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mariacallous · 2 months

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The fundamental problem for American presidents who have attempted to work with Benjamin Netanyahu is that Benjamin Netanyahu does not care what American presidents think. An exceptional English orator who was raised in Philadelphia, Netanyahu believes that he can outmaneuver and outlast American politicians on their own turf. “I know America,” he said in a private 2001 conversation that later leaked. “America is something that can easily be moved.” This attitude constituted a sharp break; in the past, even hard-line politicians like the maverick general turned premier Ariel Sharon responded to pressure from American presidents.

But during Bill Clinton’s presidency and again during Barack Obama’s, Netanyahu changed the equation. He repeatedly blew off American entreaties on issues including the peace process and Iran, and turned his willingness to stand up to U.S. presidents into an electoral selling point with his base. Faced with this unprecedented recalcitrance, different Democratic administrations tried different tactics for wrangling Bibi. Some attempted to compel his compliance with hard public pressure, only to have Netanyahu wait out a U.S.-imposed settlement freeze, then agitate against the Iran nuclear deal in Congress and the American media. Others attempted to settle disputes privately with Netanyahu, on the assumption that the Israeli leader would respond better if not openly antagonized.

None of this worked and none of it arrested Netanyahu’s drift further to the right. As both vice president and chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Joe Biden had a front-row seat to these failures. So did his close-knit foreign-policy team, including longtime staffers such as Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan. Recognizing the errors of the past, they have charted a different course aimed at outmaneuvering Netanyahu, seeking to succeed where their predecessors did not. This approach predates the current Gaza conflict, but has reached full expression in the past months. It explains why Biden has full-throatedly supported Israel against Hamas while simultaneously assailing the country’s hard-right governing coalition. And it offers a glimpse at the administration’s intended endgame for the war—and for Netanyahu himself.

In 2015, I visited another country with an ascendant right-wing populist leader: Hungary. Today, the country is essentially aligned with Russia against America and its allies. At the time, its prime minister, Viktor Orbán, was escalating his rhetoric against the European Union and the West. As part of the trip, my group met with officials at the American embassy, who explained their impossible predicament: Whenever Western countries would publicly pressure Orbán on his policies, he would refashion that pressure into electoral support, leaving his critics with no good options. Stay silent and he would win; speak up and he would also win.

Right-wing populists such as Orbán and Netanyahu thrive on posturing against outside antagonists, using external criticism to bolster their bona fides as strongmen who can stand up to the international community. This insight has shaped Biden’s approach to Netanyahu—not by preventing the president from publicly fighting with the prime minister, but by influencing which fights he picks. Simply put, Biden has opted to challenge Netanyahu on issues that splinter his support rather than consolidate it. In practice, this means strategically targeting policies where Netanyahu is on the wrong side of Israeli public opinion and forcing him to choose between his hard-right partners and the rest of the country.

Netanyahu’s disastrous attempt to overhaul the Israeli judiciary offers a case in point. The proposed legislation was drafted by right-wing hard-liners with no opposition input and would have subordinated Israel’s courts to its parliament. The attempted power grab provoked the largest sustained protest movement in Israeli history. Polls repeatedly showed that most Israelis opposed the overhaul and wanted lawmakers to come up with new compromise reforms conceived by consensus. And so that’s precisely what the Biden administration began calling for.

“Hopefully, the prime minister will act in a way that he is going to try to work out some genuine compromise,” Biden told reporters in March. “But that remains to be seen.” In July, he repeated the same point to Netanyahu, then reiterated it to the press: “The focus should be on pulling people together and finding consensus.” As the State Department emphasized at the time, “We believe that fundamental changes should be pursued with the broadest possible base of support.” By placing himself firmly on the side of the Israeli majority, Biden was able to prevent Netanyahu from turning his criticism into an electoral asset. After all, it’s hard to paint someone as anti-Israel, as Netanyahu once did with Obama, when they are expressing the opinion of most Israelis.

Biden understands that Netanyahu’s position is a precarious one. His governing coalition received just 48.4 percent of the vote, and took power only because of a quirk of the Israeli electoral system. The coalition relies on an alliance of unpopular far-right parties to stay afloat, whom Netanyahu must appease to remain in office. Biden has exploited this weakness and repeatedly poked at it. Rather than directly confronting Netanyahu, he has called out his extremist partners and in this way heightened the contradictions within Netanyahu’s coalition, undermining its stability and gradually eroding its support in the polls.

In July, Biden told CNN’s Fareed Zakaria that Netanyahu’s government has “the most extremist members of cabinets that I’ve seen” in Israel, noting that “I go all the way back to Golda Meir.” This past week, at a campaign event hosted by a former chair of AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobbying group, Biden went even further, singling out a far-right minister by name. “This is the most conservative government in Israel’s history,” the president said. Itamar “Ben-Gvir and company and the new folks, they don’t want anything remotely approaching a two-state solution.” This was Biden’s approach in action: criticizing Israel during wartime in front of a pro-Israel crowd, and doing so in a way that nonetheless denied Netanyahu any opening. As long as it’s Biden versus Ben-Gvir, rather than Biden versus Bibi, the president holds the upper hand.

Biden has brought the same strategy to bear on the issue of settler violence against Palestinians in the West Bank, which has accelerated under the cover of Israel’s campaign in Gaza. Netanyahu’s coalition is unable to clamp down on these extremists and their terrorism because it is beholden to these extremists. But most Israelis have no desire to mortgage the security of Israel and its indispensable relationship to the United States in favor of some far-flung hilltop settlers in West Bank regions that few Israelis could locate on a map.

Knowing this, Biden has begun unrolling a series of unilateral measures intended to raise the price of settler violence and pit Netanyahu and his allies against the Israeli public. Earlier this month, the administration announced visa bans on those implicated in settler violence, spurring similar actions by the EU, Britain, and France. “We have underscored to the Israeli government the need to do more to hold accountable extremist settlers who have committed violent attacks against Palestinians in the West Bank,” Blinken said. “As President Biden has repeatedly said, those attacks are unacceptable.” This past week, the U.S. froze the sale of more than 20,000 M16 rifles to Israel over concerns that they might find their way into the hands of violent settlers.

Hamas’s October 7 slaughter has put Biden’s approach to the ultimate test. Like most Israelis, he wants to see Hamas vanquished. And like most Israelis, he does not trust Netanyahu and his far-right allies to do it. This has left the president with few appealing options. Publicly denying Israel support during what it sees as an existential war wouldn’t just go against Biden’s personal values. It would collapse all the credibility he has accrued with the Israeli public through his careful diplomacy during his presidency. And it would give Netanyahu the American antagonist he desperately craves, providing the floundering premier with a lifeline he would use to reunite the right behind him.

To avoid this outcome, Biden has backed Israel’s military campaign, but worked nonstop to shape its contours and limit its fallout on civilians and the rest of the region, tapping into the reservoir of goodwill he has built with the Israeli public. The president has also upped the pressure on Netanyahu by assailing his coalition partners and explicitly calling for a new, more moderate Israeli government. U.S. officials have leaked that they think Netanyahu will not last, and Biden has told the Israeli leader to think about what lessons he’d impart to his successor.

