stinky lunch: seriously. then again, i'd go so far as to say any lunch which requires sealing, really shouldn't go to the office, because even if you can avoid offending your fellow commuters, eventually you're going to offend -someone- when you go to eat it.

ms. stewart: i can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not, but in a way i think you're right. except that she wasn't jailed for insider trading.

What do you think was in that lunch? What was the smelly part? fish? Sauce? Fish Sauce?

I'm hard-of-smelling, so have a good chance at carrying offensively smelly stuff around without knowing it.

I don't think punishing a woman for a lesser crime to distract the masses from reforms not being implemented, and old white men NOT being punished for greater crimes, is especially innovative. Or particularly feminist.

jhimm - I'm not being sarcastic, actually.

Ulrika - Regardless of reforms not being implemented, old white men, etc. She lied. She should be punished. You cannot tell me that what happened to her has never happened to a white male in a position of power. I'm not talking reforms.

deb - I have a highly sensitive nose and can smell things that others seemingly can't. It wasn't any smell that was specific...just stench. Yuck.

Re Martha Stewart: Yep. She lied.

She was found guilty of lying to a federal officer. Not of perjury; she didn't lie under oath.

Anyone out there ever say, "Gee officer, no, I didn't realize how fast I was driving..." when they knew damn well? Should *that* be a jailable (or citable) offense on its own?

It's not even clear she did anything that was actually illegal. She can't be guilty of insider trading, she wasn't technically an insider.

No, I haven't, Paul. I know how fast I'm driving. I keep my mouth shut.

My understanding is that it is a felony to lie to a federal agent whether you are under oath or not.

I was stopped for speeding a while ago.

The officer asked "Do you have any _legal_ reason to be exceeding the speed limit?"

I paused and thought a moment. I mean had a (poor) reason I was speeding(habit? laziness?), but it certainly was not a legal reason. Then I said, "No. I certainly can not say that I have ANY legal reason to be exceeding the speed limit.

For some reason, he let me off with a warning.
I slowed down in that area after that.

Yes, yes, I know it's a felony to lie to a Federal agent while not under oath. My point - somewhat obliquely made, mea culpa - is that I think that's flat wrong, possibly unconstitutionally so.

You are required to tell the truth under oath. You are required to produce items or allow searches under subpoena. Both are sanctioned by legal process and overseen by a judge. But if you're being posed questions by Joe Random Federal Agent on a fishing expedition?

In any case, Martha was convicted for lying about some detail or other of an activity they couldn't even charge her for (never mind convict her of) in the first place. Does that really seem fair?

p.s. no, i don't think that someone who lies to the cop under the suggested situation should be arrested.

deb - I was stopped for speeding in NJ on a trip down to philly with some girlfriends. The guy said, "Do you know what you did wrong?" I said, "Yes." He asked for my driver's license. Saw that I was from out of state, asked where we were going, I told him. He then gave me a warning about how the area had deer and I should really drive the speed limit and let me go. Heh.

Paul - Ah. I can't speak to the constitutionality of lying to joe agent when not under oath. Ethically, I would wonder why one would lie when not under oath. Constitutionally? Dunno.

Whether or not Martha S. was convicted for the right reason, I like to think that she was caught and punished for being stupid. Something that should happen to a lot more of our public figures.

cf,

Do you also then feel that Carly is a symbol of womens lib, after all she was fired for poor execution of HP strategy. I think that this proves the women can be fired for messing up just like men. Also she was give a huge severence package ($21.2M) just like incompetent male CEOs

mess

mess - absolutely. Carly's decision to buy Compaq was fucking stupid. She should have been fired years ago.

cf: Yeah, lying is an ethical issue, but in some situations, might there not be complicating circumstances e.g. along the lines of civil disobedience, perhaps? (I'm not saying it necessarily was in Martha's case.) Constitutionally, Amendments IV and V could apply.

