Wednesday, November 20, 2019
The Tale of the Whistle Blower
Clear as a whistle
— John Byrom, Epistle to Lloyd
After listening to Jim Jordan’s reasoned analysis of the impeachment process at the conclusion of the first day of the impeachment hearing before the House Intelligence Committee, a number of readers have written asking me to explain why, at this stage of the proceedings. it is so important for people like Jim Jordan to be able to talk to the whistleblower to discover what happened? To help readers understand the process, a simple made-up example may provide an answer.
A is the only witness to a terrible car accident that, unknown to A, was being driven by B who, it turns out is drunk. The car being driven by B was heading the wrong way on a four-lane highway at the time it crashed into another car. A promptly called the police to report the accident. Thereafter, he left the scene and went home. The next day A went to Europe on a 6-month trip.
As a result of A’s call to the police, several things happened. The police showed up at the site of the accident. Since B’s car was headed the wrong way on a four-lane highway when it crashed into the other car, the police could easily figure out who was to blame for the accident. B was given a blood alcohol test that showed his blood alcohol level to be at such a high level that he was charged with, among other things, drunk driving. As a result of their investigation, the police issued B several tickets.
B was convinced he was innocent of all the charges, and hired a lawyer named Jim Jordan to represent him. Jim had a master’s degree in education from Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, and obtained his JD degree from Capital University Law School in 2001. Jim was happy to take the case because not only would he earn a good fee, but he knew he could, as they say in the trade, “beat the rap. ”
The first thing he did after he was hired was to go to the police department to find out who it was that first reported the crash, a person known in common parlance as the “whistleblower.” Jim had visited the scene of the accident and concluded that if A had been standing in one specific spot near the highway, he could not possibly have seen the accident and his call to the police department would be discredited.
Accordingly, he caused a subpoena to be issued to A commanding him to appear at the trial. Jim wanted to be able to cross examine A because he hoped that he might be able cast doubt on A’s credibility and, as a result, cast doubt in the minds of the jurors as to whether or not B was guilty. Jim’s tactic depended, of course, on the jurors overlooking the fact that B had been convicted of drunk driving, and his car was driving the wrong way on a four-lane highway. To impeach A, Jim would have to get A to come home from Europe which, of course, A refused to do.
When arguing to the court that his client’s trial could not begin without A’s presence, Jim made a number of creative arguments in support of his position. He said: “We will never get the chance to see the whistleblower raise his right hand, swear to tell the truth and nothing but the truth and -we’ll never get that chance. This Anonymous so-called whistleblower with no first-hand knowledge (who is the reason we’re all sitting here today)-we’ll never get a chance to question that individual.” Of course Jim was counting on the fact that if A was present, he could prove that from where A was standing, A could not possibly have seen the accident and therefore would lack first-hand knowledge. Jim went on saying: “We’ll never get a chance to question that individual. We’ll not get to check out his credibility, his motivations, his bias.”
Jim’s argument to the court as to why the proceedings should be put on hold until A could be compelled to testify were excellently presented by Jim. Nonetheless, the judge pointed out to Jim one thing he had apparently overlooked. B’s client was in the wrong lane, heading the wrong way and was drunk. The trial was permitted to continue without A and B was convicted on all counts and sentenced to a long prison term.
In 2007 Jim Jordan ran for Congress and was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Ohio’s 4th district where he continues to serve today. On November 8, 2019, Jim was appointed to the House Intelligence Committee that is conducting the public impeachment hearings,by Devin Nunes, the ranking member of the Committee. Nunes knew that Jim would be able to convince the country that without the whistle blower’s presence, the hearings being conducted were nothing more than a very bad joke. B is watching the hearings from his prison cell, scratching his head. B is not the only head scratching citizen watching the hearings.
Monday, October 21, 2019
Now and Then
[A]fter the final destruction of the Nazi tyranny, they hope to see established a peace. . . which will afford assurance that all the men in all the lands may live out their lives in freedom from fear and want.
