That 15% really worries me.

There are 15% of the people in the United States who really worry me. They are not the same as the 20% of people who believe that God guided George Bush to invade Iraq and will back him no matter what. Those people are scary too, but them I can understand. No this is the 15% of people who show up on AOL as total loonies.

They popped up today in the case of two teenage boys who were on trial for felony adolescence. Cory Mashburn and Ryan Cornelison were on trial in Oregon for felony sexual harassment for having slapped the bottoms and poked at the breasts of some of their female classmates (right up front I will confess to having been guilty of the same behavior myself), actions which should have landed them in the principle’s office, but not an the registered sex offenders list for the rest of their lives. The charges were so ridiculous that even the alleged victims asked that they be dropped. Well, yesterday the judge fell victim to common sense and dismissed the charges. AOL, as it always does, ran a poll of readers to ask who agrees with the decision, and 15% of the respondents wanted to throw the little guttersnipes in jail.

AOL runs these polls all the time about everything. They ask things like “Was Live Schreiber out of line to push the photographer,” or “How long will Cameron and John last?” They are not scientific and tell us nothing but how the people how use the AOL service feel about things. The have about a plus or minus 50% chance of error. The only thing they consistently prove it that there is a 15% block of people out there who are total morons. (for the record 15% of the people think Cameron and John will last more than 6 months, and slightly over 15% -- 19% actually --think Live Schreiber was out of line for shoving a paparazzi: I can only imaging that the extra 4% are photographers. Morons).

It was the Michael Vick survey yesterday that really got me thinking about that 15%. In that case, 15% of the people responding to the poll believed that Michael Vick was being unfairly prosecuted. Fifteen percent!!! This is a guy who has admitted to running a dog fighting ring, to gambling on dog fights, and to killing underperforming dogs by hanging, shooting, drowning, or electrocution. His crimes are abominable. Everybody who reads this site knows that I hate PETA, that I eat meat and wear fur, that I support hunting, that I support coursing, that I support bull fighting, and that I think most animal rights activists are Nazis. I'm also on record as saying that celebrity justice is almost impossible to obtain, and that I thin Kobe Bryant, Michael Jackson, the Duke Lacrosse team were railroaded like Fatty Arbuckle. Yet even I think Michael Vick should go to jail. Anybody with a brain can see that Vick broke the law in a horrible, cruel, vicious manner and deserves to be called to task. So what am I to make of the 15% who are still behind Michael Vick? Besotted Falcons fans? People who breed fighting dogs themselves? Cats with keyboards? How about just acknowledging that 15% of the people out there on the internet are a bunch of absolute idiots?