Or, let's just call this a continuation of the ONT. Comments open.

Posted by: andy at 03:33 AM | Comments (387)
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Enjoy tonight's Low Content ONT.

Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Finals Tonight

I've got my money on the Los Angeles Kings winning it tonight. It would be the first Stanley Cup win for the Kings. It's quite an event. I highly recommend you tune in for the game or at least the last 10 minutes.

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Posted by: Open Blogger at 06:03 PM | Comments (758)
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In 2004, the left fully embraced anger and hatred, calling it justified and righteous.

In 2007, a guy named Peter Wood wrote a book called A Bee In The Mouth, documenting the "New Anger," an anger no longer ashamed, but now an angry proud and preening.

He warned, presciently, that this same New Anger was a poison beginning to infect the body politic of the right.

I doubt that even Barack Obama can save us from our anger now. That’s because the anger that lately pervades our politics is more than just an aftereffect of six years of Democratic setbacks (although the strikingly angry Democratic response to their six bad years does call for an explanation). Our political anger is only the most impressive expression of a much wider cultural transformation. In politics, in music, in sports, on the web, in our families, and in the relations between the sexes, American anger has come into its own. Wood says we’re living in an era of “New Anger,” and regardless of who becomes our next president, New Anger isn’t going away anytime soon.

Anger Old and New

What exactly is New Anger? Let’s find out by first having a look at Old Anger. Before we lionized all those angry anti-heroes — from Jack Nicholson in the movies, to John McEnroe on the tennis court — Americans admired the strong silent type: slow to boil, reluctant to fight unless sorely provoked, and disinclined to show anger even then. Gary Cooper in Sargent York comes to mind. Old Anger was held in check by ideals of self-mastery and reserve. As Wood puts it, “Dignity, manliness, and wisdom called for self-control and coolness of temper.” The angry man, Wood reminds us, was once thought a weak-minded zealot, bereft of good judgment and prey to false clarity. Above all, Americans (especially women) kept anger at bay “lest it overwhelm the relations on which family life depends.”

On behalf of this ideal of reserve, anger was not merely checked, but was even partially defeated (today we’d say “repressed”). There was a time when Americans strove to train themselves away from actually being angry — a time when even the private, inner experience of rage felt shameful and was shunned. Yet in compensation for the inner sacrifice and discipline demanded by the art of self-mastery, Americans experienced a mature pride in “character” achieved. In what Wood calls that “now largely invisible culture” of Old Anger, refusal to be provoked was its own reward.

That was then. America’s New Anger exchanges the modest heroism of Gary Cooper’s Sargent York for something much closer to the Incredible Hulk. New Anger is everything that Old Anger was not: flamboyant, self-righteous, and proud. As a way to “empowerment” for ethnic groups, women, political parties, and children, New Anger serves as a mark of identity and a badge of authenticity. The Civil War, and America’s past political campaigns, may have witnessed plenty of anger, yet not until recently, says Wood, have Americans actually congratulated themselves for getting angry. Anger has turned into a coping mechanism, something to get in touch with, a prize to exhibit in public, and a proof of righteous sincerity.

BLogging Anger

New Anger is nowhere more at home than in the blogosphere, where so far from being held in check, look-at-me performance anger is the path to quick success. Wood’s section on the “proud maliciousness” of bloggers (titled “Insta-Anger”) will stir debate, yet it’s far from a blanket indictment. The Insta-Pundit himself is off the hook, for example. “[Glenn] Reynolds’ comments are often sardonic but seldom angry,” says Wood. On the other hand, Atrios explaining “Why We Say ‘F***’ a Lot” (expurgation most definitely not in the original) fares far less well at Wood’s hands.

...

No False Symmetry

...

“For the first time in our political history, declaring absolute hatred for one’s opponent has become a sign not of sad excess but of good character.” That, Wood says, is why our political anger is now New Anger. For Wood (a conservative who’s written for National Review Online) New Anger is a phenomenon of both Left and Right. Yet Wood eschews false symmetry, and one of the fascinations of A Bee in the Mouth is following Wood’s attempt to make sense of New Anger’s long, slow, and decidedly incomplete seepage from the Left to the Right side of the political spectrum.

