I recently received a letter contesting my statements concerning Attorney General Bill Barr in columns (here and here and here and here) and congressional testimony (here and here). The letter is from Ralph Nader, Lou Fisher, and Bruce Fein. I have known all three signatories for many years and I have the utmost respect for them. They offer detailed and thoughtful disagreements with my past statements and the record of Attorney General Bill Barr. I asked them if they would allow me to share their arguments with the blog and they have agreed to do so. As with the prior posting of Professor Morrison, I strongly encourage you to consider the analysis from three of the most influential minds in Washington.
These are figures who require little introduction. They are well known throughout the world for their contributions to the law and public policy. Ralph Nader is as legendary figure who has fought his entire life for consumer protection, environmental protection and good government. He has run for president repeatedly (indeed I voted for him) and is widely viewed as one of the most influential figures in the world on public policy. Lou Fisher spent four decades at the Congressional Research Service and is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the shaping of congressional legislation and policies. He is widely regarded as one of the foremost experts on constitutional and congressional issues. Bruce Fein was a high ranking Justice Department figure in the Reagan Administration and has been one of the most influential conservative voices in print and television for decades. He is known for his independent and principled analysis of legal and constitutional issues.
As I stated in Attorney General Barr’s confirmation, he comes to this position with long-established and robust views of executive privilege and powers. While I have long disagreed with him on many of these issues, I view many of the current controversies to reflect policy and interpretative differences, not ethical or criminal or impeachable misconduct. I do not agree with presumptions made about his improper motivations or designs in carrying out his duties, for a second time, as Attorney General of the United States. Despite my many friends on the other side, my view has not changed. Nevertheless, people of good-faith can disagree and that is precisely what is offered by Messrs. Nader, Fisher, and Fein (sounds like a great law firm!)
Here is their letter for your consideration:
Dear Professor Turley,
We highly respect your intellect, productivity, and integrity over the years.
We are convinced, however, that the crabbed views of bribery elaborated in your July 12, 2020 internet posting, “When ‘Awfully Close’ Is Just Awful: Nadler Raises Invalid Bribery Theory In Call For Barr Investigation,” are misplaced. You focused narrowly on the definition of bribery under the federal criminal code as expounded the United States Supreme Court and subordinate tribunals.
But “bribery” as an impeachable offense in Article II, section 4 is not so circumscribed. It does not require proof of a crime. Indeed, when the Constitution was adopted and ratified, there was no federal criminal code. And the Constitution did not create common law crimes. United States v. Hudson & Goodwin, 11 U.S. 32 (1812). Thus, bribery in the context of impeachment could not have been anchored to a federal crime. In contrast to treason, the Constitution refrains from any definition of bribery. Accordingly, Congress might rationally conclude that Attorney General Barr’s offering a promotion to Geoffrey Berman exchange for his non-noisy resignation as United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York constituted impeachable bribery even if not a violation of the federal criminal code. The reasonably suspected ulterior motive was the hope that Berman’s successor, SEC Chairman Jay Clayton, clueless about criminal justice, and interim Acting United States Attorney for the Southern District, Craig Carpenito, United States Attorney for New Jersey, would be less aggressive in investigating targets tied to President Trump. As you know, an investigation running on twenty cylinders as opposed to one cylinder is the difference between night and day, even if both are equally uncompromised. Simply because Mr. Barr’s hope was thwarted and Berman’s professional deputy became Acting U.S. Attorney does not make the solicitation of Berman’s quiet resignation in exchange for a promotion any less impeachable as non-criminal bribery under Article II, section 4.
Ask yourself, Professor Turley, if you were in Mr. Barr’s place, would you have done what he did with his motives? If not, isn’t that a cogent clue that the Attorney General did something wrong in soliciting Mr. Berman’s quiet resignation in exchange for a promotion?
We submit that in your multiple writings, testimonies, or articles a much wider lens might have been employed in evaluating Attorney General Barr: namely, serial violations of his constitutional duty to faithfully and evenhandedly execute the laws to inspire public trust in the administration of justice. The abuse or violation of a public trust, Alexander Hamilton explained in Federalist 65, is an impeachable high crime and misdemeanor.
Mr. Barr has shattered public trust in a non-partisan, uncompromised administration of justice by implementing or condoning President Donald Trump’s partisan, chronically lawless political agenda. The following enumeration is inexhaustive:
- Seeking to void former national security adviser’s Michael Flynn’s guilty pleas in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia for reasons never afforded any other criminal defendant.
- Second-guessing the sentencing recommendations of the Department’s schooled lawyers for President Trump’s personal and political confidant Roger Stone, found guilty of lying to Congress and witness tampering.
- Condoning President Trump’s commutation of Stone’s sentence, which will encourage congressional witnesses during Trump’s tenure to lie in expectation of a presidential sanctuary. James Madison instructed at the Virginia Ratification Convention: “There is one security in this case [a misuse of the pardon power by the president] to which gentlemen may not have adverted: if the President be connected, in any suspicious manner, with any person, and there be grounds to believe he will shelter him, the House of Representatives can impeach him; they can remove him if found guilty…”
- Gratuitously casting aspersion on the Mueller Report by unilaterally proclaiming in the manner of a papal encyclical that President Trump was innocent of obstruction of justice. The Report chronicled multiple instances of evidence of obstruction but refrained from opining on whether they met the threshold for criminal prosecution. Mr. Mueller inexplicably balked at seeking to depose Mr. Trump or even compel him to answer written questions about his conduct as President.
