Race, O.J., and Politics–The Potential for an October Meltdown UPDATE–SIMPSON GUILTY ON ALL COUNTS

BREAKING—

From the Las Vegas Sun:

Simpson guilty on all counts; could face life imprisonment…

O.J. Simpson is going to prison.

A predominantly white, predominantly female jury has found the former NFL All Star guilty of all of the 12 robbery, kidnapping and weapons charges he faced following a run-in last year with a pair of memorabilia dealers.

More…

Note the opening of the story–as if you could miss it. Just as I predicted.  Racism taking center stage…not to mention the “woman” factor…

I’ve been thinking about the possible ramifications of a guilty conviction, especially since racism was injected into the trial as well as during jury selection (see below)…What does Obama do?  Will he be under intense pressure from his black voting block to issue a statement of some kind?  And what kind of a statement could that be, what kind of balancing act would he have to do?

I guess it depends on what kinds of demands will be made by some of his more radical followers…and if the mainstream media even allows us to know about those demands…after all, they hide nearly everything when it concerns anything dubious about Obama, his connections, and his followers.

More on Judge Jackie Glass later…I’ll just say that my research on her has revealed that she has a reputation as a very tough judge when it comes to sentencing…

Edge of Forever has commented that the media will bury the story–no more “Trial of the Century” hype like last time…and, the way things are going, she’s probably right.  I speculated in the original post that the media might love the story for it’s ratings potential and give the media and Obama another chance to play the race card…but things have been shifting, so that’s probably out the window.  It’s all about making him “the winner” now and preserving his gloss.  But, we still have to see what “the followers” do…

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~~By InsightAnalytical-GRL

The O.J. Simpson trial now going on in Las Vegas, NV wasn’t on my radar until Monday when my mother read something from the paper to me. And yesterday, while sitting in a medical office, I was trapped into watching a report on CNN and found out that they’re streaming the trial live at the CNN website.

Well, obviously it’s being discreetly handled by CNN at this point…but does it warrant on-line streaming?  In the real world, no. In Obama Media Land, however, it makes perfect sense.  It’s part of the slow build-up and they’ll be able to jump to the verdict immediately.  I really think that if we didn’t have this mortgage crisis drama unfolding, they’d have the trial going full-tilt all day…

Now, with the polling being done to prove that 30% of Democrats are racists and that white women are “a problem,” we’re getting the preview of the blame game that will happen if Obama loses fails to steal the election.

But, I believe all this will pale if the verdict on O.J. comes in and he’s convicted.  I’m not going to review the current case, since all the info is up at the Las Vegas Sun, which has an entire page dedicated to the trial.  O.J. may not be convicted, of course, but if he is, it could be a huge ratings opportunity…and another chance to help play Obama’s race card.

First, let’s see why our media buddies might be praying for a guilty verdict for the benefit of their own interests.  Way back in 1995, when O.J. was acquitted of the murders of his wife Nicole and Ron Goldman, “…at 10 A.M. PST on October 3, Judge Ito’s clerk read the jury’s verdict of “Not Guilty,” 91% of all persons viewing television were glued to the unfolding scene in the Los Angeles courtroom,” according to The Trial of Orenthal James Simpson, a project of the University of Missouri-Kansas City (UMKC) School of Law. If a conviction comes down, then we’ll see the 1995 trial replayed and lots of chatter about how justice has finally been served. The media will milk it for all it’s worth. How many times will we see that “slow chase” down the highway?

And a conviction would also provide a golden opportunity to bring the race card back, big time.

Why?

First, lets flashback to 1995. Who can forget how the trial was inexplicably transferred out of O.J.’s tony Santa Monica district and into downtown LA?  Who can forget the composition of the jury (did you know they were all Democrats?) and the celebration over the verdict in the black community after O.J. was acquitted of murder by a jury of “his peers” after a trial full of racial tensions?

Johnnie Cochran’s summation for the defense added controversy to an already very controversial trial.  His co-counsel, Robert Shapiro, was later to condemn his closing for “not only playing the race card, but playing it from the bottom of the deck.”  Cochran compared the prosecution case to Hitler’s campaign against the Jews:

There was another man not too long ago in this world who had those same views, who wanted to burn people, who had racist views, and ultimately had power over people in his country.  People didn’t care.  People said he’s crazy.  He’s just a half-baked painter.  And they didn’t do anything about it.  This man, this scourge, became one of the worst people in the world, Adolf Hitler, because people didn’t care, didn’t stop him.  He had the power over his racism and his anti-religionism.  Nobody wanted to stop him….And so Fuhrman.  Fuhrman wants to take all black people now and burn them or bomb them.  That’s genocidal racism.  Is that ethnic purity?  We’re paying this man’s salary to espouse these views…

The jury spent only three hours deliberating the case that had produced 150 witnesses over 133 days and had cost $15 million to try.  As America watched at 10 a.m. PST on October 3, 1995, Ito’s clerk, Deidre Robertson, announced the jury’s verdict: “We the jury in the above entitled action find the defendant, Orenthal James Simpson, not guilty of the crime of murder.”  Simpson sighed in relief, Cochran pumped his fist and slapped Simpson on the back.  The Dream Team gathered in a victory huddle.  From the audience came the searing moans of Kim Goldman, Ron’s sister, and the cry of his mother Patti Goldman, “Oh my God! Oh my God!”

