FOXNews.com - North Carolina State Bar Files Ethics Complaint Against Duke Lacrosse Rape Prosecutor Mike Nifong - Local News | News Articles | Nationa

Well, it had to happen sooner or later. District Attorney Mike Nifong has done so many egregious things in his handling of the rape allegations against three Duke University lacrosse players, that he had to be breaking some rules somewhere. Those who follow a pattern of bad-faith behavior will, sooner or later, go over the line in a way that even the most complacent authorities can no longer ignore. And that's what's happened now: Mike Nifong is in trouble--serious trouble--with the North Carolina Bar Association, who may be the only ones who can proceed against him, thanks to "prosecutorial immunity."

Here is a complete time-line of events surrounding the March 13 wild party, its aftermath, and the investigation of same.Note these key dates:

• March 24: Investigators take DNA samples from 46 of 47 lacrosse players
• April 10: Defense lawyers say DNA test results failed to connect lacrosse players to alleged rape

And then--more than six months later--we learn that the DNA test results are worse than inconclusive: they are well-nigh exculpatory. Not only do they show that Mike Nifong has got the wrong dudes, but they also show that five other dudes did it, if "it" was in fact anything more serious than a few rolls in the hay.

Sportsfans, if that isn't a vindictive misuse of the prerogatives of governmental office, I don't know what is.

Understand this: that still doesn't excuse the incredibly bad judgment that the Duke lax team captain showed in having a stripper come to his rented house to entertain him and his teammates. And those boys are still blessed that she didn't sink a knife into one of their bellies, or their backs. Not that I have any reason to suspect that this particular accuser would do such a thing. It's just that you never know with perfect strangers whom you invite into your house to get very-very-personal with. Do that often enough, and sooner or later you're going to get yourself seriously hurt or killed. It's that simple. Compared to that sort of thing, even a malicious, bad-faith prosecution is something, frankly, to be thankful for, just for not being worse.

All the same, though I dislike the sort of guy who would hire a prostitute--or someone very much like a prostitute, such as an ecdysiast--I dislike abusive government authorities even more.

News 14 Carolina | Rape charges dropped in Duke case

From a local television station.

So the Duke Three are no longer charged with rape--because now the accuser "can't remember" whether any of them penetrated her or not, and thus the State cannot prove rape beyond a reasonable doubt. And yet District Attorney Mike Nifong still wants to charge those boys with kidnap and sexual assault.

I have said before: Never, repeat never, get involved with strippers. Ecdysiasm is a form of prostitution, and you never know what a prostitute is going to do. I myself had some school chums get themselves killed in Boston's Red Light District after the Yale-Harvard Game of 1976. They made a deal with a prostitute, who then lifted one of their wallets, and when they tried to get the wallet back, her pimp knifed them to death. Sweet. Those Duke boys ought to hold themselves blessed that they still live after their gross error in judgment.

And what was that error in judgment? Where they got into trouble is in:

1. Hiring a stripper,
2. Who happened to be black, they being white,
3. In a year when the DA was up for re-election and had a Large Black Base,
4. To say nothing of the desire of criminal prosecutors everywhere to nab the Great White Defendant to burnish their liberal credentials.

Now since then we've heard that the DNA samples, which were supposed to have been inconclusive, actually not only exonerates those boys, but also suggests that the accuser had been with five other men--not one of whom was one of those three boys, nor indeed anyone else at that party.

But that doesn't matter to District Attorney Nifong. No, sir. Nor does it matter to the local community. You see, legal technicalities don't matter when sex and race are involved.

Something to think about, guys, the next time you think that hiring someone to take her clothes off in front of you is "good clean fun."

TIME.com: Person of the Year: You -- Dec. 25, 2006 -- Page 1

Yeah, right. Everybody gets to be the Person of the Year. Andy Warhol is now vindicated.

Laying aside the obvious publicity gimmick--Time is printing its cover with a mirror on it to make its point--what I've seen of the article rather misses the point. Blogs, letters-to-the-editor (and commentary on on-line polls), and videos are all very well. But that's not all there is to user-contributed content! Did they even bother to talk about the Wikipedia, for example?

Actually--by way of an "acceptance post"--I'd like to thank those who made user contributions possible. Let's have a hand for the folks at digg.com, and, of course, the Wikipedia--even though I can tell you right now that they're biased (and don't want to admit it). And let's also thank the wonderful folks that made the Internet what it is: a place whose barriers-to-entry are paper-thin. You don't like the Wikipedia? Have no fear! They have no monopoly on the MediaWiki software that powers their project. Lots of other Wikis are out there, advertising for editors all the time. (My current favorite: CreationWiki, the encyclopedia of creation.)

So to everyone who made it possible even for me to rant and rave (if anyone's listening), I say again: Thank you, thank you, thank you.

WorldNetDaily: North American Union leader says merger just crisis away

So says a professor at American University in Washington, DC--someone, in short, who wants this North American Union to happen. He's even been teaching a course on it. Now that doesn't make him a prime mover or shaker--just a talking head. But that's still a dangerous thing for a college professor to be talking about.

Mitt Romney: 'Wrong in the Past' on Abortion

Specifically, he told National Review that he once had supported abortion rights, but had changed his mind when someone set him straight on the matter of embryonic stem-cell research. In this regard, he is a breath of fresh air--because how many politicians, finding that they need to change their minds about something, ever admit that they are changing their minds? I have to respect a man who can change his mind and be brave enough to explain why he changed his mind, without a lot of Orwellian double-talk.

