Debasing Democracy in order to Save It (quoth)

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Self-righteous Dumbfucks. There is no other way to describe the Democrats who have misunderstood and mismanaged the impeachment process.

As I have explained before, impeachment is the constitutional analog to the de-throning of James II who, for imprecise but generally understood reasons was thought to be undermining the state under color of law. The key word here is generally. The understanding had to transcend partisanship and had to involve something more than the usual chicanery kings and politicians are wont to engage in. If you do not have the votes to convict, you should not bring forth articles of impeachment because you do not have the general understanding that is essential to the matter. If anything was foreseeable on January 8th it was that the votes to convict were not there. That should have ended the project.

If that were not enough, Pelosicrats might have hearkened to the principle of judicial restraint. It is a salutary maxim that restrains a court from reaching an issue that is not "ripe" (see above) or that is "moot". The purpose of impeachment is to remove a president from office. Once Trump was no longer in office, removing him was no longer on the table. Instead of adhering to this cautious principle, the Democrats resorted to a stretched constitutional interpretation that attempted to squeeze out from the language of Article I, section 2 the notion that a president could be impeached merely and solely to disqualify him from holding office. As I have argued elsewhere, this reading does not flow either from the grammar or the history of the Impeachment Clause.

I might add that if the person impeached is in office then disqualifying him from holding office is what removing him from office entails. On the other hand, if the so-called "Disqualification Clause" does not require the accused to be in office then it could be brought against any citizen to preemptively disqualify him from running for office. On what basis does the Senate have personal jurisdiction over Mr. Trump who is now a private citizen? Under Article III, the trial of all crimes is vested entirely with the judicial branch. Apart from removing a person from office, Congress does not have a judicial power to try citizens at large for unspecified "high crimes and misdemeanors." The exasperated cry will go up, that such absurdities were not contemplated. Indeed they were not, but that is the absurdity the flows from maintaining that "disqualification" is a ground of impeachment separate and independent from removal for office. Evidently Chief Justice Roberts agrees; for, absent from all the breathless reporting was the absence of the Chief Justice from the proceedings. Why? Because "When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside." Trump was no longer president; there was no one to impeach.

Having misunderstood the nature of impeachment, the Pelosicrats then proceeded to utterly mismanage their prosecution, turning the entire affair into a dismal spectacle of partisan revenge and personal animus.

To begin with, they began by drafting articles of impeachment which were as imprecise as they were rhetorically inflated. Was there not a lawyer in the House? and if there were what damn law school did she (or he) go to? All action has an intended purpose which, in this case, was said to be "insurrection." But "insurrection" is a vague and amorphous term. It merely means a rising up against. It has been used to cover the planned overthrow of the existing government or any diffuse striking out against the authority of government. Instead of defining Trump's alleged purpose, the Articles resorted to equally vague phrases to the effect that Trump "threatened the integrity of the democratic system," "imperiled a coequal branch of Government," and "endangered the security of the United States" to which was gratuitously added that he "betrayed his trust" to the "manifest injury" of the People.

Huffing and inflated as this kind of language may be it added nothing specific to the already vague charge. Words like "peril," "danger," and "threat," all refer to undefined potential harms not actual and specific ones such as "he blew up a bridge" or "disrupted proceedings." Legal puff talk may sound impressive but absent concrete facts it is empty. The strategy seems to have been to paint the target as large as possible so as to be able to proceed by scatter shot. And scattershot it was.

There were three overall ways a prosecutor could have proceeded on the publicly known facts. She (or he) could have chosen to charge Trump with incitement and/or conspiracy and/or dereliction of duty. Although they might all stem from the same general set of facts, each one of these offences has its own legal requirements and limitations.

The worst charge (from a prosecutorial point of view) was incitement because this crime runs smack into the wall of the First Amendment. Criminal incitement requires both intent and imminent causality, as I have discussed elsewhere. It is not enough to blabber about reckless "incitement" that "could foreseeably and likely" result in some kind of danger or damage. "Could" refers to nothing more specific than open-ended and arguable possibilities. Incitement requires words that will infrangibly result in inevitable and specifically intended harm. More than a "trigger," the words must be the hammer that strikes the pin. Why is the bar set so high? Because, as Justice Holmes famously remarked, "all speech is incitement." We do not want people dragged into court on stretched and inflammatory allegations because someone in power took offence at what was said and then argues with great emphasis and moral certitude that because an event happened it was "entirely foreseeable!" and because the effect could not but have been known to any reasonable and honest person, the result must have been intended... beyond a reasonable doubt! Such a recklessness standard can be used to punish any speech, as Holmes plainly understood. Had the House Clowns not read the Supreme's Court jurisprudence on seditious incitement? If they have, one can only conclude that what they were really interested in was dragging Trump into the well of the Senate in order to harangue him with epithets and insults decked out in a very thin tissue of "evidence."

In terms of legal theory, the easiest charge to prove would have been conspiracy to obstruct government business. To show a conspiracy it is not necessary to produce a signed agreement beforehand or audio tapes of thieves compacting in the night. All that is required is to show that the participants of the alleged conspiracy acted in a coordinated fashion toward a singular (unlawful) end. If they acted as if they had agreed to do so, it can be inferred that they in actual fact did agree to do so, if only by wink and by nod. In today's age of texting and tweets, proving conspiracy is a piece of cake. We do have the equivalent of a neighbor listening at the keyhole of the door. The beauty of a conspiracy charge, is that it re-opens the door to an incitement charge; for, all that would be needed is one tweet carelessly urging actual violence without Trump's cagey caveat to be "peaceful". The only drawback, from Pelosi's perspective, is that raising a conspiracy charge required interviews and investigation and this, in turn, would be met with claims of executive privilege and confidentiality. So she discarded a charge that required time consuming footwork and opted for something quick and dirty.

Proving dereliction of duty stands somewhere in the middle. It is not a sexy charge but if the facts are present it is a solid one. Despite all the huffing and puffing from the Pelosicrats, Trump is not directly responsible for the safety of the Capitol or any other building in Washington. The safety of the Capitol itself is entrusted to the Capitol Police which are under the authority not of the Executive but of the Legislative Branch... a detail I did not see reported anywhere on the pages of the Slime.  However, because Washington D.C. is a federal enclave, the President is responsible for activating the National Guard in and for the District of Columbia. This authority has been delegated to the Department of Defence. Reports from January 6th show that when a request to activate the Guard was made, the Secretary of Defence dillied and dallied for over an hour before responding. Trump might always claim that he didn't know the Pentagon was dragging its feet and that he was assuming they would do what was "appropriate," but this kind of self- serving excuse-making ducks the more primary issue; namely, that any president worth his salt would have called out the Guard on his own initiative upon first learning that a violent breaking and entering followed by rampaging had taken place. He certainly would not have waited two hours before telling the rioters to cease and desist. Arguably, laissez aller incompetence is not grounds for impeachment; but his inaction was the one culpable fact that was capable of plain and simple proof.

So, to summarize, there were three avenues of prosecution available to the House. They chose the worst one. Why? They did so because what is known as "bad character evidence" is dirty, cheap and easy. Just paint the accused as a thoroughly rotten apple and, without any further footwork or evidence, the case is proved. As I have explained previously, the whole case against Trump was based on the proposition that (1) nefarious, reprobate that he is, he was (gasp!) contesting an election that he clearly lost and (2) that he had for months roused his rabble with inflamed and "violent" rhetoric and therefore "in context" -- that is, in the context of his demagoguery and low-lifedness -- his call to march on the Capitol really meant and was understood as a call to violently disrupt an official proceeding and (hopefully) to lynch Pelosi in the process. There were several problems with this approach.