In other words, Biden has once again placed himself on the side of the Israeli majority, in order to undermine Netanyahu and shape the political future of the entire country. It’s one of the biggest bets of his presidency, and when the guns finally fall silent, it could determine the fate of the broader Middle East.

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jfleamont · 1 month

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Hi folks!

I've been a part of the Jily community for a while now, and I've always been curious about how linguistically diverse it is. You could say that linguistics and languages in general are my field of expertise (sort of, but don't take this too seriously) and as some of you may know, I read and write fics in English even though it's not my native language, so I thought I'd do a poll about it.

I don't know what the exact purpose of this is, but it would be interesting to find out how different languages and cultures can influence your reading preferences and your writing. I also think that reading and writing in a language that is not your own are two very different processes, so I'm making that distinction in the poll.

If none of these apply to you - you have been brought up bilingual or you might have lost your native language over time or something else entirely - feel free to share your perspective.

If you want you can also share where you're from and which circle you belong to, according to Kachru's model:

- The Inner Circle, where English is the mother tongue for most people and where it's used in media, schools, government and other official institutions and it's the de facto official language

- The Outer Circle, which includes countries that have a history of colonisation, where English is not the native language but it serves as a useful lingua franca between various ethnic and language groups; some people with higher education, the legislature and judiciary, national commerce and others may use it for practical purposes

- The Expanding Circle, in which English plays no historical or governmental role but is widely used as a medium of international communication and it is studied as a foreign language; basically the rest of the world is in this circle

Thanks for participating! ❤️

#this is sooo out of my comfort zone #but today I thought 'why not'#who knows... maybe other people will find it interesting and if they don't at least I got it off my chest lol #jfleamont rambles #jily #jple

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alynnl · 5 months

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A line I read in one of the Sherlock short stories ("My friend never stood on the dock") and my recent fixation on the Ace Attorney series led to me asking one question.

"What if Sherlock Holmes did go on trial, being accused of murder?"

The short story title would refer to the courthouse (maybe The Old Bailey, referenced in The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles.)

Immediately following his arrest, Holmes sends a message to Watson. In the note, he tells Watson not to get sentimental and visit him in jail that night, but instead to investigate the scene of the crime, and see what he can deduce from it. Showing great trust in his friend, Watson does just that and takes very detailed notes on his findings.

"There was never a greater test of my own powers of observation."

And because of Holmes's status as a sort of celebrity, he will have a closed trial, with only members of the judiciary and key people on the case attending. This is to prevent the trial from becoming a media circus, and ensure the verdict will be reached by evidence and testimony rather than public opinion.

Godfrey Norton, who is now Irene Adler's husband, is serving as Holmes's defense counsel. Irene herself is attending the trial, watching from the gallery. (This is the final way Irene outsmarted Holmes in A Scandal in Bohemia - everyone believed Norton was a prosecutor working on her behalf, when he was actually a public defender.)

The opposing counsel is Charles Culverton-Smith, a prosecutor who is on track to become Director of Public Prosecutions. There’s a possibility that he took the case to add to his reputation (but that’s just speculation on Watson and Norton’s part.)

Watson tells Holmes of this theory when they speak in the defendant's lobby just before the trial, but Holmes is skeptical.

"If Culverton-Smith truly wanted to bolster his reputation, he would insist on a public trial where he could show his legal prowess to a larger audience. There is something else at play here, something far more sinister."

The trial begins. Both Norton and Culverton-Smith give their legal arguments, supporting their stances with evidence and witness testimony.

Watson is the final witness to speak in the trial. He describes his findings at the crime scene, and tries to use factual language (as Holmes remarked to him before, when talking about his writings.) Everyone in the courtroom (including the judge and the prosecution) believe Watson's observations to be so important, that they agree to call for a thirty minute recess. During the pause in proceedings, Lestrade and other policemen to look over the crime scene one more time alongside Watson to confirm what he said was true.

Sure enough, Watson's deductions prove that Sherlock Holmes couldn't have been the killer. When court is back in session, Lestrade gives his report. Based on the new information, the judge hands down a verdict of "not guilty" to Sherlock Holmes.

There is little time to celebrate, as Holmes immediately whisks Watson away to the streets of London. He insists they make haste the nearest carriage, because "There's still time to catch the true mastermind behind this devious plot!"

Lestrade picks up on Holmes's pursuit and decides to lead his own forces to block one of the main exits to London.

Meanwhile, Holmes and Watson enter a high speed chase against the true culprit, who's been behind at least two other incidents of framing people for murders he committed.

At the end of the chase, the criminal is surrounded by Lestrade and his police force on one side, along with Holmes and Watson (who is armed with his revolver) on the other side. He finally surrenders and gives himself up, at last being taken into custody.

Watson is astonished at this turn of events. "My dear Holmes, you've done it again! I'm speechless!"

"Indeed I have, but I insist you don't undersell your role in this, dear Watson. This case would have a much darker conclusion without your thoughtful analysis. I trust that you will reflect that in your writings, if there is ever a time you will be permitted to release the details to the public."

Charles Culverton-Smith catches up with Holmes and Watson. He didn't get a chance to speak with them after the trial, but wanted them to know that he harbored no ill will towards Holmes. He was simply doing his job as a man who practices law, and couldn't imagine leaving the trial to anyone else. Because everyone deserves a fair trial, and many other lawyers are biased either for or against Holmes, depending on how his actions affected their cases.

Holmes comments that Culverton-Smith will make a fine Director of Public Prosecutions when the time comes, since his integrity speaks for itself.

"If I am ever on the dock in the future, I would trust your judgment."

Watson insists Holmes not talk about "the next time in court" because he doesn't want there to be a "next time."

Holmes agrees to move on from the subject. He points out there is still ample time for breakfast and sets off to find the nearest place that will serve Watson's favorite dishes. "My treat, naturally."

Watson concludes the story mentioning that five years have passed since the first and only trial of his friend, Sherlock Holmes. The events in the closed courtroom have been made public, to teach students of law how to conduct a fair trial of a famous (or infamous) client.

#Sherlock Holmes #ACD Holmes #John Watson #Inspector Lestrade #Sherlock Holmes OC #Charles Culverton-Smith #Sherlock Holmes fan case #Watson does deductions #Sherlock goes on trial #courtroom drama #Letters from Watson

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gffa · 1 year

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Okay I have a maybe dumb question you might have answered before but I've seen a few posts around that rub me the wrong way about how Anakin would be arrested/punished for his murder of the Tuskens and I'm really not sure how that would work? Kicked out of the Order maybe but he was on Tatooine outside of Republic jurisdiction killing a group of people already very much ostracized and othered (as shown in other media like the BoBF where people shot them out train windows or something, I don't remember exactly). So I'm not sure who would press charges or anything like that anyway??

And like I am by no means defending his crimes, like at all, but I just don't see how he would be punished for that through the Republics judiciary system? And the context of the movies and shows don't really imply that he would be arrested or anything either unless I'm missing something (which is so very possible). I always felt its more intended as a horrendously, cruel and vengeful action that serves as a way to convey Anakin’s inevitable decent/turning to the dark side. Not something to be interpreted as a secret, covered up crime he would be punished for. But Idk. So sorry if this is confusing!

