1. According to Roger Williams University Law Professor David Zlotnick, as reported by Kate Bramson on the Projo’s 7-to-7 blog, a greater degree of secrecy is allowed in Rhode Island courts than is allowed in Federal courts…
A law professor at Roger Williams University says the controversy swirling around the Derderians’ plea agreement highlights the downside of negotiating deals in secret….We appear to have yet another case of Rhode Island’s weird civic culture concentrating power in the wrong places. The rules in Rhode Island seem to make judges into semi-prosecutors, who can help negotiate plea deals and make sentencing decisions before a complete case has been presented at trial.
It can be an efficient way to bring cases to closure. But there�s a downside, and Rhode Island is witnessing that right now, Zlotnick said today.
“Now the danger is: People are saying, ‘I didn’t say that,’ ‘I didn’t mean that'”, he said.
“That’s the downside of allowing an informal system with judge participation. The downside is that sometimes people disagree about what happened in chambers and there’s no court reporter in chambers and we don’t know what happened.”
That wouldn’t have happened if this were a federal court case, Zlotnick said, because federal judges are not permitted to engage in plea-bargaining in closed chambers.
This is not an appropriate role for a judge. A judge is supposed to apply the law impartially before and during a trial phase, without taking a position on what punishment defendants “should” get for crimes that have been committed. Judges are only human; if they are allowed to directly participate in plea negotiations, it is unavoidable that they will become emotionally invested in seeing certain outcomes brought about. That may be a large part of what has happened here.
Rhode Island rules concerning judges and plea negotiations should be changed to more closely resemble the Federal rules in this area.
2. As Dave Kane has discussed (noted by Marc), the families and friends of the fire victims live with the Station tragedy every day, no matter what the legal process says or does. It’s doubtful that the day or two of extra secrecy that Judge Francis Darigan wanted would have changed much. But deciding on a sentence for the Derderians, before the victims have had the chance to present their side, has reinforced a tragic sense of powerlessness and become a real source of further harm.
3. It is still unclear why Kathleen Hagerty, defense lawyer for Michael Derderian, is insisting that who offered the deal be publically acknowledged, to the point of making unusually detailed revelations about plea negotiations (the handwritten note, the phone message from Assistant AG William Ferland).
Given the circumstances, the Derderians got an outcome very favorable to them. Why does making public the way in which the deal came about matter to their lawyers? [Open full post]
The Fogarty campaign’s parade of support from opponents of eminent domain reform continues. Last month, Governor Tom Vilsack, who vetoed an Iowa legislature bill that placed some mild restrictions on giving property seized through eminent domain to private developers, came to Rhode Island to campaign for Lieutenant Governor Fogarty. Now, the top item on the Fogarty campaign website is a message of support from Governor Bill Richardson of New Mexico, who also vetoed eminent domain reform legislation earlier this year. Richardson also made a fundraising appearance for the Lieutenant Governor in May.
Given that Lieutenant Governor Fogarty seems determined to bring as many Governors who have vetoed an eminent domain reform bill to Rhode Island as he can, (note to the Fogarty campaign: Governor Janet Napolitano of Arizona may still be available for an appearance), and that his own record on eminent domain reform has been spotty at best, it is hard to believe that eminent domain reform will be a priority in a Fogarty administration.
Or perhaps Fogarty is a true believer in the approach to the problem favored by Governor Richardson — form a commission rather than take action. This is from the Associated Press report of Richardson’s veto…
[Governor Richardson] promised to create a task force to study the eminent domain issue and propose legislation “to appropriately protect private property from condemnation that is geared solely at private commercial development.One last question: If Lieutenant Governor Fogarty couldn’t work with the legislature to get a simple eminent domain reform bill passed this year, how does he plan to get his term-limits proposal through the legislature? [Open full post]
There are at least four problems with Judge Francis Darigan’s statement regarding the Derderian pleas in the Station Fire case that Marc posted on earlier this afternoon.
[Open full post]Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s address to the United Nations General Assembly was laced with what might be interpreted as standard progressive rhetoric. Here’s an example…
All members of the United Nations are affected by both the bitter and the sweet events and developments in today’s world. We can adopt firm and logical decisions, thereby improving the prospects of a better life for current and future generations.OK, I guess the reference to “Almighty God” means that Ahmadinejad’s statement couldn’t have come from American or European-style progressives. But references to God aren’t the part of Ahmadinejad’s remarks that people need to be concerned about. The quest for “good, virtue, perfection and beauty”, the stuff that might resonate with the post-Christian West’s “spiritual but not religious” crowd, should be of more concern.
