A reader has informed me that nowhere in the indictment of Paul Minor et al. is the word conspiracy uttered. Truer words have never been spoken.

However, the acts contained within do support a conspiracy charge; two or more persons in furtherance of a conspiracy committing an overt act. Bing, bang, boom. It is true that they are charged under RICO with committing an enterprise; this is arguably harder to prove than conspiracy, but it's basically the same thing.

My apologies for the earlier inaccuracy, which is not a distinction without a difference; it is indeed a quite important distinction, which I should have made.

I must take issue with Prof. Rappaport of The Right Coast over his assertion that The Third Man is cinematically dated. I'm not familiar with the scholarship that Rappaport relied on for arguing that the movie was technically novel when released; most of the techniques, if not all of them, were well-established, and connected with Citizen Kane.

I would agree that Citizen Kane is dated, largely because the techniques perfected in Kane have been so widely adopted. But The Third Man's greatness is not because of any novelty it may have had; it is simply a well-crafted story with excellent acting, as Rappaport notes. Of course, the one novelty of The Third Man is the zither score, performed as it is by one musician. It may be the perfect film score. My one complaint with the existing DVD edition of The Third Man is that the audio levels are poorly mastered, compared with the print of the film that I saw in Scotland in 1997.

To sum up: The Third Man is not dated.

Twain, Christianity, and Just Wars

Eric Anderson fisks Sandefur's Twain quote on Sandefur's own blog. Or does he? In any case, Anderson defends Christianity against Twain's Satan, citing Aquinas's just war principle: right authority, just cause, and right intention are the criteria to evaluate the justness of a war. Aquinas, is, of course, merely refining St. Augustine's eight elements of a just war: "1) a punitive conception of war, (2) assessment of the evil of war in terms of the moral evil of attitudes and desires, (3) a search for authorization for the use of violence, (4) a dualistic epistemology which gives priority to spiritual goods, (5) interpretation of evangelical norms in terms of inner attitudes, (6) passive attitude to authority and social change, (7) use of Biblical texts to legitimate participation in war, and (8) an analogical conception of peace. It does not include noncombatant immunity or conscientious objection."

So far, so good. But I don't think that the just war argument addresses Twain's Satan's argument that religion is used as a tool in acquisitive wars to justify the conflicts. In fact, the just war argument seems to support Twain's Satan: after all, cynical rulers can manipulate a semi-schooled Christian populace by appealing to their understanding of the just war analysis. Twain's Satan is, I think, highlighting the ease of hypocrisy among Christians with regards to war.

Mississippi Judicial Scandal UPDATE

Paul Minor is wrapping himself in the American flag. Of course, he makes some very good points: what about Dickie Scruggs, the #2 unindicted fellow involved? He paid off an $80,000.00 loan to Diaz's campaign, and contributed money to the RNC, as did his wife. Is this politically motivated?

Hell, yes, it's politically motivated. Everyone knows that. But are the five indictees guilty? The evidence that's been leaked is damn close to enough to convict them on the conspiracy counts. I have heard there's more than enough evidence to convict all five on all counts of the indictments. And one thing you can be damn sure of: this case is not going to be won at trial. In Mississippi, the US Attorney doesn't lose, and almost never gets overturned. The latest numbers I've heard are 96% conviction rate, 94% affirmance rate. That's a lot of people going up the river and not coming back.

Dunn Lampton was a pretty damn good DA back in the day. Yes, he's political, but so is everyone in Mississippi. His office would not be taking these five defendants on without bulletproof evidence. Someone had best cut a deal; if this motion of Paul Minor's doesn't work (and I can't see it getting past Judge Wingate), they are in for it.