Meet critic with silence
A Fayette County jury made the right call in acquitting Brian Lutes of disturbing a public meeting. Lutes, a long-time splinter festering under the Fayette County Commission’s fingernail, on Aug. 30 stood before the three commissioners to rant. During his allotted time, Lutes told a story about a Chinese butcher who was so fed up with the government that he hacked four meat inspectors to death. He then said that it “sounds like a plan to me.”
It sounds like a stupid, wicked thing to say. But criminal?
There is little doubt that the commissioners’ meeting was disrupted that day. Following Lutes’ utterance, some audience members gasped, the commissioners were in a tizzy and demanded that Lutes leave. When he failed to voluntarily exit, Chairman Vicites recessed the meeting and called for the sheriff and county detective to physically remove him. Lutes wasn’t unruly. He didn’t fight off the sheriff and detective. In fact he did leave, only to be charged later with disrupting the meeting, harassment and defiant trespass.
Lutes wasn’t waving a meat cleaver. His words were his only weapon and those words can and were construed by the jury to be that of political speech. Commissioners needn’t endorse or even like the words that a foe uses but they must recognize that rhetoric – as long as it does not slander, libel, cause a stampede or otherwise pose a danger – is protected under the First Amendment.
Far better it would have been that day in August for the commissioners to have met Lutes’ remarks with stone-cold silence, to calmly remind him that his time was up and to take a seat. Seasoned politicians, such as Fayette’s threesome, should know that criticism comes with the job, even if it is misguided, and, as is the case of Lute’s remarks, irritating.
But it’s a lesson that the threesome has yet to learn as they continue to shoot inflammatory barbs at each other. Their fuses are short, their patience even shorter for those with whom they disagree. Now that Lutes has been cleared, and since it is an election year for county offices, the commissioners should expect that Lutes and his like will start attending meetings again, asking for a few minutes in the spotlight to spew vile. It shouldn’t be too much to ask for the commissioners to remain calm and give such comments the response they deserve: Silence.