Patterico's Pontifications

10/3/2016

Why the GOP Attack on Tim Kaine’s Work as a Defense Attorney Is Wrong and UnAmerican

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 8:13 pm



A colleague of mine at RedState praised the GOP ad today attacking Tim Kaine for doing work as a defense attorney. I respectfully disagree, and think the ad was a shameful betrayal of American values. My dissenting opinion can be found at RedState, here.

UPDATE: Democrats pull the same nonsense when it benefits them. B.S. is nonpartisan.

69 Responses to “Why the GOP Attack on Tim Kaine’s Work as a Defense Attorney Is Wrong and UnAmerican”

  1. Ding.

    Patterico (bcf524)

  2. I told them I would toss them the occasional exclusive, and since this post reflects an internal disagreement between me and one of my new colleagues, I thought it best to link it rather than entirely reproduce it here.

    Patterico (bcf524)

  3. Even a werewolf is entitled to legal counsel.

    On the other hand there are lawyers who specialize, out of ideological affinity, in defending terrorists any whatnot like Lynne Stewart, who definitely was abusing her role as lawyer.

    That exception aside, just defending someone isn’t wrong, no matter what they are accused of.

    Gabriel Hanna (bc876a)

  4. well it’s a little more than just defending capital cases is it, there is a pattern of behavior,
    but I agree as compared to his somelives matter activism and support of salafi it’s near beer,

    narciso (d1f714)

  5. well it’s a little more than just defending capital cases is it, there is a pattern of behavior,

    As I said, his actions as a governor are entirely fair game.

    Patterico (bcf524)

  6. but I agree as compared to his somelives matter activism and support of salafi it’s near beer,

    positively tourtel compared to his j street ties,

    Patterico (bcf524)

  7. A conservative is a liberal who’s been mugged.
    A liberal is a conservative who’s been arrested.

    That ad will resound with the authoritarians. Do they, by any chance, have one of him eating a hamburger for the vegetarians?

    Snort/giggle/snorfle. There is too much money in politics if that’s how they spend it.

    nk (dbc370)

  8. the soering case, seems a little like that netflix series, but the first two were particularly agregious, and apparently rather solid convictions, let him defend going to bat for these predators,

    narciso (d1f714)

  9. he also wants us disarmed, remember the stunt after orlando, and make the police useless, in addition to praying to skydragons,

    narciso (d1f714)

  10. he doesn’t give a farthing about crime victims, he’s nearly as corrupt as mcawful, in a just world would have been in the docket after mcdonnell, so let him have it,

    narciso (d1f714)

  11. Much like lawyers want to expand the scope of their own corner of the legal profession to encompass all things and doctors want their own particular health concerns to be national policy, Tim Kaine’s affinity for the worst defendants bled from his legal into his political career.

    Defense attorneys may do a necessary service. Whether that makes them a good presidential candidate that has to effectively represent more than just Americans at their worst is open to legitimate questioning. The ad is perfectly fine and the ‘authoritarian’ impulses it plays to are both perfectly normal and, if anything, very much atrophied in recent years.

    Democrats hiss at the name of ‘Willie Horton’ because it’s an EFFECTIVE attack. Don’t let them scare you away from it.

    Dystopia Max (76803a)

  12. @Dystopia Max:Democrats hiss at the name of ‘Willie Horton’

    Didn’t bother Al Gore to use the furlough program against Dukakis.

    Gabriel Hanna (bc876a)

  13. Well … this is the same campaign that accused Cruz of infidelity (notice I said “campaign”, I know it’s a GOP ad not a Trump ad).

    nk (dbc370)

  14. a pittance of justice is now ‘authoritarian’ seriously, if the death penalty isn’t for the first two cases, who is it for, one of them escaped at one point, if memory serves,

    narciso (d1f714)

  15. Willie Horton was a fair ad.

    But that went to the decisions of a governor.

    Patterico (bcf524)

  16. anyone supporting hillary has to be for defense counsels. It is a given.

