* The Hate of the Beautiful People: Bob Enyart explains the biblical principles involved in our judgment that Jussie Smollett should be charged with a hate crime. That is, after beating himself up and sending himself to a pretend hospital with pretend broken ribs, still wearing a necktie, and carrying his meatball sandwich. (He should also be charged with commiting homosexual acts, but that's a topic for a show next week.) So, charge him with the same crime (as the Bible teaches; see kgov.com/crime) that he sought, by his false testimony, to put onto others. Bob also psychoanalyzes the Panera Bread Head and the Democratic president wannabe Kamala Harris.
* Hate Crimes -- A Listener Disagrees: Tom, a long-time listener, wrote in to challenge Bob's understanding of a hate crime. Bob replied:
My position is that a credible threat, itself, is a crime. Therefore a crime is more severe if it includes an additional credible threat to other victims. (We could call that aggravating factor "hate" or some other, more descriptive term.) So a crime is more severe than the harm done to a specific victim if that crime is part of an effort (conspiracy, etc.) to target an entire group of people so that they too will be harmed in some way, including possibly by them fearing even to go about their own business, or by prompting other criminals in solidarity to harm other members of the targeted group. One of the biblical principles that supports this is God's authorization of increased punishment for those who attempt harm, whether or not they may actually accomplish that harm. (See kgov.com/crime.) Consider, if a Sunni stabs to death a Shia as part of an effort to get all Shiites out of his neighborhood, he does more harm, for example, than if he had murdered someone in an attempted robbery, etc.
Of course, hating evil is a quality and certainly not a crime. And the left uses their "hate crime" mentality to promote evil including various perversions such as homosexuality. But those obvious truths aside, we Christians should not go soft on the kind of group-threat crime that we're discussing, nor abandon the related biblical principles. A kneejerk reaction against anything that liberals happen to be saying at the moment may be easy, and even fun, but it is not a shortcut to understanding justice. That is, don't despise liberals more than you love God.
* KGOV Hate-Crime Naming Contest: We conservatives have always observed the obvious, that all murder, etc., involves hate. That should prevent us however from recognizing the biblical principles involved in prosecuting those who make credible threats, not only to individuals but to entire groups of people. [Update: On the air on Feb. 18, 2019 Doug McBurney suggested a $40,000 prize for the listener who won our crime-naming contest, for coming up with a better name for what's called a "hate crime". Bob immediately retracted that impulsive, and completely impossible, generosity! :)] But we would like to hear from you if you have a naming suggestion. It doesn't have to be witty. Just descriptive. Our own "group-threat crime" doesn't seem effective. Therefore we invite you to send your suggestion to Bob@kgov.com (even though the winner gets, well, nothing... nothing other than some satisfaction)!