The first is that dastardly, low-handed and Tricky Dicky as it might be, it is not crime to contest an election, by whatever legal means might be available. And in our free and open democratic Republic "legal means" includes bringing political pressure to bear on members of Congress. No one seems to have had any problem with advocacy groups bringing "the pressure of public opinion" (as represented by those assembled) against the Supreme Court. The Pelosicrats tried to circumvent this minor legality by casting Trump's contesting as "prevent[ing] the peaceful transfer of power." Now the transfer of power in this country is presumed to be peaceful. The Constitution does not provide for violent successions; so why insert the word "peaceful"? It was a rhetorical trick to insinuate that Trump's contesting the certification was somehow a violent act. Without more, it was not.  If Demorats meant that on January 6th Trump instigated a riot in order to disrupt, with force and violence, the certification proceedings then that is exactly what they should have said. Broad brushing two full months of obnoxious political gambits and protests as "preventing the peaceful transfer of power" was just bullshit.

Of course, the decent and sporting thing to do has been to concede at midnight Tuesday even though one might suspect that some people voted early and often. Are all these swift and gentlemanly concessions really just attributable to mainstream Protestant Decorum? Bunk. Let us be brutally frank. More connects Gore with Bush, and Hillary to Donald than connects either of them to me or to the average anonymous and unimportant anyman. They could give a rats ass about you or me (provided you are a nobody like me) but they do care deeply about preserving the aura of legitimacy around the system that cozies them in privilege and power. They are terrified that the people might see through the utter farce and sham that the whole system, and especially elections, are. People might stop paying taxes, might start revolting and then they would have to call out the goons of a professional army to restore order and everything would get very messy. So it is a far, far better thing to pretend that the elections are, on the whole and with a few minor and unimportant irregularities here and there, free and fair! And after all, the worst that can possibly happen is that for four or eight years one will have to get a cushy corporate job with percs instead of slumping into a cushy government job with percs.

Trump understands this as well as anyone else. The only difference between him and the average political whore is that he is willing to va banc. This is what so infuriated the Democrats. But they are hypocrites. Did not Democratic congressperons themselves attempt to contest certification back in 2001? And if one is concerned about preserving an aura of legitimacy, who was it exactly, that spent three years delegitimizing the previous election as the result of "foreign meddling" and interference? History is largely a matter of progressions and in the progression from bad to worse, Hillary-the-Cheated and her elves at the NY Slime had already taken things farther than they had been taken before. Trump's rabble rousing -- geared to people who are tone deaf to Buttigiegian Burbble or the gentrified sophisms of the Times -- was a logical degression.

For all that, the question was (and remains) whether Trump intended to resort to violence in order to play his hand. A resort to violence, by the president himself, would have gone beyond all political convention. I do not for a second minimize the charge if true. But its very seriousness demanded that it be proved with something more than "what else" and "innuendo." My own suspicion is that Trump was hoping for violence while stopping just short of calling for it. I feel in my bones that evidence is out there to be found. But the Demorats didn't produce it. In fact they did not present evidence at all but only their opinions about whatever it was that was shown on Youtube and television. For shame! They succeeded only in "proving" to those who agreed that Trump was one of the scummiest, if not the scummiest, politician in a country that has had no shortage of scummy politicians. But dragging out his dirty bad character onto the floor of Senate for all the world to see, did not prove the case for illegal incitement to unlawful action. To be as charitable as possible, the Democrats resorted to a case of "circumstantial impressionism."

My suspicion also is that Trump was tickled pink upon learning that Pence and Pelosi were being scurried to safety. If there are eyewitnesses to this then that would nail Trump's illegal intent; for, it would be simply too much to claim that one was not angling for violence when one is caught jumping up and down with glee when violence occurs. But again, the Democrats did not bring these witnesses into the chamber. They will have all sorts of excuses as to why they could not but none of them are relevant. If you don't have the proof, you don't have a case and shouldn't bring it.

It is far more than a suspicion to say that Trump did nothing when the rioting inside the Capitol became known. Any other president I can think of, except perhaps Willard Fillmore, would have been on the horn to the Secretary of the Army demanding the deployment of the guard. I can all but hear St Jack on the phone. But of course St. Jack would never have called upon his supporters to rally in front of the Capitol in the first place. Had he been so politically crass to have done so, he would have called them off the instant the first pane of glass was broken. In my mind dereliction of duty was the strongest case given what was known. The Democrats didn't bring it because they were too busy rushing to make a solemn and pompous march "to the other House" in the manner of country bumpkins imitating Black Rod.

This whole fiasco -- and when you loose it is a fiasco -- was the misbegotten spawn of Pelosi's pique. There is much to loathe in Donald Trump and the ghouls he surrounds himself with. He represents a next step in the ongoing degeneration of American politics. But, aside from all the pompous and self-righteous posturing, what really fires the ire of the Democrats is that he has bested them at their own game -- and worse yet, tweaks their noses while he is at it. They seethe, not with real concern for the shabby state of our so-called democracy, but with personal resentment. They were incredulous and outraged when Hillary was scorned and they spent the next three years trying to delegitimize the result.

Had the Demorat establishment and the New York Slime been capable of the least objectivity they would have stepped back from announcing to the world that this "miracle" of America (Raskin), this "temple of democracy" (Pelosi), was in fact controlled from abroad, the mere glove of Putin's hand shoved up its ass. Even real satraps don't announce to the world that they are puppets. But no. The Demorats spent three years trying to prove it.

I have been amazed at how intelligent people have fallen for the bullshit of Russiagate. I think it flows from America's Original Derangement -- its profound need for bugbears. Without enemies we are lost! For then we have only ourselves to contemplate and that is truly scary. Supposing the allegations were true, does the national interest require you to broadcast it? No, the national honor requires that the truth be denied in order to maintain the country's credit and authority on the world stage. Governments not run by hysterics and petulant egomaniacs understand this.

But none of this matters to Pelosi, the Demorats and the Slime. They viscerally hate Trump only because he has upset their complacency and sense of entitlement. Aided by the true cunning of McConnell, Trump consistently left them to stew in impotent rage. Had the Demorats acknowledged the alienation and dispossession that fuels Trump's base they would have got behind Bernie. But no. They ran a campaign whose aim and slogan was to return to the "normalcy" of the days when we were in power.

Well fine. They got what they wanted. So what did Nancy do? Enraged that the Temple of Her Office got polluted by riff-raff, she went off half cocked on a third attempt at revenge. Revanche! Revanche! Toujours Revanche. But to paraphrase St. Jack, you can't get even when you are mad.

Impeachment is a legalized form or regicide or revolution. It is very serious business because it annuls an election and thus shakes the very governmental order it seeks to save. It should not be used for tactical partisan advantage or revenge, far less for personal pique. The Republoscum started the abuse when they impeached Clinton over nonsense. There was no reason for the Democrats to turn the abuse into a habit.

I have said from the start of this fiasco that impeachment was not the way to go. The case should have been investigated with calm and care. Once the evidence of the three crimes I have mentioned was marshalled, the former president should have been haled into District Court to face the music. Instead, energized by his acquittal, Trump will claim vindication and carry on as before to the delight of his half of the country and to the general nausea of everyone else.

I have often alluded to Ridicule, the French movie about the sly, snide and sordid games played against one another by the aristocratic ruling class within the confines of Versailles. The movie ends with the distinct implication that this world of powdered and periwigged vipers will not last. Pelosi, who last year, while hundreds of thousands lined up at failing food banks, cheerfully told an interviewer that she found consolation in designer chocolates, symptomizes the despicable uselessness of this intramural class on a hill.

The Demorats can play their stupid games with the Republoscum, but the broader picture is (1) that the people in the country are close to hopelessly divided against themselves and (2) the system is economically, educationally, medically and socially failing close to 80% of the populace, with 40% subsisting in a state of no-escape destitution. In light of this socio-economic debacle, Trump is the least of this country's problems. He is a manifestation and not a cause. The rabble he roused will still be there when he is gone only to be roused by someone else. No amount of smug, self-righteous hectoring and finger wagging from the gentrified liberals and the woke "left" will change that. What will change things is not lectures, not social media control, not tearing down statutes and doxing people but putting in place social conditions which prevent the despair and degeneration of the individual.