Fritz: much as I would sometimes like to see 'stupidity' be a jailable (in extreme cases, capital) offense, in my saner moments I realize that 'freedom' includes the freedom to be stupid. And anyway, eventually stupidity becomes its own reward.

otoh, maybe you were being ironic?

paul - yes, you're right, there are complicating circumstances. And I'm oversimplifying. And the other thing is: I'd like to think I'd do the right thing in these kinds of situations, but until they occur, I don't know what I'd do or if I'd do anything different than what she or others have done. Do I have the fortitude to stand up for my convictions? Like, risk jail? Dunno. Don't want to know. :-)

CF - Well, actually, no I wasn't being ironic. But you are correct, I don't mean that being stupid by itself should be a crime. But I think that more people in the public eye who make bad decisions and thus break a law isn't about being stupid (say, for instance, not wearing your seat belt as versus lying to investigators), then they should be made an example of. And I agree with you, people need to be free to make stupid mistakes. How else can the rest of look smart, but in comparison? :-)

" Regardless of reforms not being implemented, old white men, etc."

No, not regardless of those things. It doesn't work that way. See, you were talking about a triumph of feminism. Feminism is basically about equal treatment in equal circumstances. In the society we live in, the privileged class is still old white guys with social connections, therefore the point of comparison for equality is old white guys with connections. If a woman who is wealthy, successful, connected, and white is treated worse by the system than wealthy, successful, connected white men who have committed crimes not merely as bad but significantly worse, and white guys who do what she did are not prosecuted 99 times out of 100, then that is not equality. It is privileged treatment for men. Therefore, it isn't a triumph of feminism, or anything like it. It's the same old song.

"She lied. She should be punished." Only if that is what happens to everyone caught lying similarly. It isn't.

"You cannot tell me that what happened to her has never happened to a white male in a position of power."

But that's not the standard by which equality is measured. If 1 out of 100 (or, realistically, fewer) men are prosecuted for Crime X, and 1 out of 1 women are, that isn't equality.

"I'm not talking reforms."

You can't coherently talk about triumphant feminism without it, at least implicitly.

"Feminism is basically about equal treatment in equal circumstances"

Which is exactly what happened here. Her broaker, Peter Bacanovic, who provided the tip also got 5 mths in jail. Both committed essentially the same crime and both got the same punishment. Sounds like equality to me.

As for the "and white guys who do what she did are not prosecuted 99 times out of 100" insider trading is a very difficult thing to prove. It took years to get enought evidence to convict Millikin and Boskey. This case was easier because it was so blatent. So yes, the majority of white collar crime, committed by both genders, goes unpunished.

White collar crime is committed often by both genders. To say as you do that "If 1 out of 100 (or, realistically, fewer) men are prosecuted for Crime X, and 1 out of 1 women are, that isn't equality" is misleading, if not outright false. Your claim is that there is only 1 women (Martha) who has ever committed insider trading. Do you actually beleive that? Only 1 women has ever committed insider trading? I highly doubt that.

mess

mess: Martha's making use of a tip was not insider trading; she doesn't even come close to fitting the SEC's definition of insider vis a vis ImClone. For that matter, even Bacanovic's providing the tip wasn't insider trading, though it was likely a breach of his fiduciary duty to Merrill Lynch.

Sam Waksal, CEO of ImClone, instructed Bacanovic to sell *all* if his ImClone shares prior to a pertinent FDA ruling becoming public. That *was* insider trading. Bacanovic told Martha Sam was selling his shares. Martha's acting on that tip was not in itself a crime- the SEC couldn't charge her for that.

Instead, U.S. Attorney David N. Kelley charged her for making false statements about something that wasn't a crime in the first place.

Go see:

http://www.mises.org/fullstory.aspx?control=1470

True, which is why I said her and Pete were conviced for a similar crime and did not specifically call out insider trading. I should have made that more clear.

