RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/2024/03/no-one-is-above-the-law-that-means-a-trump-doj-must-indict-joe-biden/

Let’s apply the new Trump standard.

Special counsel Robert Hur found that there was enough evidence to charge Joe Biden with a crime, yet he didn’t.

As we know, Hur concluded that a jury would probably find that Biden didn’t have criminal intent, although he stipulated during his congressional hearing a couple of weeks ago that a reasonable juror might conclude that Biden was guilty.

If this wasn’t an outlandish decision on Hur’s part, neither was it inevitable. Clearly, the fact that recommending charges against Biden would have been a thermonuclear political event, potentially affecting the election outcome, helped stay Hur’s hand. He could have gone by the strict letter of the law but allowed prudential considerations — again, not unreasonably — to play a role.

The ongoing bout of civil cases and criminal indictments against Donald Trump and, soon enough, a criminal trial raise the question: Why, if Trump wins election, should his Justice Department accept Hur’s judgment? Why wouldn’t it simply take Hur’s report and fashion it into an indictment of former president Biden?

After all, if there’s anything we’ve learned recently, it’s that no one is above the law.

After getting her fraud judgment against Trump, New York attorney general Letitia James said, “No matter how big, rich or powerful you think you are, no one is above the law.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/joe-lieberman-dies-age-82-7488ccf3?mod=opinion_lead_pos8

Joe Lieberman, who died Wednesday at age 82, was the kind of Democrat who can’t be found much these days, and there aren’t many like him in the Republican Party either. He was a foreign policy hawk who believed in the necessity of American military power and diplomacy to expand the zone of freedom in the world.

Lieberman rose in Connecticut politics as a moderate Democrat in a more moderate age. We first met him in 1988 when he ran for the Senate against the liberal Republican incumbent Lowell Weicker. He ran to Weicker’s right and won in an upset.

That set him on a 24-year Senate career notable for promoting pro-growth economic policies and a strong national defense, in addition to Democratic domestic priorities such as gay and abortion rights. He supported a low tax rate on capital gains, and his opposition to the “public option” was crucial to its removal from ObamaCare in 2010.

Lieberman was the rare Democratic office holder to criticize President Bill Clinton’s ethical misadventures in the 1990s, which made him a logical choice as a running mate in 2000 as Al Gore tried to move out of Mr. Clinton’s moral shadow. He was the first Jewish candidate on the national ticket of a major party.

As a Senator, Lieberman supported Presidents regardless of party in promoting U.S. interests abroad. He backed George H.W. Bush in the first Gulf War, in contrast to most other Democrats at the time, including then Sen. Joe Biden. The Vietnam syndrome was still prominent on the left, and the authorization to use force passed only 52-47.

https://americanmind.org/features/national-conservatism-vs-american-conservatism/two-adams-two-foundings/

There’s no escaping the tensions inherent in National Conservatism, and in political life.

Charles Kesler’s indictment of the conflicting elements in National Conservatism—between religion and secular rationalism; tradition and Constitutionalism; nationalism in the sense of “shared inheritance as the essence of shared identity and common will” and America’s “exceptional” nationalism—is so compelling as to make any attempt at refutation pointless. I plead guilty on all counts, but with extenuating circumstances. I signed the National Conservatism manifesto in full awareness of its inconsistencies, and would do so again today.

“Our nationalism has always been exceptional,” Kesler observes, “featuring more individualism, more pluralism, more freedom, and more statesmanlike deliberation and prudence than is typical. We think of ourselves as a founded nation; most nations don’t think they have or need such a clear, conscious, and principled beginning.” I would go even further: The supposed “shared inheritance” of the European nations is less the result of sedimentary accretion of traditions stretching back into the mists of time, than an ossified remnant of an earlier founding. I wrote in my review of Yoram Hazony’s 2022 book Conservatism: A Re-Discovery that “the nation as it came into existence after the ruin of the Roman Empire was not—as Hazony seems to imply—a spontaneous agglomeration of families, tribes, and clans for purposes of self-defense. On the contrary, it was a project of the Catholic Church, which sought to civilize the Visigoth barbarians who conquered Spain and the Merovingians and later Carolingian rulers of France.”

