Make the Punishment Fit the Crime?

Should cybercrime be a capital offense? No, wait, hear me out.

 A major pipeline operator had to shut down operations due to an apparent ransomware attack. Details are a bit sketchy, but Colonial Pipeline, which is responsible for transporting a major percentage of the gasoline for the East Coast, apparently got hacked and had to shut things down. No word yet on when service will be restored.

Ransomware and other cyber crimes have been in the news a lot over the last few years. Russian and other international  hackers have managed to install malware on any number of American companies’ and government agencies’ systems. Others have managed to disrupt operations at schools, hospitals, and state and local governments. I see no reason not to expect these kinds of crimes to continue, at least until the white hats in the information technology field figure out consistent ways to thwart them.

This got me thinking about crime and punishment. I mean, cybercrime flourishes at least in part because of relatively small overhead—what does an enterprising hacker really need beyond their own skills and an internet connection?—combined with relative apathy towards the consequences. Sure, if caught, you might go to jail. But getting caught is not guaranteed, and there’s potential to make millions of dollars if you target the right people. The risk-reward calculation seems out of whack.

Now, I’m not really a death-penalty enthusiast. I do think some crimes are so heinous and perpetrators so unrepentant, that the death penalty is appropriate. At the same time, I sympathize with people who argue that the death penalty is barbaric, and I agree that it’s applied in a discriminatory way—and far too prone to error. Just today comes a report that, after Ledell Lee was executed for a 1993 murder, DNA evidence was found that points to another suspect. Personally, I wouldn’t have any major concern if the death penalty were abolished.

Still, if we MUST have the death penalty, we should think about its efficacy less as punishment than as deterrent. And in this sense, I think we’ve made the wrong things into capital offenses. Murder is a capital offense, for example, but fear of the death penalty doesn’t prevent murder. If someone really wants someone else dead, they’re not likely to be swayed by a fear of consequences. Similarly, certain crimes against the state, like treason, are punishable by death—but traitors, whatever else you may say about them, see themselves as pursuing a cause greater than themselves and are often all too happy to embrace martyrdom.

Cyber criminals, though? They’re in it for the money. And with a low-risk/high-reward calculation, why wouldn’t someone with the basic skills to extort deep-pocketed victims take advantage? But what if the consequences of getting caught were exponentially worse? Might this not convince some people that it’s really not worth the effort?

And lest you think this too extreme—that it’s an example of the punishment being wildly disproportionate to the crime—consider that we’re not just talking about a hacker making it impossible to access your email or deleting a few files from your computer. We’re talking about things like potentially shutting down hospitals or knocking a city’s electrical grid offline. The consequences could most definitely be life-threatening.

We are, for better and for worse, so technology dependent as a society, that attacks on internet connections should probably be considered in much the same way as would an attempt to poison a water supply or blow up a bridge. Unless and until authorities start treating these acts as such, we’ll only see more and more of these attacks. Many of them will simply be nuisances, but some of them won’t. And it only takes a few of the worse attacks to cause mayhem.

In Which Boats Suddenly Sound a Lot More Interesting

Everybody's heard of repo men, those guys who snatch back cars from owners who have fallen behind in their loan payments.  Not the most noble profession, perhaps, but arguably a necessary evil.  And back in the 1980's, someone thought the job interesting enough to make an Emilio Estevez movie about it. . . .

That someone might well have been Emilio Estevez, now that I think about it, but still. . . .

Anyway, today I read an article about maritime repo men, people who repossess boats.  At first, I thought, well, who cares?  Boats are boring.  They're basically just floating cars, right?  But then I started reading the article: These aquarepo guys don't just grab up boats from people who've neglected to pay their bank notes; they frequently grab up boats from boat thieves, which adds a nice Omar Little-type wrinkle to the whole enterprise.  To accomplish this, they devise all kinds of ruses and shenanigans to get themselves on board the boats--forging IDs, hiring prostitutes, casting voodoo spells, etc.  Once they manage to get on board, they have to dash for the 12-mile limit of international waters to escape whatever jurisdiction the boats are being held in.

My question: How has George Clooney not optioned this for a screenplay?

In Which Hurricanes Diminish while Crime Rises

Hurricane Patricia received an unsatisfactory performance review and was downgraded to a tropical storm.  Good news for Mexico.  Same-sex marriage is mostly legal in Mexico, though, so I'm waiting to hear Mike Huckabee explain why the country wasn't wiped off the face of the Earth like it should have been.  Maybe not being America automatically condemns Mexico to hellfire regardless of its misguided tolerance for sodomites.

