Archive for January, 2007

Next Entries »
20
Jan

No Winners in the Kim Walker Verdict

By Cynapse 2 Comments
Categories: Society

A Saskatchewan jury has returned a guilty verdict in the high-profile trial of Kim Walker:

A Saskatchewan man was found guilty Friday of second-degree murder in the death of his daughter’s drug-dealing boyfriend.

A Court of Queen’s Bench jury recommended the minimum sentence, life in prison with first eligibility for parole in 10 years, for Kim Walker in the death of James Hayward, 24, on March 17, 2003.

…

Walker was charged with first-degree murder in Hayward’s death.

He bled to death in the front room of his house after being shot five times by Walker, once in the back at close range.

Walker testified he didn’t remember the shooting.

Initial public sympathy has been on the side of Walker for reasons that should be obvious to all. A dedicated parent will go to amazing lengths to protect his/her child, particularly when (s)he perceives the child is being preyed upon. To Walker’s credit, he initially tried to save his daughter using standard legal means – most notably obtaining a warrant forcing his daughter into 72 hours of rehab. Unfortunately, Jadah came out of rehab and went right back into the arms of her boyfriend/dealer. Walker’s frustration is understandable, given he had to work within a legal system more likely to arrest HIM for physically intervening in his daughters decisions (e.g. “child abuse”) than punish the man helping to perpetuate her habit. Perhaps, as Walker’s testimony implied, the shooting of James Hayward was a blackout – a moment of frustration where the most extreme response seemed to be the only appropriate response.

However, tempting as it may be to whole-heartedly endorse Walker’s tough love, the shooting was still not justified and the circumstances do not warrant any kind of reduced/suspended sentence

  • The shooting took place in James Hayward’s home. Walker was an invader which rules out any credible self-defense theory
  • Jadah was a willing participant in her drug habit, and clearly chose to be with James Hayward. She went directly to Hayward’s house after being released from rehab and resumed her habit.
  • There was no guarantee that Jadah would have stopped (or will continue to cease) her drug habit just because Hayward was no longer in the picture. There are other drug dealers in Saskatchewan and where there’s a will there’s surely a way to find more drugs. This fact mitigates the argument that eliminating Hayward was necessarily a matter of life and death for Jadah.

For this reason a second degree murder conviction is justified. Although many pundits will probably scream about how unfair the system is to protective parents, the jury obviously took Walker’s state of mind into account when deciding to convict on a lesser offense than the original first degree murder charge. Justice was served in this case, although both the Walkers and the Haywards lost in the end.

15
Jan

MLK Freed the Slaves!

By Cynapse 0 Comments
Categories: Society

It’s January 15 which means many Americans had the day off to “celebrate” Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Creating a national holiday of Dr. King’s birthday is arguably the greatest olive branch offered to African-Americans by the US Government since passing the Civil Rights Act (ironically the holiday bill was signed by Ronald Reagan, whose antagonistic relationship with blacks and willingness to appeal to pre-civil rights sentiment is well documented).

Unfortunately, like most holidays, the significance of MLK day seems lost on many who claim to celebrate it or at least get the day off work/school. NBC recently published an article demonstrating just how little some Americans know about Dr King –

In a recent survey of college students on U.S. civic literacy, more than 81 percent knew that the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was expressing hope for “racial justice and brotherhood” in his historic “I Have a Dream” speech.
That’s the good news.
Most of the rest surveyed thought King was advocating the abolition of slavery.

Only 100 years off … Pretty shocking. The article goes on to discuss whether lack of knowledge about MLK’s legacy can be related to the rejuvenated focus on standardized testing in schools –

In many schools across the country, teachers say social studies has taken a back seat under the federal No Child Left Behind law, which stresses math and reading. Squeezing history into the curriculum can be difficult, educators say, and taking time out of a scheduled lesson to use a federal holiday — even King’s — as a teaching moment can be tough.

This suggestion seems unlikely, given that North American schools have long been notorious for not teaching children history beyond names and dates of the most surface events. In a 1998 Canadian survey published by the Dominion Institute, only 41% of respondents obtained a passing grade in a 15-question quiz about major Canadian military events from WW1 to the formation of U.N. Peacekeeping forces. The pass rate drops to 26% for respondents aged 18-34.

  • Only 17 percent of respondents aged 18 to 34 correctly identified conscription as the topic of a 1942 national plebiscite, compared to twice as many Canadians aged 55 and older (37%)
  • In response to an open-ended question, one in three (36%) correctly identified the battle of Vimy Ridge as “Canada’s most famous single victory in the First World War, consisting of the capture of a key ridge on the Western Front”
  • 43 percent accurately identified Halifax as the site of a massive munitions explosion during WWI, while another 3 percent correctly identified the province of Nova Scotia, bringing the total proportion of correct responses to just less than half (46%).

Only the symbolism of the Remembrance Day poppy was correctly identified by a strong majority of survey respondents (79%). Surface symbolism and commercialism also appear to drive public knowledge of religious holidays like Christmas and Easter.

The main inference from these observations seems to be that a holiday cannot substitute for year-round historical and religious education about important events. Of course Cynics Unlimited would never advocate revoking a day off work; however, social studies should not be left to the mass media and periodic holidays that are more likely to be spent playing video games or visiting friends.

09
Jan

More Saddam Video (Post Mortem)

By Cynapse 4 Comments
Categories: Noteworthy Events and Uncategorized

And just when you thought it was over … more video of Saddam’s death has emerged. This time, the video shows Saddam being wheeled away post-mortem. A particularly nasty gash on his neck is the video’s main focus.

(obviously, you have been implicitly warned that this video is graphic)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-233844812484249985

There was some question as to whether the gash was caused by an intentional puncture after the hanging took place. One can’t say what happened with 100% accuracy (a continuous video of the proceedings has yet to surface) but the injury was probably caused by the rope when the noose tightened. If you look at the original hanging video, Saddam was initially standing on gallows but could be clearly photographed beneath the gallows after execution. This implies that the 6’2 Hussein fell at least 6 feet and 7 inches before the noose tightened.

A drop of this length qualifies the execution as a so-called “long drop”, when the force from the sudden change in acceleration once the rope tightens (which is a function of body mass, distance traveled and gravity) should ideally snap the neck, removing nearly all sensation and creating a “humane” death. According to the 1913 “Drop Tables” –created to advise hangmen how far subjects should drop in order to cause a near-instantaneous death- the 210lb Saddam Hussein could have snapped his neck after a mere 5 foot drop. Any longer of a drop would risk decapitation, which is probably what nearly happened in this case.

Perhaps we’ll just end this morbid line of reasoning here :)

Next Entries »

Further Research