Kesler draws a bright line between Europe’s ethnocentric nationalism and America’s concept of citizenship—rightly so. The nationalism of the 19th century was a Romantic attempt to reinvigorate the nations of Europe by reinventing the Middle Ages after Napoleon leveled the Old Regime. It was a new founding rather than a continuation of ancient and accretive traditions, and it prepared the slippery slope that led to the World Wars of the 20th century. Europe’s atavistic nationalism was not a revival of tradition but a perverse innovation. Sometimes empire is better. The Austro-Hungarian Empire provided governance far superior to the plethora of nationalisms sponsored by the Versailles Treaty.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/americans-leaving-cities-destroyed-by-democrats/

For decades, Democrats have controlled the nation’s largest cities. The results have been catastrophic, including high crime rates, blight, failing public educational systems, rampant poverty, and an expanding homeless population. 

These horrific outcomes are due to Democrats supporting failed policies, such as raising taxes, increasing regulations, growing the government, and refusing to prosecute violent criminals. Consequently, citizens voted with their feet and left in droves, a trend which has started to accelerate. 

For example, while the country’s population soared sixty million to 341 million since 2000, it was a much different situation in the progressive hellhole of Chicago. The “Windy City” lost 231,000 people in 24 years, the most out migration of any city in the nation. 

No one can blame citizens for wanting to exit a city led by a leftist like Lori Lightfoot. Unfortunately, Chicago voters did not learn their lesson and recently elected Mayor Brandon Johnson, an even more radical Democrat. 

Chicago is not alone among our nation’s largest cities. Since the onset of the pandemic, New York lost 492.928 people, while 379.447 citizens fled Los Angeles and 173,877 exited San Francisco. 

https://victorhanson.com/will-dei-end-america-or-america-end-dei/

At the nexus of most of America’s current crises, the diversity/equity/inclusion dogma can be found. The southern border has been destroyed because the Democratic Party wanted the poor of the southern hemisphere to be counted in the census, to vote if possible in poorly audited mail-in elections, and to build upon constituencies that demand government help. Opposition to such cynicism and the de facto destruction of enforcement of U.S. immigration law is written off as “racism,” “nativism,” and “xenophobia.”

The military is short more than 40,000 soldiers. The Pentagon may fault youth gangs, drug use, or a tight labor market. But the real shortfall is mostly due inordinately to reluctant white males who have been smeared by some of the military elite as suspected “white supremacists,” despite dying at twice their demographics in Iraq and Afghanistan. And they are now passing on joining up despite their families’ often multigenerational combat service.

The nexus between critical race theory and critical legal theory has been, inter alia, defunding the police, Soros-funded district attorneys exempting criminals from punishment, the legitimization of mass looting, squatters’ rights, and general lawlessness across big-city America.

The recent epidemic of anti-Semitism was in part birthed by woke/DEI faculty and students on elite campuses, who declared Hamas a victim of “white settler” victimizing Israel and thus contextualized their Jewish hatred by claiming that as “victims,” they cannot be bigots.

There is a historic, malevolent role of states adjudicating political purity, substituting racial, sex, class, and tribal criteria for meritocracy. They define success or failure not based on actual outcomes but on the degree of orthodox zealotry. Once governments enter that realm of the surreal, the result is always an utter disaster.

After a series of disastrous military catastrophes in 1941 and 1942, Soviet strongman and arch-communist Joseph Stalin ended the Soviet commissar system in October 1942. He reversed course to give absolute tactical authority to his ground commanders rather than to the communist overseers, as was customary.

Stalin really had no choice since Marxist-Leninist ideology overriding military logic and efficacy had ensured that the Soviet Union was surprised by a massive Nazi invasion in June 1941. The Russians in the first 12 months of war subsequently lost nearly 5 million in vast encirclements—largely because foolhardy, ideologically driven directives curtailed the generals’ operational control of the army. After the commissars were disbanded and commanders given greater autonomy, the landmark victory at Stalingrad followed, and with it, the rebound of the Red Army.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/20518/eighth-amendment-violations

It is high time to call on all judges and patriots to put a stop to crimes committed by those who have been elected or appointed to uphold the laws of the nation and the US Constitution, but who instead have been violating the law and assaulting the Constitution – sadly with impunity. We have seen former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton allegedly obstruct justice by reportedly ordering her staff to destroy 33,000 subpoenaed emails with BleachBit and smash two of her 13 BlackBerry mobile devices. We have seen President Joe Biden violate a ruling by the Supreme Court that blocked him from using taxpayer funds, some from people who, for whatever reason, did not participate higher education, to pay off the student loans amounting to $138 billion of other people who did.

