I'm Still Not Buying It

Thought for the day:  The very rich are different from you and me. [F. Scott Fitzgerald]

Yeah, big bucks often make a huge difference in the way people behave, and not always in a positive direction. For some, it's as though they were born with a perpetual winning poker hand stuffed up their sleeve, so they don't even bother to put any effort into playing the game fairly. If they commit a crime, the results too often disprove the axiom that all people are equal under the law.

Lawyers believe a man is innocent until proven broke. [Robin Hall]

Two years ago, I wrote the post I'm Not Buying It, about affluenza, and in particular, how it was successfully used as a defense in a murder trial. If you missed it, or don't remember it, you might want to go check it out before reading this follow-up.

Go ahead... I'll wait.

No? Okay, if you don't want to be bothered to read the earlier post, no biggie. In a nutshell, while inebriated on beer and valium, a sixteen-year-old boy named Ethan Couch killed four people when he plowed his speeding truck into them. Eleven other people were injured, including some of his friends who were in the truck with him, one of whom will be paralyzed for life. But Couch wasn't concerned. He knew he'd get away with it, because he'd gotten away with every other thing he'd ever done. And he was right; essentially, he did get away with it. See, his lawyer claimed a defense of affluenza, and a psychologist testified that the boy was a product of affluenza, and thus, unable to link his bad behavior with consequences because he had been raised to believe wealth buys privilege. And the judge agreed.

The slap-on-the-wrist punishment rubbed me all kinds of the wrong way, and it did the same to a bunch of you who commented, as well. I wrote: If his so-called affliction was caused by a lack of consequences, how exactly does shielding him yet again from the consequences of his behavior cure that affliction? Talk about the ultimate irony. How will "getting out of it" change his behavior?

Turns out, I was right. It hasn't changed his behavior at all, and Couch is back in the news again. He's still in the midst of serving his ten years' probation, (big whoop!) but recently, a video surfaced of him boozing it up and partying wildly with the assistance of a beer bong. Which is, of course, a probation violation, even for someone who's never faced consequences for a damned thing he's ever done before. It seems his mother didn't want her widdle boy to face consequences this time, either. So the two of them skipped town. Skipped the whole country, as a matter of fact. They threw a bon voyage party of a sort, dyed his hair, slapped a fake beard on him, withdrew thirty thousand dollars (pocket change?) out of the bank, and took off for Mexico.

[wikipedia]

They were caught in a luxury hotel in Puerto Vallarta. I guess they thought it'd be safe to use one of their cell phones to order a pizza, huh?

They thought wrong.

However, the story hasn't ended. Although he remains in police custody in Mexico, his high-dollar lawyers are doing everything they can to prevent extradition. No telling how long it'll take before their stalling tactics run out and he's forced to come back to face the music. Maybe. Maybe for the first time in his life, he will have to pay some consequences.

His mama? She's already been sent back to Texas, where she began belly-aching bitterly about the conditions of the jail cell where she was being held. Earlier this week, she was released on bail. I'm sure she appreciates the accommodations of her home a lot more, but she probably isn't too thrilled with her new less-than-fashionable ankle bracelet.

[morguefile]

Because young Couch will be turning eighteen in the spring, the sheriff and district attorney are trying to have his case transferred to the adult court. Then, affluenza or no affluenza, his long string of luck based on his perpetually winning hand of privilege may finally run out, and the only joker left standing may be... him.

So what do you think? Should he be tried as an adult? Serve time in jail? How about his mother? Should she serve time for taking him out of the country?

Ah yes, the rich truly are different. Like a post I saw on Facebook, most of us weren't raised with a case of affluenza... it was more a case of poorlio.

And you know what? I'd say we're all better off for it.





                                      Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

The Waters of Justice Sometimes Trickle

Thought for the day:  Justice is truth in action.  [Benjamin Disraeli]

EXTRA! EXTRA! [National Archives]

A couple years ago, I wrote a two-part post, Art and the Human Spirit, about the internment of Japanese-American citizens during WWII. Those posts focused on human resilience, but today's post is going to approach the internments from a different angle. From the angle of justice.

