This piece in Politico by Michael Kruse is a tour de force and I highly recommend reading the whole thing if you have time. This topic is something that’s been discussed a lot but I’ve never seen this put together in quite this way. Trump has been trying to blow up the American system of justice for decades. And now he has a fairly good chance of doing exactly that: What happened in Room 300 of the New York County Courthouse in lower Manhattan in November had never happened. Not in the preceding almost two and a half centuries of the history of the United States. Donald Trump was on the witness stand. It was not unprecedented in the annals of American jurisprudence just because it was a former president, although that was totally true. It was unprecedented because the power dynamic of the courtroom had been upended — the defendant was not on defense, the most vulnerable person in the room was the most dominant person in the room, and the people nominally in charge could do little about it.
Reading
In the morning, my son and daughter wander downstairs whenever they want. I don’t bother waking them at a reasonable hour, since my highest priority as a parent is for my kids to see me as their best friend, rather than an authority figure.
I believe that any attempt to regulate my kids’ eating will give them eating disorders, so I let them choose their own breakfast. They always choose granola.
My kids get dressed, but when I see my daughter’s clothes, I inform her they’re not revealing enough. I retrieve a pair of scissors from my unnecessarily open kitchen and cut her shirt in half horizontally to reveal her midriff. I convince both kids to put on more makeup.
Next, I drop the kids off at school because they’re too soft to walk the six miles uphill. I’m always careful to pack their water bottles, even though I never brought a water bottle to school, and I didn’t die of dehydration.
Israel has just defended the indefensible in the International Court of Justice, in its quest to have the case brought by South Africa against it thrown out. At the historic ICJ hearing on Thursday, South Africa – itself a past victim of murderous colonialism and apartheid for almost half a century – made an impassioned Continue reading »
The US and UK have reportedly struck over a dozen sites in Yemen using Tomahawk missiles and fighter jets, backed by logistical support from Australia, Canada, Bahrain and the Netherlands. A statement from President Biden asserts that the strikes against “targets in Yemen used by Houthi rebels” are a “direct response to unprecedented Houthi attacks Continue reading »
“… but they can be sure that they won’t be recorded for their crimes in history — because there won’t be any history” (Noam Chomsky, 2023) The macabre criminality of world so-called ”leaders”, coupled with the ignorant compliance of a majority of victims of global heating and nuclear annihilation, belong to the inconceivable. It is Continue reading »
John Howard took Australia into the devastating war of aggression in Iraq in March 2003 but has still not been held accountable. Recently released archives show the then prime minister did not even bother to prepare a written cabinet submission setting out the case for the invasion. Yet there was no plausible evidence available to Continue reading »
The term terrorism has become a fighting word in the arsenal of a declining world empire known as the United States of America. Its leaders’ endless talk of terrorism is in reality a desperate swansong, an indicator of the downfall of the United States as a global empire, its slow but irreversible disappearance from the Continue reading »
Israel is relying on world sympathy fatigue and amnesia. They are biding their time for the world to look away so that they can finish the job they started back in 1948. That is, the elimination of the Palestinian people. With luck, they hope, the world will stop their bleeding-heart moaning about Gaza and the Continue reading »
As South Africa presents its case against Israel to the International Court of Justice, even Genocide Joe might hesitate to defy a “binding” order of the world’s highest judicial authority by continuing to support, militarily, financially and diplomatically, Israel’s genocidal assault against the people of Gaza. The three hours of oral arguments by the six Continue reading »
“Whatever the outcome, we are witnessing an amazing moment of rule of international law history,” said Amnesty International secretary general Agnès Callamard. Human rights defenders and legal experts on Thursday lauded what many called South Africa’s “compelling” opening presentation at the International Court of Justice in The Hague in a case accusing Israel of genocide Continue reading »
The hearing at the ICJ is not only a determination of the genocidal nature of Israel’s assault on Gaza, it is also an adjudication on the morality of the West. This week, South Africa will open its case against Israel at the International Court of Justice in The Hague. The indictment is based on the Continue reading »
Here we go again. The House Republicans are running around in circles, unable to agree among themselves about what they were sent to Washington to do and we are once again on the cusp of a government shutdown. No matter who’s in charge or what the circumstances are, they just can’t get anything done. And for some reason they believe this is a winning election year strategy. The week started out on a hopeful note. I was pleasantly surprised to see that Speaker Mike Johnson and House Majority Leader Chuck Schumer had come to an agreement on a top-line budget number. This seemed to signal that Johnson and his team were serious negotiators who might actually be able to avoid a government shut down. Of course, the framework was already in place from the deal struck last spring between then Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Biden to raise the debt ceiling, but it still spoke well of his successor that he could be practical enough to recognize that he was going to have to negotiate.
