Pardon hysteria just 'pure folly'
10:28 PM, Mar. 5, 2012 |
Up in Jackson it sounded as if Chicken Little had flown into town screaming, "The criminals are a comin'! The criminals are a comin'! ..."
It wasn't Mr. Little screaming of death and disaster. It was Mr. Hood, our attorney general and former legal associate of Dickie Scruggs and Scruggs' brother-in-law, Trent Lott.
Hood was declaring to the world how Haley Barbour had just unleashed the Great Escape upon the people of Mississippi.
According to the AG it was the greatest escape in the history of the state, springing more than 200 criminals, including murderers, rapists and pedophiles who were now rolling across our state like fogs of napalm, doing-in our people and pillaging the state.
The mass hysteria created by Jim Hood and the press is pure folly, shameful and politically driven.
To put it in the local vernacular, Hood and a nettled press have taken the sugar ant's hill and made themselves a mountain of fiery fire ants.
The truth is 192 of these people were given pardons; thereby restoring their constitutional rights of citizenship.
These people, with the exception of 10, had served their time; many of them had been out of prison for years and are productive "non-citizens" of our state.
This presumes 10 who were directly pardoned from prison, with four serving time for murder.
Of these four murderers, Haley Barbour stated, "I have absolute confidence, so much confidence, that I'd let my grandchildren play with them."
The issue here is the pardoning of four convicted murderers and should not be confused with the restoration the constitutional rights to almost 200 people who have proven themselves.
This issue has every state-level politician tiptoeing through the pansy fields of political gun powder; each afraid their re-election could be jeopardized by taking a stand based on rational reasoning.
Even our new Gov. Phil Bryant is already dodging grenades.
He has immediately addressed the so-called problem by eliminating the time-honored governor's mansion prisoner workforce program, and at the same time, has requested the state Legislature provide him with an additional $119,000 to cover the wages of the folks who will be assuming the duties of the now-defunct prisoner work program.
The Mississippi Supreme Court will make its decision soon, determining if the governor of Mississippi has the constitutional right to grant pardons to convicted felons.
It is interesting to note: our Supreme Court justices are elected by the people, not appointed. Will this fact enter into the decision to be handed down by the court? I hope not.
Jack Knight is a retired Los Angeles City Schools mathematics and computer science teacher. Reach him at knight3230@bellsouth.net.
No comments:
Post a Comment