Supreme Court: Criminals Have More Rights Than Victims

In yet another disgraceful decision today, the Supreme Court once again ignored the will of the people and declared that criminals have more rights than their victims. In this case, the defendant was a man convicted of raping his then-eight year old daughter. I believ that there is no one among us- especially of those who have children in their lives- who would disagree that this is a monstrous crime. A child by definitiion is an innocent who is powerless to defend oneself. And the State of Louisiana had passed a law stating that the deserved punishment of such a crime is death. Yet the Court's majority- Souter, Kennedy, Breyer, Stevens and Ginsburg- have decided that this is a mere peccadillo and the criminal should be allowed to subsist on taxpayer funds for the remainder of his life instead of receiving his just desserts. In so doing, they have essentially made it impossible to impose the death penalty on anything- despite a move nationwide back towards a tougher attitude towards criminals

Since Congress cannot or will not exercise it's Constitutional power to rebuke the Court for these kinds of decisions, we must accustom ourselves to this type of judicial over-reach. I am no lawyer, but it seems to me that there is no valid legal reason for the Court to overturn the State of Lousiana's elected representatives' decision in this case. According to Yahoo! News,

"The death penalty is not a proportional punishment for the rape of a child," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in his majority opinion.

Again, if death is not a proportional punishment for raping a child, I don't know what is. The Supreme Court (in the person of these same justices) has already decided that raping an adult woman is OK- they have outlawed the death penalty for that as well. Now they have declared open season on children. If a criminal knows that there is no chance he will face death for raping children, there is no incentive for him to refrain from doing exactly that. Life in prison? No problem- he knows that after say ten or fifteen years, the same bleeding hearts who allowed him to live will ensure his early release because after all- he's only a rapist, not a real criminal.

It is interesting how the media and womens' rights groups are completely silent on this case, where once again, women's protections are stripped away. One would think that the safety of women and children would be important to so-called liberals. Instead, they have once again proven that they care only for the rights of predators- victims are not important. If you are female, the Court has declared open season on you- and now, they have extended that open season to children- the very people that they ought most to protect. If I were a Supreme Court justice, I would be ashamed of myself, but these five have proven before that shame is not in their repertoire.