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I Have Questions
Twitter is revelatory. The general population has probably always had a stupid streak, but Twitter makes it possible for ignorance to light itself on fire and burn so brightly it overwhelms the sun.
Reading the rants about the Kyle Rittenhouse trial is something else. First, there seems to be a large segment of the population who thinks the prosecution is doing a good job. Now, granted, I just catch the “lowlights,” but from what I have seen, Assistant District Attorney Thomas Binger has been surprised way too many times by his own witnesses.
Second, the “conventional wisdom” about the law is astoundingly bad. I mean, most people commenting on the trial would be confused watching a Matlock rerun. I could be a very rich man if I could collect a dollar from everyone who assured their fellow progressives that, no matter what, the prosecution will eventually win on appeal. That’s how bad civics education is. How the hell do that many people believe an acquittal can be appealed all the way up to the Supreme Court?
And the comments about the presiding judge, Bruce Schroeder, are something else, too. Local attorneys describe him as fair but willing to be combative. My theory, which would be easy to prove or disprove with the proper resources, is that this is not the first time this judge has witnessed this prosecutor’s ineptitude. But no journalist seems even remotely interested in any backstory between them. The media loves the clips of Schroeder’s admonitions, but doesn’t go out of their way to make clear that he makes sure the jury is out of the room when he does it.
Rittenhouse will probably be convicted on the gun charge. There is no doubt that he was underage and outside the home with a firearm. The man who supplied the weapon is probably in more trouble than the person who fired it. There is a persistent belief that Rittenhouse, who lives in Antioch, IL, carried the rifle across state lines into Wisconsin. He did not. And even if he did, there is no Federal law against that. (States have their own transport regulations but anything interstate would be the jurisdiction of the Feds.)
But one never knows how a jury will rule. Especially one that feels intimidated. The political pressure has been huge, which is why in so many of these cases overcharging has become the norm. The DA feels the heat, the jury feels the heat, and so does the judge. My only hope is that the jury is more informed than the folks on Twitter.
Published in General
Well Kyle redeemed two of them and made a believer of the third.
Slight point of order. That is indeed irrelevant to judging them guilty of a subsequent crime in a court of law. It is HIGHLY relevant to whether he should have shot them. Know them by their fruits, and they wear it on their faces, in their speech, in their conduct. It was obvious that these were bad actors, in a way which does not bear isolating from the past — they bring the past with them.
Good riddance.
After Bernie Goetz shot four muggers on the New York subway in 1984, Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa noted that street thugs suddenly became more cautious and circumspect, especially around nerds and “poindexters” whom they had previously regarded as easy prey.
Those three assailants in Kenosha, so filled with hate and bloodlust that they attacked an armed man, were the product of an environment which had taught them that they could repeatedly attack and injure people with no consequences. Next time around, Antifa and BLM thugs will be more cautious.
And just prisons, let alone the death penalty, would seem to be largely about “at this point, we don’t much care what contributions they MIGHT make if they weren’t currently locked up (or executed).”
Honest question, are there any stories out there of reformed Antifa members? I can’t think of a single one. The types of people who join these groups seem to have, how do I put this politely, “chemical imbalances” that lead to their violent outbursts. When the problem is an actual mental illness, it seems to me that they already don’t possess the kind of reasoning skills that would lead to a “come to Jesus” moment where they decide to walk the straight and narrow.
Honestly, I don’t know what point KE is trying to make. Whether or not the individuals who were shot had behaved badly in the past is irrelevant to the legality and appropriateness of Mr. Rittenhouse killing them. If someone wants to make some kind of argument based on some theory of their worthiness, some kind of defense of the justification of killing people because, well, their track record suggests that they might do future bad things, then go for it. I’ll take no part.
If the court finds, as I hope it does, that Rittenhouse was justified in shooting people who were threatening him, that’s enough for me. Whether or not KE believes they were pond scum worthy of being gunned down in the street — or whatever it is he’s suggesting — is irrelevant to me.
I’m your Huckleberry. Please bear in mind that they were trying to kill (or threatening to kill) Kyle Rittenhouse. That completes it for me.
We are not required to treat each person we meet as if we have no knowledge. We have knowledge. That’s what our brains are for.
I believe that you are the one who introduced the subject of hypothetical futures for the Rhodes scholars who tried to kill Kyle Rittenhouse. I don’t give a hoot.
I’m with Kyle.
And that they might have later repented and achieved greatness if only they hadn’t encountered Kyle Rittenhouse that night – e.g., if he had stayed home like a good boy – I’d call that irrelevant too.
Let’s examine that.