If, instead of obsessing over Trump, the Demorats rolled up their sleeves and used their thin majorities to make America a worthwhile and happy place to live in, the alienation, resentment and hate demagogues like Trump feed on, would recede away. I will not hold my breath. At the end of the day, politics is a game of entre nous and nobodies don't count except as ballot fodder to keep the illusion alive.


Post Script. As this was being readied for publication, the Demorats disclosed, at the 13th hour, that they had just discoverd (Neguse on Face the Nation) a memo from Congresswoman Jaimie Herrera Beutler about a overhearing a conversation between Congressman McCarthy and Trump which supposedly showed that Trump knew rioters were breaking into the Capitol. The letter is at least double hearsay and is still loose ended as to exactly what and when. But the letter proves my point. As I have said, I have always felt that there was evidence (real evidence and not personal conclusions) that could nail Trump. My point is that the Pelosicrats were so obsessed with viscerally going after their Hate Object that they did not properly investigate and marshall their case which ought to have been taken into a court of law.

House Lynch Mob puts on Senate Show Trial

Yesterday commenting on an editorial in the Fem Woke Guardian, I wrote:

"What we are witnessing is a show-trial satisfying the political blood lust of the Democrats. It will solve nothing; it will only drag the country into deeper irredentism.

"Impeachment was designed to remove a president from office. Trump is out of office; the issue is moot. The way to go after Trump is by criminal prosecution with the evidentiary precision and due process safeguards such a trial entails."

Instead the Democrats are pursuing a lynching decked out in the trappings of a "procedure." But don't take my word for it, hearken to the New York Slime

Impeachment Managers Focus on Lack of Remorse

"If Convicting Trump Is Out of Reach, Managers Seek a Verdict From the Public and History

“The Democrats and House managers are playing to a different jury in this case than in any previous impeachment trial of an American president."

THAT IS PRECISELY WHAT A SHOW TRIAL IS -- a performance for the public as jury, with guilt proved by lack of remorse.

And performance it is. The difference between drama and history, says Aristotle, is that history deals with particulars that have taken place whereas drama deals with more abstract concepts that could be. Both contain the same elements and both resort to "spectacle" to suspend judgement and produce a cathartic effect in the audience. And there has been plenty of spectacle. Hearken again to the Slime

Never-Before-Seen Footage Shows Trump Supporters on Rampage

Impeachment Video Reveals a True American Horror Story

"Using never-before-seen footage from Jan. 6, impeachment managers wove video from the Capitol into a narrative of terror, our television critic writes"

Our television critic? Yes, why not? There is certainly no need for any legal commentary.

The "managers" of the prosecution, the Slime tells us, want to use the "national spotlight to make the searing images of havoc the inexpungible legacy of the Trump presidency."

Lest anyone get lax about this, the Slime would have us know that:

Sometimes the horror was in seeing how much worse it could have been.

Say what? If this isn't horror enough for you, the true horror lay in the horror that didn't occur but could have?

What the Slime is telling you, in pure Orwellian fashion, is that you will be horrified whether the images sear you or not.

Let us step back for just a moment to comprehend the broader picture. While the Corporate Masters of Public Discourse are dropping accounts into a memory hole in the name of sanitizing content, the Corporate Liberal Media are telling you that you should be feel dismay and horror at the horrible things that did or did not occur, whether you saw the searing horror or not.

It is really choice when one considers that social media control is done in the name of protecting your mind from unsettling, disturbing or offensive content while at the same time we are being told that our hearts should be filled with fear and loathing. Now if they will only add anal dildos the manipulation will be complete. But I digress...

At least the Slime leaves no doubt that what this senatorial trial really amounts to is a spectacle of horror, havoc and images intended to leave a scar on your brain. So much for judicious.

Let us return to the beginning. In an incredibly imprecise indictment that only Nancy Pelosi could have managed Trump was charged with "inciting an insurrection." I will forgo a detailed parsing of the Articles of Impeachment. Suffice to say that these two words make up the two elements and two factual issues of the charge.

The ordinary meaning of incite means to "stir up" or to "encourage;" in other words, to emotively cause a particular course of action, process or situation. Okay. But as Justice Holmes said, "all speech is incitement." Most Americans get incited every sunday from the pulpit. So, the primary question is: incitement to what? and this brings us to ask what is the meaning of insurrection, since that is what Trump supposedly sought to trigger.

Did Trump seek to incite the overthrow of the government? Did he seek to instigate a coup d'etat? No. After blabbering about Trump's "false" claims to have won the election ( and it is just blabber ) the indictment finally specifies that Trump "willfully made statements that, in context, encouraged—and forseeably resulted in—lawless action at the Capitol."

So, in answer to our first question, the Articles charged Trump with inciting a riot. That is several notches down from what is normally thought of as an "insurrection," "coup," "overthrow," or "revolution".

It is at this point, that we can see what a shabby piece of work the Articles were. A riot is lawless no doubt but it is also aimless. It is a composite of individual actions that have no consistent or organizing principle, other than being a public disturbance. That a riot took place at the Capitol is indisputable. That the riot had the effect of disrupting proceedings in Congress is also indisputable. That this disruption "threatened the integrity of the democratic system" and that it "interfered with the peaceful transition of power" are exagerated ways of saying the same thing twice over. In legal practice this is known as a parade of horribles; in this case, a parade of repetitive horribles. What the matter boils down to is simply that Trump is alleged to have instigated a riot which had the effect of disrupting a proceeding in Congress.

Even to say as much gives the Article too much credit. Every entry-grade prosecutor knows (or ought to know) how to charge inciting a riot or, instigating the disruption of an official act in violation of 18 U.S. Code § 2384. Why not just say it in plain English? Because, as they say in the trade, if you don't have the facts dazzle em with bullshit... the more inflammatory and morally lofty the better.

But the shabbiness of the indictment does not end there. Let us read into the Articles what ought to have been plainly stated; namely, that a specified act was the cause of certain specified effects. Trump made statements which caused a riot at the Capital which riot had certain effects. The effects, rhetorically exagerated as they may be are, as I have said, indisputable. The spectacle of the cause (i.e. the riot) is, as I have also said, a matter of deep impression. That Trump told the crowd to "fight like hell" is also a matter of record. But what gets buried in all of this is the small issue of specific intent.

It is not enough to simply say that the "disruption" of the certification process was "foreseeable" (a disputable fact). In law, ignoring something that is "reasonably foreseeable" implicates the mental state of "recklessness." However, to prove criminal incitement the disruption must also have been specificically intended. As stated by the Supreme Court in Yates v. United States, the words uttered must be "reasonably and ordinarily calculated to incite persons to ...action" and must be aimed at "overthrowing or destroying the Government of the United States by force and violence, ... with the intent to cause the overthrow." (354 U.S. 298, at p. 326 [construing the Smith Act] .) In other words, in addition to action, cause and effect, guilt requires knowledge and intent. This is a maxim of jurisprudence that dates back to Roman law.

Now, in this situation, a strong inference of intent is usually derived from the words spoken. "Go burn down that den of iniquity" (pointing to the Capitol) very strong implies that the speaker thereof wanted his audience to do precisely that. Oh but alas! Trump told his rabble to march on the Capitol "peacefully." Trump is no fool, and that put the House prosectors in the position of proving intent from something other than the allegedly inciteful words themselves. But instead of producing evidence from which an inference of intent might be drawn, the managers resorted to the shabby trick prosecutors always use to establish their case: the conduct had the effect, therefore the effect must have been intended. Post hoc, ergo propter hoc.

