Questions for the Attorney General Nominee

Article here. Excerpt:

'Senate confirmation hearings put nominees on notice that, as a Michigan state legislator reportedly once said, “I’m watching everything you do with a fine-toothed comb.” Loretta Lynch, a talented lawyer and seasoned U.S. attorney, should be confirmed as attorney general. Her hearing, however, should not be perfunctory. Questions like the following would highlight some festering problems:

• Next year is the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta, which began the slow, serpentine progress to our modern panoply of rights, including those of persons accused of serious crimes. Today, however, regarding sexual misconduct on campuses, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights uses the threat of withdrawing federal funding to coerce colleges and universities into jettisoning crucial defendants’ protections when adjudicating, in improvised tribunals, accusations of sexual assault. Presumption of innocence? The new presumption is that accusations are valid until disproved. The right to confront one’s accuser? No, it would be traumatizing to the “survivor” (note the prejudgment). Proof beyond a reasonable doubt? Now a mere “preponderance of the evidence” will suffice. Are you comfortable with this traducing of due process?'

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• Years pass, studies are written and vows are made, yet the scandal of prison rape persists. When will the government stop this crime against inmates in its custody?
• The U.S. incarceration rate is five times Wales and England’s, nine times Germany’s, 14 times Japan’s. In 2010, more than 200,000 inmates — approximately the nation’s total number of prisoners in 1970 — were over the age of 50. How can this be necessary?