What the frack is going on with Lee? *maelstrom, son also rises, crossroads spoilers
Spoiler:
Has his anguish over the loss of Starbuck sent him around the bend? And what sort of court allows a pilot to play lawyer. Puhleez! This trial is ridiculous. Not high drama. Just low-down nonsense. And are you telling me that father and son are so immersed in their own bitterness and remorse over Starbuck that they are going to tear each other apart for the rest of the season? It's like we now see two new characters who never set foot on the BSG set before. 'Sup with that, writers?
And, is that prosecutor out to lunch, or what. I guess the notion of raising objections never occurred to her. Or, maybe she was asleep that day in her law school class. Lee should NEVER have been allowed to cross examine the President of the 12 Colonies. What was the prosecutor thinking not objecting to that gross violation of legal ethics. Since when do non-attorneys, those not admitted to the bar, practice law. This is distinctly different from a defendant acting in pro per (on his/her own behalf). It's illegal.
And the whole Tigh cross, badgering the witness into self-incriminating testimony about his commission of a capital crime, first degree murder of his collaborator spouse, was also off-the-rails. Prosecutor should have objected since it was not relevant to the case at hand, at best. And she would have been wiser to advise the witness of his right to not be coerced into self incriminating testimony on a matter that was not before the court. Then again, I guess Colonial jurisprudence simple sucks when it comes to safeguarding individual rights.
For starters, in any democracy worth it's stripes, the health of the CINC (Commander-in-chief) is often classified as a state secret. Take for examples in our own American history FDR's polio, JFK's back injuries and addiction to pain meds, Regan's Alzheimer's (conveniently "discovered" after he left office. Yeah, right.), Golda Meir's lymphoma that was covered up as bouts of shingles, Yeltsin's blackout alcoholism, etc. Heavy is the head that wears the crown of state.
Adama was within his rights to censor Roslin's testimony in the interests of natinal security. If the other judges objected, the prosecutor should have moved for a closed hearing session to determine the outcome of this issue involving national security and cleared the court room. As a former journalist covering heads of state and court cases involving issues of national security, I have first hand knowledge of this. Frankly, it would have been better, more dramatic, to handle Roslin's cancer metastasis sub rosa. Build some drama around it. Then we have another mystery within and cover-up. Oooh! Cool.
The minute Lee sniffed the tea, the Kamala Kat was out of the bag. And he never really laid a very good foundation for the line of questioning in the first place. Why? Because he's not a trained attorney admitted to the bar and allowed to practice law. Duh! C'mon. writers, try to be a little subtle. Not so obvious, please. What defense counsel did in allowing Lee to cross examine Roslin was illegal and should have cause a stern rebuke from the bench at the very worst and an immediate objection by the prosecutor at the very least. This is just stupid and unbelievable.
Ditto with the radio fiddling. The bar scene where Roslin’s chief of staff was fiddling with that red radio was a dead giveaway. And yes, the old cliché of radio signals from Earth traveling to deep space announcing, "We are here." Has been used ad nauseum as a plot trick. The best use, IMO, was in Carl Sagan's book and that abyssmal movie verison of it, "Contact". At least Dr. Sagan got the physics right. He used the very first TV broadcast signal of Hitler at the Olympics as the signal. Makes sense since broadcast wave don't warp time-space. FIFO, first in, first out.
So, if the Colonial fleet is picking up stray Earthly broadcasts, they would be seeing them as through a time machine, same way Hubble views back to the origins of the Universe. And, some crappy little radio would not be the receive. Neither would random individuals of the hull of Galactica. The energy loss as signals travel through a planetary atmosphere then out to space is significant. Add to that the influence of interstellar radiation, gravitational and other astronomical phenomena, and it would take a very sophisticated listening post to pick them up.
