Worst...Judge...EVAR!

[/comic book guy]

Judge: Jack, please sit down and stop hopping around. This is a courtroom, not a circus.

Jack: Your honor! These porn-peddlers are corrupting our youth and if that coloumbine sim...

Judge: Call it a "Coloumbine Simulator" again and I will hold you in comtempt...

Jack: ...Sir, if Bully is not put out as a 'public nuisance' soon, an epidemic will occur that will be worse than the hurricanes here in Florida.

Judge: Mr. Thompson, I have made my final verdict and I am sticking to...

Jack: FINE! You know what! If things aren't done in the name of the lord and myself, I will make damn sure you are thrown out of your seat by 2008!

Judge: ...2008?

Jack: When I beat you in the race for your seat! Brain-dead pixelantes will know me as the honorable 'Judge Dredd'!

Phoenix Wright: OBJECTION!

Judge: Hey...how did you...

Wright: 'Judge Dredd' is a trademark name protected by the copyright of John Wagner. In no way, shape, or form, can Mr. Thompson use it as his alter ego...

Thompson: No, you idiot. My alter-ego is Batman. Duh.

This just continues to prove that Jack Thompson has lost all connection to reality.

What a petulant crybaby.

"....for which additional motions are pending - including, apparently one which seeks to hold Thompson in contempt."

Cripes, if only this were "Starship Trooper" reality where the next line would be "Would you like to hear more?" I'd break my rollerball's left button jabbing at the "Yes" button on the screen. :)

nightwng2000
NW2K Software

@ BTW

Tell us when it's out :) (or when you get sued)

__________

Jack.. Thompson.. As.. A.. Judge..

*long pause

ROFL!!!!!!

Well, we all know how well his political run againt Janet Reno went...

There is at least one other (sinister) motive that I can come up with for Jack's new-found desire to sit on the bench. Fla. Bar Reg. R. 4-8.2(a) states: "A lawyer shall not make a statement that the lawyer knows to be false or with reckless disregard as to its truth or falsity concerning the qualifications or integrity of a judge...or candidate for election or appointment to judicial or legal office."

Jack could be trying to make an end-run around other attorneys' ability to criticize him (legitimately or otherwise) by cloaking himself with "I'm running for judge, you can't attack me!"

Of course, there's Fla. Bar Reg. R. 4-8.2(b): "A lawyer who is a candidate for judicial office shall comply with the applicable provisions of Florida's Code of Judicial Conduct." Based on his past performance, I'm guessing Jack might have a problem with this one.

This can't end well...

Well, really, if he does anything stupid, like win and start ruling on all sorts of video game cases (...can a judge bring up a video game case before himself??) you know the higher courts will hear all about it. And odds are, they'll reverse the decision...

I'm pretty sure this won't work. You can't try to create conflicts of interest to force a recusal if you don't like a judge. Even if it did, Friedman gave Thompson more leeway than I think most judges would, demanding to see the game and all. He'd do worse with whoever it got reassigned to.

I really can't take this seriously.

Winning the seat could be the best thing for everyone involved. He wouldn't be allowed to whore himself out there for the cases he currently takes and he would have to immediately recuse himself for any cases involving those same cases for an obvious conflict of interest. Failing to recuse himself would bring on real sanctions against him as a judge for all sorts of hilarity.

It shouldn't be too hard for his competition to come up with some ads against him. Is is possible to find a quote by him that isn't negative?

We've already seen what happens when he loses an election. Check Wikipedia. ;)

Can you imagine what it would be like if he lost? We've seen how he acts when he loses a court case, just think of his reaction if he lost an election.

The ESA and ESRB would only have to submit some of the letters he's sent them to give evidence of his incapability to be objective. Not a wanted trait in a judge.

Okay, he's a lawyer who's pretending to know the law and now thinks he's better than it despite being proved wrong several times? I dunno which is more pathetic, if he's serious or if he isn't.

Basically, Jack is saying "Well if I can't get my way, I'll just get rid of the authority figure that is in my way and I can rule all! Bwhahahaha!" I can't wait to see him lose. I think all gamers in Florida who are over 18 and registered to vote should go all out to make sure Jacko doesn't get that judge seat.

However, a source familiar with the Miami judiciary speculated that Thompson’s announced candidacy could also be a tactic designed to force Judge Friedman to recuse himself from the Bully case, for which additional motions are pending - including, apparently one which seeks to hold Thompson in contempt.

Wouldn't Jack have to recuse himself from this case as well, since he alledges to be running for Friedman's seat on the bench?

Not sure, but I think that is the general idea, if the contempt hearing is true then it would mean that the Judge would not be able to try someone who is running for judge for contempt of court, hence Jack does his usual and abuses the law simply to try and get away with his own cock-up.