It's complete now. I think we can fairly state that seepage is complete now.

Anger is not a virtue, and hatred is not courage.

Screaming and ranting does not improve morale, and does not stiffen spines.

There is a word I love: "unmanned." Bereft of manhood; sent into an emotional tizzy; screaming like a child.

It is not manly to become unmanned.

Let it be known:

Most of us are pretty angry.

But yet it must be kept in check.

Anger is sinful; but to indulge in anger, to make excuses for it, to call anger prudent and wise, is pathetic.

It is narcissistic to claim flaws and indulgences are really virtues in disguise.

I am angry. I'm often angry. Sometimes I mask it with humor.

I am also a reasoning human being who knows what most people have known since age six: Anger does not produce good decisions, nor good results.

Anger is an indulgence. A soft, callow indulgence. An indulgence of emotion, and indulgence -- like all indulgences -- that feels good.

I indulge in it too. We all do. But make no mistake, every time we do, it is an indulgence, and not a badge of righteousness.

For over a year I have been inveighing against unchecked anger, exhibitionist anger. I have cautioned against mistaking this indulgent state with actual virtue -- virtues alleged, most frequently, to consist of "courage," "integrity," and "principle."

I don't think that's what it is.

I know the left thought that their anger gave them "courage," "integrity," and "principle" when they indulged it unashamedly in 2004 (through the present), and never once did I think, "All that angry, emotional talk of theirs really shows their courage, integrity, and principle."

What I thought was: "They sound like clown-babies."

This precise same angry talk does not suddenly sound any more elevated or noble simply because it emanates from the right. A swap in political branding does not transform a fundamentally childlike, indulgent state into a noble one.

What people who are truly, unapologetically, unashamedly angry need is need less politics, not more.

Politics is not the reason for their anger; deep-seated emotional turmoil and private tribulations are their real problems.

"Politics" is simply the convenient, "socially-acceptable" outlet for it. Some are too afraid to confront their real problems, too cowardly, so they talk about "politics."

It is primal screaming, and it ought to be done in a more suitable, more productive venue.

I have always suggested productive ways to channel anger. How many of people who feel enraged and voiceless have joined their local party and attempted to take it over?

Or contacted FreedomWorks to learn how to grassroots-organize?

Taken any positive step, at all, to doing something about the alleged source of their rage?

A blog's comment area is not a good vehicle for changing the world.

The world gets changed in the one place it's always been changed: Out in the world.

Anyone filled with anger ought to try something like that. He might find his anger largely dissipated, as he would feel empowered, actively doing instead of merely emoting, and not reduced to impotent shrieking.

These utterances do not help anything, except the personal need for catharsis. Unhinged ranting is embarrassing for the entire movement, and does not, as is often alleged, somehow, in some unexplained manner, "help the cause."

Ever watch Ed Schultz and his red-faced raging? Does he seem attractive, even to people who lean to the left? Does it seem likely his impotent fury is gathering supporters beneath his flag?

Or do you think he's repulsing people?

The comments section of this blog is for intelligent conversation, interesting tips, unexplored points, fun snark, bustin' chops, running riffs, inside jokes, sockpuppet gags, making friends, flirting, talk of boobs, and of course praising me, and if you must, even praising the cobloggers.

It is expressly not a forum for rage or running other commenters down (except for trolls, and I do mean trolls, not someone you disagree with).

People often -- usually -- hide their unhappiness and fear in anger.

Anger feels like a "safe" emotion; it feels empowering, it feels like you're not expressing vulnerability.

Whereas confessing unhappiness and personal problems feels vulnerable, like a show of weakness, and people don't want to do that.

People never want to do that.

Here's the thing, though: It may seem that way, but in fact admitting problems is a far, far more courageous -- a far more manly -- thing than to hide them behind anger.

Anger is vulnerability. It's just vulnerability in the form of shouting.

People think the anger disguises that, but it does not. It's the most vulnerable vulnerability there is -- the vulnerability that's so raw it doesn't even dare confess itself.

And yet it does. "Issues," people short-hand it-- "That guy has issues." What is intended to be hidden by anger is not in fact hidden at all. It's plain-sight. Everyone immediately knows, "This guy is not just talking about politics."

