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storiesofsvu · 3 years ago

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Can you Rate the SVU ADA on scale of 1-10 and include what you think about them. I’ve already started my own but kinda curious to see what other fans opinions are

I’m just gonna roll with a lot of the adas/other lawyers on the show cause…why not…I’m bored…

Alex Cabot:

9/10. She has the best character arc out of literally every single character on the show. I will not budge on that. She comes in hot, and stays incredible. We get to see some of her softer/broken down side in Guilt, easily one of my fave eps. She’s fighting her ass off for the victims, she’s ruthless, she’s sassy, her wardrobe is incredible. She literally loses her entire life for this job. When she comes back post WPP, she’s changed, and it’s for the better, she’s grown, she’s matured, her view of the world and the legal world is changed, it’s skewed, she’s already starting to see how many things are wrong with it. After the Nardalee stuff, she takes it upon *herself* to go and try to make a change in regions of the world that are stricken with rape and assault and violence. She’s also the first person to get marital rape past the grand jury, and one of the first to get a conviction on a female rapist. When we see her again in s19(?20?) she’s said “fuck it” to following the law/rules and is helping women who desperately need it, who the justice system would probably just fail anyways, but she still has her license and is still a bad ass in court. In her earlier seasons, she definitely keeps her emotions/feelings at bay, and she doesn’t have as much compassion as later on, she very quickly and willingly takes the blame for the dude who gets third degree burns while working “undercover” for the cops and it doesn’t seem to bother her at all. She also has her cocky moments (though tbh, she deserves it). She also has a lot of resources within the legal/upper east side worlds that she is not afraid of taking advantage of and we love that for her.

Elizabeth Donnelly:

9.5/10.

She’s the baddest ass of the bad asses, like, has the biggest dick out of the entire DA’s office and everyone knows it. She’s not to be fucked with, I’m sure her win rate was super fucking high. She’s sassy, she doesn’t give a fuck what people think of her or if she offends them. She also stands up for her people, she’s protective over her girls, but also reminds them of what’s right, and the difference between legally right and morally right. She saved Casey’s ass three times, twice when she represented her in court, (stepping down from the bench) and once when she suspended her (fight me. She saved her ass from getting fired. Earlier in s9 McCoy said he would have casey disbarred if she pulled anymore crap. After the s9 finale, if liz hadn’t had her suspended, casey would’ve been done for completely). Liz also has a bit of a chaotic queen side to her and we love that. Liz also had to deal with the bullshit of fighting her way through the legal world when it wasn’t exactly a “place” for women to be, she had to deal with 10000 x more sexism in the work place than those who came after her, and that makes her even more bad ass..

Casey Novak:

9/10.

Another bad ass, but someone who had to work her ass off to get where she is. She originally didn’t want sex crimes, she wasn’t sure she was good enough for it, that she could handle it. She’s incredibly empathetic, she *feels* for the victims, and takes her losses very personally. She carries a lot of guilt when she doesn’t get justice for people, and she wears her heart on her sleeve most of the time. She’s not afraid about breaking a few rules as long as what’s right gets done, even if that means sacrificing herself in the process. She’s changed when she comes back from her suspension, part of it being maturity, having aged into her more adult life, and part of it being a “fuck it” attitude. She also has to deal with the “immediate post Elliot era Olivia” meaning that she puts up with a lot of crap, arguing and blame and attitude coming from Liv who’s taking out her frustrations on anyone around her.. she also gets some GARBAGE cases after returning so …..she loses points for her atrocious wardrobe choices in the earlier seasons though.

Kim Greylek:

4/10.

Talk about coming in hot and not following through. This bitch was all “I’m the crusader, I’m so good, I’m a bad ass, casey novak got disbarred, she can suck it”. Meanwhile she just…sucked…she would instantly blame the cops, she was just super fucking annoying. Honestly a lot of why I don’t like kim stems from two places: one, she replaced the love of my life and was cocky and rude about it, number two: the actress wasn’t right for the part, and mikaela has said herself that she wasn’t the right fit, that she wasn’t prepared/ready for the legal jargon and that’s why she left before the season was fully done. She is super pretty though.

Sonya Paxton:

7.5/10

Home girl was the executive Ada, which means she’s been doing this for a long ass time. She’s brash, she’s ballsy and she calls the cops on their shit immediately. She values *her* job and making sure that the case isn’t going to get thrown out over them even thinking about questioning. She knows what she’s talking about and knows her way around the law. She regularly gives stabler shit which gets extra points for me. Obviously she’s also a bit of an alcoholic which is pretty problematic, but she goes to rehab and cleans herself up and does everything she’s supposed to. It was a waste to fucking kill her off and I’ll forever be salty about it.

Gillian Hardwicke:

6/10

She came in basically screaming about how her win rate was in the 90’s, which seemed pretty unbelievable to start with, but like girl, chill, your rate’s about to go way down now that you’re svu. She did fairly well in court, she was good at her job, but we didn’t see much of her, she was in those seasons that they were constantly shuffling ada’s around and couldn’t decide on who to keep cast. She was a decent enough fit with the team, better than Kim was, but she wasn’t great.

Kristen Torres:

10/10.

Home girl was like the baby of the ada’s or something cause she was always talked about but never actually seen, or just in arraignment cause someone else was running late or couldn’t be bothered. I think we only actually got her as the Ada twice over the years, and once was the s10 finale cause they didn’t want to kill off alex (again). And the other episode she was in we barely saw any court scenes. She deserved better, and more…

Rafael Barba:

7/10.

(Don’t fucking come for me). Barba was a wonderful addition to the team, and had incredible chemistry (imo, platonic) with olivia. He was pretty standoffish and cocky at first, which still held up with a lot of people over the years even though him and Liv got closer. The sass, the quips, the stylish suits, great bonuses, he always looked good, and he knew it. He was great in a court room, but not so great as a person…if that makes sense. He holds little empathy for the victims, especially in his first episode, he just comes off as cold. Like, i get it, his job is to take it to court, make sure that the vics are ready to testify and win the case, but…yeah…I do appreciate how much he stands up for what’s right when it comes to taking on cops/police brutality and the like, he’s not against sacrificing personal relationships to make sure that the proper people get justice. I also appreciated his return in s22, wish we would have gotten a bit of a better episode, but hey, we’ll take what we can.

Peter Stone:

8/10.

First and foremost, this is also based on my opinions after watching Chicago Justice, where the character originated, and where he was written a MILLION times better. Also personally, I just really liked Stone. I think most people hate him because he replaced Barba and are teh people who are all #bringbackbarba on literally every single post (which is a whole other discussion. Let actors go do what they want to do pls. And also understand that they’re not the ones responsible for the direction their character goes, and that they can’t just waltz back to a show and say they want to come back…) anyways. Peter was a great lawyer, and the poor fucking guy went through SO much in such a short time. He always had a complicated relationship with his dad, having to figure out how to grieve him, while taking care of his sister who had no idea who he was, while adjusting to a new city, a new department and a new squad that all hates him because he was just doing his fucking job? Like, c’mon guys…fucking chill. He also got falsely accused of rape, watched his sister die, and in the end, literally broke the law to win the Rob Miller case. Like, yeah bro, I would fucking quit after that too.

Sonny Carisi:

6/10.

Sorry sunshine….and to clarify, this is JUST him AS AN ADA. I love Sonny, i love detective Carisi. I still love him as a human, and think he’s wonderful and so soft and lovely. But the show kinda fucked it up, and part of that is because it is a show and fiction/not close to reality. Sonny would NEVER be straight out of passing the bar, junior ada, trying cases of the level that he was. They missed an INCREDIBLE opportunity of having him shadow/second chair barba/stone through the last of their episodes, or having the option of bringing in someone (preferably a past ada) as bureau chief to over see him. We saw that with Liz/Casey/Alex, and it was a lovely dynamic to see. We even got a little bit of it with Cutter in Alex’s later seasons. It just…doesn’t make sense. They clearly show him as bottom of the barrel with his office being a cubicle and then being so small, even if he does have a door. I don’t know what they were planning with Hadid, she seemed pretty antagonist, but now she just doesn’t exist anymore? 🤷🏼‍♀️

FUCK I FORGOT PIPPA HOW COULD I??!!!

Pippa Cox:

9.5/10.

Only looses the half point because she married Hank. She’s a fucking goddess, she’s a queen who deserves everything. She’s a bad ass in court, she knows exactly how to keep her work life and her home life separate. She’s an advocate for children, which is like, so soft and wonderful and powerful all on its own. She ALWAYS looks incredible, she’s a wonderful, caring, protective mother, and she comes back even stronger after the whole hank shit goes down. So…she also a bad ass. And she kicks ass in court.

#law and order svu

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prurientpuddlejumper · 4 years ago

Text

Out Tonight (Part 4)

<- Part 3 | Part 5 ->

Summary: The morning after your drunken hookup with Rafael Barba, continued. More awkwardness and unpacking the dubcon.

3,294 words

You had been nervous waking up next to a stranger. You knew you’d both been drunk, and caught up in a karaoke dream. Now that the night’s carefree energy had worn off, and the glamorous glow of stage lights were replaced by the garish light of day, you were worried things would be awkward.

Of course, you had pictured something more along the lines of, he would think you were ugly, or you would freeze up and blurt something stupid, or he’d slip his wedding ring out of his pocket, put it back on his finger, and smack you on the ass as he swaggered out, and you’d feel like an idiot.

You had not expected the shitstorm of him not remembering anything.

He was drunk, but with the way he was spouting off legal advice, you would never have imagined he was blackout drunk. You never imagined waking up to being accused of drugging him. God—this was what you got for letting loose for once. It always seemed so glamorous when your college roommates brought guys home after a night of partying, but of course the one time you do, you’re a sexual predator. Fuck!

Then again, it was starting to make sense. Because immediately after accusing you, he practically tried to arrest himself. The open, flirtatious charmer you met at the bar was so unlike this tightly-wound ball of anxiety, he must have been down to his last brain cell last night. It was just that each and every one of his brain cells happened to contain the entire New York bar exam.

But that didn’t make you a predator, did it? He was fine. Maybe not fine, but not… It wasn’t like he was unconscious. Oh, god, was that really how low you wanted to set the bar? It’s fine to take advantage of drunk people so long as they haven’t passed out yet? Or so long as they’re men? Your stomach turned. Everything he said about filing charges against him… suddenly you were certain you were the one who should be standing in front of a grand jury.

***

Barba waved the compact hotel-provided blow dryer over his freshly washed and rung out boxers. His pants and shirt would need to be ironed before he would dare leave the hotel room (it was bad enough that he had none of his usual hair product and was already dreadfully fuzzy), but the large ironing board wouldn’t fit inside the small hotel bathroom. He would have to go back out there, but he didn’t have a change of pants. He wondered if would be appropriate to walk around in just his boxers. You had already seen him naked, he supposed. Maybe. He didn’t really know what happened between you, but it seemed a bit late to be feeling shy.

Then again, he still could not be certain he wasn’t the one who pushed himself on you. As he got into the shower, he had smelled you on his fingers, and the scent was so intoxicating he had to stop himself from licking them. A little clip of memory returned, your lips warm and inviting against his, the taste of your tongue, his hips rolling desperately against yours, and he realized what that feeling was that he could not quite place. It was attachment: a deep, carnal, passionate, bond. Probably the product of oxytocin or… pheromones? Some lizard-brain part of him had developed an irresistible need for you.

It wouldn’t be unusual for a victim in your situation to act friendly toward her abuser, if you hadn’t fully processed yet. If he had taken advantage of a drunk woman at a bar, he certainly had no desire to traumatize you further by strutting around half naked.

He put on his toasty boxers and mostly-clean undershirt, and knocked at the bathroom door, poking his head out into the room, eyes averted. “Sorry to ask, but do you have a pair of sweatpants that might fit me?”

There was a flash of movement, and a loud sniff as you jolted up into a sitting position. He looked up, and noticed you hadn’t moved from the spot on the bed where he had left you, and you were facing away from him, rubbing your eyes.

“I… I might have something,” you said, trying to hide the waver in your voice.

Without thinking he rushed out, closing the distance in three steps, then stood awkwardly by the side of the bed, suddenly aware that he had no idea what to do. “Are… are you OK?” he asked. A knot tightened in his stomach. It was him, wasn’t it? You must have remembered something he did.

Your big eyes looked up at him, red and glistening with tears. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” you whimpered.

Oh. He dropped onto the bed beside you, staring at his lap.

“I didn’t think you were… You wanted it so much! You didn't seem…. But you were. God, you were crying! You hugged me at the bar and cried into my shirt, I should have known you were in a vulnerable place. I took advantage of you. I’m sorry. I don’t know what to—what do I do to make this right? Are you going to press charges? I’ll do what you said you would, I’ll plead guilty.”

His lizard-brain had the strong impulse to pull you into his arms and tell you it was all alright. His lawyer voice answered automatically, “There’s no case. You committed no crime in New York State if I consented at the time, so long as I was not drugged against my will. Which you… didn’t?” he hazarded a guess. “Even if there was a sexually based offense here—a male victim and female defendant? No jury would ever convict you. The D.A. wouldn’t touch it without ironclad proof of wrongdoing.”

“Th-that’s not the issue! And that’s terrible!”

“It’s… the system,” he gave a commiserating shrug. “Justice has never been blind.”

“But if I hurt you…” You fell silent, and were quiet for awhile, not sure what to say, or do. His words were not exactly comforting, but they weren’t condemning either. You were more confused than ever.

“If you want to make it up to me, start by lending me some pants?” he asked with a smirk that was somewhere between rakish and about-to-die-of-embarrassment, dragging a corner of the blanket over his lap.

***

A tiny cloud of steam puffed from the clothing iron as Barba methodically pressed the appropriate creases back into his dress pants while smoothing the unwanted wrinkles out. His ejaculate had not left a permanent stain, and, vain as it was to admit, that had him feeling significantly relieved about the entire situation. That, and vomiting his guts out, taking an aspirin, and downing several cups of bad coffee from the coffee maker.

“Alright,” he said, taking his eyes off the iron just long enough to give you a probing look where you sat, cross-legged on the bed, “Walk me through everything that happened last night. Step by step.”

His gaze, though brief, was intense, like you were a witness for the defense and he was ready to poke holes in anything less than the full and complete truth. Yet it was harder to be intimidated now that he was wearing your pink and blue plaid Vermont Flannel pajamas, looking very domestic in front of an ironing board. And since you had noticed his pink heart socks that matched the color of his tie.

“What’s the last thing you do remember?”

The flash of memory of your warm lips sprang, unwanted, into the forefront of his mind. He pushed it away, and dug further back. “The McCaskey trial ended. Everyone took the verdict hard.” His lip twitched but he restrained himself from saying aloud that it was all his fault. Nobody needed a pity-party. “Everyone else had their own Friday plans, so I went out to drink alone. Don’t give me that look, I drink alone all the time.”

The look you were giving intensified.

“OK, I see how that sounded worse. I drink moderately. I have never done anything like...” He lifted the iron and used it to gesture to the entire waking-up-drunk-in-a-strange-hotel-room situation. His brow knit as he tried to peer deeper into his memory, but everything grew dream-like from there. “I need to know how this happened.”

“Do you remember singing?” you prompted.

“I sang?”

“We did half the soundtrack of RENT.”

“Dear lord…” In his stunned embarrassment, he stopped moving the iron and nearly burned his pants, jerking the iron up at the last second.

“You have a beautiful voice,” you smirked, suddenly quite enjoying his bewilderment.

“Oh god,” he moaned woefully.

He folded his pants and set them aside on the chair with his jacket, which also needed a bit of care, but would suffice enough for the walk of shame back home. He spread his rumpled dress shirt on the ironing board.

The thin fabric of his undershirt stretched over his chest, so that every movement showed off the working of robust muscles. Its low cut neck revealed a swath of dark chest hair. The overall effect made you fight with your inner voice not to run your hands all over him.

“Anything coming back?” you asked hopefully, but he only glanced up and shrugged. They say music has a profound connection to memory, so you risked singing a few bars. “What’s the time? Well it’s gotta be close to midnight...”

At first he just gave a wry little chuckle, focusing on ironing his shirt. Then his head snapped up, eyes focused far beyond the wall of the hotel room.

“They set up karaoke in my bar?” He set the hot iron aside as his mind worked over this bizarre realization as you nodded your head, confirming it was not some weird dream he had. He covered his shameful face with a large hand, pinching the tension building in the bridge of his nose. His eyes darted down at you between his fingers. “We sang together,” he breathed. He raked his hand slowly down the length of his face. As his palm brushed over his lips, the sensation of yours came back to him again: a supple, giving pressure, your tongue wet and eager and sweet like strawberry. A racing, fluttering in his heart made his breathing hitch. He felt sweaty.

He was just breathing now, staring down at you with such intensity in those leaf-green eyes, the urge to run your hands down his chest returned. But it was more than that. For the first time since you woke up, his eyes were looking at you with something like recognition. You almost glimpsed the friend you’d made, the one whose absence you’d been feeling like a hole in the gut. Then he shook his head, and it was gone.

“Tell me what happened next,” the prosecutor said.

***

The Rafael Barba of this morning was much more like what you’d expect a big-shot city lawyer to be. Now that you had seen him sober it was obvious how drunk he was already before he got up to sing. Everything you told him turned his face and his neck a new shade of red.

By the time you finished the story, he had finished ironing and changed back in to everything but his jacket and tie. He sat down next to you on the bed, his weight sinking into the mattress so you had to resist gravity not to lean into him.

“So we didn’t have sex?”

“No. I could tell you were too drunk to consent. You just fingered me. I probably shouldn’t have let you get in my pants at all, but I… I guess I really wanted to.” You blushed and your head fell, trapped between wanting to savor the delicious memory and ashamed of your conduct.

He groaned, pressing his lips thin into a tense but smug smirk. “Legally? Everything about that statement is wrong. New York law states that someone who becomes drunk voluntarily is not deemed mentally incapacitated to give consent.”

“I know. You’ve said that twice already. What’s legal isn’t always the same as what’s right.”

