Thursday, April 17, 2008

Letter to the Macomb Daily by Ron Keine

Dear Macomb Daily.

As A Death Row exonerated I take offence to your recent opinion piece.

The law according to Scalia

The recent News of Supreme court Justice Antonin Scalia¢s speech at a law school in Rhode Island is indeed disheartening. Justice Scalia is not in tune with the public anymore. He openly admits that he could only get 60 votes from the senate today as to
his qualifications to serve on the Supreme court.

-That is to ratify his appointment. I do not believe he could get 40.

Justice Scalia is the front-line enemy of the Anti Death Penalty forces. It is widely accepted that no appeals will get a fair hearing as long as he sits on
that court. He adamantly promotes an agenda of a government which executes it¢s own citizens.

He says that he is an originalist. He says that the constitution should be interpreted according to the intent of the framers of our constitution. I wonder,
does he mean the same framers whose intent was to subjugate the entire black race? Does he mean the same framers who themselves owned slaves, denied them the
right to vote, education and any other basic human rights? * article 4 sec.2. U.S. constitution.

I am not in favor of a living constitution and shudder at the thought of a constitutional convention.

However, the framers did realize that times and social values change. They did understand the need for some flexibility. Attitudes change. Things that may have
been the status quo back then are no longer acceptable in a modern society
We do not eviscerate, draw, quarter, burn at the stake, torture or behead our citizens anymore. But we do still kill them. We are one of the last few nations
in the world that still has the death penalty. Out of all the 220 nations of the world today, only a few have capital punishment. Our peers are China, North
Korea and Iran. Most have realized, long ago, that it is archaic, barbaric, morally wrong and not indicative of a modern civilization. We need to advance out of
the dark ages.

I was totally taken aback on your paper¢s lack of out cry on Justice Scalia¢s stand on the first amendment.

What are you guys smoking there? He gave a public speech at a high school in Mississippi and sent the federal marshals there to confiscate reporters tape
recordings of the event. When does the book burning begin? Am I classified as a threat to him by authoring this article? Are the federal Marshals going to come
and kick my door down?

At his speeches, he hands out lists of questions that reporters may ask and may not ask during the audience Q&A and refuses them the right to an interview. He
even tries to ban any media from his events what so ever. At his recent speech in Rhode Island it was the college who fought not to violate the first amendment
and admit the media to the event. Still, they were not allowed to ask any questions.

This is a public servant. We write his paycheck He does not have the right to refuse public scrutiny. Why not just write the news himself and then all you guys have to do is put your byline on it?

Justice Scalia has claimed that no innocent person has ever been executed in the united states, and if there were, we would be shouting it from the roof tops. How
about the Salem witch trials? Were they all guilty? How about all the Indians we slaughtered just to take their land? How about the cases of William Marion or
Charles Hudspeth? Both of these cases were of the murder victim being found alive and well but only discovered after the executions of these innocent men.
Hudspeth v. State 50 ark 534 (1888). Marion v. Nebraska,16 Neb. 349 (1884) and so Neb.233
(1886)

I am one of 128 innocent people whom have been wrongfully convicted, sentenced to death and later proven innocent and released. There have been several innocent people executed in the last 30 years. We are killing innocent people while Scalia stands guard over our constitution. Innocent people are sitting on Death
Rows in our nation as Scalia issues his personal gag orders on the media.

Byron once wrote " One drop of ink can make hundreds perhaps thousands of people think". Today that means thousands, perhaps millions. You have the power of the
pen. Don¢t let anyone usurp this by telling you what you can ask, write about or record at public events.

Ps. Scalia has openly defied God and his Pope with his stand on capital punishment. I hope the Pope gives him a good talking to as he visits the United States.

Ronald Keine

Visit the website of Ron Keine here

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