Why Doesn't This Happen to Poor People?

 I really cannot believe what I just read on the Net. Roger Clemens, another cheater in baseball who took steroids to enhance his performance and then has continued to lie about it now for at least a couple of years, was about to go on trial for lying to Congress and perjury. I say "was about to" because the jury had been selected and the trial was in its second day of testimony when Judge Reggie Walton declared a mistrial. He had barred testimony from the spouse of Andy Pettite, and he halted the trial when in video evidence someone referred to what she had said. The prosecution in this case, which apparently had built a very solid case against Clemens, either was incredibly stupid or careless. The judge said that any first-year law student would have known better and declared that it would be impossible for Clemens to get a fair trial now. Maybe not, legally he cannot, but that doesn't change the fact that the odds are now that Roger Clemens is going to skate for lying about his cheating in baseball. And instead of a conviction on his record that would prove he cheated, future generations will only have his steroid-enhanced numbers as a baseball player.

I'm not taking issue with the legal ruling here. Just with the uncanny good luck that seems to adhere to lying millionaires. Don't you think the millionaires of Wall Street, who are again enjoying obscene salaries and bonuses, two years after they brought the world to brink of financial ruin, have been lucky? A couple of centuries ago pitchfork-wielding mobs would have torn them to pieces in the street for what they did.

And let me just wonder out loud: are judges accustomed to being super diligent about fair trials for, say drug offenders? Petty criminals? I'm just saying . . .