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Editor, The North Country Gazette:
It seems our two major political parties are openly fighting and competing to field the toughest most comprehensive package of sexual predator legislation.
This comes 12 years after civil commitment was initially proposed for our worst and most violent sexual predators, and for roughly half that time the legislation has passed the state senate with almost unanimous bipartisan support, only to be stalled in the mental health committee of the state assembly so that it could not come to the floor for a vote, where it would likewise probably receive near unanimous bi-partisan support.
One might ask 'How does one not support such legislation, it would be political suicide not too?' Yet Sheldon Silver was able to obstruct this legislation year after year while most of the media turned a blind eye to the situation. Most of you reading this did not turn a blind eye. and look at what has happened these past few months after all these wasted years, and all the victims who might not have been if our worst serial pedophiles had not been released back into our communities.
To Paul Vanderburgh of WROW and Ed Martin of WGY who have been with me in this fight the longest, after years of being the lone voices daring to speak the truth in a vast silence, could you imagine the stride, the progress that could be made with the help of so few good people?
This is all the First Amendment is about, the ability of a few to expose truth to the masses, and make our government work as it is supposed to.
All the above being true and good there is one thing in particular that bothers me and some of my friends about much of what we are hearing about this legislation.
"A sex offense against a child under 13 would automatically carry the same sentence."
What is all this child under 13 cut off?
Are 13 and above no longer to be treated as minors?
Are we slowly, silently, sliding towards a 13 year old age of consent?
Is this a concession to the interests of the sex offender lobby, all the teens in exchange for the pre-teens?
Thank you Bill O'Reilly for exposing America to the existence of the sex offender lobby, and for the Wendy Murphy interview in which "The Factor" cited one case that exemplifies the ACLU's radicalism. "In Kansas a 14-year old handicapped boy was molested by an 18-year old boy in a group home, and the ACLU argued that a 14-year old has a Constitutional right to engage in sex with adults." (in their Amicus brief in support of the molester.)
Despite the ACLU's involvement with NAMBLA, and Ruth Bader Ginsberg's advocacy of lowering the age of consent to 13 while representing the California ACLU, I had failed to appreciate the scope of ACLU support for, or the reach of some of those driven to mainstream the sexual rights of youth to have sex with adults.
This is probably something more people should understand as they are exposed to the fact that so many 'public servants' across the nation seem willing to obstruct intolerance of those we now call sexual predators.
Yours sincerely,
Tom Chandler
Guilderland, New York
12-10-05
© 2005 North
Country Gazette
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