Methinks there is a big effort here to keep any indication that the
court performed less than adequately off the record [...]
if
anything, this ruling highlights that possible inadequacy but I don't
think there is an inadequacy in the questioning by the judge. The painstaking,
detailed questioning you envision is to counter people who are lying or trying
hard to obfuscate the truth. Our legal system, our civilization, is based on
people being generally honest and truthful.
If you remove that basic
assumption then the entire system falls apart. Civilization collapses. This is
why all the
shenanigans in Wall Street and by the ultra-rich and by the powerful
are so very dangerous. If the default shifts from trusting others to
distrusting them then our society will no longer function. Merely having laws
is not enough. We must trust that most people, especially people with power,
are required to act within the law.
The judge should not assume that
jurors are obfuscating the truth when they are being questioned in voir dire.
The judge should assume they are disinterested parties and any potential
conflict of interest will be brought forth voluntarily in answer to the standard
questions that are asked. Interrogating every juror as if they were a hostile
witness will cause much more harm than good. The process would take ten times
as much time and even more people would shy away from jury duty for fear of
their private lives being exposed.
IMO, it would be much better to punish
people who are caught obfuscating rather than gum up the works by assuming
everyone obfuscates.
Even if we ignore potential harm to the legal system
and to society caused by a general lack of trust in others, by not finding fault
with Hogan the judge is opening herself up to people finding fault with her
questioning.
---
Our job is to remind ourselves that there are more
contexts
than the one we’re in now — the one that we think is reality.
-- Alan Kay [ Reply to This | Parent | # ]
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