*************
FBI Director James Comey attributes a creeping rise in violent crime to the so-called "Ferguson Effect"--a reluctance by police officers to use aggressive and occasionally violent or lethal pre-emptive tactics against would-be perpetrators, lest they be held to account in the court of public opinion ('cause God knows they're unlikely to be held to account in any other court).  It makes a certain statistical sense: Because police now must exercise excessive caution not to harass and occasionally kill people for no particular reason, it just stands to reason that some of those people who would have been arrested--or killed--now go off and commit violent crimes.  I mean, why wouldn't they?  For me, every day I'm not stopped and frisked, is an opportunity to break the law.  I'm not a violent person by nature, so I generally confine myself to petty larceny and occasional wire fraud, but that's just me.  Like Sir William Blackstone said, Better ten innocent men get tazed than one guilty man go free.

As Voltaire Said, "If the Knockout Game Did Not Exist, It Would Be Necessary to Invent It"

Have you heard about the "Knockout Game"?  Ostensibly, roving packs of teenagers walk up to random people and attempt to knock them out with one punch.  Police, however, question whether the Knockout Game actually exists or is simply an internet-fueled urban myth.  Of course, whether the game exists or not, one can reasonably worry that the increasing coverage in outlets as varied as The New York Times and "The Solipsist" will inspire people to create it (you're welcome, America!).

More disturbing, though, are the official reassurances:  Sure, police say, people have been punched in the head by complete strangers for no reason. But far from being an organized activity engaged in by disaffected youth, these are merely the random acts of violence we've all become accustomed to in America today.  Nothing more to see here!

Not Right, Not Illegal

Brace yourselves, Nation: George Zimmerman is not guilty.  Now, this in no way means he is innocent, nor does it mean he should not spend a significant amount of time in jail.  But he probably won't.  Because he's not guilty.

I know this doesn't feel right: An unarmed young man, Trayvon Martin, was shot and killed by Zimmerman, an overzealous wannabe-cop, who claims that Martin "attacked" him.  The fact that Zimmerman was following Martin around, despite being told by a 911 dispatcher that they (the authorities) "didn't need him to do that" certainly weakens Zimmerman's claims of self-defense.  At the same time, though, the fact that Florida has a by-now-well-known "stand your ground" law--which enables people to claim self-defense despite, essentially, not needing to defend themselves--makes a successful prosecution difficult--particularly when the victim is no longer around to provide his side of the story.

Were George Zimmerman's actions right?  Absolutely not.  Were they illegal?  Under Florida law, probably not.  The fault lies not with the prosecution--nor even entirely with George Zimmerman--but with the benighted state of the criminal justice system in the redneck South.

Perhaps, if and when Zimmerman is acquitted, a federal civil rights case could be filed against him.  I don't know all the technicalities involved in such a prosecution, but I do know that such things have been done before.

Of course, if acquitted, Zimmerman will need to be careful.  After all, the stand-your-ground provision states that anyone "who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself."  Given Zimmerman's proven propensity to use deadly force at the slightest provocation, wouldn't anyone in his vicinity have the right to stand his ground and defend himself accordingly?

Somebody's Been Watching Too Many Movies

A couple of weeks ago, a woman had her iPhone snatched out of her hand on a busy street corner in Flushing, New York (not far from where the Solipsist used to live, in fact--coincidence?  You decide).  Not a particularly newsworthy event, to be sure: Cellphone theft--particularly smartphone theft--has become ubiquitous.  A front-page article in Thursday's paper focused on this ever-growing trend and implicitly blamed phone manufacturers for not taking all reasonable measures to make phones less attractive to thieves.  But this particular theft did not unfold in the usual manner.

The woman whose phone was stolen quickly found a police officer who happened to have an iPhone of his own.  He accessed the "Find my iPhone" app and discovered that the thief was still in the immediate vicinity.  He jumped into his car and raced to the supposed location of the thief.  The thief was no longer there, but he was still close--and up.  See, he had apparently jumped onto the number 7, the elevated train that runs between Flushing and Times Square.  So the policeman jumped back in his car and proceeded--sirens blaring--to do his best Popeye Doyle imitation, screaming down Roosevelt Avenue in pursuit of the suspect riding the rails above. Ultimately, the police contacted the train's conductor, who kept the doors closed while the police went through the cars, looking for the fleeing suspect.  He was found and arrested and the woman got her phone back.

