What the DOJ and FBI are up to these days
From Scott Johnson at Powerline:
The FBI appears to have taken up the role of the ruling party’s enforcement arm.
I submit that that happened a long time ago.
The post contains many links to help you get up to speed. It’s very chilling.
Andrew McCarthy has his own take on it, beginning with this:
The Justice Department is engaged in subterfuge to conceal its focus on the former president.
In the last week, the Biden Justice Department has taken aggressive investigative actions against former Trump administration officials and advisers. What is going on could not be more obvious: Egged on by the House January 6 committee and progressive Democrats who want former president Donald Trump to be criminally charged in connection with the Capitol riot, the department has obtained search warrants to raid the home of former Trump Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark and seize the cellphone of John Eastman, one of Trump’s private lawyers.
I think they are afraid of Trump 2024. But I think deSantis could be an even stronger candidate. Nevertheless, they would like Trump and anyone who ever helped him to be put away as a warning to others in the future and as revenge against him for the past.
Might this put a damper on the “fast-track surgery for trans” movement?
A man is suing for damages from the surgery that was intended to make him a woman. His story occurred in Britain, and it appears in The Daily Mail.
The 35-year-old man had a history of mental problems. An online discussion group convinced him that becoming a woman would solve them. This is not an unusual story these days; online groups are very influential in the growth of the numbers of trans people in both this country and Britain.
After seeing him for two 30-minute sessions, a clinic agreed and put him on hormones. His story is that he never wanted what is euphemistically called “bottom” surgery (penis and testicle removal and vaginoplasty), but after a while he got the message that he would be refused continuing services if he didn’t do it. By that time he was feeling suicidal, and so he reluctantly agreed and had the surgery in 2018 with great trepidation. Afterwards he’s been left with serious damage:
Ritchie claims he was fast-tracked into making “the biggest mistake of [his] life.” He’s been “left infertile, incontinent and with ongoing pain.”
He asserts the NHS clinic took no account of his mental health issues, which might’ve led him to believe he was transgender. Furthermore, he wasn’t properly warned of the medical risks of his procedures.
The story is chilling, to say the least. And I’m thinking that as time goes on and more such cases surface both in the US and Britain – two of the main centers of trans surgery – authorities may become more careful about doing so much of this surgery, for fear of litigation and the resulting expenses.
It used to be that such surgeries were only approved after a very lengthy process and only to adults, and mental health status – and the sort of history this man mentions – was part of the evaluation and considered a huge red flag. No more. Also, the ages have gotten younger and younger.
The idea of a “gender-affirming therapist” is an absurdity, as Jordan Peterson has pointed out:
There’s no such thing as a gender-affirming therapist. It’s a contradiction in terms. Because you don’t affirm if you’re a therapist. It’s not your business to affirm. You come to see me because there’s something wrong. … Am I going to affirm what you think? No, it’s not up to me to affirm it. You don’t get a casual pat on the back from a therapist for your pre-existing axiomatic conclusions. That’s not therapy; that’s a rubber stamp.
Peterson is describing a type of therapy that has increasingly been jettisoned in the last forty years or so. Now many therapists have an explicit bias and don’t do what used to be known as “therapy” at all.
Open thread 6/29/22
Bear with the ad at the beginning (“bear” with?):
Singing about a love you’ve never met
Let’s take a break from all the heavy politics, and talk about music.
Have you ever noticed that certain songs dealing with the very same themes are very different? Love of course is one of the main topics of songs – you might say it’s the most common subject treated. Why is it that music – particularly pop music, but certainly opera as well – and love align? Or is it heartbreak that aligns, or yearning? Fulfilled happy love can be the subject of a song, but the number of songs about happy love probably pales in comparison to the number of sad ones.
One song theme I’ve noticed before is that of a person who is imagining a love somewhere in the world, someone he or she has never met but wants to meet – sometimes desperately wants to meet, depending on the singer’s degree of loneliness. So I hereby offer four variations.