- Making deceitful redactions in the public release of the Mueller report that provoked United States District Judge Reginald Walton in FOIA litigation to write that Barr may have “made a calculated attempt to influence public discourse about the Mueller Report in favor of President Trump despite certain findings in the redacted version of the Mueller Report to the contrary.”
- Condoned unconstitutional defiance of scores of congressional subpoenas or requests for information by executive officials that handcuffed the congressional power of oversight and investigation. In 1974, without judicial blessing, the House Judiciary Committee voted an article of impeachment against President Richard Nixon for flouting a single committee subpoena. Congress does not need judicial permission to find that disobedience to a congressional subpoena is an impeachable offense.
- Condoned or supported President Trump’s June 4, 2020, Executive Order 13927 declaring a special economic national emergency based on COVID-19 as a pretext to waive environmental laws, such as the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act, to accelerate federal approval of new mines, highways, pipelines, and other federal projects as reported in The Washington Post (“Trump signs order to waive environmental reviews for key projects,” by Juliet Eilperin and Jeff Stein, June 4, 2020). Notwithstanding the alleged national emergency, President Trump has refrained from promulgating a national blueprint to fight COVID-19, and proclaimed we are witnessing “the greatest [economic] comeback in history.”
- Condoned or supported President Trump’s Executive Order 13294 instructing federal government agencies to rescind, modify, or cease enforcing regulations temporarily or permanently if they “may inhibit economic recovery” as reported in The Washington Post (“Citing an economic emergency, Trump directs agencies across government to waive federal regulations,” by Steven Mufson, Julie Eilperin, Jeff Stein, and Renae Merle, June 26, 2020). Compare the English Bill of Rights of 1689 condemning King James II for“assuming and exercising a power of dispensing with and suspending of laws and the execution of laws without consent of Parliament.” Standing alone, such industrial scale derelictions in failing faithfully to execute the laws justifies the impeachment of Mr. Barr.
- Condoned Mr. Trump’s criminal violations of the Hatch Act by directing federal employees to place his name on checks to CARES beneficiaries and to send White House letters to direct deposit CARES beneficiaries to advance his 2020 presidential campaign. Mr. Barr has refused to respond to our letter pointing out the substantial credible evidence of violations and urging the appointment of a special counsel under Department of Justice regulations.
- We take guidance from your splendid January 13, 2012 article in The Washington Post entitled, “10 reasons the U.S. is no longer the land of the free.” Attorney General Barr has championed or endorsed every one of those 10 violations and more.
He has championed President Trump’s authority to play prosecutor, judge, jury, and executioner to kill any American citizen deemed a past or future threat to national security based on secret, unsubstantiated suspicion without accountability to Congress, the courts, or the American people. President Trump has weakened internal inhibitions on assassinations that he inherited from President Obama. They also violate Executive Order 12333, section 2.11
He has endorsed indefinite detention without trial of terrorism suspects not charged with crimes at Guantanamo Bay or elsewhere.
He has endorsed presidential power to decide between military or civilian justice. French Premier Georges Clemenceau quipped that “Military justice is to justice what military music is to music.”
He supports the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to approve arbitrary targeting of organizations and American citizens for non-criminal justice purposes for political advantage. He supports the national security letters issued by the FBI with no judicial vetting which have chronically abused according to the DOJ’s Office of Inspector General and others.
He has endorsed secret evidence and secret law to justify detentions and dismissals of civil suits for government assassinations, torture, or kidnappings. The secrecy invites government deceit, as confirmed by the Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Reynolds, 345 U.S. 1 (1953) enabling a false Air Force affidavit to scuttle a wrongful death suit under the Federal Tort Claims Act.
He has endorsed blocking war crimes investigations of the American military by the International Criminal Court, including in Afghanistan, and issued asset freezes and denied visas to ICC investigators as punishment. (Although the United States is not an ICC signatory, Afghanistan is. Under the Rome Statute of the ICC, it has jurisdiction over war crimes perpetrated by the American military in a signatory nation).
He has endorsed limitless use of the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to target any person within the rearview mirror of an alleged suspected terrorist.
He has endorsed judicial immunity for companies complicit with the government in warrantless surveillance of citizens; and, sought to enlist the judiciary under the All Writs Act of 1789 to compel companies like Apple to become arms of the FBI in breaking privacy codes on cell phones.
He endorsed the warrantless use of surveillance drones to monitor American citizens, including protestors demonstrating over George Floyd’s homicide.
In the past before the practice was abandoned by President Obama, he endorsed extraordinary rendition to send U.S. detainees to countries notorious for torture or murder, for example, innocent Mahar Arar dispatched to Syria for torture. Extraordinary rendition is a lesser presidential power than the limitless presidential power to assassinate that Mr. Barr champions.
In addition to the ten violations referenced above, the Attorney General supports unbridled presidential power to initiate and continue war (including use of WMD) on his say-so alone in flagrant violation of the Declare War Clause. As you know, James Madison wrote to Thomas Jefferson on behalf of every participant in the making and ratification of the Constitution: “The constitution supposes, what the History of all Govts. demonstrates, that the Ex. is the branch of power most interested in war, & most prone to it. It has accordingly with studied care, vested the question of war in the Legisl…”
Thus, Mr. Barr supports our ongoing, never-ending unconstitutional presidential wars never declared or initiated by Congress: Libya, Somalia, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Many wrongly believe the war against Iraq is constitutional under the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002. It is not because Congress abdicated its responsibility for war to the President, an abdication prohibited by the Declare War Clause. Only Congress can take the nation from peace to war, and it did not make that decision in the 2002 AUMF. It handed off that decision to the President, who waited more than five months to attack.