During the proceedings, representative Neguse correctly noted that Trump cultivated a culture of aggresive resentments and hate. But Neguse's argument that violence was therefore "foreseeable" shifted legal standards and ducked the issue of intent. In so doing, Neguse fell back on the old --and discarded-- hobby horse of all sedition statutes; namely, the criminalization of speech that has an alleged tendency to provoke violence or sedition. This is not the rule that the Supreme Court follows. Seditious speech is not a question of "atmospherics" or "cultures" or "likelihoods" but of words that are immediately and imminently brigaded to unlawful conduct (Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969) 395 U.S. 444.)

The now recognized defect in the tendency rule is that it criminalizes anything that can arguably be said to have created a "risk" or "danger" or "likelihood" of some violence or some unlawful occurrence. The tendency rule (which is still followed in England) is the darling of all moralists and sociologists precisely because it is open ended. Anything can "tend" anywhere and on the morning after it is always "obvious" that it was going to land where it did. But in Brandenburg the Supreme Court made clear that words cannot be criminalized based on the argument that they may have a tendency to lead to some undesirable end or that that they could in the vast realm of possibilities promote some undesirable consequence. In addition to being intended to promote an unlawful end they must be imminently connected to conduct which is itself unlawful.

Trump spoke. A riot happened. Proceedings were temporarily disrupted. That is all these "managers" have. They have even less, once it is taken into account that Trump told his "fighters" to be "peaceful." To make up for the thin tissue of their case, the managers of this prosecution and the pontiffs at the Slime want to suspend your judgement with the spectacle of the horror that could have been!!

But it gets worse still. In addition to the issues of act, knowledge, cause, intent, and effect there is the small matter of free speech. The Supreme Court has made it difficult to prove criminal incitement not simply because "free speech is important" but because speech itself is emotive and fluid. If we were constrained to using words only in their precise and literal meaning, speech would be as dead as the High Priestesses of Poltical Correctness want it to be. As stated in Yates "[v]ague referemces to 'revolutionary' or "militant' action of an unspecified character" are not sufficient. So too statements like: "hang the bastards!" "fight like hell for what you believe" and "Johnson ought to be shot!" Two rules emerge: (1) mere "advocacy" of violence does not suffice; and (2), figurative expressions, metaphorical language and even violent language or "fighting words" are constitutionally protected, Nancy Pelosi notwithstanding.

Do the "managers" of this senatorial lynching really not understand that Trump's exhortation to "fight" for the government they wanted was protected speech? Do they really not understand that for words to amount to criminal incitement they must be so "brigaded" with the unlawful conduct as to be inseverable from the conduct? The Supreme Court has set an extremely high bar for prosecutors, managers and the pontiffs at the Slime to jump over; and, in making a case against Trump in accordance with these principles they have utterly failed.

As I have said, Trump knows how to push the envelope. He told people to "fight" to "save" the country. When Neguse argued that such speech "was not a metaphor" he was tacitly admitting that this kind of speech is constitutionally protected, precisely because it is presumed to be a metaphor. What did Neguse offer to show that "fight" was meant literally? What did he offer to show that "peacefully" was not meant to be taken seriously? Nothing other than that Trump had laughed off violence before and often resorted to aggressive and hateful language. "Just look at all the stuff he said before..." But this was to go around in a circle -- circumstantial evidence being used to buttress an inference from circumstantial evidence. It is in this manner that the matter is brought back to the issue of specific intent. It is only separate proof of intent that can break out of the self perpetuating loop.

It is at this point the House prosecutors actually did manage to come up with what might have been relevant evidence. Although criminal intent must exist at the time of the criminal conduct in question, it is an accepted maxim that it can be proved by conduct after the event. Typically this conduct consists in some form of consciousness of guilt. But it can also consist in consciousness of success! When a person cheers the success of something, there is a strong and logical inference that he intended for that "success" to happen.

According to Representative Ceciline, Senator Sasse was said to have said that Trump was "delighted" and "borderline enthusiastic" "as events unfolded on January 6." But like the proverbial carrot being dangled before the jury, what this double hearsay evidence left unclear was precisely what Trump was delighted at. "As events unfolded" is a very broad and vague timeline. Was Trump "delighted" at the sight of Antler Man howling in the Senate Chamber? At the sight of rioters smashing windows? Or was his delight at the sight of a swelling mob outside the Capitol?

Again, Ceciline, cited an article from the Washington Post according to which Senatory McCarthy pleaded with Trump to "to issue a statement for his supporters to leave the Capitol." To leave the Capitol grounds or to leave the building? It makes a difference.

Instead of pursuing and nailing down this potentially very damning evidence the prosecutors left double and triple hearsay statements dangling in the wind while they chased after what amounted to bad character evidence. That is the favorite tactic of all prosecutors because it makes their case as easy as it is illusory. So-and-so is a bad apple -- indeed a bad, worm eaten and rotten -- apple, ergo he must have done the bad thing. We know that Trump is a very bad and rotten apple that any decent worm would disdain, but that does not prove the case. As the matter was left the "proof" was simply a species of ad hom coupled to a vague proffer of what might have been evidence.

In this regard, it might be worth noting that this was not the first time the Certification Process has been called into question. Democrats tried to do it on the floor of the chamber back in 2001. It is a somewhat dodgy manouever but it is not illegal. Just as the Senate's prerogative to "consent" implies a prerogative not to consent; so too, the power to certify implies a power to not certify. And if that is the case, then Trump was within his envelope to bring peaceful, political, protest pressure to bear on the proceedings inside. The House prosecutors waxed indignant that Trump had dared to question the legitimacy of the vote. Whoa.... Had not the Democrats done precisely that for three years on behalf of Hillary-the-Scorned?

Was it shabby? Unquestionably. Everything Trump does is shabby and this was the shabbiest of all. Compare his conduct with Al Gore's when, presiding over the certification of Bush's win, he ruled challenges to the certification to be out of order. But shabby is not illegal. Politically pornographic as it may have been, so long as he did not incite violence, Trump was within bounds in seeking to bring peaceful pressure to bear on the process.

But just as shabby was a trial at which the evidence consisted of nothing more than accusatory closing arguments. Not a single witness has been called and, consequently, not a single assertion of fact has been cross-examined. The managers' argument was that there was no need to call witness because we all were witnesses who tuned into CNN and Youtube and saw what there was to be seen. When the evidence is "what every good German knows it to be" (thank you Roland Freisler) we are in deep show.

I realize that an impeachment trial is not a judicial proceeding in the strictest sense. But I don't know of a case where the basic rules of evidence -- direct and cross examination -- were so completely and high-handedly disregarded. The "evidence" in this case was about as real as a Trump reality show. Shabby. Shabby. Shabby.

To be clear. The Demorats might have had a case had they pursued the right issue instead of embarking on a self righteous crusade of character assassination. They might have a case had they properly formed the indictment so as to charge a separate count of dereliction of duty for failing to to protect the duly elected officials of government if and once Trump knew of the danger they were in. It is for this reason that I have always stated, that the way to proceed is by criminal prosecution...not by what amounts to a partisan political lynching.

In my view there is a strong, potential case that Trump and his cronies conspired to disrupt the proceedings in Congress, and such a conspiracy would be illegal. But that is a charge that would require much more investigation and precision in charging than what is taking place in the Senate Chamber now.

None of this is relevant to the Vengeocrats in the pits of Congrease or in the caves of the Slime. Instead, knowing beforehand that they did not have the votes to convict, they want to carry their case to the public on waves of contrived horror.

Even here, we are led to wonder what kind of nation of ninnies we have become that a largely comic riot should be accounted as and equated with History's Greatest Horrors! Per the hysteria emanating from the offices of the Slime, one would think it was a Second Albigensian Crusade. Caedite eos omnes!!