I can't help but wonder if this is the sort of thing we should be celebrating.  I mean, I'm sure the woman is happy that she doesn't have to go through all the trouble of re-loading Angry Birds, but do we really want policemen tearing down crowded city streets--and trust me, Roosevelt Avenue is a VERY crowded city street--in pursuit of stolen consumer electronics?  Is it really worth the risk to human life?  Sure, we've accepted the concept that iPhones are worth more than the lives of, say, a few thousand Chinese laborers, but we're talking about American citizens here--even if they do live in Queens!

He's Just Trying to Be a Football Player, Not Ambassador to the Court of St. James

I'm beginning to think we expect too much of athletes, at least when it comes to the whole role-model thing.  A few weeks ago, two star high-school football players from Steubenville, Ohio, were convicted of raping an unconscious girl at a series of parties.  The case gained national notoriety due to the fact that the assault was recorded and uploaded to the internet.  While few questioned the appropriateness of the verdict, there was much lamentation and gnashing of teeth over the "wasted" futures of these young men, whose dreams of football scholarships were now as destroyed as--oh, I don't know--as destroyed as the life of a teenage rape victim.  I don't feel much sympathy.

Still, I couldn't help but think of this case, as I read today the story of Josh Jarboe, a likely NFL draft pick out of Arkansas State.

Jarboe, too, was written off as a lost cause early on in his collegiate career: He was cut from Oklahoma and bombed out at subsequent colleges.  His initial offense?  Appearing in an amateurish, freestyle rap video where he seemingly endorsed the "thug life": fast cars, faster women, violence.  While I am no fan of the genre, I hardly think an affinity for gangsta rap disqualifies one from a career of catching a football.

I do not equate these two cases: The Steubenville players committed a felonious assault and received appropriate punishment.  Had the players been acquitted in a court of law, high-profile college football programs would have been well advised to avoid recruiting them: I imagine many female students and their friends and loved ones would have a problem with such a recruitment.  Nevertheless, a certain "equation" of these cases--along with cases involving drug use, gambling, and other offenses against normative society--occurs simply by virtue of the fact that the automatic punishment--a loss of playing opportunity--is the same. 

I understand Oklahoma's position: They don't want to recruit a player who will reflect badly on the university.  But frankly, freestyle-rapping is just an offense against good taste, not civil society.  At this point, if a star athlete can just play the game and avoid shooting, dog-fighting, or raping anybody on the way to the locker room, I think we should all be thankful.

What's a Little Cannibalism Among Friends?

Boy, you go online and engage in a little friendly banter about raping, murdering, and eating your wife and some of her girlfriends, and all of a sudden you're a horrible person!  Or at any rate, you're Gilberto Valle.  Valle, a New York City policeman (!) is currently on trial, charged with conspiracy to commit kidnapping after his conversations on a fetish website were discovered by his wife, Kathleen Mangan-Valle.  While the graphic conversations are certainly disturbing, to say the least, the case raises legal and ethical questions that are potentially even more disturbing.

Let me say immediately that I am obviously not privy to all the details of the case.  I don't know how far Valle's conversations went or to what extent they could be considered active plotting, as opposed to just shared fantasizing.  To me, though, the fact that the conversations took place on a fetish site (instead of, say, private one-to-one discussions) suggests they are more likely the latter.  Does that make the conversations OK?  Debatable.  I'll come back to that.  But it definitely raises questions about what, exactly, Valle is legally culpable of--if indeed he is legally culpable of anything at all.

As far as I know, a person cannot be prosecuted for conversation.  I make a distinction here between conversation and conspiracy.  A conspiracy--by definition--is secret.  Valle posted his fantasies on a website where men (I'm assuming they're mostly men) post their fantasies and share them with others.  It is, in other words, a public forum; anyone with an internet connection and perhaps a credit card can access it.  The essentially public nature of the conversations speaks against charges of conspiracy.

(Again, I do not know all the particulars: If Valle engaged in other, more surreptitious conversations that named, say, times and places or that delved into active planning, then a conspiracy case becomes much stronger.  I am here, though, more concerned with the implications of the case as I have outlined them here.)

Still, when people hear about a man--particularly a policeman--engaging in graphically violent, horrifically disturbing fantasies involving rape, torture, mutilation, etc., they understandably feel that something should be done, that punishment should be administered.  In Valle's case, his wife (potential victim?) has, quite reasonably, left him.  Considering that Valle "wept visibly" during his wife's testimony, I will speculate that he is suffering.  Regardless of the trial's outcome, he may lose his job and/or be required to undergo extensive psychological counseling.  Is this enough?  Should the criminal justice system be involved?

