Help me Understand

I think Larry Long is the archetype of an outstanding Attorney General. He has done a terrific job in continuing the tradition of keeping politics out of decisions made in the office of the state’s chief prosecutor. He is a model public servant and I have no doubts about his integrity.

Today the Sioux Falls Argus Leader reports on Long’s analogy to help reassure us that the Senate’s awkward decision to hold hearings on the alleged groping of a page by one of its own is the proper for thing for them to do. He compares their actions to a school board investigating the possible inappropriate actions of one of its teachers.

I don’t think the comparison works.

From the Argus: “Long compared the Sutton case with a hypothetical situation in which a 16-year-old student falls for an adult teacher and the two end up having a romantic relationship.

The student would be old enough under state law to consent to such a relationship, but a local prosecutor would investigate whether the student did in fact consent.

However, regardless of that investigation, the school district still would consider the relationship ethically inappropriate and would conduct its own investigation and take action against the teacher if it deemed it necessary to do so.In that case, "it might be criminal as well, or it might not, but that doesn't lessen for 30 seconds the school's responsibility," Long said.”

So let’s see, if this is true, a school board (or any other governmental body) could decide to conduct a criminal hearing or investigation MINUS sufficient evidence for any prosecutor to move forward with the same case. Such a decision would be based on politics, not on a legal basis.

That is how politics is played in Cook County or Louisiana. In those jurisdictions one might not hesitate to use the power of the office to distract the public, smear an opponent, or gain a cheap political advantage. But this is not how we do things in South Dakota, or at least how we used too.

Please don’t misunderstand me. I am not blaming Larry Long for how we got to this point. He is only trying to rationalize how the Senate made its decision to move forward with the hearings absent enough proof for even his own office to prosecute.

And although I am amazed and disappointed with their decision, I am not overly critical of the legislature either, or at least most of the present and past membership. While I expect a bit more fortitude, the body has been placed between the rock and the hard place in this situation: either they hold hearings based on little, if any, real evidence or they essentially perpetuate the swirling speculation and rumors. Worse yet, by doing nothing the legislative body can be seen as part of the problem as a group covering things up for one of its own. So while I don’t agree with their decision, one can appreciate how they made it.

No, there are a select few who can be held accountable for whipping all of this into a tawdry public scandal. I refer to those that drop bombs from their official capacities with slimy assurances to the accused that all will be forgotten if the “troublemaker” will just quietly go away. That, or the accused will be responsible for everyone becoming entangled in the snarled mess, and nobody really wants that, do they? It all seems like legitimized extortion and abuse of power.

So we go forward. The victim is victimized again, the accused will remain forever guilty in minds of most without real due process, and everyone else is left to clean up the mess. And others, like Long, are left to explain how we arrived at this embarrassing political situation.

Meanwhile the perpetrators remain deluded with the notion they are our moral heroes and are ever ready to stir up more chaos. It is unbelievable, unfortunate, and unnecessary how some advance by stepping all over the lives of others.

Maybe it really is justice for “just them.”