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2016

The FBI’s Public Commentary on the Clinton Investigation By Andrew C. McCarthy

I have never been a fan of the notion – at the Justice Department, it is the received wisdom – that the election calendar should factor into criminal investigations.

Law-enforcement people will tell you that taking action too close to Election Day can affect the outcome of the vote; therefore, it should not be done because law enforcement is supposed to be apolitical. But of course, not taking action one would take but for the political timing is as political as it gets. To my mind, it is more political because the negatively affected candidate is denied any opportunity to rebut the law-enforcement action publicly.

The unavoidable fact of the matter is that, through no fault of law enforcement, investigations of political corruption are inherently political. Thus, I’ve always thought the best thing to do is bring the case when it’s ready, don’t bring it if it’s not ready, and don’t worry about the calendar any more than is required by the principle of avoiding the appearance of impropriety.

A problem arises, however, when you start bending other rules. FBI Director James Comey bent a few of them when he decided to (a) make a public recommendation against prosecution, (b) nevertheless make a public disclosure of the evidence amassed by the FBI, and (c) include a public announcement that the investigation was closed.

All of this is highly irregular. Director Comey says he is “a big fan of transparency,” and aren’t we all? But transparency is like virtually everything else we applaud: it is not an absolute value; it has its place and its limitations.

Criminal investigations are not supposed to be transparent. There are very good reasons why, for example, grand jury proceedings are secret. They are the same good reasons why the FBI generally protects the identity of sources of information. If people come to believe their cooperation with law enforcement is inevitably going to result in the publicizing of their communications with agents or their testimony in the grand jury – even if there is no indictment or trial – then they are going to be considerably less cooperative.

That would significantly harm the mission of law enforcement. That, in turn, would badly damage the rule of law.

The Latest Shameful Accusation Against Justice Thomas A liberal Democrat has accused Thomas of groping her at a dinner party in the ’90s. The story is in no way credible. By Carrie Severino

On Thursday, National Law Journal’s Marcia Coyle reported that Alaska lawyer Moira Smith recently claimed on Facebook that nearly 20 years ago, in 1999, Justice Clarence Thomas touched her buttocks at a dinner party. To say that Smith’s account raises questions about its accuracy is an understatement; the story was obviously fabricated.

Smith has produced no witnesses for the alleged incident, so Coyle ran with Smith’s version. As Smith tells it, she was helping to set the table at the small dinner party, hosted by the head of a legal scholarship program to which she belonged, and ended up standing next to Justice Thomas, who was mysteriously seated alone at the table before dinner while the other guests mingled elsewhere. At that point, Smith alleges, Justice Thomas squeezed her buttocks several times and suggested she sit next to him.

Since Smith had no witnesses, she helped Coyle track down several of her roommates from that period whom she claims to have told about the incident shortly after it happened. Those roommates have varying levels of recollection that seem to correlate pretty strongly with their level of involvement with liberal political causes.

Laura Fink, the most outspoken of the roommates, is the liberal co-founder of a California political-consulting firm connected to the Clintons and the SEIU. A second housemate remembers a discussion but has a “fuzzy” memory of the details, and a third had nothing but vague memories and wouldn’t let Coyle publish his or her name. The only other source to go on the record was Smith’s ex-husband, Paul Bodnar, a former senior director for energy and climate change in the Obama administration’s National Security Council.

Smith herself has been closely associated with partisan causes for more than two decades, including working for a Democratic state legislator, giving money to Senator Mark Begich (D., Alaska), and serving as national committeewoman for the Young Democrats of Alaska. Smith’s current husband, Jake Metcalfe, was chairman of the Alaska Democratic Party until he stepped down to run for Congress. He withdrew from that race during the primary after his campaign was revealed to be responsible for several fake websites attacking one of his rivals. Metcalfe has worked for unions, too, including the Alaska affiliate of the public-sector employee union AFSCME.

Comey’s Mess By Jonathan F. Keiler

FBI director James Comey really stepped in it. He should have known that cleaning up one of Hillary Clinton’s messes would be just like wiping that proverbial dog poop off your shoe. You think you’ve got it, but there is always some left over in the tread that you track into the house. The wife yells, and then you’re on your hands and knees with the carpet cleaner while your oversized Rottweiler puppy tries to eat the filthy rag. Welcome to my life…but I digress.