Together we can eradicate the roots of bitter maladies and afflictions and, instead, through the promotion of universal and lasting values, such as ethics, spirituality and justice, allow our nations to taste the sweetness of a better future.
Peoples, driven by their divine nature, intrinsically seek good, virtue, perfection, and beauty. Relying on our peoples, we can take giant steps towards reform and pave the road for human perfection.
Whether we like it or not, justice, peace and virtue will sooner or later prevail in the world, with the will of the almighty God. It is imperative and also desirable that we, too, contribute to the promotion of justice and virtue.
Contemporary Islamist thought is clear that earthly harmony and the universal acceptance of Islamic law are one and the same. Here is Sayyid Qutb, a main influence on modern radical Islamist thought, explaining the concept in Milestones, a tract widely read in the Islamic world today…
Indeed, the Shari’ah of God harmonizes the external behavior of man with his internal nature in an easy way. When a man makes peace with his own nature, peace and cooperation among individuals follow automatically, as they all live together under one system, which is a part of the general system of the universe.When Ahmadinejad talks about ending “oppression” in his address (which he does frequently), if he is true to radical Islamist beliefs, he is not talking about Western-style progressive programs for ending oppression, e.g universal health care or a living wage or giving Africa a veto on the Security Council. Radical Islamists believe that freedom from oppression can be achieved only by destroying every earthly system not based on Islamic law. Here’s Qutb again…
Islam, which is a way of life, takes practical steps to organize a movement for freeing man. Other societies do not give it any opportunity to organize its followers according to its own method, and hence it is the duty of Islam to annihilate all such systems, as they are obstacles in the way of universal freedom. Only in this manner can the way of life be wholly dedicated to God, so that neither any human authority nor the question of servitude remains, as is the case in all other systems which are based on man’s servitude to man….Jihaad in Islam is simply a name for striving to make this system of life dominant in the world.Ahmadinjead’s speech is consistent with Qutb’s philosophy. Nothing that he said gives any sign that he or his government believes that Islam and other religions can peacefully co-exist. Instead, he tells us that one single version of justice and virtue — his version — is coming, “whether we like it or not”. [Open full post]
One of the very first blog posts I ever wrote was in reaction to the Station Night Club fire. Now the ProJo and other outlets are reporting that the Derderian’s have agreed to a plea deal and that there will be no trial. The one big question is: Who offered the deal?
[Open full post](Heads Up–or Nota Bene for the cultured sort–Andrew and I were obviously working the same story and posted them within 1 minute of each other. This proves we Anchor Rising Contributors don’t collude!!!! I kept my post up because of the wonderfully witty and pithy observations….but I did truncate most of it to the “extended” section.)
As noted in the comments to my earlier “poll post” {and Andrew’s new post–MAC} a new Brown poll (Darrell West) is out, with some encouraging numbers for both Governor Carcieri and Senator Chafee.
The ProJo has a story about the latest Rasmussen poll that offers a snapshot of where we stand in the races for Governor and U.S. Senate 7 weeks out from the General Election (actually 8 weeks, the poll was taken last week).
Governor
Carcieri (R) – 47%
Fogarty (D) – 45%
U.S. Senate
Whitehouse (D) – 51%
Chafee (R) – 43%
Note: The sample was 500 likely voters taken a day after the primaries and has a margin of error of +/- 4.5%.
Editorial note: How likely are “likely” voters to vote in an off-year election? With regards to the Senate race: how seriously to take numbers gathered a day after one of the most negative and contested primaries in recent memory?
Although the furor over Pope Benedict’s University of Regensburg lecture has centered on a perceived insult to the prophet Mohammed, I believe that the remarks were directed at a more recent figure, Sayyid Qutb, an Egyptian writer active in the Muslim Brotherhood in the mid-20th century whose writings are widely read in the Islamic world today. Qutb’s works have been a major influence on the modern philosophy of Islamic radicalism, including that of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini of Iran. After Qutb was executed by the Egyptian government in 1966, his brother fled to Saudi Arabia, where he became a teacher of Osama Bin Laden.
It is doubtful that it is mere coincidence that both Pope Benedict’s supposedly provocative lecture and many of Sayyid Qutb’s writings concern the split between faith and reason embodied in Western philosophy. According to Luke Loboda’s invaluable essay on Qutb’s work, Qutb believed that Christianity, under the influence of Greek philosophy and Roman tradition, had created a separation between faith and reason that was unnatural, unspiritual, and ungodly. In the Christianized West, maintaining social order became a purely rational process separated from religious faith. The separation left individuals in a state of disharmony with God’s creation, forced to deny the truth that faith and reason were inextricably linked.
