Thursday, September 23, 2010
Sex and Wisconsin DAs
Woman’s degradation is in man’s idea of his sexual rights.
— Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Letter to Susan B. Anthony
This week’s news pertains to two Wisconsin district attorneys who have very different views on sex. Both of them are Republicans (which says nothing more than that the Republican party has a very big tent, maybe one purchased used from Barnum and Bailey.) One D.A. fears sex and the other one covets it. Neither behaves appropriately.
Scott Southworth is the District Attorney for Juneau County Wisconsin. In March 2010 a Wisconsin law known as the Healthy Youth Act that deals with sex education in the public schools went into effect. That law requires school districts to “teach students medically accurate, age-appropriate information, including how to use birth control and prevent sexually transmitted diseases.” Mr. Southworth believes that because students are inherently intellectually curious beings, they will, as soon as they are taught those subjects, take steps to determine for themselves their practical applications. That would result in conduct that Mr. Southworth finds offensive.
In a letter to the school districts telling them to stop their sex education programs he said: “[I]f a teacher instructs any student aged 16 or younger how to utilize contraceptives under circumstances where the teachers knows the child is engaging in sexual activity with another child—or even where the ‘natural and probable consequences’ of the teacher’s instruction is to cause that child to engage in sexual intercourse with a child—that teacher can be charged under this statute. Moreover, that teacher could be charged with this crime even if the child does not actually engage in the criminal behavior.” The possible punishment ranges from 9 months in jail to 6 years in prison.
Juneau’s county seat, Mauston, is 127 miles from Chilton, the County seat of Calumet. They might was well be 10,000 miles apart. On September 17, 2010, Calumet’s district attorney Ken Kratz, held a news conference to explain why he was not resigning as district attorney. The news conference was to address citizen concern when it was disclosed that during 3 days in October 2009 Mr. Kratz sent 30 text messages to Stephanie Van Groll, a woman whose husband he was prosecuting because the husband had tried to strangle her. At first blush that suggests that he was an extraordinarily diligent district attorney whose concern for victims was so great that he went to extraordinary lengths to make sure Ms. Van Groll was fully informed about the case and his efforts to prosecute her husband. That was not the case. Those 30 text messages suggested that her pain might be less were she to have a liaison with District Attorney Kratz. In one text message he said: “I’m the attorney. I have the $350,000 house. I have the six-figure career. You may be the tall, young, hot nymph, but I am the prize. [House prices are apparently lower in Calumet County than in other parts of the country since in many places a $350,000 house offered as liaison bait would have little appeal. Furthermore, on line pictures of Mr. Kratz lead to the conclusion that he was relying more on material things than on looks in making that statement.]”. In another text message he asked: “Are you the kind of girl that likes secret contact with an older married elected DA. . .the riskier the better?” One could hope that there were more poetic ones that did not find their way into print but there probably were not since Ms. Van Groll decided to share the messages with the police rather than a bed with Mr. Kratz.
Since his text messages did not have the desired effect and their publication had unexpected consequences, Mr. Kratz, in a display of sensitivity and contriteness, resigned as chairman of the Wisconsin Crime Victims Rights Board and turned himself in to the Office of Lawyer Regulation. That agency did not find 30 text messages to a crime victim proposing a night of love, sufficiently reprehensible to warrant discipline. The Wisconsin Department of Justice investigated his conduct as well and took no disciplinary action. (It may have been influenced by an explanatory e-mail Mr. Kratz sent the department in which he said the text messages were not sexual in nature but simply complimentary, an interpretation not immediately apparent on first reading of the two messages set out above. He further said he’d broken no laws or rules of conduct.).
Although professional regulatory agencies do not seem sufficiently upset to take action against Mr. Kratz, the Wisconsin District Attorney’s Association has told him his behavior is repugnant and if he fails to resign it will ask the governor whether there are grounds for removal. Governor Jim Doyle has announced he is beginning the process. There is another possibility.
The District Attorney’s Association could conduct a Continuing Legal Education class for district attorneys throughout Wisconsin instructing them on professional conduct, including their obligation to follow, and let others follow, the laws passed by the legislature. Messrs. Southworth and Kratz should be required to attend. Perhaps they could even be presenters.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
Sex and Wisconsin DAs
Woman’s degradation is in man’s idea of his sexual rights.
— Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Letter to Susan B. Anthony
This week’s news pertains to two Wisconsin district attorneys who have very different views on sex. Both of them are Republicans (which says nothing more than that the Republican party has a very big tent, maybe one purchased used from Barnum and Bailey.) One D.A. fears sex and the other one covets it. Neither behaves appropriately.
Scott Southworth is the District Attorney for Juneau County Wisconsin. In March 2010 a Wisconsin law known as the Healthy Youth Act that deals with sex education in the public schools went into effect. That law requires school districts to “teach students medically accurate, age-appropriate information, including how to use birth control and prevent sexually transmitted diseases.” Mr. Southworth believes that because students are inherently intellectually curious beings, they will, as soon as they are taught those subjects, take steps to determine for themselves their practical applications. That would result in conduct that Mr. Southworth finds offensive.
In a letter to the school districts telling them to stop their sex education programs he said: “[I]f a teacher instructs any student aged 16 or younger how to utilize contraceptives under circumstances where the teachers knows the child is engaging in sexual activity with another child—or even where the ‘natural and probable consequences’ of the teacher’s instruction is to cause that child to engage in sexual intercourse with a child—that teacher can be charged under this statute. Moreover, that teacher could be charged with this crime even if the child does not actually engage in the criminal behavior.” The possible punishment ranges from 9 months in jail to 6 years in prison.
Juneau’s county seat, Mauston, is 127 miles from Chilton, the County seat of Calumet. They might was well be 10,000 miles apart. On September 17, 2010, Calumet’s district attorney Ken Kratz, held a news conference to explain why he was not resigning as district attorney. The news conference was to address citizen concern when it was disclosed that during 3 days in October 2009 Mr. Kratz sent 30 text messages to Stephanie Van Groll, a woman whose husband he was prosecuting because the husband had tried to strangle her. At first blush that suggests that he was an extraordinarily diligent district attorney whose concern for victims was so great that he went to extraordinary lengths to make sure Ms. Van Groll was fully informed about the case and his efforts to prosecute her husband. That was not the case. Those 30 text messages suggested that her pain might be less were she to have a liaison with District Attorney Kratz. In one text message he said: “I’m the attorney. I have the $350,000 house. I have the six-figure career. You may be the tall, young, hot nymph, but I am the prize. [House prices are apparently lower in Calumet County than in other parts of the country since in many places a $350,000 house offered as liaison bait would have little appeal. Furthermore, on line pictures of Mr. Kratz lead to the conclusion that he was relying more on material things than on looks in making that statement.]”. In another text message he asked: “Are you the kind of girl that likes secret contact with an older married elected DA. . .the riskier the better?” One could hope that there were more poetic ones that did not find their way into print but there probably were not since Ms. Van Groll decided to share the messages with the police rather than a bed with Mr. Kratz.
Since his text messages did not have the desired effect and their publication had unexpected consequences, Mr. Kratz, in a display of sensitivity and contriteness, resigned as chairman of the Wisconsin Crime Victims Rights Board and turned himself in to the Office of Lawyer Regulation. That agency did not find 30 text messages to a crime victim proposing a night of love, sufficiently reprehensible to warrant discipline. The Wisconsin Department of Justice investigated his conduct as well and took no disciplinary action. (It may have been influenced by an explanatory e-mail Mr. Kratz sent the department in which he said the text messages were not sexual in nature but simply complimentary, an interpretation not immediately apparent on first reading of the two messages set out above. He further said he’d broken no laws or rules of conduct.).
Although professional regulatory agencies do not seem sufficiently upset to take action against Mr. Kratz, the Wisconsin District Attorney’s Association has told him his behavior is repugnant and if he fails to resign it will ask the governor whether there are grounds for removal. Governor Jim Doyle has announced he is beginning the process. There is another possibility.