What if, instead of visiting a fetish website, Valle had simply committed his violent fantasies to a journal, a journal that was then discovered by his wife?  Would he be guilty of a crime if the journal described his desire to commit horrendous acts?  What if he had said these things in the privacy of, say, a counseling session?  Yes, therapists may be required to report patients to the authorities if they speak of plans to commit violent acts, but would a patient saying something like, "Sometimes I fantasize about raping and killing women" rise to that level?

The truth is that all of us--all of us--engage or have engaged in dark, disturbing fantasies.  Perhaps they don't rise to such grand guignol levels as those described in the case of Gilberto Valle.  Nevertheless, most people would experience shame unimaginable if even their fantasies of perfectly legal actions--telling off an overbearing boss, spending a steamy weekend with an attractive co-worker--came to light.  The potential shame, of course, is what keeps most of our fantasies safely concealed within our mental lockboxes.  But is it a matter for the courts if our fantasies, legal or otherwise, are revealed?  Personally, I hope not.

(Hm. I guess whimsy will have to wait at least another day.)

Pistorius Off

The other day, star South African athlete Oscar Pistorius shot and killed his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp.  Born without fibulas, Pistorius inspired his nation and the world, as he ascended to the highest levels of sport, competing in the Olympics and Paralympics on prosthetic limbs.  He claims that the shooting of Steenkamp was a tragic mistake: that he thought she was an intruder breaking into his home.  That's his defense.  You believe him?  Personally, I don't think he has a leg to stand on.

Oh, like you weren't thinking it!

(And before you condemn me, may I point out that MOS's initial comment was, "I don't think his defense has legs."  So you see where I get it from.)

I May Have to Rethink My Opposition to the NRA

Today has been filled with prep-work for the upcoming semester, so, in the spirit of laziness leavened with a dose of public service, I present you with a link to a disturbing story from the United Kingdom.  If you see an Oompa-Loompa coming down the sidewalk, consider crossing to the other side.  Stay safe, Nation.

Wanted: G-Street

The leaders of the National Rifle Association hold, shall we say, absolutist views on gun ownership.  To listen to their public statements one would think Americans face a stark choice: Either guns of all shapes, sizes, and capacity for inflicting mass carnage must be readily available with minimal restrictions to anybody who wants them, or Americans might as well just surrender now to the dictator who will inevitably--perhaps instantaneously--arise once we sheepishly disarm.

I can't be the only one who sees this as a false choice, right?

I suspect a sizable majority of Americans--including, probably, a majority of gun owners and possibly even NRA members--subscribes neither to the extreme position outlined above nor to its polar opposite, what we might call gun-control absolutism or abolitionism.  I include myself in this majority.  Though no fan of firearms, I would not, even if elected to some Godlike position (late-night comedy show host?), advocate a complete ban on handguns.  I don't object, say, to a law-abiding citizen having a handgun for self-defense or to a hunter owning a rifle.

A majority of Americans could presumably reach agreement on a few sensible reforms that, while not eliminating the possibility of mass shootings, would make them more unlikely.  Most people, for example, would probably agree that guns and gun ownership should be regulated at least as stringently as cars and driving: People should have to pass a test before being given a gun license; guns should be registered and a state and/or national database of gun owners created; registered gun owners should be held responsible for any damage done with their guns, etc.  (I thank a Facebook friend, Andrew Pollack, for some of these suggestions.)  The specifics of a more sensible gun policy could be worked out, but most reasonable people could accept this as a starting point for a discussion.

So, here's my question to gun owners: Why do you continue to let the NRA speak for you?  American Jews who support the idea of Israel's peaceful coexistence with other Mideast countries formed J-Street--a "Pro-Israel, Pro-Peace" lobbying group--when they realized that AIPAC, the predominant Jewish lobbying group in Washington, was never going to moderate its emphatically right-wing ideology.  Why can't gun owners who favor sensible reforms that will truly help keep the public safe--I KNOW you're out there!--break away from the dead-enders (in every sense of the word) at the NRA?

OK, Here We Go. . . .

One cause of the Republican's shellacking in last month's elections was the inability (or unwillingness) of numerous conservative neanderthals to understand that rape is a crime, and that a pregnancy conceived as a result of this crime might be considered something other than a divine blessing.  That's what happens, though, when people hold an absolutist worldview: Abortion is only and always wrong, so any logically consistent argument supporting this worldview, no matter how repugnant, must be right.  One can almost admire folks like Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock for their steadfastness and see something almost tragic (though hardly unwelcome) in their self-inflicted political deathblows.