United Against Nuclear Iran, a secretive neoconservative organization with close links to the CIA and the Mossad, is trying to escalate the Israeli assault on Gaza into an Iraq-level U.S. Attack on Iran.
The post United Against Nuclear Iran: The Shadowy, Intelligence-Linked Group Driving the US Towards War With Iran appeared first on MintPress News.
And say anything Donald Trump believes Americans who gave their lives in defense of their country are “suckers” and “losers.” What must he think of his fans who will believe any lie he tells? Paul Waldman responded to Donald Trump’s Wednesday town hall on Fox News: Trump has always employed this very simple strategy: Dish out the most preposterous hyperbole and lies, but do it with the utter conviction that only an experienced con artist can muster. It’s what he did as a businessman, what he did when he ran for president in 2016, and what he has done ever since. Trump’s shtick has worn thin, Waldman believes, but it’s the only one he’s got. Trump went to it again upon leaving a New York City courtroom on Thursday. Trump stood before reporters and lambasted N.Y. Attorney General Letitia James. Presiding Judge Arthur Engoron (who received a bomb threat at his Long Island home on Thursday) will determine how large of a fine the Trump Organization will pay for committing decades of fraud in New York. Engoron mentioned Bernie Madoff’s case at the end of the day, reported Susanne Craig of the New York Times.
Seemingly lasting an eternity, Professor Chris Painter dissects the failures of governance of the 2019-2024 Parliament, in response to momentous events
Monday’s child is fair of face,
Tuesday’s child is full of grace.
Wednesday’s child is full of woe,
Thursday’s child has far to go.
Friday’s child is loving and giving,
Saturday’s child works hard for a living.
And the child born on the Sabbath day
Is bonny and blithe, good and gay.
I was a Friday child with a Saturday moon rising.
In all of my fifty-four years of life, with me being the baby of the family and all, you’d think someone might’ve mentioned that we were poor. You’d think that during my tendril years of running wild along our family vine that someone would’ve sat me down and explained that for all my reaching for the sun, I just wasn’t ever gonna touch the sky.
Raskin and Markey will need increased security “Democrats Propose Bill to Neuter Militias” is how Vice News described it: Militias who like to spend their weekends training to overthrow the government could find themselves running afoul of federal law, under new legislation being proposed in the House and Senate Thursday that seeks to curtail paramilitary activity. The “Preventing Private Paramilitary Activity Act” is being introduced by Senator Ed Markey from Massachusetts, and Congressman Jamie Raskin of Maryland, both Democrats. Here’s the bill. Here’s Raskin’s statement: Washington, DC – Following the anniversary of the January 6th attack on the United States Capitol, Congressman Jamie Raskin (MD-08) and Senator Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) introduced the Preventing Private Paramilitary Activity Act,legislation that wouldcreate a federal prohibition on paramilitary groups through civil and criminal enforcement.
Doctor Who Series 15 is getting a Blu-Ray box set - but the new mini-episode revealing Leela's fate in the "Time War" has our full attention.
Keats was deeply interested in suffering. He came by it naturally and also medically; sometimes it appeared as an impulse towards poetic tragedy. He wants what he has always wanted, to soothe pain. If he cannot soothe it, he wants to redeem it as creative power.