Neither by treaty nor by statute may the Senate or Congress surrender the war power to the President. The League of Nations was defeated in the Senate over that issue. And the United Nations Charter, learning from history, requires a congressional declaration of war before the President may employ the military to enforce a Security Council resolution under Chapter 7. Congress is prohibited from delegating certain legislative authorities to the President to preserve separation of powers, which is a structural bill of rights to protect the people from tyranny. Clinton v. New York, 524 U.S. 417 (1998).
You appreciate the enormity of the constitutional violations of presidential wars because you represented Members of Congress in a 2011 lawsuit challenging President Barack Obama’s unconstitutional war in Libya, which continues to this very day with Mr. Barr as Attorney General.
The gravity of the Attorney General’s constitutional derelictions cannot be overstated. Do you not think his taking a wrecking ball to our constitutional order warrants impeachment and removal from office?
We look forward to a thoughtful response.
Very truly yours,
Ralph Nader Lou Fisher Bruce Fein
Thanks for posting anonymous.
While not sure about the other two, Ralph Nader (whom I used to support), is clearly suffering from dementia, and has for some time now.
His comments reflect this clearly.
From the first paragraph on, their rebuttal is based on, and disagreeing with Turley actually following current law.
Doing so was wrong in their eyes.
Under their broad interpretation, the vast majority, if not all of our presidents could have been legally impeached.
This is clearly unacceptable, and infers the constitutional authors gave no thought to the ramification of such a broad standard.
This is not a response, but an authoritarian hit piece, giving congress more power than ever intended.
I’ve come to expect such gibberish from Leftist and neocon’s, and as always, they didn’t disappoint.
Nader discredited himself with this automobile activism. The first Model Ts that rolled off the assembly line in 1913 bear no resemblance in design, safety, durability, quality etc. to the cars built in the ’50s – like my beloved ’57 Chevy. The cars built in the mid 50s were as solid as a tank and multiple times safer than those built 40 years earlier. Government had absolutely nothing to do with the improvement in design, safety, durability, quality, etc.
Consumers voted with their dollars. They voted with their dollars by purchasing safer, stronger cars. Just as after the oil embargo in the ’70s, consumer preferences changed. In the ’70s, consumers demanded tiny little vehicles that got much better fuel efficiency. The Big Three either had to respond to these changing consumer preferences or cede the market to the Japanese and Germans, who were exporting their fuel efficient vehicles to America.
You don’t need government to force you to wear a seat belt for your own good. People have free will. If they value their own safety, they will buy cars with seat belts and the auto companies will build them with seat belts.
All three, Ralph Nader, Lou Fisher, and Bruce Fein may have certain qualifications according to our Professor, but they are still 3 political hacks who hate Trump and have always hated Trump. Therefore their opinions are completely worthless. To print their view in any way is basically incompetent without supplying background information.
Kim Dotcom
@KimDotcom
“The Covid-19 chart (new daily confirmed cases) with quotes from the Trump administration.”
“The Covid-19 mismanagement by Donald Trump may end up killing more Americans than WW2.”
https://twitter.com/KimDotcom/status/1283607834391744512
Pure stupid comparison.
Maybe, maybe not. But the chart is fun:
https://twitter.com/KimDotcom/status/1283607834391744512/photo/1
In a death loving kinda way which, of course, suits you.
Let’s start with the first comment by Trump on 02/21/2020:
“Very close to a vaccine.”
He’s a hoot, isn’t he..
A ninny:
Well we are close which you might know if you had a dollar or two to put in the stock market but alas moral bankruptcy usually means financial as well.
It’s July, mesblow.
And (again?), stick to what you know.
Aninny:
“It’s July, mesblow.
And (again?), stick to what you know.”
**************************
I do. I think July 15, 2020 is in July:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/naeemaslam/2020/07/15/dow-jones-futures-moderna-coronavirus-vaccine-stock-market-rally/#586507bca80d
And obviously you don’t. Like I said, moral bankruptcy usually means financial as well.
Yeah, Trump — I’m not a doctor but I like to pretend — is a real genius. Just like mesblo who doesn’t understand that February is not July. February 21 is not in the month of July — unless you’re mesblo.
And anyone who is paying attention to the news about possible vaccines understands that Moderna has done some exellent work. Fauci’s hopeful. We’re all hopeful. That said:
EDITORS’ PICK
Jun 16, 2020,09:28pm EDT
“Trump Mentions AIDS Vaccine That Does Not Exist, Predicts Covid-19 Vaccine By End Of 2020”
https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/2020/06/16/trump-mentions-aids-vaccine-that-does-not-exist-predicts-covid-19-vaccine-by-end-of-2020/#29f9724f7d2f
“Coronavirus: FDA chief refuses to back Trump’s vaccine prediction”
July 6, 2020
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-53302766
“US health officials have expressed cautious optimism that a vaccine will be in production by the end of 2020 or early 2021.
Earlier this week, the US’s top infectious diseases expert, Dr Anthony Fauci, said the safety and effectiveness of a vaccine against Covid-19 should be known by “early winter”.
Dr Fauci said trials of various vaccines would be entering the latter stages of the testing process this month.
“We may be able to at least know whether we are dealing with a safe and effective vaccine by the early winter, late winter, beginning of 2021,” said Dr Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.”
Anilliterate:
The vaccine rally was in July you fool. As someone who profited by it, I’d know. That’s what the Forbes piece was all about. God that basement must be full of lead.
“Financial bankruptcy”
LOL Nope.