_Atlantic Charter issued August 14, 1941+
It was all in good fun It took place for trump supporters the weekend of October 14, 2019, at the Trump National Doral Miami. That was the trump owned resort that was to be the site of the G-7 meeting in 2020, until it wasn’t. It had been selected by trump for the meeting of the G7 because, as Mick Mulvaney, Acting Chief of Staff explained: “Trump still considers himself to be in the hospitality business.”
The event was organized by American Priority, a group that pretends to promote free speech. It was attended by, among others, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, and Donald Trump Jr. In a room adjacent to the main ballroom at the hotel, a video that was produced by an anonymous person operating under the name of: “The GeekzTeam” was shown on a revolving loop. The video includes the logo for the trump 2020 campaign. According to the New York Times’s description of the video, Mr. Trump’s head is superimposed on the body of a man entering the “Church of Fake News. ” As he walks down the aisle he stops, pulls out a gun, and opens fire on parishioners who have the faces of his critics, or the logos of media organizations superimposed on their bodies. Among his victims are “Black Lives Matter”, and “Vice News.” He continues walking down the aisle and as he approaches the alter, he is shown striking John McCain in the back of the neck, hitting Rosie O’Donnell in the face, and then stabbing her in the head. He sets fire to Bernie Sanders hair. The video ends with trump standing on the church altar and admiring the victims of his violent behavior.
Reports suggest that there are many similar memes, as they are known, available on the internet, all depicting violent acts against critics of trump. The trump himself tweeted a video in which he participates in a wrestling match and body slams and beats up the CNN logo. That tweet went viral among his supporters.
Although lacking internet, the Nazis knew the value of film in order to get their message to the people. In 1930 the party established a film department. In Mein Kampf Hitler wrote that: “The picture, in all its forms, including the film, has better prospects. In a much shorter time, at one stroke I might say, people will understand a pictorial presentation of something which it would take them a long and laborious effort of reading to understand.”
In 1932, Hans Traub, a Nazi propagandist, said that film is a “formidable means of propaganda.” Explaining its importance he said that: “Achieving propagandistic influence has always demanded a ‘language’ which forms a memorable and passionate plot with a simple narrative. . . . the most effective is the moving picture. . . . it has an unimaginable richness of rhythm for intensifying or dispelling emotions.”
Discussing films made in Nazi Germany, “Facing History and Ourselves” observes that although many films were made to glorify the Nazis, others were made to “dehumanize, criminalize, and demonize vulnerable minorities-particularly Jews.” The trump and his supporters know how that works.
Noel King of NPR conducted an interview of Taika Waititi, the director of the movie, “Jojo Rabbit” on October 18, 2019, the date the movie was released. The movie is a satire of Nazi Germany, and is about a 10-year old boy named Jojo Rabbit. Jojo is in the Hitler Youth Movement and he wants to be the best Nazi he can be. In the film Jojo says “I swear to devote all my energies and my strength to the savior of our country, Adolf Hitler.”
The NPR interview concludes with a lengthy commentary from Mr. Waititi, that is especially timely in today’s world. “So we think we live in the safety of 2019? Yes, we don’t have to worry about Hitler and his retribution on us for making jokes about him. [But} I mean, this film shouldn’t really need to be made. In 2019 do I really need to make a film with the heart of the message being, you shouldn’t be a Nazi. At the end of World War II, there was a very clear and simple law. If you’re a Nazi, you go to jail because there’s no room in this world for you and those ideas. Now, sadly, in America and other places, the law now is, if you’re a Nazi feel free to go down to the town square and have a little rally because we’ve got this thing called freedom of speech. And you can sort of say what you want, and you’re protected by that. It’s become very twisted. And if anyone says [about this movie] “oh, well, another World War II film-we get it. That was 80 years ago.” Well, we obviously don’t get it-because we’re getting dangerously close to this sort of thing happening again. And we’re living in a world where there are world leaders who are very happy to promote hate and intolerance and ideas that were prevalent in the ‘30s.’” Mr. Waititi got that right. Think Orban, Assad, Duterte, Putin, Xi, el Sisi, Erdogan, and, trump, the spoiled, petulant, mendacious occupant of the White House, to name just a few. It’s frightening.
