Established in Miranda v. Arizona 47 years ago, the you-have-the-right-to-remain-silent litany has "become part of our national culture," as the Supreme Court noted in a 2000 ruling that reaffirmed Miranda.
My favorite example: In the 1987 film "Robocop," the eponymous cyborg hero grabs a murderer by the lapels, growls, "You have the right to an attorney" — and hurls the creep through a plate-glass window.
Today, the issue is how, or whether, to apply Miranda to Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the surviving suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing. The Obama administration advocates a "public safety" exception that would permit the interrogation of terror suspects for a while before "Mirandizing" them and allow the government to introduce the resulting information at trial.
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