Hi! There really is no clear answer to this because you're right, I don't think it would be able to be punished through the Republic's judiciary system, because Tatooine was not part of the Republic. And we don't really know what kind of extradition laws the Republic would have with an organization like the Hutts, how much they would abide by those things. Further, the Jedi kept their dealings in house, because they were the ones who could really judge how much the Force would have been an influence, like that was a huge point of The Wrong Jedi arc, that the Jedi were desperately trying to keep Ahsoka, but the Republic came down hard with an iron fist, because that's what Palpatine was maneuvering them towards. There's no answer here because it begs the question--do the Hutts know and would sue for extradition? Do the Hutts even care in the first place? Do the Hutts even have a case if this is a Tusken matter? I don't think the other Tusken tribes would care to sue for extradition, so they'd just let it go. And how much is Palpatine sticking his fingers into this mess, because he wants to break Anakin? I don't think the Jedi would kick Anakin out, that's not really what they want, they want to keep Jedi in the Order, that's why Palpatine had to twist their arms so hard with Ahsoka, until it was that or break the entire Order and Ahsoka would have been accused of not getting a fair trial if they'd forced the issue. In supplementary material, their reactions to someone falling to the dark/doing something terrible is that they want to bring them back to the light, they don't want to punish them, they want to help them. The only time they'd expel someone is if they were putting people's lives at risk because of the choices they made and it wasn't a situation where they could reasonably intervene, just dangerous choices being made. Like Prosset Dibs tries to kill Mace and he just says it's our duty to help him back to the light and, in the meantime, he's on library duty. And, ultimately, all of that isn't really important because it's not the story being told, it's an act of cruelty that had Anakin losing control of himself, giving in to the rage (which makes it easier to give in again next time) and doubling down on how he refuses to accept that sometimes people die and we can't always stop it, no matter how hard we try. It's a super interesting avenue to explore in fic and meta and I've seen it done in really cool ways a few times, but there's no hard answer in canon as to what would have happened, because that wasn't the purpose of including the scene. Usually, that avenue being explored is about character exploration, because the political framework is too vague to really have a concise answer.

#anakin skywalker #meta

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partisan-by-default · 4 months

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Israeli courts had stopped hearing non-urgent cases after Hamas launched a devastating surprise attack from Gaza on Oct. 7, but on Friday, the country’s justice minister, Yariv Levin, said that most normal court operations could resume because the suspension had expired.

Mr. Netanyahu did not attend Monday’s hearing, which dealt with procedural issues, according to Israeli news media reports.

He could testify in person in the spring as part of the defense’s case.

Mr. Netanyahu has been on trial since 2020, accused of bestowing political favors on businessmen in exchange for expensive gifts and offering regulatory benefits to media moguls in exchange for positive news coverage. He denies the charges and has rejected calls to resign.

Over the summer, lawmakers from Mr. Netanyahu’s right-wing party, Likud, introduced a bill that would have stripped the attorney general — who has been critical of him — of the ability to oversee the prosecution of government ministers, including the prime minister. The bill was later withdrawn amid the intensification of protests that had been going on for months over the government’s efforts to assert more authority over the judiciary.

As the trial resumes, Mr. Netanyahu’s standing with the Israeli public has worsened. Many Israelis blame his government for the failure of the security services to prevent the attack by Hamas, in which roughly 1,200 people were killed, according to Israeli authorities, and about 240 people taken hostage.

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theivorybilledwoodpecker · 2 years

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I highly recommend reading the whole article. It doesn't take long, but it's well worth it. There are so many parts I want to highlight.

Professor Bridges absolutely owned that court room:

"Republican Senator Tom Cotton asked panelists testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on 12 July whether they condemn violence against so-called crisis pregnancy centres, nonmedical facilities intended to deter people from seeking an abortion.

“'I condemn violence,' said Ms Bridges, a professor of law at University of California Berkeley School of Law and reproductive health scholar. 'And I would like to note that forced birth is an act of violence.' "She pointed to an increase in the number of assaults, barricades and suspicious packages outside abortion clinics, as abortion rights advocates face escalating threats to abortion care following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the landmark, half-century precedent in Roe v Wade. "Heidi Matzke, executive director of the Alternatives Pregnancy Center in California, said crisis pregnancy centres like hers – nonmedical facilities intended to dissuade people from seeking an abortion – have been “targeted for violent assaults of vandalism, and hateful attacks online and in the media.” "Dr Colleen P McNicholas, chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood of the St Louis Region and Southwest Missouri, also condemned violence – then read the names of nine abortion providers and clinic workers who were killed for providing abortion care. “'I absolutely condemn violence against everyone, including abortion providers,' she said."

And then

"She stressed that 'people of color, specifically Black people, will feel the impact of the court’s decision in Dobbs more than any other racial group,' pointing to reporting from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that finds that Black women are three times more likely to die from a pregnancy-related causes than white women.

....

"Texas Republican John Cornyn asked Ms Bridges whether she believes “there ought to be more Black babies aborted”.

“'[Black people] have agency, they have intelligence, they know what is best for themselves and I would love to create the conditions under which they can live lives that are filled with dignity and humanity,' Ms Bridges said."

And

"Ms Bridges also fired back at Senator Josh Hawley after the Republican senator from Missouri appeared to dismiss that transgender people could become pregnant, underscoring the myriad, far-reaching impacts of dissolving legal abortion care that the committee sought to uncover, from the legal ramifications to what committee chair Dick Durbin called a looming health crisis."

#Khiara Bridges #Abortion #Roe v. Wade #reproductive rights #Black lives matter

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beardedmrbean · 2 days

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Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has suspended public duties to "stop and reflect" on whether to remain in the job, after a court opened a preliminary inquiry into his wife.

In a statement, the Spanish leader said he urgently needed to decide "whether I should continue to lead the government or renounce this honour".

The court said it was responding to corruption claims against Begoña Gómez.

Mr Sánchez said he would make a decision on his future next Monday.

His wife would defend her honour and work with the judiciary, he said, to make clear there was no substance to the allegations against her.

The complaint against Begoña Gómez was raised by anti-corruption campaigners Manos Limpias (Clean Hands), who have taken part in a number of high-profile court cases in recent years and are led by a man linked to the far right called Miguel Bernad.

Manos Limpias put out a statement on Thursday signed by Mr Bernad acknowledging that its allegations might be false, because they were based on online newspaper stories: "If they are not true, it will be up to those that published them to take responsibility for the falsehood."

The Socialist prime minister said he would give a statement to the media on 29 April, after reflecting whether it was worth remaining in office "despite the mud" that the right and far right were trying to turn politics into.

In a lengthy statement on X, Mr Sánchez complained of a "strategy of harassment" over months aimed at weakening him politically and personally targeting his wife.

The court did not give details of the accusations against Begoña Gómez other than to say it had begun investigating allegations of influence peddling and corruption on 16 April.

However, the Cadena Ser website published details of the Manos Limpias complaint, which included a list of allegations culled from news websites including El Confidencial and Voz Populi.

El Confidencial reported on Wednesday that the inquiry was looking into Begoña Gómez's links to private companies that had secured government money or public contracts.