We have seen governmental violations of the First Amendment — from Soviet-style whispers to Facebook to quash the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop by declaring falsely – knowingly so, it turned out – that the material in it supposedly had “all the earmarks of Russian disinformation,” to calling true medical information false during the COVID-19 pandemic. The first maneuver was election interference – probably decisive in undermining the integrity of the 2020 election. The false medical information disseminated by the government, depriving the ill of alternative medicine – may have cost countless lives.

Sadly, as of late, we have been witnessing even more governmental abuse of power, astronomically out of control, by individuals elected or appointed to safeguard our laws and our Constitution, but who have been disregarding them at best and upending them at worst, specifically in the treatment individuals who supposedly walked through “the people’s house” on January 6, 2021, and most recently in disfiguring the Eighth Amendment to our Constitution to prosecute not a crime, but a person. The Eighth Amendment, in its entirety, states:

“Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.”

To the severe detriment of our global reputation, the entire planet has just been witnessing staggering violations of those protections, through which District Attorneys and at least one judge have been permitted to skate.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2024/03/bragg-falsifies-business-records-charges-against-trump/

Oh, the irony.

Donald Trump is facing a state criminal trial for violating federal election laws that Alvin Bragg has no jurisdiction to enforce.

This is not apparent from last spring’s 34-count indictment, which Bragg couched as a state falsification-of-records prosecution. In the statement of facts he issued in connection with the indictment, the Manhattan district attorney also camouflaged his intentions, knowing a plainspoken admission that he was trying to enforce federal law — congressional statutes under which the responsible federal enforcement agencies had opted not to charge Trump — would ignite a firestorm. The statement of facts makes only a fleeting allusion to Trump’s involvement in a “scheme” in which participants “violated election laws” (not otherwise specified); and it conclusively alleges that the payment of hush money by Trump’s then-lawyer, Michael Cohen, was “illegal” because Cohen has “since pleaded guilty to making an illegal campaign contribution.”

We should think of Bragg as falsifying his prosecution — just as he accuses Trump of falsifying business records.

Tellingly, Bragg avoided specifying the statute to which Cohen had pled guilty — a federal statute that the state prosecutor has no authority to enforce. And as an experienced prosecutor, Bragg must know that there is zero evidentiary value in what he touts as Cohen’s admission of guilt to federal campaign-finance felonies — made while Cohen was trying to sell himself to the Justice Department as a cooperator, hoping for leniency in an unrelated federal fraud case. Given Cohen’s lack of experience in the esoterica of federal election law, his admission does not establish even that he committed federal campaign-finance felonies, much less that Trump did.

https://amgreatness.com/2024/03/24/bobulinskis-testimony-unraveling-allegations-of-biden-family-influence-peddling/

The entertainment committee never sleeps.  Hunter Biden’s former business partner Tony Bobulinski came to Congress a few days ago to testify before the House Oversight Committee about Hunter, his uncle Jim Biden, and the “Big Guy,” Mr. 10 percent, Joseph R. Biden himself.  It was an extraordinary performance. Calm. Deliberate. Detailed. Deadly. Mr. Bobulinski’s written statement shows what care he took in marshaling facts and evidence.

But it was his in-person testimony that made popping the corn worthwhile.  Tony Bobulinski and Congressman Jay Raskin. Tony Bobulinski and Congressman Dan Goldman.  He called both liars to their faces. It was delicious. It was also true.  Representative Raskin spluttered, stalled, and looked like he might burst into tears. He later, out of the line of fire, pouted about Mr. Bobulinski’s “outlandish and baseless accusations,” but that was just a feckless face-saving gambit.

Maybe the most entertaining moment of the afternoon came when Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez did her best Minnie Mouse impersonation and demanded to know what crimes, if any, Mr. Bobulinski was accusing Joe Biden of having committed. “RICO is not a crime!” she squeaked.  It was priceless.  The “greatest deliberative body in the world” in action, ladies and gentlemen. The country’s in the very best of hands.