WorldNetDaily: Death threat: Tancredo cancels Miami speech

That's right: Tom Tancredo was coming to Miami to clarify and expand on his earlier remarks, and to show exactly why he said that Miami was like a third-world city-state. And what happens?

The manager of the restaurant where Tancredo was to speak, the Rusty Pelican on Key Biscayne, said Wednesday that the owners didn't want him to appear on Thursday in order to keep up the integrity and reputation of the business. The manager also said staff members objected to working the party where his immigration talk was supposed to be held, some customers threatened to boycott the restaurant, and the restaurant had received bomb threats.

And so, too, did the staff of Tom Tancredo's office.

"Integrity and reputation of the business"? Employees refusing to work the party? Well, see here: didn't Cassandra Peterson once say that her favorite way to scare people was to:

Go into the kitchens of trendy Los Angeles restaurants and shout, "Immigraciòn!" Gets them every time.

I guess it would "get" them in Miami, too. To the point that they want to assassinate the key man in front of this issue.

WorldNetDaily: Charlie Sheen taints carol into 'Joy to Fornication'

WARNING! This article quotes Charlie Sheen's revised lyrics to Joy to the World, and they will likely offend people's sensibilities. Parental judgment and discretion are advised!

Having said the above: Of all the goof-ball things that our silly cultural mavens have even done, this is the worst. Excuse me? A man counts it as "joy" because he's going to have sexual intercourse? If that's all that any man has to look forward to, I pity such a man--not to mention the woman who allows herself to be the instrument of his (momentary) pleasure.

The head of Life Decisions International is protesting, of course. I can't blame him. Those lyrics speak directly to an issue he is raising--that we ought not encourage fornication. But--excuse me while I make another observation--why bother to watch that kind of tripe anyway? This is another reason to block CBS from your TV dial, lock the TV up with a key that only the parents are authorized to carry, or even throw the TV into the dumpster and have done with it.

WorldNetDaily: Duke joins Iran's chorus in condemning 'Zionists'

That's David Duke, former Grand Kleagle of the Ku Klux Klan, former candidate for President (whose campaign was a fraud and a scheme for graft), and habitual Holocaust denier. Now he says that Jews control American foreign policy. Haven't we heard this before? Except that now he's lending credence to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's crazy theories.

Has Mr. Duke already decided to say

There is but one God named Allah, and Muhammad is his prophet!

Well? And if he hasn't, then does he understand that that's part of the package? I wouldn't expect that from him, because after all, he's a white supremacist, and Arabs are not "white" in the traditional sense, last time I checked.

The prophet Zechariah was right: Israel the nation-state, and Israel the people, will be the stumbling block on which the world will cut its collective foot.

WorldNetDaily: Duke joins Iran's chorus in condemning 'Zionists'

That's David Duke, former Grand Kleagle of the Ku Klux Klan, former candidate for President (whose campaign was a fraud and a scheme for graft), and habitual Holocaust denier. Now he says that Jews control American foreign policy. Haven't we heard this before? Except that now he's lending credence to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's crazy theories.

Has Mr. Duke already decided to say

There is but one God named Allah, and Muhammad is his prophet!

Well? And if he hasn't, then does he understand that that's part of the package? I wouldn't expect that from him, because after all, he's a white supremacist, and Arabs are not "white" in the traditional sense, last time I checked.

The prophet Zechariah was right: Israel the nation-state, and Israel the people, will be the stumbling block on which the world will cut its collective foot.

WorldNetDaily: Judge copied ACLU in anti-design ruling

And not only that; he copied their mistakes, word-for-word.

So the ACLU has now gone into the outsourced judicial clerk service business. Stunning legal opinions made to order!

Actor James Brolin Latest Celebrity To Publicly Doubt 9/11

I never thought I'd be linking to anything from PrisonPlanet.com. They actually believe this silliness that James Brolin is now promulgating. But, hey! They're the only textual source on the Web right now--though Rush Limbaugh has just attested to Brolin's speech on ABC's The View on his radio program.

Now for those of you who are asking, "James who?": James Brolin is the second husband of Barbra Streisand, and is just as liberal as she is. Some have suggested that he wasn't always like that.

But you might want to read this article in the Wikipedia about a motion picture that Brolin (and, by either coincidence or design, Babs' first husband Elliott Gould) appeared in in the late 1970's: Capricorn One. In that film, NASA is setting up the first crewed mission to Mars (using equipment identical to that of Project Apollo), only to learn at the last minute that the life-support system aboard "Capricorn One" is inherently flawed and will only kill the crew within three weeks. NASA's solution: fake the shoot. James Brolin appears as the Capricorn One Mission Commander, and Elliott Gould appears as a Houston-based reporter covering the mission, who figures out that the mission is a hoax. Worse than that, NASA plans to kill the astronauts when their empty capsule burns up on re-entry (and whether that was intended or not, the film never explains). By movie's end, Brolin, the sole survivor of the fake mission (and rescued by Gould with help from a wisecracking Telly Savalas), shows up at Arlington National Cemetery to confront the Administrator of NASA in front of the President and also in front of millions of people.

Sportsfans, that sort of thing ought to have given you a clue about James Brolin way back then. But in case you needed a further clue, Brolin portrayed (or rather, mis-portrayed) President Reagan in the phony biopic about the Reagans, the one that CBS had to farm out to their sister network, Showtime.

So if James Brolin is out there saying that the US government blew up the World Trade Center in order to frame the Arabs, then this is all of a piece with his portrait of a US astronaut forced to participate in faking out a world about a crewed space mission and then dodging bullets to expose the hoax and redeem the honor of his men. Maybe he's hoping to land another movie role...