Thursday, January 09, 2003 :::
Reportedly, Matthew Hale has been accused of trying to have a judge assassinated. In previous situations I've felt that Hale has been mistreated (in particular he was denied entry to the bar); I have sympathy for the ACLU position that evil law-abiding citizens should not be mistreated by the system. Trying to have someone killed, though, even a lawyer, is appropriately illegal, and I lose any sympathy I had for him quite quickly.
On that sort of topic, the problem I had with "The People vs. Larry Flynt" (the movie) was that it made us like Larry Flynt, if in an embarrassed sort of way. The whole point was that just because someone's contemptible doesn't mean he doesn't enjoy free speech rights, and that point would be better made if he were more contemptible. On the other hand, perhaps that would have led to audiences feeling he shouldn't enjoy free speech rights; many people are less liberal (in the good sense) than I (even they) might like to believe.
::: posted by dWj at 1:55 PM