Legislative Pre-Game Show-Jan. 12: Demagoguery On 1st Agenda of Session

What do you do if you’re a politician and you’ve got nothing but bad news to run on and you’re facing re-election?

Simple. Conjure up potential ‘horribles’, create simplistic legislation attacking said ‘horribles’, and run as if you bravely stood up to said ‘horribles’, even if what you did was simply to create horrible legislation to buttress your political bona fides.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Business as Usual in the Delaware General Assembly.

While the State Senate seems to have been taken completely by surprise by the first legislative session day of 2010, and has no published agenda nor list of meetings, the House, for better or worse, has an agenda, literally and figuratively. First, the literal agenda.

Two of these bills are demagoguery in bill form, aka the figurative agenda.

SB 60 (Sen. DeLuca/Rep. Mitchell)-This bill seeks to substitute the ‘judgment’ of the Delaware General Assembly over presumably namby-pamby judges and prosecutors when it comes to determining when bail should not be permitted. Probably b/c the General Assembly did such a great job when it established minimum mandatory sentences for non-violent drug offenders.

This bill would (read it yourself, I’m not making this up) enable the General Assembly to “… from time to time prescribe by law, when the proof is positive or the presumption great…those offenses which may not permit release on bail…in addition to capital murder.”

Got that? Capital murder charges are already non-bailable. But the General Assembly wants the opportunity to be the backseat driver when it comes to second-guessing the judges and prosecutors. If this passes, who will sponsor the bill to make sure that the pediatric pedophile is not eligible for parole? My guess? All 62 legislators. As if any judge or prosecutor would even consider letting that slime out on bail.

This is a bill about symbolism, not substance. Except that, as experience has taught us, no good comes from allowing the Honorables in Dover to interfere with the judicial process.

HB 252 (Rep. Lee/Sen. Bunting)-Here we go again. Yet another bill pretending to be tough on sexual offenders without distinguishing dangerous predators from those who pose no risk to society. This one would  “add parks and recreation areas to properties that a sexual offender shall not reside or loiter within 500 feet. Current law only limits residing or loitering by sexual offenders within 500 feet of school property.”

Presumably churches are exempt b/c the priest shortage would be exacerbated.

This is bad public policy. Dangerous sexual offenders should be kept away from the public. We can all agree on that, I hope. But to drive those who pose no threat and have paid their dues further and further from society serves no public purpose. In fact, it makes it more difficult for them to find and keep jobs, places them at greater risk of physical and mental conditions that likely would have to paid for out of Medicaid funds, and is simply punishment after the offender has already been punished and represents no further threat.

But it is good politics, especially in bad times. It’s something that everyone can put on their brochures: “I fought to keep dangerous sexual predators away from our children.”

With the Delaware General Assembly, some things never change.