John Kerry, again the runner-up

At last night's NYC Young Republicans (the independent group) holiday party, we were honored to hear J.R. de Szigethy, president of the Chappaquiddick Society, announce the 2006 winner of the Society's "Profile in Cowardice" award. Kerry didn't win, but he did win a "dishonorable mention" for his stupid "stuck in Iraq" remark. He'll always be second best, see? (Say that in your best Edward G. Robinson voice.)

The winner is Mike Nifong, that bastard DA in North Carolina who went on a vendetta against the Duke lacrosse players. The state bar has now filed ethics charges against him, which I think are a step in the right direction but for a couple of wrong reasons. "I am convinced there was a rape, yes, sir" should not be held against a prosecutor, because if he wasn't convinced a crime had been committed, then it would be wrong for him to bring charges against the suspect. However, "One would wonder why one needs an attorney if one was not charged and had not done anything wrong" is completely unworthy of any competent practicer of criminal law. The same goes for his not interviewing the alleged victim for months, all the while dragging those poor boys through the mud.

Worst of all:

Nifong was also charged with breaking a rule against "dishonesty, fraud, deceit and misrepresentation." The bar said that when DNA testing failed to find any evidence a lacrosse player raped the accuser, Nifong told a reporter the players might have used a condom.

According to the bar, Nifong knew that assertion was misleading, because he had received a report from an emergency room nurse in which the accuser said her attackers did not use a condom.

"Misleading" nothing. He lied.

I know to an extent what these boys have been through, having once been the victim of an overzealous DA. He sicced his staff on what he thought was an easy case, another notch in their belt. Riddle me this: what kind of an idiot will pursue a criminal case when the alleged victim himself says there was no crime and urges the DA to drop the matter?

In the end, the trumped-up charges against me were dropped -- but not before it cost a lot of money to hire a lawyer to file a mere two goddamn pieces of paper, all because the goddamned (and I mean that adjective literally) judge refused to talk to anyone else. So when Nifong implies that only the guilty would get a lawyer, I have but a few choice words for him: fuck you, asshole.