slaves a part of the bible to give them hope, and to give the abolitionists a part of the bible to tell them they must act. But that’s just a theory.

    Interestingly, there is a documentary called something like “The Exodus Decoded” with James Cameron “introducing” it, but some other guy doing most of the work. It has a very fascinating theory that basically the supervocanic eruption that destroyed the Minoan civilization caused the exodus story. That is they came to the “Reed Sea” (Red Sea is a mistranslation) which was really more like a river, and suddenly the vocano shook the earth so much it actually rose and created a path across, and then after they got through, a tidal wave swept in. Now some would say that this takes God out of the equation, but if that was true, you would have to conclude one of two things. Either they were the luckiest people in the history of humanity, or somehow the Jews knew exactly where to be and when. Which I might add lines up with what I said earlier about how Jesus showed John he knew exactly what was about to happen to him. I don’t know if I believe what “Decoded” said, but its intriguing.

    > So if I’m an anti-Christian bigot

    What struck me as bigoted was you claiming that almost every single Christian throughout most of the faith’s history were anti-semites.

    Jeff

    > I don’t know what kind of evidence you need. It was widely covered that the Swiss were focusing on whether or not Polanski faced six months. It wouldn’t have made any sense at all to consider that issue if they didn’t think he had already begun his sentence

    Maybe your right. maybe the swiss are as dumb as you are. Doesn’t make them right, though.

    Or maybe they watched that stupid documentary one too many time and believed what it said.

    > Of course it’s my theory. What’s yours?

    My theory is supported even more directly by what the swiss actually said. They cited two reasons for letting him go. 1) failure to turn over this transcript, and 2) the belief that Polanski came in good faith, etc. As a matter of logic, United States authorities could only have affected the first one, so literally, logically, if both reasons are sufficient to let him go, there is nothing the United States could have done to make them keep him. Now maybe in theory they wouldn’t have had the balls to let him out on theory #2, if that was the only theory, but their actual statement says that this is not the case. Their official position is it didn’t matter what United States authorities did, the child ass rapist would be a free man regardless.

    By the way, I should try that theory out for myself. “Hey, look officer, I drive in the HOV lane all the time with no passengers, so I had a good faith reason to think I could still do that.” Or maybe OJ could have used that if he killed the men he was robbing in Vegas: “look officer, I had a good faith belief that I would never be tried for murder given that I got away with it the first time.”

    JD

    > JEffy – have you quit buggering underage goats yet?

    I keep asking… what is the age of consent for a goat? Lol

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  231. Aaron: “My theory is supported even more directly by what the swiss actually said…failure to turn over this transcript…”

    That doesn’t refute what I told you. They wanted Gunson’s testimony to help them decide if Polanski had served all, or only some, of his sentence.

    Since you’re so interested in what the Swiss actually said, chew on this:

    “Under these circumstances it cannot be excluded with certainty that Roman Polanski, who was imprisoned in the Chino State Prison for 42 days, has not already served the sentence imposed on him.”

    Again, the issue for the Swiss was not whether or not Polanski’s period of confinement was tantamount to serving at least part of a sentence. They clearly believed it was. The only unanswered question for them was whether or not the defendant was facing more prison time, and if so, how much.

    Aaron, you call the Swiss dumb, but you can’t even comprehend what their position is. Comprehending what it is doesn’t mean you have to agree with it.

    If an intelligent thought were ever to pop into your head, it would die of loneliness. In addition to being dumber than dirt, you’re unwilling to be enlightened. So it’s impossible to have a worthwhile discussion with you.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  232. Well, at least he doesn’t defend multiple child molesters, put on a chicken suit and cuss at passerby, and then try to sound judicious and holier than thou.

    This fellow Norman is twisted little puppy.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  233. This fellow Norman is twisted little puppy.

    Comment by Eric Blair — 7/17/2010 @ 9:16 am

    He certainly is. I haven’t bothered to read his comments because I imagine it’s the same nonsense he posted the last time he came to a Polanski thread.

    nk (db4a41)

  234. This is the same Jeff Norman who’s a buddy of Scott Ritter’s, right?

    (It’s a shame that the site no longer allows site signatures.)

    nk (db4a41)

  235. Yup, nk. Higher up in the thread, I included some links. I can’t tell if the guy is simply contrarian, or has some wires loose in his neural net.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  236. Jeffey-boy

    > They wanted Gunson’s testimony to help them decide if Polanski had served all, or only some, of his sentence.

    And they said that even if he had 50 years to serve, they would let him go anyway. I mean there is that, you know?

    > Aaron, you call the Swiss dumb

    Yes, that statement is dumb. And to the extent they agree with you, you both are dumb. it is not, as a matter of black letter american law, part of the sentence.

