The court of public opinion

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In the court of public opinion, Bill Cosby has already been tried and convicted of serial rape.

Now that more than twenty women have come forward to publicly accuse Mr. Cosby, apparently that is enough for most people to decide he’s guilty.

Before going any further, let me be crystal clear about something– rape is NOT even remotely funny. Rape is no joking matter.

Period. End of discussion.

The act of forced rape is a despicable crime committed by cowards, an act of violence that is usually perpetrated against women. Rape should never be excused or tolerated, no matter the identity of the accused, or the victim.

Convicted rapists and sex offenders should be punished to the full extent of the law, with no exceptions whatsoever.

I need to be very clear to say that I don’t know whether or not Mr. Cosby is guilty — only that if he is guilty of any of these horrific accusations and they can be proved in a court of law, that he should be tried, convicted, and sent to prison.

On the other hand, it’s very important to note that as troubling as these allegations may be, it is equally troubling to see his reputation destroyed without these charges being proved in court.

More than twenty potential rape cases couldn’t even find one prosecutor like Mike Nifong? Why has Bill Cosby been immune from prosecution all these years?

A preliminary investigation into the histories of the accusers of Cosby represented by attorney Gloria Allred suggests at least some of these cases are fraudulent.

However, if even one of them is true and can be proved in court, then Bill Cosby should be sent to prison. That isn’t subject to debate, in my opinion.

Except…why did these charges suddenly become a topic of conversation?

Well, a relatively obscure and bitterly jealous comedian named Hannibal Buress decided to make a name for himself by making references to the Cosby allegations into his stand-up comedy routine and media interviews.

This “comedian” has admitted that he despises Bill Cosby — not because he knows Cosby is guilty of rape, but because Bill Cosby has been known to admonish young black men for their sloppy dress and behavior, telling them to pull up their pants and to speak using proper English.

Bill Cosby has said that black men need to be part of the family and sharply criticized the welfare state mentality, identifying that as a significant part of the problem when it comes to violence involving young black people.

The enemies of Bill Cosby’s message are using the rape allegations to impeach his character. These people care nothing about getting justice for the accusers. They only care about destroying the reputation of Bill Cosby when they claim the rape allegations against him must not be ignored.

Meanwhile, yesterday former President Bill Clinton was honored to receive an award from the King Center for “inspiring youth.”

He gave a speech denouncing the dangers of a “shame-based culture” — you know, the culture that Bill Cosby was describing as what we need to fix society, a culture where people are held accountable for how they behave.

Clinton, who was impeached for committing perjury, is a man guilty of sexual misconduct with a former intern that would have caused any other executive guilty of the same offense to face prosecution for sexual harassment.

And Monica Lewinsky was not the only victim.

Remember Paula Jones? Kathleen Willey?

Before you say the affair with Monica Lewinsky is different than the Cosby allegations because it was consensual, what about all the other allegations of sexual violence against Bill Clinton that weren’t?

Juanita Broddrick isn’t the only woman who claimed Bill Clinton raped her, not by any stretch of the imagination. In my opinion, about the only thing worse than raping an adult woman is the rape of a child. And evidence has surfaced in the last several days linking Bill Clinton to an alleged pedophile and domestic child sex trafficker named Jeffrey Epstein.

Yet Bill Clinton was honored yesterday.

The double standard shown by the media in the way allegations against these two public figures have been handled would be funny, if politics played no role.

Of course, no one who has been falsely accused of such a heinous crime would find it amusing — like Bill Cosby, for example.

As a writer, I find the irony of this sort of hypocrisy can be quite delicious. And if I were a liberal instead of a Libertarian, I would relentlessly accuse the Cosby denigrators of being racists, at this point.

The double standard by which these two men are being judged, however, is both galling and very offensive to me.

Mostly I’m sad for the victims, whichever of the actors in this drama they may prove to be.