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Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on August 12, 2014 8 Comments
Lois Lowry's well-loved classic, The Giver, hits the silver screen Friday, August 15. Well produced, beautifully filmed, and featuring big name celebrities like Meryl Streep, Jeff Bridges, Taylor Swift, and Katie Holmes, the cinematic adaptation of The Giver has created a buzz in the conservative community, but does it live up to the hype? I cringed when I heard the conservative community touting The Giver as a great film. I read the book in grade school, loved it, and naturally assumed the desperation for an ideologically friendly film would've produced the epic suckage we've come to see in releases like Atlas Shrugged. I figured rather than making a movie that subtly blended favorable ideological tones with great story telling, we were getting yet another awful conservative film; one so hell bent on brow beating conservatism, it sucked the joy right off the screen. I was very wrong. Set in a community genetically and physically designed to achieve absolute equality, the film opens with three teenagers preparing for their assignment day. "From great suffering came a solution, communities," Meryl Streep's character explains. Everyone in the community is assigned family units, clothes, jobs, and pretty much everything else that could possibly be assigned. Designed to be devoid of almost all emotion, the entire community merely exists. There is no love, no human connection, no pain, no living. Sameness was meant to protect humanity from pain, jealousy, envy, greed, the unexpected, and everything that ails the human condition. As events unfold, it's evident that despite their best intentions, the desire for sameness comes with calamitous consequences.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on August 12, 2014 25 Comments
We mentioned earlier today, in our post about the federal court suit by Brett Kimberlin, that some bloggers also were subject to suit in a state court case as to which the trial was ongoing. Dave Weigel from Slate.com was at the trial, and just tweeted: Robert Stacy McCain and Ali Akbar react:

Posted by New Neo on August 12, 2014 20 Comments

Suicides, whether famous or not, leave behind a legacy of pain for their families and friends....

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Posted by William A. Jacobson on August 12, 2014 8 Comments
Some of you may be aware that Brett Kimberlin has sued numerous conservative bloggers and media figures (Michelle Malkin, Twitchy, Glenn Beck, Redstate, etc.) alleging, to the extent it can be discerned, a wide range of purported violations, including, incredibly, violation of the Ku Klux Clan Act and the RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) Act, as well as a variety of other conspiracy and defamation related claims It all relates to criticism of Kimberlin and exposure of his criminal record and other legal problems he has had over the decades, and reporting on the issue of "swatting" (falsely calling in a report of someone with a gun at a location to get the police Swat Team to arrive, guns drawn.) Two of the defendants are Patrick Frey (of Patterico) and Mandy Nagy -- yes our Mandy Nagy -- unrelated to her work for Legal Insurrection. The case is filed in federal Court in Maryland, and has had a bizarrely active and unproductive docket, with over 180 entries to date, many of which were precipitated by Kimberlin's serial filing and requests for permission to file, amended complaints. Kimberlin now is on his 2nd, and according to the Court, final, Amended Complaint. Many defendants have moved to dismiss, and now so too have Patrick and Mandy, jointly represented by Ron Coleman (who also represents Legal Insurrection when needed, which fortunately is rarely). Ron is a great friend to bloggers. My take? Having read through the various complaints, including the latest, I'm wondering how in the world the case could survive. But I've learned not to bet on court cases, we can only hope that justice is done, and promptly. There's also a separate trial underway in a different state court case involving some but not all of the same defendants (Frey and Nagy are not part of that). Dave Weigel is attending the trial and reporting. Stacy McCain, a defendant in the state and federal cases, is reporting on his own trial as well. I've split the Motion to Dismiss in the federal case into the Memo of Law and the Affidavit and Exhibits. Here they are:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on August 12, 2014 13 Comments
Tom Reed used to be heavy. Very heavy. Then he had gastric bypass surgery in February 2013, and now he's quite lean: Tom Reed Buffalo News Gastric Bypass 2013 It's not hard to find photos of the thin Tom Reed: Tom Reed Floor of Congress Taxes Reed is being challenged by Martha Robertson, whose campaign is in deep trouble as reported by every independent analyst, even though Robertson is the recipient of DCCC and out of state money, including a fundraising visit by Nancy Pelosi. When candidates are in trouble, they do desperate things. Robertson's campaign is playing the fat card on Reed, using a photo of him that portrays him as his former fat self.  [See featured image] The photo is from 2011:

