Btw the Biden angle was a more a case of all the laws he has passed in the forms of various "defense of women" acts, this stuff smacks of silly protective behavior. Its not really a partisan thing, just pointing out some of the dangers of enacting chivalry in law enforcement legislation. (More done by traditionalist conservatives at time more than anything tbh).

The Violence Against Women Act was passed in the early 1990s IIRC. You were too young to remember it, but at that time people were finally starting to break away from some pretty hard previously existing bias against women on the subject of sex insofar as the old chastity expectations for women in conjunction with undue sexual licence given to men. Those laws were the end result of putting some pretty unfair treatment to rest. Ending the billing of raped women for rape kit evidence was only one aspect. The rape shield laws to prevent the abusing of women and unfairly prejudicing a case by smearing women on the stand about their collateral sex histories was another aspect.

Beforehand, too many people still viewed women filing rape claims with scepticism or browbeating along the lines of things like 1) she's being an evil bitch making it up to get even with the guy for something, 2) she's a golddigging shrew doing it to blackmail someone, 3) she's a slut and/or careless fool who 'asked for it' due to her dress and/or conduct, 4) she's partially at fault and therefore to blame because didn't resist the assault as she should have, etc, and these kinds of biases found their way into forms of official conduct.

I do not know why she was not charged but I assume it is due to the belief by the NC prosecuting authorities that they lack sufficient evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that she criminally fabricated the story and/or they believe that it was more the result of the puffery and other wrongdoings of the now disgraced and disbarred former prosecutor Mike Nifong. As for the feds, they need to have jurisdiction and in many incidents they do not.

That may be the sticking point, i didn't realise they needed the jurisdiction to go in first...i thought they could over-ride and involve themselves into any criminal investigation they felt like?

Nifong was a disgrace and while he should be held to a higher standard she started this whole thing, for the smount of stuff she caused (expelled students, coach resigning, millions in taxpayer money wasted and spent, now remunerations too), she should be serving the maximum time in jail for each count of perjury and OoJ going her way to run consecutively, like with the this McCain staffer lady.

Well as bad as it may have been then you don't think harm has come to the entire proccess because of the at times, over-protective nature of the laws? Or maybe their intrepetations there of?

I think its gone too far the other way now, i didn't remember it back in the 90's and was indeed too young but surely what we have now isn't what the law's drafters intended be the outcome of their passage?

Also, a lot of the time, even to this day a lot of the past sex life info and "she's a gold-digger" are still used by the defense aren't they anyway? All the shield laws do it make the lawyers work harder to do their own research i presume and not have the local paper just brandish the girl a slut and kill the case on arrival? Or have i mis-interpreted what you meant?

Just to edit in, i absolutely agree that this idiot in this case deserves a stiff jail term for sure like you said. I just think that half the way these laws are writte and or interpreted allows for folks like her (and the Duke stripper) to think they can get away with this sort of thing.

The federal government only has jurisdiction to enact and enforce laws within subject matter expressly or generally delegated to it under the US Constitution. Any particular conduct must implicate those areas or else they have no jurisdiction.

That is assuming too much. The specific laws must be reviewed as well as the totality of her conduct to discover whether 1) what about her conduct can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, and 2) whether that conduct violates any particular criminal statutes.

I guess we'll never know now...

No. I approve of those changes wholeheartedly.

Rape kit evidence is state's evidence to be used in the state's prosecution of the criminal. Charging the victim for that is ethically reprehensible, implicates the possible violation of a few Constitutional provisions (even the 'takings' clause) and is counterproductive to the enforcement of rape laws.

Rape shield laws prevented the miscarriage of justice in numerous valid rape cases with wrongful acquittals, improved the ethics and fairness of court practice, and provides fairness to victims.

As for any intentionally filed false charges, plenty of laws exist to punish such people.

These kinds of laws above achieved their intended effect without any remarkable, if any, negative setbacks.

No, that kind of evidence does not come in anymore. You don't even dream of it actually because it would cause mistrials and judges sanctioning you, etc.

Lawyers for the defence must now actually stay focused on the case evidence at issue itself. Simply trying to smear the woman as a slut due to her prior and collateral sexual experiences is mostly if not often completely a red herring trick, e.g., if a woman slept with someone else consensually in another unrelated event, it doesn't mean she must have consented to have sex with the defendant. It sought to trigger improper prejudice in judges and juries to get desired results. It was also an improper tactic for intimidating witnesses to not testify to get the desired results.

If the stripper in the Duke lacrosse case violated criminal statutes and it can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, she should be prosecuted and slammed. Knowingly and intentionally filing false rape charges is extremely serious given the kinds of life ruining sentences the victims can receive if wrongfully convicted on top of the loss of reputation, jobs, spent attorneys' fees and bail, and other negative consequences that can happen to the victims of the false accusation.

The only thing the dude is guilty of is believing mainstream media reporting that actually matched something that he might want to hear, find advantageous to his own side, or find deeply offensive to his own side.

Are you casting the first stone?

Nah...been otherwise occupied.

Cool. Yeah. She sucks. Just like the perpetrator would have sucked if the story were real.

The message, however, was approved by neither Barack Obama or John McCain...regardless of how it panned out.

Both campaigns played it straight. Well done. There is hope.

Yes, but that does not indicate the commission of a hate crime.

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Whan they come, Ah sall staun mah grun
Staun mah grun, an be na afraid.
Thochts ae hame tak awa mah fear
Sweat an bluid hide mah veil o tears.

Time to swallow your own words.

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Im Grabe schlummert ein neues Morgenrot.

I'm sorry, I am not sure what you are referring to.

I was referring to Ms. Todd when I said that.

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Since when did conservatives want the government interfering with people's lives?

http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?equlity

I thought you were making reference to the OP making a post about this story and it turning out to be a fake crime.

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"Compassionate Conservatism"?!?! That is a stupid phrase. Conservatism is inherently compassionate. It is liberalism that is cruel for the sake of maintaining a constituency.

Racism and lying is the typical M.O. of the McCain camp. I'm not surprised at all that it turns out that this campaign worker is a racist liar. People like this are attracted to the McCain camp.

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Is our children learning? -George W. Bush

"I think—tide turning—see, as I remember—I was raised in the desert, but tides kind of—it's easy to see a tide turn—did I say those words?"—Washington, D.C., June 14, 2006

"[T]he illiteracy level of our children are appalling."—Washington, D.C., Jan. 23, 2004