This week I published a column on how the Democratic Party seems to have jettisoned many of its defining values to simply become the anti-Trump party. The best example of that transformation is the automatic opposition to Trump’s decision to pull troops out of Syria and other countries. At the same time, liberal media outlets like CNN and MSNBC have been airing continual experts denouncing the “hasty” withdrawal. Now veteran NBC award-winning journalist William Arkin has resigned in protest of what he says is the unrelenting support of the network for endless wars. He notes that the anti-Trump agenda at the network has overwhelmed what used to be critical coverage of “the machine of perpetual war acceptance and conventional wisdom to challenge Hillary Clinton’s hawkishness.” Now the reflective anti-Trump response at the network has overwhelmed all such considerations, according to Arkin. While Arkin calls Trump “an ignorant and incompetent impostor,” he cites the transformation of NBC into an opposition network as the main reason for his departure.
Continue reading ““The Machine of Perpetual War Acceptance”: Veteran NBC Journalist Resigns In Protest Over One-Sided Coverage”
We have previously discussed the shameful and corrupt law in Alabama that allowed sheriffs to personally pocket any money left over from food funds for inmates. It is astonishing to me that the entire legislature was not held responsible and thrown from office for maintaining such a moronic and perverse law. Nevertheless, despite scandals of sheriffs pocketing hundreds of thousands for beach houses and personal windfalls, the legislature ignored national outcry over the law. Now Sheriff Todd Entrekin of Etowah County, Alabama, may have finally gone too far. Not for Alabama, mind you, but the federal government which takes a different view of pilfering the public fisc. Entrekin, who lost his re-election this year after he was found to have pocketed $750,000 allotted for feeding inmates in county lockup and using it for a beach house, is facing new allegations that he took an additional $1.5 millions aside for feeding federal immigration detainees.
Continue reading “Former Alabama Sheriff Who Used Inmate Food Funds To Buy Beach House Now Faces Allegations of Pocketing $1.5 Million In Federal Funds”
As readers know, I totally geek out with NASA missions and this week is no exception. This is the long awaited image of Ultima Thule (“beyond the known world”) and it is provided by the most distant ever exploration of a Solar System object. The previous record was the New Horizons image of Pluto in 2015. Ultima Thule is 1.5 billion km further out. Thought to be the shape of a bowling pin, it turns out to be a 4.5 billion-year old, brick-colored cosmic snowman in the cold of deep space. Closer to home: this week saw China land the first probe on the dark side of the Moon.
Continue reading “Meet Ultima Thule: Cosmic Snowman”
I have long been critical of the attacks of President Donald Trump against critics and the media as unpresidential and inimical to our values. This week has another disturbing example of such personal attacks when Trump responded to criticism by retired Gen. Stanley McChrystal by calling him a “dog” who was fired by President Barack Obama. Being President of the United States will always come with an abundance of critics but the office comes with a modicum of expected restraint and decorum. Calling former generals (or anyone) “dogs” is clearly well below the expectations of most people in the conduct of a president.
Continue reading “Trump Calls Decorated Retired General A “Dog” After Criticism Of His Decisions”
Amy Siskind, founder of the feminist nonprofit The New Agenda, shocked many people in stating that she would never support any white male in the Democratic primary. Period. Does not matter what they have accomplished or what they want to accomplished. Does not matter if they are the most qualified for the White House. Siskind simply intended to vote on race and gender, but apparently does not like being called a sexist or racist. When political talk show host and Boston College professor David Pakman made the obvious objection to her tweet in a video entitled “Racism & Sexism Exist On The Left, Too“, he says that she not only blocked him on Twitter but allegedly complained to Boston College to jeopardize his adjunct position.
Continue reading “Feminist Activist Posts Sexist Tweet . . . Then Allegedly Retaliated Against Boston College Adjunct Professor Who Objected”
Below is my column in The Hill newspaper on the evolution of the Democratic Party under the Trump Administration.
Here is the column:
Continue reading “The Anti-Trump Party: How The Democratic Party Has Lost Its Defining Values In The Obsession With Trump”
Tonight we rang in 2019 at home in McLean, Virginia. New Year’s eve is also my wedding anniversary. Twenty-one years ago, Leslie and I eloped in Old Town Alexandria after dating eight years. Once again, we will celebrate two anniversary dates. I count the anniversary as our 29th while Leslie insists on counting this year as our 21st anniversary. We will toast our anniversary and the New Year (as we did 20 years ago) with a bottle of Schramsburg Cremant.