Tuesday, October 8, 2019
All ye, all ye outs in free
Pray you now, forget and forgive.
— Shakespeare, King Lear
One went up and one went down. Each enjoyed similar benefits as a result of their travels. I refer to Brett Kavanaugh and Maryanne Trump Barry. Brett ascended to the United States Supreme Court and Maryanne descended from the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Their travels enabled them to escape the consequences of their misconduct.
Because of his ascension, Brett avoided facing any consequences for claims of sexual misconduct that followed him through his confirmation process, and more pertinently, complaints about his ethical misconduct during his confirmation hearing.
The misconduct during his confirmation hearing came about because of his inadequately developed sense of propriety that manifested itself when, during the hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee which was considering his appointment to the United States Supreme Court, he modelled himself after the White House juvenile (who in a recent moment of petulance described himself as having “great and unmatched wisdom”). Equally petulant during his confirmation hearing, Brett screamed and yelled at the committee which was trying to determine whether he was fit to serve on the United States Supreme Court. He said the hearing was “a calculated and orchestrated political hit job . . .revenge on behalf of the Clintons and millions of dollars in money from outside left-wing opposition groups.”
By the time the senate voted on Brett’s confirmation, 83 complaints had been lodged against him with the Committee on Judicial and Disability because of, among other things, his puerile conduct before the Senators. After his ascension, the Committee said he was no longer subject to the federal judiciary’s internal ethics review process. That is because the Act does not give the Committee the ability to investigate grievances against members of the Supreme Court. Brett is home free for life. So is Maryanne.
Maryanne is the sister and incidental, (and probably not unwitting), beneficiary of the illegal conduct of her baby brother, a man whose complete lack of anything bordering on ethical behavior, has resulted in his making huge amounts of money through his dishonest and corrupt business practices. His family, including Maryanne, have been the beneficiaries of his corrupt behavior.
According to a report in the New York times there were, among other things, many examples of successful tax fraud by the trumps when dealing with assets owned by their father. The results of that fraud were that the trump and his siblings made huge amounts of money by cheating the federal government on the estate taxes owed on account of their father’s death and undervaluing assets that were transferred to them in order to avoid payment of gift taxes, to give but two examples of their corrupt behavior. Other instances of fraudulent conduct were disclosed at length in the New York Times’ investigation.
Notwithstanding her participation in family fraud, Maryanne is not without a sense of propriety. When her baby brother became the president of the United States, Maryanne notified the court that she would no longer be hearing any cases and would relinquish her staff and her chambers. The only benefit she retained following her retirement was her salary. Not only did she remain entitled to her salary following her retirement, but she remained subject to the rules pertaining to judicial conduct that apply to all federal judges except those on the Supreme Court. As a result she could be investigated for perceived misconduct.
Following the conclusion of the New York Times investigation, a complaint was filed with the appropriate Judicial Conduct Council by lawyers concerned about her apparent ethical breaches while a federal judge, as the incidental beneficiary of her baby brother’s corrupt behavior. Maryanne did not, it seems, want to wait to find out what the Council would conclude as to her participation in family fraud. Instead, she fully retired from the court. That deprived the Council of jurisdiction to determine if, in fact, she was subject to any form of discipline because of her involvement in her baby brother’s criminal activities. Her descent from the court into the world of everyday mortals was a great result for Maryanne if not for the reputation of the federal judiciary.
Senator Elizabeth Warren has now come up with a plan to put an end to the immunity for consequences of bad behavior by federal judges that now protects them. She wants to close the loophole through which Brett and Maryanne crawled. As she explained: “My plan extends the authority of the Judicial Conference to former judges so that individuals under investigation cannot simply resign from the bench to avoid accountability.” She also wants to extend the Code of Conduct for United States Judges to Justices sitting on the Supreme Court. If Senator Warren’s proposals were adopted, Brett-Maryanne results would no longer occur.
He went up, she went down. The American public went nowhere. Neither did the investigations into their misconduct. As the trump would say: SO SAD.