In particular, it cited a "sponsorship agreement" involving tourism group Globalia and a foundation she ran in 2020 called IE Africa Center. In 2020, Globalia secured a €475m (£407m) bailout for its airline Air Europa, as part of a series of government rescue packages for companies during the Covid-19 crisis.

The legal complaint was signed by Miguel Bernad, the head of Manos Limpias, which describes itself as a trade union and has in the past targeted politicians, bankers and King Felipe VI's sister, Princess Cristina.

Spain's conservative Popular Party (PP) demanded explanations in parliament earlier on Wednesday, to which the prime minister said simply that he believed in justice "despite everything".

Spanish media said he had left parliament for his Madrid residence visibly upset. Hours later he accused PP leader Alberto Núñez Feijóo of working with far-right party Vox to bring him down.

"I am not naive. I realise they are denouncing Begoña, not because she has done anything illegal - they know there is no case - but because she is my wife," he complained in his statement.

Political allies expressed support for Mr Sánchez, who has been in power since 2018, but his decision to suspend public duties comes at a tense time for his Socialist party ahead of European Parliament elections in June and elections in the Catalonia region of north-eastern Spain next month.

He was due to take part in a Catalan campaign launch in Barcelona on Thursday.

Pedro Sánchez leads an awkward coalition that includes two Catalan separatist parties, which were persuaded to support the government in return for an amnesty that covered a banned Catalan referendum on secession in 2017.

Without the support of the Catalan Republican Left (ERC) and Together for Catalonia (JxCat) he would not have been able to stay in power, following an inconclusive election last year.

Opposition parties were outraged by the amnesty, which also means the former Catalan regional leader Carles Puigdemont will stand in next month's regional vote, seven years after he fled imminent arrest and went into exile in Belgium.

Mr Puigdemont is still facing a terrorism case but believes the amnesty will enable him to return to Spain.

#nunyas news

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dreaminginthedeepsouth · 1 year

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LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

April 6, 2023

Heather Cox Richardson

The Supreme Court was in the news this morning, as Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott, and Alex Mierjeski of ProPublica explained that for more than twenty years Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has enjoyed the hospitality and funding of Dallas real estate magnate and major Republican donor Harlan Crow. Thomas and his wife Ginni, who was closely involved in challenging the 2020 presidential election, have taken trips in private jets and gone on vacations with Crow worth as much as $500,000.

Thomas did not disclose any of these valuable gifts. Indeed, in a documentary funded in part by Crow, Thomas presented himself as a regular guy. “I prefer the RV parks. I prefer the Walmart parking lots to the beaches and things like that. There’s something normal to me about it,” he said. “I come from regular stock, and I prefer that—I prefer being around that.”

After the story dropped, David G. Savage of the Los Angeles Times recalled that his newspaper had disclosed the close connections between Thomas and Crow in 2004, noting, for example, that Crow had given Thomas a $19,000 Bible that had belonged to the famous formerly enslaved abolitionist and writer Frederick Douglass and a $15,000 bust of Abraham Lincoln. After their story appeared, it seems that Thomas did not stop accepting expensive gifts and travel from the wealthy mogul, but instead stopped disclosing them.

In Crow’s company, Thomas rubbed elbows with his host’s other guests, including senior business executives, major Republican donors, and leaders of right-wing think tanks. Crow has worked hard to move the judiciary and the legal system to the right, and at one of the properties where Thomas vacations, there is a painting of him in conversation with a number of figures, including Leonard Leo, the leader of the Federalist Society who has orchestrated the court’s hard-right turn. Leo is now overseeing Marble Freedom Trust, established to disburse funds from a $1.6 billion bequest to manipulate elections in favor of Republicans.

Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) tweeted: “Important for news media to not simply label this guy as a ‘[Republican] mega donor’. It’s so much worse. Crow has many interests before the Supreme Court. His groups file petitions before the court. It’s the clearest, most brazen violation of judicial ethics you can imagine.”

In Congress today, House Judiciary Committee chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) issued a subpoena in its investigation of the Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg’s office after that office indicted former president Donald Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records on Tuesday. Bragg explained: “The trail of money & lies exposes a pattern that, the People allege, violates one of New York’s basic & fundamental business laws.”

Although Jordan himself refused to respond to a subpoena issued by the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, he is demanding that Mark Pomerantz, a former county special assistant district attorney who investigated Trump’s finances, show up to testify.

Pomerantz resigned from his role in the investigation out of frustration that Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg was not then moving forward with an indictment. The wording of Jordan’s letter indicates he is hoping to use Pomerantz’s words critical of Trump to argue that the district attorney’s office was biased against the former president.

General counsel for the Manhattan district attorney’s office Leslie Dubeck previously rejected the demands of Jordan, House Committee on House Administration chair Bryan Steil (R-WI), and House Committee on Oversight and Accountability chair James Comer (R-KY) for testimony and documents from Bragg, warning them that their attacks on Bragg and his office were “unlawful political interference.”

Dubeck pointed out: “our Office is legally constrained in how it publicly discusses pending criminal proceedings,… as you well know.” She called their interference “unnecessary and unjustified” and reminded the men that Congress has no jurisdiction over individual criminal investigations. Nor does it have jurisdiction over state investigations. “The Committees’ attempted interference with an ongoing state criminal investigation—and now prosecution—is an unprecedented and illegitimate incursion on New York’s sovereign interests,” she wrote.

Now Jordan is trying a different approach. Bragg responded: “The House [Republicans continue] to attempt to undermine an active investigation and ongoing New York criminal case with an unprecedented campaign of harassment and intimidation. Repeated efforts to weaken state and local law enforcement actions are an abuse of power and will not deter us from our duty to uphold the law.”

In the Tennessee statehouse this afternoon, Republican legislators led by House of Representatives speaker Cameron Sexton voted to expel Justin Jones and Justin Pearson, two young Black lawmakers who had led young protesters in chants from the floor of the house chamber in favor of gun safety legislation after house Republicans refused to allow debate on such a measure.

The Republicans charged that the three representatives had broken house rules and had engaged in “disorderly behavior” and “knowingly and intentionally” brought “dishonor to the House of Representatives.” The body avoided expelling Gloria Johnson, the white woman who chanted with Jones and Pearson, by one vote. Although the debate showed that a Republican had also broken house rules by recording a video that was then misleadingly edited and shown, that representative was not charged.

The three Democratic representatives joined protesters to call for gun safety legislation after six people, including three 9-year-olds, were killed in yet another school shooting. The Republicans have focused on cultural issues and have opposed taking up gun safety legislation. Indeed, they have worked to loosen gun laws; on the same day as the recent school shooting, a federal judge cleared the way for the Tennessee legislature to lower the age for permitless carry in the state from 21 to 18. Republican governor Bill Lee signed the permitless carry bill for 21 and up in 2021 at a Beretta gun manufacturing plant.

Today, young protesters in the statehouse defended the Tennessee Three, as they have become known, saying: “You ban books, you ban drag—kids are still in body bags!” After the votes to expel, the chants changed to “F*ck you, fascists!”