His bright eyes sparkled when you said that. “Agreed. But irrelevant,” he brushed off your interruption. “For the purposes of determining criminal sexual assault, New York law also does not distinguish between penetration by penis, finger, or foreign objects. In other words—if, hypothetically, New York changed its laws regarding intoxication and consent—I would be guilty of raping you.” He said it in his callous, matter-of-fact voice, then after thinking about the weight behind his conclusion, looked as if his head might explode. His eyes fell across the marks still visible above your collar. “The way you tell it...” he began hesitantly, low and shamed, “It sounds like I’m the one who got drunk and pushed myself on you.”

“No!” you cried immediately, with a force that startled you both, and aggravated your headaches. "You didn’t push. If I said no, you would have stopped… I checked,” you added with a small laugh.

He exhaled in relief. “Really?” he raised a soft brow with a bit more blond in it than his hair.

“Yep. You’re quite the gentleman, even blackout drunk. That’s why I didn’t think you were…” You trailed off.

“Well. It’s good to know there are lines I won’t cross.”

Your hands were folded tightly in your lap. He was hunched over with his chin buried deep in his fist. You opened your mouth to speak, but he spoke first, and you apologized at the same time for talking over each other.

“You first,” he said.

“I just… I’m sorry, Rafael. Mr. Barba? I don’t…” you sighed, and gave him a weary smile. “Last night was a lot of fun. We had fun together. I liked getting to know you. I’m sorry it turned into such a shit show. I should have just gotten your number and said goodnight.”

“I don’t know which one of us to blame,” he said with finality. You looked so helpless and small, the fierce urge to protect you welled in his chest. He hated to think of you carrying guilt over his own stupid mistakes. “I don’t blame you.” He reached an arm behind you to pat your back, but his hand froze, shaking, without making contact. He didn’t know how you’d feel about him touching you.

You leaned into the open space his arm created, turning your head into his shoulder in a side-hug. The primal impulse fighting him for control screamed in victory, taking in the smell of your hair and relishing it. His hand patted your upper back stiffly, three times, like a good soldier obeying conscious, sober, higher-brain Barba. You pulled back and stammered an apology, cheeks darkening.

“Well. Then.” He stood suddenly, swallowing. He bustled about the room collecting his things, touching up his hair, getting ready to leave.

***

You leaned against the wall by the door, waiting to say goodbye, debating and mentally practicing the words you wanted to say. Finally, he stood in the narrow entryway, and you had your chance.

“Hey. Maybe this is too forward, but… do you want to hang out again?” you asked, eyes having trouble deciding whether they wanted to gaze deep into his or avoid him entirely and stare at the ground.

“What could be forward about a date after this?” he shot you a look from under his eyebrows. “The fact that I would remember it?”

Ground. Your eyes made up their mind; you stared doggedly at the ground hoping it might open up and drop you eleven stories to merciful death on the lobby floor.

“It’s nothing personal,” he began buttoning up his jacket, “it’s just… this was a mistake. I do not have time to be frolicking about like a sophomore at a liberal arts school. I let myself get out of control. Whoever you met last night is not who I am.” He tugged the jacket to straighten it for emphasis, though all the while his heart was fighting against the bounds of his rib cage. You looked so downtrodden. Apparently you had a wonderful, magical time singing musical theater karaoke with his drunk alter-ego, and in less than an hour sober he had already made you cry once, and seemed poised to do it again. “You don’t know me,” he sighed. “I know you even less. I doubt you would like me very much.”

“But maybe I would,” you said, finally returning his gaze with fragile determination. “I’d like to at least get to know you sober. To see if this… meant anything. I don’t want to believe this was all a mistake, that everything I felt—that I thought you felt, too—was a lie. I don’t know if you’ll like me, either, but how do you ever get to know anyone if you don't give getting to know them a chance?”

His jaw tightened with the obvious answer that he didn’t. Barba had work, and he had his lonely Scotch at his usual bar (which it now looked like he might have to replace if it was turning into a karaoke dive).

“Aren’t you lonely, Mr. Barba?” you asked, as if reading his mind.

“No,” he said tersely, but then softened his answer, “My work keeps me too busy for relationships. I don’t have the time.”

“Is there no room in your schedule for one date? I’m not asking for a relationship, just… a half hour to do something fun. I feel awful about how bad this was for you. I just want to leave you with something to remember me by… that you’ll actually remember.”

He did have more fun with you than he’d had in years. Even from the handful of scrambled memories that came back to him, he could tell that much—how good it felt to let go and belt out songs he only ever sang in the shower, to have a partner singing back to him, completely in sync with each other. He remembered babbling on about laws, and you patiently listening like it was actually interesting and not obnoxious. As you fidgeted nervously awaiting his answer, you added a coy, “¿Por favor?” and his mind filled in por favor, papi. It brought with it another snippet of memory. A song you were singing, together, your beautiful eyes looking right into his, pleading. “The heart may freeze, or it can burn.”

He grumbled and shifted feet. “I have a lot of prep for my next case, but I should be finished with it by nine,” he said. His tone was so flat and sharp it took you a long moment to realize what he meant. “If you want to… have dinner.”

You beamed ear to ear, pushing off from the wall to bounce on your toes so vibrantly you made yourself nauseous and had to stand still. Then your face fell. “Ah—you mean tonight? I can’t tonight, I’m going to Hamilton with my parents. How about tomorrow? I’m getting dim sum with a friend at Radiance. She’s bringing her girlfriend so I’ll be a total third wheel if I don’t have a date.”

“You want to bring the stranger from your drunken hookup to lunch date with an old friend?” he grimaced. “Won’t that be, I don’t know, awkward?”

“Oh, incredibly. But we can lean into that, for fun, and science!” you grinned dangerously.

“How about breakfast,” he offered. “Coffee?”

“Coffee would be great.”

• ● • ━━━━━─ ••●•• ─━━━━━ • ● •

Tags: @beccabarba @caked-crusader @itsjustmyfantasyroom@thatesqcrush @dianilaws @permanentlydizzy@eclecticreader2020 @mrsrafaelbarba @da-po

#Rafael Barba #Rafael Barba x Reader #Raúl Esparza #Barba x female reader #My writing

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wonderlandleighleigh · 4 years ago

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TimKon or anything from the Tuna Melt-verse, which is fantastic, by the way.

Thank you!!! Here’s some unfinished Tuna Melt Fic. Maybe one day it’ll get done. It’s called “His Day in Court.” The Joker origin referenced is lifted from Batman: Streets of Gotham.

“Mister President.”

Bartlet looks up from his desk and grins, before getting to his feet slowly. “Judge Walters.”

As they shake hands, Jed marvels, not for the first time, at just how tall, and just how green Jennifer Walters is. She’s a beautiful woman.

She’s just…

Well, she’s She-Hulk.

Well, she used to be She-Hulk.

Now she’s a United States federal judge.

Like Mendoza, getting Jenn appointed as a federal judge had been a nightmare. She’s green, she’s huge.

She’s hardcore leftwing.

“Please, have a seat,” he offers, gesturing towards the couches and chairs.

Jenn nods, and does, settling into one of the chairs carefully, always hyper-aware of her own body and its impact on the world around her.

“I assume you know why I’ve asked you here,” he says, settling onto the couch next to her, clasping his hands in his lap.

“I have a pretty good idea,” Jenn smirks, leaning back a little. “The Joker case?”

Bartlet nods. “The Joker case. The prosecution is putting everything together, and I’ve been informed you’ve been chosen to preside.”

Jenn doesn’t say anything for a long moment, watching the president carefully before speaking up. “Permission to speak my mind?”

“Of course.”

“This whole trial is bullshit,” she says.

“It’s the law.”

“It’s bull. Look, I believe in our justice system when it works the way it’s supposed to, but jesus, this isn’t a case of innocent until proven guilty, this is a case of the defendant boasting in a public forum about the very fact that he is guilty. He’s killed thousands of people. He’s maimed and mentally and emotionally scarred more. Why put the survivors and the families of the dead through this? And how the hell are we supposed to choose a grand jury? An enormous percentage of people in this country, and just about everybody on the East Coast has been affected, in some way, shape or form by the Joker.”

“So you think we throw United States law out the window and just kill him?” Jed asks, lifting his eyebrows. “You don’t think that might look bad to the rest of the country? That they’ll start pointing fingers at whoever the hell, and asking why those people haven’t been offed too?”

“I think the Joker is different,” Jenn says. “I think he’s this country’s modern day boogieman, and I don’t think he deserves a traditional trial. And anyways, it’s not out of the question that the Joker could die...other ways.”

“Jennifer.”

“Don’t you have the Red Hood on speed dial?” she asks, lifting an eyebrow. “Didn’t I hear that somewhere?”

“Like that kid hasn’t been through enough,” Jed grumbles. “The last time somebody tried to take out the Joker because they thought it was the right thing, it ended in an office full of dead FBI agents and an attack on this White House. We do this the right way.”

“The right way would have been lethal injection at Arkham twenty years ago,” she tells him. “Everything beyond that is just us cleaning up decades-old messes.”

“Jennifer, are you saying we should find a different judge to preside over this case?” Jed asks, looking at her seriously. “Because what you’re telling me is that you cannot possibly be fair-”

“I’m telling you there is no fair,” she interrupts him. “Mister President, the Joker has eschewed legal council. He’s defending himself, which means he will run around my courtroom like the damn lunatic he is before he gets bored and attempts to massacre everyone in it.”

Bartlet closes his eyes and takes a breath before opening them again. “Jenn, all we can do is prepare for the worst. But we don’t have any other choice.”

*****

“It starts tomorrow, you know.”

“Hm?”

“The Joker trial,” Danny clarifies.

Maggie nods as she steps past him and back into her cube. “And you’re pissed.”

“A little.”

“Because you’re not the one writing about it,” Maggie goes on. “Because there’s no way to be impartial when you thought he was gonna kill you.”

“There’s not an impartial journalist in the world when it comes to this maniac,” Danny points out.

Maggie sits and looks up at him. “You can still go to the trial you know. Take a few days off. Head up to New York. You could even write an independent piece and farm it out to the Atlantic or whatever.”

Danny shakes his head. “Not worth feeling that angry. How are you doing with all of this?”

“I...have to be fine,” she says, blowing out a breath. “So I’m fine.”

“What are you working on? Anything good?”

“Well…”

He frowns, tilting his head. “What?”

“I...it’s just...how does somebody like the Joker, become the Joker?” Maggie asks. “What drives a person so far over off the deep end that they become...that?”

“Does it matter?”

“Doesn’t it?”

“So you’re looking into who the Joker really is,” Danny surmises.

“I have some leads,” she admits. “The problem is that he’s killed so many people, it’s hard to figure out what was personal and what was just...his version of a good time.”

“But you’ve got a hunch.”

Maggie nods, looking troubled. “I have a hunch.”

“Well?”

She blows out a breath. “About five years ago, Joker cornered an aging Mob Boss named Guzzo.”

“That guy was no joke,” Danny comments, pulling up a chair and taking a seat. “My mentor did a write-up about him back in the day. The stuff he did was almost as bad as the Joker. This was a few years ago, right?”

“Right. So...Joker corners him on amusement mile and sics a pack of hungry hyenas on the guy,” Maggie says. “All that’s left are a few teeth, which is how they identified him. What’s confusing is that if you look at the interviews done of the for-hire goons back then, Joker and Guzzo didn’t know each other. And if you look at the way the city was split up before Guzzo died, Joker’s usual territory was as far away from Guzzo’s as he could get.”

“Like he might have been avoiding the guy.”

“Maybe…”

“You think there’s a connection?” Danny asks. “Joker kills Guzzo for revenge?”

“I think Guzzo hurt a lot of people over multiple decades,” Maggie tells him. “What if one of the people he hurt was Joker, before he was Joker?”

“So you think Joker’s got a sob story.”

“I think he was once something resembling a person,” Maggie corrects him. “And if you wanna take down a monster, you show the world its weak spots.”

*****

“Maybe you should come home for a few days.”

Jason closes his eyes as he listens to his older brother over the phone.

“All anybody is gonna be talking about down there is the trial,” Dick goes on. “Or hey! We could take a roadtrip! Load up the car with snacks and sodas and get outta town for a while.”

“Dick.”

“I don’t want you to be alone,” Dick admits.

“I’m not.”

“Fine. I don’t want you to be so far away from me that I can’t be there for you,” Dick adds. “And neither does Bruce.”

“Is he testifying?” Jason asks.

“Yeah,” Dicik confirms. “He’s showing up in full bat-gear and he’s testifying.”

“That’s nuts,” Jason points out. “This whole -”

“I know.”

“Fucking - why can’t I just kill him?”

“Because it won’t help you,” Dick says sadly. “Little Wing, just because the monster is gone, doesn’t mean the nightmare never happened.”

Jason goes quiet. “I wanna go to the trial.”

“Jay-”

“I wanna go. At least to the first one.”

Dick sighs sadly. “The last thing I want is for this to be the thing that breaks you. You’ve been doing so well...the job, and the girlfriend...you looked so happy at that wedding we all went to. What if going to that trial just sets you back.”

“What if he hurts somebody?” Jason asks. “What if he takes down an entire courthouse full of people?”

“Then it won’t be your fault,” Dick says gently.

“One of us should be there every day of that trial,” Jason argues.

“Maybe. But it shouldn’t be you.”

“The hell it shouldn’t!”

“Jay,” Dick says firmly, but worriedly. “Look, with what he did to Babs...I have a good excuse to be at the trial every day. I’ll go. I promise. But you need to stay home.”

“You don’t get to-”

“Jay.”

Jason goes silent, and Dick can hear deep, heavy breaths.

“I’ll be there every day,” he says. “I promise you, Little Wing. I’ll go every day. Whatever happens, I’ll be there to help stop it.”

*****

“You’ve reached the office of Jason Todd, Wayne Technologies Liaison to the White House. I will be out of the office until the end of the month. You can reach my fill-in, Luke Fox at the following number…”

*****

“He took the entire month off?” Leo asks, staring at Luke Fox, utterly bewildered.

“He did,” Luke nods.

“To do what?” Leo snaps.

“Not go crazy,” Luke says simply. “This Joker thing has him fifty shades of fucked up, Leo.”

“The DoD hate you more than they hate him,” Leo points out, relaxing a little.

Luke chuckles and shrugs. “I know it freaks those old farts out to have to deal with a black man who is younger, smarter and more attractive. That’s what makes it fun for me.”

Leo sighs but grins wryly. “It’s gonna be a helluva month.”

“Oh it definitely is,” Luke smirks back. “You want lunch? My treat?”

"It’s hard to say no to that.”

#The Tuna Melt-Verse #fic #au #Jason Todd #Maggie Rogers #OFC #West Wing Crossover #Anonymous

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clodiuspulcher · 6 years ago

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Heyy just curious bc you seem more knowledgeable about it - what WAS the point of the trial of Orestes then? I guess I found it a little infuriating (pun?) the kangaroo court and weakass verdict from Athena, but I only read it casually, without extra study

This is a valid question because to be honest it is infuriating. It seems like a bizarre and anticlimactic end to the story and I felt the same way when i first read it. Even the famously misogynistic Ancient Greeks knew the mother played an essential role in heredity; Lucretius adapting the Greek Epicurus emphasizes that both the male And female “seeds” are necessary for procreation and in Aeschylus’s own time, both your parents had to be Athenian citizens for you to be one, which doesn’t make sense if the argument Apollo puts forth is a widely accepted belief of Athenians at the time. Also, it’s wild that APOLLO of all the gods would be the one to say “the mother doesn’t have a real blood connection to her child” when, you know, he and Artemis were literally ride or die for Leto and are probably the gods most attached to their mother in the Greek pantheon (Dionysus also a contender). It’s baffling from a characterization standpoint then as well as a biological one- it doesn’t make sense! But I don’t think the actual argument made here is the point of the trial scene at all - what’s important is that Orestes gets acquitted.

To me, the most cohesive, meaningful, and lasting theme of the Oresteia is that revenge is a futile and destructive effort. The blood justice enacted by members of the House of Atreus and the crimes they commit against each other in the name of vengeance - Atreus on Thyestes, Thyestes on Atreus, Clytemnestra and Aegisthus on Agamemnon, Orestes on Clytemnestra - doesn’t meaningfully work towards true justice. There is no possibility of restitution and healing; killing Agamemnon doesn’t end the curse on the House of Atreus the way Clytemnestra thought and hoped and truly believed it would, it only continues the vicious cycle of violence and brutality. It results in her children growing up under tyranny and her partly wishing for the death of her own son, it leaves her dead by his hand and Orestes himself wracked with guilt and tormented by the furies. Blood justice and violent vengeance just leads to more cyclical destruction and violence; it leaves the House of Atreus devastated, the walls of the grand palace soaked in the blood of previous crimes, the last male heir to the throne tortured and frail and begging for Apollo’s help. So Apollo’s play here is focused entirely towards breaking the chain of destructive violence, because vengeance is counterproductive and only precipitates more cyclical violence. The trial of Orestes is Apollo putting his foot down, refusing to let the House continue to devour itself with violence and replacing blood “justice” with something more sustainable and less violent.

In this vein, Apollo’s literal only goal is to get Orestes acquitted: to let the furies have him and do what they want with him would again simply feed into that cycle. Eumenides Apollo is basically 100% ancient lawyer 0% actual deity, and he’s going to act exactly like an ancient lawyer whose only goal is to acquit their client, by any means possible. So it doesn’t really matter if Apollo’s argument is based in reality- ancient law is more about who’s the better rhetorician than who had the stronger case; ancient law was emotionally driven; playing the audience and using good rhetoric are what matters and literally anything goes. I haven’t read ancient Greek legal texts in depth but I have read Cicero who was inspired by Demosthenes, and he had such great legal hits as “I deserve to have this property back because my opponent once dressed up as a woman to do mischief and therefore will always be in the moral wrong” and “Even if my intern was involved in conspiracies against the state, Whom Among Us WASN’T seduced by Catiline back then? Therefore he did nothing wrong.” An ancient audience used to lawyers genuinely using arguments like “my client went on a sea voyage recently and his boat didn’t sink, if he was guilty the gods would have sunk his ship so therefore he’s innocent” (real example) wouldn’t be thrown by Apollo’s argument being obviously wrong because Apollo is simply utilizing effective rhetoric and playing to the jury he has. He’s just being a Good Lawyer and acquitting Orestes so the violence plaguing Atreus house can END.

