Usually, Fox News (click here) patented outrage starts on official Fox opinion and them makes its way over to official Fox News for further reinforcement and validation. However, the newest bit of right wing apoplexy, over Columbia University's hiring of a former Weather Underground radical who has done her time and is now a distinguished sociology professor, started yesterday on official Fox News with Megyn Kelly. It then made its way to Fox & Friends where Peter Johnson Jr. had a total hissy fit about it....
This is Kathy Boudin today as she appears on the Columbia University website. (click here) Columbia University is not hiding anything about Ms. Boudin's past. They are proud to be a part of a rehabilitation program after she has served her time. She was in prison a very long time. There is nothing evil and covert about her employment, quite the contrary.
Dr. Kathy Boudin is director of the Criminal Justice Initiative: Supporting Children, Families and Communities, based at Columbia School of Social Work, where she is also an adjunct professor. The Initiative is dedicated to ending reliance on incarceration and retribution. Working within the University, the Initiative also implements community-based projects supporting education for youth with incarcerated parents, advocating for parole reform and promoting restorative justice. Boudin also works with the Center for Comprehensive Care, St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital, where she is founding director of the Coming Home Program for people returning from prison....
We are not a tooth for a tooth and eye for an eye society. My deepest sympathies to the families of those suffering losses so long ago in the incident of which Ms. Boudin was a part. It still hurts. It will always hurt and be a place of pain for generations I am sure, but, this isn't about them so much as it is about what the USA determines as Justice.
There is much about 'that time' in the USA that was not reasonable either. I know the Right Wing political machine likes to tidy up after their corrupt politicians and wars, but, enough is enough.
This was Kathy Boudin many years ago. I apologize to her and Columbia University for having to endure this exercise, but, there is a very important lesson that still needs to be learned evidently.
No one person is a judge and jury in the USA except perhaps for a Texas Ranger. People are tried by a jury of their peers. I make no apologies for that.
We have lived in a society of injustice in many ways. I was in Newark, New Jersey the day the OJ verdict was read. The reaction was palpable. Everyone in the room was elated at the outcome. I was astounded. It shook me to my shoes that an entire social class of people were relieved at his vindication. Of course, that was due to zealot police and all kinds of indications there was doubt to his guilt.
We reap what we sew, isn't that the parable? As a society under the direct power of people that deceive the electorate to obtain office we are very vulnerable. The 'time of our country' during which these horrible things happened was a time when many horrible things were happening and some were due to abuse of power by the federal government of the citizens. Citizens at that time that were still unable to vote.
There is no doubt there are problems to be solved in the USA, there are problems with engagement of our military and how that all plays out in deceiving the public and electorate.
The media in the USA has been granted huge concessions through the Freedom of Speech. That has been the way of the USA. It has been a way for citizens to let government know they are not pleased with outcomes. Whether or not that media acts responsibly then or now is a matter of whom the story teller is and whether there is 'an agenda' in that story.
I am not going to relive the 60's. If one is honest with their own self-reflection we all know what occurred. But, to say Ms. Boudin should be denied a life after serving a sentence handed down to her is not our democracy. That narrative is a faux democracy based in vengeance, not forgiveness and I thought the biblical reference is, "Vengeance is mine says the lord."
So, before anyone seeks to defame a former inmate that has acted to improve her life and seek to add to the structural dialogue of a university, I think it's time for everyone to forgive Ms. Boudin. She has no more penance to pay and to expect that of any inmate returning to society only defeats the hopes of all Americans to stop crime forever without recidivism.
I remind. For those seeking vengeance beyond the sentence and prison system of the USA, it is illegal and they can suffer the penalties of acting in a manner inconsistent with our democracy.
I wish Ms. Boudin well and I congratulate Columbia for taking on a difficult task of reintroducing our rehabilitated inmates back to society.
