Re: Husband/Wife jailed for saying Clinton Sucks

jimmy carter proved that we anyone could be president, and it looks like clinton is proving that we don't really need a president. -paul

From cypherpunks-errors@toad.com Thu Aug 22 03:09:20 1996 X-Sender: jimbell@mail.pacifier.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.2 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type> : > text/plain> ; > charset="us-ascii"> Date: Wed, 21 Aug 1996 14:36:23 -0800 To: Brian Davis From: jim bell Subject: Re: Husband/Wife jailed for saying Clinton Sucks Cc: cypherpunks@toad.com Sender: owner-cypherpunks@toad.com Content-Length: 1492

At 02:47 PM 8/21/96 -0400, Brian Davis wrote:

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On Tue, 20 Aug 1996 Scottauge@aol.com wrote:

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Rush Limbaugh reports:

That a husband and wife are being jailed for yelling to Clinton "You Suck".

The Secret Service states additional words (yet un-uttered to the rest of us) were mentioned that they deemed threatening.

"I hope you die."

Doesn't sound much like a "threat" to me.

...

And the couple was arrestd for disorderly conduct by Chicago police.

It sounds to me like the Chicops were just showing their "loyalty" by sitting on somebody, not that they believed any real crime had been committed.

...

Any possible federal charges for threatening a president in violation of 18 U.S.C. Section 871 await a determination of the seriousness of the statement, in context with the wife's conduct, by prosecutors. I predict no action.

But it isn't even a "threat", regardless of how "serious" it was. The "I hope you die" part is, presumably, a statement of fact: She did, indeed, hope he dies. But I don't see how hoping this can be considered a threat, or even SAYING she's hoping this is, likewise.

Makes me wonder whether visiting one of these appearances with a "Clinton Doll" and a bunch of pins, and visibly inserting those pins into the doll (while uttering various strange incantations), would constitute a "threat."

Frankly, I'd rather have a president who didn't feel the need to be protected by thugs.

Jim Bell jimbell@pacifier.com