But, as the old song said, “it don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing.” In any normal polity, Mr. Bobulinski’s testimony would have been devastating to its targets. But in our polity, it was just entertainment.  If Congressmen Raskin and Goldman were capable of embarrassment, they would be squirming with shame.  But they are not so endowed, which means that they will emerge unscathed by any pangs of conscience. After all, they are still in office. Perhaps they will even be reelected and continue suckling at the public teat for the rest of their adult lives.

There will be a lot of tongue-clucking. You’ll see many columns rehearsing the details of Mr. Bobulinski’s testimony. At the end of the day, though, it won’t matter what evidence Mr. Bobulinski adduced.  The Justice Department is run by the State Party, aka the Democrats, and the DOJ is going to do exactly nothing about what Rudy Giuliani colorfully baptized the Biden Crime Family.

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/america/2024/03/shredding-the-law-to-get-donald-trump/

Nothing has shocked me as much recently as the result of New York Attorney-General Letitia James’ prosecution of Donald Trump, following closely, as it did, on the absurd award of $83 million in damages for defamation to memory-challenged alleged sexual assault victim, E. Jean Carroll. 

If you’re not reporting for  the mainstream media, you know this is a politically motivated hit-job. In other words, an attack on the very essence of American democracy.  You know, the ultimate sin of which Trump stands accused.  The one for which he must be defeated later this year. James told us exactly that when she campaigned for election on a platform of getting Trump:

I will never be afraid to challenge this illegitimate president,” James said in a video during the campaign. “I believe that this president is incompetent. I believe that this president is ill-equipped to serve in the highest office of this land. And I believe that he is an embarrassment to all that we stand for.” She went on to say Trump should be indicted on criminal charges and charged with obstruction of justice.

So, even before she had any case, she was determined to pursue him, not because of any crime she may have suspected he committed but because in her eyes he was both an illegitimate president and incompetent. But, no doubt under the influence of Trump Derangement Syndrome, James would have been confident a fishing expedition would yield some dirt.  

There are many troubling aspects to this case.  The first is the staggering amount of the fine – US464 million.  And the second is that this matter was prosecuted as a civil fraud case.

New York, which reputedly has some of the toughest fraud legislation in the country, recognises two types of fraud – civil and criminal.  Here, from the website of East Coast Laws, is a short summary:

Fraud can be both a civil and criminal offense in New York. Civil fraud involves a breach of contract or a violation of a legal duty, resulting in harm to another party. The victim of civil fraud can sue the perpetrator and seek damages in court. Criminal fraud, on the other hand, involves intentionally deceiving someone for personal gain, which is a violation of the law. Criminal fraud is prosecuted by the government, and the penalties can include fines, imprisonment, and other criminal sanctions.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2024/03/the-shameful-success-of-letitia-james/

Her lawfare has worked brilliantly.

While other prongs of the lawfare campaign against Donald Trump are flailing or encountering timing issues, Letitia James has delivered.

The New York attorney general sought to use the power of the state to target Donald Trump, smash his business, and personally embarrass him.

So far, it’s promises made, promises kept.

While Fani Willis has disgraced herself and is hanging on by her fingernails, Jack Smith is beset by various delays that may keep him from achieving his goal of politically damaging trials before the election, and Alvin Bragg is stuck with a dog of a case, James has gone from strength to strength, gloating all the while.

All it takes, it turns out, to achieve lawfare success is a willingness to make abusive use of a broadly written statute, a pliant judge, and some moxie and determination.

Take note, America — this is how it’s done.

Even if her case somehow goes away tomorrow (and it won’t), she still will have gotten a fraud judgment against Trump and forced him to admit that he’s not liquid enough to produce the more than $450 million bond he needs to prevent her from beginning to collect the judgment. There’s speculation that Trump might resort to declaring Chapter 11 or simply let James take Trump Tower, both of which would be humiliations (and don’t seem likely).

There’s no doubt that in financial terms in this case, the walls really are closing in.

This is a great success for James and a great shame for our system. She has proven that it’s possible to stretch the law to make a dubious case against a political enemy in a major jurisdiction of the United States and impose a punishment with no connection to the underlying offense but with ruinous personal consequences.

We should all hope that this model is never repeated, whether the intended victim is a Republican or a Democrat, someone running for president or for alderman.