Reply to Family of Braylon Meade says justice was not served in deadly drunk driving incident

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I think the criminal justice system failed the community in this instance. All the general public knows is that an almost-man got a slap on the wrist for a very adult crime that stole the life of someone else’s child. I’m not saying the answer is to lock up every teenager - or even this one - when they mess up. But most of us only know who the victims are, not the responsible parties, and we’re left with rumors that the driver comes from a wealthy family that was prepared to lawyer up or whatever. In reality, that family may be experiencing immense grief and hardship of their own, and the kid who did this may be deeply remorseful, but the community only sees certain very unsympathetic facts, and privacy practices leave us with no opportunity to evaluate the bigger picture. We just know one of our kids was killed under outrageous circumstances and there’s been almost no criminal consequences. That, and some of the prosecutor’s statements come across as dismissive of the legitimate retributive role of our Justice system. If my child had been killed under these circumstances, I would demand some heightened and visible accountability. As an Arlington resident, I think we all deserve something more than what we got.[/quote]

I agree with this.  The fashionable view among our political leadership seems to be that punishment is illegitimate, period, and the only role of the criminal justice system is rehabilitation.  I understand the impulse, but it doesn’t work.  It’s turned into a pathological disregard of victims and a narrow focus on the interests of offenders, rather than taking into account the victims’, and society’s in general, interest in seeing some measure of justice done.  The long term consequence is continued erosion of the legitimacy of the system, more crime, and [b]ultimately more ungovernable private retaliation.[/b]  [/quote]

Sounds very MAGA. [/quote]

But of course.  Let me quote that first notable MAGA-tard, Thomas Hobbes, writing in 1651:

“But I have also shown formerly that before the institution of Commonwealth, every man had a right to everything, and to do whatsoever he thought necessary to his own preservation; subduing, hurting, or killing any man in order thereunto. And this is the foundation of that right of punishing which is exercised in every Commonwealth. For the subjects did not give the sovereign that right; but only, in laying down theirs, strengthened him to use his own as he should think fit for the preservation of them all: so that it was not given, but left to him, and to him only; and, excepting the limits set him by natural law, as entire as in the condition of mere nature, and of war of every one against his neighbour.”  Leviathan, Chapter XXVIII.

You can call names all you want, but ignorance of the lengthy philosophical tradition exploring the relationship between people and government isn’t particularly persuasive to anyone.  The sovereign (correctly) demands that its subjects forswear private vengeance, but in so doing, it has undertaken a duty to dispense justice on their behalf.  If it disavows this duty, people revert closer to a state of nature where that kind of thing occurs more often, which is bad for everyone.[/quote]

That’s some A+ Republican fearmongering. Nice work on the philosophical hysteria. 
[/quote]

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