Posted by Bruce Carroll on August 12, 2014 5 Comments
Various news outlets are reporting the crash of a helicopter being used in the humanitarian relief effort for the Yazidi refugees in Iraq. Jim Sciutto who has been covering the crisis in Iraq for weeks reports that Vian Dakhil, the only member of the Iraqi Parliament representing the Yazidi minority group was on the helicopter. Additional reports now say the helicopter pilot was the only death, but many of the passengers are injured including Dakhil and her son who was on board as well.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on August 12, 2014 26 Comments
For years we have been documenting the rise of anti-Semitic violence in Europe masquerading as anti-Zionism, in a coalition of Islamists and Leftists in places like Malmö, Sweden. Copenhagen, Denmark also has this history, so much so that the small (6,000-8,000) Jewish community all but stopped showing Jewish symbols in public. In 2012, the Israeli Embassy advised Israelis visiting Denmark not to wear a Yarmulke (aka Kippah or skull-cap) or other similar religious symbols in public. The threat on the streets continues, with a Jewish school in Copenhagen just this month forbidding its students from wearing yarmulkes in public:
A Jewish school in Denmark informed parents that its pupils are no longer allowed to wear religious symbols near school grounds. The private Caroline School in Copenhagen informed parents of the policy in a recent letter, the Jyllands-Posten daily reported Friday. The letter said it was not permissible for students of the 7th, 8th and 9th grades to leave school premises if they are wearing visible Jewish symbols.... Hansen also said the move was “pure preventative.” He added: “I know there has been an increase in the number of Jews who have been accosted over the summer in connection with the conflict in Gaza.”
When actor Seth Menachem traveled recently in Denmark and Sweden, his group encountered numerous acts of anti-Semitism:

Posted by David Gerstman on August 12, 2014 14 Comments
The United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) has decided that Israel's self-defense needs to be investigated. (Note in the UN"s announcement the words "Hamas" and "rockets" are nowhere to be found.) After Operation Cast Lead the UNHRC picked a panel of four individuals, all of whom had prejudged Israel's guilt. The leader of that investigation, Judge Richard Goldstone of South Africa later recanted his group's conclusions, but the damage was done. The UNHRC has decided that having a committee that is biased against Israel is necessary and selected an Irish professor of human rights law named William Schabas to head the new committee. Schabas has been involved in the travesty called the Russell Tribunal on Palestine along with crackpots such as Cynthia McKinney. At a hearing this "tribunal" in 2012, Schabas said "[m]y favorite would be Netanyahu within the dock of the International Criminal Court." UN Watch has compiled a list of statements and from Schabas showing his bias against Israel, including:
- A few years earlier, Schabas called for “going after” Israeli president Shimon Peres in the ICC, saying, “Why are we going after the president of Sudan for Darfur and not the president of Israel for Gaza?” - In a 2009 blog post about the UN’s infamous Durban II conference on racism, Schabas urged the world not only to “ignore” Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s statements, but to stop “exaggerating” them. According to Schabas, those who “deserve the blame” are “Israel and its friends, who have manipulated the truth about the nature of the work of the United Nations by gross exaggeration of the role and intervention of certain fanatics.” Schabas described Ahmadinejad as nothing more than a “provocative politician,” and not a torturer of dissidents, inciter of genocidal anti-Semitism, and arch-sponsor of terrorism.