You can also look at Apollo’s argument and the fact that it sways the jury and frees Orestes more cynically - like, even if this is a superior form of justice, it still has its own weaknesses, such as the susceptibility to empty rhetoric clearly not based in reality and the fact that a system like this would be extremely vulnerable to corruption and manipulation (but hey, at least no one gets axe-murdered). It could be a way of admitting the legal system is still deeply flawed, or that any system for addressing crime and trying to establish “real” justice is going to fall short in one area or another. Orestes got acquitted and thus the cyclical violence and the curse associated with it can finally be broken, but is it truly a just system if Orestes was acquitted by such a bizarre and easily refutable argument that only worked because of the jury present at the time? Was Apollo’s manipulation of the jury and the prejudices/ideas he knew were unique to that group of people “just”? It might be more Just but is this an Ethical application of the law? It’s still better than Blood Justice (which is The Point) but still. .. Something To Think About….

Eumenides is also really an etiology for the Areopagus as much as anything else - it’s establishing the importance of justice based on something less destructive than Uh Vengeance in the world of the trilogy but also in Athens in Real Life. So perhaps the argument Apollo makes to acquit Orestes doesn’t really matter, but it is a huge sticking point for a lot of people who read the trilogy so I’ve tried to explain my Take on that aspect the best I can.

Very long post that is to say, it is a truly bizarre characterization take on Apollo from Aeschylus, but in my opinion, Apollo just needed to Acquit Orestes Any Way He Could to end the cycle/break the curse, even if the argument he made was buck wild - ancient law really was just like that sometimes! And the point is that now we can all move on instead of killing each other Literally.

#thanks for Indulging me re gifs #tagamemnon #the house that dripped blood

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phroyd · 6 years ago

Link

WASHINGTON — Paul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign chairman, has been ordered to serve a total of seven and a half years in prison after a second federal judge added more time to his sentence on Wednesday, saying he “spent a significant portion of his career gaming the system.”

Judge Amy Berman Jackson of Federal District Court in Washington sentenced Mr. Manafort, 69, on two conspiracy counts that encompassed a host of crimes, including money-laundering, obstruction of justice and failing to disclose lobbying work that earned him tens of millions of dollars over more than a decade.

“It is hard to overstate the number of lies and the amount of fraud and the amount of money involved,” she said, reeling off Mr. Manafort’s various offenses, rapid-fire. “There is no question that this defendant knew better and he knew what he was doing.”

Each charge carried a maximum of five years. But Judge Jackson noted that one count was closely tied to the same bank and tax fraud scheme that a federal judge in Virginia had sentenced Mr. Manafort for last week. Under sentencing guidelines, she said, those punishments should largely overlap, not be piled on top of each other. Mr. Manafort was also expected to get credit for the nine months he has already spent in jail.

Soon after the additional sentence was handed down, Mr. Manafort was charged in state court in New York with mortgage fraud and more than a dozen other felonies, an effort to ensure he will still face prison time if Mr. Trump pardons him for his federal crimes.

Mr. Manafort asked the judge in Washington not to add to his time in prison. “This case has taken everything from me, already,” he said, running through a list of his financial assets that now belong to the government. “Please let my wife and I be together,” he added, hunched over in a wheelchair because of a flare-up of gout.

Mr. Manafort’s lawyer Kevin Downing told the judge that while he was not accusing the office of the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, of mounting a politically motivated prosecution, “but for a short stint as campaign manager in a national election, I don’t think we would be here today.”

But the judge firmly rejected the argument that the prosecution was somehow “misguided or invalid,” saying it showed Mr. Manafort did not fully accept responsibility for his crimes. She suggested that defense lawyers kept repeating it not because they hoped to influence her thinking, but “for some other audience” — an apparent reference to Mr. Trump, who has commented repeatedly on the Manafort case.

Andrew Weissmann, one of Mr. Mueller’s top deputies, said Mr. Manafort had squandered his education and a wealth of opportunities to lead a criminal conspiracy for more than a decade. Once caught, he obstructed justice by tampering with two witnesses, he said, and then repeatedly lied to prosecutors and to a grand jury after he agreed to cooperate with the special counsel’s office in September.

“He served to undermine — not promote — American ideals of honesty, transparency and playing by the rules,” Mr. Weissmann said.

Mr. Manafort’s case stood out in many ways, not the least of which is because it was brought by the special counsel investigating Russia’s interference in the 2016 presidential election. It is also rare that the government reaches a plea deal and then pulls out, claiming that the defendant has deceived them instead of cooperating.

Judge Jackson ruled earlier that Mr. Manafort breached his plea agreement by lying, but prosecutors have not publicly disclosed why they consider those lies important, saying they wanted to protect an open investigation. That was expected to make it harder for Judge Jackson, who takes pride in explaining herself in terms that ordinary people can understand, to describe how she arrived at her sentence.

In another oddity, Mr. Manafort’s prosecution was divided into two cases — the one before Judge Jackson, and the related case overseen by Judge T. S. Ellis III of Federal District Court in Alexandria, Va. Last week, Judge Ellis sentenced Mr. Manafort to 47 months in prison for eight felony counts of tax evasion, bank fraud and failure to disclose a foreign bank account.

Six Trump advisers or officials have been charged by the special counsel.

Judge Ellis’s sentence set off a firestorm of criticism from commentators who complained it was overly lenient for a defendant who had orchestrated a multimillion-dollar fraud over a decade. Much of the legal world considered the sentencing guidelines in the Virginia case, which called for a prison term of 19 to 24 years, far too harsh. But some public defenders and former prosecutors said a 47-month sentence exemplified the sentencing disparities in a criminal justice system that favors wealthy, white-collar criminals.

Instead, some predicted, she would most likely allow Mr. Manafort to serve his sentences simultaneously, which would cap his prison term at 10 years.

“What is happening today is not and cannot be a review and a revision by a sentence imposed by another court,” Judge Jackson said on Wednesday, referring to the sentence Mr. Manafort received last week.

Hanging over the entire case has been the chance that Mr. Trump could pardon Mr. Manafort. Asked about that possibility, Mr. Trump’s answers have varied. He said late last year that he “wouldn’t take it off the table.” More recently, he said, “I don’t even discuss it.”

Asked about a pardon on Monday, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary, said, “The president has made his position on that clear, and he’ll make a decision when he is ready.”

Last June, when Judge Jackson revoked Mr. Manafort’s bail and sent him to jail after prosecutors filed new charges of witness tampering, President Trump said Mr. Manafort was being treated like a mafia boss.

“Who was treated worse, Alfonse Capone, legendary mob boss, killer and ‘Public Enemy Number One,’ or Paul Manafort, political operative & Reagan/Dole darling, now serving solitary confinement — although convicted of nothing?” Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter.

State prosecutors in Manhattan are said to be preparing charges against Mr. Manafort to help ensure he will serve prison time even if Mr. Trump pardons him for his federal crimes.

Judge Jackson is comfortable with complex decisions, said Robert P. Trout, a defense lawyer who runs the law firm where she worked for a decade before President Barack Obama appointed her to the bench in 2011. “If anyone can get their head around the complexities and sensibilities of the sentencing considerations in play here, it is Judge Jackson,” Mr. Trout said.

The special counsel has not requested a specific sentence in any criminal case it has brought. In the case before Judge Jackson, prosecutors said that Mr. Manafort had “repeatedly and brazenly” violated a host of laws and did not deserve any breaks. Even though sentencing guidelines recommended a prison term of up to 22 years, the maximum sentence was governed by the statutes, not the guidelines, and so was limited to 10 years.

The judge sentenced Mr. Manafort to five years on the first conspiracy count, but said 30 months of that would be served concurrently with the Virginia sentence because of the overlap between the two cases. On the second conspiracy count, which involved obstruction of justice, she sentenced him to 13 months, saying that his efforts to influence witnesses had “largely been nipped in the bud.”

Judge Jackson tends to be relatively lenient on convicted criminals who appear before her. In the five years that ended in 2017, she handed down an average prison sentence of just 32 months, below both the Washington district’s 46-month average and the nationwide average of 47 months, according to court data maintained by Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse.

But Judge Jackson has gone out of her way to make clear that being well-connected earns no chits in her court. “She knows who commits white-collar crime,” said Heather Shaner, a Washington lawyer who represented an embezzler in her court. “And she thinks it’s perfectly fine to punish them if they commit a crime and hold them to a higher standard because they have the education, and because they have the wealth.”

Six years ago, she sentenced the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson Jr., the former Illinois congressman and son of the Rev. Jesse Jackson, to 30 months in prison for stealing $750,000 from his campaign to pay personal expenses. He had asked for probation. But she told him: “How would I explain a probationary sentence to those troubled youths who are locked up, who didn’t start where you started, and were not given what you were given?

“It would be read one way and one way only, as a clear statement that there are two systems of justice: one for the well-connected, and one for everyone else,” she added. “I cannot do it. I will not do it.”

Phroyd

#justice department

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yobaba30 · 6 years ago

Quote

The inability of U.S. journalists to understand three key legal terms—PROOF, INDICTMENT, and CONVICTION—is making discussion of the Barr Letter and the entire Trump-Russia investigation *impossible*. I'll try to remedy the problem here.

Seth Abrams

I knew things were bad when @maddow put up two straight 100% WRONG chyrons on her show on MSNBC last night—"Barr & Rosensten Conclude Mueller Doesn't Have Evidence Trump Obstructed Justice" and "Barr: Mueller Finds No Proof of Collusion, Doesn't Offer Judgment on Obstruction."

@maddow has focused on Trump-Russia more than any U.S. journalist—so if her show has LITERALLY NO IDEA what happened on Sunday and can only express it in on-screen chyrons that are 100% WRONG, America's in real danger of having our Trump-Russia discourse descend into nonsense.

I'm putting aside non-journalists like @KimStrassel, who willfully abuse the terms PROOF, INDICTMENT, and CONVICTION to score political points: my focus in this thread will simply be on educating actual journalists (print, radio, TV, and digital) who want to stop *messing up*.

Once you've read this, I ask that you consider not just retweeting it but tweeting it "at" journalists (print, radio, TV, digital) when they *mess up* in using these 3 key legal terms—because when they do, they're *misinforming America on the most important story of our time*.

Below is the definition of PROOF. Note that "proof" is simply *any* evidence that is probative, meaning—if you're on one side of an issue in a legal case—"proof" is *any* evidence that tends to make your position on a matter in dispute *more likely*. I'll give some examples.

PROOF - 1 : the effect of evidence sufficient to persuade a reasonable person that a particular fact exists — see also evidence. 2 : the establishment or persuasion by evidence that a particular fact exists — see also burden of proof.

Let's say that—in an arson case—one of the "matters in dispute" is whether the defendant in the case was living on the west side of Akron, Ohio or the east side of the city on the night of the fire. *Any* evidence that tends to make *either* proposition more likely is "proof."

From that example, you'll see that you can have a) very *small* amounts of proof, and b) proof on *both sides* of a question. So one might say, "There's a great deal of proof that the defendant was living on Akron's west side—and very little proof he was living anywhere else."

You can *also* see from that example what the phrase "no proof" would mean: it means that no one involved in the case with an interest in proving a particular question could find *any* evidence tending to support their position. Let's fit that phase back into our hypothetical: If *every piece of evidence* as to where the defendant was living on the night of the fire indicates he was living on the west side of Akron—and *none* of it indicates he was living anywhere else—we would say that there is "no proof" the defendant was living on the east side. 10

Sometimes—*but only sometimes*—we use the word "proof" in legal cases to represent the amount of evidence we have on the "final question" in the case: in a criminal, the question of whether the defendant (let's say in our hypothetical arson in Ohio) is *guilty or not guilty*. In the United States, the most serious criminal cases are classified as "felonies" (rather than "misdemeanors," which are less serious and carry smaller penalties). Felonies are brought into the U.S. criminal justice system by means of a document that we call an INDICTMENT. INDICTMENTS require a certain amount of PROOF on the "final question" of whether a defendant is guilty or not guilty, a determination often—but not always—made by a grand jury, which is a large body of average citizens called to act as "grand jurors" for a set period of time. The level of PROOF required for a prosecutor to get an INDICTMENT of a defendant—that is, the amount of evidence on the question of whether a suspect is guilty that a prosecutor must have to move a case into the criminal justice system—is set at the level of "probable cause."

INDICTMENT - formal charge or accusation of a serious crime."an indictment for conspiracy" - synonyms:charge, accusation, arraignment, citation, summons

So let's return to our hypothetical arson case in Ohio. Imagine that a prosecutor in the jurisdiction that could bring the case says to a colleague of hers, "I don't have enough proof he did it to bring an indictment." Does that mean there's "no evidence" or "no proof"? *No*. What it'd mean is there was "insufficient proof" on a matter in dispute—the suspect's guilt—to reach the "probable cause" standard of proof needed for indictment. We almost never encounter cases with "no evidence" or "no proof"—as how was there ever an *investigation*, then? The position taken by Trump's defenders in the Trump-Russia case is *so insane* that it never had *any* chance of being accurate: *unless* journalists played along by misusing key legal terms. Here's what Trump's defenders say: there is "no evidence"/"no proof" of collusion. That's right—the *insane* position held by Trump's defenders is *there never should've been any investigation of Trump* because *there was never a SCINTILLA of evidence he did anything wrong*. When we say there wasn't a SCINTILLA of evidence, it means there was zero evidence. And yes, SCINTILLA is used as a legal term in our criminal justice system, nearly always in the following sentence: "There's not even a SCINTILLA of evidence..." or "There's not even a SCINTILLA of proof..." That's what Trump's defenders say about collusion *and* obstruction.

OK, returning to our arson case in Ohio, let's now imagine that our hypothetical prosecutor in Akron has enough PROOF on the matter of the suspect's guilt (namely, PROOF at the level of PROBABLE CAUSE) to secure an INDICTMENT. How does she win her case once it gets to trial? The answer is that our hypothetical prosecutor will need to have PROOF at a much higher level than PROBABLE CAUSE—rather, at the level of BEYOND A REASONABLE DOUBT—to secure a CONVICTION (a term meaning a decision by a judge or jury than a given defendant is in fact guilty).

CONVICTION - a formal declaration that someone is guilty of a criminal offense, made by the verdict of a jury or the decision of a judge in a court of law.

Now we come to the *one spot* where things get tricky, so if you've been following along so far, make sure you have everything in this thread on lockdown before proceeding further. The next step in understanding these terms is where *every* journalist seems to get tripped up. Under the ethical guidelines governing prosecutors' work, they're not supposed to seek an INDICTMENT of a defendant *unless and until* they believe they have enough PROOF to secure a CONVICTION, as well. This is confusing because it involves looking at *two* levels of proof. Back to that hypothetical arson in Ohio: imagine the prosecutor knows she has enough PROOF—that is, at the PROBABLE CAUSE level—to get an INDICTMENT, but thinks a jury won't CONVICT the defendant because there isn't proof BEYOND A REASONABLE. Can she proceed with her case? It's sort of a trick question, as of course the answer is "yes she *can*—but she's not *supposed* to." In the example I just gave, the prosecutor could INDICT the defendant—she has enough proof for that—she just wouldn't do so (if she's ethical) because she can't CONVICT him.

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crimethinc · 7 years ago

Text

Surviving a Grand Jury: Three Narratives from Grand Jury Resisters

We’ve prepared a zine version of our guide to grand jury resistance, which originally appeared as episode #59 of the Ex-Worker podcast. This zine presents the voices of three people who successfully stood up to grand jury indictments: one who served jail time for resisting, one who went on the run rather than testify, and one who supported a grand jury resister from the beginning to the end of the process. You can also read their narratives below.

Please print out copies of this zine and share them with anyone who is curious about what it looks like to confront the full force of the so-called justice system and win. For a wide array of resources on resisting grand juries, consult this list. You can also watch this live video presentation.

Click the image for a zine version of this text.

A Few Words about Grand Juries

Grand juries serve the state as a sort of auxiliary legal proceeding to force people to inform on each other. A grand jury isn’t a criminal trial; there’s no judge present. It takes place entirely in secret. As a witness, you can’t even obtain transcripts of your testimony.

Only the prosecutor and the jurists are allowed in the room with the witness. The jurists are chosen according to the prosecutor’s agenda and not screened for bias. The grand jury doesn’t have to inform you about the details of what they are investigating; you have no way to know what information might be incriminating for you or another person.

Grand juries suspend Fifth Amendment rights. They can subpoena you and give you “immunity” in order to force you to testify; if you refuse, they can jail you for up to eighteen months. This immunity does not protect you from prosecution; it only stipulates that the information you personally provide cannot be used against you, although the same information provided by someone else can be.

All this explains why people who do not want to be complicit in enabling the state to persecute communities refuse to give any information to a grand jury whatsoever. You never know what detail might be used against someone else. Even if no one is guilty of any crime, providing information to a grand jury can result in ongoing legal harassment that can ripple out and affect many people.

Grand juries serve to gather information on dissidents far beyond what police and prosecutors could gather on their own; they have been used to isolate, divide, and destroy social movements since the 1960s. Grand juries are currently being used to target anarchists, anti-fascists, and indigenous water protectors who struggled at Standing Rock.

If you’re subpoenaed by a grand jury and you decide to resist, you have two options: show up in court and refuse to testify, then serve time in prison for contempt, or go on the run before your first court date.

Click the image for a pdf of this poster.

Three Who Fought the Law and Won

The following stories are from three comrades: Esme, who served jail time for resisting; Devlin, who went on the run rather than cooperate; and Cora, who was the partner of a grand jury resister and supported them before, during, and after imprisonment.

We’re deeply inspired by the choices these people made in resisting the state. We hope that if you ever have to face a grand jury, criminal charges, or police harassment, their words will give you strength and faith in yourself. It can help to learn from the experiences of those who walked in your shoes before you—to know that you are not alone.

A Knock on the Door

Esme: I remember when those douchebags first came to my door. I particularly remember the tall man with sharp features and creepy blue eyes. He knocked on my door at 6 am. When I answered, still half-asleep, he said, “Oh, hi, sorry to wake you. I saw through your window that you were sleeping. You know this is my least favorite part of the job.” He was there to subpoena a friend of mine. I slammed the door in his face. Over the following months, my friends got served their subpoenas and had to go to court dates. I helped to organize support for them. At the time it felt like an agent was lurking behind every corner—and the tough part was sometimes they were.

