Proud Boys convicted of seditious conspiracy

The New Neo Posted on by

This guilty verdict was a forgone conclusion, considering that the trial was held in DC and the judge refused to move it:

A jury on Thursday convicted Enrique Tarrio, the former leader of the Proud Boys, and three allies of a seditious conspiracy to derail the transfer of power from Donald Trump to Joe Biden, a historic verdict following the most significant trial to emerge from the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

Jurors also convicted the four men — Tarrio, Ethan Nordean, Joseph Biggs and Zachary Rehl — of conspiring to obstruct Congress’ proceedings on Jan. 6 and destroying government property. The jury acquitted a fifth defendant, Dominic Pezzola, of seditious conspiracy but convicted him of obstructing Congress’ Jan. 6 proceedings as well as several other felony charges.

Historic, all right. “Historic” because they were convicted under a law that isn’t often used and that is ripe for abuse. This article about seditious conspiracy is over a year old and it’s in the leftist Guardian (and concerns the Oath Keepers, another January 6th group). But it explains a few of the problems with such charges:

The charges are significant because they allege that the January 6 attack went beyond disorderly conduct and assaults on law enforcement, instead constituting an organized and violent attempt to stop the democratic transfer of power.

But because sedition charges so rarely go to trial, there isn’t a great deal of precedent for how such trials proceed, experts say. And US prosecutors have a checkered history in securing sedition convictions. “It’s been used in ways that have been absurd and has been used in ways that were slam dunks,” said Joshua Braver, an assistant professor of law at the University of Wisconsin.

By the way, we’re not talking about charges of sedition but rather seditious conspiracy, which is even easier to abuse. When I was in law school, there were three criminal law principles that troubled me immensely, and they were felony murder, conspiracy, and entrapment – and the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys cases involve the political misuse of those last two (conspiracy, because the bar is so low for the prosecution proving it, and it often just amounts to thoughtcrime; and entrapment, because the bar is so high for defendants’ successfully using it as a defense). I wrote at some length about all of this, in connection with the previous Oath Keepers trial, and I suggest you read it for more background on seditious conspiracy and its uses by the government.

In the past, prosecutors were more aware of the dangers, and more reluctant to bring such charges because of the huge potential for dangerous abuse:

Partly because seditious conspiracy allegations carry so much political weight, prosecutors have generally been hesitant to bring such charges in the past.

“Seditious conspiracy charges are rarely used in American jurisprudence,” said Jeffrey Ian Ross, a criminologist and expert on political crime at the University of Baltimore. Prosecutors can be wary of issuing such charges, even in cases that may fall under its broad statute, he added.

Prior to the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys January 6th cases, the most recent such prosecution was against “Islamist extremist Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman and nine co-conspirators with seditious conspiracy. Prosecutors alleged that Abdel-Rahman and his followers plotted to bomb the United Nations, the FBI building and several other landmarks around New York City.”

Prior to that, it was the Puerto Rican extremists who in 1954 shot up the House of Representatives and wounded five members of the House. I wrote about that incident in this previous post, written just a few days after the January 6th protests, and in it I harked back to a previous post I’d written in 2018 about the Puerto Rican shootings. The differences between January 6th and the shooting in 1954 is quite obvious.

Julie Kelly has been the best reporter on all the January 6th cases, and she’s been writing about the Proud Boys case, too. Here’s what she had to say about the jurors (the judge in the case is also named Kelly, in case you’re confused by that):

I refer you to several articles she’s written on the case. The first is this [my emphasis]:

The government devoted an untold amount of resources and manpower to the case. The former president loomed large as prosecutors frequently cited his September 2020 debate remark for Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by” as a call to action. (More on Trump’s legal jeopardy related to the outcome of the trial in Friday’s column.)

Ethan Nordean, Zachary Rehl, Joseph Biggs, and Dominic Pezzola have been incarcerated under pretrial detention orders since early 2021 on various counts, including conspiracy and obstruction of an official proceeding. By the time jury selection began in December, the defendants had been in jail for almost two years awaiting trial…

Two cooperating witnesses and multiple FBI agents and police officers took the stand over the course of several weeks to detail the defendants’ alleged plot to strike “the heart of our democracy,” assistant U.S. Attorney Conor Mulroe said on Monday. “Their success was only temporary. The Constitution survived.”

