"Is any jury going to convict Jack Bauer?"
At this, America's fringe-right Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia began to twitch.
Here's an excerpt from the story in Canada's Globe and Mail ...
"Jack Bauer saved Los Angeles. ... He saved hundreds of thousands of lives," Judge Scalia said. Then, recalling Season 2, where the agent's rough interrogation tactics saved California from a terrorist nuke, the Supreme Court judge etched a line in the sand.The problem..."Are you going to convict Jack Bauer?" Judge Scalia challenged his fellow judges. "Say that criminal law is against him? 'You have the right to a jury trial?' Is any jury going to convict Jack Bauer? I don't think so.
"So the question is really whether we believe in these absolutes. And ought we believe in these absolutes."
HE IS A FICTIONAL CHARACTER ON A TELEVISION SHOW, REACTING IN A FICTIONAL ENVIRONMENT TO FICTIONAL THREATS, USING FICTIONAL TORTURE TO OBTAIN FICTIONAL RESPONSES FROM FICTIONAL CHARACTERS!!!
That a justice on the United States Supreme Court would use the "Jack Bauer" argument to give an implicit approval of the use of torture in interrogations just scared the steaming piss out of me. Dear Lord.
Approving such techniques puts our men and women at severe risk. Consider the British sailors who were recently captured and released by Iran. Do you think they would have come home unharmed if the U.K. had been torturing Iranians?
Rupert Murdoch's propaganda machine has influenced our highest halls of justice. One has to wonder what the next horror coming down the pipeline will be.
Labels: separation of powers