Cora: I was awoken that morning by my partner, who was in shock. Federal agents had come looking for a friend and former housemate of ours. They wanted to serve him a subpoena to testify before a grand jury. The days that followed were a flurry of hushed conversation, larger displays of solidarity, crying, and panic.

Our house was awkwardly built with four doors to the outside and many windows. It wasn’t the greatest layout for feeling protected when paranoia struck. I was home alone one evening when I heard car doors slam outside our house. This wasn’t strange for our neighborhood, but my fear of the feds turned every sound into impending arrest or another subpoena. This time, it was federal agents. A group of five medium-to-large men with flashlights, in black clothing, began assessing our home from the outside, starting near my partner’s bedroom door, around to our backyard, around the side yard and completing the circle up front. I stayed hidden. I was afraid they would enter the house, thinking it to be empty, and corner me there alone—but they only seemed interested in our yard and our home’s exterior.

It was after this that all of us—my partner, and housemates, and I—decided it was absolutely necessary to move. They had already subpoenaed the people they had originally been searching for. Why were they still coming around? What did they want with our house? We weren’t under the illusion that a new house would provide more safety, but the anxiety mounting in that space was beginning to feel overwhelming and we needed a change of environment. We found a new home quickly and eagerly moved in. We had just begun to settle in when the FBI visited us again.

Esme: One day two men were lurking outside my house. I pushed away what I thought was an irrational paranoia. I let myself believe they were Mormon missionaries. I walked outside to my car and they addressed me by my name. I shut the car door and ran into my backyard. I couldn’t think fast enough. I fumbled with the latch on the gate and they yelled after me that they had positively identified me, so the subpoena had been officially served. I turned around and grabbed it out of their hands. They offered to take me into the grand jury right then. I didn’t answer them, but walked into my house and burst into tears. I remember crying and repeating the words “I don’t want to do this, I don’t want to do this” over and over again as my friends read the subpoena. I knew what it meant by that point, as several of my friends were already in jail over this shit. It never occurred to me to do anything other than resist, but I was terrified.

Cora: When my partner was issued a subpoena it felt like a nightmare. It was the same grand jury that had already subpoenaed our friends, who were now serving jail time for resisting. None of us felt we had the tools to navigate what was ahead of us. I treated it like a job, because there was so much we didn’t know.

Esme: I called a public defender and explained the situation. I told him that I intended to not cooperate. He said in a condescending tone, “Oh you can’t just NOT cooperate with a grand jury subpoena.” I explained that I knew exactly the consequences: eighteen months max in jail for civil contempt, and that I was prepared to do it. I told him that if he was going to represent me he would have to respect that. After that he never questioned my resolve once. Ultimately, I would have to educate him about how grand jury resistance works.

Cora: It surprised me how little the defense lawyer understood about grand juries. Maybe that was just me giving too much credit to lawyers, cause I was like, you go to school for eight years for this, you should know what’s going on. It boggled my mind. Luckily, we were able to talk to other, radical lawyers. There wasn’t a lot of information online, and a lot of it was contradictory. So we talked to lawyers who had explicit experience in political cases. It’s not that our lawyer was incompetent, it’s just that grand juries are so outside the scope of regular court cases—to the point that the lawyers can’t even be in the room.

Esme: Just like my lawyer, my parents initially encouraged me to “consider my options.” I told them flatly that I knew I was going to go to jail over this and that if they wanted to visit me while I was in jail they were going to need to respect my decision. In this one conversation, our relationships changed from a parent/child dynamic to one of adults. Being clear and upfront with both my parents and lawyer about how this was going to go it made it much easier for all of them to support me in the ways I needed. This meant they never pressured me to cooperate even if they didn’t understand my ethical reasons for non-cooperation. 

Cora: No one knew how long punitive detention for refusing to cooperate with a grand jury subpoena would actually be. One isn’t sentenced to a particular length of time, but attorneys told us that eighteen months was the maximum. We were told to expect the maximum because of my partner’s public refusal to cooperate and the overt political nature of the investigation. We went from meetings amongst friends, to meetings amongst family, to meetings with attorneys, to phone calls with comrades trying to gather as much information as possible in the short time before inevitable incarceration. We stayed busy.

The wait was agonizing. No matter what we did amongst friends, amongst our political milieu or in our romantic relationship, I never felt prepared to have my partner’s physical and emotional presence stripped from my life. I never felt prepared to watch them experience detention and isolation. We talked with people who had experienced similar repression, made plans for communication, strengthened our relationship while supporting one another through the trauma of uncertainty and constant harassment from the State. We made big banners for demonstrations and, after, hung them in our house as encouragement. We even got married in order to grant ourselves some luxuries and legal rights regarding prison visits and attorney-client privileges.

Esme: We’d had some time to talk out scenarios before this happened, and we decided to get married—not out of love, but practical necessity. We knew that was the only way Cora would be able to visit me. They would continue to be an unwavering support person to me through the hard months to follow. Thankfully, they were not the only person to rise to the occasion. Many friends and loved ones showed up to hold me up and support me. Friends would come by our house and drop off food and treats and gifts on the regular. This isn’t to say everything was rosy—the stress of the time definitely reverberated throughout our friendships. Many stepped up to mediate conflicts—it really did take an extended community to support us.

Cora: In those days leading up to Esme’s incarceration, we were hardly ever alone. It would have been easy to be isolated as a couple, to feel trapped in this intense experience that was effecting the two of us most intensely, but luckily that didn’t happen. I think that’s part of why our relationship has stayed as strong as it is through all of this—even when friends couldn’t always show up in the ways I wished they would, we were really held by a large community.

Threats and Pressure

Esme: After the subpoena, the prosecutor hurled all kinds of threats at me. I was told I would be charged with criminal as well as civil contempt and other crimes if I refused to cooperate. The paranoia that had been a dull roar in my mind increased to full-blown panic. I blamed myself for lack of vigilance for letting myself get subpoenaed. I had been anxious before, but now I started to experience more intense panic. It was getting more difficult to determine which fears were worth paying attention to.

We knew from affidavits in the case that some of us had been followed, so it would make sense to believe I was being followed. Sometimes I would see an SUV with government plates parked outside my house—but that blue-eyed man who came to my door the first time had been driving a beat up old Pontiac. So there was really no way of knowing how deep the surveillance went.

Sometimes clearly absurd fears would enter my brain and I couldn’t push them away. Once I was driving and heard a series of ticks and beeps. I began to fear a bomb had been planted under my seat. I sat stopped at a red light and considered my options. I was almost certain this wasn’t real, but the Feds had bombed Judi Bari’s car this way in 1990. But surely I was not as high a priority as she had been. Waiting for the light to turn, I couldn’t reason my way out of this. I pulled over into a Burger King parking lot and got out of my car. I walked a safe distance away I waited a few minutes before cautiously approaching the vehicle again. I checked under the seat, then under the car itself: nothing. I felt the seat for anything inside it: nothing. I got back into my car, took a deep breath, and got to work just a couple minutes late. 

Experiences like this helped me develop a framework for how to handle these kind of fears. I created a set of four questions, and for each one I’d either ask a friend’s advice or imagine what advice they might give. The questions were:

How likely is it that what I fear right now is real? What evidence do I have for it? Has this happened to others?

If what I fear is real, how serious of a threat is it to me in this situation?

Can this situation be addressed? Is there anything that I can do to make myself safe from this?

How costly or inconvenient is this precaution? Is this response illegal? Could I get hurt or get in more trouble?

Using this framework, it made sense to get out of the car to check for a bomb. Though the likelihood of the threat being real was remote, the precaution I took was low cost and only made me slightly late to work. Having this structure helped me feel like I was doing all I could to keep myself safe.

Often, in scary repressive situations people oscillate between feeling strong fear and then pushing it out of their mind—without taking basic precautions to handle what they’re afraid of. Dealing with repression is about risk management. We can’t be completely safe from the state or from the far right, but there are steps we can take to mitigate some of the potential harm. Since then, I’ve used this framework with households and other groups to assess risk from both feds and neo-Nazis.

Cora: As Esme’s court date approached, we rented a hotel room with friends and talked all night. It was moments like this that kept us going, and something worth doing if you’re facing any kind of repression, because everything will feel like shit. In hindsight, I realize there are a few things I would have done differently, especially around asking for support. I mean we got amazing support, especially all the fundraising and one friend who gave us a few hundred dollars to cover Esme’s rent and car insurance and stuff. At the time I didn’t want to ask for support just for me because it felt like a finite resource. Thinking about asking close friends for more than just basic friendship felt like taking something away from others. I didn’t really realize how the experience was affecting me. I also don’t know how receptive I would have been to someone saying “this is just time for you.” On a certain level, I wasn’t able to do all the intense support I was doing and also check in with all my emotional needs. Esme was the same way, and we brought that out in each other. We both stayed really task-focused.

Esme: That night in the hotel I could feel my freedom slipping out from under me. I hadn’t seriously considered going on the run, but in that hotel room it suddenly seemed so appealing. How was I going to walk into the hands of my enemies the next day, when I could just as easily breath the free air for another day? I thought about trying to live underground in the States or leave the country and start a new life under a different identity—but both would have to be indefinite if not lifelong exile, which seemed hard to imagine. Jail time at least had a max of eighteen months, and it seemed like most people usually did more like six. And I could get letters from my loved ones, something much harder to pull off from underground. So, going on the run seemed like the harder option, although it perhaps represented an even larger middle finger to the law. I reconciled myself to my choice.

I spent the night embracing my friends and watching Mean Girls 1 and 2 (spoiler: the second one is terrible, don’t bother). I appeared at the courthouse the next day delirious from lack of sleep but ready to face my incarceration.

Devlin: I didn’t decide to become a grand jury resister on the day the federal agents emerged, seemingly out of nowhere, forcing their subpoena into my unwelcoming hands. Decisions like this are rarely made in the moment. For me, it would be more reasonable to say I started to make this decision five years before I was subpoenaed, when I first learned of Dr. Abdelhaleem Ashqar. At the time, he had just been sentenced to eleven years and three months for resisting grand juries in New York and Chicago. A fighter for Palestinian liberation, Dr. Ashqar was jailed several times between 1998 and 2007 on civil contempt charges. These were intended to coerce his testimony to a perennial grand jury investigating Palestinian nationals on racketeering charges. As exhausting as the protracted struggle must have been, Ashqar was unyielding in his defiance, refusing to implicate anyone, saying in court that he refused “to live as a traitor or as a collaborator.”

In 2007, the case came to a head. As they admitted defeat in turning Ashqar into a state agent, the law played their final trump card: a punitive prison sentence, meant to strike fear into all of us watching from the sidelines. For me, as I’m sure for many others, it didn’t have that effect.

I was in awe of Ashqar, of his contempt, in the choices he made to reject his status as innocent witness and take on the complicity of solidarity. Resistance felt alive and real to me in that moment. I decided then that if ever I was called upon to resist a grand jury, a thought that seemed impossibly far away to a young anarchist who had yet to see the inside of a jail cell, I would try to breathe as much fire into the legacy of grand jury resistance as I was capable of.

I wanted my resistance to be as defiant as it could be. I didn’t want it to be based on the fact that I was “innocent,” but rather to be a clear and outright refusal of everything they wanted from me. I hoped that this complete defiance would inspire others as Dr. Ashqar had inspired me.

I also thought about it from a security standpoint: my brain was like a hard drive that stored valuable information, and I had no way of knowing what stray detail I remembered could be used to incriminate comrades of mine. So my perspective was that the best way to prevent the state from having access to that information was not only to encrypt the information (stay silent) but also to never give them physical access to the hardware (in this case my body). Thus, I went on the run.

Esme: On the morning of my court date, my parents, my partner, my lawyer and I got coffee across the street from the courthouse. My lawyer noticed a stocky man with a military haircut holding a newspaper in front of his face and staring at us. My lawyer said we should talk outside. For my parents, this one fairly minor act of surveillance seemed to shatter their cherished view of a benevolent government.

A number of people had shown up to the courthouse to support me, including some older folks who had done support for grand jury resisters in the 70s. I met two who had been part of an urban guerrilla group back then and wished me their support. One of them told me about an oath that they used to say to each other back in the day:

If ever I should break my stride, or falter at my comrade’s side

This oath shall kill me.

If ever my word should prove untrue, should I betray the many or the few

This oath shall kill me. 

If ever I withhold my hand, or show fear before the hangman

This oath shall surely kill me.

It was powerful to feel like included in a tradition of resistance, even if some of our political inclinations were different.

I walked in to the courthouse with my lawyer. We were led to the third floor where two men introduced themselves as prosecutors. One of them was the man with the creepy blue eyes and sharp features I had seen months earlier on my doorstep. When my lawyer introduced himself, the blue-eyed man identified himself as the lead agent on the case. 

I remained silent while my lawyer schmoozed with the prosecutors, and then I entered the grand jury room with them. My lawyer, of course, had to stay behind.

The room resembled a community college classroom. It had an overhead projector and the dozen or so jurists sat in chair/desk combos arrayed in rows facing me. I was at the front of the room as though I was a guest lecturer. The prosecutor asked me my name and date of birth. I told him. Then he asked me where I worked and I figured it was as good a time as any to start resisting. I stammered out a refusal. He then asked me a slew of questions: peoples names, where I was on certain dates, where others were on specific dates. With growing confidence, I refused to answer each question. As I wasn’t allowed to have my lawyer present or record any of the questions, I would ask for a break after every three questions and go into the other room and write them down so I wouldn’t forget them. This way I could share what they were asking about with everyone else, and make this secret process more transparent. Leaving the room frequently was also a way of demonstrating to my lawyer and others that I wasn’t answering their questions, so there would be no doubt.

After a dozen or so questions and refusals, the prosecutor said he had heard enough. As I got up to leave the room, a jurist in the front row smiled and raised his fist in salute to me. I still wonder to this day what that guy’s deal was. Maybe he had something to do with the outcome of things? But I may never know—that’s the thing about repression, there are so many bizarre unknowns that you just have to accept.  

After that I was taken in front of a judge, granted immunity, questioned by the grand jury again and refused again. By the time all this was over the workday was over and I was given another court date a few weeks away. It felt a bit anti-climactic. I had prepared myself to go to jail. I had packed up all my stuff, found someone to rent my room, and now I had to go back to my house where I no longer really had a room and kill time until I went to jail.

As I waited, I searched for ways to prepare for what really can’t be prepared for. I talked to more former political prisoners who offered incredible advice and emotional support. I made plans with my partner, parents and friends about my support.

After another court date I was given a self-report date and at 9 am on a grey morning, after all that waiting, I gathered with a small group of comrades and my parents to say goodbye. As the time approached for me to go in I started to hug people goodbye I started crying and an older comrade grabbed me by my shoulders and looked into my tear-filled eyes and said “Hey, you’ve got this! Seriously, don’t doubt it for a second, you’ve got this!”

That phrase would come back to me often in the following months. 

Jail Time

Cora: I wasn’t prepared for what it would feel like to have my partner be so physically absent from my life. While Esme was in jail, I focused all my emotional energy on supporting them. This involved writing long letters every day, micro managing their support, talking with friends about our visits, meticulously planning my trips to visitation and really trying not to plan for life after they got out. I tried not to think about the future. They could be in for over a year, and at the end of that could end up indicted as part of the ongoing investigation. There was also the fear that I would be indicted as a result of the grand jury’s findings. The future was so unclear that the present was all I could grasp.

I buried myself in work every other day of the week. Shortly after my partner’s subpoena, I took on a second full-time job. I used my 60- to 70-hour work week as a way to exhaust myself and dissociate from the trauma I was incurring. It gave me purpose while I felt aimless and heartbroken. I withdrew from many friendships and stayed firmly in high-functional crisis mode. If you had asked me at the time what kind of support I needed, I wouldn’t have been able to say. I felt like any care someone gave me was taken away from Esme. In retrospect, I’d do a few things differently. But I do think it was important for both of us to focus on practical details and things we could control. It wasn’t until much later that we both realized how not okay we had been.

Esme: When I walked through the front door of that jail, I was shuttled between various booking rooms for hours. Around 11 am, I was given a ham sandwich and some pudding in a brown bag. I decided that if the state wanted to lock me in a cage and attempt to ruin my life, I would resist by making my time in jail the best thing that had ever happened to me. I looked at that ham sandwich on white bread and decided that I was going to eat as healthily as I could for this meal and all the ones to follow. So I left the white bread and pudding in the bag. It sounds weird but this helped me feel like I was regaining some amount of agency.

They took me in front of a guard sitting at a desk who called himself a counselor. He asked me a slew of questions to figure out if I was eligible for placement in General Population. I tried to answer every question so that I would qualify. I remember him smirking and rolling his eyes when I told him I was straight. But at the end he said I looked like I was eligible for GP. He sent me back to a holding cell, then came back a while later and inexplicably took me into the solitary confinement unit and put me on cell alone status. The guards told me, “Since you haven’t committed a crime, and you’re being held here coercively not punitively, we can’t house you in GP with criminals.” I responded that my co-defendants were in GP, but they didn’t offer any other explanation. I found out later that at that same time my co-defendants were being transferred to other solitary confinement units as well. It’s clear to me that the prosecutor was trying to apply extra pressure to us to get us to break.

I woke up the next morning at 6 am to a tray of warm food being slid through the trapdoor inside my door. I again picked through for the less processed seeming parts and ate them, even though I wasn’t hungry and wanted to keep sleeping. I figured I would take what I could get.

After breakfast, they asked me if I wanted to go to the rec yard. I had assumed I would be in this one cell all day and jumped at the opportunity to get out. They put me in what passed for a rec yard in solitary, which turned out to be a triangular cell with chain link fence on all sides and a vent through which cold air blew but you could see the sky if you stood in the right place. It was barely larger than my cell and it was so cold I couldn’t really do anything other than shiver. After that, I stayed in my cell during rec time.

