How Innocent Is the Innocence Project?

You know how sometimes things just really don't pass the smell test? You can't prove your hunches, but things just don't add up, too many coincidences, too many impossible-to-beleive things. Tonight the TV series "Dateline" miked for all it was worth the "sad" story of Ryan Ferguson who was convicted of murder when his accomplice testified against him at his trial. Well, of course, to the rescue, a lawyer shows up who specializes in helping convicted criminals get off. They made a big point of saying this lawyer took the case pro bono. There have been many of these cases lately..... too many. Here's the part that just doesn't pass the smell test. An irrational number of them have succeeded in getting really bad people exonerated. The Innocence Project's own web site puts the number at more than 300 since they started their business in 1992. An astounding number, given the biases that already are built into our systems to prevent truly innocent people from getting convicted in the first place. Yet in spite of those measures, these public-spirited lawyers would have us believe that the judges, juries, prosecutors, and all others involved in the original trials got it completely wrong. Sorry, doesn't pass the smell test.

Nobody is saying that law enforcement officials never make mistakes, but far too many have been overturned since the "Innocence Project" started snooping into old, settled cases and getting them reversed by casting doubt on DNA evidence. Many times, the witnesses who testified at the original trials are no longer available, or are now sympathetic to the convict since they "have served enough time." Maybe the biggest factor in these pro bono cases is money. How can money play a role if the cases are taken by the lawyers without requiring a fee? They simply sue the pants off the municipalities, courts, police departments (read tax payers) and anyone else they can think off. Of course the lawyers take a large cut from the proceeds of the lawsuits they win. They are hardly dispassionate, heroic onlookers who are just trying to right wrongs. They're in it for the money. Millions and millions of taxpayer dollars.

Fortunately, the judge in the Ryan Ferguson case wasn't buying the "recanted" testimony of the star witness and Ferguson's conviction was upheld. Of course, the lawyers trying to get him off and reap a huge windfall from so doing, are going to appeal. Here's hoping they fail, and fail again and wind up losing money for their efforts.

Will We Ever Know What Really Happened in Boston?

This whole episode is starting to remind us all of the murders in our consulate in Benghazi. We have yet to get a clear, blow-by-blow, narrative of what happened, both in Benghazi, and in Washington, that is devoid of all political cover-ups and bias. It is clear that, for political reasons, the complete and exact retelling will never be forthcoming. The Obama administration cannot allow the extent of their incompetence to be revealed. They cannot allow the obvious truth to be told that they were unprepared and unable to protect, defend and/or rescue their assets in Lybia

It's starting to look like the same thing will happen with the Boston bombing. We don't seem to be able to get a cogent, complete story. There are widely circulating speculations that the bombers were two innocent college students who just looked up on-line how to build "pressure cooker" bombs, and without any help, or even practice, managed to penetrate the extensive security which undoubtedly surrounded the Boston Marathon, plant and detonate both bombs within seconds of placing them. The story is: they acted alone, had no connection or help from any outside terrorist group, and did it all because they didn't like the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that they managed to out-gun and elude several hundred policemen with one single 9mm pistol. This does not pass the smell test.

It is high time for some news organization to paint the unvarnished truth. We know Obama would like everybody to think that the Islamic Terrorists don't exist. He wants us to think that when Osama died, so died the threat of terrorism in the US. He wants us to forget about the many other Islam related terrorist attacks that have occurred on his watch. We just can't allow his political agenda to rule our information media any longer. It's high time to come clean with the American people. Our lives really do depend on it.