Reply #13: But why are you "withholding your opinion" on Blagojevich?

[Occam Bandage]

Surely you do not think that "innocent until proven guilty" amounts to a public duty to avoid passing judgment on public officials who have not (yet) been convicted of crimes in a court of law.

You needn't believe in a conspiracy of silence or cowardice keeping "the so-called leaders of this country" from prosecuting George W. Bush. The reasons he has not been charged of a crime are happily outlined by Blagojevich's stalwart defenders on this board and others: it is extraordinarily difficult to prove wrongdoing of public officials. It's almost impossible to get evidence from an executive branch official. Most everything is handled by dozens of underlings, so the idea that you can find the chief executive's fingerprints on anything in particular is laughable. Your best hope is some sort of conspiracy charge, but conspiracy charges are jokes. And all it takes is one fall guy willing to go down for obstruction of justice, and your case falls apart.

Disregarding the scope and impact of their crimes, the principal difference between Blagojevich and Bush is that Blagojevich has committed his crimes in a slightly more flagrant manner, and as such a United States Attorney believes he has a reasonable case against him. I do not believe that flagrancy of criminality is a mitigating factor when it comes to passing judgment on public officials.