I started journaling: planning out workouts and other self-improvement activities. In the evening a cart came by my cell and I was told I could pick two books from it. I picked out the longest one I could see. Then scanned the titles for anything familiar, to my surprise I found an Octavia Butler book I had been meaning to read. The familiar author brought warmth and joy to me when I was confused and alone. Her writing, bleak but yet so honest and nuanced, felt like just the emotional tone I needed set going into the next few months of my life.

I asked about phone calls and was told that I could make one 15-minute phone call each month. It seemed unbelievable, but it was true. I would have to be sustained by letters. On the third day, when I started receiving them, everything got so much better. The guards seemed resentful of having to read all my mail but their resentment just made me feel better and better. The first book I received was Vida by Marge Piercy, which follows a woman in a fictionalized Weather Underground type group as she tries to survive living on the run. I knew some of my comrades who had also faced repression had gone on the run, but I had tried to avoid any contact with them or knowledge of what they were going through so as not to lead the authorities to them. Vida made me feel connected to what they might be going through. The story doesn’t glorify life on the run—it left me feeling like I was the lucky one to be safe in a cell rather than precariously waiting for the cops to come busting my door down like my comrades surely were.

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Life on the Run

Devlin: At the beginning of my time on the run, my comrades and I had to leave the area quickly and figure out a more concrete plan along the way. Much of the work hinged on having a network of solidarity and computer skills. It’s actually quite a bit of work to protect yourself digitally. I won’t go into specifics, but the skills we needed were not those we could have learned on a whim. We were able to do it because we had years of experience to draw from.

At one point, a security breach meant that we had to relocate for fear of being tracked. We relied on the quick thinking and very generous solidarity of comrades from all over who helped tremendously with our transition. This type of anarchist solidarity was invaluable and without it we would never have been able to do what we did.

Getting needs met like health care and money were major obstacles. Over time, living in a situation not of our own choosing was physically and emotionally detrimental. We had organized our lives around fighting the state. Suddenly, when we didn’t have any fight to do or decisions to make, our camaraderie eroded. Bonds between close comrades started to break down and I felt trapped and without an outlet or shared fight to channel my energy into.

Those stresses caused health problems which became harder and harder to address because I was on the run. These compounding effects became major obstacles.

At home, I had lived through highs and lows of struggle and repression but they were shared highs and lows. All of a sudden, no one around me understood the constant crisis I was going through or even why I had moved to that place at all. People didn’t even know my real name, yet I was trying to build authentic bonds of camaraderie with them.

I remember once a cop showed up at my house and they waited at my door and wouldn’t leave. My mind raced. I remembered that I had mapped out a way to escape by jumping between rooftops, but I hadn’t tested it and didn’t know if it would work. I had this internal freakout but I quieted my fears because I would have to deal with the implications later. Right now, I just needed to get out. My body became weirdly calm as I went through the house burning everything that could be used to identify me. I also ate a package of cookies cause I didn’t know the next time I would be able to eat. I sent word to let friends know what was going on, got a backpack together for my rooftop journey, and looked out the window one last time—and the cop was gone.

Friends later found out through social engineering that the cops were involved in something entirely unrelated, and we were able to return to that spot. Even so, it was incidents like that that shook my nerves so much. The simple act of interacting with a cop—something many people would consider routine—would have completely changed my life at that time. I lived in constant fear of having to interact with law enforcement.

I see how I needed every moment of that build up, all of the reinforcement of self that I put into the previous ten years to get me through the experience intact. When the focus of the radical left had moved on to the next crisis, when I hadn’t seen my dearest friends in years, when I was puking blood from a mysterious illness with no way to see a doctor, when I didn’t even have my own name to give coherence to my words, what I did have to hold onto was the promise I had made to myself—and implicitly to all others engaged in struggle—that I would put everything I had into the fight. Prolonged psychological dissonance can really disorient, subjecting what seems like our strongest foundations to deterioration. Anarchy became the one place to which I could recede that remained intact; resistance struggles the thread that connected my past to a possible future.

Maintaining Mental Health

Esme: As the days became weeks, I got some basic stuff on commissary and had a routine planned in half-hour increments so I would always be busy. I was teaching myself to eat and write with my left hand, practicing Spanish in the evening, reading Foucault in the morning, writing three long letters after dinner, and starting to meditate.

My cell looked west out over a park, but the tiny window was opaque and foggy. There was one corner, though, where the clear epoxy that sealed the window hadn’t been fogged over. Through that tiny gap I could make out two trees in the distance on a hill, silhouetted against the sky. I would watch them for hours as the light changed. I still feel a happy sense of nostalgia when I think of how beautiful those two trees were. Since my release I’ve gone back and tried to find them, but none of the trees really seem right. Maybe they have been cut down, or maybe I imagined them.

Every now and then the guards would transfer me to another cell. None of the others had a view like the first one. One cell was so cold my bones ached from the pain of it, and I couldn’t sleep. I asked for a second blanket but they never gave me one. This was the hardest time: I felt so alone and sad, and not being able to sleep much made everything harder. If I slept during the day when it was warmer, I’d be up awake at night with no light, unable to read or distract myself from my thoughts, which were often dark. When the dark thoughts came, I would do ten burpees and then sit for a minute and scan how I felt, and do it again, as necessary. As bad as that was, I could hear other inmates having harder times—once I heard one pounding the walls and screaming about being suicidal. A unit of cops in riot gear beat them until they were quiet. Incidents like this were impossible to ignore, because they stood out so starkly from the monotony of my days, but each time they happened I was plunged into much darker thoughts.

After the cold cell I was transferred to one with a window that faced a wall, and no mirror. This detail may seem insignificant, but my ability to see my reflection had previously allowed me a sense of identity that was suddenly lost. Without an image of myself or a companion, my mind became a stranger and stranger place. I looked inwards and saw nothing. So instead I turned to my letters. It was these correspondences that gave me a sense of self. I was not an island but an amalgam of my relationships, conversations, and collective passions. Whether I was working out, meditating, eating, reading, or writing letters, I was doing it to strengthen my interactions with the outside world. I lived off of the letters, zines and books I received.

Right when I’d learned how to handle the cold isolation and identity crisis of solitary confinement, when I felt ready to endure this for the next sixteen months, I was transferred to General Population.

It was nothing like what you see on television.

People were initially suspicious of me, as I didn’t have the normal paperwork that other inmates had. My story didn’t quite make sense to some. Most people had never heard of civil contempt. Once I was able to show them a newspaper clipping about my case people started to trust me. Then I met an older bank robber, John who said he had been in prison in the ’70s, the same prison, in fact, as the ex-urban guerrilla folks who had come to my court date and shared their oath with me. I asked John if he knew those people and he did a double take. He said, “Holy shit, you’re into that stuff?” I said “No, no, no, they are just friends of mine—but we believe in a similar cause.” 

After that John, dedicated himself to looking out for me. He said that he missed the old days of principled convicts who didn’t betray each other and he saw me as staying true to that legacy, I was flattered.

I made other friends in general population, kept up with my workouts, started to fall behind on my correspondence, played cards, tried to explain anarchism to people and generally had an OK time. One thing that I found difficult to navigate ethically was racial politics. I am white and thus I had to sit with white people at lunch, watch the white TV, etc. I tried my best to buck these rules and build friendships with people of color, since I’m ideologically opposed to white separatism—moreover, some of the other white inmates were affiliated with white supremacist gangs. One way I managed to do this, oddly enough, was by hanging out with evangelical Christians. The Christians were organized on a multiracial basis. Though I didn’t go to their Bible study I would work out with them, and play cards and chess with them.  

In some ways time went by fast as I started to build real friendships with other inmates based on emotional support and vulnerability. I was also able now to have hour-long contact visits with my partner and my family.

Cora: The waiting room, the same room where I last saw my partner before they were taken into custody, was grey. The walls were large, painted brick interrupted by the occasional bulleted list of rules and expectations. I always arrived right when visitation hours began. We waited there until the guards called visitors up in groups to go through security.

I and handful of others, often families with children, were led through a long series of heavy doors to the visitor area. As we entered the room, I watched as people recognized one another, briefly hugged and sat to talk with their incarcerated loved ones. I didn’t see my partner, but thought maybe they would be one of the few inmates trickling in. Over the following few minutes, my mind went directly to the worst-case scenarios. I knew they were in solitary confinement. Were they hurt? Were their visitation privileges rescinded? Did I misunderstand the visitation guidelines?

A guard came from behind and asked me to follow him. I was led into a small room off the main visitation room. This room had two small television screens with telephones attached. The visitation wouldn’t be in-person but over the screen. My heart sank as I waited for a familiar face to appear on the screen. Their body was small on the screen, the camera was an awkward distance from where they sat. This made our communication feel less personal. I remember moving closer and closer to the screen instinctively, trying to hear their words more clearly and see their face more clearly. The visit was brief. It was hard to know what to talk about with one another. I can’t quite remember how long visitations were, but I do remember that video visitation was shorter than in-person ones. Our time together was via video for the majority of their incarceration. Two visits in a row, the video wasn’t working, so we could only communicate over the audio.

Release

Esme: At a certain point, my co-defendants had all been released after refusing to cooperate. I was the last of us left inside. After a few more months the judge finally determined what my comrades and I had known: that my incarceration had become punitive since there was no way I was going to cooperate. Much earlier than I’d expected, I was released back into the world.

Cora: I had almost no warning that Esme would be released. It was so surreal. It might have been the day before, or the day of—I ended up getting a call for our friend letting me know. I was preparing for eighteen months; we’d gotten married, I had my schedule down for visitation. We had a system, and we’d been getting good at it, and then it was suddenly over. I hadn’t planned for what would happen after. I felt like if I started to think ahead, I’d get caught up in longing for that. So when they were released, I didn’t even know what to do. It was hard to even feel relief, since the grand jury was still convened and the possibility of future subpoenas and indictments still hung over us. It seemed impossible that three or four people would be incarcerated over this for months and no indictments would follow. Esme was home for now, but would it even last? Or would I be the next one taken in? A lot of us had experienced being detained or mass arrested, things that were a direct result of certain conflicts with the police and state, but this felt like a different category. It’s not like there was a sentence to be served and then it was over. We had no timeframe for how long we had to wait. One lawyer identified the date they thought the grand jury convened, but because they could always reconvene and subpoena more people, it never felt like there was an end. It just hung over us until it eventually dissolved into our past. But I put it in the back of my mind because there wasn’t a lot I could do except keep functioning.

Esme: The shock of release was intense. Riding in a car felt so bizarre. I had lost so much weight none of my clothes fit. I had picked up strange mannerisms and new anxieties. But I was overjoyed to be with my comrades in the flesh again. The collective trauma we all experienced brought us much closer and forged powerful bonds that continue today. Some of my friends would stay on the run for years after, but that’s another story. There were some who betrayed their comrades and capitulated to the state’s demands. I won’t waste my breath on them, except to say that their mistake was tremendous. They lost all their friends and endured just as much trauma as any of us, but they cut themselves off from any support because they chose to throw others under the bus. Not only was their decision unethical, but in the end it wasn’t even self-serving. My experience was painful and lifechanging. Many years have passed and I’m still healing from it, but I do not regret my decisions for an instant.

Afterwards

Cora: Now that this is as behind me as it will ever be, I can see the ways it has shaped me. I moved out of town and onto a farm, in part because of my fear of the police. I had so many traumatic experiences about having them in my home. On the other hand, I feel much stronger and more capable than I did before—specifically, I know exactly how to do this and I could do it again. I know how to navigate the prison system, and I have much more empathy for incarcerated people. When I write them letters now, it feels more personal. I’m also proud of how I was able to build relationships that held a foundation for us all to hold each other through this experience. It helped us get out of the theoretical realm and solidify what we really think and believe. Being able to watch someone I love so much make those decisions based on their personal beliefs was inspiring. We can also say of course we would never crack, but it’s interesting to see someone actually rise to that challenge. It made it seem possible for me, because I was terrified I was going to through the same thing.

Esme: When I first got out, I thought I was fine. It wasn’t until years later that I realized how not okay I had been. Thanks to therapy, hallucinogens, learning about trauma, writing and the loving patience of friends I’ve healed a lot. I’m forever changed but in many ways I am stronger and I’m able to come to anarchist struggles with a focus and intention that I learned from my experience.

Devlin: After several years had passed we assumed that the grand jury had ended, since usually they have expiration dates. But even so lawyers I had talked to suggested that if I ever interacted with police again in my life I would certainly go to jail—so the question of coming out of hiding could not be taken lightly. But the life I was living on the run felt so difficult and I didn’t feel like I could keep living it. I had repressed my feelings during this time so much that I had in a sense lost my ability to feel, I started taking more and more dangerous risks because I didn’t see the point in anything.

But some part of me was aware of the self-destructive path I was on and I discussed it with my comrades. We made the decision that the cost of staying underground was no longer viable.

None of this is to say that it was all bad. It’s easy to emphasize the negative, but there were so many incredible high points I may not have experienced otherwise. Like when I drove for hours in a car full of friends and swam with dolphins in the ocean I remember thinking, “I’m supposed to be in jail right now!” It made the joy feel that much more intense.

Returning to my life felt like exiting one dream world for another. My first run-in with the police felt like the real test of whether or not things could settle down for me for awhile. I had no idea if I would be in jail just for a few hours or if I would be in there for way longer. I wondered to myself, “What do the cops know? How much info did they share between agencies?” But in the end I was released.

Coming back to my life and seeing people was hard, seeing how their lives had moved on. Distance had grown between us. I had to immediately find a job and a place to live. I got a bizarrely normal job in an office and just went through the motions of a functioning person. Over time, it’s grown to feel more and more like my life again.

I still feel rootless and disconnected in big ways at times, but I’m starting to feel comfortable with that. I have been able to make deep friendships with people all over, engaged in disparate but consistently inspiring work. I feel appreciative of the people and struggle around me even if I don’t entirely know where I belong. I embrace emotionality and a more communicative process of dealing with the difficulties of lifelong anarchist struggle. I expect to face harder things in the future than my experience on the run and I think now I’m more prepared to deal with what may come. I feel really strong now and as committed to my politics as I ever was. In some ways I feel less isolated that I did before I went on the run.

Being on the run brought contradictions between many of us, between who we wanted to be and who we are on the surface. So many people set aside their own needs and did support to make resistance to repression possible. At the same time, there were people who I feel let us down and that added to the pain of the whole experience.

If I had to offer anything resembling advice to someone who was thinking about grand juries or repression more generally, from the comfort of a home or stable life, it would be to decide right now who you are going to be. Know what your struggle looks like and spend every fucking day building that context in one way or another. If you are serious, you will be tested. In those moments, you can lean on the continuity of your resistance, and on the rest of us and our experiences. You, too, will be fanning the flames of someone else’s defiance.

Our thanks to all of these comrades for sharing their stories with us. State repression affects everyone, even those who aren’t directly in the line of fire, but there are ways to survive. Years after the ordeal, Devlin has reassumed every aspect of their old identity, as far as the state is concerned, and has a decent paying tech career, despite their stint on the run. Esme is directing amateur theater companies, and Cora is tending to animals on a farm while studying to be a nurse practitioner. Esme and Cora’s relationship with each other and with most of the friends who supported them through this time is still incredibly strong.

As Devlin said, if you’re serious, you will be tested. We may not all face the same kinds of repression, but it’s easy to live in fear when we see what happens to our comrades. We hope these stories have given you some tools and perspectives to use if you or your friends are ever in this situation. As a side note, Dr. Abdelhaleem Ashqar, who was such an inspiration to Devlin, was released this June!

Part of how the grand jury holds its power is through secrecy. The people in charge of these proceedings want us to be mystified and terrified. They want us to live in fear, knowing that fear can keep us docile and contained. The more we learn about how grand juries work and how we can keep ourselves whole and sane as we navigate them, the less power they can hold over us.

“The state demeans everything that we hold dear when they threaten us in this way. The most free and wild thing we have in this world is our love for each other, and we know that our health, our safety, and our liberation can only exist in a world without their cops, their courts, and their cages. Our strength lies in knowing that we can provide that for each other, and that nothing they offer or threaten is worth betraying our commitment to our communities.

“As state repression escalates, I know that all of us are struggling with the trauma and the grief that comes from the forces we fight against, and the vulnerability that we feel to the state in its despicable efforts to attack us. What I also know, what I believe with all my heart and everything I have, is that we have the strength we need to take care of each other and to fight back until we win.”

-Katie Yow, grand jury resister

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pullcarol0-blog · 5 years ago

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2:00PM Water Cooler 12/21/2018

By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

*** Ruth Bader Ginsburg Health Update: Supreme Court Justice Has Cancerous Lung Growths Removed ***

Trade

They issue press releases:

#China's Central Economic Work Conference news release promising on external reforms: pic.twitter.com/crz2zeKEFg

— Bert Hofman (@berthofmanecon) December 21, 2018

“How to fix America’s dysfunctional trade system” [Ryan Cooper, The Week]. “Timothy Meyer and Ganesh Sitaraman at the Great Democracy Initiative have a new paper that presents a solid starting point for developing a fundamental reform of American trade structure…. Then there is the problem of pro-rich bias. Put simply, the last few decades of trade deals have been outrageously biased towards corporations and the rich. They have powerfully enabled the growth of parasitic tax havens, which allow companies to book profits in low-tax jurisdictions, starving countries of rightful revenue (and often leading to companies piling up gargantuan dragon hoards of cash they don’t know what to do with). Corporations, meanwhile, have gotten their own fake legal system in the form of Investor-State Dispute Settlement trade deal stipulations…. Meyer and Sitaraman suggest renegotiating the tax portions of trade deals to enforce a “formulary” tax system — in which profits are taxed where they are made, not where they are booked.” • This is well worth a read for all the policy suggestions. And then there’s this:

[F]or all its other disastrous side effects, Trump’s haphazard tax on aluminum has dramatically revived the American aluminum industry. Ensuring a reasonable domestic supply of key metals like that is so obviously a security concern — for military and consumer uses alike — that it wouldn’t have even occurred to New Deal policymakers to think otherwise. It takes a lot of ideological indoctrination to think there’s no problem when a small price disadvantage causes a country to lose its entire supply chain of key industrial commodities.

Yep.

