In the ensuing collision, four people standing by an SUV that had broken down were killed. Two people riding in Couch's truck were severely
injured. One can no longer move or talk due to a brain injury. The other suffered broken bones and internal injuries. Three hours after the crash, Couch
had a blood alcohol content of 0.24, three times the legal limit, as well as traces of Valium in his system. Last week State District Judge Jean Boyd sentenced Couch to to 10 years probation, and ordered him to receive therapy at a long-term, in-patient facility, because she didn't believe jail would the right place to get it.
Therapy for what? Psychiatrist G. Dick Miller
testified that Couch suffered from “affluenza” and that his parents gave him “freedoms no young person should have.”
Defense attorney Scott Brown added insult to injury. “There is nothing the judge could have done to lessen the suffering for any of those families,” he said.
Oh yes there is, but it would upset the ideological apple cart that elevates rehabilitation over punishment. Defense attorneys wasted no time pouring salt in that particular wound, requesting that Couch be sent to an exclusive private home near Newport Beach, California, that offers intensive one-on-one therapy, for which Couch's father will pony up $450,000. Prosecutors countered that the state juvenile justice system also offers counseling, but Boyd has indicated she will allow the boy to be placed in an affluent setting to deal with his affluenza. The judge has already missed the gargantuan irony of alleviating Couch of the consequences of his actions, even as his defense attorneys' entire presentation rested on the premise that Couch's parents never held him responsible for the consequences of his actions.
Why stop now?
“He'll be feeling the hand of God, definitely,” said Marla Mitchell, whose 24-year-old daughter, Breanna, was killed by Couch's recklessness. “He may think he got away with something, but he hasn't gotten away with anything.”
Oh yes he has. Boyd apparently bought the ridiculous, poor-little-rich-boy premise posed by Miller. He
testified that couch's parents had a volatile, co-dependent relationship, a contentious divorce, and that the boy witnessed his parents arguing on several occasions. He contended that Couch's father “does not have relationships, he takes hostages,” his mother's mantra was “that if it feels good, do it,” that the kid's intellectual age was 18, but his emotional age was 12, and that Couch “never learned to say that you're sorry if you hurt someone. If you hurt someone, you sent him money.” This hired hack then insisted that if Couch got the treatment he needed, he might become a contributing member of society and make amends. “This kid has been in a system that's sick,” Miller insisted. “If he goes to jail, that's just another sick system.”
What's really sick here is the notion that this is all about Ethan Couch, and that his six victims are little more than inconvenient appendages to a well-crafted sob-story about emotional poverty trumping material wealth.
As sick as that reality is, we have been building towards it for decades. Back in the heady days of the '60s, Americans in wholesale numbers kicked conventional morality and organized religion to the curb in favor of “doing your own thing” and “raising one's consciousness.” One of the prevailing slogans of the time was Friedrich Nietzsche's notion that “God is dead.”
All well and good, but nature abhors a vacuum. So what filled that vacuum? Modern-day America has abandoned right and wrong in favor of legal and illegal, and/or well and unwell. A nation of 300 million that once placed a large portion of its faith in faith, aka an overarching sense of morality, has collectively decided there is greater wisdom to be found in an attorney's office, or on a psychiatrist's couch.
This case is a textbook example of where such an unholy alliance inevitably leads. But it is hardly an anomaly. Every day is so many ways, Americans are reminded that expediency, excuses and rationalization have supplanted decency, character and personal responsibility. Millions of Americans wear their non-judgmentalist worldview on their sleeves, lest they be perceived as unenlightened. Those who challenge that status quo are dismissed as one kind of over-zealous, opinionated bigot or another.
Yet somehow, a vestige of righteous anger endures. For some Americans, the idea that a rich kid gets therapy for killing four and maiming two doesn't sit well. Eric Boyles, who lost his wife and a daughter in the collision, likely hit on the prevalent reason why. “Money always seems to keep [Couch] out of trouble,” Boyles said. “Ultimately today, I felt that money did prevail. If it had been any other youth, I feel like the circumstances would have been different.”
Maybe, maybe not. Certainly good lawyers cost a boatload of money. So do expert witnesses willing to conjure up clever ideas. But it remains undeniable that Boyd was more than willing buy into the corruptive idea that retribution is an outdated concept. And while this particular case may have turned on money, the failure to exact proper retribution is certainly not a concept where a defendant's financial status has been the only mitigating factor. One of the reasons crime skyrocketed in the 1970s was due to the progressives' idea that “root causes” of any perpetrator's execrable behavior must be taken into consideration when doling out justice. Many of those cases dealt with inner-city youths and the material
deprivation that ostensibly drove them to crime. Thus, wealth or a lack thereof is not the common denominator. The failure to hold one responsible for one's actions is the great unifier.
Unfortunately, everything old is new again. Newly elected New York Mayor Bill de Blasio
contends that a progressive movement is “sweeping” the nation. Perhaps it is, but more likely the broom will be doing little more than brushing up the last pockets of common sense and common decency that still give rise to the indignation expressed in this case.
Expediency is the order of the day, whether it emanates from a Texas courtroom, an Obama administration that makes up healthcare law as it goes along, or a Congress that will soon give unwarranted credence to the euphemism “undocumented immigrant.” Those are paths of least resistance, which is the default position of mankind when right and wrong are removed from the equation. Better to pass more laws – and conjure up new conditions.
