CRIME WATCH : Paddles and Politics

The synchronized knee-jerk competition among politicians to portray themselves as tough on crime has moved into overdrive with an Orange County assemblyman’s bill to have juvenile graffiti vandals whacked up to 10 times with a wooden paddle. A parent of the miscreant would be offered the chance to wield the paddle; should the mother or father decline, or wield the stick too lightly, a court bailiff could do the job.

As a visceral reaction to an ugly blight, paddling is understandable. So is shooting a car thief. So is hanging an armed robber. But while such punishments might seem emotionally satisfying, as rational law they stink.

Still, the proposal of Assemblyman Mickey Conroy (R-Orange) has ridden the airwaves since he introduced it last week, becoming a staple on talk radio shows and even showing up in newspapers overseas. A key reason is the extensive publicity given to the case of Michael Fay, the 18-year-old American who was struck four times with a four-foot rattan cane in Singapore last month. That barbarism followed Fay’s guilty plea to vandalizing cars by spray-painting them.

Graffiti scars buildings in Paris and Frankfurt, New York and Los Angeles. But the scrawls are not an ever-increasing phenomenon. Some Orange County judges said last year they thought it was abating, in part because convicted vandals were being fined more and forced to spend more hours painting over their handiwork. Those are appropriate punishments, worth maintaining even in years when politicians are not up for reelection.