Let me be clear, again. Violence is ugly. Two men pummeling one another on a street corner is a shocking spectacle of raw animal rage. A bar room brawl, which might be the scene of slapstick comedy, is, in actual fact, a brutal event. It is very injurious and at times fatally so to be blindsided by a chair or hit over the head with a bottle. Protests turned riot -- whether of the left or the right, by blacks or by whites -- are harmful precisely because people have lost their better judgement and are utterly unpredictable in what they will do. Those faced with a tsunami of rioters running amok are justifiably scarred shitless. No one can fault AOC or Pelosi or Pence for being fearful for their own safety. Nor do I make light of the fact that one protestor was shot by a federal agent or that one cop died from as yet unkown causes.

But for all that, history is (in Gibbon's inimitable words) the sorry chronicle of the "crimes, vices and follies" of mankind. We have seen far, far worse before than the riot at the Capital on January 6th. When we are called upon to make an objective judgement as to the legal or political harm involved, a certain callousness is required. Increasingly, public discourse is being reduced to using words as emotional flash-bangs. If we are to fall to pieces in fits of quivering fear and hysteria at the mere thought of any injury or violence, then we are not fit to make dispassionate judgements.

That is precisely the fear and trembling the Slime wants to substitute for judgement. And not even judgement in the Senate, because the Slime has already conceded that the votes for conviction are not there. No... the Slime is talking about judgement by the public and by history. By history reduced to a spectacle of horrors and a public induced into states of hysteria.

As much as I think Trump is a despicable creature; as much as I am glad he is out of office, I refuse to be jerked around in this fashion. The Slime and the Pelosicrats can go to hell.

Fetische Korrecktheit

Morgan Wallen...

Who?

... was dropped from his record labels and radio stations across the country on account of using a RACIAL SLUR.

According to the Aunt Britannia Broadcasting Company the incident was filmed.   "In the footage, reportedly filmed by a neighbour last weekend, the 27-year-old is seen saying goodbye to some friends and calling one of them the N-word."

That's TERRIBLE. 

Not only that its TERRIBLY INTOLERABLE.  If I had any I would immediately have thrown out all my Morgan Wallen records... after of course, smashing them to bits and sweeping up all the debris to make sure no VERBAL POLLUTION remained in my house.

Morgan Wallen is a DISGUTING HUMAN BEING, if he even qualifies as that. ...

In fact...

....uh but wait... what was that about "saying goodbye to friends"? 

Surely a hideous RACIST like Wallen can't have an RACIALLY SLURABLE friend!

Confused... we googled to see what it was, exactly, that Wallen had said to whom, seeing as Aunt Britannia Broadcasting Company was protecting us from HORRIBLE WORDS  by not printing them, for our own safety and good.

Thanks to Variety Mag, we learned that a drunk Wallen was carrying on loudly with friends outside his house.  "As Morgan appears to stumble toward his house, he tells someone to watch over a guy in his group. He says ... "take care of this "p****-ass mother******" -- and then goes on to say, "take care of this p****-ass n*****" ... before finally heading in."

pushy-ass  mother nucker?

puppy-ass figger

What could the horrible word have been?  

* ****** ***'* figger ** ***

Oh well it must have been WRONG and BAD, but not as wrong as bad as the terrorizing of uncivil society by fetishizing Torquemadists.  Make no mistake, political correctness is tyranny and when it is coupled with unthinking fetischized irredentism it is nothing less than a form of terrorism

Let start with the fact that all meaning is contextual.  Words like nigger, bitch, fag, spic, jarhead and just about any epithet or insult you can think of can be used in either a hostile and denigrating way or as sign of affection or appreciation.

One can hear the instant and uncomprimising rejoinder of the Korrectheit Fascist:  "THAT'S NO EXCUSE!"  "THERE'S NO EXCUSE -- EVER -- FOR USING WORDS THAT ARE OBJECTIFYING and OPPRESSIVE, DEMEANING and DIVISIVE, ASSAULTIVE and INJURIOUS, Blah, Blah, Blah, and still more very uncompromising blah.

Well yes, swee' pea there is.  Adopting a denigrating epithet is a way of asserting control over it.  Using it as a term of cameraderie or affection is a way of neutralizing its poisonous impact.

Black gang members refer to themselves as "nigga's" all the time.  Depending on context, it can mean just another black man or it can refer to our nigga bro.  Sometimes it is left ambiguous as in: he's a sorry-ass nigga which  can signify either sympathy or contempt.

The same is true of just about every  perjorative epithet and every other human group.

The High Shrieks of Correctness, Heiko-the-Idiot, Saint Jacinda-the-Mournful, any wool-for-brains British judge and the entire gaggle of of limped dicked, never fucked academics, sociologists and activists are intent on killing civil society and turning it into pretty and harmless snow globe... as dead and as stupid as they are.

Have they ever heard of "chilling effect" ?  Yes, in fact they have and it is exactly what they wish to bring about.  Soon we will be left to ask not what is prohibited but what is allowed --the legal hallmark of LL totalitarian law   And because we will never know for sure, we will always be looking over our shoulder, always checking our tongue and always wondering if perhaps we ought not to say what once we said so spontaneously and lively. 

This is what the tyrants of correctness want.  That we
only think what is approved
only speak what is approved
only want what is approved
and most importantly of all
only buy what is approved.
Don't turn around; the algorithm's in town

Abusing the Process

 Once again, the Demorats are abusing the power of impeachment for naked partisan purpose only this time the spectacle is worse since the object of their outrage and wrath no longer holds office.

I have already discussed the nature of impeachment [here] and see no point in repeating myself, pleasing as that may be.  I would, however, like to expatiate briefly on the scope of impeachment.

As is well known by now, the Constitution gives the power of impeachment to the Commons and reserves trial of charge to the House of Lords.  With respect to the latter, the Constitution provides,

Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States.

Now sage pundits writing in august papers have told us that "America was the birthplace of modern democracy."  Even more sage "legal experts" testified before Congress last year that America "invented" the principle that no man, including the President, is above the law.  When the laughter in Great Britain dies down, we might observe that such pronouncements are completely and totally wrong.  So wrong as to be classed as downright ignorant.

I will forgo discussing medieval law or the revival of Roman jurisprudence during the Renaissance.  Suffice to say that in in recent modern times, the principle that the King was subject to the Law was pronounced by Lord Coke before James I to his face. The king "grew mightily wroth" and moved to strike Coke who "fell on all foures" before scurrying away to safety.  Five years later Coke made the same announcement, this time with the backing of Parliament and the stage was set for the English Civil War.  

The concluding chapter of that century long struggle was the Glorious Revolution of 1688 which deposed James II and established Parliamentary supremacy.  In what, precisely, that supremacy consisted called for a little tempering given the fact that sovereignty was still thought to be embodied in the King.  The characteristically English way of expressing the matter was to say that the Sovereign could only act with the consent of Parliament.   This Fusion of Powers is expressed in the phrase "The King (or Queen) in Parliament" which signifies the totality of sovereignty shared and participated in jointly by the monarch and both houses of Parliament in the understanding that Parliament is the absolute and supreme legislative power but that no act can become law without the assent of the Monarch who in turn can only act with the consent of Parliament.  If this sounds circular, it is; but it has worked reasonably well for 332 years.

The "Founding Fathers" were steeped and versed in this constitutional  "Settlement" (as it was called).  Anyone (even a legal scholar) who bothers to read them can see that the Bill of Rights of 1689 and the Act of Settlement of 1701 provided the rough drafts of the U.S. Constitution.  Anyone who does not read the Constitution in the light of its historical English antecedents is playing the sola scriptura fool

The Constitution of course abolished hereditary monarchy. But it established a presidency with monarchical powers -- in effect, a pro tem elected monarchy.  But what to do when this new monarch got out of hand, the way James II had done?

