Judge Merchan loosens Trump’s gag but doesn’t remove it
I guess he did it just in time for the debate on Thursday:
Merchan on Tuesday partially lifted the gag order because the trial has concluded.
Trump is now able to speak about protected witnesses and jurors.
Steven Cheung, Trump campaign spokesperson, said in a statement Tuesday, “Today’s order by Acting Justice Merchan leaves in place portions of the unconstitutional Gag Order, preventing President Trump from speaking freely about Judge Merchan’s disqualifying conflicts and the overwhelming evidence exposing this whole Crooked Joe Biden – directed Witch Hunt.”
Of course. Mustn’t cast aspersions on the integrity of the court, or of Biden.
I was curious to see how often only the defendant in a trial is bound by a gag order. So far I haven’t found the answer, but I did find this:
… [T]he U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit invalidated a broad gag order issued by a federal district court in the criminal trial of sitting Rep. Harold Ford from Memphis, Tennessee, back in 1987. Ford faced mail and bank fraud charges, and the judge issued a broad gag order prohibiting Ford from discussing the merits of the case. The order even prohibited him from making any statements about the trial, including an “opinion of or discussion of the evidence and facts in the investigation or case.”
The Sixth Circuit wrote in United States v. Ford (1987) that “such broadly based restrictions on speech in connection with litigation are seldom, if ever, justified.” It also explained that it is “true that permitting an indicted defendant like Ford to defend himself publicly may result in overall publicity that is somewhat more favorable to the defendant than would occur when all participants are silenced. This does not result in an ‘unfair’ trial for the government, however.”
Ultimately, the Sixth Circuit held such gag orders are justifiable only if the government can show public comments about the trial pose a clear and present danger to the fair administration of justice.
Obviously, there’s no comparable case involving a gag order on a front-runner in a presidential race who’s been prosecuted by people from the opposing party on a charge that uses a novel and preposterous legal theory.
Latimer beats Bowman in NY Democratic primary
Jamaal Bowman – you remember him, the puller of the fire alarm in a House office a while back – lost his primary yesterday to George Latimer. It was quite a contest, and the defeat was well-deserved.
The district is “diverse,” combining part of the Bronx (heavily black and Hispanic, I believe) and Westchester (more whites and Jews). Israel was a big big subject of the campaign rhetoric. Here’s the charming Bowman (who used to be a middle school principal in the Bronx):
Speaking before Sanders and after Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez over the weekend, Bowman opened with a salty stemwinder aimed at AIPAC.
“We are going to show f**king AIPAC the power of the motherf**king South Bronx,” Bowman said. “People ask me why I got a foul mouth,” he added, accusing his opponents of attacking his family. “What am I supposed to do?”
AIPAC stands for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, and is a pro-Israel lobbying group. I guess Bowman’s remarks didn’t serve to ingratiate him with the Jews of Westchester.
This primary was billed as the most expensive ever.
Latimer gave a post-primary speech about inclusion, and Bowman continued his AIPAC-bashing (and didn’t concede the election):
…[I]n a clear pivot to a general election race that he is expected to win, Latimer struck a bipartisan tone. …
Speaking at his own party in Yonkers, Bowman blasted AIPAC and its affiliates, which he said helped “brainwash” voters.
“Unfortunately some so-called Democrats are aligning themselves with radical, racist Republicans,” Bowman said.
As opposed to radical, racist Israel- and Jew-haters like Bowman. Such a gracious guy.
The margin of defeat was 17 points. Here’s a description of how the different parts of the district voted:
[Bowman] would maintain an overwhelming advantage in the Bronx throughout the night, but Latimer quickly took the lead when Westchester County began reporting early voting results. At the time AP called the race, Latimer held a 26-point lead in Westchester with almost half of the county’s estimated vote tabulated. Westchester accounts for about 90% of the district’s population. Latimer was also ahead in the district’s moderately Democratic areas, which make up most of the district, while Bowman was far ahead in the district’s most heavily Democratic areas.
NOTE: And Lauren Boebert won in her primary. Just as Latimer is in a heavily Democratic district and expected to win in the general, Boebert is in a heavily Republican district and is expected to win in the general.
