Deerhounds have teeth like you wouldn’t believe. And, yes, they know how to stand their ground.

My wife liked a show called The Closer, which was about a ruthless detective who always got a confession and usually got justice as she personally conceived it, in defiance of political correctness, California liberalism, and the tyranny of bureaucratic mercy for the wicked.

That show has been replaced by a sequel called Major Crimes, which is indubitably kindler and gentler. And which has just committed a major crime of its own in direct contravention to its forebear.

The major crime I speak of is incitement to murder. A show that begins with the shooting of an unarmed Hispanic in a white man’s home, immediately references Trayvon Martin by name, and ends with an act of vigilante murder, as the father of the slain man shoots his son’s killer in the head.

This is an outrage on two levels. First because it exemplifies the worst of “ripped from the headlines” exploitation so long typical of Law & Order and all its depraved spawn. Which, in the current explosive racial environment, can’t help but be deemed an irresponsible drama grenade tossed by so-called entertainment into the tinder of contemporary events. If someone shoots George Zimmerman hereafter, how we will we not see this episode of a TV show invoked as a provocation and excuse? As it should be. The producers, the director, the editors, and the actors who said the lines are all culpable. We were told three, maybe four, times that anyone who shoots an intruder in a California home is not legally culpable for anything. This is almost certainly not true. According to California’s “castle doctrine,” the burden of proof in a home shooting is transferred to the prosecution, but that does not mean no murder prosecution is possible. In a case like the one dramatized, where there is a clear personal motive that can be demonstrated, the law offers resort, civilly even if the criminal prosecution wimps out. The show was a lie.

Second level. Isn’t Hollywood supposed to care about its own artistic integrity and legacy? Truth is, The Closer was kind of a breakthrough police drama. The protagonist, Deputy Chief Brenda Leigh Johnson, was about as far from being an admirable authority figure as you can get. Selfish, narcissistic, manipulative, emotionally dishonest, and absolutely without scruples in her pursuit of suspects, she was a triumph of charm and brains over character. That was the basis of the series. In fact, the last two years of the show detailed her flailing attempts to escape the consequences of what amounted to police vigilantism during her tenure in the LAPD.

The reason people watched was to experience the pull between her polarities. You loved her when her twisted genius could see the truth everyone else couldn’t. You hated her when she found every way possible to ignore the consequences of her own actions, even with her husband and parents. You wondered how anyone could put up with her for a moment. But then you remembered that she was lovely, beguiling, convincing, and smart as a whip, able to find an exit not only for her own latest screwup but those of the ones whose loyalty she required.

Then came Major Crimes. Brenda replaced by a kind of drab female Christ, endlessly patient and ultimately tolerant. Not lovely, not charismatic, not anything but perfect and brainy, even if she lacked Brenda’s lightning flashes into the heart of evil.

What’s the result? Amazingly, something much much worse than anything ever shown on The Closer. A real-life setup for real-life crime. Brenda was the argument for the rule of law, a loose cannon who needed reining in. Her successor is somehow the argument for feeling transcending law, which has been expressly translated in the new series into a preference for plea deals, selective prosecution, and understanding in place of moral judgment.

No, they never mentioned the words “stand your ground.” But they caved in dramatically to the cheapest finale any cop show can ever have. When the law has proven its impotence, the vigilante will have his day. And all that’s left to the perfect liberal is a certain measured clucking. Awwww.

The place where I’m invoking Raebert’s teeth. Those who have no strong moral convictions are bound to feel the surprise of gnashing teeth eventually. Not a promise. Just a reality of life.

Think you can outrun conscience? Little known secret — not even greyhounds are reliably faster than an angry deerhound. It’s just the way of things.

And I know that will bother you more than anything else… Teeth of the past bite harder, deeper, and more fatally.

Killing you would be, uh, easy. Want it to be for a word or a deed?