This is the way it’s done:
“I never buy at the bottom and I always sell too soon.” ~Baron Nathan Rothschild
“Moderna unveiled encouraging coronavirus vaccine results. Then top execs dumped nearly $30 million of stock”
https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/22/investing/moderna-coronavirus-vaccine-stock-sales/index.html
“New York (CNN Business) Moderna’s stock price skyrocketed as much as 30% on Monday after the biotech company announced promising early results for its coronavirus vaccine. As ordinary investors piled in, two insiders were quietly heading for the exits.”
Aninny:
Calendars aren’t your strong suit either. You are a destitute clown skewered on your own lies and exposed for all the world to see. But the worst part is you’re illiterate. Keep digging you look good in brown.
“Big Mess” (h/t to J. Bug) must have been into the Dewar’s, earlier tonight, when he made some of these comments.
https://jonathanturley.org/2020/07/16/the-case-against-bill-barr-nader-fisher-and-fein-respond-to-professor-jonathan-turley/comment-page-2/#comment-1979780
“The Covid-19 mismanagement by Donald Trump may end up killing more Americans than WW2”
Interesting. Of course you’ll have to discount a large number of the NY deaths which can be directly blamed on Gov. Cuomo’s disastrous decision to send infected Covid patients to nursing homes. This is the deadliest policy of any US government official in the 21st century. Some 30K US deaths compared with 7 or so thousand that can be blamed on Bush’s decision to invade Iraq.
I read the first few paragraphs, and then decided it wasn’t reading any of the rest… In the comments of several people here have justified me in that thinking.
As liberals are very much inclined to do, these three start from a conclusion and then start finding acts which justify their conclusion, more properly, acts that appear to justify their conclusion. That conclusion of course is that what Barr has done is impeachable. Making that your conclusion, you then reach back for any actions that could be misconstrued to justify that belief.
These three may have fine records… I question that, especially in Nader’s case. His initial foray into the public arena was to trash the Chevrolet Corvair… Numerous studies since then have shown that he didn’t know what he was talking about… But this attempt to stir things up falls far short of their best work ever.
They desperately need to put an edit function here… to correct my voice to text errors, I meant to say “I decided it was not worth reading the rest …”
Use Word? Correct, then copy and paste?
There are three references to torture in the letter.
This was written by Jonathan Turley, one upon a time:
“Turley: Americans Who Authorized Torture Should Be Prosecuted for War Crimes”
“If the U.S. does not prosecute those behind alleged torture, it will stand as guilty as its enemies.”
https://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2009/05/18/war-crimes-must-be-prosecuted-at-home-or-abroad
And this, also in USA Today, apparently, by I haven’t located it:
“THE IMPROPRIETY OF TORTURE”
https://jonathanturley.org/2012/09/11/the-impropriety-of-torture/
Excerpt:
Not only have people like the commandant at the Salt Pit been promoted, but various CIA officials associated with the abuse of detainees have also been promoted under President Obama. Likewise, the lawyers responsible for those now rejected legal opinions have been promoted. One of the most notorious, Jay Bybee, was even given a lifetime appointment as a federal judge in California.
We have gone from prosecuting torture as a war crime after World War II to treating allegations of torture as a “question of propriety” under Obama. Hundreds of officials, including President Bush, were involved. People died in interrogation. High-ranking CIA officials admitted that they destroyed evidence of torture to keep it from being used in any later prosecutions. Yet, after a years-long investigation, not a single CIA official will be charged with a single crime connected to the program. Not even a misdemeanor or a single bar referral for an attorney. Well, no one except former CIA official John Kiriakou, who is awaiting trial on criminal charges for disclosing information on the torture.
After World War II, political philosopher Hannah Arendt coined the phrase “the banality of evil” to describe those who committed war crimes. The Obama administration now can add the “impropriety of torture” to our lexicon. The image of a man beaten, stripped and frozen to death in a CIA prison is not nearly as unnerving as a nation that stood by and did nothing about it. We have become a nation of dull-eyed pedestrians watching as our leaders strip away the very things that distinguish us from our enemies. With our principles gone, we are left with only politics and, of course, our sense of propriety.
Jonathan Turley, the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University, is a member of USA TODAY’s Board of Contributors.
USA TODAY September 11, 2012
Concerning “these three”, their singing is a lot better than their letter writing:
This was one of the stupidest things I have ever read. It is pure nonsensical accusations and most made without any real evidence. Most of this screed is reaching in a way that Ralph Nadler only can because if they were grounds for impeachment every AG in history would be impeached. They just automatically declare a conspiracy theory in the Flynn case and offer zero in the way of evidence. They ignore the fact that the actual judge in the Stone case said that the first sentencing recommendation was, indeed, excessive and the new one was much more appropriate, and that comes with the fact that the judge does not have to sentence Stone to whatever the DOJ says.
The “bribery” charge they hoist upon Barr, by saying that in order to impeach one does not have to meet the standard set by legislative laws, may be true but what they do is try substituting pure opinion. Basically they are saying Barr committed “bribery,’ and should be impeached and removed because we didn’t like what he did and we need no evidence. Opinions are fine but, like the old cliche, “opinions are like —holes, everyone has one.” This is the old, “Well, we say impeach because we don’t like the guy. Unfortunately for them, some people do like the guy. Congress has the ability to impeach and remove but it is the only the President that can nominate someone to the AG position. When a party in the majority in the House and the party of the President are different, the President can have an AG that the other party doesn’t like, the election decides that.
“the President can have an AG that the other party doesn’t like, the election decides that”
As Obama smugly said: “elections have consequences”
Under Joe Biden, 82% of Americans will see their taxes go up!
