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Did the Rev. Jim Bakker receive a fair punishment last
week when federal judge Robert Maximum Bob
Potter
fined him $500,000 and sent him to prison for 45 years?
At first, the sentence sounded rather mild, since Bakker was found guilty of filching at least $3.7 million in Heritage USA contributions and applying that money to such vital personal needs as an air-conditioned dog house.
The average American worker earns about $18,000 a year. Bakker thus stole the equivalent of 205 years of toil, but he's going to prison for only 45 years, with the chance of parole in 10.
On the other hand, Bakker is such a minor-league thief by current standards that it's a wonder they even bothered to prosecute him. At least $4 billion has been misspent away by HUD. The federal farm credit system has been abused to the tune of $4.6 billion. Recent Pentagon procurement corruption comes to $5 billion. Then there's the $50 billion problem of looted savings-and-loans.
But have you heard of any sticky-fingered bankers, generals, defense contractors, farmers or realty agents going to jail for 45 minutes, let alone 45 years?
Bakker's a lightweight when it comes to thieving, and
there's an even bigger difference. The others all stole
from the public treasury, and offerings to that fund, known
as taxes,
are hardly voluntary. Bakker took his
money from people who were freely giving it.
If the concept of individual liberty means anything, it means that we all have the right to spend our money in ways that please us. Some of us buy comic books and some of us buy computer software. Some Americans simply cannot resist making an immediate and substantial pledge when they turn on the tube and see Jim and Tammy explaining how the PTL Club needs another million or two.
Nobody forced them to send that money. And if they can
no longer buy Heritage USA vacations, they'll find some
other moronic way to waste their resources; our government
has yet to repeal the law that a fool and his money are
soon parted.
Bakker's punishment won't pay back the people he defrauded. His fine isn't nearly enough, and the money goes to the government, not his victims.
The sentence probably won't stop Bakker, either. If he is paroled sometime before 2014, he could easily go back to preying on the same people. The people who fell for his line the first time around aren't going to let a little thing like a fraud conviction prevent them from believing in Jim and Tammy the next time. Witness the Rev. Charles Blair of Denver, still passing around the collection plate, despite his encounters with the securities-fraud laws a few years back.
The other purpose of punishment is deterrence, the hope
that Bakker's example will prevent others from doing the
same thing. The prosecuting attorney said the sentence
sends a message that you can't use TV and the mails to
make fraudulent statements to get people to send money to
you.
Really? Examine your junk mail and late-night TV ads. Then call Jerry Miller, assistant U.S. attorney in Charlotte, N.C., and tell him you've got dozens of major crimes to report. He should be glad to hear from you.
If Bakker really deserved to be punished, the judge should have sentenced him to perform community service, like Ollie North.
Whatever else Jim Bakker is, he's a genius at persuading people to send money to dubious causes. Our government could use his special skills. He could take collections to aid the beleaguered contras, amass pledges for the front-line bureaucrats in the war on drugs, and pass the plate to restore houses built on landfills in an earthquake zone.
Instead, they're going to squander his spectacular talent in a prison. That's truly criminal.
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