The implication of your comment is that the degree to which Mr. Rittenhouse was justified in shooting his assailants depends to some extent on their past behavior. But presumably Mr. Rittenhouse didn’t know — couldn’t know — their past behavior.
So you’re saying that the justification — legal or moral; I’m not sure which you mean — of his actions is dependent on the unknown history of people who were attacking him.
Is that really the standard you wish to apply when evaluating self-defense shootings? Do we get to look at the people shot and say “Well, he was a very good kid until this night, so we should condemn and/or convict the shooter?” Because I think that’s where this goes.
Sorry, I won’t go there with you. If I shoot someone who attacks me, I don’t want his past behavior to be a consideration in the defense of my own actions. I reject that kind of thinking.
Use the rest of the quote, please. It’s there for a reason.
No. I was responding to KE doing that, pointing out that speculating about what the young miscreants might do in the future is irrelevant. Don’t mischaracterize my position. Go back and read post #384 and you’ll see that KE introduced the point, which I think is irrelevant.
I beg your pardon. I’ll go back. Sorry, ke, but I typically skim your stuff.
I could see that being a one-way street: having been previously angelic shouldn’t count against your self-defense claim, but if they’ve previously been aggressive/violent that should be allowed to support it. The likelihood that someone who’s been violent before was being violent again, could easily be relevant. Especially if it bears upon untreated mental issues.
It doesn’t make your comment any more sensible. But I’ll oblige:
When you say “whether he should have shot them,” you are making an argument about the justification — moral, legal, something — of his actions.
Now, if your whole point is that it’s good that they’re dead, then, while I find that kind of grotesque, I can accept the logic of it. But if you’re saying that whether or not Rittenhouse should have shot them depends on aspects of their past about which he knew nothing, then I’ll call that nonsensical.
And I don’t know how else to interpret your comment than that you are saying that whether or not he was justified in shooting them — should have shot them — is dependent on some aspect of their past. I reject that.
Are you sure that those arguments are about whether Kyle Rittenhouse himself knew them in advance, or whether the court can have consideration of them in the handling of the case?
Hank (Can I call you Hank?), you are correct that kedavis brought up hypotheticals. But I’ll gently stand on my prior position because:
It is in this sense that I feel you introduced the hypothetical disposition of these men’s souls, as opposed to their conduct that evening, whether interrupted by Rittenhouse or not.
I think it is well justified to assume that those rioting before being shot by Rittenhouse would have continued rioting at least that evening. That is an hypothetical, but hardly of the same order as allowing for their eventual conversion to some better life an unknown time period later.
They took this urgency of consideration upon themselves when they attacked Rittenhouse. They had the rest of their lives to figure out how to live better — they denied themselves that opportunity through their hostile disregard (at a minimum) for the good order that allows most of us to sleep through this and read the news the next day. It’s on their heads, they called it, it came, and I am comfortable with it.
It’s easy to get heated about this stuff. It’s easy to think that accusing Rittenhouse of poor judgment is tantamount to defending his attackers. It’s easy to think that defending Rittenhouse for shooting his attackers is tantamount to defending vigilantism. Neither is the case.
I’m not inclined to feel a great deal of sorrow about violent thugs meeting an early demise. I’m also inclined to believe that, occasionally, young men with bad starts turn out okay. My suspicion is that Rittenhouse probably spared the world future problems by removing two problematic individuals. But I’m not going to celebrate that, because I’m not God and I don’t know what would have happened to the young men who died. I suspect they’d probably end up hurting someone else, but I don’t know that.
So we have courts and due process and a system of laws and the means to enforce them. I won’t applaud reckless vigilantism, which is what I think the case of Mr. Rittenhouse represents. At the same time, I’ll defend his right to defend himself.
What I won’t do, because I think it’s presumptuous, is pretend to know what would have become of the men Rittenhouse killed, and to base my opinion of his actions on that supposition. I’ll defend his right to kill them in the circumstances. I won’t lose any sleep over their deaths. But I won’t pretend to know that the world is a better place because they’re gone. I’m not God.
In terms of what was happening that night – at least a couple of them had already started fires, one of which KR had previously extinguished – and in line with BDB’s assertion/recognition that they weren’t likely on their way home when they attacked KR, it seems undeniable that they would have done SOME more violence even THAT NIGHT, if they hadn’t been (in two cases, permanently) stopped.
We can ponder or even argue about how MUCH damage – if they were enraged enough to attack KR they might easily have attacked one or more unarmed people, perhaps with very tragic result – but it seems undeniable that they weren’t FINISHED causing damage/destruction when then met up with KR. But they WERE finished causing damage/destruction AFTER they met up with KR.