    But hey, keep fraking that chicken.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  237. Α.W., Scott Ritter is a convicted child molester. And Jeffie was his asshole buddy. Don’t waste your time arguing with this enabler of perverts.

    nk (db4a41)

  238. “Under these circumstances it cannot be excluded with certainty that Roman Polanski, who was imprisoned in the Chino State Prison for 42 days, has not already served the sentence imposed on him.”

    Jeffy – If Polanski hasn’t actually been sentenced, how could he have served part of it? All you and the Swiss are doing is repeating the spin of his lawyers. Polanski’s request to be sentenced in absentia makes it clear he has not actually been sentenced and has been turned down multiple times. Gunson’s testimony is sealed and will remain sealed until Polanski returns to the U.S. for sentencing. Requests to unseal have been turned down multiple times. The fact that the Swiss have requested Gunson’s testimony at the suggestion of Polanski’s lawyers does not create any new legal facts under U.S. law and is merely a red herring. Next theory.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  239. “What struck me as bigoted was you claiming that almost every single Christian throughout most of the faith’s history were anti-semites.”

    A.W. – There WAS a carve out for the last 150 years or so that you should acknowledge. I was expecting a demand for reparations the way his comments were flowing.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  240. Hey, DRJ, do you want to start a thread about Pontius Pilate? 😉

    You strike me as an intelligent person, and I have some ideas about him that you might find interesting. (Stole this one from Bulgakov.)

    nk (db4a41)

  241. I think, nk, that Mr. Norman wants us to accuse him of being a short eyes. All we know for certain is that he associates with them and defends them.

    And I am interested in these other topics—theology versus history—and hope they don’t devolve into name calling. There was much that was interesting in the thread. Mr Anonymous and Mr Norman, not so much.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  242. Eric – As a scientist I hope you understand my questions about what “we know” about events from 2000 years ago. Ancient history, if I can call it that, is not exactly a hard science.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  243. daleyrocks, you’re also dumber than dirt. I already explained the Swiss are focusing on the spirit of an international treaty, not interpreting California law. As I told the other dullard, to have a meaningful conversation, you first need to comprehend what the position of the Swiss is, which doesn’t mean you have to agree with it. In other words, the only discussion worth having is whether or not the Swiss are correctly interpreting the treaty. Nobody disputes that Polanski was never formally sentenced. So you’re arguing with voices in your head.

    I’m open to a well-reasoned argument that the decision made by the Swiss is legally flawed. But you pathetic morons haven’t offered any reasoning. You’re just spewing emotion. You’re simpletons of the worst kind. I’m no expert on international law, but I know it’s not based on how much you’re bothered by Roman Polanski. And I know there was no reason to expect that Polanski would be extradited. Which means the authorities you worship mishandled the situation. You pretend to care about victims, but your phoniness is revealed by your failure to criticize the DA. He’s the one we need to rely on to keep bad guys off the street. It doesn’t help to dwell on Polanski. To the contrary, it distracts from more important cases involving people who pose a risk to the Los Angeles community NOW.

    Why can’t you cite any extradition or international law experts who say the Swiss misinterpreted the treaty? Sadly, expert opinions don’t even interest you. For you, it’s all about your feelings. You FEEL the Swiss are wrong, so they are. That’s how children and dysfunctional adults experience life.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  244. “I already explained the Swiss are focusing on the spirit of an international treaty, not interpreting California law.”

    Jeffy – If the Swiss are focused on the spirit of an international treaty, than why are they attempting to retry Polanski’s case?

    The DOJ has made a representation that their extradition request is completely factual yet that is not good enough for the Swiss.

    Polanski has not been sentenced because he did not show up for his sentencing hearing. This is not rocket science. Somehow both you and the Swiss have trouble acknowledging this fact by wondering if the time he spent being evaluated is part of his sentence. D’oh, he doesn’t have a sentence.

    What part of that don’t you understand Jeffy?

    What part of the court mandating that the Gunson hearing transcripts will remain sealed, whether the request is made domestically by Polanski’s lawyers or by the Swiss, prodded by Polanski’s lawyers, until Polanski returns to the U.S. don’t you understand? Again, this is not a difficult question.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  245. Anyone that does not defend and befriend underage child assrapists and goat buggering douchenozzles the way Jeff Norman does is a simpleton. He has achieved a higher state of enlightenment by defending child assrapists. You simpletons with outdated things like morals and ethics and common decency are just simpleton hilljack rubes.

    JD (5308da)

  246. Roman Polanski, if he ever did, no longer poses a threat to the LA community

    — As if my #177 didn’t put an end to listening to this guy’s idiocy, maybe the above will put the final nail in that coffin.

