The ever-excellent slacktivist discusses the public response to a prison scandal in Delaware (summary of response: they were in prison, they deserved what they got). Slacktivist comments:
The attitude expressed in such letters is as popular as it is morally repugnant. This popularity is both dismaying and baffling. Letters like this express contempt for the Constitution as though such contempt were patriotic — as though the Bill of Rights were some kind of threat to the American way of life.
It’s not just in Delaware. The Cornerstone group (traditionalist Tories) have put out their platform, which includes not merely the repeal of the Human Rights Act, but also withdrawal from the European Convention on Human Rights. Because, of course, this human rights nonsense is just the invention of liberal elitist New Labour types, right?