News-Record.com

It won't take you much trouble to find somebody on a message board who decries the 23-month federal prison sentence
imposed on Michael Vick today. Nearly two years? For fighting dogs? For gambling?
You bet.
The justification of the punishment is rooted in far more than the offenses to which Vick pleaded guilty. It's about the defendant's post-plea conduct as much as the atrocities that started this tale in the first place.
MInutes after admitting to the charges, Vick went into a hotel ballroom packed with reporters and offered an allegedly heartfelt apology. He spoke of being a changed man and about the influence of a higher power in his life. Legions of enablers, having decided long ago to deem him a martyr and a victim of racist prosecution, praised the oratory and decided he had suffered enough.
Even some of his harshest critics backed off. Public opinion was already prepared to offer him a second chance.
And how did he react to this shifting of the sands?
First off, he violated a term of his bail by testing positive for marijuana. More recently, he failed a lie-detector test that asked, among other things, if he had ever participated in the killing of dogs.
Are those the actions of a contrite, reformed man of God?
The judge threw the book at Michael Vick. Good for him. The quarterback thought he was above the law even when the law was sitting on top of him and ready to pile on if necessary.
It was necessary.