    Perhaps the Nuremberg Trials should have been voided, due to the inability of the defendents to pose a threat to those few surviving Joooos in Poland.

    Icy Texan (3699fa)

  247. Mr. Norman is getting angry. Again, given his web-available history, he is in a self-referential race between being pathetic and downright creepy.

    Everytime he posts, especially as he gets angrier and begins spewing the insults he claims to be above, I just wonder how often he cleans his chicken suit, and how thoroughly. A sick little man.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  248. Daley, I always find your posts interesting. Ancient history is indeed a tough subject. Look at how politicians bat around the 2000 election, let alone 2000 years ago.

    Add faith based issues and things get potentially very dicey. My ex-wife made fun of Mormon beliefs but had no trouble with Old Testament stories. I try to stay out of that kind of thing. But understanding people from long ago is fascinating.

    As I say, I would love to see the thread.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  249. it distracts from more important cases involving people who pose a risk to the Los Angeles community NOW.

    — A variation on the “why ticket people for jaywalking in a school zone, when there are far more important things that the police could be doing” meme. Notice how, for a guy that purports to be arguing about international law & honoring a treaty, that along the way he continues to throw in these little side excuses.

    Icy Texan (3699fa)

  250. daleyrocks, why can’t you or your fellow geniuses cite any extradition or international law experts who say the Swiss misinterpreted the treaty?

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  251. In the “evaluation prior to sentencing”, it’s the “to” part that has him confused. He thinks it’s “two” sentences, which would be illegal under Swiss law.

    htom (412a17)

  252. Jeffer

    > on the spirit of an international treaty,

    > Nobody disputes that Polanski was never formally sentenced.

    Wow, so basically you are saying that the letter of the treaty is on our side, but the “spirit” of the law should allow him to go free. Well, first, so the spirit of the treaty is that we should interpret it to to allow for the unilateral actions of criminals to thwart justice? That is Polanksi, having interrupted the ordinary sentencing process in California, now can use that fact to claim that the state can’t prove he owed more than 6 months on his sentence?

    It’s a strange spirit of the law you are invoking there.

    But contrary to what you might have heard, the “spirit” of a law is of literally no consequence. For instance, if California passes as law stating that no person shall have sex with any other person’s animals, and they catch you fraking a chicken that you personally own, they can’t say, “the letter of the law says he is innocent, but the spirit of the law says he is guilty, so let’s convict him!”

    > you first need to comprehend what the position of the Swiss is,

    I do comprehend it. In fact, I understand it better than you do. You don’t understand, for instance, that by their literal words they would not have turned over Polanski no matter what.

    > But you pathetic morons haven’t offered any reasoning. You’re just spewing emotion.

    Actually when you rely on the “spirit” of a law, you are the one being emotional rather than reasoning.

    > And I know there was no reason to expect that Polanski would be extradited

    Except you yourself have acknowledged that the letter of the law is on our side. I mean, there is that.

    > Which means the authorities you worship mishandled the situation.

    Not at all. I don’t worship the Department of Justice, they are a bunch of idiots these days. And there is a dispute whether they f—ed it up, or the LA District Attorney. I don’t “worship” the LA District Attorney but I respect them if only because they have the wisdom to hire Patterico. So maybe people I respect screwed up. Or maybe the Department of Justice did, in which case the people I consider to be idiots acted idiotically. That’s not even unexpected in this world. Its like gravity pulling downward.

    > Why can’t you cite any extradition or international law experts who say the Swiss misinterpreted the treaty?

    Because most of the people arguing with you are themselves lawyers and don’t need to consult anyone. I would add that it would also be engaging in the argument from authority fallacy.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  253. Jeffy – If you come up with a reasoned and rational argument supporting your position please feel free to advance it. Arguing the spirit of the law or the penumbra of the law or indefensible gibberish such as that does not cut it. Right now, you’ve got nothing.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  254. Well, daley, he does have his chicken suit. Gravitas.

    Eric Blair (1cc534)

  255. And he has underage goat love spunk on his chin.

    JD (358a94)

  256. How could I forget the chicken suit and the goat love spunk! He’s got that going for himself, which is nice.

    He’s getting a little pissy, though. Maybe it’s been a little too long between visits to the farm.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  257. Daley

    well certainly you can’t call a person irrational for not accepting a spirit of the law argument that lets a child butt rapist free.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  258. No, Jeff Norman, your omission of that part of the story you yourself chose to link to was not “irrelevant” but in fact went to the core of your claim.