    Jim (a9b7c7)

  17. the ad focused on those particular cases, the soering case is a little different for the class distinction, I cited the rutherford brief in the the the third instance, but it seemed sloppy,

    narciso (d1f714)

  18. The law is process. Like baking a cake. You follow the recipe which includes a zealous prosecutor on one side, a zealous defense on the other, and impartial judges and juries, and you get a reasonably palatable result. Not always, maybe never, perfect, but as good an approximation of justice as humans can get.

    nk (dbc370)

  19. Cruz’s infidelity/general weirdness/donor dependency were legitimate tells for a chaos candidate who would definitely have lost badly to Hillary Clinton’s team.

    One might say that he would have nobly refused to go against his donor-trained conscience, or professional legal courtesy from one lawyer to the next.

    It’s like the only real reason some people are against Trump is due to their own profession likely suffering a loss in status and responsibility once an avalanche of populism sweeps away the previous justification for their finely crafted legalogical niches.

    You can’t Make America Great Again! That’s illegal! Just not done! If you have to choose between national renewal and breaking the constantly-reinterpreted laws that got us here, choose the second one every time! What the heck am I here getting paid for, anyway?

    What, indeed:

    https://ratfacedman.wordpress.com/2016/06/05/capture-your-value/

    Dystopia Max (76803a)

  20. “The law is process. Like baking a cake. You follow the recipe which includes a zealous prosecutor on one side, a zealous defense on the other, and impartial judges and juries, and you get a reasonably palatable result. Not always, maybe never, perfect, but as good an approximation of justice as humans can get.”

    When the process is dominated by certain nasty actors who heavily exploit the process orientation, one starts to long for results from results-oriented people. Someone who’s probably richer and smarter than you once wrote about it:

    http://johntreed.com/blogs/john-t-reed-s-blog-about-military-matters/69792323-process-orientation-versus-results-orientation

    Dystopia Max (76803a)

  21. a con law class I took acquainted me with the baldus study, post furman, they couldn’t attack the death penalty outright, so they focused on the implementation, they gave that angle for the means of the process,

    narciso (d1f714)

  22. Meaning at some point they admitted that they really didn’t care personally about the overarching process, they were really results-oriented people who didn’t particularly care what terrible effects those results would have on the greater system or respect for the law in general (did they have homes out in the countryside away from all the people that inevitably caused legal trouble? in gated communities? were they acting as Satan’s Willing Executioners so long as they got the penthouse suite in hell? These questions are best left unasked!)

    Process-oriented thinking: really more like guidelines when you think about it!

    At some point you realize exactly the mood in which disinterested professional outsiders and middleman minorities suddenly meet tragic and completely avoidable ends.

    Dystopia Max (76803a)

  23. somewhat like moloch’s minion, who don’t mind trading in embryo organs, as long as the can get a lamborghini out of it, but one is protected by the highest officials in the land,

    narciso (d1f714)

  24. Thank you, Christoph, but I learned about ritualism in Sociology 101, from people who did not peddle self-help books and get-rich-quick schemes. The legal system I know does not practice it.

    nk (dbc370)

  25. As for your favorite results-oriented people, they ran into other results-oriented people. The notorious judge got himself blown up in his courthouse by an Allied bomb; others took poison before they could be hanged; and others got hanged.

    nk (dbc370)

  26. Agree. Being a defense attorney is legitimate work.

    Denver Guy (4750ec)

  27. well yagoda, yezhov, and beria, did get their comeuppance, but kaganovich died in his sleep, the same for their chinese counterparts,

    narciso (d1f714)

  28. One version I read about Stalin’s death is that his attending physician was his psychiatrist (psychiatrist!) and he treated his stroke with enemas. The architect of so many purges was himself “purged” was the joke.

    nk (dbc370)

  29. UPDATE: Democrats pull the same nonsense when it benefits them. B.S. is nonpartisan.

    Patterico (bcf524)

  30. i have to be honest this Kaine person’s not on my radar really all I know is he’s a senator

    us senators are not people of high moral caliber

    they’re nasty bottom feeders, and this Tim Kaine one is harvardtrash to boot

    yuck

    that said, there’s nothing wrong with being a defense attorney per se

    but this one’s been deemed pliable and craven enough to be the running mate of a diseased, criminal, and thoroughly depraved pig

    it’s really hard to see him in a good light

    a person just doesn’t get to be in the situation where this one now finds himself by being honorable and creditable

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  31. kane lip locks his backers.

    mg (31009b)

  32. here and at redstate the link in your update’s being bolloxed by a trailing apostrophe

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  33. i have to say though i think all the idea in your article at redstate about how it’s wrong to attack someone “simply for defending a criminal defendant” is a lot undermined by your insistence that it’s legitimate to attack Mr. Trump simply for following the tax laws

    in both cases neither Mr. Kaine nor Mr. Trump appears to have done anything wrong

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  34. CNSNews.com) – In fiscal 2016, which ended on Friday, the federal debt increased $1,422,827,047,452.46, according to data released today by the U.S. Treasury.