Continue reading “HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!”
Happy New Year to all of our blog community from around the world. As has been our tradition on this blog, with the start of 2019, I thought I would wanted to share our annual “State of The Blog” statistics. It has been a great year for the blog with the highest traffic in years with another expansion of roughly 20 percent. We also have an increasingly large international contingent of readers and commenters. We are approaching 36 million views and remain one of the largest legal blogs in the world.
Continue reading “STATE OF THE BLOG (2018)”
Below is my column in The Hill newspaper on the recent admissions of Christopher Steele, the author the controversial dossier used as part of the basis for the secret surveillance conducted on Trump associates by the Obama Administration.
Here is the column:
Continue reading “The Steele Dossier and the Perils of Political Insurance”By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
Yesterday brought us in my view a greatly significant event–the Ebril, Iraq book launch of George Orwell’s Animal Farm, translated into the Kurdish Language.
The book was formerly banned under the Saddam Hussein regime; rather obviously for its negative portrayal of how a dictatorship can emerge in a nation or community. Coupled with the dark history that for decades nations such as Turkey proscribed the Kurdish language, the fact that such a work can be sold publicly shows the remarkable transformation that has taken place in the former dictatorship.
Continue reading “Significance of Kurdish Writer’s Translation of Orwell’s Animal Farm Cannot Be Overstated”By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
As part of a series of articles regarding censorship by the crowd-funding service Patreon, I now pose the question of whether Patreon, as based upon its current actions and policy, would censor and ban great historical figures such as Aristotle, Jacob Riis, and numerous other contributors to the betterment of the human condition. The men and women of those times certainly did not subscribe to the ideas of 21st century political correctness and were the products of their own times, but since Patreon through its actions seems to conflate the idea of these people as a brand, where an arbitrary set of ideas about the author dictates the value of the content of their ideas or speech. It seems most likely these figures would not have been granted a voice had Patreon been the gatekeeper to their ideas.
What contributions to history might have been lost had the mindset such as that engendered today by Patreon prevailed?
Continue reading “Patreon: A Threat to Free Speech Part 3: Would Patreon Censor & Ban Aristotle?”
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
I have noted over the years a trend to punish victims of crime. Yes, victims of crime. Punishment of property owners who’s buildings are tagged with graffiti, people who have had firearms stolen and then they were used in crimes, and now it is shopping carts stolen from retailers that have led to the City of Federal Way, Washington to pass an ordinance punishing the victims, the store owners, for having their shopping carts stolen.
While there does exist some limited case law in that a victim cannot be a suspect concurrently, ordinances such as this lead me to believe that the legislature should establish laws mandating that crime victims have a right not to be prosecuted as a result of being crime victims.
Continue reading “City’s Shopping Cart Ordinance and the Punishment of Crime Victims”
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
As part of a series of articles to be published on how I believe the crowd-funding source Patreon and its current practices represent a threat to free speech we look at insights reported by several current and former patrons and content creators. The conclusion I cannot help but arrive at is that the individual, as evidenced by Patreon’s words, represents a “brand” where choices made outside the scope of content posted to Patreon can be used against the user, resulting in their livelihood earned from income being revoked without notice. In other words, if the company does not like you as a person, they can remove your income. The restraint of this form of “depersoning” is just another example of how Americans are steadily losing their hard-won free speech rights.
Sen. Ben Sasse, R.-Neb., has demanded an investigation into the sweetheart deal given to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein who was notorious for his infamous “Lolita Express” where he took friends like Bill Clinton by plane to his private estate on the Caribbean island of Little Saint James with young girls who allegedly were used as prostitutes. Epstein was known for his preference for young women and powerful figures like Clinton were repeat guests.
Chicago attorney Jerald Jeske, 51, believed that his wife loved her two Chihuahuas more than she loved him. One could certainly understand why she would feel that way after he then proceeded to throw both dogs off their balcony. According to WGN-TV in Chicago reported, one was killed and one survived long enough to run off (and has not been found).
Continue reading ““You Love Those Dogs More Than You Love Me”: Chicago Attorney Arrested After Throwing Wife’s Dogs Off Balcony”