    You really need to practice your trolling more, we have been hoping for a better class of troll here lately.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  259. romanpolanski
    polish dwarf with taste for
    buggering young girls

    ColonelHaiku (26e9b5)

  260. True enough, Colonel. But what of our so-serious chicken suit wearer?

    Eric Blair (c8876d)

  261. Aaron: “Because most of the people arguing with you are themselves lawyers and don’t need to consult anyone.”

    Obviously, you and your anonymous friends who might or might not be lawyers are impressed with each other. But that doesn’t explain why you can’t find any extradition or international law experts who believe the Swiss misinterpreted the treaty. As usual, your position is simply that you’re right because you say so. How impressive!

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  262. put norman in dress
    add polish dwarf and spa
    that’s entertainment

    ColonelHaiku (26e9b5)

  263. “What struck me as bigoted was you claiming that almost every single Christian throughout most of the faith’s history were anti-semites.”

    I didn’t say that exactly, although it would, unfortunately, be only a slight exaggeration to say that. What I said was that it was endemic–almost universal, with periodic flare ups. That’s why, for instance, the Spanish/Portuguese Jews often emigrated to the Ottoman Empire, because Moslem rule offered them greater freedom and security than Christian. Not because the Muslims were so tolerant, but because the Christians were so intolerant. Mel Brooks was wrong. Everyone expected the Inquisition.

    Also, I didn’t say the Crucifixion didn’t happen. I said the Gospel accounts are not accurate history by eyewitnesses, a statement that is backed up by almost all modern Biblical scholarship, so you can’t trust them for an accurate depiction of all the details. Given all the evidence in hand, we can say a wandering religious preacher named Yeshua from Nazareth was crucified during the procuratorship of Pontius Pilate, and his followers believed he was raised from the dead a few days later. But that’s all you can actually say: and there’s probably dozens of books churned out every year to try to expand on that bare summary.

    If you’re interested in the subject, I would suggest “A Marginal Jew”, not because everything in it is correct, but because it gives a very good presentation of one of the most complicated subjects in the world; you’ll walk away with a fairly good knowledge of the issues involved.
    There was of course a man named Allegro who came out with the theory that Jesus was actually not a person but the focus of a hallucinogenic mushroom cult. 🙂

    Just an illustration: in the late 19th/early 20th century, a number of hotels throughout the US refused to allow Jews as guests, even having signs up saying “no Hebrews”. Supposedly that’s how the Borscht Belt began–Jews started up their own hotels because they couldn’t stay at existing hotels in the area.

    kishnevi (c8ebbd)

  264. That last paragraph should have been the second paragraph.

    And as far as Mr. Norman:
    But that doesn’t explain why you can’t find any extradition or international law experts who believe the Swiss misinterpreted the treaty

    Probably because said experts have more important things to do than proving the obvious for the benefit of those who defend child molestors and would continue to do so even when the proof was given to them.

    kishnevi (c8ebbd)

  265. Well, thinking we are right because we say so is somewhat more impressive that linking to a story that undermines the claim for which you linked to it.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  266. Jeffrey – exactly what would it take for you to become ashamed of yourself?

    JD (d7de45)

  267. JD, I’m thinking the first response that pops into Jeff Norman’s mind is “Getting caught”.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  268. Why can’t America stop trying to hold child ass rapists accountable? When will the oppression stop?

    Jeffy – Experts? Now YOU demand experts? Too funny. The Swiss punt on a risible technicality and you attempt a puerile “spirit of the law” argument and we need experts to swat that sh*t away?

    Surely you jest! Where are your experts, man?

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  269. Maybe I should have said “intent” rather than “spirit” of the treaty. Either way, you “lawyers” haven’t explained why, under international law, the Swiss should have given more weight to the fact Polanski wasn’t formally sentenced, than to the fact he was committed to prison by a judge.

    Even the DA and DOJ aren’t complaining that the Swiss were wrong to interpret, under INTERNATIONAL law, that Polanski’s period of confinement was at least part of his “sentence” with respect to the treaty. That’s how far off the charts you are. You’re arguing something that isn’t even a matter of controversy anywhere (except amongst anonymous fruitcakes on this blog).

    That’s why you can’t cite any experts who agree with you. It isn’t even a controversy! In other words, you’re detached from reality.

    Polanski simply wasn’t extraditable unless it could be shown he was facing six months or more. The DOJ and DA couldn’t prove it without addressing Polanski’s argument. The DA’s position was that Polanski doesn’t deserve to have his argument considered unless and until the defendant returns to LA. That was a childish, egomaniacal position (much like the crap you guys constantly spew) to take, because it ignored the need to satisfy the Swiss that the fugitive was really facing the minimum amount of prison time required by the treaty.

    The Swiss gave Patterico’s incompetent colleagues plenty of time to convince them, and they FAILED to do so. So the Swiss finally said the game’s over.