As Hamilton observed in Federalist Paper No. 69, " The person of the king of Great Britain is sacred and inviolable; there is no constitutional tribunal to which he is amenable; no punishment to which he can be subjected without involving the crisis of a national revolution."   That indeed had been the case.  The only way to remove James II was through a Glorious Revolution which somewhat more than half of the country supported.  But since the American Monarch was elected and had no possible claim of Divine Right, the expedient offered for his removal from office was by means of impeachment, viz.:  "The President of the United States would be liable to be impeached, tried, and, upon conviction of treason, bribery, or other high crimes or misdemeanors, removed from office; and would afterwards be liable to prosecution and punishment in the ordinary course of law.

Now, it must be said that, as pamphleteer, Hamilton was being a tad tongue in cheek when he implied that the British monarch could only be removed by a revolution.  After running James II out of country Parliament invited William and Mary to assume the throne; and when Queen Anne, Mary's sister and James II's youngest daughter, died, Parliament invited "the Hanoverians" to assume the throne, on which they have sat to this day.  Since 1688, England has never had to "impeach a monarch" but should  the need arise, there could be no doubt whatsoever that Parliament could do so on the principle that who grants can revoke.  More precisely, the 1701 Act of Settlement established the qualifications, by lineage and religion, of all future British monarchs.  The act has been on auto-pilot since then.  But no one doubts the power of Parliament to alter the terms of succession provided for in the Act.  Nor does anyone doubt the power of Parliament to enlarge or restrict the prerogatives, such as remain, of the monarch.  Writing in 1789, Hamilton was certainly aware of English constitutional history.  Were Parliament to seek to remove a monarch it would produce an political upheaval but removal would not require what the word "revolution" suggests.  

In all events, the American Constitution made the matter simple and straightforward.  Our pro tem, elected monarch could be removed from office by means of Congressional impeachment and conviction.   But to say as much is to say that "impeachment" has to be understood as an adaptation of the principle established by the Glorious Revolution; i.e. the legitimate head of state can be removed from office when there is a national consent that he is abusing his power and trust, albeit under colour of law.

Again, I have discussed the matter elsewhere; but to understand what was meant by "high crimes and misdemeanors" one again has to turn to the reign of James II, otherwise known as James-the-Envelope Pusher.  From the beginning of his reign, that monarch was pushing the limits of his prerogatives and testing the limits of the nation's tolerance.  A lot of what he did fell into the category of "obnoxious and annoying things kings always do"  -- high handed running over roughshod stuff.  

But one matter in particular irked most (but not all) of the country: James' announced Catholicism.  There was no law against his being Catholic, but people preferred he do it in the closet especially given the fact that he was supposed to be the temporal head of the English Church. Well James was old and childless and when he died the throne would pass his Protestant sister Mary.  So the country grit its teeth and waited.

But then James had a son whom, he announced, would be raised as a Catholic.  That was a high misdemeanor the country could not tolerate, because it signaled the end of the Reformation in England.  Nor was it only a matter of religion.  Behind the religious issue was James II's friendship with France and his preference for the centralized French mode of governance.  He was also allowing too many Jesuits into the country to meddle in All Things English.  He was, in short, legally and under color of law subverting the General Understanding which had been reached as to how things ought to be done and what the country was about.

The debates at the Constitutional Convention reveal that there was some question as to whether impeachment applied to lesser and more ordinary forms of malfeasance.  But the fact the participants were arguing over lesser points does not mean that they did not have the bigger lesson in mind.  If they didn't talk about James II and the Glorious Revolution, it was because they didn't need to.  It was understood; and not only as a matter of history in the Mother Country.  One of James II's initiatives was the so-called  "Andros Plan" which aimed to centralize administration of the American Colonies.  The plan was hated by the Colonists for obvious reasons and led to American's small but significant participation in the Glorious Revolution.  To wit:

"The 1689 Boston revolt was a popular uprising on April 18, 1689 against the rule of Sir Edmund Andros, the governor of the Dominion of New England.  A well-organized "mob" of provincial militia and citizens formed in the town of Boston, the capital of the dominion, and arrested dominion officials. Members of the Church of England were also taken into custody if they were believed to sympathize with the administration of the dominion. Neither faction sustained casualties during the revolt. Leaders of the former Massachusetts Bay Colony then reclaimed control of the government. In other colonies, members of governments displaced by the dominion were returned to power."  (Wiki)

Oh the Ironies of History!!!

Whether or not our Founding Father's were sympathetic to rioting insurrectionists taking over the seat of government, they certainly had not forgotten misbehaving king's abusing of government.  

Two conclusions flow from this historical background: (1) "impeachment" extends no further than removal from office and (2) "impeachment" is not to be confused with or used as the equivalent of a parliamentary vote of no-confidence.

The first conclusion ought to be obvious.  The Constitution expressly states: impeachment "shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, ..."   The provision does not read "... or to disqualification...etc."    The conjunction "and" signifies that "disqualification" is an adjunct of "removal from office."   That "disqualification" is merely a derivative (and rather obvious) consequence of "removal"  is further shown by the fact that Hamilton doesn't even bother to mention "disqualification."  He refers only to removal from office.  The reason Hamilton only mentions "removal" is that his thinking was infused by the history I have just outlined.  Once James II was run out of town, his further "qualification" for holding any office was more than moot.

The second conclusion requires some further explanation.  Under the "Westminster System" the administration of government is handled by a Prime Minister.  If and when the opposition to the government attains a majority in Parliament, the government can be "toppled" by a vote of no-confidence.  A change of administration then takes place.

In the American system the position of head of state and head of government ("executive administration") are fused.  Thus, if the President could be removed from office on account of mere political opposition to his policies "impeachment" would become the equivalent of a "vote of no-confidence."

The Constitution gives the power of impeachment to the House (the American "Commons")  on a mere numerical majority.  But the Constitution prevents that from becoming a vote of no confidence by the fact that a trial is required in the Senate (our Lords).   Here again, a mere majority does not suffice to convict, but rather requires two thirds of those present.  The phrase "of those present" provides a certain amount of wiggle room but the overall thrust and intent of the provision is that "conviction on articles of impeachment" is not the equivalent of  a vote of "no-confidence."

That the impeachment process was viewed as something transcending ordinary partisan politics is also shown by the fact that the consequence is mere removal from office.  The party in power remains in power. The Vice President assumes the presidency and  the majorities in the House and Senate remain unaffected. No new elections are called for.

In my view nothing could be more clear than that impeachment was aimed solely at removing the head of state from office when there was a substantial national consensus that he was in some very serious manner subverting the Constitution, even if he was doing so under colour of law or in the exercise of an asserted prerogative "in the manner of James II."

That is an important constitutional device and it ought to be preserved for what it was intended.  Instead, Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats are abusing the process to exact personal revenge and for the sake of partisan advantage.  In this latter respect they are tacitly joined by a number of Republicans who seen political advantage in neutralizing the hold Trump holds on their party.

 

They rushed the articles of impeach through without any investigation or hearings.  Even the language of the article was vague and uncertain.  What Pelosicrats wanted was to get the impeachment started while Trump was in office so that they could then claim that, Oh gee, the ball was pitched, we'll now just have to try him while he is out office.  Meritless. The process "shall not extend further than removal."   Since Trump is no longer capable of being "removed" the process has reached its extent.

To be fair, abuse of the process began with the Republicans when they impeached President Clinton over nothing of any constitutional significance.  Now the chickens they spawned are coming home to roost.  But they are bad chickens all the same.  The use of impeachment to embarrass, stymy, forestall, blackmail the President and his party's agenda will serve only to turn partisan politics into ongoing political civil war.  The political life of the country should not be allowed to degenerate to such a state of affairs, no matter how much Nancy hates Donald, no matter how much Mitch wants Trump neutralized.  Once Trump is out of office, the issue of impeachment and conviction are moot.

This is not to say that Trump should not be neutralized.  It is only to say that the way to do so is by the way the Constitution allows. The same provision that provides for "removal" from office also provides for criminal prosecution once out of office.  That is what should done upon a diligent and thorough investigation and with all the attendant safeguards of a public jury trial.  That much would at least have judicial credibility, instead of the tawdry and sordid affair unprincipled politicians are pursuing. 