Politics

“But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature?” –James Madison, Federalist 51

2020

“The Democratic Party Is Getting Ready for a Very Messy 2020 Primary Race” [New York Magazine]. “The basic debate schedule itself acknowledges the likely massive field, and the potential for a drawn-out scrap for delegates that will ultimately determine the nomination. Perez said the first debate will be held in June 2019 — earlier than Republicans’ late-summer kickoff in 2015 — and the last one is scheduled for April 2020 — deep into the primary calendar, once the early-voting states and Super Tuesday have passed, and by which point the field is (usually) much winnowed. Perhaps not this time.”

“Critics Say Bernie Sanders Is Too Old, Too White, and Too Socialist to Run for President in 2020. They’re Wrong.” [The Intercept]. “Despite refusing to join the Democrats in the wake of the 2016 election, the party’s base still adores him. As of October 2018, he had a whopping 78 percent approval rating with Democratic voters.” • Yeah, but who cares about them?

2018 Post Mortem

“Americans Actually Voted in the 2018 Midterms” [Bloomberg]. • These are very interesting charts, but marred by being two-dimensional. It’s really absurd to put AOC and CIA asset Spanberger in the same blue box, or consider them both “left.”

Mattis Flap

Let The Hagiography Begin (1):

All Americans should take time to read General Mattis’s letter of resignation. It is a truly beautiful letter that speaks to our very best values as a nation. https://t.co/XY0mvqfv9q

— Nancy Pelosi (@NancyPelosi) December 21, 2018

Let The Hagiography Begin (2):

Sen. Schumer: "Sec. Mattis was 1 of the few symbols, the few items of strength & stability in this administration. Everything that indicates stability, everything that indicates strength, everything that indicates knowledge is leaving this administration." https://t.co/Bd79j1n4xF pic.twitter.com/22Byt1iZkh

— The Hill (@thehill) December 21, 2018

Breath of Sanity (1): “Random Observation” [Eschaton]. “Whatever the brain worms are telling him, I’m pretty sure that I’d generally prefer Donald Trump be running Not War instead of War, almost no matter what.”

Breath of Sanity (2):

Holy crap. I agree with Stephen Miller on Wolf Blitzer’s show on #CNN. He’s calling for US to get out of other nation’s wars!!! The world is upside down.

— Medea Benjamin (@medeabenjamin) December 20, 2018

Breath of Sanity (3):

1. I support withdrawing US troops from all these wars, overt and covert. 2. Trump is an unstable authoritarian who cannot be trusted. 3. “Mattis was an adult” is bullshit. He’s a hawkish war criminal. 4. It’s very telling that the war party in DC is furious.

— jeremy scahill (@jeremyscahill) December 21, 2018

“How the Trump-Mattis alliance crumbled” [CNN]. “Eight months before his resignation, Mattis managed to forestall the Syria troop withdrawal after the President announced during a rally in Ohio that US troops would soon be coming home. Meeting later in the Situation Room, Trump told his military and national security advisers they had six months to wrap up the mission in Syria.” • Interesting…

“Fear Mounts as Mattis Quits Pentagon” [Daily Beast] • And fear means clicks!

New Cold War

“Prosecutors win court fight over secret subpoena of a foreign company” [WaPo]. “A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday against a foreign company embroiled in a secret subpoena fight… Officials have not confirmed who the prosecutors on the case are, but on the day the court order under appeal was issued, two lawyers were observed exiting a sealed hearing before Chief Judge Beryl A. Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia — who oversees grand-jury proceedings — along with five prosecutors with the special counsel’s office, including appellate specialist Michael Dreeben… The framing of the debate suggests that whatever the company is, it is not one that has a significant business presence in the United States, because foreign firms operating in America typically comply with demands from U.S. authorities for evidence.” • Hmm.

Realignment and Legitimacy

“Democrats Just Blocked Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Push For A Green New Deal Committee” [HuffPo]. “Democratic leaders [***cough*** Pelosi ***cough***] on Thursday tapped Rep. Kathy Castor (D-Fla.) to head a revived U.S. House panel on climate change, all but ending a dramatic monthlong effort to establish a select committee on a Green New Deal. Castor’s appointment came as a surprise to proponents of a Green New Deal. … Despite weeks of protests demanding House Democrats focus efforts next year on drafting a Green New Deal, the sort of sweeping economic policy that scientists say matches the scale of the climate crisis, Castor told E&E News the plan was “not going to be our sole focus.” She then suggested that barring members who have accepted donations from the oil, gas and coal industries from serving on the committee could be unconstitutional. “I don’t think you can do that under the First Amendment, really,” she said.” • Cool. Liberals totally on board with Citizens United. I don’t think this appointment is the end of the issue.

“Liberals No Longer Feel Your Pain” [Ted Rall, Counterpunch]. “I noticed the de-empathification of the Democratic Party during the implementation of Obamacare. I lived in one of many counties with zero or one plan on offer…. On Facebook I complained about the paucity of affordable plans in my online health insurance marketplace. “I don’t know what you’re going on about,” one of my friends snarked. ‘I found an excellent, affordable plan.’ My friend lives in Manhattan… In the 1970s right-wing Republicans like Richard Nixon promoted the cliché of the “limousine liberal”: self-righteous, hypocritical, privileged and disconnected from Joe and Jane Sixpack. I don’t know if it was true then. It certainly is now.” • Falling life expectancy in flyover isn’t even on liberal Democrat radar as a policy issue.

“Do America’s Socialists Have a Race Problem?” [The New Republic]. The deck: “Inside a raging debate that has split the country’s most exciting new political movement.” The paragraph that caught my eye: “In one notable dispute, a brake light repair initiative in the [Momentum (democratic centralist?)] East Bay DSA was flatly rejected by the chapter’s co-chairs, who refused to put it up for a vote. The repair clinics first sprouted in New Orleans as a strategy to combat police brutality, as people of color are often pulled over for problems as innocuous as broken taillights. These traffic stops can even lead to—as in the case of Philando Castile—killings by the police. While DSA chapters across the country soon began replicating the program, and embraced it as an effective way to build a stronger working-class base, East Bay leadership remained strongly resistant to the campaign. In a private conversation, one East Bay co-chair insinuated to a member of color organizing the clinic that it would look like ‘white saviorism.’ A former member of the chapter’s leadership referred to it as ‘charity’ in a blog post.” • Well, that’s just dumb. Super dumb. FWIW, I thought the headline was a bit clickbaity, and the author, though writing in good faith, probably missed plenty of local nuance. That said: (1) America’s socialists have a problem with race, because America does; and (2) America’s socialists also have a problem with class, for the same reason, and (3) the Democrat Party has a substantial presence among aspirational policy entrepreneurs of color, shall we say, who have their own strongly felt institutional objectives. Worth noting that back in the 30s, the CPUSA was one of very few institutions to defend the Scottsboro Boys (the NAACP being the other). So it’s not like there’s no heritage here to build on.

Stats Watch

GDP, Q3 2018: “The third quarter was a strong one for the economy, getting a boost from an overdue inventory build but driven once again by the most important factor and that is consumer spending” [Econintersect]. “Whether continued strength for the consumer can be expected in the fourth quarter will get an indication later this morning with the personal income and outlays report for November.”

Personal Income and Outlays, November 2018: “November was a mixed month for the consumer as personal income managed only a lower-than-expected … gain which is offset, however, by a solid and higher-than-expected … rise for consumer spending” [Econintersect]. “November was a mixed month for the consumer as personal income managed only a lower-than-expected 0.2 percent gain which is offset, however, by a solid and higher-than-expected 0.4 percent rise for consumer spending.”

Durable Goods Orders, November 2018: “A swing higher for the always volatile aircraft group gave an outsized lift to durable goods orders” [Econoday]. “The biggest disappointment, and the heart of the capital goods group, is machinery where November orders sank a very steep 1.7 percent.” • Not good, in a capitalist economy.

Kansas City Fed Manufacturing Index, December 2018: “This morning’s durable goods report proved no better than mixed as have many of the recent regional manufacturing reports including Kansas City’s composite index for December which slowed” [Econintersect]. “And flattening is a reasonable description for the nation’s factory sector in general, ending what was a strong 2018 with a bit of fizzle.”

Consumer Sentiment, December 2018 (Final): “Consumer sentiment ends this month at a stronger-than-expected index level” [Econintersect]. “The feeling of this report is very much like personal income and outlays, hinting at consumer spending strength at a time of limited income growth and very flat inflation.”

Corporate Profits, Q3 2018: “After-tax corporate profits rose a year-on-year 6.1 percent” [Econintersect].

The Bezzle: “Wall Street’s Billionaire Machine, Where Almost Everyone Gets Rich” [Bloomberg]. “Eric Smidt is a new kind of super-rich. He made his fortune by transforming an old-fashioned business into a giant ATM, an overhaul aided by one of the hottest plays on Wall Street: collateralized loan obligations. Meet the new aristocrats of debt—the people and companies cashing in on a record boom in these once-marginal investments whose relatively high returns have attracted yield-hungry investors. They’ve fueled a rapid buildup in corporate debt that some think could become the epicenter of the next credit crisis but has been minting money for many.” • Oh.

The Bezzle: “Personally I’ve Never Experienced Anything Like That” [Current Affairs]. “Amazon pays employees specifically to tweet that they are well-treated and not exploited. And they’re very vigilant—I recently wrote an article pondering the ethical quandary of shopping at Amazon while being critical of its labor practices, and the very same “Fulfillment Center Ambassador” from one of the news articles about the practice (“Phil”) popped up to tell me that he himself feels he is treated fairly…. [A]ssuming they are people and not robots (however much Amazon is intent on blurring the distinction between those two categories), and they are treated well and sincere in relating their positive experiences, I think it’s worth pointing out the very simple problem with what they’re saying. ‘I have not experienced this problem personally’ does not make a very good case that ‘This problem is not experienced by others.'”

The Bezzle: “Uber’s entire business model is in jeopardy after losing its latest legal battle over the rights of UK drivers” [Business Insider]. “Uber has lost its latest court bid to stop its British drivers being classified as workers, entitling them to rights such as the minimum wage, in a decision which jeopardizes the taxi app’s business model…. Uber said it would appeal the verdict, meaning the legal process will continue.”

The 420

“The world’s biggest beer company is looking at making cannabis drinks” [CNN]. “Could Budweiser drinkers soon be swapping beer for pot? AB InBev (BUD), the world’s biggest brewer, said Wednesday that it’s teaming up with Canada’s Tilray (TLRY) to research cannabis-infused drinks. It’s the latest major company to start exploring the pot market following decisions to legalize recreational marijuana in Canada and a number of American states. AB InBev and Tilray will invest a combined $100 million into researching non-alcoholic drinks containing cannabis elements.” • My vision of marijuana legalization was always small, local growers and no corporate advertising. Oh well.

“Pot Unites Democrats, Republicans as Ex-Party Chiefs Join Tilray” [Bloomberg]. “Tilray Inc., the first cannabis company to list directly on a U.S. exchange, announced Thursday the formation of a 10-person advisory board including Howard Dean, a former presidential candidate and chairman of the Democratic National Committee between 2005 and 2009, and Michael Steele, head of the Republican National Committee from 2009 to 2011.”

Gaia

“What a Newfound Kingdom Means for the Tree of Life” [Quanta]. “The tree of life just got another major branch. Researchers recently found a certain rare and mysterious microbe called a hemimastigote in a clump of Nova Scotian soil. Their subsequent analysis of its DNA revealed that it was neither animal, plant, fungus nor any recognized type of protozoan — that it in fact fell far outside any of the known large categories for classifying complex forms of life (eukaryotes). Instead, this flagella-waving oddball stands as the first member of its own ‘supra-kingdom’ group, which probably peeled away from the other big branches of life at least a billion years ago…. Impressive as this finding about hemimastigotes is on its own, what matters more is that it’s just the latest (and most profound) of a quietly and steadily growing number of major taxonomic additions. Researchers keep uncovering not just new species or classes but entirely new kingdoms of life — raising questions about how they have stayed hidden for so long and how close we are to finding them all.” • Like Hollywood, nobody knows anything. Or at least not much. Although I have known some flagella-waving oddballs, generally in corporate environments…

“Widespread, occasional use of antibiotics in U.S. linked with resistance” [Harvard School of Public Health] (original). “The increasing prevalence of antibiotic resistance in the U.S. appears more closely linked with their occasional use by many people than by their repeated use among smaller numbers of people, according to a large new study from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health…. ‘Our findings suggest that combatting inappropriate antibiotic use among people who don’t take many antibiotics may be just as important, or more important, to fighting resistance than focusing on high-intensity users,’ said lead author Scott Olesen, postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases. ‘More antibiotic use generally means more antibiotic resistance, but it seems like the number of people taking antibiotics might matter more than the amount they’re taking.'”

Police State Watch

“Alabama police department blames Satan for spike in homicides” [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]. This was the now-deleted Facebook post from the Opp Police Department:

THIS PAST SUNDAY, A YOUNG MAN WAS SHOT AND KILLED IN KINSTON. MONDAY NIGHT, A MOTHER WAS SHOT AND KILLED IN NORTHERN COVINGTON COUNTY. THERE HAVE BEEN FIVE MURDERS IN COVINGTON COUNTY IN 2018. THESE MURDERS HAVE BEEN DONE BY OUR YOUNG PEOPLE. THIS IS HAPPENING BECAUSE WE HAVE TURNED AWAY FROM GOD AND EMBRACED SATAN. WE MAY HAVE NOT MEANT TO DO SO BUT, WE HAVE. IT IS TIME TO ASK FOR GOD’S HELP TO STOP THIS. IT IS TIME TO BE PARENTS AND RAISE OUR CHILDREN, NOT HAVE THEM RAISE US. IT IS TIME TO FULLY SUPPORT LAW ENFORCEMENT AND STAND BY THE OFFICERS AND DEPUTIES THAT ARE FAR TOO OFTEN HAVING TO WALK INTO THESE DANGEROUS SITUATIONS AND CLEAN UP THE MESS. FRIENDS, IT IS TIME TO STAND UP AND BE RESPONSIBLE, GROWN UP LEADERS IN OUR COMMUNITY. BOTTOM LINE, THERE ARE SHEEP; THERE ARE WOLVES AND THERE ARE SHEEP DOGS. WHICH GROUP DO YOU BELONG TO?

I am successfully resisting my urge to mock (well, except for the ALL CAPS) because of the multiple levels of tragedy: So many deaths in a small town, and the evident inablility of the local elites to cope. And it’s not any more crazypants than what you hear from a typical neoliberal economist. Just no pseudo-mathematics.

Class Warfare

“Is It Merely A Labor Supply Shock? Impacts of Syrian Migrants on Local Economies in Turkey” (PDF) [Doruk Cengiz, Hasan Tekguc, Political Economy Research Institute]. “We use a large and geographically varying inflow of over 2.5 million Syrian migrants in Turkey between 2012 and 2015 to study the effect of migration on local economies. We do not find adverse employment or wage effects for native-born Turkish workers overall, or those without a high school degree. These results are robust to a range of strategies to construct reliable control groups. Our analysis suggests that migration-induced increases in regional demand, capital supply, and productivity enable local labor markets to absorb inflow of migrant labor.” • Contra post-Mariel studies of Florida.

Xmas Cheer

“Hackers Celebrate Holidays With Fake Amazon, Apple Receipt Attacks” [NewYork Magazine]. “You get an email about an order from Amazon or Apple you’re not quite sure you placed — but who knows in the last-minute rush to make the Christmas deadline? You click through to see what exactly you ordered, and congrats, you’ve just got spear-phished. Happy holidays! Two recent phishing attacks outlined over at Bleeping Computer, work slightly differently but use the same basic principle to lure users in: send them a receipt for a purchase, get them to click through to a link to see what the purchase was for, and then hope the user makes some unwise choices.” • Stay safe out there!

News of the Wired

“The intertwined quest for understanding biological intelligence and creating artificial intelligence” [Stanford HAI]. “Thus both neuroscience and AI have deeply shared scientific goals of understanding how network performance and decision making arises as an emergent property of network connectivity and dynamics. Therefore the development of ideas and theories from theoretical neuroscience, and applied physics and mathematics could help in analyzing AI systems. Moreover, the behavior of AI systems could change the nature of experimental design in neuroscience, focusing the experimental effort on those aspects of network function that are poorly understood in AI. Overall, there is much to be gained from tighter connections between neuroscience, AI, and many other theoretical disciplines, which could bring about unified laws for the emergence of intelligence in biological and artificial systems alike, as we suggest next.” • If we really understood biological intelligence — the epigraph for the article is from Richard Feynman: “What I cannot create, I do not understand” — would handing that understanding over to, say, Jeff Bezos be a good thing? Why?

* * *

Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, with (a) links, and even better (b) sources I should curate regularly, (c) how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal, and (d) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. Today’s plant (4Corners):

Everything is still sunny inTucson, AZ! I love floral tapestries like this, made up of different colors and textures.

* * *

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This entry was posted in Guest Post, Water Cooler on December 21, 2018 by Lambert Strether.

About Lambert Strether

Readers, I have had a correspondent characterize my views as realistic cynical. Let me briefly explain them. I believe in universal programs that provide concrete material benefits, especially to the working class. Medicare for All is the prime example, but tuition-free college and a Post Office Bank also fall under this heading. So do a Jobs Guarantee and a Debt Jubilee. Clearly, neither liberal Democrats nor conservative Republicans can deliver on such programs, because the two are different flavors of neoliberalism (“Because markets”). I don’t much care about the “ism” that delivers the benefits, although whichever one does have to put common humanity first, as opposed to markets. Could be a second FDR saving capitalism, democratic socialism leashing and collaring it, or communism razing it. I don’t much care, as long as the benefits are delivered. To me, the key issue — and this is why Medicare for All is always first with me — is the tens of thousands of excess “deaths from despair,” as described by the Case-Deaton study, and other recent studies. That enormous body count makes Medicare for All, at the very least, a moral and strategic imperative. And that level of suffering and organic damage makes the concerns of identity politics — even the worthy fight to help the refugees Bush, Obama, and Clinton’s wars created — bright shiny objects by comparison. Hence my frustration with the news flow — currently in my view the swirling intersection of two, separate Shock Doctrine campaigns, one by the Administration, and the other by out-of-power liberals and their allies in the State and in the press — a news flow that constantly forces me to focus on matters that I regard as of secondary importance to the excess deaths. What kind of political economy is it that halts or even reverses the increases in life expectancy that civilized societies have achieved? I am also very hopeful that the continuing destruction of both party establishments will open the space for voices supporting programs similar to those I have listed; let’s call such voices “the left.” Volatility creates opportunity, especially if the Democrat establishment, which puts markets first and opposes all such programs, isn’t allowed to get back into the saddle. Eyes on the prize! I love the tactical level, and secretly love even the horse race, since I’ve been blogging about it daily for fourteen years, but everything I write has this perspective at the back of it.