In Qutb’s view, God had provided man with a system for uniting faith and reason in his day-to-day life — the system of Islamic law. Reason was acceptable when used for interpreting or implementing Islamic law, but not useful for discovering truths outside of its structure. Social orders claiming a rational basis and without relation to Islamic law and were especially unacceptable; Qutb viewed them as restrictions on and distractions from the precise instructions provided by God on how to exist harmoniously within the universe.
At the end of his Regensburg lecture, I believe that the Pope offers an olive branch to those sympathetic to Qutb’s idea that reason and faith cannot be healthily separated from one another. The Pope asserts directly that the West has gone too far in separating faith and reason…
In the Western world, it is widely held that only positivistic reason and the forms of philosophy based on it are universally valid. Yet the world’s profoundly religious cultures see this exclusion of the divine from the universality of reason as an attack on their most profound convictions….The West has long been endangered by this aversion to the questions which underlie its rationality, and can only suffer great harm thereby. The courage to engage the whole breadth of reason, and not the denial of its grandeur — this is the program with which a theology grounded in Biblical faith enters into the debates of our time.But then the Pope makes his challenge, taking the position that harmonizing faith and reason does not imply the subordination of reason…
“Not to act reasonably (with logos) is contrary to the nature of God”, said Manuel II, according to his Christian understanding of God. It is to this great logos, to this breadth of reason, that we invite our partners in the dialogue of cultures. To rediscover it constantly is the great task of the university.In other words, since God’s nature is ultimately loving and reasonable, achieving harmony with God’s creation requires humans to be loving and reasonable. Doing unto others as you would have them do unto you is equally as or more important than following any particular system of rules.
Qutb and the modern Islamists under his influence reject this view. They believe relations between individuals should be regulated first through Islamic law. Then they go further. Qutb advocates the destruction of any worldly institutions not based on Islamic law because the very existence of non-Islamic institutions places barriers between men and God. This is the basis of the modern Islamist conception of jihad. Qutb advocates waging offensive wars to destroy non-Islamic institutions until nothing but a social order based on Islamic law remains on the Earth. Quoting directly from Qutb’s Jihad in the Cause of God…
Islam is not a “defensive movement” in the narrow sense which today is technically called “defensive war”. This narrow meaning is ascribed to it by those who are under the pressure of circumstances and are defeated by the wily attacks of the orientalists who distort the concept of Islamic Jihaad. It was a movement to wipe out tyranny and to introduce true freedom to mankind, using resources according to the human situation, and it had definite stages, for each of which it utilized new methods.Qutb’s definition of jihad is the basis upon which Islamists rest their claim that their violent acts are consistent with the Koranic sura that “there is no compulsion in religion”. Technically speaking, they do not seek to force anyone to convert to Islam. They seek “only” to obliterate completely all non-Islamic institutions everywhere, thus creating a world where it is easier for people to choose Islam on their own (because there is nothing else to choose).
In the end, Pope Benedict never argues that Islam is inherently flawed or that radical Islam is an inevitable and natural outgrowth of “authentic” Islam. The Pope argues that anyone — be they Islamic, Christian, Jewish, Hindu or whatever — who subordinates their reason to comply with a set of rules or the decree of an individual leader risks acting contrary to God’s nature. No matter what the letter of the law says, human beings should strive to embody God’s loving and reasonable spirit in every action that they take. Though radical Islamists — the Muslims who get most of the press these days — find this position unworthy of consideration, Pope Benedict is inviting moderate Muslims to a dialogue on this subject. [Open full post]
Recently, Anchor Rising had the opportunity to ask Republican Secretary of State Candidate, Sue Stenhouse, about her run for statewide office.
AR: What do you believe is the most glaring problem currently within the Secretary of State’s office?
SS: First and foremost, this Office has been lacking a dedicated leader for four years. Without a champion sponsoring initiatives and fighting for funding for technological improvements, this Office, outside of the mandates from HAVA, has not had the proper leadership to improve programs and accessibility of government information for our constituents.
Secondly, a good percentage of Rhode Islanders have only a vague idea of the myriad responsibilities of the Office of Secretary of State. This office should be reaching out more to citizens to educate them on the various duties of this office — ensuring the integrity of the voting process; assuring that our government is open, accessible and truly serves its citizens; providing assistance to companies doing business in the Ocean State; and protecting
and sharing the historical documents that are such a vital part of our shared heritage.
By informing our citizens about the Office of Secretary of State, we can
energize them to become more involved in our government, our communities,
and our heritage and excite them to take a more active role in ensuring that
the three branches of government are operating as they should.