One wishes some similarly logically-consistent gun-rights advocate would make the obvious comment in the wake of today's Connecticut elementary-school massacre: Those bullets that killed twenty children?  God-given early-Christmas gifts for kids lucky enough to live (briefly) in a country that protects the right to bear arms!  Imagine the backlash!

Of course, no NRA spokesman or (presumably) member would so blatantly blame the innocent victims of this horrific assault.  And yet, within hours of this morning's shootings, many gun-apologists predictably engaged in something only slightly less offensive, opining defensively that if only--If only!--teachers at Sandy Hook Elementary had been armed, this tragedy would have been prevented (or at least minimized).

See, everybody?  It's not the fault of Adam Lanza, the obviously deranged young man who apparently killed all these children, as well as some school personnel, his own mother, and, ultimately, himself.  The fault lies with those irresponsibile schoolteachers who failed to take full advantage of their constitutional freedoms and thereby failed in their duty to protect their young charges!  Why, they're practically as guilty as Lanza!  They ought to be arrested!  Well, the ones who survived anyway.

What gets me about this particular knee-jerk reaction to gun violence is its fundamental illogic.  The argument seems to be that, if we strengthen gun-control laws, we will effectively be unilaterally disarming--that law-abiding people will no longer be able to arm themselves against lunatics with guns.  The problem, of course, is that law-abiding people are NOT consistently arming themselves now.  So unless the NRA is advocating a law requiring gun ownership--they're not, are they?--this argument rings hollow at best, heartless at worst.

I keep waiting, though so far in vain, for the event that will trigger the backlash.  Maybe Sandy Hook will be it.  Maybe this will finally convince people that the NRA should not have a stranglehold on our politics.  I'm not optimistic.

Yes, Yes: Too Soon

Two weeks ago, Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher horrified the NFL--and society in general--when he committed suicide in front of his coach shortly after he murdered his girlfriend.  A few days later, the hapless Chiefs, who had one win to that point in the season, notched an inspiring victory over the Carolina Panthers at Arrowhead Stadium.

Last week, Jerry Brown, a practice-squad linebacker for the Dallas Cowboys was killed when his teammate, driving under the influence, crashed the car in which Brown was a passenger.  A day later, the Cowboys defeated the Cincinnati Bengals in an emotion-filled game.

Right now, if I'm a mid-level defensive player for a team in desperate need of an inspirational win, I'm being EXTRA careful and watching my back.  Tampa Bay Buccaneer Najee Goode?  I'm talking to you!

Mens Perversa in Corpore Sano

Sunday mornings are for The New York Times, but it's a bit jarring when the first stories one reads feature a steady stream of murder, rape, drug abuse, and robbery sprees.  Even more jarring is the fact that I always begin with the sports section.

I am constantly justifying my enthusiasm for sports, unshared by many in my extended circle of friends and family, many of whom are musical-theatre snobs or pseudo-intellectuals or both.  They look down on sports as the preserve of insufficiently evolved alpha males (and a few alpha females), undeserving of the attention (and certainly the money) lavished upon it.  I counter with an argument that sports (and maybe politics) provide the only dependable sources of actual narrative excitement.  Each game provides a classic plot: beginning, middle, and end.  And whereas movies and television shows, no matter how well done, are fundamentally predictable--except "Breaking Bad," but I digress--sports constantly surprise.  No matter how heavily favored one team is, the games still must be played, and the underdogs occasionally triumph.

So it's depressing when the front page of the Sunday sports pages are dominated by stories of a Kansas City Chiefs linebacker killing himself after shooting his girlfriend to death; of the prevalence of Adderall as a new performance-enhancer of choice among NFL players; of a quartet of Rugers University basketball players busted for a series of dormitory robberies.  In what passes for an "uplifting" story, Kathy Redmond, has devoted her life to combating the culture of sexual abuse that exists among collegiate athletes--a commitment she developed in response to her own rape at the hands of a Nebraska football player in the early 90's.

I'm not likely to abandon an enthusiasm for sports any time soon.  But the constant drumbeat of crime and depravity is disheartening.  True, I'm not a child, and I have no need of athletic heroes to look up to, but wouldn't it be nice to know that at least a FEW of these guys were worthy of such admiration?  That some are blessed with gifts of character to match their obvious physical gifts?