So, BSG fans, I think this episode just went completely off the rails. And, as a parting challenge, why would Roslin go back to sipping Kamala when she has Hera available as a blood donor to treat her cancer. DUH! Hey BSG guys. Don't you think we actually watch this stuff? C'mon, get with the program. Cut the metaphysical crap and start giving us unique and character-honest scripts instead of relying on old, hackneyed and cliché scifi tricks. You should not take fan loyalty for granted.
And, is that prosecutor out to lunch, or what. I guess the notion of raising objections never occurred to her. Or, maybe she was asleep that day in her law school class. Lee should NEVER have been allowed to cross examine the President of the 12 Colonies. What was the prosecutor thinking not objecting to that gross violation of legal ethics. Since when do non-attorneys, those not admitted to the bar, practice law. This is distinctly different from a defendant acting in pro per (on his/her own behalf). It's illegal.
And the whole Tigh cross, badgering the witness into self-incriminating testimony about his commission of a capital crime, first degree murder of his collaborator spouse, was also off-the-rails. Prosecutor should have objected since it was not relevant to the case at hand, at best. And she would have been wiser to advise the witness of his right to not be coerced into self incriminating testimony on a matter that was not before the court. Then again, I guess Colonial jurisprudence simple sucks when it comes to safeguarding individual rights.
For starters, in any democracy worth it's stripes, the health of the CINC (Commander-in-chief) is often classified as a state secret. Take for examples in our own American history FDR's polio, JFK's back injuries and addiction to pain meds, Regan's Alzheimer's (conveniently "discovered" after he left office. Yeah, right.), Golda Meir's lymphoma that was covered up as bouts of shingles, Yeltsin's blackout alcoholism, etc. Heavy is the head that wears the crown of state.
Adama was within his rights to censor Roslin's testimony in the interests of natinal security. If the other judges objected, the prosecutor should have moved for a closed hearing session to determine the outcome of this issue involving national security and cleared the court room. As a former journalist covering heads of state and court cases involving issues of national security, I have first hand knowledge of this. Frankly, it would have been better, more dramatic, to handle Roslin's cancer metastasis sub rosa. Build some drama around it. Then we have another mystery within and cover-up. Oooh! Cool.
The minute Lee sniffed the tea, the Kamala Kat was out of the bag. And he never really laid a very good foundation for the line of questioning in the first place. Why? Because he's not a trained attorney admitted to the bar and allowed to practice law. Duh! C'mon. writers, try to be a little subtle. Not so obvious, please. What defense counsel did in allowing Lee to cross examine Roslin was illegal and should have cause a stern rebuke from the bench at the very worst and an immediate objection by the prosecutor at the very least. This is just stupid and unbelievable.
Ditto with the radio fiddling. The bar scene where Roslin’s chief of staff was fiddling with that red radio was a dead giveaway. And yes, the old cliché of radio signals from Earth traveling to deep space announcing, "We are here." Has been used ad nauseum as a plot trick. The best use, IMO, was in Carl Sagan's book and that abyssmal movie verison of it, "Contact". At least Dr. Sagan got the physics right. He used the very first TV broadcast signal of Hitler at the Olympics as the signal. Makes sense since broadcast wave don't warp time-space. FIFO, first in, first out.
So, if the Colonial fleet is picking up stray Earthly broadcasts, they would be seeing them as through a time machine, same way Hubble views back to the origins of the Universe. And, some crappy little radio would not be the receive. Neither would random individuals of the hull of Galactica. The energy loss as signals travel through a planetary atmosphere then out to space is significant. Add to that the influence of interstellar radiation, gravitational and other astronomical phenomena, and it would take a very sophisticated listening post to pick them up.
So, BSG fans, I think this episode just went completely off the rails. And, as a parting challenge, why would Roslin go back to sipping Kamala when she has Hera available as a blood donor to treat her cancer. DUH! Hey BSG guys. Don't you think we actually watch this stuff? C'mon, get with the program. Cut the metaphysical crap and start giving us unique and character-honest scripts instead of relying on old, hackneyed and cliché scifi tricks. You should not take fan loyalty for granted.
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