Crooked Joe never met a tax increase he didn’t like!
Joe Biden and AOC’s Radical Green New Deal:
1. Will eventually eliminate all fossil fuel energy production
2. In the 1st year only cost 75K per household
3. Destroy 3.4 MILLION jobs in oil, natural gas, and coal industries.
Under DonaldTrump, we are energy independent!
@RudyGiuliani
Relationship between Obesity, the immune system, and infectious diseases like SARS-CoV-2.
There are other issues as well like the hormones that adipose tissues secretes which derails the many cascades and processes within the body.
Obesity is a risk factor on the body for many reasons. Here is one more.
Link is free. Note Figure 1 in the article
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/oby.22844
Malavazos, A.E. et al., 2020. Targeting the Adipose Tissue in COVID‐19. Obesity, 28(7), pp.1178–1179.
Targeting the Adipose Tissue in COVID‐19
Human dipeptidyl peptidase 4 (DPP4) was also identified as a functional receptor for the spike protein of the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS)‐CoV ((7)). MERS‐CoV binds to the receptor‐binding domain and interacts with T cells and nuclear factors involved in the pathogenesis of inflammatory disorders. DPP4, a transmembrane protein, has been identified in human adipose tissue and is associated with obesity‐related type 2 diabetes. DPP4 inhibition increases glucagon like peptide‐1 secretion, leading to an improved insulin sensitivity and glucose metabolism within the adipocyte. DPP4 inhibition could also play a role in the immune response to COVID‐19 by reducing inflammation ((8)). Inhibition of the DPP4 enzymatic activity suppresses T‐cell proliferation and the secretion of proinflammatory cytokines, such as interleukin (IL)‐6 and ‐10 ((9)).
Besides the expression of these enzymes and their possible role, there are multiple mechanisms by which the adipose tissue may contribute to the development and progression of COVID‐19 ((10)). Complex interactions occur between the immune system and adipose tissue. The overexpression of inflammatory adipokines from visceral fat depots can affect the immune response, impair the chemotaxis, and alter the macrophage differentiation. The imbalance between anti‐ and proinflammatory adipokine secretion from thoracic visceral fat depots, such as the epicardial and mediastinal, can also play a role in the cytokine storm described in patients with severe SARS‐COv2. Interestingly, adiponectin was reported to predict mortality in critically ill patients upon admission to the intensive care unit. The innate inflammatory response of the visceral fat depots can cause an upregulation and higher release of inflammatory cytokines such as IL‐6. Excessive proinflammatory cytokine release was thought to be the link between visceral obesity and influenza‐related severe respiratory complications. As elderly individuals are at higher risk of COVID‐19 complications and poorer outcome, it is worth noting that aging can cause visceral fat accumulation and adipose tissue inflammation and fibrosis. Similar changes have also been described in patients with HIV.
Hence, the role of the adipose tissue during infectious diseases, such as COVID‐19, could be important.
“We highly respect your intellect, productivity, and integrity over the years.”
************************
UUU-UUU as Toody on Car 54 would say, I forgot this little analysis: Anytime a bunch of guys who consider you dumber than they it always starts like this and then proceeds to imply you’re dense. You can translate this academic/lawyerspeak to:
“Decorum and Dale Carnegie requires us to hide our fangs in the introductory paragraph so we make up some complimentary, insincere nonsense to set you up even higher as we proceed to saw every rafter under your feet in the succeeding paragraphs. Oh and “respect your intellect, productivity, and integrity 𝙤𝙫𝙚𝙧 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙮𝙚𝙖𝙧𝙨” means you’ve gotten damn stupid, lazy and disingenuous here lately and we are going to fix that.”
That was the cue that it was entirely disingenuous.
After reading Professor Turley’s introduction I was thirsty for alternative ideas. Then I read further: “Ask yourself, Professor Turley, if you were in Mr. Barr’s place, would you have done what he did with his motives?” Do they perceive themselves as mindreaders and use their “special talent” as evidence? It seems so and makes one look at an earlier statement: ” Indeed, when the Constitution was adopted and ratified, there was no federal criminal code.” So what! The founders discussed many things to prevent any President from being abused by those more interested in politics than the Constitution.
My thirst was quenched but not with the dirty water provided.
I expected a well reason response to Mr. Turley’s original post. I instead got TDS and it’s a shame. Until this letter, I was never sure which way Mr. Turley leaned politically. (Voted Green Party twice). This is impressive because of all the writing and speaking he does it would be easy to allow his personal beliefs to override his objectiveness.
Thank you, Mr. Turley for being the umpire we need these days.
Whether or not you want to go to the beginning of the country or use the bribery statute, Barr would have to be personally enriched for bribery to be plausible. Barr was not enriched in any way.
I’m wondering what else is going on. Two weeks after Bergman moves on Maxwell is arrested in New England. Why would she be here and not France (where she couldn’t be extradited from) unless she was (1) already cooperating, or (2) under the impression she would be safe from prosecution?
IIRC the Ukraine prosecutor announced before Bergman was released that he had sent referral information to Bergman in 2018 on Biden and his son. This is probably the reason that Bergman was offered a promotion.
What if Bergman was sitting on those one cylinder cases? His reluctance to leave until he sees “some cases through” sounds like a hollow excuse to stall through the election.
Lastly, there has to be some leeway to allow the executive branch to handle its responsibilities and not be micromanaged by everybody that thinks he has something to say or the DOJ, in this case, will be hamstrung from the get-go.