The first is “Goodnight My Someone” from “The Music Man.” This is from the original cast album, which is the version I saw in person on Broadway as a kid and loved (I identified with the bookish librarian, and I was drawn strongly to Robert Preston’s brash energy – what charm he had!). I was only a little girl, but this song meant something to me. And I was aware quite early on of something I thought odd yet intriguingly satisfying about it – it has the same melody as the revved-up blockbuster “Seventy-Six Trombones” from the same musical, even though this is quiet and contemplative:
I never much cared for this next song, even though I like Linda Ronstadt and I know it was really popular:
And then there’s this song of clever repartee between two people who think they haven’t yet met their true loves but who profess to know exactly what they want. The joke is that of course they end up in love with each other by the end of the show, after many twistings and turnings. They just haven’t a clue as yet. This is also from an original cast album; I can’t stand the movie. The male singer here is Robert Alda, Alan Alda’s dad:
Last but not least we have the Bee Gees – of course. Love in all its manifestations was their grand theme, although they also wrote about other things. Loneliness was a big one, too, particularly with Robin, who put his plaintive voice to good use. I love love his voice; your mileage may differ. But I love all three of them, as you no doubt already know. And I like the use of the heartbeat sound in this one. It’s a bit hokey but effective and hypnotic:
And I’ll close with this poem by Vikram Seth. It’s deceptively simple:
All you who sleep tonight
Far from the ones you love,
No hands to left or right,
And emptiness above –
Know that you aren’t alone.
The whole world shares your tears,
Some for two nights or one,
And some for all their years.
ADDENDUM: There are so many other songs on the same theme that could be included. See the comments for readers’ suggestions.
Roundup time
(1) Ghislaine Maxwell receives a 20-year sentence for her grooming role in Epstein’s sex crimes perpetrated on minors. It was less than she might have received but more than her attorneys wanted. Epstein and Maxwell remind me of another famous couple who collaborated in grooming minors but who not only were not sentenced but whose activities in that arena aren’t widely known even today: John-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, whose repellent behavior I wrote about in this previous post.
(2) At least 46 people were found dead in a truck that had illegally crossed into the US from Mexico and then was abandoned. But press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said, “The fact of the matter is the border is closed.”
(3) More SCOTUS news: “The Court blocked a ruling by Obama-appointed judge Shelley Dick, in which she declared that Louisiana’s updated congressional maps must include a second majority-minority district.”
(4) During the Obama administration, accused men (and it was mostly men) under Title IX in colleges were deprived of due process rights – because, you know, women don’t lie or some other utter nonsense like that. Trump correctly removed the impediments and gave these men back some ability to defend themselves. But Biden has taken us back to those glorious earlier times. Under the rules that he’s set up again in colleges, Biden himself would have been found guilty of sexual harrassment and assault. But fortunately, he’s not a college student.
Please read the whole thing.
(5) The Democrats need some young blood for 2024. So – are you ready for Hillary?
This couldn’t have had a good effect on people’s health
The other day I had a doctor’s appointment for a regular checkup, and she asked me when I’d last had a mammogram. I had a strong memory of its having been about six months ago.
I’m usually very conscientious about such things. But I also usually get yearly reminders in the mail that I’m due and need to make an appointment.
Later I went home and checked my calendar but couldn’t find anything recent. Same when I checked my insurance statements. Then I called the mammogram place and asked them to check the records and see when I’d last had one, and the answer was July, 2020.
That’s two years ago. I was so shocked that I didn’t believe her. But after more checking I determined she was right. How had two years passed with me thinking it was six months?
I blame all this COVID stuff – the passage of time gets more difficult to sense when nothing all that much differentiates most of the days. “COVID time” seems like a big blob, some sort of Lost Weekend that went on and on and on.