It is often the case that the steps we take to conceal ourselves reveal us most of all.

This blog is a home, of sorts. People want to come here for interesting and fun banter.

It is not intended to be a hostile environment. If anger makes you hostile, you will have to check that, or check out.

Although I would strongly urge fixing the problem that drives unthinking anger in the first place. Or find a productive channel by which you can feel empowered by really doing something to change the circumstances you despise.

Anger is hard on the heart and makes life poorer. I don't think some people understand a basic fact: No one is "comfortable" with someone else's angry outbursts. The person engaging in those angry outbursts may be comfortable with his anger (a little too comfortable, by my lights), but others are not.

Of course you don't have to listen to me. Just free advice. Free, but in this case, valuable.

And in this case, also, mandatory.

I heard Dennis Praeger say something to Adam Carolla that I thought was stupid and sappy when I heard it, but then Adam Carolla agreed, and then I realized they were both right.

He said it is a selfish indulgence to be unhappy, and that it is a moral necessity to be happy and cheerful.

Not for yourself, he clarified-- for others. For the sake of others in our lives, we should project good cheer and warm spirits, even if we do not exactly feel that inside.

I've been trying this for a while. About, I don't know, a couple of months. My whole life I had done what Praeger called moral cowardice, or selfish indulgence -- I had frowned, I had shown a lack of interest or enthusiasm, I had been stingy with kind words and compliments.

I was, in short, a real piece of shit. Still am.

But I am trying. I am trying to take Praeger's counsel and remind myself that to be unhappy, and to project unhappiness out into the world, makes other people's lives poorer, other people's lives unhappier.

So far, at least in my personal life, it's working. I'm still depressive, but I feel good on occasion by just being nice.

So I'm faking it. Fake it 'till you make it. To do otherwise is to simply indulge oneself. Yes, my natural state is phlegmatic, unenthused, unengaged, reserved, lazy, and depressive; but then, my natural state is also to be fat, and beat off twice a day. And I've done something about those (1, Adkins, 2, "Rawdog Aversion Therapy").

I began this post much angrier myself, in the beginning; I've tried, in successive drafting passes, to soften it, and add some lightness to it.

But the people I mean -- not many, but a few -- know who they are. You have to lighten it up, you have to keep in mind that it's not just your own emotional state, but those of your would-be comrades.

I will enable comments for just this post. I imagine some will want to argue about this. That's fine; that's why I'm enabling comments, so you can express that, so you can argue back.

But the policy is the policy and will be the policy. I will enable comments, so you can express your disapproval, and suggest I'm taking away your right to free speech, or whatever other grievance you might have; but in the end, I think this is the right policy, and the policy that will make these comments better for 95% of all commenters. 5% it might make it worse for, but it's a numbers game.

It's also my very strong preference.

There is always a dispute about noise in a building or neighborhood-- the noisy guy thinks the Neighborhood Standard should be set to "Noisy" and the quiet guy thinks the Standard should be Quiet.

Neither one really has any objective proof that his preferences should prevail. Nevertheless, between the two, someone must prevail, and that always seems unfair to the losing side.

But it is every bit as unfair to the other side, should that side lose.

It's a question without an answer you can "prove." And yet, a standard must exist. Either the guy is going to have to turn down his stereo, or the bookworm is going to have to wear uncomfortable earmuffs; two purported rights are in conflict, and someone is going to lose what he purports to be his "rights" (which will be found, in the end, not to be "rights" at all, but merely preferences which have been disfavored by official policy).

I'm setting the standard as lower hostility, and lower anger. Arguments are fine; attacking other commenters, unprovoked (and the expression of a disfavored idea is not "provocation") isn't.

Some people will object to this, but most, I believe, will welcome it.

Anyway, comment away. I have attempted to scrub some of the first-draft angry talk out of this, but I probably missed some. For that, I apologize in advance.

Posted by: Ace at 02:22 PM | Comments (1531)
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Brit Hume posted this tweet, with what I imagine is a screenshot of his Notepad take on the subject.

A larger shot of the comments are here.