(SNIP)

The Simpson trial demonstrated the polarization of racial attitudes on issues such as law enforcement that still exists in our country [POLLING DATA ON SIMPSON VERDICT].  It may be for that, more than anything, that the trial will be remembered.  But it had other effects.  It created a greater awareness of domestic violence issues, provided lessons in how not to run a criminal trial, slowed the trend toward the use of cameras in courtrooms, and created a new type of “immersion” journalism that still flourishes today.

Fast forward to Wednesday and Rep. Alcee Hastings ranting about Palin, hunting, and Jews…

Rep. Alcee Hastings told an audience of Jewish Democrats Wednesday that they should be wary of Republican VP nominee Sarah Palin because “anybody toting guns and stripping moose don’t care too much about what they do with Jews and blacks.”

Eerie, to say the least.  And venomous and illustrative of the seething resentment that we’ve seen during this campaign.

And this hostility could erupt further if O.J. is convicted now. As this report from the Las Vegas Sun on the current trial reveals,  the jury situation this time around is entirely different.

O.J. Simpson jury contains mostly women, no African-Americans

Two alternate jurors are black — one man and one woman

O.J. Simpson’s future and freedom is in the hands of a predominantly white, predominantly female 12-member jury.

Simpson, 61, and his co-accused, Clarence “C.J.” Stewart, 54, could be sentenced to life behind bars if convicted. The two former golfing buddies face 12 robbery, kidnapping and weapons-related charges following the alleged Sept. 13, 2007, raid of two memorabilia dealers’ Palace Station hotel room.

(SNIP)

The nine-woman, three-man jury will hear from them, along with dozens of other witnesses, in the coming weeks.

SNIP

Judge Jackie Glass, along with lawyers for the prosecution and the defense, questioned shortlisted candidates for four days to compile a pool of 40 qualified jurors from which a jury could be selected.

(SNIP)

The prosecution challenged and ejected two of the four black people in the potential jury pool. One of them, a middle-aged female minister, was originally slated to serve as part of the critical 12-member jury that will deliver the verdict.

The defense challenged both dismissals, saying they were racially motivated.

“Exercising that peremptory challenge excludes her as the one and only (African American on the jury),” Simpson’s attorney, Yale Galanter, said about the minister’s dismissal.

African-American jurors are a particular interest in this case because both Simpson and Stewart are black. It is often thought that black jurors are more sympathetic toward African-American defendants than white jurors.

Simpson’s 1995 murder trial had a jury made up of nine African-Americans, two whites and one Hispanic who delivered the not guilty verdict.

Much like his current trial, most of the 1995 murder trial’s jurors, 10 of the 12, were women.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Christopher Owens and District Attorney David Roger insisted their reasons for having the two women dismissed were completely “race-neutral” and instead largely related to their deep religions beliefs.

They argued ministers can have a perceived moral authority and influence over others. Prosecutors said a minister might “take over” the jury, if left sitting.

They also worried the second woman, was also deeply religious, employed philosophies that could lead her to forgive a guilty person rather than deliver a verdict that would condemn them to prison.

Glass ultimately sided with the prosecution. “Throughout these last four days there has been no evidence to me that the state has made a purposeful discriminatory effort to eliminate African-American jurors,” she said.

The judge was careful to say no racial stacking of the jury was afoot. “We have no quota system for jurors,” she said, noting the pool of potential jurors was randomly selected from a cross-section of the community.

After the two controversial peremptory challenges, the no blacks remained in the main jury panel. However, there appeared to be one Asian woman and another Latina juror. Court officials could not confirm the ethnicity of jurors.

The two blacks that remain, one man and one woman, are in the pool of alternate jurors. This six-member panel will only be used if and when main jurors are dismissed. Six of the original 12 jurors from Simpson’s 1995 murder trial were dismissed.

The current group of alternate jurors is split 50-50 in terms of gender, with three men and three women.

Can you imagine what will happen if O.J. is convicted??? The racial hostility we’ve seen during this campaign, most recently from Rep. Hastings, could erupt in a manner that could become even more ugly than what we’ve seen so far. Will we hear how Judge Jackie Glass, with “only” six years on the bench, wasn’t qualified to try this case? And how the jury was stacked against O.J. and his co-defendants?  And, don’t you think we’ll see a parade of Obama spokespeople pushing the victim/race card?  Don’t you think that media will cooperate by having their pundits pound into the brain of every American voter the same message?  Won’t the guilt-trip be laid with the insidious intimation that Obama should be for REWARDED with the Presidency because he’s been victimized by whites, especially by that group of troublesome white women who should be falling in line? Look at all those white women on the jury, perhaps seeing the opportunity to finally punish O.J.! And how will the media drag McCain into the morass?

The trial started on September 8, with final jury selection was completed on the 11th.  Several weeks of proceedings are expected, which means the trial could go into October.

Which means we all my be facing an “October Surprise” that could become a nightmare…and a final meltdown for this Presidential race.