Republicans in the Tennessee legislature could act as they did because they have a supermajority thanks to their redistricting of the state after the 2020 census. In that redistricting they cracked Democratic-leaning Nashville, dividing it among three districts in which they overwhelmed Democratic voters with Republicans from the suburbs. A new state law has now required Nashville to cut its city council in half. Meanwhile, laws prohibiting people with a past felony conviction from voting cut more than 470,000 people from the voter rolls.

This lock on power has given Tennessee Republicans the ability to do as they please. Today it pleased them to expel two young Black legislators who were trying to force the Republicans to do something about the epidemic of gun violence that is killing their constituents.

The Supreme Court, Congress, and the Tennessee statehouse. What would you say if you saw today’s news coming from another country?

Before he left the chamber, Representative Justin Pearson told his suddenly former colleagues how he saw it.

“You are seeking to expel District 86’s representation from this house, in a country that was built on a protest. IN A COUNTRY THAT WAS BUILT ON A PROTEST. You who celebrate July 4, 1776, pop fireworks and eat hotdogs. You say to protest is wrong because you spoke out of turn, because you spoke up for people who are marginalized. You spoke up for children who won’t ever be able to speak again; you spoke up for parents who don’t want to live in fear; you spoke up for Larry Thorn, who was murdered by gun violence; you spoke up for people that we don’t want to care about. In a country built on people who speak out of turn, who spoke out of turn, who fought out of turn to build a nation.

“I come from a long line of people who have resisted.”

—

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

#Letters From An American #Heather Cox Richardson #Tennessee Three #Clarence Thomas #Corrupt GOP #Criminal GOP #fascism #gerrymandering #Corrupt SCOTUS #gun violence #protest #Resist

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mariacallous · 9 months

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Ukraine is in the waiting room to join both NATO and the European Union. NATO leaders meeting in Vilnius, Lithuania, disappointed Kyiv last week with only a vague statement on a future invitation to join the alliance when “conditions are met.”

But at least NATO is being honest in signaling that there are still obstacles to overcome among the allies. That stands in stark contrast to the EU and its messaging on Ukrainian membership. If you think Ukraine’s path to NATO is a struggle, wait until what happens when Ukraine’s EU accession gets serious.

With its grand rhetoric on Ukraine’s future in the EU, Brussels is talking as if Kyiv joining the bloc were a done deal. When Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited Brussels in February, EU leaders elbowed each other for a photo-op with the wartime leader. European Council President Charles Michel greeted Zelensky with a tweet: “Welcome home, welcome to the EU.”

When EU membership is discussed in detail with Ukraine, the focus is on what Ukraine needs to do to join. Deeply united by the war, Ukrainians are pressing ahead to do their part, adopting new laws and implementing regulations required for EU membership. The Ukrainians are checking more and more boxes on the long EU membership to-do list, from reforming their judiciary to developing a new media law to cracking down on corruption.

Ukraine, together with Moldova, attained EU candidate status in June 2022, drastically shortening a byzantine process that has taken years for other countries on the waiting list. Kyiv will get the first written progress assessment from the European Commission in October. To keep up the momentum, Ukrainian officials are pushing for the official start of accession negotiations by the end of this year, possibly at a European Council meeting scheduled for December.

But while Ukraine is working at pace to join the EU, Brussels and the bloc’s member states are not doing nearly enough to be ready to absorb Ukraine. EU leaders’ high-flying rhetoric on Ukraine’s membership therefore does not match their actions. To absorb a country with the size, population, low income level, financing, and reconstruction needs of war-torn Ukraine, it would require a major reform of EU institutions, policies, and budget processes. At the very least, this will set off vicious conflicts between current members about the distribution of EU funds.

Therefore, if EU leaders were really serious about membership for Ukraine, efforts to reform the bloc should already be underway. At the heart of the issue is the EU budget, which is dominated by two major elements: agricultural subsidies and development projects in poorer regions, which combined account for roughly 65 percent of the EU’s long-term budget. For both these issues, prospective Ukrainian membership is explosive. Ukraine is one of the poorest countries in Europe, with a per capita income of barely one-tenth of the EU average and less than half that of the EU’s poorest member, Bulgaria. Ukraine also now has vast infrastructure and reconstruction needs. To all of this, add one of the continent’s largest agricultural sectors that would suddenly be eligible for EU subsidies.

Were the EU’s budget and redistribution process to remain unchanged, Kyiv would immediately suck in a vast part of the EU budget, including funds now going to the bloc’s less affluent members in Eastern Europe and elsewhere. Many countries currently benefiting from EU funds would turn into net contributors overnight. If you think any of this will be a smooth process, then you don’t know much about European politics.

Given the current redistribution of funds within the EU, it’s no surprise that the biggest cracks in support for Ukrainian membership have come in Eastern Europe, where the EU’s net recipients are concentrated. In fact, the battle over giving Ukraine access to European agricultural markets has already started, long before a single euro in EU farming subsidies is reallocated: Following the invasion, Brussels supported Ukraine by allowing its grain and other agricultural products to enter the EU’s single market. Cheaper Ukrainian goods undercut farmers in neighboring Poland, Hungary, and Slovakia. Even though Ukraine was desperate for revenue, Poland violated EU rules and unilaterally blocked Ukrainian grain from entering Polish territory. The EU intervened with a compromise, allowing Ukrainian produce to enter the EU but requiring it to bypass five Eastern European countries most affected by the unwelcome competition.

It is also no surprise, then, that some of these Eastern European countries—which count among Ukraine’s biggest military and diplomatic backers—also oppose any serious effort to undertake the EU reforms that are a prerequisite for Ukraine to join. Not only do these countries potentially stand to lose substantial funds, but EU reforms to prepare the way for Ukrainian membership will also likely include streamlining EU decision-making rules, which could reduce individual members’ power, especially countries such as Hungary and Poland that have made liberal use of their veto power to influence EU decisions.

EU enlargement is one of the most successful political, economic, and social policies in history, peacefully expanding the union to incorporate 450 million people in 27 countries. For new members, entering the bloc has often set off an economic miracle—a combination of market access, EU funding, the bloc’s rules on good governance, and the confidence that comes with having a secure future. Yet for the past decade, further enlargement has been on ice, largely because the redistribution involved when new, usually poor, members join has been so politically wrought.

Since Zelensky submitted an official application for EU membership on Feb. 28, 2022, just four days after the start of the Russian invasion, the question of further enlargement has been back on the table. Besides membership for Ukraine and Moldova, EU leaders are increasingly aware that other countries not yet in the EU—specifically, in the Western Balkans—will also have to be brought on board if European security and stability is to be ensured.

The explosive impact of Ukraine’s membership on the EU budget will force a discussion about the EU forging a fiscal union. In essence, that would mean a large increase in contributions by wealthier members, such as Germany, France, and some of the smaller rich countries; EU-wide income and other progressive taxes; a big increase in the EU’s ability to issue its own debt; or all of the above. Obviously, this is no minor discussion.

Further enlargement would also strain the EU’s already handicapped ability to make decisions and adopt new laws and policies. Reaching unanimity—needed in foreign policy, for example—among 27 sovereign member states is already a Herculean task, complicated further by the presence of an illiberal, Russia-friendly state such as Hungary. Adding Ukraine and other countries patiently waiting to join could push the EU to well past 30 members. There is a long history of members weaponizing their veto power, which explains why other member states hesitate to add more countries to the decision-making mix without changes to the EU’s functioning.

