We previously discussed the accident involving an off-duty FBI agent whose service weapon fell out while doing a back flip on a dance floor in Denver. Chase Bishop has now charged with assault. The charge is problematic in my view. I have been a long critic of the criminalization of negligence and civil violations for years. This seems like a clear case of negligence that could be properly handled in a torts action and internal disciplinary actions at the FBI. Continue reading
There has been a rising movement in colleges and universities led by professors who are advocating speech regulation and contesting basic values of free speech. The anti-free speech movement takes many forms. I previously voiced my objections to Antifa and its anti-free speech values, including academics legitimizing efforts to violently curtail free speech on our campuses. One of the most recent examples is the writing of University of Tennessee sociology Professor Victor Ray who explained in a column in Inside Higher Ed that diversity of thought is something of a trap and is in reality “a Trojan horse for white identity politics.” Continue reading
Douglas Kelly, 49, can rest assured that he was not ripped off. Kelly was convinced that a dealer had sold him fake drugs so he went to police to bring charges. He gave the police a bag of meth that he said did not feel right. The police tested the meth and found it was genuine . . . and then arrested Kelly.
Much of the impetus for the current Special Counsel investigation can be attributed to two equally disastrous decisions: the decision to fire FBI Director James Comey in the midst of the Russian Investigation and the meeting of Donald Trump Jr. with Russians promising dirt on Hillary Clinton. While I continue to doubt that the meeting (or the later misleading statement issued by Trump Jr.) constituted any type of crime, I have previously written that it was an astonishingly dumb decision to go (with both Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort) to this meeting. I have little doubt that the Clintons would have eagerly accepted the same information, but they would have used surrogates as they did with the Steele dossier. Now Trump Jr. is dismissing the very idea that his father would sit down with Mueller. While this is certainly a good-faith disagreement among lawyers, Trump Jr. is wrong again about a meeting. There are perfectly good reasons for his father to go to such a meeting and interview, but it should have been done months ago as I previously discussed. Continue reading
It appears that things got ugly in a recent meeting between Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and House oversight staff. Rosenstein reportedly threatened to “subpoena” House committee members if they went after him with a contempt sanction for failing to turn over material on the FBI’s investigation of Trump campaign officials. If the account is true, it was a mistake by Rosenstein. To quote The Godfather, oversight is not personal, its oversight business. Continue reading
It may be the ultimate expression of our overheated politics. Longtime DNC member Bob Mulholland accused a Sanders supporter of being a possible Russian stooge after she attended a meeting of the Democratic National Committee to discuss rules and bylaws. It appears that anyone can now be denounced as Russian collaborators in an environment that is increasingly picking up McCarthyite elements. The bizarre allegation from Mulholland comes after the DNC moved to effectively block Sanders from the next presidential primary unless he registers as a Democrat. The effort was later abandoned, but left bad memories of the last primary where the DNC was shown to have secretly rigged the process for Hillary Clinton.
I periodically post old mugshots which offer a gritty insight into criminal history. The West Midlands Police just released some gems from their archives including what is believed to be the oldest mugshot in British history. That distinction rests with Isaac Ellery who was convicted in March 1853 and sentenced to seven years transportation for stealing four ‘gig’ cushions.
