Perjury is a word with a meaning.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

Listening to the KO replay and he said, "Senator Burris who may have perjured himself..."

Well, Senator Burris MAY have assassinated the Archduke Ferdinand but if the meaning of the phrase is "there is some reason for a rational person to think he may have perjured himself" it complete bullshit.

I know this irritates most non-lawyers no end, but perjury does not mean, "testifying in a less than ideal way or allowing an implication to stand or lacking total candor."

It's a crime with a narrow definition.

If people want to say Burris is a liar, go for it. That's vernacular. But perjury is a legal term.

Clinton lied. He did not, however, perjure himself. And Burris isn't within ten miles, perjury-wise, of where Clinton was.

[BlooInBloo]

1. (shrug) According to DUers, you're a moron if you think he's not guilty.

Of course, whether or not that matters depends rather heavily on one's assessment of DUers' intellects.

[Bolo Boffin]

2. You're absolutely right, come to think of it. n/t

[kwenu]

3. Agreed. Based upon what I've seen so far there is no perjury.

[grantcart]

4. what is the working definition of perjury as you understand it?

Oh and I think that Burris is a liar and that he intended to deceive the IL impeachment committee but I suspect that you are correct that Burris is a good student of the law and he would be very careful not perjure himself.


(Oh and in a similar vein I suspect that if all of the facts are well established it will be difficult to find Bush and Cheney guilty of a lot of the crimes we think they are guilty of because they also were well briefed on the law and would go up to a line and not cross over it. I suspect that a full investigation will show that they are guilty of some smaller more technical crimes and would be found not guilty in a court of law for the larger crimes that we know they bear responsibility for. Like Rove it will fall into an area of having to prove 'intent' to do something, a very high bar indeed. And yes I think there should be an investigation and prosecution if possible.)

[Vattel]

5. It's not so much that

Bush went up to the line and did not cross over it. One big problem is that some of the most serious crimes Bush might be prosecuted for (e.g., war crimes as defined in the War Crimes Act or torture as defined in the Torture Act) have been so rarely prosecuted that no clear line has been established. Another part of the problem is that many of these statutes are very poorly crafted and hence open to a wide variety of interpretations.

[Kurt_and_Hunter]

6. Unequivocal and knowing false assertion or denial of a material fact

You have to really pin it down.

"Did you speak to Joe Smith?"
"Did you speak to Jane Doe?"

etc..

The exchange in question is kind of a primer in how to examine a witness with no hope of good answers, let alone a perjury conviction.

There's no law against asking a witness to "List all conversations you had with any person in this group" versus, "did you talk to any of these people?"

Then you follow that with exhaustive narrower questions.

Since reasonable doubt pertains to perjury as well as any other crime you have to have really get someone cold. Perjury prosecutions are rare.

[Unsane]

7. Keith was an ass about it. IMO Burris didn't perjure himself.