I'm sure some are.  It's sad, though, when reading about, say, Robert Griffin III--by all accounts a delightful human being as well as a spectacular athlete--to find oneself wondering how long it'll be before we discover he's running a child-prostitution ring in Malaysia.  Many times bitten, many times shy.

Thursday Trendwatch, Veterans' Day Edition

10. TOTAL SOLAR ECLIPSE
Why it's trending: As FOS used to say, I'll give you three guesses, and the first two don't count. . . . Right! A solar eclipse is on the way.  Tuesday, at 12:30 PM Pacific, our old pal the sun will find itself completely occluded by the moon.  Chances are, unless you're a dolphin, you won't see it live, as the path of coolness (official astronomical term, by the way) lies mostly over the Pacific.  Perhaps more interesting: Apparently, total solar eclipses look just like big blocks of cheddar cheese:



 



9. MIKE LEACH
Why he's trending: The Washington State football coach has denied abusing his players.The accusations came from Leach's star receiver, Marques Wilson, who spoke of physical and verbal abuse, but declined to provide specifics.  When pressed, Leach acknowledged that practices could get a little rough, but that all players could at any time invoke the "safe word" ('diphthong').

8. DENISE RICHARDS
Why she's trending: In an effort to "do her part" after Hurricane Sandy, she adopted a puppy.  Why she chose to adopt a puppy from Nebraske, I have no idea.

No, no, no: The puppy was from Long Island, and the celebrity wanted to promote animal adoptions, especially of pets displaced by the storm (I think Richards is the one on the right).  Thousands of Staten Islanders who still have only sporadic electricity service applauded Richards' selflessness.

7. DEREK DOOLEY
Why he's trending: Wasn't that the name of Mark Wahlberg's character from "Boogie Nights"?  Anyway, Dooley is the football coach at the University of Tennessee, and he might or might not be on the verge of getting fired.  If he IS fired, though, I think he should move to Canada and become a Mountie.  He's got the perfect name for it.

6. KAT VON D
Why she's trending: Apparently, she and something called "Deadmau5" are no longer dating.  I wonder if she had tattooed--I'll say "his"--name on her--I'll say arm.

5. ASTHMA
Why it's trending: A Danish study has linked acetaminophen (Tylenol) use in infancy to the development of asthma in pre-schoolers.  In other news, a study sponsored by Tylenol has linked the intake of Danish to being fat.
4. MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL
Why it's trending: Because it would be stupid for it to be trending on Thursday!  Tonight's game features the Kansas City Chiefs against the Pittsburgh Steelers.  To be sporting, the Steelers have agreed to play with only nine men on defense.  They are still 19 point favorites.

3. FIRST NFL TIE SINCE 2008
Why it's trending: Yesterday, the San Francisco 49ers played the St. Louis Rams to a 24-24 tie.  For those not familiar with NFL rules: In a regular-season game, if neither team is ahead after one overtime period, the game officially ends in a tie.  As you can see, this happens quite rarely.  I suppose a team would rather have a tie than suffer a loss.  Frankly, though, if I had gone to that game and paid good money, I'd want a refund.  Look, if I want to see something with an indeterminate endings, I'll just stay home and watch DVD's of  "Lost."

2. MCAFEE MURDER
Why it's trending: John McAfee--of antivirus software fame--is being sought for questioning by police in Belize in connection with the death of McAfee's neighbor, Gregory Viant Faull.  Faull was found dead of a gunshot wound to the head this weekend.  McAfee is described as a "person of interest," not a suspect.  Rumors of extensive high-fiving at Norton are unconfirmed.
And the top-trending story at this moment on the space-time continuum. . .

1. TEXAS SECESSION
Why it's trending: Over 25,000 people have signed a petition requesting that Texas be allowed to "peacefully secede" from the United States.  No word on what percentage of those signatures came from outside Texas.

Never Mind Yelling--What about OPENING Fire in a Crowded Theater?

Following up on yesterday's post, it now appears that James Holmes, the "alleged" (nudge-nudge, wink-wink) shooter in the Colorado movie-theater massacre, purchased all his guns and ammunition legally.  So, I will now go ahead and say what I thought I would say yesterday: This country needs seriously to rethink its attitudes toward gun-control.

Of course, some of our more right-wing brethren suggest that gun restrictions are, in this case, part of the problem.  They claim that, if only--if only!--someone else in the theater had been armed!  He or she could have taken out James Holmes and put an end to his rampage.  I think this claim deserves serious . . . consideration.