Over a long career, Comey carefully cultivated a reputation for smarts and probity. Perhaps it was truly earned, more likely the result of basic competence combined with clever politicking and strategic sycophancy. Either way, it earned him his current job and, as standing in D.C. goes, an enviable combination of power and respect on both sides of the aisle.

Comey was no stranger to Hillary’s machinations. He was part of the team that investigated Whitewater only to recommend that no charges be filed. Confronted with Hillary Clinton’s email corruption, Comey tried to be too clever by half. He accompanied his legally and bureaucratically inappropriate exoneration of Clinton in July with a public tongue-lashing intended to preserve his Boy Scout image while letting Clinton, himself, and his agency off a sharp political hook. He rather spectacularly failed.

Comey’s letter to the Senate last Friday announcing that the FBI was reopening the email investigation that he closed so confidently in July has placed the nation into a constitutional crisis regardless of what the emails actually say, or the outcome of any further investigation or criminal proceedings. The mere fact that FBI agents found problematic emails on at least one computer owned by Huma Abedin (Hillary’s closest aide) and her estranged pederast husband, former Democrat New York congressman Anthony Weiner, after voting in the election has begun, ensures that regardless of outcome, the result will not be accepted as legitimate by a significant portion of the American public.

The political and media hyperventilation over Donald Trump’s refusal to commit to accepting the November result now appears doubly hypocritical and misplaced. Hillary and her allies are already lambasting Comey – their erstwhile former hero – for inserting himself into the race less than two weeks before Election Day. Are Hillary and her supporters now prepared to accept the election result if Trump pulls out a come-from-behind win thanks in part to public misgivings over the renewed investigation? And should Hillary win, it goes without saying that Trump and Republicans in general will have legitimate reasons to question a result that makes a person under active criminal investigation President-Elect.

How Voting Really Works: An Eyewitness Account By Susan Stanton

Obviously, this election cycle has evolved into a circus of corruption. The mud-slinging is interminable, filled with duck and run operations, outright fraud, and lawlessness. In a little over a week, by hook or crook, we will know the winner of the presidential election. The question is, will it be fair, or is the voting rigged? In the State of Washington, it is hard to tell. There are so many avenues for potential dishonesty.

This week, I took the time to personally carry my “mail-in ballot” to the local voting office in King County, Washington. The state instituted its slick new balloting system several years ago. However, the way they handle ballots is extraordinarily disturbing. Here’s what happened.

Entering the building, my husband and I were met by a cadre of temporary employees steering citizens to various areas. The woman who approached me appeared stern, as if I wasn’t supposed to be there, and asked what my business was. I replied, “I would like to hand-deliver my ballot to the election office.” Her response was, “Oh, that’s unnecessary. All you have to do is drop it in the repository in the parking lot.”

Aware of this practice, I balked.

A large steel box has been placed at the end of the parking area (over 50 yards from the front door), abutting the freeway, near a far corner of the building. Guiding me to the window, she pointed out a large white and blue steel container with a slot in it, somewhat like an oversized U.S. Postal Service mailbox. I turned to her and said, very patiently, “No…I want to hand-deliver it to an election official. I am not comfortable with drive-by voting.”

She banally replied, “But that’s the way we are set up to collect ballots.”

France: Muezzins, not Church Bells by Giulio Meotti

French Catholicism is now witnessing a tragic decline, caught between two fires: state secularism and political Islam.

Le Figaro wondered if Islam can already be considered “France’s prime religion”.

Muslim countries are generously funding France’s mosques, covering an average of 50% of total costs.

“Avignon is no longer the city of the Popes, but of the Salafis. … They [Muslim extremists] urge us to rewrite the history of France in the light of the ‘contribution of the Islamic civilization'” — Philippe De Villiers, author of Will the Church Bells Ring Tomorrow?

The trend indicates that in France, there are currently three young practicing Muslims for every young practicing Catholic.