This is such a critical time to get the economy up and running. Everyone assumes it’ll bounce back because it always has, but I believe that we are at a tipping point with an astronomical national debt that has has 60 degree north by northeast trajectory. What good is protecting the environment if we have a major famine catastrophe in this country? It is way down the list in the hierarchy of needs.
“I expected a well reason response to Mr. Turley’s original post.”
One would have thought that but after listening to the lawyers during the impeachment hearings I realized that for the left side of the legal profession intellectual honesty has been on life support and has since died. I think a few jumped ship, Turley being one of them and he is now in ‘limboland’, but so far he seems to be surviving with a foot on the left shore. Dershowitz is another but was totally dumped by the left even though he continues to support Biden. No life buoy was provided.
Biden Family Has a Long Rap Sheet
4 Bidens. 9 arrests, 0 jail time.
No surprise. And they are all VERY wealthy now. Including crack additct Hunter.
Two-tiered system of justice? Family cashing in on Joe’s political office? You better believe it. Just vote NO to Joe’s family corruption and graft.
https://nypost.com/2020/07/11/joe-bidens-family-has-a-long-rap-sheet/
THE BIDEN BUSTS
The rap sheets, and favorable court outcomes, of four Joe Biden relatives
Ashley Biden
Daughter, 39
Charge: Pot possession in New Orleans in 1999. No conviction recorded.
Charge: Attempting to obstruct a police officer in Chicago in 2002. Dropped.
Frank Biden
Brother, 66
Charge: DUI in Florida in 2003. Six months probation.
Charge: Petty theft in Florida in 2003. Dropped.
Charge: Driving with suspended license in Florida in 2004. Three months in rehab.
Caroline Biden
Niece, 33
Charge: Resisting arrest, obstruction of government administration, harassment in NYC, 2013. Case dismissed.
Charge: Grand and petty larceny in NYC in 2017. Two years probation; restitution of $110,000 in stolen credit card charges.
Charge: DUI, driving without a licence in Pennsylvania in 2019. Case pending.
Hunter Biden
Son, 50
Charge: Drug possession in New Jersey in 1988. Pretrial intervention program, records expunged.
“We look forward to a thoughtful response.”
****************************
Okay I’ll try mine first and I did think about it — alot:
First, the premise of the letter by the Three Really Old Blind Mice is that:
a. Though Turley is right about the federal bribery statute’s elements, it doesn’t matter ’cause we feelBarr is sorta, kinda guilty of it since there was no criminal code when the Constitution was written (Things never change for these guys — good or bad — and they’ve discovered the virtue of originalism which has Nino Scalia RPMing at about 4000 in Fairfax Memorial Park) and Barr is guilty of bribery for giving the guy Berman an option to resign or take a promotion without alerting the Press, calling Interpol and renting a barnstorming plane to fly over DC with a banner that read ” Berman is doing a really suckie job but I want to give him a promotion or else kick him to the curb. What do you gators think?”;
b. Barr has done lots of things that we pussy-hatted wheel-chair dwellers don’t like but even though they are barely legal, it helped out “Orange Man Bad” so Barr ought to go; and
c. Barr’s better at manipulating the FISA court (“He has endorsed limitless use of the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to target any person within the rearview mirror of an alleged suspected terrorist.”) to catch terrorists hell-bent to kill us than our ham-fisted clods like Strozk, McCabe and “What Did I Just Sign” Rosenstein who got caught at the coup we coulda done lots better if given the chance and access to Geritol.
Finally to answer their dramatic hanging question that delivers quite a bit of irony to all but the politically tone deaf (read them):
“The gravity of the Attorney General’s constitutional derelictions cannot be overstated. Do you not think his taking a wrecking ball to our constitutional order warrants impeachment and removal from office?”
And the answer clearly is: “If the Steele Dossier, IRS politicization, Fast and Furious, DOJ Politicization and spying on your political opponent to further a coup are kosher to these “silent-when-it-counted” Triumvirate of Trump Haters when Obama did them, then everything else is kosher, too. Marquis de Queensbury, you know.
Is it true that septuagenarian and octogenarians need warm milk to go #2? If so, these guys bought the whole cow.
Mespo you are very patient. I am too irritated to appreciate your wise feedback on barr and all this criticism of him at this juncture. But i thank you for it.
I cant get over the preposterous nature of public officials now who say that everyone has to stay home because of COVID besides BLM
I did not ever claim that the states lacked emergency powers to enact public quarantine restrictions–
but i do contend that they must be proclaimed AND ENFORCED with “DUE PROCESS” fairly, which we learned in law school, comes down to, “EQUAL PROTECTION OF LAW”
If this was not the most blatant nationwide occurrence of un-equal protection of laws, that is, everyone gets quarantined except for BLM protesters and their rioting friends, I dont know what is.
are the BLMers and “peaceful protesters” and the riot squads, all suddenly american aristocrats, who get to go out while we peasants must stay inside?
And i see barely anybody who is a well known lawyer including respected Prof Turley has breached the subject.
I see a few voices like Breitbart mocking this awful hypocrisy in social media.
But it’s not lost on normal people. Like the ones who couldn’t have funerals with more than ten people while George Floyd had about three of them with thousands, tens of thousands of attendees.
We have been through the most hypocritical two months in American history during our lifetimes and I can only heave a gob of spit on all these “more nuanced” conversations about our vaunted “constitutional order” …. i can think carefully of almost nothing else in the whole area of constitutional law right now than this unfair situation. it vexes me supremely.
but i have a fake name here, and you are more or less out in the open, so, I know, you have to be the moderate. So: I admire your courage and also your patience.