Let's imagine, for the sake of argument, that someone else--some responsible, law-abiding citizen--at that ill-fated midnight show had been carrying a gun--

--and frankly, I find it difficult to believe no one else was carrying.  This was a packed theater--several hundred people, including, we now know, several members of the military.  Furthermore, this occurred in Colorado--not the reddest of red states, sure, but a Western state with a somewhat relaxed attitude toward personal gun ownership.  Is it really reasonable to assume that not one other person in the theater was packing heat?  Still, let's go along with the right-wing argument that overly restrictive gun-control laws keep guns out of the hands of everybody--except apparently unstable lunatics.

Where were we?  Ah, yes.  Let's assume that someone else at the theater had been carrying a gun when James Holmes burst in and began his rampage.  What would have happened?

Holmes would still have enjoyed the advantage of surprise.  Apparently, several moviegoers at first thought the whole thing was some kind of publicity stunt.  Not unreasonable: This was a premiere of a major blockbuster--an action movie--and based on descriptions of Holmes' attire, it sounds like he closely enough resembled one of the film's characters that most viewers, in a festive mood and certainly not anticipating danger, would suspected nothing was wrong, at least until they realized that the smoke-bombs Holmes released contained real tear gas or some other irritant.  And then, of course, the shooting started.

So now, imagine what confronts our hypothetical hero--sitting somewhere with her pistol tucked in her purse: A darkened theater, filling up with caustic smoke (to which, of course, she is not immune), and dozens of people screaming and frantically trying to escape the carnage.  If she actually tried to shoot Holmes, what are the odds she would hit him and not one of her fellow theatergoers?  For that matter, the shooter was reportedly wearing all manner of body armor; unless our hero were carrying a very powerful little gun, and/or found herself right next to Holmes so she could shoot him directly in the head, it seems unlikely she could have been all that effective.  Given the circumstances, unless you're a member of Seal Team Six, or maybe Andy Garcia's character from "The Untouchables," your best course of action would have been to leave the gun in your purse or pocket and hightail it out of the theater with the rest of the audience.

********************************************
Honestly, I don't know what the solution is.  Of course, people determined to commit gun-fueled mayhem will find a way to arm themselves despite any laws that gun-control proponents manage to pass.  But, seriously, could we just maybe consider making things a bit more difficult for the James Holmeses of the world?  Surely some middle ground exists between outlawing guns altogether and allowing absolutely anybody anywhere to buy as many guns and as much ammunition as the market will bear?  Surely it's not unreasonable for law-abiding citizens to want some assurance that the guy walking down the street toward them is not packing more firepower than an average Israeli commando unit?

Is it?

OK, But Aside from THAT, How Was the Movie?

Yeah, yeah. . . . Send your complaints to Solipsist Central.

As the nation absorbs this latest example of chaos in our midst, I brace myself for certain inevitabilities.

The pundits will do what pundits do: pontificate.  Already we've had the predictable calls for increased gun control, which I generally agree with, but which may or may not be all that relevant.  A lot depends on whether "alleged" shooter James Holmes came by his guns legally.  Considering that he was a PhD candidate in neuroscience, I suspect Holmes would have had no trouble obtaining whatever weapons he wanted legally, which certainly would call into question the wisdom of existing gun regulations.  On the other hand, if it turns out the guns were purchased illegally, then the issue is really not so much that we need more gun laws, but that we must just better enforce the ones we have.  At any rate, this is not the most annoying inevitability.

The presidential candidates both responded appropriately, expressing sympathy with the victims and their families and curtailing political activities for at least a day or two.  No one's much in the mood for vitriolic rhetoric right now--with the possible exception of one Texas douchebag who claims that the shootings were a result of the "ongoing attacks" on Judeo-Christian beliefs.  Kinda makes one hopeful that the next news cycle will bring revelations that Holmes was molested by priests at an early age.

Really, though, while it's somewhat reassuring to see both President Obama and Mitt Romney slip easily into the role of Comforter-in-Chief, this kind of event presents a political no-brainer.  When tragedy strikes, anyone aspiring to high political office has got to know enough to drop whatever he or she is doing and respond.  Only a total moron would go on conducting business as usual or, say, reading "My Pet Goat."  Just sayin'.

These political response, however, are also not the most annoying inevitabilities.