Germany, for example, is pushing for the expansion of qualified majority voting to new policy areas, such as foreign policy. No longer requiring unanimity would significantly streamline the ability of the EU to make foreign-policy decisions. Smaller countries fear that losing their veto would mean losing their voice in the EU—a debate familiar to any student of constitutional history. Other potential concerns relate to the distribution of member of the European Commission—currently one commissioner per member—or seats in the European Parliament. Enlargement would require reform in these areas, too.

Enlargement would also spotlight the unresolved issue of rule of law and democracy. The EU defines itself as a union of democracies and has strict rules on civil rights, and there are deep concerns over democratic decline and the rollback of the rule of law in Hungary and Poland. Western European governments, in particular, are very wary of enlarging without strengthening the EU’s ability to act against democratic erosion. This concern is especially acute since not a single country on the candidate list is rated fully free in Freedom House’s 2023 Freedom in the World index.

Ukraine could be the catalyst to jump-start a new wave of enlargement. The prospect of its membership requires reform, which in turn would remove many of the obstacles that have similarly held up the accession of Western Balkan countries. Russia’s brutal attack on Ukraine has already been a catalyst for the EU in another way—by demonstrating to Europeans that their bloc is indispensable to their security. When it comes to defense, in survey after survey, Europeans want the EU to play a much greater role. Critically, support for Ukraine among EU citizens remains incredibly high. Even after a year of sanction packages, millions of refugees, energy decoupling, and a cost-of-living crisis, 74 percent of EU citizens approve of the bloc’s support for Ukraine, according to a Eurobarometer poll.

Ukrainians are fighting for their European future. EU leaders now need to do their part to be ready to bring in Ukraine. If they pursue the long-overdue reforms of EU institutions and processes that will be required to make Ukrainian membership work, they will not just make the EU larger. They will make it stronger as well.

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dontmeantobepoliticalbut · 1 year

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Reports about former President Donald Trump's legal team handing over to prosecutors a laptop belonging to one of his aides has spurred calls for Republicans to hold a new congressional hearing to look into the matter.

Representative Ted Lieu, a California Democrat, said that House Republicans should hold a hearing about the aide's laptop similar to the one they held this week, which focused on the suppression of a New York Post article that was published in 2020 about Hunter Biden's laptop.

"Since MAGA Republicans are obsessed about laptops, @HouseGOP should do a hearing on the Trump laptop that illegally stored classified information. Instead, House GOP did a stupid hearing on what Twitter said about a widely known NY Post story about Hunter Biden's laptop," Lieu tweeted on Friday.

Trump's legal team in December and January turned over the laptop, along with more documents with classified markings, CNN reported on Friday. The documents included an empty folder with the label, "Classified Evening Briefing."

Pages with classified markings were found by Trump's lawyers at his Mar-a-Lago home in Florida and were turned over to the Department of Justice (DOJ). Trump's unnamed aide, who works for Save America PAC, reportedly made a copy of those same pages and added them to a thumb drive and laptop without realizing they were classified.

"Since House Republicans love to hold hearings over laptops, they should immediately hold a hearing discussing the #TrumpLaptop," said Democratic activist and lawyer Aaron Parnas.

"Trump laptop?????? Dear @Jim_Jordan , Will there be a hearing on the trump laptop?" asked Christopher Gibbs, chair of the nonprofit, Rural Voices USA.

Meanwhile, social media personality Brian Krassenstein tweeted: "'Accuse your opponent of what you are guilty of...' For the last 3 years we have been hearing about Hunter Biden's 'laptop from hell'. The real laptop from hell could be the #TrumpLaptop in which classified documents were copied onto and found at Mar-a-lago. THAT IS A CRIME!"

"Trump attorney James Trusty informed agents that top secret documents had been electronically copied to a laptop of a current Trump aide. Donald is a clear and present danger to our national security," wrote Michael Cohen, Trump's former attorney.

A GOP-led House committee held a hearing on Wednesday over Twitter's decision to temporarily block the Hunter Biden laptop story. The social media company temporarily prevented users from sharing the New York Post's article in October 2020, fearing that the story about the laptop's contents was the result of an illegal hacking. The newspaper reported that the laptop allegedly contained information about Hunter Biden's finances and ties to foreign companies.

During the hearing, Representative Jim Jordan, an Ohio Republican who chairs the House Judiciary Committee and serves on the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, said that the former Twitter employees were "played" by the FBI, adding that the company's executives searched for reasons to remove the article.

The hearing was part of an ongoing effort to investigate the alleged "weaponization" of federal agencies under the Biden administration.

The Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, which is chaired by Jordan, was launched after a 221-211 House vote in January. The subcommittee aims to look into a number of subjects, including the DOJ's investigations against Trump and whether or not the FBI tried to censor conservative voices. Newsweek reached out to Trump's media office and Jordan's media representatives for comment.

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philosophicalconservatism · 1 year

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Response To An Earlier Post.

Original post.

https://style-nyc.tumblr.com/

"I believe we shouldn’t rely on businesses, or the people who run any entity entirely focused [on] or created to make money for social change and setting of the public moral course. Firstly whatever changes they make will naturally be to help improve them making money, which means improving the lives of a small few aka those who reap the profit. Sometimes govt does need to legislate to quell some of the worst parts of mankind like our prejudices and discrimination."

Philosophicalconservatism.com

In the original post I referred to "businesses and various other aspects of the private sphere". Business does not and cannot act autonomously, or within a social void. Do you remember the TWA scandal from a few years ago? The popular airline company decided to mistreat a passenger in pursuance of one of its policies. What happened? The media got wind of it and drowned the company in bad press. The public (its consumers) took notice and it was forced to reverse course. All of this was the operation of the private sector. The private sector includes businesses, the press (which is also a business, but one whose interests naturally oppose most other business interests) philanthropic organizations, churches, watchdog organizations, community organizations, labor unions, universities etc. There are also temporary informal kinds of organization such as boycotting.

The existence of a free society depends upon the ability of its citizens to organize in creative and effective ways. This entire social ecosystem is the source of change. Second, it is not true that the objectives of business tend to benefit the few rather than the many. The tremendous benefit provided to all of society by the existence of the companies Apple, IBM and Microsoft greatly exceeds the benefits enjoyed by the wealthy entrepreneurs of those companies. Finally, the most egregious perpetrator of discrimination and group oppression in American history has been the government itself, not private business. The Jim Crow system in the South was a collection of laws created by state governments. The Dred Scott ruling which declared that Blacks had no rights under the Constitution was in fact a ruling of the Judiciary branch of the government. Japanese internment was an executive branch policy (later upheld by the Supreme Court) etc.

None of this is to say that government does not have its own proper role in securing natural rights, the point is that it is not to serve as the engine of change within society.

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theculturedmarxist · 9 months

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It's fun to clown on Musk, but in this case he's actually right.

Whether or not risk of myocarditis is greater as a result of contracting covid is irrelevant to whether or not it is also a risk of taking the vaccine. In fact, knowledge of that risk is vital to having the informed consent necessary to administering that vaccine, especially now when it seems to be the case that there is a compounding risk of myocarditis from repeated covid boosters.