Posted by Amy Miller on August 12, 2014 34 Comments
At this year's American Bar Association annual meeting in Boston, ABA President James R. Silkenat took the opportunity to tout the ABA's Standing Committee on Gun Violence. The Standing Committee is one of the ABA's advocacy wings, and is affiliated closely with the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence.
"Part of our mission as an association is to defend liberty and deliver justice," Silkenat said at the program, "Combatting Gun Violence: A Role for Lawyers and the Bar." Someone "who cannot go to the laundromat, the movie theater or school, without fear for their safety, is not truly free—even if he or she can vote or have the right to legal counsel," he said.
Other gun control advocates went on to trot out the recent death of James Brady as a boon to their argument for stricter background checks and waiting periods:
Opponents of gun regulations cite the inconvenience to potential gun buyers of waiting periods associated with background checks, said Jonathan Lowy, director of the legal advocacy project of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. He noted that James Brady once said, from his wheelchair, "I guess I'm paying for their convenience." Lowy cited a well-known argument from the head of the National Rifle Association, that "the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun." He noted that victims of the assassination attempt were protected with the guns of the Secret Service.
James Brady was the victim of a terrible act of political violence. He spent over three decades in a wheelchair because of his injuries, and lawyers and policymakers owe it to people like Brady to take care in their examination of the law. There is a difference, however, between advocating for strong, constitutionally-sound policy, and using worst case scenarios to swindle the public into believing that the mere presence of a gun bodes ill for the safety of the American people:

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on August 11, 2014 154 Comments
All hell broke loose in Ferguson, Missouri after a police officer killed an unarmed teen. Michael Brown got into an altercation with local law enforcement, and was shot and killed by one of the police officers. According to ABC News:
The struggle began when the officer encountered two men, one of whom was Brown, in the street outside of an apartment complex, and one of the men pushed the office [sic] back toward his squad car, according to police. A shot was fired inside the squad car and then multiple shots were fired at Brown outside the car, killing him, authorities said.
The identification of the officer responsible for the shooting will be released tomorrow at 2:00 in a press conference, ABC News reports. A vigil held Sunday night in Brown's memory turned violent as attendees began looting and destroying local businesses:

Posted by New Neo on August 11, 2014 45 Comments
ISIS is the embodiment of evil. But:
“We don’t understand real evil, organized evil very well,” said America’s former ambassador to Iraq and Afghanistan, Ryan Crocker, in an interview with The New York Times. “This is evil incarnate.” “People like [Islamic State commander] Abu Bakar al-Baghdadi have been in a fight for a decade,” he added. “They are messianic in their vision, and they are not going to stop.”
My question is: does anyone ever "understand" evil? I don't think so. Evil's very nature is to be inscrutable. Evil is altogether mysterious and altogether different from the way most people operate or could even imagine operating. In all the biographies and histories that have dealt with Hitler, for example, who has ever really explained him? No one. Religious people posit a spiritual origin for evil. Non-religious people tend to doubt its existence, until they look into its eyes. If it were necessary to fully understand evil in order to fight it, World War II would have never been won by the Allies. What is necessary is to be able to recognize evil and see it for what it is quite early in the game. Those are the important first steps. The next steps are finding the will and the tools to fight it. Evil is very strong, because it doesn't know the same restraints and limits as morality or good. Regarding ISIS, Elizabeth Warren pipes up:

Posted by Amy Miller on August 11, 2014 32 Comments
Last month, the Justice Department asked for an injunction to prevent the state of North Carolina from implementing changes the legislators made to state election law. The lawsuit, first filed in 2013, is backed by the NAACP and the League of Women Voters, and claims that the new law--namely, its strict voter ID requirement--was passed in violation of the 14th, 15th, and 16th Amendments, as well as section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. However, a federal district judge has ruled against the DoJ, which means that North Carolina's new election laws will be in force for the midterm elections come November. The court held that, although the DoJ's lawsuit has merit (meaning that the court can't justify simply dismissing it,) attorneys for the plaintiffs failed to provide a "clear showing" of entitlement (meaning that they failed to show the court that they would succeed on the merits of their legal claims.) The court also said that, with regards to several of the claims, the plaintiffs had failed to show that they would suffer irreparable harm before trial in the absence of an injunction. North Carolina's new election laws contain a complete overhaul of the state's policies. Although the main point of contention rests with the new voter ID laws, the bill also reforms existing law. From the opinion:
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