Why yes, it DOES remind me of “Idiocracy,” which is only funny if it isn’t true.

Today, just prior to convicting Drew Peterson of killing his wife, his jury sent a message to the judge asking what the word “unanimous” meant.

Think about the implications of this. First of all, it means that one man’s life and the U.S. justice system’s integrity is resting on the judgment of twelve people, not one of whom possesses a fifth grade vocabulary, or, if one of them does, he or she did not possess the skills of persuasion or credibility to convince a majority of his colleagues that yes, “unanimous” means that everybody is in agreement. It means that the voir dire system managed to carefully select the most ignorant and inarticulate jury of adults imaginable for a first degree murder trial.

That’s not all. It means that in Joliet, Illinois, a select group of twelve adults, in addition to possessing only a rudimentary English vocabulary, were completely uninformed about the jury system. To reach adulthood this stunningly ignorant about one of the basic features of our justice system and  democracy, these individuals could not have regularly read newspapers or watched the news, and if they did, could not possibly have understood what they were reading or seeing. Continue reading →