The characterization of the French Socialist candidate for president as a “rich banker” who “brought down the world economy” is especially amusing.
My friend, there is nothing wrong with speculation. I don’t think anyone here is very seriously invested in this case. All we’re doing is throwing ideas out there.
Also, if you think that I “exonerated” him “on the grounds that he is Jewish,” you have drastically misunderstood the point of my post.
Yabbut remember, the guy is a SOCIALIST. That’s practically like a Commie and a Nazi stapled together to make one big scary, – scary thing. And he’s on a path to become the President of France!
Can you IMAGINE France with a Socialist President? That just can’t be allowed.
Or maybe the guy saw Maid in Manhattan on the TV the night before, and thought that was just one of the amenities in the Rich-Guy Suite.
Does no one read the news?
He was arrested on an Air France flight at JFK airport just before it it was set to depart. Port Authority police at the airport were contacted by New York City police and told to detain Strauss-Kahn. P.A. police boarded the aircraft and made the arrest. Then, they turned him over to the city police.
Now my own thoughts about hurrying to the airport: Air France has five flights from JFK to Paris every day. He could have been originally scheduled for another flight, but rushed to the airport to change his ticket to get on the next one out.
Well… I have to recognize that right-wing dictators/politicians at times made the country go in the equivalent of night parties with really unwholesome fellows…
Didnt see that in the news I got, I mean what happened at the airport (remember it happened Saturday evening for us, and we have only one major newspaper that comes out on Sundays).
Well, the police was awfully spry. And if he was rushing to get a plane at all costs, while phoning to change his ticket, there’s gonna be shitload of evidence to back up the hasty flee scenario.
Thank you for prejudging his guilt. It’s not as if women haven’t made false claims of rape before (Duke, Hamilton, etc), is it?
His political career has been ruined by the mere accusation.
If he did indeed chase her down a hallway, while he was naked, it was probably caught on security cameras. Evidence like that could make the police act quickly.
If he’s given bail, he probably won’t come back.
That was a hallway inside the suite, not a public hallway outside the suite.
I used to disagree with what I’m about to say, but now I believe it’s true.
We don’t do this in other RO threads about other crimes. Why the hell is an accusation of rape so different that we have to try to wait and see, but every other criminal or single news story is perfectly okay to get riled up about?
It’s okay to speculated and get mad. This is the fucking Pit. That’s what we do.
This comment is really interesting to me. So you’ve got the evidence of two well-known cases where women have falsely accused men of rape. On the other hand, there’s evidence that rape is significantly underreported, and that false accusations are actually rarer than with other crimes. I agree that “innocent until proven guilty” is generally a good idea, but I feel like the few well-known false accusation cases are used against rape survivors to cast them as potentially lying bitches. Do you have evidence that the Duke lacrosse boys and Hamilton are suffering lifelong effects, beyond the ones of simply having gone through an incredibly stressful time (which is a big deal, yes, but no more than anyone who has to deal with the criminal justice system faces)? Is there a reason that we have to keep bringing up the liars, when we don’t seem to do that as much with other crimes?
It’s just interesting to me that there are so many little dogwhistles and assumptions that happen with rape that don’t happen with other crimes unless you add in racial or other discriminatory issues, but so few people seem to realize it.
Yes. He believes that the means of production should be commonly owned, and that every citizen should be able to afford $3,000/night hotels.
I’m constantly amazed at how often people on this MB just assume anyone arrested is guilty. But I guess it’s especially easy to take pot shots at “bankers”.
Drugging and raping a 13-year-old girl might have been what he actually did, but what he was accused of was having sex with a minor. This kind of accusation is something that appears to be a Very Big Deal in the US, but which people in many other countries just scratch their heads trying to comprehend. It’s like the comment about how it seems American television can show war scenes and heads being blown up at hours when kids are watching, but just show a breast and you can hear people scream murder from miles away. So unless one is really familiar with the case, it can really seem like another example of misplaced American Puritanism. Don’t for a moment believe that people in France think raping 13-year-old girls is acceptable.
Also, while he did plead guilty to this charge, as I understand it he fled when it looked like the court would renege on his plea bargain. This just seems like an injustice, even if he is actually guilty. And of course, we must also separate one’s opinion of Polanski as an artist, or even as a person, with one’s opinion of what he did. It’s perfectly possible to think he’s a great filmmaker, even though he did something wrong. It’s even possible to think he did something wrong, but has been an upstanding citizen since the late 1970s and should be forgiven.
I’m not actually taking a position in the Polanski case. I’m just pointing out how it is more complicated than you make it seem.
Well, he may be a “banker”, but he’s also a Socialist. Plus he’s French. I’m confused, does this mean he’s guilty or not?
Oh, and:
Dude, the former President of Israel is currently in prison for rape. That’s, like, the world’s Number One Jew. Compared to that, I don’t think Strauss-Kahn is going to make any difference to anti-Semites.
Only since Lansky bought it . . .
Wait, are we talking about John Kerry? 
They may keep his passport. No doubt he would have the means to get out of the country anyway if he really wanted to, but that sure wouldn’t look good.
Sorry, but a grown up having sex with a 13 year old minor is not going to be looked upon favorably in most of Europe. I dont think that’s what you meant, but it kind of reads that way.
Well, that just leaves Bangkok and the Church.