The District Attorney’s Association could conduct a Continuing Legal Education class for district attorneys throughout Wisconsin instructing them on professional conduct, including their obligation to follow, and let others follow, the laws passed by the legislature. Messrs. Southworth and Kratz should be required to attend. Perhaps they could even be presenters.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Theological Nonsense
“As for that,” said Waldershare, “sensible men are all of the same religion.” “And pray, what is that?” inquired the prince, “Sensible men never tell. “
— Benjamin Disraeli, Endymion
The Mormons are back in the news again. While their most prominent spokesman is demonstrating theological wisdom, the folks in Salt Lake City have reached yet another agreement with holocaust survivors who are concerned about the involuntary heavenly placement by Mormons of dead non-Mormons. This dispute is, by now, more than 15 years old.
In 1994 we learned that the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints, known as the Mormon Church, was engaging in something called “baptism for the dead”. During that ceremony, living people stand in as proxies for decedents to offer them a chance, but not an obligation, to become Mormons post mortem, as it were. Apparently, once in heaven (assuming the decedent got that far) the decedent can look over the digs in which the Mormons live and compare it, for example, with where the Baptists (if that was the decedent’s religion at death) are hanging out, and decide whether to exercise the option and join the Mormons or to stay with the Baptists.
In 1994 it was learned that Adolph Hitler had been posthumously baptized by the Mormons together with 380,000 of his holocaust victims. Among them were Anne Frank, David Ben-Gurion, the first Prime Minister of Israel and Sigmund Freud. (It is unlikely that many of the 380,000 would have opted to move into the Mormon section of heaven once they saw Hitler there.) When news of those baptisms became public, the Jewish community was incensed. Aaron Breitbart, senior researcher at the Simon Wiesenthal Center said “these people were born Jews, they lived as Jews and many of them died because they were Jews. They would not have chosen to be baptized Mormons in life, and there is no reason they would want to be baptized by proxy in death.” In 1995, Mormons and the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors based in New York, arrived at an agreement whereby the Mormons agreed to unbaptize those it had involuntarily baptized and agreed to quit conducting “vicarious baptisms.”
Although the 1995 accords were thought to have put an end to the practice of post-mortem baptism, they did not. In 2003 it was disclosed that the Mormons had continued the process of “vicarious baptism.” Todd Christofferson, a Mormon involved in the 1995 negotiations explained that: “We never had in mind that we would on a continual basis, go in and ferret out the Jewish names. That would represent an intolerable burden.” (One can only assume that the need to increase the celestial Mormon population is so great that it requires mass proxy baptisms that does not permit individual scrutiny of the name of people affected by the process.) Thanks to the advancement in computer technology and perhaps the assistance of the Lord, the burden has been lifted. On September 1, 2010 it was again announced by the Mormons and the American Gathering of Holocaust Survivors that a new computer system and policy changes should bring to an end the involuntary baptism of non-Mormons. It can only be hoped that this is more successful than the efforts begun 15 years ago.
Now that this has been resolved we can examine the pronouncements from the newest spokesperson for the church and noted theologian, Glenn Beck. In his most recent disparagement of President Obama Mr. Beck took direct aim at Mr. Obama’s religious beliefs. He analyzed them and provided his listeners with the benefit of his analysis. In his radio show on the Tuesday before his Washington D.C. rally he said the president’s belief system is grounded in what Mr. Beck calls “liberation theology.” He then defines it saying: “You see, it’s all about victims and victimhood; oppressors and the oppressed; reparations, not repentance; collectivism, not individual salvation. I don’t know what that is, other than it’s not Muslim, it’s not Christian. It’s a perversion of the gospel of Jesus Christ as most Christians know it.”
It is surprising to have a member of a church that baptizes dead people by the hundreds of thousands by proxy without anyone’s consent, worrying about “collectivism” as distinguished from “individual salvation” and deciding what is and is not a “perversion of the gospel of Jesus Christ as most Christians know it.” It is, of course, possible that he has uncovered some golden tablets that have not yet been revealed to the other members of his church that will, when translated, show that a divine being ordained Mr. Beck to be not only a radio talker but a judge of the religious values of others. Until he shares those golden tablets with the rest of us, however, he will, like Koran burning Terry Jones, remain nothing more than another nut who is willing to attack whomever and whatever he pleases if he thinks it will improve his ratings.