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Source: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2018/12/200pm-water-cooler-12-21-2018.html

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piepeloe · 7 years ago

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Ok, now I think I’m following. I’m still not sure I entirely agree. One thing I do agree on is that I don’t like it when Liv cajoles him into a specific course of action whether it’s bending the law or sticking with it. I like him with some spine and a mind of his own. But I’m not sure how her having to convince him to take a case or to take risks make him seem less passionate. More pragmatic, maybe? I think they both care about justice equally, just in very different ways. Often it’s the squad (Liv in particular) pushing for him to take a case when there’s not enough to go on, simply because they feel it’s right and they want to help the victims. He then says no, because there’s not enough to go on. And it might mean losing the case and therefor more trauma to the victim.

Again, I get how it can seem more passionate to take risks and charge ahead. But it’s often the dumbest option. I like that he demands them to be smarter and work harder. That’s him being passionate IMO. Not just about any particular case, but about his job, the law, all of it.

I honestly don’t know how I feel about a person bending/breaking the law when there’s no legal option. I’m sure in real life it’s happened, but I honestly can’t remember a single time on the show (at least the eps I’ve seen) where it’s been absolutely necessary. On the show it genuinely just feels like a cheap plot device used to heighten tension. Especially for a character like Barba who was established as someone who used the law, albeit creatively.

- Cops’ grand jury: I think on this one we sort of agree? He was awesome because he did his job and/or the right thing, no matter what.

- Drug addict: you got that part right. If she had testified all strung out, he would have lost and the defendants would have walked. So I’m with Liv (and I’m guessing you) in that I don’t think he should feel all too terrible over it. But I also don’t think it should classify as ‘doing the right thing’. There probably was no right thing in that scenario.

- Mistrial: if the mistrial had happened some other way, those would all have been possibilities I think. But since it’s his fault and he was removed, it was out of his control. The next prosecutor might not have cared a bit and not even considered a plea deal, and gone straight for her. He got lucky they accepted his idea of family court. It was a very big risk, with little chance of it working the way it did, and it could have been avoided. But this one I can sort of understand, because while I dislike how this plot seemingly forgot his competence and intelligence, it did showcase his compassion in a way we don’t often see.

- Airline grand jury: they’re the only charges mentioned? That speech was his final plea to the jury, his case of why they should indict. If he was indicting on other charges he’d be explaining why they should vote for those, not explaining why Grand Larceny makes sense. And for a tv show it also wouldn’t make sense not to tell us what the charges were going to be and why. There’s no reason to believe he brought other charges except for the fact that these would be ridiculous. If nothing else, that’s bad writing.

I agree that since it’s fiction obviously everything has to be made more exciting. I just wish they’d be more thoughtful about it. Especially since SVU claims to be socially aware and whatnot, with how people perceive the US justice system I just don’t think it’s a good idea to show our heroes breaking or bending or skirting the law. Unless it’s then followed by negative consequences.

Personally, I also just like Barba best when he’s clever and sharp and biting. He’s like that when he’s at the top of his game in the courtroom. Often when he’s taking risks/’doing the right thing’ he winds up floundering for some reason it feels like, needing help from Liv. But that might just be a feeling.

fallingfortheprohibited replied to your post “SVU 19x11 Flight Risk”

Tbh I like this side of Barba better. I love it when ADAs are passionate and put justice over law which is something we haven’t been seeing much since Alex Cabot and Casey Novak stopped being part of the show. I don’t like how most of the time Olivia has to remind him why he needs to do the right thing.I love the Barba who indicted the cops who shot the unarmed black man, the Barba who broke the law so that drug addict would be able to testify, the one who caused the

mistrial last week and fought misogyny this week. I’ve missed having an ADA who will go far and beyond to do what’s right. Regular Barba would thiink “what’s the point of prosecuting them, they’ll get away with it anyway” and Olivia would go on about how they need to send a message that misogyny wont be tolerated. But this episode was different. In this episode, he was the one who surprised Olivia with how far he’ll take it (like she, Alex and Casey would often do) and it was awesome. Btw, I also loved his speech. I thought it was very direct and moving.

So, I wasn’t sure I was going to reply to this, first because I was busy at work, then because I didn’t know if I wanted to get into it. But days later it was still bugging me, so here we are. This feels like it could be a sensitive subject and I don’t know how coherent my answer is, but I tried. It got long so I put it behind a cut.

Keep reading

#svu #barba

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thisdaynews · 5 years ago

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‘Thin to win’: How Democrats are building the case against Trump

New Post has been published on https://thebiafrastar.com/thin-to-win-how-democrats-are-building-the-case-against-trump/

‘Thin to win’: How Democrats are building the case against Trump

“I see a prosecutorial approach being used here quite effectively,” said Elie Honig, a former New Jersey and federal prosecutor.

One of the most fundamental questions House Democrats have been grappling with in the impeachment inquiry, Honig said, is one prosecutors have to confront “all the time.”

”That is, do you take the kitchen sink approach, and present jurors with every damaging thing you have, which might overwhelm them?” Honig said. “Or do you go ‘thin to win’ and get the best, strongest argument out there, front and center, and waste no time?”

Democrats appear to be ditching the kitchen sink for simplicity.

They had no shortage of potential targets — from potential emoluments clause violations stemming from foreign and federal business at Trump properties, to obstruction of justice in the Mueller probe, to an immigration policy that led to children being separated from their parents at the border.

But experienced litigators say it’s much easier to explain why it was an abuse of power for Trump to ask a foreign leader to dig up dirt on Joe Biden, which is why a narrow approach might work best.

“The biggest insight I’ve had in trying complex cases is that you want to be the one telling the simple story, and you want the other side to be telling the complicated story,” said Renato Mariotti, a former federal prosecutor in the Northern District of Illinois. “Whichever side telling the simple story wins, and it’s simply because of the way the human brain works.”

Patrick Cotter, a former federal prosecutor who was part of the team that convicted Gambino family boss, John Gotti, called it “standard practice” to advocate for a narrow set of charges that are easily proved.

“I can draw on my own experience,” Cotter said. “In the Gotti case, the Justice Department said, ‘Make sure you get him good.’ So we literally sat around the table for days and discussed all the things we could in theory charge him with.”

Ultimately, Cotter said, prosecutors settled on 11 specific charges — and left several out.

“The other crimes we could’ve charged we left alone because we thought, ‘We can’t put a complicated, hard-to-prove case before a jury with varying levels of proof,” he said. “The goal is to identify your strongest charges that are the clearest and easiest to present, and the easiest to get the desired result.”

The strategy is likely being pushed by the House Intelligence Committee’s senior adviser and director of investigations, Daniel Goldman, according to people who know him.

Goldman, a former federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York who oversaw prosecutions of Russian organized crime and successfully prosecuted members of the Genovese crime family, was hired by Schiff—himself a former prosecutor—in March when the panel was still closely scrutinizing Trump’s ties to Russia.

“I do see his fingerprints on this,” said a former colleague of Goldman’s who requested anonymity to comment on his work.

Goldman took the lead on questioning former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch and Ambassador Michael McKinley, the former senior adviser to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Transcripts of their depositions show Democratic members repeatedly deferring to Goldman as he sought to establish the factual record.

Honig pointed to Goldman’s “precision in questioning, the full-court awareness of what other evidence shows, and the use of that other evidence to draw out key points of witness testimony.”

Legal experts often note that an impeachment inquiry is a political rather than a criminal process, and caution against framing the inquiry in terms of crimes the president may have committed, or specific statutes he might have violated.

But that doesn’t mean the process itself can’t be conducted the way a prosecutor might pursue an indictment, they said.

In the case of impeachment, noted Joyce Vance, a former U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Alabama, investigators don’t have to prove specific elements of a crime beyond a reasonable doubt—only that the facts are “compelling, and compelling to those who may be supporters of the president.”

“That counsels in favor of charges that are easy to understand and taken separately or together make a compelling case that the president is unfit to continue serving,” she added.

The current private, investigative phase of the impeachment inquiry has been compared to the grand jury process in a criminal proceeding, where witnesses are called in secret and evidence is compiled by prosecutors. Republicans have criticized this approach, accusing Democrats of conducting a secret inquiry that deprives Trump of due process.

Unlike the actual grand jury process, however, the closed-door depositions have actually given Republicans significantly more access than a defendant’s team would have during a criminal probe, Honig said.

“The No. 1 advantage being the ability to question witnesses,” he said, referring to the nearly 50 Republicans who are able to participate in the hearings by virtue of their committee membership.

In the hearings, House Democrats have tried to focus less on what Pelosi recently described as the “smoking gun”—Trump’s July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in which he specifically asked for a probe of the Bidens—and more on the shadow foreign policy campaign that preceded it.

Goldman’s first question to Yovanovitch was when she initially became aware that Giuliani “had an interest in or was communicating with anyone in Ukraine.” He later asked whether Ukrainian government officials were aware of Giuliani’s connection to Trump, and whether with the benefit of hindsight, she could describe how the shadow campaign affected the State Department’s official Ukraine policy that Yovanovitch was charged with carrying out.

“Ukrainians were wondering whether I was going to be leaving, whether we really represented the president, U.S. policy, etc,” she replied. “And so I think it was — you know, it really kind of cut the ground out from underneath us.”

Goldman also got Yovanovitch to say she believed Trump wanted her gone because of his relationship with Giuliani, who at that point was relaying negative information about her to the president that he was gleaning from a former Ukrainian prosecutor, Yuriy Lutsenko. And she testified that she was recalled so suddenly from Ukraine because the State Department was trying to get ahead of a potential Trump tweet about her.

The strategy is likely intended to strengthen Democrats’ case that Trump acted with corrupt intent, former prosecutors noted. “Putting everything under the umbrella of ‘abuse of power’ is smart because it’s simple,” Mariotti said. “There can be no debate about whether that’s an impeachable offense — it has been in the past.”

The Judiciary Committee approved three articles of impeachment against Richard Nixon in 1974, for obstruction of justice, abuse of power and contempt of Congress.

The president, meanwhile, has remained fixated on the call and the whistleblower who first raised alarms about it, and has treated his conversation with Zelensky as if it is the only evidence investigators have gathered as part of the impeachment inquiry.

“What I said on the phone call with the Ukrainian President is ‘perfectly’ stated,” Trump tweeted on Monday. “There is no reason to call witnesses to analyze my words and meaning. This is just another Democrat Hoax that I have had to live with from the day I got elected (and before!). Disgraceful!”

Several senior officials, including former national security adviser John Bolton and former White House lawyer John Eisenberg, have not committed to testifying in the impeachment inquiry.

But Democrats have taken depositions from nearly a dozen White House, State Department, and Pentagon officials in recent weeks, and their testimonies have gone far beyond the “words and meaning” of Trump’s call with Zelensky.

The transcripts of some of those depositions are now public, with more on the way. Both Yovanovitch and McKinley testified that they believed Yovanovitch was removed as part of the shadow campaign Trump’s allies were running to extract political favors from Kyiv.

“When the transcript of the call was released — I’m just going to state it clearly as a foreign service officer — to see the impugning of somebody I know to be a serious, committed colleague in the manner that it was done raised alarm bells for me,” McKinley testified. “It absolutely did.”

And from what has leaked of the other witnesses’ testimonies, it’s clear Democrats are focused on establishing a pattern of conduct—including Yovanovitch’s removal, the withholding of a White House summit for Zelensky, and the freeze on funds to Kyiv—and the motivations behind it.

Each witness has described efforts led by Trump’s personal lawyer Giuliani and U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland to pressure Zelensky into publicly announcing investigations into the Bidens in exchange for a White House summit.

Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, an Army officer who serves as the Ukraine director on the National Security Council, testified that he understood the summit and military assistance aid to be contingent on Zelensky committing to those probes. U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Bill Taylor was told the same by Sondland, he testified.

The depositions have also revealed that Eisenberg took steps to conceal the content of the call, by moving it to a top-secret codeword system and instructing Vindman, who listened to the call, not to discuss it with anyone.

That could help Democrats establish that some in the White House had a guilty state of mind, which at least one Republican senator has already cast doubt on. “To me, this entire issue is gonna come down to, why did the president ask for an investigation?” Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy told The Washington Post last week.

“To me, it all turns on intent, motive…Did the president have a culpable state of mind? Based on the evidence that I see, that I’ve been allowed to see, the president does not have a culpable state of mind,” Kennedy said.

Leaked testimony also shows that House investigators have been homing in on whether Trump directed his advisers to pressure Ukraine into a quid pro quo—a finding that could be key to the impeachment inquiry’s popularity with the public, said Mimi Rocah, a former federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York.

“You could have an abuse of power without having bribery and a quid pro quo,” Rocah said. “Just asking a foreign power to intervene in our election is an abuse of power.”

But, she added, “I’m not sure whether the public would buy that given recent GOP arguments that the president is in charge of conducting foreign policy, no matter what that looks like. At the end of the day, to maintain the momentum, Democrats will need to demonstrate with all this witness testimony that a quid pro quo occurred.”

The Judiciary Committee will ultimately be responsible for drafting the articles of impeachment based on the findings of the inquiry. The committee has been studying the history and legal precedents on impeachment for several months with the help of legal experts Norm Eisen and Barry Berke, who were hired earlier this year and will likely be deeply involved in the drafting of articles.

Still, there could be surprises on the way.

Despite the narrow scope Democrats are maintaining for now, Rocah noted, “they’ve left themselves some wiggle room with a potential ‘abuse of power’ article, which is broadly defined, and they’ve done a good job of showing that this wasn’t just about one phone call. Instead, with the depositions, they’re showing that this was a broader pattern of conduct over time.”

Prosecutors take a similar approach at trial. “You don’t reveal everything at once, or in your opening,” Rocah said. “You reveal it piece by piece during trial and then make your strongest argument in your closing.”

#building #Foreign #Politics #Trump

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obertsonpddamarispb86insura-blog · 5 years ago

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Can home insurance companies completely deny you because you have a dog that attacked someone at one point?

Thank you all very much for the quick responses, although not the greatest news :- I guess I ve just heard from others that insurance companies can offer a liability waiver, sort of like car insurance companies do. In that way, owners and insurance companies agree that the animal will not be covered. He s a nice dog, we refuse to put him to sleep, worst case scenario is that he will live with someone else. Thank you all again.

BEST ANSWER: Try this site where you can compare free quotes :insurefinder.xyz

SOURCES:

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fitnessexpert00-blog · 6 years ago

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Trump Jr says he was open to intel on Clinton's 'fitness' at Russia meeting

New Post has been published on https://fitnessqia.com/must-see/trump-jr-says-he-was-open-to-intel-on-clintons-fitness-at-russia-meeting/

Trump Jr says he was open to intel on Clinton's 'fitness' at Russia meeting

Presidents son says he was open to hearing about Hillary Clintons fitness, character or qualifications for presidency ahead of meeting with Russian lawyer

Donald Trumps eldest son denied colluding with any foreign government but told Senate staffers that when he accepted a now infamous meeting with a Russian lawyer last year, he was open to receiving information about Hillary Clintons fitness, character or qualifications for the presidency.

Donald Trump Jr made the comment in an opening statement delivered on Thursday to staff of the Senate judiciary committee, who were interviewing him privately as part of investigations into links between Trump aides and Russia.

Trump Jr and the committee negotiated the meeting. Senators were allowed to sit in but not ask questions.

Senator Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat, attended part of the interview and said it was cordial. He would not discuss details but said there were a lot of areas that need to be pursued for more information. Trump mostly spoke for himself, Blumenthal said, instead of his lawyers speaking for him.

The statement focused on the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower involving Trump Jr, then Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, senior Trump adviser Jared Kushner, the lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya and others including other Russians.

The meeting is also of interest to special counsel Robert Mueller. The appearance before the Senate staffers was the first known instance of Trump Jr giving his version of the meeting in a setting that could expose him to legal jeopardy. It is a crime to lie to Congress.

Trump Jr said he only remembered seven people attending the meeting. Eight have been publicly reported. The seven Trump Jr identified were himself, British music publicist Rob Goldstone, Manafort, Kushner, Veselnitskaya, a translator and Irakli Kaveladze, who worked for the Agalarov family, which has done business with the Trump Organization.

Trump Jr did not mention Russian American lobbyist Rinat Akhmetshin, a former Soviet counterintelligence officer who has said he attended the meeting at Veselnitskayas invitation and who has testified about his recollection of it before a Washington grand jury used by Mueller.

Profile

Donald Trump Jr

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Born

31 December 1977 in Manhattan

Career

After brief stint bartending in Aspen, he moved back to New York to join the Trump Organization, supervising Trump Park Avenue and other projects. He took an interest in other family enterprises in later years, appearing as a guest adviser on his fathers reality television show The Apprentice and as a judge of various Miss USA pageants.

High point

Just before the news of his meeting with the Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya, he was riding high as executive director of The Trump Organization and one of the presidents closest confidants.

Low point

On Tuesday 11 July 2017, he produced the most damning evidence yet in the FBIs investigation of Russian meddling in the US election, catapulting himself on to the international stage with emails showing he knowingly met with a Russian lawyer claiming to have dirt on his fathers rival.

He says

I think I probably got a lot of my fathers natural security, or ego, or whatever I can be my own person and not have to live under his shadow. I definitely look up to him in many ways Id like to be more like him when it comes to business but I think Im such a different person, its hard to even compare us. His work persona is kind of what he is. I have a work face, and then theres my private life, Trump Jr to New York magazine, 2004.