    At the close of business on Sept. 30, 2015, the last day of fiscal 2015, the federal debt was $18,150,617,666,484.33, according to the Treasury. By the close of business on Sept. 30, 2016, the last day of fiscal 2016, it had climbed to $19,573,444,713,936.79.

    According to the Census Bureau’s latest estimate, there were 118,215,000 households in the United States as of June. That means that the one-year increase in the federal debt of $1,422,827,047,452.46 in fiscal 2016 equaled about $12,036 per household.

    The total federal debt of $19,573,444,713,936.79 now equals about $165,575 per household.

    DNF (ffe548)

  35. Didn’t we start down this path in 08 with the ambulance chaser from NC who cheated on his wife and used campaign funds to hush up the husky, all while his wife was dying of cancer?

    Then it was “how dare lawyers get rich doing the job of a parasite!” or something similar in the argument. With a discussion about tort reform and limiting lawyer fees and an overall questions about or willingness to sue first in conflict resolution in this nation.

    Oh and Patterico, check your link to Hoy’s column. You have a couple of extra characters there that lead to a 404 page.

    Charles (8c8580)

  36. Would be nice if #nevertrump read this, but it is the Movement in essence, so why ask?

    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-10-03/more-confessions-economic-hit-man-time-they%E2%80%99re-coming-your-democracy

    DNF (755a85)

  37. Zerohedge is an FSB(KGB) dezinformatsiya operation.

    nk (dbc370)

  38. Well if I had actually seen the ad I might get my panties in a twist like Patterico. But since I haven’t seen the ad–and all I can see is a frothing at the mouth headline “wrong and Unamerican” I don’t know what you’re foaming about. A little context might be helpful, but our host has been on a Kamikaze NeverTrump mission for months now. The good news is that it’s possible that he’ll be calmed down say 90 days after Trump loses. The bad news is that Hillary will be President, and I’m not certain that she is the lesser of two evils.

    Skeptical Voter (1d5c8b)

  39. Skeptical Voter, I haven’t seen the ad either, but It’s enough to say they try to bust on him by implying there is something wrong in holding the government to account in presenting a cases against guilty-in-fact people as opposed to accused innocent people.

    It’s completely ethical and desirable for the government to have to follow rules, adhere to constitutional restraints and assemble a case that proves guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

    SarahW (3164f0)

  40. It’s completely ethical and desirable for an attorney to perform this function of making the government prove a case, and making the government stay within the lines of the rules that constrain its power.

    SarahW (3164f0)

  41. Patterico – your “the Democrats also do this” link to the San Louis Obispo Tribune no longer works; it goes to a ‘that could not be found’ landing page.

    aphrael (3f0569)

  42. In Knox County Tennessee, a defense attorney for one of the killers in the Christian-Newsom torture-murder case beat one of the prosecutors in an election for a judgeship.

    BTW, the defense attorney, Scott Green, ran as a Republican. The prosecutor, Leland Price, was a Democrat. Patterico would approve of the voters not blaming Green for his client’s actions.

    If you want to know (or can stand) the details of the crime, Google “Channon Chritian and Christopher Newsom.”

    DN (21cace)

  43. The ad is easy to see. You could have clicked on the second line of Patterico’s post where it says here. It takes you to YouTube embed with an arrow that you can also click. Clicking that arrow plays the ad. Two little clicks to see the ad. Click here7 for the first one.

    nk (dbc370)

  44. Bondi, McCrum, Chisholm, Nifong and Mosby have all provided very clear evidence of the need for zealous advocacy on the part of defense attorneys. I have no idea why the decision was made to bark at this particular tree wrt Kaine so I’ll chalk it up to 2016 – the year of endemic stupidity in the GOP.