It’s not that I haven’t been going about my normal business for quite some time. But normal social life and activities of that sort haven’t totally picked up again even now. And elective medical tests and procedures were on hold for a long time.
Then again, look at that date: July 2020. That was at the height of pre-vaccine COVID. And yet I went for a mammogram. So what happened during the next two years to change that?
Next, I called to make an appointment for a mammogram and I asked them why I hadn’t gotten any reminders of the sort they usually send, and the answer was “Oh, because of COVID.” I pointed out that that made little sense; plus, I still haven’t gotten any reminders, and things picked up quite some time ago. After years and years and years of reminders, people come to rely on them. And why, I asked her, hadn’t they started sending them out again?
“We got behind,” was her answer – whatever that means. It still makes little sense to me. But I’m not going to expect any reminders in the future.
Fortunately the mammogram itself was fine. And actually, at my age, the guidelines for them are a bit arbitrary: every year is recommended by many organizations but some say every two years. At any rate, this isn’t really about me – I’m just using myself as an illustration. A lot of tests have been postponed for a lot of people, and to what effect? The almost inescapable conclusion is that it caused some people to receive serious diagnoses later than they otherwise would have, and that can affect their treatment and prognosis negatively.
Open thread 6/28/22
I didn’t think I’d watch this video for more than about five seconds, but the whole thing ended up mesmerizing me. I’m not sure why, except the food seemed so unusual – different from the Japanese dishes I know – and this woman took so much care making multiple little tidbits for each meal:
The wait for the Webb…
SCOTUS is on a roll
June is usually a big time for SCOTUS decisions, and here comes another:
Today the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously overturned lower court decisions in the consolidated cases of Ruan vs. United States and Kahn vs. United States. The two physicians were convicted of prescribing opioid pain medicine “outside the usual course of [medical] treatment” and were sentenced to prison.
The jury in Ruan was not instructed to consider Dr. Xiulu Ruan’s “good??faith defense,” i.e., that he was indeed prescribing the drug “legitimately” to treat pain based upon his good??faith assessments of his patients’ medical contexts and requirements. The Eleventh Circuit Appeals Court denied Ruan’s request to vacate the lower court decision on the grounds that he was denied a “good faith” defense.
The Supreme Court held “the Government must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant knowingly or intentionally acted in an unauthorized manner.”
And you know what? That decision was unanimous.
Another case was handed down today:
The case is about a high school coach who used to go out to the middle of the field and offer a private prayer after a game. He did this alone and without inviting anyone to join him. However, some students and players did wind up joining him, as did players from the other team.
The prayers were short.
The District he worked for forbade him from doing this, claiming that the Establishment Clause of the Constitution, and the Lemon “endorsement” test, required them to forbid him from privately praying.
He did it anyway, and the District dropped him as an employee.
Please read the whole thing. This ruling in favor of the coach’s right to offer a private prayer (in public) in the school sports setting was decided by the familiar 6-3 vote.
Why would pro-abortion radicals in deep blue states be so very angry about Dobbs?
Commenter “Kate” writes:
Why pro-abortion radicals are rioting in left-wing jurisdictions is hard to understand. California and New York have virtually no restrictions on abortion up to the point of delivery, and California’s legislature is proposing to effectively extend that to seven days postpartum.
Let me tackle that last part first: no, the California legislature is not proposing to extend that to seven days postpartum. That’s one of those misinterpretations that’s become a rumor that’s been spread around. I read the wording of the law myself and it applies to things that a woman might due during pregnancy – not an abortion – that might end up causing harm or death to the baby. For an example of the sort of situation it’s meant to deal with, see the Chelsea Becker case:
A California judge has dismissed a murder case against a woman who delivered a stillbirth after consuming methamphetamine, saying prosecutors failed to provide evidence that she took drugs knowing that it could kill her baby.
Kings County Superior Court Judge Robert Shane Burns delivered his decision in court Thursday, said Dana Sussman, deputy executive director for the National Advocates for Pregnant Women, which is providing legal counsel for the woman, Chelsea Becker.