I always knew that things would get a lot stranger before we're done hearing about him. If this actually goes anywhere, I think things might get nasty. Can you imagine an attack ad from Jack? Also, I'm not sure that he's going to get elected based solely on his position on video games. I'm guessing that's going to be the focus of his campaign. This has the potential of a lot of unintentional humor on Jack's part. Let's just hope he doesn't accuse this opponent of being gay, like he did with Janet Reno. Is she still being blackmailed by the mafia about that Jack?

I wonder how far he'll take it? He might chicken out, but we'll just see.

Upon further reflection, both this and his earlier letter to Patricia Vance both smack of desperation. Jack's running scared now. He knows he lost a case that was very significant to his career and has done serious damage to his credibility. He's now trying anything he can to salvage what little he has left. I once said earlier when he announced his involvement in the Cody Posey case that he was like a drowning man desperately trying to cling to anything he could to keep from going under. This, ladies and gentlemen, is further proof of that.

Dammit jccalhoun, you beat me to it. What people should do to stop his step into political office is bring out everything he's done behind the scenes: Penny Arcade, Flower For Jack, every innaccuracy and lie he has pulled out, and every nasty letter, email, and message board post he has ever done to the gaming community and industry to ruin his chances of ever getting any money or spotlight ever again. I believe once he told a gamer the F-word twice in one message. Not very professional, is it?

I encourage everyone who is going to be living in Miami around that time to try and bring it all out. Ruin his chances of coming out into politics.

[...] Jack runs for Judge. [...]

Don't judges need to be able to pass judgment after hearing both sides of the case?

oh dear... Jack Thompson as a judge. I'm guessing no one under 18 gets a fair trial in HIS court.

Jack: So what did you do?
Boy: I beat up my friend in self defense...
Jack: Ok, so you say you played Bully and murdered everyone at your school.
Boy: What? NO!
Jack: Too late, I'm the judge and what I say goes. Guards, take him to the tower. DEATH PENALTY! DEATH PENALTY!

Now this, this will be interesting, if anything things tend to come to light when you run for office, and if how he really is is revealed, he'll have to jump through hoops trying to get support.

This can't be.... if he was judge, he would start allowing all sorts of pointless video game laws. However, it may not happen because he's still a braindead idiot.

Ok after reading this some people did make a few good points.

Can he bring cases to court himself anymore?

I don't see this working out for him because there is ALOT more too it when being a judge.....seeing as how Take-Two and Rock start seem to be his obcession and his "life"....he won't last long or win because he'll have to worry about a crap load of other cases and issues....though he might try to bring video games into a non-video game related issue...then again Judges can't do that.....can they? They can't bring stuff to court themselfs...

Other another point was made that REALLY annoyed me...

Is he doing this to get out of the hot seat?...Being in comtempt and running for judge to get out of that?....Man that just annoys me....what an excuse....he'll have to follow up on this now...if he just happens to drop out a few months later...can he...can he even still get held for comtempt or anything?

My first thought is that this is an excellent reminder of why it's usually better to -appoint- judges.

Think of this as the forum equivalent of a troll asking for mod status.

I swear, I was thinking the EXACT same thing a week ago: "If Jack THompson wants all of his damn buisness to go his way, then why shouldn't he be a judge?

@Brer: No, this is an outstanding reason why judges should NOT be appointed. If they're elected, then it would mean Jack, in order to become a judge, has to look like the most qualified candidate to 50% of the voters. If they were appointed, he'd have to look like the best candidate to ONE important, like-minded person in power. The entire concept of democracy is that any official is accountable to the people and is supposed to make decisions based on what THEY want, not what HE wants.
(or she wants, if that's the case, we're equal opportunity here)

If he is unable to bring cases to himself (I'm not sure on this so hopefully someone can correct me if I'm wrong) wouldn't that be a good thing for us? Then he'd pretty much be stuck with nothing but florida cases to preside over.

I say vote for Thompson to watch him fall flat on his face, it would at least get him out of our hair for sometime.

You suck your honor......can I have your job?
So when can we expect a lawsuit after he's lost this battle? Can you imagine if he loses to a woman? He's going to be calling her a closet lesbian and handing her little surveys. How professional, eh?

One question: Can we legally avoid calling Jackie "Your Honour", given that he's proven that he has no honour?

Even if Jack did make judicial office, which I can only pray doesnt happen, there is the wonderful little thing called "conflict of interest". Even if Jack made judge, he would not be allowed to preside over any case concerning games given his past

Remember that time when some guy couldn't get his own way, so he/she decided to change the system so they'd always get their own way?