No, my eye-rolling arises after seeing the immediate flooding of every movie-theater across America with reporters running up to people and asking if they are now worried about going to see movies in general and "The Dark Night Rises" in particular.  Unsurprisingly, most people--because they are not congentially stupid--express little personal concern about their odds of making it home alive from the 3:40 showing.  Sure, what James Holmes did--"allegedly"--is horrifying, but since all signs so far suggest that Holmes was a lone psychopath and not part of some Qaeda-esque jihad against all things Batman, why would this stop anyone from going to the movies?  Any individual audience member is far more likely to suffer injury or death in a car accident going to or from the multiplex than from anything that happens within the theater itself.  (They should, however avoid the popcorn "butter"--that stuff WILL kill you.)

Sadly, random acts of violence and mayhem have become a part of the fabric of American culture.  But movies have long been a much bigger part of that culture.  As one blogger has pointed out, one truly sad aspect of this shooting is that it took place during a screening of a film that, in a way that few movies do anymore, brings people together in a sort of communal celebration--a shared experience the likes of which grow ever-rarer in these days of high-end home-entertainment systems and internet-enabled fragmentation.  This shooting should not make people afraid to go to movies; it should make them fear what I suspect we'll discover is the crippling sense of isolation that drives the James Holmeses of the world to murder.

It's Australian for 'Hamana-Hamana-Hamana"

I'm a bit tuckered out from yesterday's discourse on "Anonymous," so I have not much to say today, except this:

An Australian hooligan (redundancy?) is lighting up the internet after brazenly holding up a convenience store.  This is primarily because the robber was (A) foolish enough to let her face be captured on the store's security camera and (B) has a set of bahoogies that might make Dolly Parton feel inadequate.

All of which is to say, Australia is awesome.  See you tomorrow.

Sentencing Structures

As the nation waits for the Supreme Court's decision on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare"), let's take a look at another decision they announced yesterday.  In the consolidated cases of Jackson v. Hobbs and Miller v. Alabama, the court ruled that mandatory life sentences for minors convicted of murder were unconstitutional.  Essentially, this means that judges can not be legislatively required to automatically sentence those under the age of 18 to life sentences without the possibility of parole, this being a violation of the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment.

Sounds reasonable to me.  Personally, I've never much cared for mandatory sentencing for any type of crime or criminal.  Judges should have discretion to sentence people based on mitigating and/or aggravating circumstances--it's part of the job.  While murder is always a horrible crime, there are clearly differences between degrees of guilt for different participants: If a seventeen-year-old and a fourteen-year-old set out to rob someone, and, during the crime, the seventeen-year-old shoots and kills the robbery victim, both perpetrators may be found guilty of murder, but it seems to me they are not equally culpable or deserving of the same punishment.

The most disturbing aspect of the Supreme Court's decision, though, is what it reveals about the dissenting justices: While we all knew that Justices Scalia, Alito, Thomas, and Chief Justice Roberts were on the conservative end of the spectrum, their dissents in this case suggest they may also be insane.  In his dissent, Chief Justice Roberts wrote, “It is a great tragedy when a juvenile commits murder — most of all for the innocent victims. . . . But also for the murderer, whose life has gone so wrong so early. And for society as well, which has lost one or more of its members to deliberate violence, and must harshly punish another.”

Well, yeah. . . . And you do realize you just voted to MANDATE the increased "tragedy," right?

More worrisome still was Justice Alito's dissent:

“Even a 17 ½-year-old who sets off a bomb in a crowded mall or guns down a dozen students and teachers is a ‘child’ and must be given a chance to persuade a judge to permit his release into society,” he wrote of the consequences of the majority ruling. “Nothing in the Constitution supports this arrogation of legislative authority.”

Since the Supreme Court's decision does not FORBID life sentences, but merely says that such sentences cannot be mandatory, I failed at first to understand what Alito was getting so incensed about.  Then it hit me: Maybe Samuel Alito--presumably a well-educated, incisive man--doesn't know what "mandatory" means?!?  And he's supposed to make a ruling on a healthcare MANDATE?!?

I fear for the Republic.

Makes One Nostalgic for "Just Say No"

Mexican presidential candidates are advocating a new approach to the war on drugs.  In an attempt to reduce the extreme levels of violence in their country, candidates have suggested that their policies will focus on reducing violence, rather than on arresting narcotraficantes and otherwise disrupting the criminal cartels that rule the drug trade.

Certainly understandable.  If I were in their shoes, I, too, would make public safety my top priority.  Nevertheless, I have concerns about one candidate, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, because he has too many names.

No, that's not it: I am concerned because of his campaign slogan, "Abrazos, no balazos."  Sure, it sounds all nice and rhyme-y in Spanish, but the slogan translates to "Hugs, not bullets."  Is the man running for president or head Carebear?