They say

Its a do-anything-you-can-to-win world that hes part of, and his eagerness to meet with this lawyer, who was very explicitly described as having information that came from Russian government sources theres no mystery there. Theres no veil. Theres not even one veil. Her name wasnt mentioned but everything else was very explicit and he leaps at it. Thats all part of this all-that-matters-is-winning, theres winning and theres losing, thats it. Thats the value system and in that way, he very much echoes his father. Gwenda Blair, Trump biographer, to the Guardian, 12 July 2017.

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Trump Jr has faced scrutiny since the first report of the meeting, which happened in June 2016. An email exchange released by Trump Jr revealed his eagerness to receive the information. I love it, he wrote to Goldstone, who brokered the meeting.

Goldstone told Trump Jr the crown prosecutor of Russia had offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father. Trump Jr later insisted that the meeting had turned out to be a nothing.

In his statement on Thursday, he said he was skeptical but had thought he should listen to what Rob and his colleagues had to say.

To the extent they had information concerning the fitness, character or qualifications of a presidential candidate, I believed that I should at least hear them out, Trump Jr said.

Seeking to explain his I love it remark, Trump Jr said it was simply a colloquial way of saying that I appreciated Robs gesture.

Trump Jr said he knew Goldstone through the family of Aras Agalarov, the Trump Organizations partner on the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow. Trump Jr said he did not attend the pageant, noting that he has not traveled to Russia since 2011. He met Goldstone, he said, when Agalarovs pop singer son, Emin, performed at a March 2014 golf tournament at a Trump course in Doral, Florida.

Trump Jr said that Goldstone would intermittently contact him to offer congratulations or support. When he received the email that led to the Russian meeting, Trump Jr said, he had not heard from Goldstone in quite some time.

In addition to detailing the timing of phone calls and emails leading up to the meeting, Trump Jr provided explanations of why he said he could not be sure about parts of his recollection.

He said Goldstone did not give him a list of who would attend. Trump Tower security also has no record, Trump Jr said, because Goldstone was able to bring the entire group up by only giving his name to a guard in the lobby.

There is no attendance log to refer back to and I did not take notes, Trump Jr said.

Trump Jr agreed to the interview after the judiciary committee chairman, Republican Chuck Grassley of Iowa, threatened to subpoena him. Manafort and Kushner spoke to investigators on Capitol Hill in July. In a statement at the time, Kushner echoed Trump Jrs denial, saying: I did not collude, nor know of anyone else in the campaign who colluded, with any foreign government.

Grassley said in July that Trump Jr and Manafort would be questioned by senators in a public hearing, though he declined to say in recent days whether that would still happen.

Trump Jr is also expected to appear before the Senate intelligence committee. Mark Warner of Virginia, the top Democrat on that panel, said the senators want to speak with others who attended the meeting before interviewing Trump Jr.

We want to do this in a thorough way that gets the most information possible, Warner said.

In a statement after the hearing, Trump Jr said he answered every question posed by the committee … until both sides had exhausted their lines of questioning. I trust this interview fully satisfied their inquiry.

The New York Times was first to report Trump Jrs statement.

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/us

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aclearerviewfromlockdown-blog · 6 years ago

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Dear Readers, and all fair minded as well as legal minded people, my legal matter is about America's immigration fraud. FBI scandal and corruption to the fullest. My case is not just about America, "No" it is really about corruption finding its way into America's courts and continues until now. It is said "Until the Lion learns how to write, the hunter would always be the hero." I was used as a political scapegoat by both the American and Trinidadian governments in a very corrupt and shameful legal matter, the U.S. government keeps on the hush low for the past decade after lying to an American grand jury, the American people in order to bring me and this corrupt case into America. Court paper claims that an untold sum of money was spent in this case and continues to be spent. So let me first touch on a few issues before I give you the true and raw fact of an unjust, unlawful, corrupt case and you be the judge. Today a slave bible sits on display in a Washington D.C. museum for all to see and question. A copy of its very kind was sent in to the Caribbean West Indies many moons ago to help govern, keeping black slaves weak minded and well obedient. All the empowering stories of the bible was never mentioned in the slave bible including the story about the children of Israel was removed. Their hardship and their overcoming at the end. Nothing to give black slaves hope was mentioned in that evil book. Today I clearly understand why my government statesmen, judges, and other high office holders are such a sellout, weak, self-centered, "Cool Uncle Tom's" to foreign powers who keeps their foot on my people's necks and their hands in our wealthy pockets for decades in the most crafty ways. God bless my country in so many ways only Him and the heavens know about. Whatever this world has for sale my country could freely bought it all in cash, much less to now come and be handing over my country citizens, men and women, to foreign government based on their laws and corrupt policies now yet equally reviewed or lawfully justify nor pass in the upper House of the Trinidad and Tobago House of Representatives. Just rubber stamp down our throat in the disguise of a friendly treaty. Today when these very same law and policies now see the prosecution of a few of my country statesmen their wealthy friends in America. Somehow these laws no longer exist or apply to them. When you refuse to uphold and practice your very own laws and policies as they are written then turn around and twist the laws to help justify your corrupt opinions what messages do you send to the rules of law that you boldly use daily to oppress and keep in prison the less fortunate while both the Democratic and Republican parties play games, politick for their personal gain and the gains of the selective few. Who is financially responsible for putting and keeping them in office while the American people needs are never met only pacify at time. The red, white, black, and brown kids, America's future suffer at America's door steps daily in so many ways to get by. Senior citizens who have already paid their dues in full in wars, etc. to make America the great place she is are now forced back into a job at old age to make ends meat. It has now become a culture, how sad, overnight in America to go into public schools, places of business, etc. and kill innocent people, where has America gone and how rich self-centered and heartless the selective few, gun makers, etc. are seeking to become that they cannot put differences aside pulling together power, influence, good/common sense for the better good of all Americans and this world you badly seek to lead and police. The time for pointing fingers been long gone. America's heads of states, congressmen, and women, you all must come clean now before it's too late because you all hold the burden and responsibility for what is taking place throughout America. Firstly, start by revisiting and reviewing all thes oppressive, wicked laws which you enhance and sign in to bill knowing very well firsthand how unfair and evil these laws are before passing them. Stripping people of their rights to keep America's biggest business running prison modern day slavery. Who do you all think you are fooling while you all allow each other to run loose at times breaking the laws on all different levels known and unknown to each other, making a mockery of democracy in the face of all Americans. The order of the day and America's business affair before Congress, and the World, etc, has now turned into a live soap opera all because what many of you did in secret today Trump now does openly. Far too much time and money has been spent on these Trump issues while American lives still slowly deteriorate. The bar was set very low in the 2016 general election and poor hard working, frustrated Americans went to the polls and did what they all thought was best. Seeking at least a piece of the American dream through good governance rather than living a nightmare in constant poverty. America is without without any question a foreign land mainly because the very blood, sweat, and tears of all races built America in every aspect. Forget if you all want to but it was 400 hundred years of free labor pain and suffering willingly and unwillingly Africans endured a price no race has yet paid to build America and exist. Simple minded as well as strong sound minded Americans you all know very well that Trump brought nothing but chaos to the table for all Americans so spending billions on a border wall would not help Americans nor put food on their tables, protect them or bridge the gap widely open since Trump took office. This wall is a business venture for the rich to get richer, passing hardworking tax payers money around through contracts to help cover old favors due. Racist America, you all pretend to have compromise with the growth and contributions other race have given their very lives in wars to make America safe, but if you don't now fully let go of that old racist stigma deeply rooted within which hinders America's best potential entering such a critical century putting all Americans at risk at home and abroad. Today is a very sad day worldwide but mostly a very sad day in America. American life expectancy went down in 3 years, gun violence, suicide, drug overdoses are at highest in the world. The fact that prosecutor has now totally corrupt the very integrity of the court turning it into their personal play ground only to build themselves is a whole entire different story by itself. I now call into questioning the fact of America being the land of the free while America keeps hundreds of thousands of their citizens and other countries citizens in prison. The charges, evidence, prison time given, and the rate people are being sent to jail in America do not add up to nothing lawful nor justice being served. No regard for the rule of law as it is written. Corrupt enhancements, wrongful arrests, illegal prosecution, rubber stamp trials, ghost drugs, ghost guns, in other words no evidence, abusive-unjust sentencing has murdered the claim of America being the land of the free. It is said that conspiracy is America's most dangerous weapon, no facts, no proof, nothing physical nor scientific, you go to jail for the rest of your life. "Conspiracy was serve". It may well seem like the judge you are before, the prosecutor and your very own lawyer all got some kind of investment in prison, who knows? who do we trust, because prison now such a money making business for all. Rudy Giuliani, you are the most perfect example to show the lies, corrupt games, and unlawful acts committed by so many prosecutors inside as well as outside the court. Thank you Mr. Giuliani so much for showing the American people what so many prosecutors are truly about. There is no preferential treatment in the prison system in court it constitutes deliberate indifference. "Senator" Howard pronounced that it established equality before the law and it gives the humblest and the poorest, the most despair of race the same rights and the same protection before the law as it gives to the most powerful, the most wealthy or the most boastful, than if that's the case, why was Paul Mannefort awarded luxurious treatment at Northern Neck County jail, while facing criminal prosecution until now he was allowed street food daily, taken to court alone in luxurious Federal Suburban's, housed in jail housing unit alone built for at least 30 inmates while his staff workers, friends, family members were able to freely walk in and out of the county jail at any given time, personal computers, et. while immigrant kids are being housed like doges in cages, suffering the fear of being separated from their mothers, etc.? Homeland Secretary Kirst M. Nielsen, you show no compassion as a mother, as a woman for the death of the 7 year old immigrant child who dies trying to enter America. Ms. Nielsen, you poorly chose your words in such a moment only to say how dangerous the journey is to enter America, but that journey today is no less harder or less dangerous Ms. Nielsen than the one your forefather and other immigrants took to come to, and help build America. Much less the journey Africans were forced to endure, dragged into America. Mr. Trump, for everything that is holy, please give the dreamers a chance, these kids are brilliant minds who work so hard to be good, trying their utmost best to find their place in our world as Americans. My words, feelings, etc, are not directed to no one race because evil starts, gets adopted and ends or not as time goes on. We all had paid a price or been through some kind of pain or hardships in our lifetime, some situation far more greater than others but nevertheless we all been down that road called sadness. We need to seek and find peace within ourselves in order to help each other build a common ground for our kids and all children worldwide to be safe and free from pain and suffering. World leaders I know for a fact that greed, power, and pride has consumed your very hearts and souls. Many of you, while you all bomb and gas wickedly killing men, women, and children boldly before the worlds very face, forcing women and kids to refugee camps in the middle of nowhere while they and their kids, babies, starve and freeze to death. You live, promote, and preserve old doctrine which has not yet worked for no one but yourselves. How do you all sleep at night, if any at all? The crimes you has so far committed, gotten away with and continue to do is nothing but the work of the devil, whoever Allah guides, none can misguide, and whoever he misguides there is none that can guide him. "God" is the greatest. American officials, you keep removing mothers who have been living in America for decades without committing a single crime in America, tearing them apart from their American kids through deportation causing hardship and pain destroying well knitted families while you all play evil politics without regard to who lives, dies, or suffers. To now come and take me unlawfully out of my country keeping me on your legal cross with two life sentences, without physical or scientific evidence against me, based on an alleged American citizen, someone who raped a minor and was very abusive to women after he illegally entered America. Who fraudulently became an American citizen but is in no way at all lawfully an American by the rules, laws, and policies which govern America's immigration system. This person I am speaking about was statutorily disqualified by law for American status because he deserted America's military in a time of war. he was ordered deportation and never left America as ordered by an immigration judge the record would show. He then fraudulently won an American Green Card a few months after he was ordered to be deported back to Trinidad. The prosecutor brought before the trial court two American passports belonging to this person, with different names and an unsigned American Naturalization Certificate to probe he is an American citizen. His first fraudulently obtained American passport issued in 1995 was not put into evidence, "Why", his change of name American passport issued in "2000" was put into evidence. The 1995 American passport carries the name he illegally entered America with, was ordered deportation, deserted America's military, criminal record history, etc., while in America before fraudulently becoming a U.S. citizen. Without any question this person American citizenship status is unlawful based on American immigration rules, laws, and policies at it is written. He was not even eligible by law for U.S. status as a military deserter. If that is not corruption before both the court and law, let's say bold fact could it be double standards, while America's War Veterans, who serve their country faithfully, remain homeless in the thousands throughout America and government funding are being pulled, are no longer given to help soup kitchens throughout America which help feed American War Veterans daily. Yet you spend millions, court papers said an untold sum, on the behalf of someone who deserted your military in a time of war, who broke all your immigration rules, laws, and policies causing you to now corrupt the court with lies, corrupt evidence, etc. to win a conviction when the true facts and lawful evidence, etc. are before your very eyes. The head FBI case agent sent into my country on this very same case, started having a sexual relationship with the alleged victim's niece, a potential witness before I was wrongfully charged in my country or wrongfully charged by a U.S. grand jury. The alleged victim's niece became the head FBI case agents "wife-away-from-home" for months in an ongoing investigation to the point that the head agent was going into my country unknown to FBI officials to meet the niece of the alleged victim in an open investigation. The FBI case agent got demoted at some point because of that sexual issue long before the trial started but was still allowed to take charge of the case, the ongoing investigation, gave evidence at my trial while he still kept seeing the alleged victim's niece openly. My case prosecutor corrupted my case from the start to the very end, tampering with witnesses, etc. After I lost at trial, rub out of my freedom, while pending my direct appeal, my case prosecutor allowed one trial witness, who was also charged in the very same case and was to be deported back to Trinidad after doing his prison time, to live at the prosecutor's home for "18" months or better while pending my direct appeal. It was only when my "2255" motion came before the court the witness was quickly removed out of the prosecutor's home. The case prosecutor told an investigating team out of the justice department, by immediately stating that my trial judge is fully aware that the witness is living at his home. Today, my case prosecutor is being investigated in a few other cases and it is said that my legal fate would be determined on those outcomes. While my new prosecutor keeps getting "stays" and extensions for months in my legal matter. Fair minded as well as legal minded people, the misconduct by the FBI case agent, my prosecutor, the court throughout the case investigation and trial up until now is outrageous, damaging to be side stepped or pushed under a rug in a case with such high penalty. My legal fate should be judged base on mainly the wrong doing, unlawful and corrupt acts taken in my legal matter. I have so far felt the wrath of the corrupt, unjust, part of American Justice System, innocently while corrupt lawmakers and other American government officials get a slap on their wrist for crimes committed which would leave a lasting effect on America in every aspect. You all try your utmost best to paint me like if I were some kind of monster, but your lies, corrupt, inconsistent evidence given before the trial court did not add up to a conviction. You need to now look in a mirror and you will see the monster while you work on borrowed time to unlawfully keep me in your prison based on an alleged American citizen. America, what did your four trial witnesses say against me before the court, the "record would show", one witness said he did not know me at all, one said "Straker was not there", another witness said he was not there, while the other witness said he was, and one was forced to say I was there for whatever reason after he had already told a U.S. grand jury he never knew "Straker" before this crime took place. Today this same man while back in Trinidad in 2017 told my private investigator he never knew me. Before America took me out of my country "the record would show" I stayed arrested in Trinidad for "18 months". I never signed anything when asked by Trinidadian police or FBI, nor did I ever give a statement to no one, even while being assaulted by both Trinidadian Police and FBI, without my lawyer present. As soon as they took me out of my country the FBI case agent who was having sex with the alleged victim's niece, who I had already refused to give a statement to back in Trinidad, brought before the judge in America an unsigned statement and said that I gave it to them on the way up to America. It is said that you must be tried by a jury of your peers before the court, "Peer" means one who has equal standing with another. I am a Trinidadian citizen from Trinidad and Tobago who was tried in Washington D.C. before a jury of Washingtonians, white, black, Chinese, etc. who knows nothing at all about my country, our culture, how our legal system works or who I am as a person. All they heard was an American died and the only thing we had in common is the fact that we are all human beings, that is NOT a jury of my PEERS. These so called jurors of my peer Washingtonians sat in a two and a half months of trial like sheep lead by their nose, and heard evidence of fraud, two American passports with different names, deportation order, U.S. Armed Forces deserter in a time of war, FBI case agent having sex with alleged victim's niece throughout the investigations, an unsigned American Naturalization Certificate, witness tampering by the prosecutor, etc.. And no one, none of these "peers" said, "hold on", "this is too much", and it does not add up. This man, a born Trinidadian citizen, is an American citizen with these kind of conflicting American documents. I legally entered and lived here in America and Canada as I please for many years and never at no time did I ever have any run in with their laws or immigration laws and policies. Neither have I any criminal conviction or history of any kind in my country before being accused of this crime, in the blink of an eye, I am before American Courts getting two life sentences. Where is justice without corruption and who is going to respect American rules of law as its written? Americans you are truly brave souls, you all give your lives to protect America, and Americans, and the World as well. Young men and women who never even got the chance to fall in love end up on the frontline for love of country and die, kids are now left mother and fatherless because their parents put America first. Lawmakers, heads of state, congressmen and women, if you truly do not have respect and compassion for those lives lost, and sacrifices made, than may God be with you all. I do not see race or color when I see "God", creation, "Mankind". Today when the world cries or smiles I find my place in the moment and find peace because I am a citizen of our World and only wish the best for it and all those living in it! I am no judge, nor am I in a position to judge anyone, but I would speak truth when truth needs to be known. My first daughter, Talia, sent me this picture and she wrote on the back that her best memories are the ones spent with me. I won legal custody of Talia when she was eight months old. You would be surprised to know the strength a child could give you, making you so much stronger and responsible, and at peace, teaching you the meaning of true love. Children are a blessing and the greatest of our treasures. Talia helps mold me in to a man, a good father, and I won a lifetime-best friend in her! World Leaders, Please stop killing the children of our world the way you are! You all got kids of your very own and were once kids as well! Please do better! Please! I humbly ask that you please pass this on. -Anderson Straker Noteworthy: Food for thought....Did you all know that America's 3rd President, Thomas Jefferson, found it fit to own his personal Quran, and that Morocco was the first country to recognize America's independence? Or, that there is an unbroken treaty between Morocco and America for the past 230 years, which was signed by Thomas Jefferson? Just something to ponder on.....

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