“It is conceivable that Islam is overtaking Catholicism”. — Osservatore Romano, the Vatican official daily newspaper.

A new book is shaking France. Les cloches sonneront-elles encore demain? (“Will the Church Bells Ring Tomorrow?”), by Philippe de Villiers, is shattering the nation. France, the “eldest daughter” of the Catholic Church, is instead turning into “the eldest daughter of Islam”. “With arrogance, they [Muslim extremists] urge us to rewrite the history of France in the light of the ‘contribution of the Islamic civilization'”, de Villiers states.

De Villiers points out that:

“France has experienced many misfortunes in its history. But for the first time, it must face the fear of disappearing. In France, there are two groups: a new people who move with pride and an exhausted people, who are not even aware of the conditions needed for their own survival”.

De Villiers paints a grim picture of French Catholicism: “Avignon is no longer the city of the Popes, but of the Salafis”. In Saint-Denis, where the French kings and Charles Martel are buried, “tunics and beards now dominate, and girls are dressed in the Islamic shrouds”. If a parish is still alive there, it is thanks to the zeal of the Christian community of Africans and Tamils. “The Kings’ cemetery is just one enclave. It belongs to a story that does not count anymore”.

The bell towers of the churches in de Villiers’ book are already growing silent in Boissettes (Seine-et-Marne), and on the outskirts of Metz, where the bells of the church of Sainte Ruffine have been forced by the state secularist authorities to keep silent. It happened in the Breton village of Hédé-Bazouges, where silence is filled by the sound of what de Villiers calls “the clergy in the djellaba” [outer robe worn by North Africans] — the muezzin’s call to prayer. It is happening everywhere in France.

Mockeries of Justice in Denmark by Judith Bergman

An appeal would have sent a signal to potential terrorists that Danish authorities look sternly upon logistical assistance to terrorists, and will do everything in their power to pursue justice.

The only one at risk of actual harm is Lars Hedegaard himself: his attempted murderer remains at large. “I have resorted to making the suspected assassin’s name as well-known as possible in self-defense.”

It is deeply disturbing, not only for the victims, but for all citizens, when the courts so clearly divorce themselves from pursuing what most citizens would perceive as justice, and instead appear to favor those who seek to harm society.

Refusing to implicate Omar El-Hussein’s friends in his terrorism, despite their obvious contributions to his terror deeds, and fining the victim of a terrorist attack for publicly naming his would-be murderer, who escaped justice by fleeing the country, inevitably appears like a mockery of justice, not its fulfillment.

If the legal system in Denmark is anything to go by, being an accessory to murder is just fine. Attackers are protected to the hilt; their victims are left unprotected and fined.

In February 2015, the terrorist Omar El-Hussein murdered Danish film director Finn Nørgaard in front of café Krudttønden in Copenhagen. Later that night, he killed a Jewish guard in front of the Copenhagen synagogue. Danish police shot and killed El-Hussein during the subsequent manhunt.

Four men assisted El-Hussein after he killed the film director: They helped him get rid of the murder weapon, gave him fresh clothes and bought him a new bag, which he used to store the gun used to kill the Jewish guard. They also met with him several times in different places around Copenhagen in the five hours leading up to the murder of the Jewish guard. One of those places was an internet café, where El-Hussein googled for information about the synagogue. The four men were charged with complicity in the terrorist act against the synagogue.

At the end of September, the Danish District Court acquitted all four of the terrorism charge. The district court found no evidence that the men knew of El-Hussein’s plans to attack the synagogue, when they met with him after his attack at Krudttønden. Instead, the four men were convicted of minor charges, such as threats and violence against prison staff, weapons possession in particularly aggravating circumstances, and possession of illegal ammunition. Three of the men were free to go after the sentencing, as their 18 months in custody meant that they had already served their sentences, which were sixty days, six months, two and a half years and three years respectively. One of the four men has already declared his intention to sue the Danish state for damages amounting to 1 million Danish kroner (USD $150,000) for the 18 months he spent in custody. The prosecution has decided that it will not appeal the verdict, which is therefore final.