    Rick Ballard (1aa129)

  45. We have had a long history of the presumption of “innocent until proven guilty” and the burden of proof being on the prosecution. In point of fact, legally speaking no defendant is guilty until convicted. Is this a perfect system? No, but then we don’t get perfect systems. Bad as what we have can be when it’s abused, it’s better than the alternatives out there.

    And as for “technicalities”, the technicalities in question can often involve violations of a person’s constitutional rights, such as the right to be secure against unreasonable searches and seizures. Sorry, that doesn’t sound like a technicality to me. Does it mean the bad guy sometimes walks? Maybe. Do you really want to be stopped and searched at any time for any reason (or no reason?)without the police having to justify the action? To have the police come into your house without a warrant and interrogate your family and search your premises? The point of the those amendments in the constitution is not to protect criminals, but to protect citizens from the abuses and power of a centralized government. Just as the point of the second amendment of the constitution is not to allow people to possess and own guns for the purpose of murdering people and committing crimes, but to to protect citizen’s right to keep and bear arms for self defense and defense of their liberties. Just as the point of the first amendment is not to protect liars, but to protect people’s freedom of expression. People abuse those right, that’s true. What’s the answer? How much are you willing to allow the state to grow? Because government is a double edged sword and its powers can be flipped around in ways that its supporters never intended with the never-ending refrain of “but this isn’t what I meant”

    lordmacnoob (26ac75)

  46. the sequence of the clicks is key

    happyfeet (28a91b)

  47. “Thank you, Christoph, but I learned about ritualism in Sociology 101, from people who did not peddle self-help books and get-rich-quick schemes. The legal system I know does not practice it.”

    The legal system does, of course, train certified midwits to practice slanderously posturing against people who are in fact very much smarter than them. Otherwise you would never, ever, have called John T. Reed a purveyor of ‘get-rich quick schemes’, he is in fact something like the opposite:

    http://www.johntreed.com/blogs/john-t-reed-s-real-estate-investment-blog/61653315-john-t-reed-s-views-of-various-real-estate-investment-gurus-part-1

    “As for your favorite results-oriented people, they ran into other results-oriented people. The notorious judge got himself blown up in his courthouse by an Allied bomb; others took poison before they could be hanged; and others got hanged.”

    Sounds like a nice legal and political precedent to take on some new targets to me!

    Dystopia Max (76803a)

  48. Yes, yes, it is. It is even codified as the Nuremberg Protocols. You must have read a book. And you also know that alt.schnitzel-in-das-arschloch were the targets and will be again.

    nk (dbc370)

  49. @nk: Do you have any non-Godwin arguments?

    Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1)

  50. Gabriel, do you have any idea what you’re commenting about when you comment?

    nk (dbc370)

  51. @nk:Gabriel, do you have any idea what you’re commenting about when you comment?

    Yep. See you reaching for the Godwin a lot.

    Then there were your charming stories about Trump’s penis.

    Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1)

  52. Your disingenuousness has an awesome quality to it, like the hindquarters of an elephant. You are easily the most dishonest commenter on this site in your snipes against both the hosts and other commenters.

    nk (dbc370)

  53. Clearly the right position to take, Patterico. Also, distinguishable from the “HRC defends a child rapist, gets him a light sentence, and laughs about it” controversy, as the point that angered a lot of people was her apparent attitude about the incident, not the fact that she defended a child rapist in the first place.

    M Scott Eiland (1edade)

  54. @nk:You are easily the most dishonest commenter on this site in your snipes against both the hosts and other commenters.

    Wow. I’m the most dishonest by an overwhelming margin? I would love to see what your evidence is for that.

    Did you not write the Trump penis stories then? If I’m wrong, you know, maybe I confused you with someone else.

    Gabriel Hanna (64d4e1)

  55. I did not only write Tiny Donnie Teeny Weenie stories, I constantly deride Shortfinger about his “NothingToBragAbout”.

    And that will be your last bone for a while. For Christoph, too.

    nk (dbc370)

  56. “Yes, yes, it is. It is even codified as the Nuremberg Protocols. You must have read a book.”

