And now the media are full of stories about how the Tsarnaevs were all-American kids and “beautiful, beautiful boys” and maybe it was the boxing or the Ben Affleck movies or the classical music but, whatever it was, it was nothing to do with Islam. Nothing whatever.
Also, I fearlessly predict calls for, and introduction of legislation to ban the purchase and possession of recreational fireworks by the general public.
As Mark Twain wrote, the principal difference between a dog and a man is that the former won’t bite the hand that feeds it. Once again, we see a connection between welfare and terrorism. As in the UK, we fund their lifestyles so that they have the leisure and resources to plot to murder and maim us.
[Update a few minutes later]
Did Boston have it coming? The UN (of course!) says yes. Remember: blame America first.
And of course, fisking lying anti-Semitic leftist Richard Falk is like shooting a whale in a barrel. I heard him speak in Ann Arbor in the late seventies, when I was a student. He doesn’t seem to have learned much in the interim.
I agree with this take on how the terrorists won in Boston. This sort of irrational risk aversion is the theme of my book. “Safe” is never an option, in any absolute sense. In order to prevent a potential death of a citizen, the authorities shut the whole town down, costing hundreds of millions of dollars to the local (and probably national) economy. The whole town, that is, except for the Duncan Donuts shops. Which, as he says, really tells you everything you need to know. It was security theater, just like TSA.
As I said, people of a certain age remember this history. For those that don’t, Robert Redford is kindly about to release a movie recounting the Rockland robbery (albeit relocated to Michigan). By all accounts, the film lionizes the Weather Underground terrorists, Boudin and her accomplices.
Perhaps to bring it full circle, Professor Boudin can soon guest-lecture at a film class at Columbia when the Redford movie is screened.
Other than the passage of time, one can find no real distinction between the cowardly actions of last Monday’s Boston murderer and the terror carried out by Boudin and her accomplices. Yet today we live in a country where our leading educational institutions see fit to trust our children’s education to murderers and Hollywood sees fit to celebrate terrorists.
The Web site of Columbia’s School of Social Work sums up Boudin’s past thus: “Dr. Kathy Boudin has been an educator and counselor with experience in program development since 1964, working within communities with limited resources to solve social problems.”
“Since 1964” — that would include the bombing of my house, it would include the anti-personnel devices intended for Fort Dix and it would include the dead policeman on the side of the Thruway in 1981.
We have a sick culture, particularly in Hollywood and academia.
Some people are making silly (dare I say ridiculous?) comments in this thread about how I’ve suddenly become a big-government authoritarian because I don’t think that the Boston bomber should be read his Miranda rights, or necessarily questioned with a lawyer present. I think that this criticism arises largely from ignorance of the law and Constitution (along with a healthy dollop of hysteria). Orin Kerr explains the legal situation:
A lot of people assume that the police are required to read a suspect his Miranda rights upon arrest. That is, they assume that one of a person’s rights is the right to be read their rights. It often happens that way on Law & Order, but that’s not what the law actually requires. The police aren’t required to follow Miranda. Miranda is a set of rules the government can chose to follow if they want to admit a person’s statements in a criminal case in court, not a set of rules they have to follow in every case. Under Chavez v. Martinez, 538 U.S. 760 (2003), it is lawful for the police to not read a suspect his Miranda rights, interrogate him, and then obtain a statement. Chavez holds that a person’s Miranda rights are violated only if the statement is admitted in court, even if the statement is obtained in violation of Miranda. See id. at 772-73. Further, the prosecution is even allowed to admit any physical evidence discovered as a fruit of the statement obtained in violation of Miranda — only the actual statement can be excluded. See United States v. Patane, 542 U.S. 630 (2004). So, contrary to what a lot of people think, it is legal for the government to even intentionally violate Miranda so long as they don’t try to seek admission of the suspect’s statements in court.
Emphasis mine.
It’s just that simple. There is no need to get his testimony in court, because the other evidence against him is overwhelming. What there is a need to do is to find out if there are other co-conspirators, and other bombs, and other plans. And as Orin also points out, there are even ways to get the evidence into trial even under these circumstances, should it be necessary.