Comey Announcement Only the Latest October Surprise FBI director’s revelation about Clinton emails may or may not affect election; earlier cases weren’t clear-cut By Daniel Nasaw

FBI Director James Comey’s revelation on Friday that the bureau was reviewing new evidence related to a previously completed investigation of Hillary Clinton’s email practices roiled the presidential race just 11 days before Election Day. It also provided the latest chapter in a long history of October Surprises.

Republicans seized on Mr. Comey’s notification to Congress to attempt to reinvigorate Donald Trump’s campaign, while Mrs. Clinton and other Democrats challenged the Federal Bureau of Investigation to release the pertinent evidence promptly.

The October Surprise has been a staple of American politics for decades. The phrase refers to an 11th-hour revelation or turn of events that, whether intentionally or not, has the potential to shift the direction of the presidential race. Sometimes October Surprises appear to have altered the course of a campaign, sometimes not.

Here are notable examples:
1972

In October 1972, Richard Nixon was coasting to re-election against Democratic South Dakota Sen. George McGovern; polling showed him leading by as much as 26 points that month.

Though his campaign seemed little in need of a late boost, on Oct. 26, Nixon’s national security adviser Henry Kissinger declared “peace is at hand” in Vietnam, and that a final cease-fire agreement with the North Vietnamese communists could be reached within days.

Rather than applaud the Nixon administration, Mr. McGovern credited the anti-war movement for the development. He questioned why it had taken Nixon four years to “put an end to this tragic war” and declined to speculate on the effect on his chances at winning the election.

Mr. Nixon won re-election in one of the most lopsided landslides in U.S. history. And peace wasn’t, in fact, at hand. The war continued another 2½ years, ending with the fall of Saigon, now known as Ho Chi Minh City, in April 1975.
1980

The release of U.S. hostages in Iran was the October Surprise that never surprised.

In November 1979, Iranian student activists stormed the U.S. embassy in Tehran and took 52 Americans hostage. The Americans were still held a year later. In the thick of President Jimmy Carter’s re-election campaign against former California Gov. Ronald Reagan, Mr. Reagan warned repeatedly that Mr. Carter would unveil an “October Surprise” to turn the election around at the last minute, possibly securing the release of some or all of the hostages.

“Presidents can make things happen, you know,” Mr. Reagan said in a Florida television interview on Oct. 10. In an interview with the Associated Press earlier that month, he said he was “bracing myself for an October Surprise,” noting the Iranians “are not exactly supporters of mine.”

Ultimately, the hostages weren’t freed before the election. Mr. Reagan won a resounding victory—and the hostages were released the day he was sworn into office.
CONTINUE AT SITE

Indian shooter Heena Sidhu refuses to wear ‘hijab’, pulls out of Asian shooting championship in Iran

Ace shooter Heena Sidhu has pulled out of the Asian Airgun Shooting Championship to be held in Tehran in December this year.

Heena, the reigning title holder, has withdrawn her name because of Iran’s insistence on female contestants adhering to the dress code which makes wearing of ‘hijab’ mandatory for women participants.

“Forcing tourists or foreign guests to wear ‘hijab’ is against the spirit of the game. Since I don’t like it, I have withdrawn my name,” Heena Sidhu told Times of India.

“You follow your religion and let me follow mine. I’ll not participate in this competition if you are going to force me to comply with your religious beliefs,” she added.

The organisers have made it clear on their official website that the female contestants will have to wear clothes in compliance with the rules of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

It’s not for the first time that Heena has withdrawn her name from a tournament being held in Iran.
“Yes, I have done it earlier as well. Two years back, I had decided not to go to Iran for the same reasons. It’s only Iran which insists on such a code. It does not happen in other nations,” Heena said.

Meanwhile, the President of Rifle Association Rajendra Singh has said that Indian shooters have always respected the Iranian traditions.

“We have good relations with Iranian shooting federation and we respect their culture and tradition. All females, including tourists and diplomats, wear hijab when they visit Iran. All other Indian female shooters, except Heena, have accepted the decision,” Rajendra Singh told TOI.