[courtesy of Karen Korematsu and the Korematsu Institute]

Fred Korematsu was one of many Japanese-Americans living on the west coast at the beginning of World War II, when President Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066, which authorized the internment of all people of Japanese descent into what was euphemistically called relocation camps. On May 3, 1942, General DeWitt ordered 120,000 Japanese-Americans to report  to Assembly Centers six days later as a prelude to their incarceration.

[National Archives]

As American citizens, many of whom were born and raised in the United States, these men, women, and children considered themselves to be red-white-and-blue American patriots. They hung banners and signs from their businesses declaring their allegiance, but it didn't matter, because they couldn't change the way they looked.

Tanforan Assembly Center [National Archives]

Twenty-two-year-old Fred Korematsu and his family were to be transported to Tanforan Assembly Center, where they'd be kept in converted horse stalls until assigned and relocated to camp. But Fred didn't believe the government had the constitutional right to imprison its own citizens without benefit of trial, hearing, or filing of charges. So he didn't go.

Waiting to be taken to camp. [National Archives]

He was nabbed on May 30 for looking like a Jap while standing on an Oakland street corner, and on September 8, was convicted in federal court for defying the order to report for relocation. He received five years' probation... but was sent immediately to Tanforan. Then, like so many others, he was put on a train to his assigned internment camp.

Topaz, Utah camp [National Archives]

Like the rest of his family, he was incarcerated in a desolate camp in Topaz, Utah. There, he lived in a horse stall lit by a single light bulb. He said conditions were worse there than in the jails.

Other residents of the camp avoided him, because they considered him to be a troublemaker, and thought his defiance was wrong and disrespectful. He continued to believe in their constitutional rights, and in the American justice system, and he was sure he would find justice in the courtroom.

Supreme Court building [Wikipedia]

The ACLU used his case to test the legality of the WWII incarcerations, and after losing several appeals, his case made its way to the Supreme Court in 1944. There, in a 6-3 ruling, it was determined that your ethnic affiliation can predispose you to disloyalty if you're an American of Japanese descent, and that compulsory exclusion, though constitutionally suspect, is justified during circumstances of emergency and peril. 

But Korematsu didn't give up He continued to pursue his plea of innocence. A special commission formed by President Carter concluded in 1982 that the internment of Japanese-American citizens was a grave injustice based on race prejudice, war hysteria, and  failure of political leadership. That same year, Professor Peter Irons uncovered evidence that the government's lawyers had withheld important information during Korematsu's 1944 Supreme Court hearing. In 1983, the U.S. District of the Northern District of California overturned Korematsu's conviction. Standing before the court, he said, I would like to see the government admit that they were wrong and do something about it so this will never happen again to any American citizen of any race, creed, or color.  And, If anyone should do any pardoning, I should be the one pardoning the government for what they did to Japanese-American people. 

In 1988, Congress apologized, and granted personal compensation of twenty thousand dollars to each surviving prisoner.

[photo credit: Dennis Cook]

President Clinton also presented Korematsu with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1988. Until his death in 2005, Korematsu continued to speak tirelessly on behalf of civil rights, and in 2004, in reference to the detainees at Guantanamo, he insisted, No one should ever be locked away simply because they share the same race, ethnicity, or religion as a spy or terrorist. 

Since 2011, January 30 has been celebrated as Fred Korematsu Day... a day to remember him, and to honor his unwavering belief in civil liberties, justice, and the Constitution of the United States.

In the 1944 Supreme Court decision,  in speaking for the dissenters, Robert Jackson said, The Supreme Court for all time has validated the principle of racial discrimination in criminal procedure and of transplanting American citizens.  And that 1944 Supreme Court decision... still stands.

                                    Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

P.S. If you'd like to see the two earlier posts, you can find them by clicking on the Gaman tag in the sidebar.

I'm Not Buying It

Thought for the day:  The very rich are different from you and me.  [F.Scott Fitzgerald]

Well, obviously, people who have enough money to wipe their tushes with hundred-dollar bills have a lot more money than we do, but that isn't the only thing that sets them apart from the rest of us. Numerous studies have shown that the wealthy tend to behave differently, too. And many of them have attitudes of entitlement.