The conspiracy, Mulroe explained, can be “unspoken, implicit, a mutual understanding, or a wink and a nod”—a laughably broad definition for an offense akin to treason.

Please read the whole thing; an excerpt isn’t adequate. Also see this article by Ms. Kelly, in which she explains how the Proud Boys case is most likely a prelude to charging Trump in connection with it:

Any convictions in this trial would give Special Counsel Jack Smith, an independent prosecutor in name only, justification to pursue similar charges against Trump as a coconspirator of sorts…

Prosecutors insist the conspiracy began on December 19, 2020—a date that should alarm Team Trump. At 1:42 a.m. on December 19, Trump tweeted this: “Statistically impossible to have lost the 2020 Election. Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!” According to the Justice Department, that prompted Tarrio and Biggs to formulate plans to “radicalize” the group…

[That this could be a prelude to charging Trump] explains why Graves’ prosecutors pulled every dirty trick in the book to ensure convictions. Further, the burden of proof for the conspiracy charges is shockingly low.

That low bar is one of the things that so upset me when I was in law school.

And here is Kelly’s piece from today, after the verdict was announced:

…Joe Biden’s Justice Department seized on the [seditious conspiracy] law’s vague language—the same manner in which top officials weaponized an untested post-Enron evidence tampering felony—to criminalize political dissent. Six members of the Oath Keepers were found guilty of seditious conspiracy at two separate trials and four other defendants, including one member of the Proud Boys, have pleaded guilty to the offense. Both seditious conspiracy and obstruction of an official proceeding are felonies punishable by up to 20 years in prison each.

Most of the government’s evidence consisted of inflammatory text messages posted in group chats, which included the presence of an unknown number of FBI informants. No defendant was accused of bringing weapons to the Capitol or assaulting a police officer. Tarrio, the group’s leader, was in a Baltimore hotel on January 6, having left Washington under court order following his arrest on January 4, 2021 for an unrelated incident.

I also refer you to Ace’s post on the subject.

NOTE: I expected this news; in fact, I would have found it shocking if this DC jury had not found them guilty. Nevertheless, it is another intensely depressing example of how far things have gone, and how successful the left has been.

The Democrats’ war against the conservative justices on SCOTUS

The New Neo Posted on by

The Democrat position is that the left should own SCOTUS.

When I was in law school, they did. And that was true for a long time, or at least they often did because of so-called “swing” justices voting with the Democrats.

Now, instead, the Court features a 6-3 conservative majority, so that one swing vote – which certainly sometimes happens – doesn’t mean that the left wins the case. And it’s even more galling to the left that the conservative justices who turned the tide were appointed by the hated and reviled Trump, who (according to them) was an illegitimate president. In addition, McConnell infuriated them by standing firm against Garland’s appointment in the waning days of the Obama administration. That opportunity was lost.

What’s more, if only the highly-revered Ruth Bader Ginsburg had not waited to retire! How could she have been so short-sighted as to allow herself to be replaced by a Trump nominee, when she could have made sure it was Obama who got the chance to name her replacement? If you add up what happened with the death of Scalia and then Ginsburg, the left sees a lost chance for the left to have had that 6-3 majority. And then they would have owned just about the entire US federal government (not the House, but the rest) as well as the federal agencies.

Talk about missed opportunities.

The left has been attacking conservative justices ever since the days of Bork, and then the sexual accusations against Clarence Thomas and more recently Kavanaugh. There have been threats, protest demonstrations at justices’ homes, and assassination attempts – after all, the death of another justice or two during the Biden administration would solve everything for the left. And now they’ve continued the intimidation with accusations of supposed ethics violations for activities that were never considered violations when liberals on the Court indulged in them:

The purpose of the Democrats’ attacks, obviously, is to smear conservative justices in the eyes of the ignorant and ill-informed–i.e., those who rely on the New York Times, the Washington Post, and CNN for their news.

Most recently, Democrat Dick Durbin asked Chief Justice John Roberts to appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee today, to testify on “ethics” in the Supreme Court. Roberts naturally declined the invitation. All nine Justices signed this letter explaining the separation of powers grounds for Roberts’ response and also expanding on how judicial ethics are regulated (i.e., not by Dick Durbin):

I find it interesting that all nine signed.

