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Hey, Rich Kids: If You Get Wasted and Kill People With Your Truck Blame It On “Affluenza”
Townhall.com ^ | December 15, 2013 | Doug Giles

Posted on 12/15/2013 9:48:56 AM PST by Kaslin

Lawyer’s for 16-year-old Ethan Couch were able to pawn off on a doe-eyed court that “affluenza” was to blame for his stealing beer at WalMart, getting wasted and then plowing his out of control Ford F-350 into a group of folks, killing four.

Affluenza? Please.

For those who’re not hip to “affluenza“, allow me to help you add another word to that ever growing list of PC terms spun by blame-shifting therapists in order to explain away criminal behavior by little Ethans who need to go to prison instead of a luxury rehab in Newport Beach:

Affluenza is a portmanteau of “affluence” and “influenza“. It’s the malady of rich kids whose parents never let them suffer the consequences of their bad behavior. In my day we called them spoiled little bastards and the way we’d help them get healed from affluenza is by beating the crap out of them at school when mommy and daddy weren’t around.

According to a defense psychologist, this is what Ethan suffers from and we should feel sorry for this brat. Yep, these wizards postulated that little Ethan was unable to link his criminal/deadly behavior with its being bad due to his parents’ teaching him that wealth buys privilege. Therefore, to impart to him this hard lesson in reality, his parents hired out an expensive law firm that successfully convinced a court that numb-nuts needed rehab versus jail. Wow. Way to go. Lesson learned.

God knows this ain’t the last specious, bullet-dodging word we’re doomed to learn to let evil people off the hook. Mark my word, some redneck is going to die trying to ride one of T.Boone Pickens’ wind turbines after getting all liquored up at Hooters. His trailer trash parents, upon learning it was one of T. Boone’s turbines, smell blood in the water and sue Pickens for not taking into account their sons Dipshitzophrenia that disallows him to time his jump on to the moving blades. That would be the swiftly rotating unsafe blades, mind you.

Hey, losers. Two can play at that game. I say our conservative reps in the House should start getting more vociferous regarding their disdain for BHO and The RINOS. They could blame their new, aggressive outspokenness on a Stercore Tauri Disorder that makes ‘em scream “BS” uncontrollably when those twins trample upon our founding docs.

Silliness aside, we have four dead individuals who lost their life because this punk didn’t have a life; and now walks away unpunished because our land defines deviancy down.

Personally, as you can imagine, I feel no sympathy for Ethan’s made up ailment. No, my empathy begins and ends with the victims and their shattered families who, not only have to live with their loved one’s loss, but they have the additional pain of watching our justice system dole out a comfy sentence to a kid who should swing


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Editorial; Government
KEYWORDS: drunkdriving; judgesandcourts; rich; wealth
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To: GeronL
"If they find a really ridiculously
stupid judge it could work."
Oh! My...you didn't raised the "bar" high enough.
stupid judges are as common as LIV..
regardless of "legal requirements"

41 posted on 12/15/2013 10:47:20 AM PST by skinkinthegrass (The end move in politics is always to pick up a gun..0'Caligula / 0'Reid / 0'Pelosi :-)
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To: yldstrk

A couple of years on the chain gang would do wonders for the boy. That and curing his ‘affluenza’ by making his dad forfeit all of his money and assets to the victims.

You need to review the chapter on ‘Why Punish’. One of the four reasons for the state to punish someone is to prevent vigilante justice. Judges keep giving the ruling class a pass, and sooner or later folks will turn to extrajudicial justice.


42 posted on 12/15/2013 10:47:32 AM PST by PAR35
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Comment #43 Removed by Moderator

To: PAR35

We have a winner. No further replies needed.


44 posted on 12/15/2013 10:50:58 AM PST by Black Agnes
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To: DeepInTheHeartOfTexas

Yes.


45 posted on 12/15/2013 10:51:38 AM PST by James C. Bennett (An Australian.)
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To: yldstrk
right if someone hurts you by accident

http://roselawtx.wordpress.com/2012/10/16/manslaughter-and-criminally-negligent-homicide-in-texas/

Manslaughter and Criminally Negligent Homicide in Texas

Manslaughter in Texas is codified under Texas Penal Code Chapter 19.04(a) and is committed when someone “recklessly causes the death of an individual.” Manslaughter is a 2nd Degree Felony (2 to 20 years in the Texas Department of Corrections). The legal definition for reckless is defined by Tex.Pen.C. 6.03(c). That provision states, “ A person acts recklessly, or is reckless, with respect to circumstances surrounding his conduct or the result of his conduct when he is aware of but consciously disregards a substantial and unjustifiable risk that the circumstances exist or the result will occur. The risk must be of such a nature and degree that its disregard constitutes a gross deviation from the standard of care that an ordinary person would exercise under all the circumstances as viewed from the actor’s standpoint.” ..