For example, consider these tidbits gleaned from Jim Winokur's book The Rich Are Different: 

*  When Christina Onassis got thirsty, she ordered Diet Coke... to be flown to her by private jet.
* Ivana Trump hated to see footprints on the carpet in her house. In fact, she hated it so much, she wouldn't even enter a room unless the rug was freshly vacuumed.
* The Sultan of Brunei flew the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to London for his son's ninth birthday. The cost? A cool million bucks.
* Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton was often carried around by a hunky attendant. When asked why, she said, "Why should I walk when I can hire someone to do it for me?"
* When one-time Time Warner boss Steve Ross flew his wife and two other couples to Mexico for Christmas, the trip required two corporate planes... one for the people, and one for the gifts.
* Donald Trump's 727 had 24-carat gold belt buckles.

Having more money doesn't make you happier. I have fifty million dollars, but I'm just as happy as I was when I had forty-eight million.  [Arnold Schwarzenegger]
              **********************

When I was in elementary school, our principal would often pop into our classroom, and when he did, he usually told us a silly joke. One of those jokes was about a pet parrot named Enza. The family was very distraught because their beloved parrot had escaped through an open window, but the punch line delivered a happy... and corny... ending. When they left the window open again... In Flew Enza. Okay, so he wasn't the world's best comedian, but it's gotta mean something that I can still remember that punch line after all these years.

Well, ya know what you get when you combine  influenza with affluence? You get a whole new word to describe an affliction that strikes only the wealthy: affluenza. 

That word burst into my consciousness this past December, but it actually isn't a new concept. In fact, the term may have been coined as far back as 1954, and PBS ran a special by that name in 1997. British psychologist Oliver James defined the term several years ago as placing a high value on money, possessions, appearances, and fame. In their 2006 book, called Affluenza: When Too Much is Never Enough, Australian psychologists Clive Hamilton and Richard Denniss concluded that wealth causes over-consumption and materialism, and inevitably leads those poor little rich kids to self-medicate with booze and drugs.

Some people made a teensy bit of fun at the idea of affluenza:

But this past December, the unthinkable happened. It was used as a defense in a criminal trial.

Was this a case of the scales of justice being blatantly tipped to favor the wealthy? You decide.

The case: Sixteen-year-old Texan Ethan Couch and seven of his friends stole and drank two cases of beer. The other boys allegedly begged Couch to slow down, but he was still driving the pickup truck thirty MPH over the speed limit when he plowed into four people at the side of the road. And killed them. Eleven others were injured. Two of his friends were thrown from the bed of the truck, one of whom will be paralyzed for the rest of his life. Couch? He fled on foot, yelling, "I'm Ethan Couch! We'll get out of this." Three hours after the accident, his blood alcohol level still measured three times the legal limit, and a trace of valium lingered in his blood.

Bottom line, he was right. He did get out of it. This wasn't his first run-in with the law, either. He'd already been charged with underage drinking before, and he was found with an unconscious, undressed fourteen year-old girl in his truck, too. The consequences? Nuttin, honey.

It's all about the affluenza. His lawyer said he suffers from it, and needed rehabilitation, not prison. G. Dick Miller, a psychologist hired by the family, said the boy was a product of affluenza, and thus, unable to link his bad behavior with consequences because he had been raised to believe wealth buys privilege.

I'm not buying it, but evidently the judge did. She sentenced him to alcohol rehabilitation and ten years' probation. The posh California rehab center looks like a resort... and will cost the family almost half a million dollars a year.

So, I ask you, if his so-called affliction was caused by a lack of consequences, how exactly does shielding him yet again from the consequences of his behavior cure that affliction? Talk about the ultimate irony. How will getting out of it change his behavior?

And if essentially what is an innocent by reason of wealth is a valid defense, shouldn't innocent by reason of poverty be a valid plea as well? If a kid can get a slap on the wrist for being over-privileged, doesn't an under-privileged kid deserve the same consideration?

Lawyers believe a man is innocent until proven broke.  [Robin Hall]

Yeah, right. I wouldn't give a plug nickel's chance of that ever working. Matter of fact, in 2012, the same judge who sentenced Couch to rehab and probation sentenced another fourteen-year-old to ten years in juvenile detention. He punched a man, and the man fell, hit his head, and died. That young man was black. Okay, so that may not have had anything to do with the ruling, but let's just say... he wasn't named Ethan Couch. And I doubt very seriously if he or his family were troubled with an overabundance of funds.

And so it goes.

                                               So what do you think...?

                          Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.