    That’s all there is to it. Your rants about Polanski are irrelevant. They have nothing to do with the law or how the case was mishandled.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  270. Why does the goat buggering child assrapist apologist try to make it sound like he was sentenced, just not formally sentenced?

    Jeffie – Why are you friends with child assrapists?

    JD (b812d8)

  271. “You’re arguing something that isn’t even a matter of controversy anywhere (except amongst anonymous fruitcakes on this blog).”

    Jeffy – You have a serious comprehension problem and are arguing in circles. You said above that there is no disagreement that Polanski has not been sentenced, correct? Well if he has not been sentence, how can it possibly be determined if the time he was being mentally evaluated would be deducted from his sentence? Please answer that one genius without going around in circles again.

    The issue of Polanski having to return to LA to be sentence has already been decided at the trial and appellate court level. You earlier claimed the Swiss were not attempting to retry the case. By refusing to abide by settled U.S. law, that is exactly what they are doing – thumbing their noses at the U.S. court system, demanding properly sealed records be unsealed even though they will not be unsealed in the U.S.

    This ain’t rocket science Poindexter. They don’t want to extradite him and they’ll manufacture excuses out the ying yang.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  272. “You have a serious comprehension problem and are arguing in circles. You said above that there is no disagreement that Polanski has not been sentenced, correct? Well if he has not been sentence, how can it possibly be determined if the time he was being mentally evaluated would be deducted from his sentence?”

    Because international law isn’t the same as California law. I already explained, so obviously you are the one with the comprehension problem.

    “You earlier claimed the Swiss were not attempting to retry the case. By refusing to abide by settled U.S. law…”

    The Swiss are required to abide by international law, not U.S. law.

    You can’t cite any experts who agree with you, because the issue we’re “discussing” isn’t even a controversy except amongst Patterico’s fruitcakes.

    You’re dumber than dirt, Daley.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  273. You call other people fruitcakes when you go forth and befriend and defend f$cking child assrapists and bugger goats?

    JD (b812d8)

  274. Dumb Jeffer

    > But that doesn’t explain why you can’t find any extradition or international law experts who believe the Swiss misinterpreted the treaty.

    I don’t need an expert. I AM the expert, you fucking idiot.

    > As usual, your position is simply that you’re right because you say so.

    I have never asserted any such thing. But hey, keep fraking that chicken.

    You have retreated into the spirit of the law, which means even you know the letter of the law is against you. Why do we need an expert to tell us what you have already admitted?

    > Maybe I should have said “intent” rather than “spirit” of the treaty.

    In other words, you made a damaging admission and now you are trying to back away from it.

    As for “intent” the intent is not to let serious criminals go. Child rape is a serious crime. The intent with the 6 month rule is to say “we are not going to waste our time with unserious crimes.” I know you don’t take child ass rape seriously, but most of the civilized world does (of that point is admittedly circular—I judge a place as civilized based on whether they take child ass rape seriously).

    > than to the fact he was committed to prison by a judge.

    I expect them to take notice of the reason why he was committed: to get his head checked. It was for evaluation purposes, rather than punitive purposes. That’s why they let him out so he could go visit the girlfriend he had been having sex with since she was 15 in Germany: because it wasn’t really designed to punish him.

    > Even the DA and DOJ aren’t complaining tha

    How can you be sure of that? have you asked them if they agree with that?

    > It isn’t even a controversy!

    You’re right. Even Polanski’s lawyers knew that the judge could sentence him to anything, which is exactly why he ran. No controversy on that point.

    > Polanski simply wasn’t extraditable unless it could be shown he was facing six months or more. The DOJ and DA couldn’t prove it without addressing Polanski’s argument

    No, according to your theory, there was ABSOLUTELY no way to address it because Polanski ran before the final sentence was determined. His running made it impossible for them to meet your silly burden of proof. You talk about the spirit of laws, or when called on it, you pretended you meant the intent. Do you really think that the purpose of that 6 month rule is to protect child rapists who manage to flee at that stage?

    > The DA’s position was that Polanski doesn’t deserve to have his argument considered unless and until the defendant returns to LA.

    The Polanski “the judge promised me!” argument? Yes. It’s a subject for United States law, not the Swiss to intrude. The District Attorney is right on that point, too.

    > That was a childish, egomaniacal position (much like the crap you guys constantly spew) to take,

    No, it is a position that demands that the swiss respect our laws. They would expect no less from us.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  275. Little Aaron: You’ve offered no analysis. No legal experts agree with you. Not even the DA has taken your position.

    “How can you be sure of that? have you asked them if they agree with that?”

    Ha ha! You’re a funny little boy.

    Yes, Aaron. It’s possible the DA and his hired thugs see it as you do, but just haven’t said so. It’s also possible that many legal experts see it as you do, but just haven’t said so.

