There's a lot of truth to this take on it.
Then again, the guy lied to a federal grand jury, when he knew that Balco was raided and that he had given them blood and/or urine samples. The 5th was written for that very circumstance, but he didn't use it. So, can he be indicted? Certainly. Should he be indicted? I think the whole thing fell into the "utter waste of time" category from the get go, and the fact that some idiot in Washington thought it was a good idea doesn't make it holy writ. Can't say as I'm a huge fan of Barry or his behaviour; never really liked the guy, actually, but I'm even less of a fan of the folks who are after him. Enough, already.
Maybe if we ship truckloads of mosquitoes to Washington every year, we can encourage fewer people to stay anywhere near the place with time on their hands. I'm sure a few other parts of the country would happily spare the mosquitoes...
I disagree. If they have a case against Bonds, I say they should nail him right into the ground, and then go on to the next name on the list.
Repeat until the teams figure out that they're risking millions by signing drug wonders like Bonds, and players figure out that the game has freaking rules.
The Martha Stewart principle? The Scooter Libby Principle? The Barry Bonds Principle. The Bill Clinton Principle?
How about the don't lie to a Grand Jury Principle. It undermines our system of justice. Bonds is not going to jail for 30 years. So I don't know why anyone would bring it up.
Guiliani based his clean up of New York on the idea is that if you are serious about fixing the small transgressions, the big one's will fix themselves. Lying to a grand jury is not a small matter. Nor might I add, is obstruction of justice.
This thing is no longer about baseball.
As far as the baseball side is concerned, I am an enormous fan. I think steroids or not Bonds along with Ken Griffey was the players of their eras. Both were magnificent and genuine five tool talents. The difference between them is that Griffey was injured for years and Bonds, by his own admission took Performance Enhancing Drugs, which he told the Grand Jury he thought, were among other things, linseed oil. There has never even been a whisper of Griffey's being involved with what is called in the baseball world PEDs.
I have no grudge against Bonds. I don't know the man. But it is very hard for me to take the last 8 to 10 years of his career seriously. His records are here
http://www.baseball-reference.com/
Search for Bonds, Barry.
There have never even been a whisper of Griffey's being involved with what is called in the baseball world PEDs.
As a baseball fan, I do resent the 'roiders perpetrating a fraud on me and other fans by their behavior, but they will pay the piper for that come Hall of Fame voting time. Just ask Mark McGwire.
My niece's husband, an attorney, spent some time in the the Federal Prosecutor's office in Manhattan. I met a few of his colleagues, neither he nor them seemed to be the types that like to be lied to. That is not going to change.
I feel bad for Bonds, but I do not feel much sympathy.
They'd need to step up enforcement of perjury a lot to put even a dent in either the public perception of how lax enforcement is, or to add any concern for sticking to the truth to people under oath.
There's thousands of 'small cases,' where "witnesses" have directly contradictory testimony. Particularly when it is something edging on worker's compensation, you have a lot of incentive for fudging because the only 'victim' of the lie is a faceless insurance company.
I really can't understand the equating of perjury with a white lie or a fib. That sort of attitude seems to me to be pure ignorance, as is the idea that we should overlook the perjury and obstruction of justice that the perjury leads to because, as in Scooter Libby's case, the underlying crime was not prosecuted. Both show an absolute lack of any understanding of the judicial system which is based upon getting to the truth.
One would also think that there is a reason that traditions as disparate as the Judeo-Christian and the Buddhist elevate truth telling to basic tenet in their moral code.
Perjury is an extremely pernicious crime and should be teated as such. The fact that it is difficult to prove makes it even more insidious and malign.
"I disagree. If they have a case against Bonds, I say they should nail him right into the ground, and then go on to the next name on the list."
But they don't, or they would have done so. They haven't, and the current indictment is not for using HGH or anything else.
"Repeat until the teams figure out that they're risking millions by signing drug wonders like Bonds, and players figure out that the game has freaking rules."
Which is MLB's responsibility, not that of any branch of the US government. Which had, last I checked, a few responsibilities to attend to that were a bit more serious. Like, 10,000 or so things.
I'll add that if a grand jury is going after someone for something that is not a criminal offense, to me that is an abuse of the system ab initio. At which point, I pretty much cease to listen to whinings about "the integrity of the justice system" - that was thrown out from the get-go, and let's not diminish that system further by pretending otherwise.
Hence my consistent position re: Bill, Scooter, and Barry.
"I disagree. If they have a case against Bonds, I say they should nail him right into the ground, and then go on to the next name on the list."
But they don't, or they would have done so. They haven't, and the current indictment is not for using HGH or anything else.
_________________________
'Roids and HGH have nothing to do with this indictment. They have him up on perjury and obstruction of justice charges. We will see, at trial, if the Feds have a case.
In defense of Martha Stuart, she spent time in Federal Prison, not for lying to a grand jury but for lying to a federal investigator. No raising of the right hand, no witness oath, simply talking to a federal agent.
You would think that it would be in the interest of everyone that cops for federal agents would be able to interview people without them dummying up or lawyering up, and that a cop would use their cop-dar to sort through whether a person being interviewed is fibbing out of self-interest -- i.e. to cover their sorry backside. The Martha Stuart precedent pretty much says that when the FBI comes calling, tell them to go away or tell them to come back when you have legal counsel present -- does this help with investigations?
There is a place to pursue obstruction of justice or lying-to-investigator charges. Madison, Wisconsin had a young woman who concocted stories that she was stalked and when she then later disappeared, when later found she lied about being kidnapped and gave a description of a suspect that sent the police chasing around.
There is a real good reason to throw the obstruction-of-justice book at someone in such a case. Young women disappearing because they are victims of serial killers is a terrible thing when it happens, and "crying wolf" about such an occurence is singularly unhelpful to the safety of women everywhere. Also, by giving the description of an alleged assailant, the police could end up ruining the life or perhaps even ending the life of an innocent person who matches that description by happenstance and reacts in panic to pursuit by the police.
"The Martha Stuart precedent pretty much says that when the FBI comes calling, tell them to go away or tell them to come back when you have legal counsel present -- does this help with investigations?"
I would think that this would be the most common of common sense. How dumb must people be to think they can lie to the Feds? Bonds had a lawyer and he still took the route of a petty criminal thinking that he could fool a Federal Proscutor and a Federal Grand Jury. I just find that to be idiotic beyond belief.