©wcg 2021

Heiko-the-Idiot Speaks Again!

 

"This should be extremely clear: Those who, like Trump, have spent years using words to constantly inflame and incite their own supporters, ultimately bear responsibility for this attack on the heart of American democracy. We see all around the world what happens when radical populists come to power and systematically stir up resentment against democratic institutions. Yes, democracy thrives on contradiction, even disagreement. But it dies when brute force silences the other, when sheer hatred breaks all bounds of decency and respect." (Heiko Maas in Der Spiegel Int'l. 7 Jan 21.)

Let us extremely parse the idiot's logic:

"Those who use words to inflame and incite their supporters bear responsibility for an attack committed by those supporters."

Notice how he does not define "inflame" or specify what these supporters were incited to do. Were they incited to violently break into the capitol? To physically disrupt the proceedings? What were the inciteful words used? Heiko does not say.

Instead he rattles on to prattle about "radical populists" who "systematically stir up resentment against democratic institutions." Like Lenin perhaps? Or maybe John Adams inflaming Bostonians against entirely legitimate Parliamentary rule which, in the misinforming fake news of the day, he falsely described as "monarchical tyranny".

So we are left to infer that "incitement" really means "stirring up resentment" This is precisely the language of notorious statutes against seditious libel, the Mother of All Statutes being the English law that prohibited any speech which had a tendency to bring the Crown or into "hatred or contempt" or if it promoted discontent or hostility between citizens.  The American statute followed faithfully, prohibiting any malicious statement against the government or exciting "the hatred of the good people of the United States."

Aha.

From this lofty heap of insults dressed in pieties, Heiko tumbles into the deep bullshit of "Yes, democracy thrives on contradiction, even disagreement" Yes! in a democracy we can contradict one another EVEN to the point of disagreement and surpassing agreeing contradiction.

Whu????

Well maybe he means agreeable contradiction; i.e. disagreements HE doesn't particularly mind.

Paddling around in this verbal swill he attempts to extricate himself by pontifically postulating that democracy "dies when brute force silences the other, when sheer hatred breaks all bounds of decency and respect."

Oh ... it is just too choice. Brute force? This from the man who three years ago pronounced "free speech ends where the criminal law begins."

Uh huh? Exactly whose "brute force" are we talking about here?

But let us be charitable! Let us suppose that that what Heiko has in mind is some band of radicalized thugs who go beyond "inflaming" or "disparaging" and fall to beating up on their opponents. No one in his right mind would disagree that resorting to violence to make a political point (or even to make no point at all) is bad. Very bad. It should even be punished!

Let us be even more charitable and, for the sake of argument at least, assume that the riotous breaking into the Capitol was "brute violence." What has that to do with "sheer hatred break[ing] all bounds of decency and respect."

This is exactly how sophists insinuate and confuse.

Note the "," and the lack of either an "and" or and "or." Does Heiko mean to equate "brute force" with "sheer hatred" or does he mean to contrast brute force with sheer hatred? He intentionally leaves it ambiguous.

Why? Because he knows the "brute force" is not the same as "sheer hatred." One can hate intensely without resorting to force. One can shout and scream filled with anger and hatred and still not resort resort to brute force. Brute force is physical violence. Sheer hatred is speech and/or emotion. One is criminal; the other is protected speech.

So how does Heiko fuse the two together, so that "hatred" becomes indistinguishable from "brute force"? He does so with the phrase "breaks all bounds of decency and respect."

So, Oh German, what do you do with Martin Luther, whose "sheer hatred" of the "Whore of Bablyon" certainly "broke" all bounds of "decency and respect".... at least from a papal point of view?

Here too, "break" has both a literal and a metaphorical meaning which is left insinuatingly ambiguous. In this manner Heiko equates indecency and disrespect with brute force... so that speech can end and the criminal law begin. 

 

 

What a despicable little shit. Put a uniform on him and he looks just like the perfect bureaucrat of 70 years ago. And in truth he speaks the same language albeit with slightly different catchwords.

 

-oOo-

 

By and large Der Spiegel has been a reliable Atlanto-Liberal magazine; that is, it suscribes to the principles of the Atlantic Charter and supports close trans-atlantic neoliberalism.  Domestically, it was known for its "telegraphic" style of reporting and a certain amount of sardonic muck-raking.  In the 1970's and 1980's it did a fair amount of "retro-reporting" on the Nazi era, which was non-hysterical and somewhat like what they might have reported at the time had they been allowed to.  Originally Social Democratic, the difference between social and christian democratic is nowadays more of a fine point than anything else.  It has not shied away from inconvenient realities. All in all it is a more "popular" version of the Economist with a broader range of reported subject matter.  Of late, however, they have increasingly become just another biased bull-horn for the Four Freedoms; that is corporate globalism dressed up in multi-cultural  drag.  In this regard, they resort to the usual tricks, as for instance running a report of "What Germans Think" about such-and-so, under a picture of cross-ethnic and multi-racial faces, as if to visually suggest that "Germany" is "just the world at large in all its wonderful, glowy, diversity." That rather begs a grundsatz issue.  That they would publish this insidious Heiko Hogwash (Quatsch} shows that they have cast off their fig leaf without shame. 

 

 

©wcg 2021

 

 

The Liberal Assault on Liberalism

 

"... Apple and Google removed [Parler] from their app stores because they said it had not sufficiently policed its users’ posts, allowing too many that encouraged violence and crime."   ---Today's NYSlime, in glee mode.

"POLICED"

Not a peep of protest from the Slime.  On the contrary, they are creaming in their pants that their loathed opponents are being silenced.

I find it astonishing that erstwhile liberals would be applauding the policing of public forums.  That is what police states do.    That is what the segregationist press did.   That   is....   Is it really necessary to catalogue?

"The mere abstract teaching . . . of the moral propriety or even moral necessity for a resort to force and violence is not the same as preparing a group for violent action and steeling it to such action." (Noto v. United States, 367 U. S. 290, 367 U. S. 297-298 (1961).)

In Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444  (1969), the Court again explained the boundaries of free speech.  In that case, 12 hooded figures, some of whom carried firearms had gathered around a large wooden cross, which they burned. No else one was present.  The defendant, in Klan regalia, made a speech, in which he said,

"This is an organizers' meeting. We're not a revengent organization, but if our President, our Congress, our Supreme Court, continues to suppress the white, Caucasian race, it's possible that there might have to be some revengeance taken. ...  We are marching on Congress July the Fourth, four hundred thousand strong.  ...   Personally, I believe the nigger should be returned to Africa, the Jew returned to Israel."   (Id., at p. 447.)

Though some of the figures in the films carried weapons, the speaker did not.  Defendant was prosecuted under an Ohio statute which prohibited ""advocat[ing] or teach[ing]  the duty, necessity, or propriety" of violence..."

The Supreme Court reversed…

"Statutes affecting the right of assembly, like those touching on freedom of speech, must observe the established distinctions between mere advocacy and incitement to imminent lawless action"  (Id., at p. 449.)

The distinction is not that difficult to fathom and is illustrated by the facts in Brandenburg.  Had a Negro chanced to walk by on the other side of the field or on the road, during the meeting, and had defendant thereupon shouted: "Hey boys, there he goes! Let's go teach that coon what we mean!" that would have been incitement to imminent action.   Although the words might precede the conduct, if they are immediately connected to the conduct such that they can be called the immediate and proximate cause, then they have incited unlawful action and are not protected by the First Amendment. 

Of course, every case will depend on its particular circumstances.  If the defendant have been addressing a group of journalists, then it would be highly unlikely and unreasonable to suppose that the words would result in immediate action.    It must be remembered that when the Supreme Court hears these cases they do so after the fact.  What did or did not result from the words spoken is a known fact.   The case is otherwise when prior censorship is used; that is, when words are spoken without there being any known effect.   