I made the jump to indider trading since that is what I thought the message that I was responding to was refering to. If I misread the meassage, I am sorry.

mess

mess - i had updated my entry to show that it wasn't insider trading, sorry about the misleading statement there.

mess, You're right, you didn't specify insider trading. My bad.

However, I'll stand by my lesser point that what Martha did (lie to an agent while not under oath) and what Pete did (breach his fiduciary duty) are not equivalent.

The rest of my post was clarification of the events, not directed at you. I was just on a roll. :-)

Again, my apologies.

Paul,

Understood, and my response was just trying to clear things up. I'm not sure if I agree that the two crimes are not equivelent. I guess we can leave that at a difference of opinion.

What I was really driving at was the statement that 1 in 100 men get proscuted vs. 1 in 1 women. I think that it delibertly paints an unrealistic view of socitey. Women are not always right and men are not always wrong. That statment has that viewpoint embedded in it and that is [Bull] (To reference another blog posting)

mess, and everyone: I would assert the 1:100 vs 1:1 has little - or more likely nothing - to do with gender.

Rather, it has to do with the relative fame of the 100 men vs 1 woman, and with the craving of media attention and overzealous need to "send a message" on the part of the aforementioned U.S. Attorney.

If Kelley thought could have nailed Emeril Lagasse on this, he would have.

Mess-

What an apt nick. You seem a little muddled in your arguments. If Martha Stewart was not convicted of insider trading, and was convicted of something that was not a crime, i.e. without sufficient evidence to convict her of an actual crime, then what exactly does the alleged difficulty of convicting of insider trading bear on the discussion or the comparison of the treatment of men versus women? The rest of the problems with your discourse flow from similar conflations, so I leave it as an exercise to the reader to sort them out.

Ulrika,

Martha was convicted of a crime. She was found guilty of conspiracy, obstruction and two counts of lying to investigators. That you do not consider these crimes is irrelevent.

Now, I admit that in skimming the messages, I misread them and thought that you were refering to insider trading. Once again, Im sorry for misreading the message, but I still disagree with your basic position. You seam to beleive that old, rich, white guys get away with whatever they want while old, rich, white women do not. I do not think this is the case. I think that the world is far more equal that you do. I think that women are treated more equally than you do.

If you would abandon the typical libral democrat victim mentality you might see that things are more equal and that Marthas conviction is an example of that equality.

>> It doesn't work that way. See, you were talking about a triumph of feminism. Feminism is basically about equal treatment in equal circumstances. In the society we live in, the privileged class is still old white guys with social connections, therefore the point of comparison for equality is old white guys with connections. If a woman who is wealthy, successful, connected, and white is treated worse by the system than wealthy, successful, connected white men who have committed crimes not merely as bad but significantly worse, and white guys who do what she did are not prosecuted 99 times out of 100, then that is not equality. It is privileged treatment for men. Therefore, it isn't a triumph of feminism, or anything like it. It's the same old song.>>>

Hm. I said that she was a symbol of progress.

Fat, old white guys are definitely still in charge. But I cannot believe we haven’t made progress. And yes, I think we should measure ourselves by our successes but I think we should also include our failures.

>>>But that's not the standard by which equality is measured. If 1 out of 100 (or, realistically, fewer) men are prosecuted for Crime X, and 1 out of 1 women are, that isn't equality.>>

No, it’s not. But it also isn’t 1:1, anymore.

>>>"I'm not talking reforms." You can't coherently talk about triumphant feminism without it, at least implicitly.>>>

What reforms are you talking about? I thought in your original reply you were talking about reforms dealing with what they charged Martha with – as in, should someone go to jail for lying to a federal agent when not under oath. I do not think those are gender specific.

Paul - fame plays into it. The lust for sensationalistic stories in the media is strong and america's need for it just as strong.

cf: It's not the media's lust for sensational stories I was referring to, rather the U.S. Attorney's presumed lust for media coverage of his activities.

If Martha wasn't famous, I wonder whether he would have bothered.