AR: Do you have any ideas/plans to clean up the voter list?
SS: Currently, in order for a Board of Canvassers to eliminate someone from the voter list, it has to receive three pieces of returned mail. I would advocate investing of funds into some type of computer program so that all records — death certificates, marriage licenses and property transfers — could be confidentially shared among and between municipalities and the State so that changes would immediately be “flagged” and voter lists could be immediately updated. I have also proposed a Voter Credential Card which is compatible with our current Central Voter Registration System which will ensure that the person voting is properly identified and their vote is noted in our statewide system so only one vote will be counted in our system.
AR: What differentiates you from your opponents? Why do you believe you are the best person for this role?
SS: As a Councilwoman in Warwick and in the Governor’s Office of Community Relations, I have a record of substantial accomplishment in serving as a bridge between government and the people it’s meant to serve. I have had to learn how to work across party lines to get concerns addressed and substantial pieces of legislation passed. I am willing to reach out to people of varying interests, backgrounds and experiences to achieve compromise on difficult issues.
Additionally, as a woman and a member of the state’s minority party, I realize
firsthand how important — and how difficult — it is to get qualified, energetic people to run for office and/or to become involved in the electorate process — as someone who has been deeply involved in her community, I have been able to engage people and make them realize how issues actually affect them.
I have a proven ability to LISTEN to people, get them engaged and thus make the SOS office the most effective, efficient and professional in the nation.
AR: Many have used the Secretary of State’s office as a launch pad for higher office. Have you thought that far ahead?
SS: I never expected to run for elected office in the first place! My past six years on the Warwick City Council have been a very rewarding, educational and enlightening experience, and I feel that I have been able to help our citizens improve their personal situations and the community as a whole.
When I ran for City Council, I never envisioned it as the first rung on a political
ladder; it’s only as I have grown as a public servant that I realized that
my experience, knowledge and enthusiasm could perhaps benefit all Rhode
Islanders, which is why I decided to run for Secretary of State.
Given the circumstances that have gotten me to this point, I have learned
never to say never to something, but right now my sole purpose is to be
elected Secretary of State, and do that job well and, hopefully, beyond my
own expectations. The ambitious initiatives I have proposed, especially in Election Reform (Voter Credential Cards, Expansion to Three Day Polling for Elections, Changing the primary date to June, etc.) will take me well into two terms to accomplish on a statewide level.
AR: What are your thoughts regarding publicly funded campaigns for lower offices? Example, $5,000 for endorsed/primary winners for City
Council/Town Committee races with the thinking being giving more people
more access to run for elected office.
SS: Although I am receiving matching funds for my campaign for Secretary of State, and believe that this program is vital to offer candidates of all financial means an opportunity to run for statewide office, I do not believe
that it is in the taxpayers’ best interest to offer publicly funded campaigns for local offices. I know from my own experience on the Warwick City Council that if a candidate is willing to put in the time, effort and energy into his or her campaign, fundraising is not the obstacle that it is for candidates for statewide office. Campaigns at the local level are nowhere near as expensive, as they do not require electronic messaging to reach their electorate and are won on the one-on-one contact (walking), so I can’t see asking taxpayers to subsidize those races.
If one presses, as in the comments to a post by Don Hawthorne, it is possible to get a straightforward answer. Writes Bobby Oliveira of the Constitutional requirement that religion be banned from the public sphere:
Since everyone will not choose to participate, based on belief systems, you cannot allow some belief system to obtain an advantage because they choose to participate. Therefore, no one gets to participate.
The first thing to note, given timing, is that Bobby has provided a particularly apt bit of evidence for my suggestion in the previous post that liberal demands are increasingly exposing themselves as tyranny. Somehow, in the metamorphosis of the “living Constitution,” the mandate for “free exercise of religion” and “freedom of speech” transforms into a requirement that nobody is free to express their religious beliefs in the hopes of affecting the public sphere. Call it “the tyranny of the non-participatory.”
The second thing to note, related to the first, is the impossible mind bending that such post hoc legal reasoning as Bobby’s requires of those who know better than the authors of the Constitution how to constitute a country. After all, isn’t it possible that some groups benefit from universal non-participation of religion in the public debate? I’m thinking, for instance, of those whose religion, such as it is, nigh upon requires them to pollute public airwaves and the entire culture with pornography and graphic violence. For another instance, consider those who speak as if they’ve a positive right to federal funds for morally questionable research. Why is it appropriate to give them an advantage in the government sector?
The answer is that it is not. Thus rationalize those who would bind their inconveniently disagreeable, and incompatibly religious, fellow citizens.
