The Patriot Post® · Jury Duty

By Burt Prelutsky ·
https://patriotpost.us/opinion/56467-jury-duty-2018-06-18

Rudy Giuliani got into hot water for merely stating that whereas he admires most women, he draws the line at Stormy Daniels, a slut whose entire life has been devoted to performing sex acts for the camera.

Naturally, the fact that he is Donald Trump’s friend and lawyer was enough for the media’s performing seals to react as if he’d trashed Mother Teresa. The fact is, these days, he’d have gotten off a lot easier if he’d actually dumped on Mary, the mother of Christ.

The entire episode took me back to the last time I was called for jury duty. During voir dire, when prospective jurors are questioned as to ascertain their competency and their open-mindedness, the defense attorney asked me two questions that, once I answered them honestly, got me dismissed.

First, he asked me if I assumed his client was guilty just because he’d been arrested and indicted. I said I did, pointing out that it isn’t easy to get arrested, let alone indicted, especially when plea bargains are the order of the day. And as the defendant was the only person in the crowded courtroom on trial, I assumed he was guilty, but promised to try to keep an open mind when considering the testimony.

That led the mouthpiece to ask if I would be able to give equal value to sworn testimony, no matter who the witness was. I confessed I couldn’t in good faith make that promise. I said, and quite reasonably I felt: “Why would I or anyone else take the word of a drug dealer, for instance, over that of a nun?”

That’s all it took and the judge excused me, but without the usual thanks for showing up. I wasn’t disappointed to avoid doing jury duty, but I took exception to his cavalier dismissal, so as I got up to leave the jury box, I indicated the jurors who had already been found acceptable, and said: “You can dismiss me, but you know, I know and they know that I’m the only person who has answered all the questions honestly.”

I was a little surprised the judge didn’t cite me for contempt of court. It’s not as if I could have pled not guilty.


Speaking of the legal system, 20% of those serving time in our prisons are immigrants, and 93% of them are illegal aliens. But I’m sure that Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi would be sure to describe them as “hardworking” criminals.

As for the latest bit of bunkum that the liberals use in trying to gin up sympathy for the illegals — the separation of parents and their children — it is not only the same plight faced by our native-born criminals who are sent to jail but those patriots who sign up to defend America by joining the military. The illegal aliens, on the other hand, aren’t serving anyone’s interests except their own selfish ones.


I’m 78 years old and last night, while viewing TV commercials, I believe I saw more biracial (black and white) couples selling me detergent, cars and vacations than I have actually encountered in my entire life.

Understand, unlike black film director Spike Lee, who admits to becoming enraged whenever he spots such a couple in New York City, I have no objection to them. I just think, as an observer of the American landscape, that it’s worth mentioning that the social engineers on Madison Avenue are selling us a lot more than the goods and services of their clients.

Clearly, there is a propaganda campaign being waged here, just as there has been for several decades in movies and on TV to portray homosexuals as invariably kind, witty, warm and wonderful, and as much better friends and neighbors than heterosexuals could ever hope to be.

Having spent about 50 years working in Hollywood, I can assure you that some homosexuals are very pleasant people, although I doubt that sainthood lies in their future. They’re just people, with all the usual follies and foibles that go with the human condition. But they are definitely not as noble or self-sacrificing as you would be led to believe if your only experience with them was through their portrayal in the media.


I generally ignore the emails I receive on nearly a daily basis from Angie’s List, but this morning I paused before hitting the delete button because it occurred to me that what was on my screen was a good argument against the mindless insistence of too many parents that their offspring waste four years and a ton of money attending college.

What was displayed on my computer screen was the average cost of home services in North Hills, a middle-class community here in the San Fernando Valley where my wife and I happen to live.

According to Angie, a typical visit from a plumber will run you $304; an electrician will cost you $315. If you require landscaping, $2,773; a new roof, $7,315; window installations, $5,050; a new deck, $7,088; a remodeled bathroom, $9,731; a remodeled kitchen, $22,187.

Plumbers, electricians, roofers and carpenters not only make a lot more money than the typical college graduate but they actually provide important services to the community. What’s more, they can learn their trade without parking their brains at the curb just so left-wing, agnostic professors can more easily stuff their heads full of anti-American, anti-religious crapola.


For centuries, self-serving bigots tried to rationalize slavery and Jim Crow segregation laws by insisting that black people were less than human. Today, black college students voluntarily segregate themselves on campuses around the nation. In the meantime, the black street rabble led by the likes of Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Maxine Waters and the mindless clods in Black Lives Matter, who answer to George Soros, do their best to make the belated case for the bigots.


That leads me to wonder about the shelf life for lunacies like global warming, socialism and special cutouts for black Americans.

It was roughly 20 years ago that the Supreme Court was debating how much longer blacks should be given a leg up when it came to college enrollments, business loans and employment. By then, slavery had been over for about 140 years and it had been nearly 40 years since the passage of the Civil Rights Act. Yet here we are, two decades further down the line, and we find that unemployed, badly educated blacks are still being given preferential treatment, even when it’s for something as important as positions as air traffic controllers.

As for the climate hoax, which began in the 1990s with Al Gore warning us that the oceans would rise 20 feet in the next 10 years, it is still going on in spite of the oceans not having risen two inches.

In order to prolong the hoax, the con men posing as scientists point to hurricanes, pretending they are fiercer and more numerous than they’ve ever been, and the Millennials who have no interest in history swallow the swill whole, like baby birds being fed worms and grubs by mama bird.

In the same way, the young boobs eagerly accept the fairy tale of socialism, which promises them a free education (which, these days, is pretty much what it’s worth), free health care and something called a living wage, even if they choose not to work.

The brainless wonders never ask how the government can possibly provide a life free of strife, competition and even labor when the government doesn’t make money, except in the physical sense of printing the stuff. Put the question to the young squirts and they’ll just shrug and probably say: “Whatever.”

If you point out that socialism has never worked out well — not in the Soviet Union, not in Nazi Germany, China, Cambodia, Cuba, North Korea or Venezuela — that everywhere it’s been attempted, the end result has been oppression, poverty for the masses and a despot’s boot on the neck of the people, they will parrot what Lenin’s “useful idiots” always say: “This time, it will be different.”

The only things that ever change are the names of the tyrants, but in order to know the facts the young idiots would occasionally have to stop taking selfies and listening to the blather of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren long enough to read a book.

Unfortunately, based on their reading habits, they’d never consider bothering with anything longer than 140 characters.


Today’s gag comes to us courtesy of Bert Black, Silver Spring, Maryland’s resident jokester.

During his annual physical, the doctor asked his retired patient if he was getting enough exercise.

The old guy assured the physician that he was getting plenty.

“Yesterday was typical. I took a five-hour walk, covering about seven miles through pretty rough terrain. I waded in a small lake, pushed my way through two miles of brambles and trekked through miles of sand. I barely avoided stepping on a snake, luckily escaped a mother bear when I got too close to her cubs and then had to outrun an angry elk.”

Looking in awe at his small, elderly patient, the doctor could barely believe his ears. “Wow, you must be one hell of an outdoorsman!”

“I’m afraid not, Doc. I’m just a really lousy golfer.”