On Fridays I have a bit of a break between the discussion sections I lead, and it usually provides enough time to sit and read the NYT while I'm having lunch. It really is amazing what you'll find when you have an extra 10-15 minutes. For example:
ST. GEORGE, Utah, Sept. 13 — The prosecution’s star witness in the trial of the fundamentalist Mormon polygamist leader Warren S. Jeffs testified on Thursday that she was taught to either obey church leaders without question or face dire consequences.
“We would forfeit our chance at the afterlife” by disobeying religious leaders, testified the woman, who in 2001 at age 14 married her 19-year-old first cousin in a religious ceremony performed by Mr. Jeffs.
That's a really odd way to frame a story about alleged underaged marriage and rape, isn't it? All churches use threats about the afterlife to compel certain behaviors. That's a widely accepted practice, so it can't actually be what is at issue here. The problem isn't the justification, its the action. It's not that they compelled her, but towards what ends. Framed this way, I can actually begin to see why prosecuting these cases is usually so difficult. Rather than focus on the actions, you instead get the jury to focus about beliefs. And that, we've all been instructed, is simply unacceptable.
Next, on the very same page, this:
A judge spared a man who was to be executed today in a double murder, after the Dallas County prosecutor’s office discovered evidence they believe had been withheld from the man’s lawyers. A second polygraph given to a co-defendant of the man, Joseph Lave, came to light in the last few days and reflects on the credibility of the co-defendant, said Mike Ware, of the district attorney’s conviction integrity unit. Mr. Lave was one of three robbers involved in the 1992 deaths of two teenagers in Richardson. Prosecutors say lawyers no longer with the office misled the court by saying the evidence did not exist.
My comments here are simple. End capital punishment. End it now. Better that a thousand guilty men spend like in prison than that a single innocent man be put to death. This isn't complicated. End it. End it now.
And last but not least, this:
The former head of an oil field service company said in federal court that he bribed three Alaska legislators, including the son of a senator who is under federal investigation. The man, Bill Allen, 70, the former chief executive of the VECO Corporation, testified in the corruption trial of former Speaker Pete Kott of the state House. Mr. Allen is awaiting sentencing on bribery charges. He said he bribed Mr. Kott; the former State Senate president, Ben Stevens; and former Representative Vic Kohring. Mr. Stevens, the son of United States Senator Ted Stevens, Republican of Alaska, is under federal investigation but has not been charged. “Mr. Stevens has consistently said he’s not engaged in any of the illegal activity that is alleged by Mr. Allen,” John Wolfe, Mr. Stevens’s lawyer, said.
Two stories of immense importance buried as tiny paragraphs on page A15, both sitting alongside a story about polygamy and child marriage in Utah.
The more I read the Times, the less I understand why they are so well respected. And that's sad, really, because they really are the best we've got.
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