Mr. K:
As you presciently point out, Covid is the Trojan Horse of the Left. It’s losing traction as most folks deplore these restrictions and are ignoring them. More power to them.
Thank you for the nice compliment, too. And I owe you another thank you recommending “Gates of Fire” that I read in three days. Great book! “Carrying Your Shields or On Them” and “Fight In The Shade” are my favorite quotes from antiquity.
Yes and Trump needs to leverage all of this to his advantage! Please Trump campaign, get a handle on this message and milk it!! Over and over and over again! The media is lying and obfuscating, intentionally! They are deceitful, intentionally working against Trump!! Do not fall for the Fake News!
Vote!! Trump 2020 — as if your very freedoms and liberties depend on it, because they do! Do not give these Democrat fascist totalitarians any more power! Vote every last one of them OUT of office!
“…Democrat fascist totalitarians…”
Just silly. Maybe try getting out more.
Yes, we would “get out more” if the Democrat fascist totalitarian idiot mayors and governors would stop saying No…you may not get out, you must wear a mask at all times if you do go out, your children may not go back to school, your church may not be open for worship, and if your church IS open, you may not SING in church, your restaurants and small businesses may not open but…BUT!! you MAY go out and flood the streets if you want to protest and SING and chant and shout, with or without masks, in support of Black Lives Matter because THAT is an important right that we must not trample on….everything else they will trample on, oh but not your right to protest! THAT is the totalitarian fascist Democrat politcians in action these days.
Vote Trump 2020 as if everything that matters depends on it. Because it does!
There are plenty of ways to get out. And it can be done safely.
Plenty of spoiled, pampered, entitled Americans…who don’t understand what it is to make sacrifices…for the greater good.
Mr. Kurtz– my spouse and I could not attend the funeral together of one of our oldest friends because of Covid restrictions that limited the service and graveside to a handful of people. Her husband of 40 years could not even visit her as she lay dying in the hospital but had to wait outside when they transferred her to another facility so he could look in the ambulance as it drove by. It was during this time that the worthless felon was being grieved by thousands in three services by phony people who shed crocodile tears for an awful man that would have scared them to death in life. As long as I live I will never forget that travesty. I was never going to vote for any democrat anyway after what they have put this country through during the Obama/ Biden years, but I suspect there are a lot of people who could be Biden voters that experienced what we did or something very similar. And, there are many businesses who are being told they must close again and possibly lose all they have. The only exceptions are are protesters, arsonist and looters. And then there is the rampant destruction of monuments to people who helped build this country, unlike the whiny protesters who are tearing them down. If these events to do not move voters to reject democrats, including Joe Biden, then I doubt that this country is sustainable. We will retire to our ranch which has a strong fence and signs all around. You’ve probably seen them: “Trespassers will be shot and then prosecuted.”
Indeed. And why hasn’t Minnesota AG Keith Ellison released the full body cam tapes of the arrest of George Floyd? If those tapes supported the left’s “narrative” (not to be confused with actual facts) those tapes would have been released immediately. But Ellison is still sitting on them. And we all know why. Can’t let the facts get in the way of a false narrative. Disgusting Democrats. Vote them all out of power.
“Disgusting Democrats. Vote them all out of power.”
Gotta be hatin’ on someone. Gotta have someone to blame, rather than looking at the big picture and understanding that we’re all to blame — in some way, shape or form.
Aninymouse:
“… we’re all to blame — in some way, shape or form.”
**********************
You wear the ashes and sack cloth then ‘cause I look better in navy and seersucker, Sucker. And I apologize for nothing except spending precious seconds responding to a self-loathing mass of protoplasm that deserves a long walk off a short pier.
“self-loathing”
lol
You reach the darnedest conclusions, mesblow, old boy.
But, hey, you might want to haul your fat ass back to bed and get up on the right side this time.
Anonymous:
“self-loathing”
lol”
********************
Nervous laughter is the tell. No you think a lot of yourself publicly and that’s your psychological shield. Privately you’re a mess with busted relationships, fear, self-doubt and no accomplishments save a insult hurled with impugnity to your betters from time to time. You’re pathetic and disingenuous which is the surest sign of self-hatred which of course translates here to your loathing by people that have actually accomplished something with their lives. In short, you’re loser in all phases as a candid assessment of yourself might reveal had you the character to do that. You’re to be pitied even as you’re kicked to curb. Those sack cloth and ashes are for you.
Go back to bed, blow-boy. You’re projecting all over the place, this morning. The only loser is you.
Now you have a good day.
I already did have a great day decimating yet another feckless clown who I’ve revealed as the life’s mess she is. Oh you’re a mess for sure. It’s the running away in tears, that’s the tell. Chuckles.
Looks like you could use a little hit of Neil Diamond, snarky Anonymous, so here you go: ‘Turn on your heartlight, Let it shine wherever you go, Let it make a happy glow, for all the world to see.’ 😉
Minnesota, the Twin Cities, twin pillars town, has deep ties to the Rockefeller family. I think someone in govt there is married to one of them.
George was a psy-op, gold caskets, by horse, like the sun God, Ra. I mean, you can’t get more archaic than this stuff.
His lawyer. A Prince Hall freemason.
George’s Twin. There we go again, with the twins, in the Gemini, that NBA player, also a Prince Hall freemason, sometimes referred to a Boule.
Psy-Op, pre planned.
HLM:
That’s a damning indictment of this COVID farce. I hope there’s a divine tribunal to consign the Dimorats to the fiery pit they’ve so much richly earned.
