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Showing posts with label hate crimes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hate crimes. Show all posts

Saturday, July 2, 2011

Rich asshole framed for rape?

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Based on what New York prosecutors have discovered about their client regarding the DSK rape allegation, we may actually have a case here in which a bona fide member of the global elite community may have been falsely accused of something. Sez the New York Times:
Investigators with the Manhattan district attorney’s office learned the call had been recorded and had it translated from a “unique dialect of Fulani,” a language from the woman’s native country, Guinea, according to a well-placed law enforcement official.

When the conversation was translated — a job completed only this Wednesday — investigators were alarmed: “She says words to the effect of, ‘Don’t worry, this guy has a lot of money. I know what I’m doing,’ ” the official said.
But then again, maybe not. Press leaks about an allegedly lying rape victim do not constitute an acquittal of the accused. Outside of the Gucci law office that is a privilege of a gentleman of DSK's standing and the Manhattan District Attorney's office, we  know only a few things for certain. One is that a person is innocent of an accusation until proven guilty. Another is that raping a woman who lies, or may even be a "gold-digger," is a crime nevertheless.

Beyond those things, there is a certain conjecture (for a hypothetical case, naturally) that may not be automatically false; namely, a case in which two nasty, cynical people might simultaneously try to do something horrible to each other at different coordinates of human experience, so to speak. For example, a hardened woman without conscience might be willing to entrap a rich asshole into raping her in return for a huge payday, and a misogynist asshole may follow his dick and the woman's "script" into committing an act of sexual violence. Interesting legal and existential questions follow for the ages, not to mention a zillion insipid talk show interviews, a tell-all book by those "who have knowledge" of the situation, and a Hollywood blockbuster based on a true story.

Many other conjectures are possible, too, so the one put forth above means approximately nothing.

Meanwhile, based on what I heard on NPR this morning, irrespective of what may have happened in that Schrodinger's cathouse of a hotel suite, I think that a majority of French citizens will jump at the chance to greet DSK as if he were a returning war hero and rid themselves of the ridiculous President Nicolas Sarkozy in next year's national election. After all, at least one conspiracy narrative emerged very quickly on the heels of DSK's May arrest. It's feasible that Sarkozy could find himself as an unwilling partner in a metaphorical menage a trois.

Editor's note: I saw this story first at Balloon Juice.

Saturday, June 13, 2009

More Fox Effect

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As seen first on TPM: the Executive Director of Minutemen American Defense (MAD*), Shawna Forde, and two others arrested on charges related to a double homicide in Arizona. Two members of a family with a Hispanic surname were reported to have been murdered in a 30 May home invasion 10 miles north of the border. Authorities suspect premeditated murder as part of a scheme by "thieves looking for drugs and money," according to the report. The Post-Intelligencer referred to the alleged home invasion ringleader as an "anti-immigration activist." That's some nice post-intelligence newswriting, I'd say. Here is an undated and unedited statement by Ms. Forde, copied and pasted directly from the MAD web page (go find it yourself, I'm not linking to it):
I would like to let everyone know that we are in full operation we have people coming from Florida and other parts of the country to assist in gathering exclusive footage of drug cartel drug smuggling and humane trafficking.
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* No shit!

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

The Fox Effect [updated]

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Here's a timely example of The Fox Effect. It's about 30 seconds into a Glenn Beck segment:

"It's no longer dis... un... uh... respectable to be antisemitic on The Left."

Triple play! Some nobody on Fox immediately found a way to connect today's Nazi-inspired terrorism at the Holocaust Museum to the Palestinian people and American liberals while obscuring the fact that the suspect in custody for the shooting is an extreme right-winger with a history and a following. You know, just like Glenn Beck.

Yes, let's call it The Fox Effect. Even Shepard Smith knows it.

Update: as Martha Gellhorn's Ghost implies in the comments, The Fox Effect, like Mephistophiles, is known by many names. And it looks like she came up with a valid alternate coinage.

I have a better name for it

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Let's not call it "The Obama Effect." The correct name for it is "The Fox Effect."