Crime against [blank].

From Wired News (side blurb on front page) concerning the sentencing of Terry Nichols in the Okla. City bombing:

“The judge said the bombing was not so much a crime against the 169 people who died and their families as it was a ‘crime against the Constitution of the United States. That’s the victim.’”

This pisses me off more than I thought it would. While in some cases I would agree that the interests of the govt. should supercede those of a few people, comparing the lives of all those people (and their families) to the Constitution was a huge fuckup on the judge’s part. What an idiot.