“Former game show host deactivates Twitter account after his son contracts Covid-19”
By Jon Passantino, CNN
Updated 5:14 AM ET, Fri July 17, 2020
https://fox8.com/news/coronavirus/former-game-show-host-deactivates-twitter-account-after-his-son-contracts-covid-19/
‘Woolery deactivated his Twitter account Wednesday, Young said.
‘In his last posted tweet, Woolery said, “Covid-19 is real and it is here.”‘
(Obesity is a risk factor. Just sayin’.)
Anonypuss:
I’m just saying you ought to get back to that remote learning cause your juvenile taunts are just droll. My guess is you’re a fat little kid cut from every team you ever tried out for and love to project. I could be wrong but we’ll never know since you hide behind that mask of anonymity which of course means you’re a coward when you incite. You’re the perfect millennial or codger builder from Gainesville, either or. Chuckles.
Says the blow-boy — the the king of “juvenile taunts.”
“I could be wrong ”
lol
Ya think?
The mortars are hitting home I see. Good.
“The mortars are hitting home I see.”
Yeah, on your end. Better take refuge in your fat-boy bunker.
Direct hit!
Mespo, with all the posts Anonymous the Stupid is making today it sounds like he hurt himself so he has found another use for his hands.
“mespo727272 says:July 17, 2020 at 11:19 AM
Direct hit!”
…screams mesblo from his fat-boy bunker.
The Mesbloviator needs your help.
Allan is another master of projection.
Anonymous the Stupid someone needs to tie your hands together.
And true to form — and desperate for attention — the idiot Allan wanders in…
Soon Anonymous the Stupid will untie his hands and we won’t have to listen to him for awhile.
Aninny:
I’m in your beach blonde head and it’s really empty in here! Lol. I love an insulting adversary. Means I’ve win the argument. When they curl up in a fetal position with juvenile insults, it’s a complete rout.
You kids have fun doing what you do best.
Allen:
Aninny the Stupid is obviously a fat chick with lots of time on her hands given her all day and night postings. She doesn’t argue like a man and is easily offended. Note the obsession with appearance, refusal to admit obvious error like the Forbes piece in July and the disdain for reasoned debate. Oh and easily triggered and downright dumb. She said the whole package. And rather amusing in a dull kindergartener kinda way. I looking forward to manipulating her into yet another stupid reply.
Mespo I originally called her The Brainless Wonder but then noted something a bit different and started calling him Anonymous the Stupid. Now I use them interchangeably or both at the same time which may be appropriate because he seems to have gender identification problems along with a whole host of other problems that causes him to “copy” things and other people. in large part that is probably due to a difficulty in comprehension.
A horrible story and one that I think will significantly influence the election.
The sign on your ranch is what we normally see. Here is a variation of that type of signage that was seen on Palm Beach every time Ted Kennedy was staying over…
Trespassers will be violated.
You remember he once celebrated Easter by waking up his son and his nephew for a late night trip to Au Bar.
I don’t remember that but I do know he was a regular at Au Bar and you could generally recognize him by looking for the guy with his pant’s zipper down. Of course Au Bar was a bit notorious. The old Palm Beach women would prowl there looking for young guys, buying them drinks in order to satisfy their own cravings.
Sorry Lawyer there is little comfort in shared misery but some
The sudden dictatorial incarceration of the elderly in nursing homes is an incredible development that was unimaginable a year ago.
and even these cruel and draconian quarantine policies have not “saved” them as the disease has spread though the facilities.
but here we are … and get ready for worse if Trump loses.
hell it may get worse even if he wins; maybe another 4 more years of sabotage and insurrection– but at least we will have a leader for our side, the side of law and order.
there is non way to avoid a fight in life, life is full of struggle. but with a leader we have a chance.
without one, sheep lead to slaughter.
mespo…👍!!
They screwed up their entire diatribe with “Thus, Mr. Barr supports our ongoing, never-ending unconstitutional presidential wars never declared or initiated by Congress: Libya, Somalia, Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.” At that point, they unmasked themselves as fringe activists akin to those who believe (rather, have proof!!) that the Federal government has no authority to invoke an income tax. At least they fell short of saying: “Thus, Mr Barr supports the unproven and unprovable whacko theory that the Earth is round, and should be impeached for blasphemy.” Thank you, Professor Turley, for publishing their letter. Res ipsa loquitur
They have certainly strained out a gnat and swallowed a camel. I imagine Barr is awake at night praying that his fealty to the law doesn’t compel him to file charges of treason against one or more of the pack of liars.
Who are you cunaeus? !!! Just out of the blue you drop into this blog thinking you can do what I do!? STFU. This is my yard and I’m the biggest dog on this property. Beat it you fake sock puppet trolll posing under any number of fake names!! get lost
Time for JT to weigh in, again. You didn’t learn anything the last time, Seth?
Anonymous:
I am Seth. I am Spartacus!
I have read their letter and still agree with Professor Turley. It seems in their analysis the definition of bribery is so inexact it can mean a boss giving job alternatives to an employee in a government position is criminal.
It’s odd these astute historians reference Jefferson multiple times, yet ignore the historical precedent set by all previous AG’s. Every accusation listed against Barr Is subjective at its core.
what is the point of this post? someone disagrees with Turley? uh, ok.
What is the point of your post? Nature hates a vacuum?
Who are you cunaeus?!?! Another sock puppet account from any number of trolls using fake names and thining they can come here and take over my backyard. Get out of here, cunaeus! this is my yard and I don’t take well to crazed idiots like you thinking you know something when you do not. I know everything and I am king of the blog, get it!?
Seth………was naptime cancelled today? Settle down, little tiger.
I am Seth. I am Spartacus!!
A hearty LOL!