Open thread 6/26/24
Julian Assange plea deal
It appears that Julian Assange will be returning to Australia, his original home:
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is due to plead guilty on Wednesday to violating U.S. espionage law, in a deal that will end his imprisonment in Britain and allow him to return home to Australia, ending a 14-year legal odyssey.
Assange, 52, has agreed to plead guilty to a single criminal count of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified U.S. national defense documents, according to filings in the U.S. District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands.
He is due to be sentenced to 62 months of time already served at a hearing in Saipan at 9 a.m. local time on Wednesday (2300 GMT Tuesday). The island in the Pacific was chosen due to Assange’s opposition to travelling to the mainland U.S. and for its proximity to Australia, prosecutors said.
At this point, it does seem rather like ancient history, doesn’t it? Fourteen years ago for Assange’s leaks.
I have very mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I think that journalists should not get a pass on leaking classified documents especially concerning ongoing military operations, which was the case at the time of the Assange-assisted leaks. I don’t trust journalists’ judgments on this, to say the least, although it’s not as though I trust the government either. On the other hand, I’m not sure what the proper punishment would be for Assange; perhaps it is enough already in Assange’s case. On still another hand – I’m up to three hands now – sometimes we do get important information this way, but I don’t think it’s good to adopt an “ends justify the means” excuse.
The marriage of the left and the jihadis
I’ve cued up about a two-minute excerpt from a longer talk by Matt Goodwin, a British professor of political science. In it, he offers a concise summary of what the left and the radical Islamists have in common:
Here are a few more minutes I recommend listening to:
Trudeau in trouble?
[Hat tip: commenter “Bob Wilson.”]
Could it be a portent of things to come?:
A Liberal stronghold for thirty years and one of the ridings that helped squeak out a minority government for Trudeau in the last election, swung Conservative in last night’s Toronto-St. Pauls by-election. This is most certainly a sign of things to come in the next general election, scheduled for late 2025.
Late 2025 is awfully late, though.
Canada has a parliamentary system, and Trudeau’s present government is a coalition. The left isn’t going to relinquish power easily, and so there’s talk of a tighter coalition next time: a Liberal/NDP merger. The NDP has never formed a Canadian government and stands to the left of Trudeau’s party. Sounds great. A merger, however, would create a stronger force – and an even more leftist one. So whereas Trudeau may not be the head of such a party, it’s possible it would be led by someone even worse and more leftist.
At least, as a bona fide non-expert on Canadian politics, that’s my take.
If such a merger were to occur, though, I’m not sure it would be all that strong, because if it moved even further left some of the current Liberal Party (Trudeau’s party) supporters might leave.
Any Canadians here who can shed a bit more light on this?
Open thread 6/25/24
The wheels of Snopes grind slowly
Well, well, well. Better late than never?:
In a news conference after the [Charlottesville] rally protesting the planned removal of a Confederate statue, Trump did say there were “very fine people on both sides,” referring to the protesters and the counterprotesters. He said in the same statement he wasn’t talking about neo-Nazis and white nationalists, who he said should be “condemned totally.”
The Charlottesville incident happened in 2017. The Democrats have talked about it incessantly, as has the MSM and Biden himself, stating that Trump said neo-Nazis and white supremacists were “good people.” The right has known almost from the start that he didn’t say that, and it wasn’t hard to discover. All one had to do was actually listen to an unedited version of what he said. Apparently, until now, Snopes was somehow unable or unwilling to do that.
The question isn’t why; Snopes is left-leaning. The question is why they finally have admitted this now. Is there a mole at Snopes?
The furor from the left was so great that Snopes issued this semi-disclaimer:
Some readers have raised the objection that this fact check appears to assume Trump was correct in stating that there were “very fine people on both sides” of the Charlottesville incident. That is not the case. This fact check aimed to confirm what Trump actually said, not whether what he said was true or false. For the record, virtually every source that covered the Unite the Right debacle concluded that it was conceived of, led by and attended by white supremacists, and that therefore Trump was wrong.