    That’s all you can come up with. There MIGHT be people out there who see it as you do, but for some reason, they’ve ALL chosen to remain silent.

    S it’s not ONLY Patterico’s fruitcakes. It’s Patterico’s fruitcakes AND the many, many, many experts who are in agreement but just don’t feel like saying so.

    Ha ha!

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  276. “LOS ANGELES – District Attorney Steve Cooley said today that although Switzerland refused to return Roman Polanski to California for sentencing, extradition will be sought if the fugitive is arrested elsewhere. “I am deeply disappointed that the Swiss authorities denied the request to extradite Roman Polanski,” Cooley said in a prepared statement. “Our office complied fully with all of the factual and legal requirements of the extradition treaty and requests by the U.S. and Swiss Departments of Justice and State…….

    Failure to extradite Polanski for sentencing is a “disservice to justice and other victims as a whole,” the District Attorney said. “To justify their finding to deny extradition on an issue that is unique to California law regarding conditional examination of a potentially unavailable witness is a rejection of the competency of the California courts. The Swiss could not have found a smaller hook on which to hang their hat.”

    Jeefy – How’s my @ss taste?

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  277. 268. Jeffrey – exactly what would it take for you to become ashamed of yourself?
    Comment by JD — 7/17/2010 @ 6:30 pm

    — Well, JD, there was that one time when the goat rejected me because I was playing too gruff.

    Jeff No-man (ebf207)

  278. Jeffy sure like fruitcake.

    daleyrocks (1d0d98)

  279. That’s worse than when Ritter defended the children’s prisons in Iraq, was that OFF contribution that significant

    ian cormac (d28167)

  280. Dumb Daley, as I correctly told you and the other dullards, not even Steve “Airtight” Cooley has claimed the Swiss were wrong to interpret, under INTERNATIONAL law, that Polanski’s period of confinement was at least part of his “sentence” with respect to the treaty. Not Cooley, not the DOJ, not any legal expert. Only Patterico’s fruitcakes. The quote you cite makes no mention of that issue.

    At this point, the only unanswered question is: Who’s dumber, Daley or Aaron?

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  281. In other words, Jeff Norman, you don’t understand a word of Cooley’s statement at all.

    We knew that.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  282. Chicken Jeff keeps…well, you know.

    I like how he doesn’t have much to say about his buddy Ritter. The fact that he uses the same kind of defense (adding paranoid conspiracy theory) as he does with Polanski (and yes, Chicken Jeff, we all remember your original defenses of Polanski, which, um, bear a striking resemblance to those of “Mr. Anonymous”) says it all.

    Defender of child molesters, at the beginning and the end. Pathetic.

    Eric Blair (2ad21f)

  283. Jeffin’ Stupid…

    Um, you do know the link you provided was from 2009, right?

    And then you call us dumb.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (f97997)

  284. Actually the link that Jeff Norman put under Cooley’s name does not support anything that Jeff Norman writes. It is more incoherence to link that Slate piece that does not support any of Norman’s weird claims. Certainly, nothing in it could be an omitted “denial” of something that hadn’t happened yet … except in Norman’s incompetence.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  285. stormin’ norman just
    tempest in teapot but he
    sure does blow big time

    ColonelHaiku (26e9b5)

  286. The Cooley link was just to explain my nickname for him. He thinks the plea is “airtight.” Well, a lot of good that does him.

    The extradition matter was about whether or not Polanski faced an additional six months or more in prison. If the dispute had been about whether or not the 42 days constitutes part of a sentence (under international law), it would have been pointless for the DA/DOJ to expend so much time and effort arguing about what additional time he was facing. That’s because if the 42 days doesn’t constitute part of his sentence (under international law), Polanski would have been extraditable simply because the crime to which he pleaded guilty, is punishable by one year or more in prison.

    In other words, a fugitive who hasn’t yet been sentenced (as defined by international law) couldn’t be extradited based on how much time is left on his particular sentence (a sentence which couldn’t even exist, if he hadn’t been sentenced). He could only be extradited based on what the punishment might be for anyone who’s been convicted of the extraditable crime in question.

    Bottom line: You dullards can’t cite anything that indicates anyone outside of this blog believes the Swiss misinterpreted the treaty with respect to categorizing Polanski as a fugitive who had already served at least part of his sentence (as defined by international law). You’re also unable to cite anything that indicates the DA/DOJ contend the Swiss miscategorized Polanski as someone who has served at least part of his sentence (according to the treaty and international law).

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  287. Wow. Chicken Jeff loves him some italics. And child molesters, too.