The goal is to either make the conservative justices resign prematurely, not wanting the aggravation or the danger – or, failing that, another goal would be to get the conservative justices to temper their conservative views and decisions in order to placate the left and call off the mob. Another is to delegitimize the Court in the public’s eyes.

Whether these tactics will work or not depends on the mettle of the conservative justices. One thing is certain: the left won’t be quitting the fight.

Vermont wants to corner the market on assisted suicide tourism

The New Neo Posted on by

Vermont has long billed itself as the Green Mountain State. Is it now going to be known as the Green Pastures State?:

Vermont removed its residency requirement for assisted suicide on Tuesday, officially opening the door for any American to travel to the state to end their life.

Nine other states allow the practice of assisted suicide, but Vermont is the first to actively change its law to strip the residency requirement. Oregon, which also allows assisted suicide, agreed to stop enforcing its residency requirement as part of a settlement to a lawsuit that alleged the requirement is unconstitutional. Advocates of assisted suicide thought it discriminatory.

Carolyn McDonnell is litigation counsel for Americans United for Life. She wrote a Newsweek op-ed that made some interesting arguments against the practice:

California dropped its reflection period from 15 days to a mere 48 hours, severely limiting a safeguard that ensures a patient takes the time to understand the severity of assisted suicide. Vermont allows telemedical assisted suicides without requiring the prescribing doctor to medically evaluate the patient in person.

Those elements of the California and Vermont laws seem very dangerous to me, in terms of exploitation by those who are either impulsive or faking medical need. Slippery slope, indeed.

McDonnell cites research that has found in increase in suicide in general when laws allowing medically assisted suicide are passed. Also, she mentions cases that indicate that the rights of medical prrofessionals to refuse to assist in suicide may ultimately become compromised.

It is ironic that medically-assisted suicide has become more and more accepted at the same time the pharmaceutical treatment of the dying has advanced, in terms of hospice care and the greater availability of drugs such as morphine. On the other hand, suffering can be very acute and very terrible, and the “solutions” still often fail to alleviate much of the problem. And long before the legalization of physician-assisted suicide – which compromises the “first, do no harm” prescription for doctors in dealing with patients – many suffering and terminal people managed to get the means to either kill themselves or be assisted by a non-medical person in doing so.

But we have seen from Europe’s example that, once the first step is taken towards allowing physicians to help with suicide, the population of people who avail themselves of their services expands to encompass those who are not terminal and may even be suffering from depression only.

Hanson on Carlson

The New Neo Posted on by

Interesting take:

Two other points. The first is that, for what it’s worth (considering the source), the NY Times says that the real reason Carlson was fired was a text he sent that in part consisted of this:

A couple of weeks ago, I was watching video of people fighting on the street in Washington. A group of Trump guys surrounded an Antifa kid and started pounding the living shit out of him. It was three against one, at least. Jumping a guy like that is dishonorable obviously. It’s not how white men fight.

Megyn Kelly has had a lot to say about Carlson’s firing. One of those things is that, technically speaking, he wasn’t actually fired:

Kelly explained that her information about his “parting of the ways” with Fox was that he wasn’t officially “fired” — that he was still under contract with Fox. She said the head of the network told him that Monday morning that his show wasn’t going to be aired anymore but they never told him why. They even kicked him out of his company email which was pretty slimy. Kelly said they needed to work out with him getting out of his contract. But that they thought it would be an “amicable parting.”…

The current problem for Carlson, Kelly explained, is that he’s still technically under contract so he can’t sign any other deals until he gets out of the contract.

Some are concerned that this may be an effort to silence him right before the election…But Kelly noted Carlson has a great attorney and they’re working out the contract issues now.

Here’s one of the offers Carlson is apparently entertaining:

The latest on the debt ceiling fight

The New Neo Posted on by

Biden may have to give in, if only a little bit:

After weeks of saying he would never meet with House Republicans to raise the debt limit, Joe Biden was forced to cave to the Republicans after his Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen gave Washington a drop dead date for raising the debt ceiling — June 1.