Mickey Kaus agrees, and chides liberal pundits for pretending this is just some silly slip of the tongue.

However, Kaus himself gets it wrong by suggesting the "private sector is doing fine" is just a misstatement. (If this seems contradictory, he's nuanced: He thinks Obama's statements about the primacy of the public sector are the real gaffe. My disagreement with him is that both parts are "the real gaffe.")

It's not.

I am searching for this now, and have not yet found the articles to prove it, but I will, because I read them.

This argument has been trotted out numerous times by left-wing analysts and commentators.

It's not new.

It's what the left believes.

And it is, I think, what Obama himself reads.

And it's what he believes, even though he's been cautioned not to say it.

If there were no general chatter on this point, perhaps one could claim Obama "misspoke."

But there has been general chatter on this point. The left has been making this argument on blogs for months. The left has been claiming for a year that the private sector is "doing fine," we just need to give money to state governments so that the Democratic Client Class of bureaucrats can be spared any cuts in benefits.

They view this as a type of stimulus spending -- the best kind, because it flows into the hands of the Democratic Client Class.

So this did not come out of nowhere. This as been written about, and argued, and urged, for a long time.

Obama made a mistake, but he did not "misspeak." His error was to say aloud the talking point he's been reading -- and believing -- for months.

If anyone wants to assist me in the hunt for proof of what I remember, I believe the agitation for this proposition must have come from the only liberal analysts I occasionally read: Paul Krugman, Robert Reich, Ezra Klein, Greg Sergeant, various folks at Talking Points Memo, and possibly ThinkProgress and Matthew Yglesias (though I almost never see anything they write).

Boom Goes The Dynamite: Harry Reid said the EXACT SAME THING last October.

Thanks so much to @last_train.

Video below the fold.

This statement was made as part of Obama's failed "Pass this Jobs Bill" blitz, so this message was likely part of the White House strategy on that.

More: Krugman too, from April 22, 2012.

Check the ninth paragraph.

Same claim.

Misstatement? Or just ill-advisedly stating the actual liberal belief on the point?

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Posted by: Ace at 10:04 AM | Add Comment
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While we're waiting for the New New Comments Thingy, I've set up an alternate site for comments at http://acedark.wordpress.com.

We'll mirror posts there until the new site is up and link to it from here for comments.

Temporary New New Comments Thingy

Posted by: andy at 08:01 AM | Comments (1)
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I apologize to most commenters.

Jimmah, however, has decided to set blog policy for me, and several others have decided to challenge me on the point as well.

I will have to end commenting until I can figure out how to ban them.

This is precisely how I wanted to spend my Friday night.

I know that everyone else -- everyone else -- was of course pleasant and wonderful as usual.

But there are some who just enjoy sabotage and fragging.

I don't know how to fix it at the moment, so I'm going to possibly simply destroy the blog by letting it go dark.

But I don't know what else to do.

You expect to be knifed in the front by your enemies. It's too much to be knifed in the back as well.

Again, I realize most people understand without being told.

My mistake here is thinking some people will understand if told -- no, the sort of person that doesn't know until told also won't know after he's told.

Thanks for everyone who understands without being told.

For the rest, registration is coming, possibly Monday. I do not have the time or patience regarding continuing arguments about Standard Blog Policy -- standard blog policy on any blog, at any time, let alone now, when I'm under siege -- and I simply will not be entertaining any more arguments about it.

You can be stubborn about a lot of things, but when you get stubborn over another man's right to make his livelhood as he believes right, and to protect himself and his family as best he knows how, you've gotten stubborn about the wrong thing, and the last thing.

And also, you're a bad person with a deep psychological problem, and no, merely being "conservative" does not make up for your selfishness and arrogance. You might want to consider character-building exercises over reading about politics. Before one's a good conservative, one ought to strive to first be a good human being.

Without the latter, the former isn't worth shit.

Posted by: Ace at 10:46 PM | Add Comment
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11:41. Close enough.

Posted by: Ace at 07:41 PM | Comments (475)
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The upside-down flag is an unofficial symbol of distress, an SOS.

It's also a symbol of America itself turned upside down.

In the face of harassment and threats against the right to free speech, allies of liberty are fond of saying "We will not be silenced."