    Eric Blair (af8bca)

  288. Jeffin’ slow

    > The Cooley link was just to explain my nickname for him

    Yeah that would be the second time you said something stupid and then pretended you didn’t mean it.

    > If the dispute had been about whether or not the 42 days constitutes part of a sentence (under international law)

    International law doesn’t control on this point. Local procedure, does, duh.

    > Polanski would have been extraditable simply because the crime to which he pleaded guilty, is punishable by one year or more in prison

    Well, excuse me, but are you now claiming that the statute, at the time, had a mandatory minimum of a year in prison? Then how could the judge possibly sentence him to time served?

    > In other words, a fugitive who hasn’t yet been sentenced (as defined by international law) couldn’t be extradited based on how much time is left on hisparticular sentence (a sentence which couldn’t even exist, if he hadn’t been sentenced).

    Except evan polanksi admits the final determination of sentence hadn’t been made. It was the entire basis of his defense to the charge of fleeing.

    > You dullards can’t cite anything that indicates anyone outside of this blog

    You keep demanding that we engage in the fallacy of authority and then you take our refusal to engage in a fallacy as proof that they got it right. the law simply doesn’t work that way.

    Seriously, why do you have this raging hard on for him being free?

    Aaron Worthing (Filling in for Col. Haiku) (f97997)

  289. Jeffrey Norman is waiting to have a quaalude and Burger King dinner with Polanski and Ritter.

    JD (b1f7fc)

  290. “Well, excuse me, but are you now claiming that the statute, at the time, had a mandatory minimum of a year in prison? “

    I didn’t say or imply the potential punishment was mandatory. Voices in your head?

    “You keep demanding that we engage in the fallacy of authority and then you take our refusal to engage in a fallacy as proof that they got it right.”

    Fallacy of authority is a cute phrase.

    I’m just saying there’s no sign your issue was or is a subject of controversy in the real world, and you simpletons haven’t offered any legal analysis. It’s not as if you presented a well-reasoned argument, and I dismissed it by saying some law professor knows more than you do. It’s that you’ve said zero, and it seems nobody outside of this blog sees it as you do. I’m open to an argument from anyone. But I’m not persuaded by anonymous dolts who do nothing but spew emotion.

    Jeff Norman (159014)

  291. bill invite norman
    to a show but he say no
    that he cannot go

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umHj1lf_bU8

    ColonelHaiku (26e9b5)

  292. You know, Chicken Jeff is actually pretty funny, if unintentionally so. I think he needs medical help (apart from his fascination with child molesters, I mean). Does he not read his own posts?

    Is he actually saying other people are posting emotionally? Honestly?

    I believe I said it before when this sad little video artist did his original Polanski defense—which as I have said previously and merits repeating, was quite similar to “Mr Anonymous”—I am not sure if this is performance art or mental illness.

    All this seriousness from a guy spewing profanity in a chicken suit. Just a Friend of Ritter.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  293. Backpedaling about your failed attempt to link to your assertion about Cooley is pretty pathetic, Norman, but it is of the same nature as your failed attempts to justify the Swiss’ arbitrary refusal to extradite.

    SPQR (26be8b)

  294. JEffy Norman – no matter how hard you try, no matter how much you wish, you will never be Ritter or Roman’s type. They prefer them drugged and underage. Your heroes. Child assrapists. You are on e sick twisted perv.

    JD (43ccd5)

  295. Jeff Norman, did Cooley take your pony away? Is that why you are still mad?

    SPQR (26be8b)

  296. Jeffin’ Idiotic

    > I didn’t say or imply the potential punishment was mandatory.

    Um, actually you did, with these words:

    > is punishable by one year or more in prison.

    So that would now be the third time you have said something, perhaps in error, that essentially conceded we were right.

    > I’m just saying

    No, you are not allowed to walk it back. You kept asking us to engage in a fallacy.

    But hey, keep fraking that underage goat. And keep telling yourself that someday we will be more accepting of your freaky sex habits.

    Aaron Worthing (Filling in for Col. Haiku) (f97997)

  297. If — I say if it was certain that Polanski would no more than six months on the original crime, he would still face either a misdemeanor or felony for not appearing, which has a maximum of either a year or three years (not a lawyer, sources seem to differ; Cal. Penal Code 1320a, 1320b, or 1320.5 depending.) So he was facing more than a possible six months.

    htom (412a17)

  298. And isn’t it sad that a pervert can get us all to 300 comments? Sigh.

    Eric Blair (d7ba5c)

  299. Eric,

    > And isn’t it sad that a pervert can get us all to 300 comments? Sigh

    Well, technically your comment is the 300th one, so are you telling us something about yourself?

    (yes, that is a joke.)