TOM GROSS: ON ANTISEMITISM IN ENGLAND AND FRANCE

https://www.facebook.com/TomGrossMediaBRITISH POLITICIAN SUSPENDED BY PARTY AFTER JEWS BLAMED FOR THE HOLOCAUST IN PARLIAMENT

Baroness Jenny Tonge, a former medical doctor and formerly a trustee of the charity Christian Aid, who was made a baroness and appointed to the British House of Lords by the center-left British Liberal Democratic Party leader even after she had made many other anti-Semitic comments, some under the cloak of “anti-Zionism”, has finally been suspended by the party. This follows remarks at an event she organized and chaired in the House of Lords on Wednesday in which Jews were blamed for the Holocaust and Israel was compared to Islamic State.

“The meeting hosted on Wednesday by Baroness Tonge in the House of Lords, a former Liberal Democrat MP, provoked concern about the level of anti-Semitic discourse entering mainstream British politics,” The Times of London reported.

An audience member (believed to be from the ultra-orthodox self-hating Jewish sect Neturei Karta admired by Baroness Tonge) was applauded after he said at the meeting that Hitler only decided to kill the Jews after he was provoked by anti-German protests led by a rabbi in Manhattan. The speaker claimed that Rabbi Stephen Wise, whom he described as a heretic, said in 1905 that there were “six million bleeding and suffering reasons to justify Zionism”. He urged the audience to note the number.

This quotation is one of many fabricated or totally out of context remarks regularly used by Holocaust deniers to suggest that the figure of six million Jews later killed by the Nazis was a myth.

Another audience member suggested that the “Zionist movement” had power over the British parliament comparable to the power wielded internationally by Jews described in the [infamous Tsarist forgery beloved by Hitler] the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.

Another audience member was applauded after saying: “If anybody is anti-Semitic, it’s Israelis themselves.”

Lady Tonge made no attempt to challenge the provocative comments.

Lady Tonge, who had already resigned the Lib Dem whip in 2012 after claiming that the state of Israel was “not going to be there for ever”, resigned from the party on Thursday following her suspension from the Lib Dems.

THE BALFOUR DECLARATION- 100 YEARS LATER: BENNY BEGIN

“A hundred years later, and despite everything, the national home of the Jewish people is growing, rising and prospering in the land of Israel. And so it shall be.”

Next week will mark the beginning of the 100th year since the Balfour Declaration. On Friday, Nov. 2, 1917, British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour announced in a short letter to Lord Lionel Walter Rothschild that “His Majesty’s Government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.”

Five years later, the Balfour Declaration was included in the League of Nations resolution to mandate Palestine to the British government, and another sentence was added to it: “Whereas recognition has been given to the historical connection of the Jewish people with Palestine and to the grounds for reconstituting their national home in that country.” Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann, who, with the assistance of his colleague Nahum Sokolow, worked persistently and wisely on behalf of the World Zionist Organization to obtain the documents, aspired to a clearer commitment, but the modest version was still an important tier in building the State of Israel.

Arab leaders in Palestine opposed the Balfour Declaration as soon as it was made public. They protested the use of the terms “the Jewish people” and “national home” as well as the reference to the Arabs as one of the “communities” with civil and religious — but not national — rights. It is for these reasons that the Palestine Liberation Organization determined in article 18 of its 1964 charter, three years prior to “the occupation,” that “the Balfour Declaration, the Mandate system and all that has been based upon them are considered fraud.” In keeping with his organization’s charter, PLO Chairman Mahmoud Abbas recently stated at the United Nations General Assembly (Sept. 21, 2016): “One hundred years have passed since the notorious Balfour Declaration, by which Britain gave, without any right, authority or consent from anyone, the land of Palestine to another people. This paved the road for the Nakba of Palestinian people and their dispossession and displacement from their land.”

In the same speech, Abbas also demanded that Britain apologize to the Palestinians “for the catastrophes, miseries and injustices that it created” as a result of the Balfour Declaration. Two months earlier (July 25, 2016), Abbas, in a speech read at the summit of the Arab League, asked the secretariat-general of the Arab League to support him “in preparing a legal portfolio in order to file a lawsuit against the British government for issuing the Balfour Declaration and for subsequently implementing it in its capacity as a Mandate authority.”