First: It's very disingenuous of you to remark that you are not going to pursue the argument "out of repect" when you start out by referring to me using a diminutive name that's also a vegetable.

Second: Unless you live in a cloistered monastery, you could, by some wild stretch of the imagination, find yourself accused of a heinous crime which you did not commit. It happens. Ask the men who have been exculpated by DNA evidence after years in prison on circumstantial evidence. All it takes is being at the wrong place at the wrong time, along with sloppy police work.

Third: By your own response to me, you disprove your previous remarks concerning how unimportant it is for the general public in a democracy, republican or otherwise, to be scientifically literate. An attorney cannot educate an entirely scientifically illiterate jury in the time it takes to conduct a criminal trial. He has to have something to work with, even though he himself has a minor in biology.

Furthermore, his object will be to get them to the point where they believe that, if a scientist says it, it must be so. He's a defense attorney. His job is to defend his client and to procure his release. This doesn't necessarily involve any real understanding of DNA evidence on the part of the jury, only a belief in it. The same card can be played by the prosecution.

If scientific literacy is a lynchpin for either side, the educational level of the prospective jurors will play a key role in the jury selection phase, as well. The side whose case benefits the most from a knowledgeable jury will be seriously handicapped by a pool of scientifically illiterate citizens from which to pull.

A jury's ignorance will undermine its ability to weigh the evidence fairly and to evaluate the claims of both the prosectution and the defense. And that, in turn, will undermine the pursuit of justice in the courtroom, because a jury "tutored" by an attorney whose professional duty is partisan is not really capable of impartiality. Their understanding is too basically shallow and skewed to be able to make a fair judgement.

Fourth: However much you might like to believe it, not all liberals with advanced degrees are drug-addled pinheads -- yes, even the ones who went to school with you.

Fifth: You are an engineer, and a good friend of yours is a lawyer, and that gives you insight. I grew up among lawyers, teachers and politicians. And I've been closely associated with engineers for going on 25 years. That gives me a little insight too.

Regards--
Mary Anne