Originally Posted By ecdc <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/19/nyregion/strauss-kahns-accuser-testifying-before-grand-jury-lawyer-says.html" target="_blank">http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05...ays.html</a> I'm always torn by these cases. I no longer immediately believe it when someone is accused of rape. I've read too many stories of people who spend years in prison, only later exonerated by DNA or other evidence. And I think our culture's "guilty until proven innocent" attitude thanks to the attention of the media is wrong. But, things don't look good for this guy. On balance, he certainly sounds like a dirt bag and it's hard to imagine a woman making up a story like this, or the need for a suicide watch if he's innocent and it's the shady work of some political opponent.
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Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>Ben Stein's defense of this guy<< It's always amazing to me that law-and-order, let-em-rot-in-jail conservatives suddenly develop an attitude that there has been a rush to judgement whenever someone they like gets caught up in one of these situations. Of course, people are innocent until proven guilty. But that idea seems rather selectively applied, doesn't it?
Originally Posted By mele There are quite a few articles about it...here's one: <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/blogpost/post/ben-stein-pitches-in-with-a-strauss-kahn-defense--and-misses/2011/05/17/AFWcvy5G_blog.html" target="_blank">http://www.washingtonpost.com/...log.html</a>
Originally Posted By ecdc I read Stein's column. Yuck. He has about two or three worthwhile lines (if he's lucky) around presumption of innocence, but he extrapolates that into positively mind-baffling statements about how a man accused of a violent assault doesn't deserve prison, how hotel maids can't be trusted because they have stressful jobs, and that the crime is dodgy because we don't know how he might have forced the woman to do the act that allegedly happened.
Originally Posted By mele I like that he states that a person isn't a criminal if they haven't been caught before. (I'm sure this only applies to white collar workers, I'm sure.) I like that he acts like this guy is "public servant" because he is an economist. Yes, that is truly where saints are created. I also LOVE that he states that Strauss-Kahn is one of the most recognizable people on the planet. No, he's not; not even NOW. All I know is that I hate people who stay in $3000 hotel rooms! Everyone else...vengeance will be mine!
Originally Posted By Dabob2 < I also LOVE that he states that Strauss-Kahn is one of the most recognizable people on the planet. No, he's not; not even NOW.> Of course. I'd heard the guy's name as IMF chief, but I had no idea what he looked like, and if I'd seen him on the street in Manhattan, I'd have had no clue. But I think this is telling. Obviously, STEIN knew who he was, and probably felt a certain kinship with him. And we all tend to think that "people like us" don't do that sort of thing - it's what those "other people" do.
Originally Posted By ecdc <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/01/nyregion/strauss-kahn-case-seen-as-in-jeopardy.html" target="_blank">http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07...rdy.html</a> And now the case is falling apart. Maybe he's guilty of this, but this is why we supposedly have an "innocent until proven guilty" system. Instead, he was convicted by media and public opinion and then vilified every moment of every day since.
Originally Posted By dshyates Great, laughing stock of the planet will be the least of our global image problem if we mistakenly took down the head of the IMF and the furure French President. Gotta love American due diligence.