Even the one who was only wounded, may be permanently retired from rioting. Martha Stewart tells me “it’s a good thing.”
As James Taranto used to say (sarcastically), “What would we do without experts?”
Yes, I understand your point. I just don’t wish to make the kinds of judgments you’re making. Self defense, legal standing, things like that: okay. Speculating on the future value of a human life: you’re welcome to do that; it just doesn’t interest me.
Then shouldn’t you also oppose prison sentences, since if they weren’t locked up they might accomplish great things? Sure, maybe they’ll still accomplish great things after prison (if they get out at all), but they would have a lot more time for potential greatness if they weren’t locked up.
No. We don’t try and convict people because of things they might do. We try and convict them of things they have done.
Rittenhouse shot people because of what they were doing. That shooting was not in any sense legitimate because those people might go on to do bad things — any more than it was illegitimate because those people might go on to do good things.
Again, you’re welcome to speculate about what people might do in the future. I think it’s irrelevant to both the legal and moral justification of what Rittenhouse did. You look into the souls of the dead men and speculate however you wish.
Fair enough. I do not pretend to know either. I just say that reasonable decisions can be made given the information available at the time. And if the questions is forced, then it will be along those lines.
This may be off-topic, but speaking of “redemption”, earthly redemption isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.
I knew a guy who was a hit man. He used to tell gross stories. For him shooting someone was a highly erotic experience. He was serving functionally a life sentence. He’s probably passed on by now, so I’ll write a bit about him.
In prison he turned to his religious heritage; and he was rather sedate, and said that he wished he hadn’t lived his life the way he did, but he fully knew why he was spending his life in prison, and approved of it as just. [This comment has been edited down a bit.]
I’ll add for contrast ***********************
According to his friend Jacob Marshall, who is pictured with Grosskreutz, the BLM supporter’s “only regret was not killing the kid and hesitating to pull the gun before emptying the entire mag into him.”
GRAPHIC: A friend of the man who rushed at the #Kenosha teen with a pistol and was shot in the arm has posted an update about his status. Doctors were able to save Gaige Grosskreutz’s right arm. The friend says Gaige regrets not being able to kill the teen. —
12:47 PM · Aug 27, 2020·Twitter Web App
This is where you lose me.
It used to be considered a sign of good citizenship to step in and hold the line when the authorities failed.
What the hell happened to us?
A large fraction of identified Antifa thugs have histories of mental illness, violence, sex crimes, etc.
I have heard Antifa organizers have a policy of recruiting crazy people, precisely because their violence is useful.
Not that many years ago the public was horrified when people just stood around while some victim was being attacked. (Despite what I am told the law is in Wisconsin, I do not see much if any moral distinction between attacks on property and attacks on persons, as that property represents someone’s personal time and energy (life) in creating or acquiring that property.)
It’s totally likely I’m stealing a thought from a Ricochetti, but I have so much bouncing around in my noggin at the moment I can’t keep things straight, but someone somewhere mentioned something like specializing us makes us more dependent.
Or maybe that’s my own thought that someone managed to bring to bear on this topic that I didn’t think to connect it to.
Rufus, was that you? No! It was my HUSBAND!
If things do get that bad, I can blame all the “reasonable” conservatives who will have moved the goal posts.
For what it’s worth, if the law in WI is like it is most places, the criminal background of the “victims” can only come in as evidence in very limited circumstances. If the only point is to show that we shouldn’t feel bad that they’re dead, then the criminal background can’t come in at all. Obviously that’s not legally relevant and the jury shouldn’t even consider that question. The jury’s only job is to say whether the state proved the case or not, not judge the value of the defendant’s action in the grand scheme of things.
Beyond that, it can get a little complicated.
If the victims have a reputation for initiating violence, that can come in, but only if there is a question as to who started the fight, and only as the reputation bears on that question. The victims reputation of being a child molester, then, would not be admitted. Also, only reputation evidence can be admitted in that circumstance, not evidence of specific unrelated prior bad acts. So, a witness can say that “victim X is known as a hot-head who starts fights,” but cannot say “I saw victim X attack someone back in 2015.” This is partly to keep the trial from devolving into little mini-trials on prior events only tangentially related to the case.
Specific prior bad acts can come in as evidence if the defendant knew of them (which almost requires the defendant to testify), and if they contribute to his belief that his life was in danger. So, Rittenhouse could say (if it were true), “I saw him attack and try to kill someone back in 2015,” because that would be directly relevant to what he believed was going to happen to him.
To be clear, this is just generic law, which I think is interesting for background context, but as the evidence came out, doesn’t necessarily apply to Rittenhouse’s case. I think the judge handled all of this appropriately.