In this latter case, the trend has been to censor speech on the ground that it could  lead to some adverse consequence or on the ground that the words spoken have a tendency to provoke disturbances or bring the government into disrepute.   This is the language of the old sedition statutes which make a shambles of free speech.  "Could" is a matter of speculation and an argument can always be made that some words could, might, or should certainly result in some unacceptable consequences.   But this is not an objective measure. Notwithstanding the sociological and statistical mumbo-jumbo that is often brought to bear, it is simply an argument and arguments can always be rustled up to suppress speech that the powers that be do not like.   

Now, as I've said elsewhere, Google, Twitter and social media are privately owned.  But that doesn't solve the problem it makes it worse.  Even medieval peasants understood the evil of "enclosing" common lands, which is what has happened.  

The internet was developed with public funds and is and ought to be regarded as a public space.  For a variety of technical reasons it has been effectively taken over by private corporations who now wish to treat it as their private domain to do with what they wont.  

Amur'kans ever sucking the cock of the free market and private ownership think this is just fine.  Who has the bucks, calls the shots.  What could be more natural?!  For shame.

First Amendment protections should be extended to "commons" even if they are privately owned, as I argued yesterday.

Most of what people have to say is garbage.  Just look at Martin Luther for example!  His words triggered a 30 year long war that cost 8 million lives.   But if the dogs in the field have a natural right to howl, so too man.   It should not be curtailed or policed no matter what the excuse. 

Historically, speech suppression has been the hallmark of monarchs and reactionary institutions like the Church.   But of late it has been pushed by the "liberal" establishment with a ferocity and vindictiveness that exceeds anything mustered by Torquemada or Savanarola.    The hypocrisy drips from their sputtering mouths.   They extol "diversity" and claim to value "vigorous debate"  but then they turn like rabid hyenas on anything they peremptorily denouncet as "inappropriate," "unacceptable" or  "beyond the pale".  Of course!  Of course we value free speech... .but not this!   

Liberals have managed to prove that they, as much as anyone else, are a threat to democracy which can only be based on free speech.

Just as wretchedly, they accomplish their aims by destroying language itself.   Argument or explanation is reduced to a barrage of free floating, inflammatory adjectives ("hateful," "extremist,"  "terrorist")  or verbs unmodified by any prepositional phrase. It was said that Trump "incited" the crowd.  Incited to what?   What did Trump actually say that supposedly triggered a mob assault into the Senate chamber? No answer.  Instead, from the outset the media rushed to label the riot a "coup" and an "insurrection" both of which -- if words are to have any meaning -- presuppose conspiracy, organization and intent.  But again, no facts.  Two days later Pelosi called it an "unbalanced assault" -- whatever the hell that is. This is nothing but language as flash-bang. It is, of course, the sort of thing Trump does in his own fashion, but it is resorted to in equal measure by his opponents and by the august New York Slime, whose headlines in the past few days have been an undiluted demagoguery of their own

The reduction of speech to un-nuanced, emotional trigger-words is the essence of Orwellian mind control; and in this the liberals have proved themselves adept and shameless. 

We are tired of having to constantly explain the basics of free speech and to defend it against sanctimonious guardians, such as the Woke Feminist Guardian, Heiko-the-Idiot, Jacinda-the-Mournful, the unaccountable owners and guardians of social media and, of course, the New York Slime.   But among the many causes of dismay in the country, none is more insidious and dangerous than the debasement of language coupled with the suppression of opposing points of view.  

Since liberals seem to be hooked on Nazi and Fascist analogies,  I might point out that it took an actual fire in the Reichstag to provide a passable justification for enacting the Law for the Protection of the People and the Reich.   For today's establishment liberals a mere riot will do.   If we constantly explain and defend the principles of free speech it is because it is threatened by a liberal crusade to make the internet and public spaces, safe, inoffensive, politically and factually correct; that is, (stripped of bullshit), to rid it of things they don't like.   It is my fear that just as 9/11 was used as the pretext for instituting the Nation Security State, this riot will be used as an excuse to dox, vet, sanitize and control speech and information; to safeguard our democracy for the right-thinking people who deserve it!

Bah.

The Black Cat

Needless to say, Antifa & the Pelosicrats are rejoicing that Trump got his mouth suspended from Twitter. Alvin and the Chipmunks are leading the Chorus. (Alvin is the name of the NYSlime Editorial Board.) Beware meeses. When the Black Cat goes around he comes around.

Let us be clear...there is at least probable cause to believe that Trump incited the disruption of an official act and that is a violation of 18 U.S. Code § 2384. It is my belief that that is also the meaning of a "high misdemeanor" and is grounds for impeaching him. But assuming Trump were to be impeached or be found guilty of a crime (neither of which has as of yet occurred) that does not mean he should be banned from Twitter.

It is one of the utter perversities of the neo-liberal system that what are in effect public spaces can be privately owned. It is no answer to this to say that Twitter is privately owned and that the Mr. Moneybags who owns it can do with it what he wills. In the first place that begs the question of what to do with public spaces that are privately owned. In the second place it is not true.

In Pruneyard Shopping Ctr. v. Robins, 447 U.S. 74 (1980),  the USSC upheld a California Supreme Court ruling which prohibited private shopping centers from prohibiting passers by from exercising their free speech on the premises. Various states have followed the California court's lead on this.

Although the Supreme Court did not uphold Pruneyard under the First Amendment it has recently recognized one of the underpinnings of that case. In Packingham v. North Carolina, 582 U.S. ___ (2017), the Court held that the government may not prevent convicted criminals from using the internet (Facebook). In reaching this conclusion the Court found that social media, like Facebook and Twitter served the function of a public commons." That is a very important finding. It dispels the idea that it is sufficient to say "Nyah nyah it's my property!" Social media may be privately owned but it is not simply private property.

From this premise, the Court went on to hold that the Government (in this case North Carolina) could not prohibit a convicted sex offender from cruising the internet.... no matter what blabbidy blab about "risk" and "sacred innocent children" and "improper content" it resorted to. In a unanimous decision the court ruled "A fundamental principle of the First Amendment is that all persons have access to places where they can speak and listen, and then, after reflection, speak and listen once more ... By prohibiting sex offenders from using those websites, North Carolina with one broad stroke bars access to what for many are the principal sources for knowing current events, checking ads for employment, speaking and listening in the modern public square, and otherwise exploring the vast realms of human thought and knowledge." Justice Kennedy added: "It is well established that, as a general rule, the Government 'may not suppress lawful speech as the means to suppress unlawful speech'."

Thus even if Trump were actually impeached or convicted the government (state or federal) could not bar him from using the internet.

The question then becomes can Twitter (a private entity) do what the government cannot do even before Trump has been convicted of anything? Can a private entity pre-emptively prohibit speech? Pre-emptively, mind you, which gives rise to what the Supreme Court has condemned as a "chilling effect" on freedom.

Packingham did not answer this question. But if you read Prunedale and Packingham together the answer ought to be a resounding NO.

Of course, the First Amendment only applies to government action. But the underlying difficulty is that private actors hold a monopoly on what is acknowledged to be a public space. If you grant Twitter or Facebook the right and the power to censor and pre-censor speech then you have basically shit-canned the exercise of free speech in the modern world.

Do you really want to do that? You may hate Trump and pedophiles, or the "alt right" or "extremist" or this or that. But these are just labels. One day you will say something that will "deeply offend" someone or make a person feel "threatened" or "assaulted." You may say something that is "beyond the pale," "devoid of reason" or that "denies a self evident (cough) fact!" blah, blah, blah. The outrages and the excuses of censors are always the same.

Just remember: first they silenced criminals, but I am not a criminal; then they silenced extremists, but I am not an extremist, then they came and silenced me. The Black Cat always makes its rounds.

Meeses would be well advised not to cheer. 

©wcg 2021