    Yes. You’ll recall that they were put into place by a certain power whose enforcers may in fact now be much more sympathetic to the counterparty. Like a certain popular alt-rightist says:

    https://twitter.com/JohnRiversToo/status/739894566568878080

    You really sure this line of argumentation is, y’know, good for your ingroup?

    “And you also know that alt.schnitzel-in-das-arschloch were the targets and will be again.”

    So we can definitely put nk down for wanting to murder the gays, then? I know Milo can be annoying, but it does seem a bit extreme relative to the culture you want to lead, and the contributions of LGBT members to it, and especially the lawyering community.

    Dystopia Max (76803a)

  57. I don’t think all gays are Nazis. I think all Nazis are c**cksucking fa**ots. For the record.

    nk (dbc370)

  58. I do appreciate the re-introduction, normalizing of proper anti-gay language, hope we see more of it IRL from you, as you certainly won’t suffer for it career-wise using it around co-workers.

    Dystopia Max (76803a)

  59. Du bist ein gut hund, Christoph. And that’s the last bone I’ll throw you for a while.

    nk (dbc370)

  60. Why, it’s almost as though a Jew can shamelessly and fluently fall into the language of ancient tyrannies personal division when called out on his particular hypocrisies.

    Dystopia Max (76803a)

  61. Why, it’s almost as though a Jew can shamelessly and fluently fall into the language of ancient tyrannies personal division when called out on his particular hypocrisies.

    Goodbye. Do not darken the door of this blog again.

    Patterico (b7c0f1)

  62. narciso (d1f714) — 10/3/2016 @ 8:57 pm

    he’s nearly as corrupt as mcawful, in a just world would have been in the docket after mcdonnell

    I have to feel that is true because why else do you suppose Hillary Clinton picked him as her vice president?

    Sammy Finkelman (57e37d)

  63. DNF (ffe548) — 10/4/2016 @ 4:10 am

    According to the Census Bureau’s latest estimate, there were 118,215,000 households in the United States as of June. That means that the one-year increase in the federal debt of $1,422,827,047,452.46 in fiscal 2016 equaled about $12,036 per household.

    The total federal debt of $19,573,444,713,936.79 now equals about $165,575 per household.

    Do we have a tax system that taxes people an equal dollar amount per household?

    Sammy Finkelman (57e37d)

  64. 29.nk (dbc370) — 10/3/2016 @ 10:05 pm

    One version I read about Stalin’s death is that his attending physician was his psychiatrist (psychiatrist!) and he treated his stroke with enemas. The architect of so many purges was himself “purged” was the joke.

    No, they gave him Coumadin for his stroke. Of course, if hiswas on purpose, it makes the “doctor’s plot” true, at least in one case. Stalin was going to purge doctors. (or maybe Jews. But I would think that doctors would think it was doctors.)

    http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/Human_Rights/plot.html

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctors%27_plot

    http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/05/world/new-study-supports-idea-stalin-was-poisoned.html

    Relying on a previously secret account by doctors of Stalin’s final days, its authors suggest that he may have been poisoned with warfarin, a tasteless and colorless blood thinner also used as a rat killer, during a final dinner with four members of his Politburo.

    Sammy Finkelman (57e37d)

  65. the point I was making is unlike freisler, goebbels, goering et al, these men who killed tens of millions, were not held accountable for their crimes,

    narciso (d1f714)

  66. here and at redstate the link in your update’s being bolloxed by a trailing apostrophe

    Thank you. I just now saw that. I have fixed it, not that anyone cares now.

    Patterico (bcf524)

  67. i have to say though i think all the idea in your article at redstate about how it’s wrong to attack someone “simply for defending a criminal defendant” is a lot undermined by your insistence that it’s legitimate to attack Mr. Trump simply for following the tax laws

    Could you do me a favor and link and quote my language where I so insist?

    Patterico (bcf524)

  68. Occasionally, a bad guy walks. Is a defense attorney allowed to slack off when he’s convinced his client is guilty, or thinks it likely? No. He can dump the case on somebody else who won’t slack off, I suppose.
    The result is that some bad guys walk. This costs the rest of us. It would be useful if the defense community acknowledged this instead of sneering we must want to abrogate the Constitution.

    Richard Aubrey (472a6f)


Powered by WordPress.

Page loaded in: 0.1026 secs.