Bridget Johnson (AKA GOP Vixen) has a thoughtful piece in today’s OpinionJournal on how certain murderers, including the late Stanley “Tookie” Williams, manipulate celebrity activists and other death penalty opponents. She notes how despite claims of Williams’ redemption, he had done nothing to help “authorities clean up the Crips network.” He, like other murderers before him who gained media favor, was a “master manipulator.”
Bridget contends that the same skills that helped Tookie to achieve success on the streets also helped him convince Hollywood that he had changed: “He was a gang leader, which requires a certain arm-twisting ability not only to keep operations running, but to recruit and build ranks.” As usual, Bridget has a great column. And this one includes a chilling anecdote about Ted Bundy. Since she does a much better job of relating that story — and making her point — than I ever could, just read the whole thing!
Media journalists are actually pretty dumb and naive when it comes to people who are ideologically useful to them. If a media person is ant-Death Penalty, then anything a death row inmate says to him/her in a sincere tone of voice will be believed without question. Similarly, a media person will automatically be skeptical of people representing a viewpoint they don’t agree with.
Much the same mechanism is at work when lefties insist that Bush Is Hitler for authorizing wiretaps of terrorist contacts and refuse to accept any contrary information, but, conversely, reports of barbarism by the insurgents or the mullahs are treated with skepticism.
I don’t think criminals are all that manipulative. The anti-everything groups just grab these guys up and parade them around. Tookie just got a free ride. He wasn’t clever. A shame Hollywood can’t find time to rally around one of these guys’ victims just once in their wasted lives.
Bridget is absolutely right. And really, even more so, what it is is that these are liberals who are so steeped in the belief that “the system” is corrupt that they are willing to believe anything that reinforces that, even if it comes from the mouth of someone with a history of lying that’s as long as your arm.
What I find sadly ironic is that liberals who run to the court system as to enlightened, empowered, always-right judge when it comes to things like abortion are the first ones to blast it as biased and corrupt when it comes to things like convicting murderers.
No, no, NDT, you misunderstand the liberal perspective.
All crime is caused by a person’s response to poverty and/or discrimination (unless, of course, the criminal is a CEO or a Republican politician, in which case he is evil). Therefore, any punishment is bad since so-called criminals are really victims of circumstances.
Therefore, any court who convicts someone and attempts to actually punish him for his crime is inherrently biased and corrupt.
As a follow-on, Best of the Web today notes the case of Clarence Ray Allen, the geriatric thug executed in California recently. The pro-murderer groups that tried to stop his execution claimed that he was “confined to a wheelchair” in order to get sympathy, but apparently, he walked to his execution.
And now, he is in Hell.
Why didn’t that old guy, who was executed the other night, garner any celebrity and media support?
I mean, other than the fact that he was white.
#3 I don’t agree. While all of them may not be manipulative, many of them are, especially those who have lots of experience in the justice system.
I do think the media likes to latch on to certain criminals and create huge sympathetic stories around them-which often bothers me-since while all the sympathy is being poured on the criminal-the victim and their family go ignored (and sometimes demonized).
But I also agree with #7 it seems like white guys rarely get the opportunity to be the media darling in the media circus.
I don’t see one shred of evidence where these death row inmates manipulated the celebs into believing their innocence. A CA resident, I seem to recall all the noise around Tookie being about his post jailing good deeds. Mike Farrell, Sean Penn and others are one record as being opposed to the DP so I don’t think they bought into anything. Just another case of the conservative media shouting facts without the evidence to support them.
Ralph, the only one who claims they were duped into believing “innocence” was you. GPW’s post clearly says the celebs were duped into think these people had “changed.”
Mike Farrell and the rest of the pro-murderer idiots are, however, trying to make a case that convicted child murderer Kevin Cooper is innocent, based on rumor, innuendo and conspiracy theories. They don’t just want him spared from the needle, they want him set free. And, there were many who wanted Tookie set free and many who still want convicted cop-killer Mumia al-Jamal set free. If you go to the savetookie-dot-org website, they make similar claims to cast doubts on Tookie’s guilt (the prosecution was “corrupt,” the Police framed Tookie, et c.)
V the K, WTF?
V the K, read the article not just GPW post. fact is innocent or guilty the people I mentioned are vehemently opposed to the DP, so whether they believe pleas of innocence or change is not an issue. They don’t give a damn. As far as they are concerned the DP is cruel and should be abolished.
Um, I did read the article. You said you didn’t see a “shred of evidence” that the celebrities were duped into believing “innocence.” But neither Bridget Johnson nor GPW at any time say that the celebrities themselves were duped into accepting the innocence, only duped into acting as PR tools for convicted murderers. Show me a quote from GPW’s post or Bridget Johnson’s column that claims celebrities bought into the innocence of Tookie Williams.
Here is irony, your point is based on accusing GPW, Bridget Johnson and “conservative of media” of alleging a fact not in evidence, when in fact, you have no evidence that they have done so. Even you seem to be weaseling away from your assertion by the end of your post #12.
V thh K, let me state it this way, if you inherently believe that the death penaly is wrong and should be abolished you can be duped. No one was duped. My comments are consistent. Your reading and comprehension is flawed.
Talph said, “I don’t see one shred of evidence where these death row inmates manipulated the celebs into believing their innocence.” Then, he says, “Just another case of the conservative media shouting facts without the evidence to support them.”
Clearly, Ralph is accusing GPW, Bridget, and “conservative media” of asserting facts (i.e. Celebs were duped into believing Tookie’s innocence) without evidence.
I challenged him to point where either GPW or Bridget Johnson had claimed the celebs believed the killers were innocent.
Ralph can not cite anything supporting his accusation.
Ralph then denies that it was ever his point anyway.
Then Ralph claims my comprehension is flawed.
I think this is just another case of a liberal shouting “facts” without the evidence to back them up, then weaseling when he is exposed.
V the K were you deprived of a decent education at some crumbling public school. Or is it something simple like you were simply born with an inability to comprehend English and understand logic. Maybe it came from years of practice. Let me make this clear so that an idiot can understand it, Mike Farrell and Sean Penn have for years stood up against the death penalty; for them to be shouting off against any execution is neither news nor surprising. Not a good case to prove a case of manipulation. I would have been more impressed with the argument had she used celebs that do not have a long history of being against the death penalty.