And then discovered that they were in fact just warming the bench in the courtroom.


Jack Thompson had his time, now we have a new wave of 'angry moms' and 'concerned citizens'. It's the way this stuff has been going on for ages, some groups are succesful and eventually survive to appear on many current affairs programs...

Others... well they grow old, tired, and become like some kind of amusing side show, like watching ants chew through a discraded biscuit.

I really hope Mr. Thompson finds a new gimmick before this garbage destroys his carreer entirely.

Is there anyone here who knows the process to become a judge in Florida? I'm interested, in particular, what kind of hurdles our favorite punching bag is going to face in his attempt to bring down the bill of rights. And how does his college tour work into his master plan?

Personally, I think he has less chance of becoming a judge than a Green Party candidate has of becoming President, but Jack either knows this, and is just going for publicity, or really is that deluded.

Can someone wiht legal expertise weigh in? Can you purposely create a conflict of interest in order to make a judge recuse himself? I thought it had to be a pre-existing issue, in order to prevent venue-shopping.

@Brainswarm
Our favorite punching bag has more-or-less no plan. He's just lashing out with little thought to whats going to happen next.
or thats how it seems

There is no way in hell that Thompson would ever become a judge. If he stays in the race, I will form a Political Action Group - people against John Bruce Thompson. All I will do is gather all the hateful and downright stupid things JBT has written on the internet, and make silent commercials about them. Using his wikiquote site would help. I would accept monetary donations from EVERYFARKINGWHERE and I would run these commercials anywhere I could.

If JBT keeps this up, I solemnly swear I will bring him down in the most publicly humiliating way possible. I will destroy his career and any shred of respect he has left with the public. I will do so by presenting the facts, and nothing more, including his courtroom antics, his response to Flowers for Jack, and the idiocy he perpetrated with Janet Reno quite a while back.

Do you hear me JBT? You have no chance in hell of winning. I've alread started production of the first commercial - it's a black background, silent commercial with shreds of paper floating past, close to the camera, detailing just how immature and depraved you really are. The end, when it is finished, will say "Is this really the kind of person you want deciding law?" Every fact will be presented with proper context, every quote will have a footnote detailing where it came from. I will let the truth speak for itself, so you can't even sue me for libel. I short, your public reputation will be utterly destroyed. Continue at your own peril - you've already destroyed any chance you ever had at a political career, I'm just the tool that will use your own words like a hammer, driving the final nail in the coffin.

I have to admit that this wouldn't be such a horrible idea if not for the fact that we all already don't trust JBT's motives. I'm current working on a Master's degree and have on occasion thought of trying for a Ph.D and a professorship as a career because I've had a lot of crummy professors and figure that I can likely do a better job than some of them. And honestly, the same line of reasoning applies to a number of people running for legislative offices - "I believe my representative is doing a poor job, and if no one will offer to do a better job, then I will!" Ned Lamont's campaign against Lieberman, for one, always seemed like it followed this line of reasoning.
The catches with it, of where there are two I can think of: one, it helps if you're motivated by an actual desire to be useful and not some personal issue. If JBT thought poorly of the judge and thinks he can do better, and wants to do better to serve the community - good on him for being a good citizen. But that's a dubious claim in light of all this talk of judicial manuevering and loopholes. Second is a question of capability - would you actually be a better man for the job than the current guy? I might be giving myself too much credit thinking I'd be a good professor; JBT might likewise give himself too much credit. Hard to really say if you don't have much related experience, and JBT's previous interactions with the law are enough to raise some serious questions.

@Benji

Remember that it's not -just- the Supreme Court that's appointed. So are all the Federal District Court Judges (again, with Senate approval required, continuing the checks and balances). Plus Supreme Court justices can review and (if necessary) remove judges from any lower court, meaning that the ones from previous administrations can also act as a check, although that's very rare and would require a rather egregious violation of Judicial ethics.

As for JT's chances, I think the idea that this is a legal tactic to slip out of the contempt charge is far more likely than the idea that he actually wants to be a local Judge. As a local judge JT would be under even closer scrutiny by the Florida Bar (a group we already know he has a rather mixed relationship with) and his actions would be constrained by the requirements of his office. It would effectively end his days as advisor to anti-game legislators and television talk show guest, and I find it hard to believe that he's ready to give that up yet.

You have no idea what you are unleashing in doing this!

http://www.dearinternet.co.uk/uploads/ssjjt.gif

swj719, you shall burn in hell heathen. God will reign supreme and come judgement day none of you shall stand before him in righteousness. Live your lives playing this corrupt trash then what will you have to say to God when he asks you what you have done? Fall on your knees and follow HIM for he is your Lord and only redemption.