And when the current expectation is that people are going to a) get multiple boosters per year and b) get multiple infections per year, every year, for the foreseeable future, yeah, that's an important consideration.

And I remember that when the vaccines first came out that any and all mention of adverse side effects, including the possibility of myocarditis or adverse effect on menstruation, were called misinformation and anti-vaxxer nonsense or conspiracy theories, all because the Biden administration wanted to get as many people vaccinated as possible as quickly as possible in order to force people to "return to normal."

The most embarrassing revelation of the “Facebook Files” released by House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan yesterday (described in more detail here) involves the news media:

In one damning email, an unnamed Facebook executive wrote to Mark Zuckerberg and Cheryl Sandberg:

We are facing continued pressure from external stakeholders, including the White House and the press, to remove more Covid-19 vaccine discouraging content.

We see repeatedly in internal communications not only in the email above, but in the Twitter Files, in the exhibits of the Missouri v Biden lawsuit, and even in the Freedom of Information request results beginning to trickle in here at Racket, that the news media has for some time been working in concert with civil society organizations, government, and tech platforms, as part of the censorship apparatus.

In the summer of 2021, the White House and Joe Biden were in the middle of a major factual faceplant. They were not only telling people the Covid-19 vaccine was a sure bet — “You’re not going to get Covid if you have these vaccinations” is how Biden put it — but that those who questioned its efficacy were “killing people.” But the shot didn’t work as advertised. It didn’t prevent contraction or transmission, something Biden himself continued to be wrong about as late as December of that year.

If you go back and give a careful read to corporate media content from that time describing the administration’s war against “disinformation,” you’ll see outlets were themselves not confident the vaccine worked. Take the New York Times effort from July 16th, 2021, “They’re Killing People: Biden Denounces Social Media for Virus Disinformation.” You can see the Times tiptoeing around what they meant, when they used the word “disinformation.” In this and other pieces they used phrases like, “the spread of anti-vaccine misinformation,” “how to track misinformation,” “the prevalence of misinformation,” even “Biden’s forceful statement capped weeks of anger in the White House over the dissemination of vaccine disinformation,” but they repeatedly hesitated to say what the misinformation was.

Any editor will tell you this language is a giveaway. Journalists wrote expansively about “disinformation,” but rarely got into specifics. They knew that they couldn’t state with certainty that the vaccine worked, that there weren’t side effects, etc., yet still denounced people who asked those questions. This is because they agreed with the concept of “malinformation,” i.e. there are things that may be true factually, but which may produce political results considered adverse. “Hestiancy” was one such bugbear. Note the language from the unnamed Facebook executive above, which describes the press lashing out “Covid-19 vaccine discouraging content,” not “disinformation.”

This is total corruption of the news. We’re supposed to be in the business of questioning officials, even if the questions are unpopular. That’s our entire role! If we don’t do that, we serve no purpose, maybe even a negative purpose. Moreover, think of the implications. News outlets wail about “disinformation” when they’re aware the public has tuned them out. When people don’t listen to reporters, it’s usually because they suck. You can do the math, as to why the current crop embraces censorship. A more embarrassing outcome for our business would be hard to imagine.

#coronavirus #covid vaccines #internet censorship #biden administration

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thepeoplesnotes · 1 year

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**THESE ARE ALL ACTS OF INTIMIDATION CARRIED OUT BY DEMOCRATS AGAINST OUR U.S. SUPREME COURT JUSTICES!**

2019 - A group of Democrat Congressmen send threatening 'brief' to justices calling to "pack the court" if they fail to render desired verdict.

2020 - Democrat Senate Minority Leader Schumer delivers public threat against justices from steps of Supreme Court if they fail to render desired verdict(s).

2021/2022 - Democrats in Senate attempt to pass bills "restructuring & packing" the Supreme Court, as a result of verdicts they did not agree with.

2022 - Supreme Court clerk, suspected of being a Democrat, leaked classifued decision documents, in attempt to change an anticipated verdict.

2022 - Democrat protestors illegally surround & protest at Supreme Court Justices homes, in attempt to change an anticipated verdict.

2022 - Democrat President Biden fails to condemn illegal protesrs outside Supreme Court Justices homes & permits them to continue, in attempt to change anticipated verdict he opposes.

2022 - Democrat Senators & Congressman attack, critice, & defame Supreme Court Justices, including starting public chant of "Fuck the Supreme Court" in an attempt to change an anticipated verdict.

2022 - A Democrat plots & attempts the murder of Supreme Court Justice, gaining access through illegal protests outside Justice Kavanaugh's home that have been permitted to continue by Democrats, in attempt to influence future verdicts..

2022 - Democrats in Senate & House attempt to pass bills to usurp state constitutional authority over abortion, in defiance of Supreme Court Authority & verdict rendered.

2022/2023 Democrat Director Merrick of DOJ instructs U.S. Marshalls not to "refrain from making arrests" while protecting Supreme Court Justices as illegal demonstrations continue, in attempt to influence future verdicts

2023 - Democrat led Senate Judiciary Committee holds ethics hearings against Supreme Court conservative Justices, in attempt to justify threat of restructuring & packing Supreme Court & to influence future verdicts.

2023 - Democrats in Congress threaten to defund the Supreme Court, in attempt to influence future verdicts.

2023 - Democrat Director Merrick threatens to end DOJ funding of US Mardhals protecting Supreme Court Justices, in attempt to influence future verdicts.

Yes, you read that correctly!

Attorney General Merrick Garland acknowledged that in training slides recently brought up in committee by Senator Katie Britt the U.S. Marshals assigned to protect Supreme Court Justices were instructed to "refrain from conducting the arrests" during illegal protests outside Supreme Court Justice's homes.

Democrats on the U.S. Senate & Attorney General Merrick just threatened to cut the budget providing U.S. Marshal protection of Supreme Court Justices, despite illegal protests continuing at their homes & despite last year's attempted murder of Justice Kavanaugh.

**Senator Josh Hawley states that the leak of Supreme Court preliminary decision documents on abortion, along with the unlawful demonstrations, murder attempts, and Democratic public attacks on the Supreme Court and its Conservative Justices majority, are all part of** ***a Democrat campaign to undermine the “independent judiciary.”***

Sen. Hawley stressed the significance of discovering the identity of the leaker while also issuing ***a warning about what many Democrats are attempting to do as they “try to pressure the Court to compel and force the Court the way they want.”***

The Democrat led Senate Judiciary Committee convened a hearing last week on 'Supreme Court Ethics Reform,' and throughout it, **Republican Senators emphasized how overt these Democrat political crusades against the Supreme Court have grown to be.**

***"That’s why all the attacks on the justices that are clearly coordinated, especially Justice Thomas, that’s why the leaker did what he or she did. It is clearly to try and strong-arm the Court,”*** Sen. Hawley suggested to the media.

