RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2019/06/24/against-the-democrats-court-packing-scheme/

A terrible idea is getting new support

No bad idea is ever truly dead. The latest to rise from the crypt is Court-packing: expanding the size of the Supreme Court to pack it with justices who can outvote the current majority. Progressive activist groups — including one, bluntly titled “Pack the Court,” that boasts it will spend millions in 2020 — have formed to push the idea. Prominently on board are Hillary Clinton’s former press secretary and Harvard law professors Laurence Tribe and Mark Tushnet. Democratic presidential contenders noticed. Pete Buttigieg first attracted national attention when he pushed Court-packing, and he has since rolled out a complex plan, to create a 15-member Supreme Court, that NBC News described as “front-and-center of his campaign.” Several rivals followed suit, including Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, Beto O’Rourke, and Kirsten Gillibrand.

Court-packing is a Rubicon we should dread to cross. It last appeared on the national agenda in 1937, the high-water mark of one-party federal government at home and ideological authoritarianism around the globe. Even then, it was roundly rejected by the American body politic. In one swoop, it would irreparably destroy the American tradition of judicial independence of the political branches. In short order, this would end the American experiment of the rule of law and a government of separated and limited powers.

The Supreme Court has always been political in various ways, but at a remove from direct control by politicians. Life tenure, rare vacancies, justices long outlasting the elected terms of the people who appoint them — these things sustain the Court as a separate branch. Allowing the Court to be swamped with new appointees whenever the president wants new precedents is something we recognize as a banana-republic tactic when we see it in other countries. Our own system, strong and durable as it has proven, is not immune. Court-packing would set off an unstoppable dynamic of reciprocal escalations. Even Bernie Sanders has criticized the proposal on the grounds that Republicans would retaliate in kind and the Court would be destroyed in the process. We’ve had cries of wolf before about threats to judicial independence and the rule of law. But to quote Justice Scalia, this wolf comes as a wolf.

https://thefederalist.com/2019/06/12/forum-reflects-rising-concerns-jews-across-world/

A shift in tone at the 2019 AJC Global Forum seems to be a sign of these trying political times and the recent spike in anti-Semitism.

What does it look like when our vulgar and polarized political era collides with one of American Jews’ oldest and most genteel organizations? Rather like the 2019 American Jewish Committee (AJC) Global Forum.

Last week, nearly 2,500 people representing the United States and 50 other nations gathered in Washington D.C. for the organization’s annual conference. Myriad speakers addressed issues concerning Jews across the world, reflecting AJC’s global advocacy efforts.

Those concerns, which recurred across three days of speakers, panels, and videos, included such weighty issues as the resurgence of anti-Semitism in the United States and Europe, hyper-partisanship in our politics, concerns about the misrepresentation of Jews and other minorities, a defense of values including civility, an affirmation of a community of conscience, and a discussion of whether American global leadership is in decline.

As is typical of these annual conferences, there was a star-studded lineup of speakers. However, as AJC CEO David Harris noted in his call to action this year, organizers focused more than usual on capturing the zeitgeist. So, while the conference included AJC’s hallmark bipartisanship (among speakers) and brainy bent, the event had a different feel this year.

Changing Times

For example, when Jason Isaacson, AJC’s chief policy and political affairs officer, introduced Neera Tanden and Michael Anton’s debate over whether American global leadership is in decline, Isaacson felt compelled to remind the crowd that booing would not be tolerated. I didn’t hear any booing, but having attended multiple such gatherings since 2001, I also don’t recall ever hearing such a warning before. It’s clearly a sign of the times.

Another striking change appeared in the ongoing conversation over resurgent anti-Semitism. A panel on this subject was introduced by a video that led with American examples, including assaults in Brooklyn, as well as the deadly attacks in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Poway, California. AJC has been warning about this resurgence for nearly 20 years. However, even a year ago, this video and the ensuing discussion would have been laser-focused on Europe. No more.

https://www.city-journal.org/california-progressive-policies-hurt-working-and-middle-class

The recent California Democratic Party convention in San Francisco exposed the divide between the state’s progressive and working-class voters. Progressives, in their militant certitude, support left-wing policies that often don’t affect them; it’s the working class that suffers the consequences of these proposals. But the Green New Deal, widely embraced by party leaders, pushed too far, triggering a backlash at the convention. The state’s private-sector labor unions, notably the building trades, organized a “Blue Collar Revolution” protest against the Democrats’ climate legislation.

The Democrats are calling for the elimination of fossil fuels by 2030, which would result in California’s immiseration, especially for workers in the state’s energy-production sector, the nation’s fourth-largest. In 2012, the oil and gas industry employed over 400,000 Californians, but these workers—unionized and well-paid—can expect pink slips with the green package. California’s renewable mandates also threaten the building-trades unions, which count 400,000 members statewide—a sizable contingent, though considerably below the industry’s 2007 numbers.

While new wealth drives demand for expensive housing, building restrictions that stymie expansion into suburbia limit the sector’s growth. Not long ago, building-trade union members were considered part of California’s aristocracy, but they can no longer afford median-priced homes in any of the state’s urban counties. Residential sales have dropped statewide, and California’s rate of new housing permits has fallen behind the national average, making construction workers’ economic prospects even dimmer. And the manufacturing sector has stagnated—this despite a 4 percent national expansion, along with 5 percent and 14 percent growth in neighboring Arizona and Nevada.

https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2019/06/10/it_started_with_a_lie_bruce_ohrs_linchpin_role_in_russiagate.html

Associate Deputy Attorney General Bruce Ohr was perfectly positioned to advance the Russia collusion narrative. He had a rare set of relationships — ties to opposition researchers and the FBI — and would use his links to both in 2016 to connect federal law enforcement to those advancing Trump-Russia conspiracy theories.

A mystery remains: To some in his narrow circle, Ohr was upfront about the compromising nature of his connections, yet he hid that fact from officials charged with overseeing ethics at the Justice Department. Why, then, did Bruce Ohr admit to the FBI that his wife worked for opposition researchers Fusion GPS while failing to disclose it to the DoJ? The answer speaks volumes not just about how the Trump-Russia affair gained traction but about the way Washington works.

Christopher Steele: “Love and Best Wishes to you, Nellie and all the family,” he wrote to Bruce Ohr (top photo).
Orbis Business Intelligence Ltd.

Ohr has since confirmed to Congress who the conspiracy theorists were: “Chris Steele, as I understand it, was hired by Fusion GPS to do research or gather information. He provided information to me,” Ohr has testified. “Glenn Simpson, who is, as I understand it, a principal of Fusion GPS, on a couple of occasions, he provided information to me. And on one occasion my wife, who was a contractor with Fusion GPS, provided some information to me.”

The average opposition researcher would be hard-pressed to get the attention of an associate deputy attorney general, let alone his cooperation. But the Fusion GPS crowd had the right connections. Steele and Ohr are close enough that Steele could sign an email to his old friend with “Love and Best Wishes to you, Nellie and all the family.” Simpson is an acquaintance of long standing. Nellie is, well, Ohr’s wife.

Fusion GPS didn’t just get Bruce Ohr’s valuable attention, the firm used it to make an ask. Nellie Ohr acknowledged in her own congressional interview what Fusion GPS had in mind when Steele invited her and her husband to breakfast at the Mayflower Hotel on July 30, 2016. “Chris Steele was hoping that Bruce would put in a word with the FBI to follow up on the information in some way.” He did just that.