46 posted on 12/15/2013 10:52:56 AM PST by ontap
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To: DeepInTheHeartOfTexas

no I have not gotten drunk and killed somebody, but I thought all of y’all were a smarter bunch

It is an accident, first, second the kid is under age, third, he was impaired so could not form the requisite intent for murder which is a specific intent crime, fourth, y’all appear to be angry because the kid has money

I guess you are all too thick to get it


47 posted on 12/15/2013 10:53:20 AM PST by yldstrk (My heroes have always been cowboys)
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To: Jane Long

Is she retiring to her new vacation island in Aruba? The one she was suddenly able to afford right before this case concluded?


48 posted on 12/15/2013 10:55:04 AM PST by MediaMole
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To: yldstrk

I know for a fact, if this kid was white trash and had parents on the dole, he’d be doing serious time. He’d have been tried as an adult and would be locked up till he had wrinkles and gray hair.

The fact that his parents have money is why he will certainly do this again.

Hopefully it’ll be YOUR kin he kills or maims next time.


49 posted on 12/15/2013 10:55:56 AM PST by Black Agnes
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To: ontap

ok

right

like getting in a fist fight and the person dies

it’s a real gray area

getting in a car accident while impaired because of underage drinking doesn’t get there

give it up, it is a legal analysis and you don’t get the distinction.


50 posted on 12/15/2013 10:56:09 AM PST by yldstrk (My heroes have always been cowboys)
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To: Kaslin

What did a 16 year old, in Newport Beach, need an F350 truck for?

In the county where I live, the lefties are always touting the benefits of public transportation or bikes. My response to them is always to put their own kids back on the school buses or public buses and close the school parking lots to students. It would solve a lot of the traffic congestion and prevent a lot of accidents.


51 posted on 12/15/2013 10:56:52 AM PST by Eva
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To: Black Agnes

you seriously hope he will kill my kid?

I am reporting you to the the admin

you are a creep


52 posted on 12/15/2013 10:56:56 AM PST by yldstrk (My heroes have always been cowboys)
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To: yldstrk

are you serious Paco?
drinking/driving and killing are not “accidents.”
Plenty of people go to jail if they killed someone while drinking and driving.


53 posted on 12/15/2013 10:57:46 AM PST by snowstorm12
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To: Eva

LOL my Mom always said the only reason kids get driver’s licenses is because parents are tired of driving them around.


54 posted on 12/15/2013 10:59:34 AM PST by nascarnation (Wish everyone see a "Gay Kwanzaa")
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To: snowstorm12

Nothing new here. Teddy Kennedy used this defense years ago.


55 posted on 12/15/2013 11:02:19 AM PST by artichokegrower
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To: Kaslin

Cue Malcolm McDowell being fed steaky-wakes and eggy-wegs.


56 posted on 12/15/2013 11:02:41 AM PST by bakeneko
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To: snowstorm12

adults


57 posted on 12/15/2013 11:02:49 AM PST by yldstrk (My heroes have always been cowboys)
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To: yldstrk
There's some people on this site that don't get the distinction but it ain't me...and it most assuredly is not a gray area. It kind of shoots down your whole it's just and accident crap. He knew he was drunk and got in that car and killed four people and he is culpable. The only reason he's not in jail is the idiot judge that bought in to this bullshit!!
58 posted on 12/15/2013 11:03:31 AM PST by ontap
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Comment #59 Removed by Moderator

To: yldstrk

If you don’t think drunks are repeat offenders you’ve been living under a rock.

True story:

Kid I went to high school with DUI’d and killed his girlfriend when he was 17. Parents got him off because mom was a bank exec at one of the big banks in Jackson. He got community service and probation as a ‘punishment’. His parents sent him to a ‘treatment facility’ somewhere out west for a pretty penny.

Guess what happened less than 5 years later? If you guessed DUI and killed someone ELSE you’d be correct! In fact, a whole family this time. This time, however, he did it in a different state (Alabama) where mom and dad didn’t know the right people to pay off. He’s still doing time in Alabama for this incident ~30 years later.

Guess what hasn’t happened since this ‘vengeful’ punishment that involved jail time? NOBODY ELSE HAS DIED!!!!!

This kid will kill someone else before he’s 30. Bet the farm on it.

If we’re lucky it’ll only be himself and some unassuming pine tree or highway divider.


60 posted on 12/15/2013 11:09:13 AM PST by Black Agnes
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