The legislature has been revising the wording of the bill to remove any ambiguity and make sure it does not apply to infanticide or even to purposeful neglect after birth:
University College London Hospital clinical lecturer in infertility and a leading voice on medical ethics, Dr Francoise Shenfield, told Reuters: “Definition of perinatal death is stillbirth, plus early neonatal deaths under seven days.”
Rather, the bill seeks to protect parents from legal prosecution if that perinatal death is the result of accidental causes, she said.
Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, I’ll try to answer the implicit question in the first part of Kate’s comment: why would pro-abortion radicals riot in left-wing jurisdictions where abortion is not going to be outlawed and probably is going to become even more unlimited?
A lot of reasons – and let me add that the majority of these people are women, although it’s not limited to women:
(1) They’re being encouraged to do so.
(2) They’re being lied to by leftist leaders and legislators and led to believe that this ruling does constitute some sort of abortion ban, and since a lot of people neither understand law nor follow its ins and outs, that lie gains some traction.
(3) Even if they do understand that their own states will not be restricting abortion, they are used to it being available to all women. Some are old enough to remember the horrors of illegal abortions (some even had them), and many of the younger ones have been told stories about the olden days.
(4) Many women on the left have bought the “Handmaid’s Tale” sort of scenario which goes like this: rigid fundamentalist Christian men are trying to control the reproductive organs of women and will stop at nothing till they get total control. This fear has been drummed up incessantly for many years.
(5) Many also believe that the Catholics on the Supreme Court are intent on imposing Catholicism on everyone and the ruling in Dobbs originates in their Catholicism. There is no separation of church and state here (#5 relies on their not understanding that the ruling actually takes the Court out of the business of ruling on abortion at the federal level, but there are plenty of people who not only don’t understand that but who are not interested in even listening to that sort of assertion, much less crediting it).
(6) A leftist doesn’t want states to be able to make their own decisions – as opposed to the federal government dictating what states can do – unless the issue involves something the federal government is trying to do that the left is against and the right is for. Then states’ rights become good and the left will support them. When Trump tried to enforce immigration laws, for example, the left was in favor of states’ defiance against the feds. But when SCOTUS allows abortion to revert to the states to make their own varied rules as the states see fit, that is an abomination because abortion is a right – after all, Roe said so, and that’s been the law of the land for well-nigh fifty years. The fact that the Court has longer and consistently held that immigration is a federal power and never said that regulating abortion was a federal power until Roe, thus generating a large distinction between the two issues, is irrelevant to the left.
(7) They’re not used to ceding ground. Usually there’s no reversal after they’ve won a battle. There might be a pause, but it should only be temporary.
(8) They’re being told this is just the beginning of what the right is planning. Next there will be a federal abortion ban. Then the Court will reverse previous decisions on gay marriage, contraception, and even interracial marriage, and some states will ban those things and perhaps the Republicans will ban them nationwide through federal legislation if they ever get control of Congress. The fact that Dobbs explicitly stated that reversal of those cases won’t be happening, because different principles apply, is ignored. The left is also using Clarence Thomas’ concurrence – the one about the overuse of the due process clause, a position which none of the others joined – to mount its argument that these bans are on the right’s agenda. But even if Thomas hadn’t written that, the left would have said the right is planning to attack these things next anyway.
(9) It’s all Trump’s fault, and he is evil.
[NOTE: I think the current rage centers on Dobbs, but the concealed carry SCOTUS case Bruen has intensified the anger and even if Dobbs hadn’t been decided as it was, the left would still be mad at Bruen – although not as mad. All gun control cases are considered to be about the exceedingly rare phenomenon of non-gang-related mass shootings. The fact that very few gun-control measures have anything to do with such events nor would the proposals have prevented the events in question is not even part of the arguments the left deigns to deal with.]