Sen. Hawley has made it abundantly clear that he disagrees with some of the decisions this Court has rendered, but he also stressed that ***“there is a big difference between saying ‘you know what, I don’t agree with that’ and then saying ‘I’m going to try to pack the Court, or intimidate the Court, or change the Court, so they’ll do what I want them to do. That’s not an independent judiciary. That’s not our Constitution.”***

Even more, Sen. Hawley said, ***“I do think this assault on the Court, by the left, is dangerous, very dangerous, and I think that leak is part of that, as well as these recent attacks on Justice Thomas.”***

***The frequency and urgency of these attacks has reached “a fever pitch from the left,”*** according to Sen. Hawley. He also cited threats made against Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch by then Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) in March 2020 if they did not vote the way he wanted in an abortion case.

Sen. Hawley stressed the need to ***“just follow the law”*** when it comes to the protests by holding them in a public setting rather than illegally holding them at the justices’ homes, including late at night and while endangering their children.

***"Finding out who the leaker is still doable and imperative,*** Sen. Hawley said.

This is exactly as Sen. Mike Lee stated in a phone conversation with the Daily Signal last week.

Sen. Hawley stated that ***he “wasn’t surprised at all”*** that Justice Samuel Alito thinks he knows who leaked the Dobbs opinion in reference to remarks Justice Alito made to the Wall Street Journal in an interview last month.

Sen. Hawley added, ***“I don’t think it’s that hard to find the leaker,”*** as he mentioned how few employees there are at the Court based on personal experience.

Sen. Hawley worked as a law clerk for Chief Justice John Roberts before, while Sen. Lee worked as a law clerk for Justice Alito. These two Senators know about what they are speaking on this point

**The regular employees, whom Sen. Hawley highlighted were “wonderful, wonderful people,” are only 36 in a given year, and even then, he made it apparent that “numerically, there just aren’t that many of them,” and “it’s not really a very big staff at all.”**

The reason Sen. Hawley said, ***“I just don’t buy this, this ‘oh, we can’t tell who it is,'”*** is because of the small quantity.

Similar urgency was voiced by Sen. Lee as well. If the leaker is not caught, the issue might worsen, as Lee had previously told the Daily Signal. ***“This sort of thing will continue if there’s no consequence to it,”*** he had said.

A January investigation by DOJ had produced very little information, and it was determined that the leaker could not be found.

Considering this investigatiin was led by the same DOJ that instructed U.S. Marshalls to "refrain from conducting arrests" & the same DOJ now threatening to "end the protection details" of our Supreme Court Justices, Americans are NOT in the least surprised.

***However, to see Director Merrick, the highest Democrat appointed law enforcement authority in our land, playing a significant role of the intimidation attempts against Supreme Court Justices, the highest court authority in our land, whom Democrats did not appoint & whom Democrars wish to destroy!!***

It is **illegal** to attempt to intimidate judges/justices as means to influence their decision making in court cases. Imtimidation can be done in a variety of ways, such as making threats of violence, threats od retribution, threats against their position, or by offering bribes. I timidation carries a variety of penalties, including imprisonment.

***APPARENTLY DEMOCRATS...FROM PSYCHO ON STREET, TO PROTESTORS, TO CONGRESSMEN, SENATORS, & EVEN THE PRESIDENT....ALL THINK THEY ARE ABOVE U.S. LAW!!***

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usafphantom2 · 1 year

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Israel shoots down "aircraft" coming from Syria amid growing tensions with Iran

Fernando Valduga By Fernando Valduga 04/04/2023 - 12:00 in Military, War Zones

Israeli airstrikes hit several locations in Homs province, Syria, early Sunday, injuring five soldiers, Syrian state media reported. Hours later, the Israeli military said they had shot down an "aircraft" that was crossing from Syria to Israeli airspace.

In Iran, the state media reported that an Iranian adviser who was injured in an Israeli attack on Friday died due to his injuries. Since the beginning of the conflict in Syria in March 2011, Iran has been one of the main supporters of President Bashar Assad's government and has sent advisors since the early days of the war.

Sunday's attack marked the ninth time Israel has hit targets in Syria since the beginning of the year, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitor linked to the opposition.

This photo released by ImageSat International on April 2, 2023 shows damage to al-Dabaa airport in Syria after an airstrike attributed to Israel a day earlier. (Photo: ImageSat International)

The state news agency SANA, citing military sources, said the attacks targeted locals in the city of Homs and its surroundings. Syrian air defenses intercepted the missiles and shot down some of them, he said.

The observatory reported that the missiles hit Syrian military and militia sites linked to Iran, including a research center.

On Sunday night, the Israeli army said that Israeli Air Force helicopters and fighters were mobilized after an unidentified aircraft that appears to have crossed from Syria to Israeli territory. He added that the aircraft was monitored by the Israeli Air Force throughout the incident and was later shot down.

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There was no immediate statement from Israel about the attacks in Syria.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not directly mention the attacks at a meeting of his cabinet on Sunday, but said that Israel was acting against foreign threats.

“We are charging a high price for regimes that support terror outside Israel’s borders,” he said.

Netanyahu said that a major domestic crisis about his government's plan to reform the judiciary did not affect Israel's ability to attack.

“The internal discussion in Israel does not harm and will not harm our determination or intensity or our ability to act against our enemies on all fronts, anywhere and at any time necessary,” he said.

Later on Sunday, Israel's Defense Minister Yoav Gallant commented on Syria during a visit to soldiers in the occupied West Bank, but did not directly confirm the recent air strikes.

“We will not allow the Iranians and Hezbollah to harm us. We do not allow this in the past, we will not allow it now or at any time in the future," Gallant said. He also accused Iran of trying to consolidate its presence along Israel's borders.

"When necessary - we will push them out of Syria to where they belong - and that's Iran," Gallant said.

The reservists promised not to attend the service while the reform progressed, leading military and defense officers to warn of damage to military capabilities. Netanyahu stopped the review for the time being.

Israel has carried out hundreds of attacks against targets within parts controlled by the Syrian government in recent years, including attacks on Damascus and Aleppo airports, but rarely recognizes specific operations.

Israel says it targets bases of militant groups allied with Iran, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, which sent thousands of fighters to support Assad's forces.

On Friday, Israeli airstrikes hit the suburbs of Syria's capital, Damascus, killing an Iranian adviser, state media from Syria and Iran reported. Iran's state television reported on Friday that Milad Heidari, an Iranian military adviser, was killed during what he called a "criminal attack" by Israel.

Iranian state media reported on Sunday that another Revolutionary Guard adviser injured in Friday's attack succumbed to his injuries. Iran's state TV identified the adviser as Meghdad Mahghani, adding that his funeral would be held on Sunday in Damascus.

An Israeli air strike last month targeting Aleppo airport left him out of service for two days. The airport has been a main channel for aid remittances since the 7.8 magnitude earthquake that hit Syria and Turkey on February 6.

Israel also attacked seaports in areas controlled by the Syrian government, in an apparent attempt to prevent the sending of Iranian weapons to militant groups supported by Tehran, including Hezbollah.

Source: AP

Tags: Military AviationWar Zones - Middle East

Fernando Valduga

Aviation photographer and pilot since 1992, he has participated in several events and air operations, such as Cruzex, AirVenture, Dayton Airshow and FIDAE. He has works published in specialized aviation magazines in Brazil and abroad. Uses Canon equipment during his photographic work throughout the world of aviation.