However you vote, whichever lives you think matter, you may be forgiven for asking one question.

When former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was stabbed 22 times in prison, did he say to his attacker, "I can't breathe"?

The "I can't breathe" quote was supposedly uttered by George Floyd, the criminally inclined Black man Chauvin choked to death in Minneapolis. According to The New York Times, the phrase has been used by dozens of people who died in police custody.

I say "criminally inclined Black man" to describe George Floyd because the man had a police record of some length and seriousness. That said, I don't think police officers get to strangle you to death for things you did in the past. Floyd was murdered. Chauvin is doing time for killing him. This is how things are supposed to happen in our judicial system, in a straight line.

Despite the fact that I think he's a murderer, I'm not happy Chauvin was stabbed in prison, nor do I believe his stabbing was any kind of "justice." Convicts are not judges. Nothing they do to each other is or can be described as "justice."

A lot of Americans feel differently about the matter of justice meted out by convicts. When a child molester is jailed, some of us droolingly note that other convicts don't like child molesters, and the guy who gets jailed on that kind of charge will have a rough time behind the wall.

I don't give a damn about what convicts do or don't think about child molesters. I don't believe that anyone in jail should be harmed by the other prisoners or by the guards.

Americans also believe that prison rape is a noble sort of punishment for those convicted of various crimes.

Where I live, a former mayor is doing six years for assorted crimes connected to his time in office.

"Wait until he gets to jail," I heard or read on Facebook a dozen times. "Big Bubba's going to be waiting for him."

It is not necessary to ask what Big Bubba will be waiting to do to the ex-mayor. We all know.

But again, the sentence is six years in prison, not an illegal form of retribution carried out by other prisoners who have always had trouble with impulse control and who are now crazy from the cage.

So, yes, Derek Chauvin is a victim. He wasn't before, but he is now. In jail, Chauvin is entitled to all the rights, privileges and protections to which George Floyd was entitled while living free in Minneapolis. Anything else is un-American.

With the possible exception of "former child star," there may be no worse label than "disgraced former police officer," although "ex-convict" comes close. Chauvin is nearly as done as George Floyd, though Chauvin is still breathing.

Someday, and I hope it happens, Derek Chauvin will be released into a world where labels are mighty hard to shake. By then, he may be more of a hero to some people than he is now, depending on what kind of government we have and which band of slogan-shouters is in charge. He may even now be praying that former President Donald Trump will be reelected. Surely Trump will not forget the simple police officer who lived his professional life protecting white Americans from the feral Black underclass. Like Kyle Rittenhouse, Derek Chauvin may become the Horst Wessel of the New America.

Sometimes, in America, it's awfully had to breathe.

To find out more about Marc Dion, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit www.creators.com. Dion's latest book, a collection of his best columns, is called "Mean Old Liberal." It is available in paperback from Amazon.com and for Nook, Kindle, and iBooks.

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