The lead editorial in the spring issue of Ms. Magazine — written by Editor-in-Chief Elaine Lafferty — expresses outrage at the recent prosecution and conviction of Martha Stewart, and asks women to speak out.
“The issue is proportionality. John Ashcroft’s Justice Department spent millions of dollars overzealously pursuing a case in which Martha Stewart saved herself $52,000 in stock losses by following an insider stock tip. And she wasn’t even prosecuted for that — she was busted for lying about whether or not she’d sold her stock based on that tip.
We certainly believe in the judicial system, and in going after “bad guys,” including rich white collar criminals who use their power and connections to make money off the backs of small investors. Let’s just go after the real bad guys, and put Martha Stewart into perspective.
For example, we can’t wait for indictments to come down on Bush crony Kenneth Lay of Enron, contributed thousands to the Republican Party, who sold off $80 million in company stock while telling his employees to keep buying. When those employees found out that Enron’s profits were created by smoke-and-mirror accounting, many lost their retirement nest eggs.
We’re also concerned about Vice President Dick Cheney’s sale of Halliburton stock in 2000, on which he made $18.5 million. The price of stock then was $52/share; sixty days later, when reports of poor earnings surfaced, it dropped to $13/share.
Ordinary investors lost their life savings. Mr. Cheney is now being sued in civil court — but not by the federal government — for being part of a conspiracy to overstate company profits.
… These are scary times we’re living in. Our government is creating and exploiting fear. If you’re on a list of people who support progressive causes, you could potentially not be allowed on an airplane flight. If you’re accused of being a terrorist — just accused — you aren’t even allowed a lawyer. As I write this, I anticipate my name will move to the top of the list for an IRS audit.
But it’s time for all of us to speak out against fear and intimidation. And it’s time for Ms. to join the chorus of those who believe that Martha Stewart was taken down because she’s that bitchy Martha Stewart. The punishment should fit the crime, and Martha Stewart going to prison is wildly wrong, overzealous, and disproportionate.”
Jonathan D. Glater, writing in The New York Times, provides further perspective on Ms. Stewart’s conviction, exploring the notion that the decision by the state to prosecute Ms. Stewart was motivated by the desire to take down a popular and very public female chief executive, that she had become a target for prosecution because she supported members of the Democratic Party, and that justice officials went after her simply because she was not a member of the old-boys network.
MARTHA WILL SERVE NO TIME
Shed no tears for martha. Martha and her team have found a woman in north carolina who is dead ringer for martha. After months of rigorous work involving genetic implants and massive blood transfusions, the replacement is almost ready. Teaching her proper table manners and good grammer are proving more difficult than first thought. When the replacement martha is complete, she wiil switch places with the original martha and serve the time.
There is one small snag, martha wants to pay her replacememt minimum wage and deduct any prison wages earned while in custody. It seems they did too good of a job programming the replacement martha making her almost as greedy as the original. Right now it looks like a mexican standoff.