So Michael Vick is going to plead guilty to various charges in his dogfighting case. His initial charges could have brought up-to-6 years in prison, with a likely sentencing range of 3 to 4. He ended up taking the plea for 1 1/2 to 3 years, in no small part to the threat of additional charges to be levied in accordance with the RICO Act. Vick was going to be charged with running a criminal enterprise for illegal purposes, similar to the charges brought upon many sports betting operations run out of Old World Social Clubs. These charges would have brought the total maximum sentence from 6 years all the way up to 20+.

Here’s what it all boils down to:

You can breed dogs to fight to the death for hours. You can use medieval-English looking items like a pry bar and rape stand to make sure they’re in fighting shape. You can use innocent, defenseless dogs as slaughter fodder to hone the killer instinct of your fighting dogs. If a dog is not competitive, you can murder it using the most torturous, sadistic methods you can think of (drowning, electrocution, hanging).

Just don’t bet on the outcome of the fight, or you’ll be in 4x the trouble. It’s much better if you run the operation purely for the love of watching animals slaughter each other, just for kicks.

When someone can explain how that makes the slightest bit of sense, please let me know.