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  300. I would say it’s the outrage of defending the indefensible, I imagine JN will take Mel Gibson’s cause next

    ian cormac (d28167)

  301. Ian

    Actually Gibson might have a defense—there is evidence that the damning tapes were tampered with and potentially fake. But I will confess I don’t want to think he is such an awful human being, so I might be biased. I mean I was all ready to get braveheart on blue ray and now I am like, geez, I don’t know. Of course its not clearly as bad as Polanski, because the money actually probably funds the abuse, but still… (that’s sort of how kish and I ended up on the topic).

    Of course him lashing out in a drunken rage at those cops several years ago definitely did happen, so…

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  302. I was being a little sarcastic AW, Gibson is indeed talented but troubled, maybe all the pressure since
    he took up ‘the Passion’ had a little to do with it.
    The message of Braveheart, and to some extent, the
    Patriot is still very timely, today, ‘specially since they do intend to “take our freedoms”

    ian cormac (d28167)

  303. Ian

    The patriot had its moments. I remember my dad saying his two favorite movies was Last of the Mohicans and Braveheart and he was hoping for something that combined that. but it really fell short.

    And there was too much weirdness. Oh, he was a plantation owner who… didn’t own slaves, but instead they were his employees. Sorry, wtf?

    But I did like the conflict between his quest for freedom and his quest for revenge. I mean in Braveheart, both pointed in the same direction. This time he had to choose to either do right by the revolution, or by the person he was avenging.

    Still I am waiting for the great movie to be made about revolutionary times, but I think we have a Hollywood that is too ironic and anti-american to make it anytime soon.

    But still by comparison Braveheart was just perfect, except as a representation of actual historical events. I will tell you that you probably wouldn’t want to learn the truth in that it would ruin the movie for you, but suffice to say that its about as accurate as your average robin hood movie. I mean I can afford not to give a crap because its like 1/4 of the world away, anyway.

    I thought apocolypto (sp?) was just odd. It had its moments as a pure adventure, but not much else. And I think his whole routine as this being a criticism of America was just some marketing BS he tacked on to it.

    Let’s face it, he has made some really odd choices in movies.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  304. Half of the other great stars are commies or perverts.

    I can happily enjoy Gibson’s library of movies. They stand apart from his personal views (real or faked). Roman Polanski actually uses his ‘casting’ to abuse people, so it’s slightly more like buying child porn to support his films. Which is a shame, as some of his work is good (and some is over-rated crap). Their was that one move, Pirates, that I thought was dull and overblown like Michael Bay‘s work.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  305. Well just like with 300, which is based on Herodotus, with a popular gloss, Ahmadinejad understood the importance of the message in there

    ian cormac (d28167)

  306. I misspelled ‘there’! Oh good grief. Let’s pretend I was being ironic.

    Dustin (b54cdc)

  307. Here’s my question…

    Has Hollywood always been this complete basket case it is now and they were just better at covering it up? Or is it really much worse today?

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)

  308. The patriot had its moments. I remember my dad saying his two favorite movies was Last of the Mohicans and Braveheart and he was hoping for something that combined that. but it really fell short.

    And there was too much weirdness. Oh, he was a plantation owner who… didn’t own slaves, but instead they were his employees. Sorry, wtf?

    The Patriot reminded me a great deal of an old Jimmy Stewart movie Shenandoah. It was thematic, rather than historical, so any inaccuracies didn’t matter to me.

    Some chump (e84e27)

  309. Incidentally, I was just at Target and saw the Patriot on Blue ray on sale. I thought of you guys when I saw it. but for me it was a choice between that and Robocop. That was not a hard choice.

    By the way, this is my take on blue ray v. DVD. First, if you are thinking of buying a blu ray player, just buy a ps3. They cost about the same but you can’t play games on a mere player. Second, I still buy dvd’s. this is my rule. I only buy it on blue ray if the movie has some kind of visual punch. So the last of the Mohicans with its lush depiction of the American wilderness (if memory serves, that was rural North Carolina standing in for colonial New York. Or a movie with lots of cool explosions. Or not to be all testosterone oriented, I could picture my wife getting Mamma Mia on blu ray because supposedly if I could watch more than 1 minute of it, I would see lovely greek vistas.

    But “Meet the Parents” on blu ray? What is the fracking point? So I can see Ben Stiller’s moles really good? so that kind of personal comedy or drama, or what have you is best kept for just regular old DVDs.

    Indeed, sometimes blue ray is too good for its own good. for instance, in the beginning of the chronicles of Narnia, with the german bombers, they look like plastic toys on blue ray. I mean, yes, I know they are computer generated, but instead they just look plastic. That scene would probably look better in regular DVD.

    Aaron Worthing (A.W.) (e7d72e)


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