"This is not a hate crime. This is not a religious crime."

So says one of the attorneys for the three men arrested for burning churches in Alabama.

I guess they did it out of love.

One of them says it was a joke "that got out of hand." I wonder when that happened? Was it when they burned the third church or did it not get out of hand until they hit four?

What, I wonder, was the punch line of this joke supposed to be if it wasn't a statement about religion? Actually, posing the question suggests the problem with hate crime laws. How would we go about proving that these guys burned the churches because, say, they hated Christianity? Wouldn't we have to introduce evidence of their religious (or irreligious) beliefs? Doesn't that run the risk of prejudicing the jury?