The date was at least a month earlier than most experts were predicting. And with Republicans already having a debt limit bill in hand, Biden reluctantly agreed to drop his demand for a “clean” debt limit bill with no negotiations.

Biden’s position was never viable. So the president must now talk about budget cuts with the GOP or find a way to avoid the blame if the whole kit and kaboodle goes south.

Democrats have one bullet they can use. Because they control the Senate, they can bring a “clean” debt limit bill to the floor and dare the GOP House to defeat it. But it’s not even clear that Democrats can pass a clean bill in the Senate, and Majority Leader Chuck Schumer may not risk it.

The GOP is unusually united in backing Kevin McCarthy on this, which is a feat in itself.

RIP Gordon Lightfoot

The New Neo Posted on by

Singer-songwriter – this article says “troubadour” – Gordon Lightfoot has died at 84. RIP.

Lightfoot was not an extreme favorite of mine; for example, I never bought an album of his. Nevertheless, he wrote many classic folk-type songs that I liked very much indeed, and still like. The first one – and the one I associate with Lightfoot most strongly – was this, in which a love ’em and leave ’em type sings to his most recent forsaken lover. It’s not a “nice” song, but I still think it’s a great one, not so much for the fairly simple but catchy melody, but even more for the words. The first line and refrain – “That’s what you get for lovin’ me” – has a certain ironic, teasing bite to it, as does what I think is its most brilliant passage of all: “Now there you go you’re cryin’ again…/But then some day when your poor heart is on the mend/I just might pass this way again.”

The casual way he speakks about re-breaking her heart – what a touch!

It was one of the first songs I ever learned to play on the guitar, and I could even finger-pick it way back when. I wouldn’t have a clue how to do that now.

Here’s Lightfoot singing it:

And here’s another great one by him; one of so many more:

Another bank bites the dust: First Republic

The New Neo Posted on by

The call is for stricter regulations on banks. First Republic appears to have run into trouble because of the huge percentage of uninsured deposits it held, coupled with a run on the bank:

First Republic had been hit by a massive wave of withdrawals following the twin collapses of New York City’s Signature Bank and the Bay Area’s Silicon Valley Bank in March.

JPMorgan Chase has now gobbled up First Republic.

Billionaires for Biden

The New Neo Posted on by

For quite some time, the Democratic Party has been mostly the party of the rich and the poor rather than the middle. That’s an exaggeration perhaps, but it certainly seems to be a general trend. And this despite the fact that Democrats like to pretend they support the average working person and that it’s the GOP that’s the party of the very very rich. But those days are gone, although it helps the Democratic Party to pretend otherwise.

In a way, it makes sense that the very rich support Democrats and Biden, ever since the Democrats have become more and more allied with the welfare state. After all, the very very rich can afford it; it’s the squeezed middle who can’t. It also helps assuage any guilt the very very rich might have about the extent of their money – after all, they’re supporting the party that is so very generous to the very poor.

And after all, the right is inhabited by dangerous bigots and violent gun-toting morons as well as religious fanatics, or so the left likes to say. Sort of like “Deliverance” plus “Elmer Gantry” on steroids. And the right is headed by that vile, criminal, maniac Trump.

Or, as former vice chairman at Evercore and founder of Signum Global Advisors Charles Myers says:

Stakes are higher than ever. Trump 2.0 would be devastating for the country and arguably the world.

It’s a puzzlement to me how anyone could say that and believe it. Perhaps he does believe it; perhaps he doesn’t. Perhaps his company is expecting special perks from the Biden administration that it wouldn’t get from Trump.

The same article quotes hedge fund executive Donald Sussman as saying, “No one since FDR has accomplished as much for Americans. I am thrilled [Biden’s] unique leadership will continue.”

Well, there’s one thing with which I agree – Biden’s “leadership” is indeed “unique.” Whether it’s even “leadership” at all is another question, and probably not an important one to Donald Sussman.

Money matters in campaigns. Money can buy lawyers for your cause. It can buy advertisements and visibility. It can buy mailers. If people can figure out how to do it, it can even buy votes. It can certainly buy campaign workers and canvassers and the like. And the Democrats have the capacity to raise enormous sums of money.