Thursday, October 1, 2009

Why Roman Polanski Needs To Go To California

William Faulkner, the American Nobel Prize Winner for Literature in 1949, once wrote in The Sound and the Fury, "Did you ever have a sister? Did you? Did you?"

I wonder if Woody Allen asked Roman that before he signed that petition for his unconditional release.

As an artist/writer/musician/cartoonist/poet who has even had a film idea or two in my day and been in a couple of award-winning films, one as the subject and one as a bit actor, I respect Roman Polanski's directorial talent and can understand why some people in the industry are upset that he was arrested on his way to the Zurich Film Festival on 9.26.9, but it was the right move.

What kind of message does that send when a man who drugs a 13-year-old girl with quaaludes (however slight the amount) and champagne flees before sentencing and then is embraced by the international film community? I am so glad that Luc Besson of La Femme Nikita fame was not one of the directors to sign that silly petition to let a rapist go unpunished.

I think any director who signs that petition should be boycotted. Luc also directed all the Transporter movies, so put them in your Netflix queue! He also directed Taken, which stars Liam Neeson trying to rescue his daughter from a plethora of scumbags.

I guess the judge who handled the case might have mishandled it a bit, but that does not mean Polanski should be lionized for running away to France. Nor does it matter than the girl he raped is now in his camp. By raping her, he committed a crime against The United States of America. That means a crime against every American as America is by, for, and of the people. Nor does it mean that she cannot be called to the stand if need be, even though she may have signed a settlement agreement before he paid her off to avoid a civil suit for damages.

Any contractual provision or settlement provision that impedes a criminal trial, criminal investigation, or a fundamental right, e. g., the right of free speech, the right to run for office, et cetera, is prima facie unconstitutional.

That is why the Massachusetts Senate did not try to restrict the newly-installed U. S. Senator Paul Kirk from seeking to retain his office in January's special election. As The New York Times put it on 9.23.9, "legislators feared that such a condition would not pass constitutional muster......" It is on page A22.

Here in Macomb County, Michigan, the assistant prosecutors, represented by the UAW, signed away their fundamental right to run against the sitting prosecutor. It would probably not pass constitutional muster, but no one but me seems to care. The Ninth Amendment reserves to the people all unenumerated fundamental rights. If you can't run for office, you are a lackey, and not a free man or free woman. America is better than that.

And America is better than letting Roman Polanski go scot free after drugging and forcibly raping anally a 13-year-old girl. Sure, he pled to a charge that does not speak to the drugging or to the forcing, but the facts in the criminal complaint are very clear that that occured.

I was thinking, though, that since he hired a close friend of Attorney General Eric Holder to be on his legal team, and President Obama is probably looking for an easy way out of this Hollywood dilemma, why not commute his sentence after he serves a year in prison---but under one condition: he be bunkmates with Charles Manson! I bet that would make Charles's day!

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