For me to want Donald Trump to go away. For me to want reform at the border. For me to think that Britney Griner needs to serve her term. For me to question what the definition of a man or a woman is. For me to want peace in our country?
It’s fine with me, but to some it’s a problem and sometimes quite baffling. For instance in this forum it’s okay to post outrageous things that are just idiotic, but it’s not okay to point it out.
Seems ok, except I have no idea why you’d want Griner to serve a sham of a prison term as (essentially) a Russian hostage. I don’t think we should cave to a crazy prisoner swap, but she is also undoubtedly being held as a bargaining chip. So the resolution will almost undoubtedly be some type of prisoner swap.
Re: the Griner issue, I feel like she thought she could do as she pleased for multiple reasons. Despite how we may feel here in the States, the rest of the world, or part of it, may feel differently. We want respect for our values? Give it back in kind. Don’t agree with their position? Then go or work your ass off to effect global change… with the expectation that your efforts, in the short run, may feel in vain.
I think you have a firm grasp on the reality of the situation. I would add it would be utter hypocrisy for politicians to work to free griner while mj remains illegal federally.
Russia incarcerated Griner on a trumped-up drug smuggling charge in order to use her as a bargaining chip for a prisoner exchange. She broke the law. I'd have had no issue with them convicting her for the petty crime she committed. But that's not what happened. I don't respect those values.
Not nine years for vape cartridges. It’s nine years for bringing cannabis oil into the country. Russia has some of the strictest drug laws in the world. What I would like to know is how does this sentence compare to the sentence a Russian citizen would’ve gotten for doing the same thing. If hers is significantly more than a Russian would get, then it’s politically motivated. If a Russian committing the same crime would’ve gotten a similar sentence, then it is just under their laws.
I agree 100%. I personally believe a Russian citizen with less than 1 gram of cannabis oil on a first offense isn’t getting nine years, but I don’t have any data to back up that assertion.
This debate seems academic anyways, and ignores some key facts. The US government basically says she's been wrongfully detained, and is actively looking for a prisoner swap. Moreover, her pleading guilty and basically not contesting the charge was what we told her to do (left to her own devices she probably mounts a more effective legal defense) to speed up the process since they wont deal until the trial concludes. The sentencing happened after we had declared that this was basically a farce too, so of course the court is going to throw the book at her for maximum leverage.
Russia lacks rule of law. There is no extradition treaty between these two countries, which is a signal we don’t trust their rule of law. No, we don’t need to respect the justice system of a criminal gangster state. There isn’t much we can do about it, aside from calling a spade a spade, in this case officially considering Griner unjustly detained or as a hostage. Russia’s justice system is a sham. Something like 99% of defendants are found guilty. Does the Russian state *never* make a bad arrest, or is everyone being railroaded (regardless of innocence or guilt). For goodness sakes, they throw their own citizens in jail (also under the threat of 10 years) for calling the Ukraine war a war, instead of a “special military operation”. On a related note, when’s the last time the world heard from Alexei Navalny?
I'm not going to defend the Russian system, but the conviction rate here for federal offenses is around 99% too, and we lead the world in incarceration by some measure. To some extent the number of people saying she needs to do 9 years isn't surprising, Americans love putting people in prison too.
I know the feds have a high rate of conviction, but the feds also bring relatively few cases and very few make it to trial. Not sure we can say the same w/Russia. I agree with you the incarceration rate here is absurd, the feds aren’t the main drivers of that, the states are. Still, I don’t doubt for a second there are still hundreds if not thousands of people with ridiculous fed sentences ( based on minor drug offenses) not far off from Griner’s circumstance, and who knows how many states have locked up - that unfortunate reality does not help us negotiate w/Russia who would of course point back to that as well.
The sentence received for the "crime" violates common decency and common sense. Just because it's their law doesn't mean we have to respect it, nor restrain from trying to right what is clearly a wrong. There are countries in which being gay is punishable by death. Do I have to respect that crap as well?
Naturally. I said the same in an earlier post. They needed to make the sentence heavy in order to make the swap viable. If they gave her something like 90 days we’d just let it ride.
Do we know it was less than 1 g? I’ve read that she had several cartridges and a quick search showed cartridges tend to be half gram or 1 g. I don’t know what the total amount she had was. I seen conflicting information. Some places say for small amounts it’s just an administrative charge, but other places said even small amounts can get a Russian five years in prison. She claimed it was an honest mistake not realizing she packed those being in a hurry. My understanding is she had lived in Russia previously, so she should have been aware of the strictest of their laws. I am reminded of back in the 1990s when I was going through the metal detector at Pittsburgh airport, the guy in front of me had his carry-on bag x-rayed. It came out and they opened it up to inspect and pulled out a .357 magnum. He claimed, “Oh I forgot I packed that in there.”
