Jury Duty

Dear Mr. President,

I was summoned for jury duty this week and spent two days at the Hall of Justice in a large pool of prospective jurors. I was, in the end, not selected to sit as a juror but it was fascinating to watch the process. The Rule of Law. The legal system. Trial by jury. Even though this was a relatively minor case, a DUI charge that the defendant was fighting, it was Justice in action with all the gravity and careful deliberation of a major criminal case, the judge carefully explaining what was required of each person, how the process worked, why the questions he asked were important–“in order to learn a little about each of you, your life experiences and whether they might prevent you from being completely impartial…we want to select the best possible jury for the case.” Both the prosecutor and defense attorney reminded prospective jurors again and again that the defendant is innocent until proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt, and both sides questioned and dismissed anyone they thought might exhibit bias toward their side in the case. Impartiality. Innocent until proven guilty. Beyond a reasonable doubt. Over and over again. The judge talking about how the court, this jury, this case, is outside all political pressure, financial pressure, a self-contained world. A jury of 12 peers to judge the case based only on facts. This is the way guilt or innocence is judged in America, he said, and as I listened to him yesterday and watched the process, I realized it was Kill List Tuesday and you might at that very moment be sitting in judgment, deciding who would die this week at the hand of a Special Operations assassin or by a Hellfire missile fired from an unseen drone four miles above some remote village in Afghanistan or Pakistan or Yemen or Somalia, controlled by a CIA agent 8,000 miles away in Langley, Virginia, or by an Air Force “pilot” on some base in Nevada or New York or New Mexico. No jury of unbiased peers, no evidence presented in a court of law, just analysts, bureaucrats and advisors with who knows what life experiences, biases, prejudices, motives. These Kill List meetings make mockery of the Rule of Law, Mr. President. They do not reflect American values. They are illegal, immoral, evil, soul-corrupting. They do not make us safer. They only create more enemies and ensure future hatred and violence. They are the tools of cowards, dictators and mass murderers. They are an abomination. They are a war crime. Jill Stein for President!