I'm not proposing Law & Order is the place to learn the law, but at least their consultants ensured they got those basic facts right.

To be sure, Law and Order does an excellent job of getting the law right. They have good consultants, they listen to them, and they are justly proud of the fact.

The one area where they take poetic license (as they must) is that it seems as if a homicide takes a couple of weeks from crime scene investigtion to jury verdict. Most major cases take over a year to go to trial.

A couple of weeks ago I got to meet Sam Waterston and Linus Roache through an old friend, an actor who often appears on L&O. Waterston said that when he meets ADA's they mostly say that the show gets it right but they wish they could wrap up their cases in under an hour!

wbgonne:

While I am not fully familar with federal criminal procedure I do know it does not permit pre-trial detention without due process. The point you keep making is that preventative detention without due process is nothing new. So citing federal crim pro does absolutely nothing to support your argument.

The preventative detention procedure you seem so sure Obama will design and implement is so full of safeguards, independent review, and checks and balances it sounds to me indistinguishable from our current criminal justice system.

So I ask you: exactly why do we need to create this whole parallel system?

That case, which involves whether due process needs to be observed in revocation of parole [which is a mediation of punishment and takes place after due process] and the case referred to as precedent...Macene v. MJW...is allowing for flexibility in due process, AS LONG AS EVENTUALLY DUE PROCESS IS OBVSERVED.

This is what I get for coming to the debate 17 pages in.

Revocation of parole?? Holy Toledo, talk about apples and orangutans!

Parole is a get-out-of-jail-free card. The convicted prisoner signs away all kinds of basic constitutional rights in exchange for (as you said) a shorter sentence, including a full, warrantless, unannounced search of his premises at any time for any reason or no reason. (Believe me, it's one of my favorite arrows in the quill!)

He still hasn't answered me: if Obama's program is so chock full o' due process, what's wrong with the system we've got?

If courts (as he correctly points out) show such huge deference for national security, then why the need for a parallel system?

I'm fine with military tribunals (real ones, not MCA joke trials) for KSM and a couple of other special cases, but the fed crim system is fine for the rest of 'em. I think this is just a bunch of political theater from Obama.

I almost fell out of my chair when I read

“I felt she could be very judgmental in the sense that she doesn’t let you finish your argument before she jumps in and starts asking questions,” said Sheema Chaudhry.

I can only conclude that Ms. Chaudhry wasn't on moot court in law school and that her appearance before Sotomayor was the only time she has ever set foot in an appellate courtroom.

That Johan Santana is so rude! I batted against him and he kept throwing balls in the strike zone that I couldn't hit!

Either judicial cases -- such as Ricci -- should be decided on the law and binding, relevant precedent, or they should be decided based on empathy for Frank Ricci and the alleged unfairness of affirmative action policies. Which is it?

I choose a) cases should be decided on the law and binding, relevant precedent, and not on "empathy" for either party.

Why on earth Obama introduced the dreaded E-word into the discourse I will never know.

Isn't that the same Krauthammer who thinks that there should be no prosecutions for torture, that are legally required, based on an empathetic plea that the GW admin was doing it's best to protect us and we should cut them some slack?

-- muntaba

Exactly! Precisely why I have been arguing here that "empathy" was a completely inappropriate criterion for Obama to identify as a desired judicial quality.

Off-topic, Glenn :) but hey, it's your forum.

You're the one who asked "what's changed?", Bozo.

I don't think I have ever posted such a comment in over three years here, but Glenn I would like to thank you for the work you've done on the Sotomayor pick, especially in exposing and discrediting Rosen's hit piece.

I know you're not entirely wild about Justice Sotomayor, but you defended her for all the right reasons. The more I hear and read about her, the happier I am with the nomination. She's my kind of pick: not a doctrinaire liberal, but mostly left-leaning, although tough on crime (a former New York City A.D.A! Yeah, baby!!), and clearly not a judge who would let her sympathy for one party or another lead her to a ruling unsupported by the law. From my colleagues in the New York City criminal justice community I hear almost unanimous praise from all sides: People and defense, conservative and liberal.

I was deeply offended by the picture Rosen and his mindless followers tried to paint of an unintelligent, obnoxious woman. I have almost unending respect for Justice Sotomayor and what she has accompished in her life.

I believe your efforts had both a significant and helpful impact on the mainstream discourse - I've seen the fact that Rosen's piece was discredited and at least partially retracted reported far and wide in the MSM - and for that you deserve great credit.

Thank you.

Talk about three-martini lunches...

Sir, you are drunk, and an idiot. In the morning, you will be sober. However, you will still be an idiot.

Now don't you have a WTC7 conspiracy convention to attend?