For the prize of one “Honk! If you’d Rather Check My Birth Certificate than Govern” bumper sticker, can anyone tell me (enter in the comments section) in what century the above statement was made by a Tennessee State House representative?
Was it:
A) 18th
B) 19th
C) 20th
D) 21st
E) All of the above
Anarchival has both the date, the name and the context:
This statement was why I went to bed thinking about the biker gang who roams around Tennessee hunting down sex offenders. The legislative purpose of a sex offender registry is to notify the public of the presence of this certain type of criminal, so that hopefully they can take steps to protect themselves and their families. Very few people in the total population of Tennessee take advantage of this information. Even fewer are actually protected by it. However, there are plenty of sadistic people in this state who are happy to use the registry to find people no one really cares about to bully and victimize. Of course, for people like Eddie Bass (D-Prospect), that’s OK. As a good ‘ole boy from a rural county, he still believes that justice is best executed by lynching, not by the constitutional protections he has sworn to uphold. He will happily stand by shouting “Burn, Baby, Burn!” as Rep. [Debra] Maggart [R-Hendersonville] sets fire to that Constitution, because he believes all alleged criminals deserve is a stout oak tree and a sturdy rope…until he, of course, is accused of a crime. Then I’m sure he’ll want all the constitutional protections he can get. As the saying goes, “No one escapes when freedom fails. The best men rot in filthy jails. And those who cried, ‘Appease! Appease!’, are hanged by those they tried to please.” Luckily, we’re not to that point yet, even if this Bill passes. The worst that might happen is that a fifteen year old boy who was raped and beaten for eleven years by his stepfather, and then took out his own frustration on the neighbor kid, ends up being bludgeoned to death and left to die in a field by a biker gang. And who will care if they did? Not Eddie Bass.
Rep. Maggart and Rep. Bass are rapidly becoming members of Rep. Campfield’s “It’s my State, you just live in it” club where they get to decide – based on their whims – when Tennesseans abide by the U.S. Constitution and when we don’t. Tsk.
The registry was never created to prevent offenders from re-offending. It was designed to inform the public so that they could make decisions about their own safety and the safety of their children. That is actually spelled out in the Tennessee Code Annotated. Rep. Maggart cited that in the committee. As for the opponents of the bill, they were ranting on the wrong bill. Maggart has been working on this legislation for a few years and had filed several versions.
The finished product that came out of the committee 10 to 2 was a result of her starting with the minimum requirements and then taking the counsel of the treatment providers on assessing the worst of the violent sex offenders who happen to be teenagers. Only those assessed violent who have committed the crimes of rape, rape of a child and aggravated rape of a child go on this registry. The mental health folks said these kids can not be ‘fixed”.
That means these are teenagers who have raped babies, kids under 13 and others. Parents have a right to know who these teenage violent sex offenders are. Would you want to unknowingly hire one as a babysitter? Ask a mother of a raped little girl or boy how she feels about this registry.
It is too bad people don’t read the right bill and listen.
Yeah – that’s what I get for blogging on 3 hours sleep. As Kleinheider said, “YOU COULDN’T SEE THROUGH YOUR BIAS.
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Um, as hard as it is for me to want to admit, Eddie Bass is technically a Democrat, though not in spirit.