But Snopes is misleading its readers again, at least somewhat. While Snopes is quite correct that Trump explicitly excluded neo-Nazis and white supremacists, it fails to discuss who these “good people” on the right to whom Trump was referring might be. To the best of my understanding, he was talking about some of the people who were trying to stop the historical statues’ destruction.
It remains a bit hard to see why Snopes would now write something that even partially exonerates Trump. Is this part of the campaign to get rid of Biden? I doubt it, because this news would help Trump against any Democrat opponent who replaces him. Perhaps Snopes just feels the story has served its purpose lo nigh these seven long years, and it’s time to retire it. But that doesn’t make sense to me, either. There’s no expiration date on the political power of lies.
One thing seems true to me: most Democrats will continue to believe that Trump is a racist white supremacist who supported racist white supremacists and still does.
Is Biden “about to” abandon Israel?
The title of this piece is: “Biden May Be About to Abandon Israel.”
It seems to me, however, that he abandoned Israel long ago, when he lifted sanctions on Iran and released money to them. One of Biden’s very first acts as president was to abandon Israel; the following is datelined February 18, 2021:
The Biden administration on Thursday rescinded former president Donald Trump’s restoration of U.N. sanctions on Iran, an announcement that could help Washington move toward rejoining the 2015 nuclear agreement aimed at reining in the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program.
They resumed the Obama-era policy regarding the so-called Iran deal, and only abandoned it when the lead negotiator for the administration, Robert Malley, was caught in some shady doings involving security compromises. That was about a year ago. And Biden also released billions to Iran, and has continued to do so:
The Biden administration renewed a sanctions waiver on March 13 [2024] that grants Iran access to $10 billion in previously escrowed funds. The waiver, which allows the Islamic Republic to use electricity revenue from Iraq for budget support and debt repayment, comes just six weeks after an Iran-backed drone attack killed three U.S. servicemembers in Jordan. The Biden administration last extended the sanctions waiver on November 14.
This is not just because the Biden administration wants to get some extra votes in Dearborn. This is a long-term Obama-era decision by the left to favor Iran in order to “balance” Israel’s power and that of the Sunni Muslims in the Middle East. It seems both evil and self-destructive to me, but what else is new?
The current threat of administration abandonment of Israel involves the prospect of war with Hezbollah. Hezbollah is, of course, an Iranian proxy.
Caroline Glick has quite a bit to say on the matter. There’s so much in there that I’m only going to quote a small part of it, but I suggest you read the whole thing [emphasis mine]:
The top U.S.-Israel story of the week is the prospect of a massive ground war in Lebanon.
The main question dominating the discourse is whether the Biden administration intends to provide Israel with the munitions it requires to prosecute such a war successfully. The White House says it has Israel’s back. But recent U.S.-Israel backstories indicate that Israeli anxiety about the U.S. position on munitions is well founded. …
… [There are fears in Israel] that consensus organizations including the Regavim Movement and government ministers, first and foremost Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, may soon be sanctioned by the U.S.
Regavim uses the legal system and public awareness campaigns to protect Israel’s state lands in Judea and Samaria, the Negev and the Galilee against illegal encroachment. Recently, Regavim published a massive report documenting the depth and breadth of the U.S.-funded, -armed and -trained Palestinian security forces’ engagement in terrorism. …
Smotrich has been widely condemned by progressives inside and outside the administration for refusing to transfer funds to the Palestinian Authority due to its support for terrorism. Smotrich has also be singled out for calumny for refusing the authorize the destruction of Israeli building projects that leftist NGOs supported by the U.S. and other foreign governments claim are unlawful. …
Last Thursday, Yediot Achronot’s veteran reporter Itamar Eichner published a bombshell report titled “U.S. asks Israelis applying for green card whether they committed war crimes.”
Eichner reported a number of instances where IDF veterans and reservists applying for U.S. entry permits ranging from tourist visas to green cards have faced detailed interrogations—under oath—regarding their service in the IDF.
The damage this administration has done since it’s been in office is almost unmeasurable.
The books are being printed
And that means I finally signed off on the proofs. Proof-reading is one of my least favorite occupations, and at a certain point you just have to say enough, because it seems it’s always possible to find mistakes.
I still have to do work on the book-selling website and make some decisions about mailers. But printing the books is a big big step.