Re: Scienter and all that stuff

[chen@intuit.com (Mark Chen)]

> The facts and the law only matter when the government doesn't have
> a hard on for you.  If the government wants to get you [and, perhaps, 
> if you're not a millionaire "sports figure"] it will get you. The 
> crime bill just makes the task a bit easier.

This is quite accurate.  Howard Zinn makes the same point in
_Declarations of Independence_.  He describes an incident during the
'60s when a group of black civil rights demonstrators approached him
and asked if they would be within their legal rights conducting a
demonstration on a public street.  Zinn responded that they would be,
but that their legal rights were irrelevant; the police would arrest
them anyway.  After citing a number of such examples, he concludes
that law is made not by legislators and judges, but by the policman's
club.

   - Mark -


--
Mark Chen 
chen@netcom.com
415/329-6913
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