Cokie Roberts: "Take Him (Polanski) Out and Shoot Him"

Quite a few celebrities have chimed in on the side of Roman Polanski, following his recent arrest in Switzerland on thirty-year-old charges of sex with a minor, as well as his fugitive status. Cokie Roberts, not so much.

Speaking on ABC's This Week on Sunday, Roberts said:

"Roman Polanski is a criminal. He raped and drugged and raped and sodomized a child, and then was a fugitive from justice. As far as I'm concerned, just take him out and shoot him."

Nation editor Katrina vanden Heuvel, chimed in, perhaps a bit taken aback by Roberts' statement, which appeared to be said in jest, and said:

"Ooh, no, no, no, whoa, Cokie. Now, we're both mothers of daughters, and I think Roman Polanski, there should be no dual system of justice in this country. He should not be privileged because he's a famous director or even because he's a victim of the Holocaust. But, I think, one needs to see the documentary that was made, which I thought was very powerful in showing judicial and prosecutorial misconduct. That doesn't mean he should have fled the country. I think he needs to come back, not fight extradition, but find an appropriate way of serving justice at this stage. But I think to be shoot him ..."

The list of Polanski's supports reads like a a Who's Who of Hollywood, including, among others, Woody Allen, Martin Scorsese, David Lynch, Harvey Weinstein, Pedro Almodóvar and Ethan Coen. This seems, to me, no different than a lot of these types of crimes. You think someone like John Q. Public would get off as easily as Mel Gibson, Paris Hilton, or Lindsay Lohan? Nope. This is no different.

Watch the video, from This Week, broadcast Oct. 4th, 2009, via Raw Replay.