IÂ’ve not commented on the Duke lacrosse team case. I want to wait and hear a bit more evidence before I make up my mind, because too much ambiguity is out there.

But I will take issue with this tripe from Jesse Jackass Jackson.

''Divorced mother of two, working way through college, allegedly raped, abused by gang.'' Had the headline read that way, the fury would have been great. The facts that the police didn't arrest anyone, that the gang was not talking, that it took two days for the police to search the scene of the crime would have added to the anger.

But that's not how it was reported. Rather it was reported that a black stripper was accusing members of the Duke lacrosse team of rape after she and another woman were hired to dance for them at a party. That method of reportage put race and class in the center of the story. Predictably, the right-wing media machine has kicked in. Rush Limbaugh called the two women strippers ''ho's,'' though he later apologized. And Michael Savage referred to the alleged victim as a ''Durham dirt-bag'' and ''dirty, venomous black stripper.''

Why was the story not reported the way Jesse suggests in the first paragraph? Well, it could be because the words he uses do not accurately convey what happened. I won't defend any of the examples of "conservatives" that he cites (one so incindiary that I reject him as representative of conservatism), because they rushed to judgement.

This was not a gang – it was an athletic team.

Why were they not talking? Because of the legitimate advice of their lawyers – based upon the Firth Amendment and the liberal precedents of the Warren Court that are usually trumpeted when the accused are members of the liberal-favored victim class instead of upper-class white kids.

And sorry, Jesse, but the bit about her being a stripper is relevant – it explains why she was at the house. Her “working her way through college” job is somewhat relevant to the story, given that strippers are also, at times, prostitutes – could this be an extortion case or a dispute over failure to pay for “services rendered”? Notice, please, that I am not calling this alleged victim a prostitute, but I won't discount that possibility given other legal issues in her past. I'm agnostic on the matter.

And for once in his life, Jesse seems to want arrests without a complete investigation, in the face of convoluted and uncertain evidence. He also apparently wants to do away with the requirement that there be a warrant obtained to do a search. In other words, white men accuse by black women should not get the same benefit of the doubt or due process as his favored members of the victim class.

Jesse wants “searching discussions of race and gender issues” – sounds good to me.

Let’s start with Tawana Brawley – and the tendency of so-called civil rights leaders to assume that minority accusers are always victims and whites accused are always guilty.

Posted by: Greg at 10:03 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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