[atari 2600]

I like Oxbow.

Used to know the Harvey Milk guys all those years ago. Mentioned them a couple of times a long time ago.

...makes me think of the murder of the real Harvey Milk and the "Twinkie defense."

Originally Posted by wiki

The expression derives from the 1979 trial of Dan White, a former San Francisco, California (U.S.) Supervisor who assassinated Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk on November 27, 1978. At the trial, noted psychiatrist Martin Blinder testified that White had been depressed at the time of the crime, and pointed to several factors indicating White's depression: He had quit his job, he shunned his wife, and become slovenly in appearance. Normally a fitness fanatic and health food advocate, White had also been consuming Twinkies and Coca-Cola. As an incidental note, Blinder mentioned theories that elements of diet could worsen existing mood swings.[2] Another psychiatrist, George Solomon, testified that White had "exploded" and was "sort of on automatic pilot" at the time of the killings.[3] The fact that White had killed Moscone and Milk was not challenged, but in part because of the testimony from Blinder and other psychiatrists, the defense successfully argued for a ruling of diminished capacity. White was thus judged incapable of the premeditation required for a murder conviction, and was convicted of voluntary manslaughterWhite Night Riots. instead. The verdict was unpopular, leading to the
In stories covering the trial, satirist Paul Krassner had played up the angle of the Twinkie,[2] and he would later claim credit for coining the term "Twinkie defense".[4] The day after the verdict, columnist Herb Caen wrote in the San Francisco Chronicle about the police support for White (a former policeman himself) and their "dislike of homosexuals" and mentioned "the Twinkie insanity defense" in passing.[2] News stories published after the trial, however, frequently reported the defense arguments inaccurately, claiming that the defense had presented junk food as the cause of White's depression and/or diminished capacity, instead of symptomatic of and perhaps exacerbating an existing depression.[5]
As a result of the White case, diminished capacity was abolished in 1982 by Proposition 8 and the California legislature, and replaced by "diminished actuality", referring not to the capacity to have a specific intent but to whether a defendant actually had a required intent to commit the crime with which he was charged.[6] Additionally, California's statutory definitions of premeditation and malice required for murder were eliminated by the state's legislature, with a return to common law definitions. By this time, the "Twinkie defense" had become such a common referent that one lawmaker had waved a Twinkie in the air while making his point during a debate.[2]