Justice Obstructed

The news last week was dominated by the stunning decision of prosecutor Kim Foxx to drop all 16 counts against Jussie Smollett, with shifting rationalizations.  First, she implausibly contended that her move was an “alternate prosecution” as Smollett agreed to forfeit his $10,000 bond and do community service.  Then she explained that this is the sentence he would have gotten anyway because he was a first time offender.  Then, Foxx claimed that she didn’t believe there was sufficient evidence to convict.  That last statement flies in the face of everything that has been made public by the Chicago Police Department.

After a momentary outburst of righteous indignation in which outgoing mayor Rahm Emmanuel decried a “whitewash of justice,” Rahm reverted to his hyperpartisan self and blamed Donald Trump for “creating the toxic atmosphere” that made Jussie’s actions possible.

Smollett’s lawyer speculated that maybe the Nigerian brothers were wearing whiteface like the Joker and threatened to sue the city.

What is really going on? Tina Tchen, Michelle’s former aide contacted Foxx.  The conversation went something like this: “Kim, we need you to just drop those charges.  Just make something up.  You will catch heat for a few weeks, and you’ll probably be asked to step down.  But don’t worry.  We have you covered.  There will be a job at Netflix for you if you need it.”

The cue came from the assistant State’s Attorney Joe Magat’s statement.  Magat used words identical to that of Robert Mueller and said that dropping the charges does not mean that Smollett was exonerated.

Here’s my final take.  Dropping the charges was a direct poke in Trump’s eye by the Obamas.  It was meant to send a message and that message is “You may control a few things in DC, but we are still boss in Chicago, the West Coast, and the Deep State.” 

The Smollett fiasco is very bad on 3 levels.  It was an egregious exercise of clout in a city known for its corruption- these people put the bananas in banana republic.   It showed that consequences are for the little people.  Finally, and the worst part, is that a fake hate crime is worse than an actual hate crime.  A hate crime hurts a single person.  A fake hate crime rips at the fabric of our entire society by propagating a lie.  It is designed to pull us apart, to put us at odds with one another, make us suspicious of each other.   Fake hate crimes should be punished even more severely than real hate crimes.  The justification that Magat provided, that “we work to prioritize violent crime and the drivers of violent crime” doesn’t pass muster.  In this case, Smollett did extreme violence to the cohesiveness of our entire society.

The real bottom line is that real hate crimes and real disrespect shown to others because of their race, religion or ethnic origin is actually quite rare in America. But because racial division is politically profitable and vital to the narrative of the Democratic party, we are seeing more instances of hoaxes.  And it is important that the perpetrators of hoaxes and false narratives suffer consequences.   In the case of the smear against the Covington Catholic kids, the courts will sort that out.  In the Smollett case, courts also would have, but they were not allowed to function.

I think we found the obstruction of justice thing. And it was right here in Chicago.