Playboy: Krassner vs. Breitbart

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Playboy ran a lengthy conversation between our pal Paul Krassner and our former-pal Andrew Breitbart.

KRASSNER: As a Supreme Court Justice, Thomas has declared that the Constitution gives states a right to establish an official religion, that prisoners have no constitutional right to be protected from beatings by guards, that a school official is allowed to strip-search a 13-year-old girl to look for two extra-strength ibuprofen pills, that a key part of the Voting Rights Act giving blacks political power in the South should be struck down, that an American citizen could be held as an enemy combatant with no charges and no hearing. He announced a decision that threw out a verdict in favor of a black man who had been convicted of murder and nearly executed because prosecutors hid evidence that could have proved his innocence.

BREITBART: I don't know the answers to these things. If you had given me this detailed information, I could have come back with my detailed response. This is like the Sarah Palin "gotcha" question on Paul Revere. I'm not able to answer this because you are coming to me armed with data, and I don't have the ability to see whether there is a rational argument to defend it or not.

KRASSNER: Well, it's all a matter of record. Recently a campaign-finance watchdog, Protect Our Elections, asked the FBI to investigate Clarence Thomas and his wife, Virginia, seeking his disbarment. It alleges that he falsified his financial disclosure forms, that he engaged in judicial corruption by receiving $100,000 from Citizens United during his nomination and then in 2010 ruled in favor of Citizens United without disclosing that fact or disqualifying himself, and that he engaged in judicial insider trading to enrich his wife by providing her with information about that decision prior to its issuance, which she then used to launch a new company to take advantage of that decision.

BREITBART: Do you believe in innocent until proven guilty?

Playboy: Krassner vs. Breitbart