It's a statement that projects confidence, defiance, and vigorous defense of one's rights.

But, as noble as this declaration may be, it's not wholly true.

Because a sufficiently painful harassment, or a sufficiently grave threat, will in fact silence those who would otherwise enter the public square.

Two people have already been silenced. One man has been arrested -- arrested, for blogging about the criminal history of Brett Kimberlin, and for describing his ongoing ordeal at Kimberlin's hands.

Unless Congress acts -- and acts swiftly -- there will be still further innocent citizens subjected to Brett Kimberlin's lawless vigilantism.

Brett Kimberlin does not want people writing about his past -- a past that includes convictions for serial bombing, drug smuggling, perjury, and even impersonating a member of the military. (One of his ploys as a major narcotics trafficker was to avoid inspection of his drug-carrying planes when they were refueled by... dressing himself and his crew in fake military uniforms and flashing fake DoD credentials, telling ground crews that the plane was a top-secret flight and they were ordered to ask no questions about it. Citizen K., pages 94-95.)

Then-FoxNews reporter Ed Barnes filed this report in 2010, questioning whether Brett Kimberlin was a "political prisoner" turned self-styled activist, or merely a career criminal with a new scam.

Leftist Blogger's Criminal Past Raises Questions About His Real Intent

By Ed Barnes

Published October 19, 2010

Even before his release from prison 10 years ago, Brett Kimberlin had learned a lesson that has served him well: If you publicly accuse a well-known political figure of crimes or misdeeds -- even without proof -- publicity and money will follow.

Kimberlin, a convicted bomber and drug dealer, learned that lesson in 1988, when he claimed from his prison cell that he had been Dan Quayle's marijuana dealer in college. The claim got a lot of attention because Quayle was running for vice president of the United States at the time.

Now, 22 years later, Kimberlin has taken that lesson and made unfounded accusations a profession of sorts. Using two popular leftist blogs, the 56-year-old from Bethesda, Md., has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars from the public and left-leaning foundations by promising to put conservatives he disagrees with in jail, often with offers of large rewards. So far -- without success -- he has called for the arrest of Karl Rove, Andrew Breitbart, Chamber of Commerce head Tom Donohue, Massey Energy Chairman Don Blankenship and other high-profile public figures.

A review of tax filings for Kimberlin's blogs, "Velvet Revolution" and "Justice Through Music," raises troubling questions about whether his "nonprofit" operations are dedicated to public activism -- or are just a new facade for a longtime con artist.

One person who doubts Kimberlin's credibility and intentions is his biographer, Mark Singer, who literally wrote the book on Kimberlin: Citizen K: The Deeply Weird American Journey of Brett Kimberlin. Although Mark Singer began the project as a believer, and a supporter -- he shared the advance for the book with Kimberlin, and had previously mainstreamed his evidence-free claims about Dan Quayle by reporting them in Tina Brown's very first issue of The New Yorker -- his entire book is a repudiation of his past credulity, and a refutation of nearly all claims of Brett Kimberlin.

Mark Singer's book is remarkable in as much as it is a book-length repudiation of his previous reportage, an extended exercise in self-flagellation for his gullibility, for his having been swindled by a narcissist with a talent for self-promotion and lies.

There are many books demolishing previous reporting on a subject -- but very few in which an author demolishes his own career-making earlier work.

While I, and Kimberlin's other targets, are heartened by Congress' letter to Eric Holder to look into the SWATting matter, what a reading of Citizen K demonstrates is that Congress itself needs to act in order to finally put an end to Brett Kimberlin's ongoing digital (and real-life) terrorism.

Because not even prison stopped Brett Kimberlin's crimes. While working as a prison clerk, Brett Kimberlin forged his own release order, forging all necessary signatures; he planned to release himself at 12:01 am on Memorial Day weekend. His plan is that no one would attempt to call the warden to confirm the release in the middle of the night on a holiday weekend; to make the process of confirming the strange midnight release, he also took the step of removing contact information from the office's Rolodex. This scheme was ready to be executed, but for a lucky break for justice: Kimberlin was unexpectedly moved to another prison before Memorial Day, and his forged release form was now useless.

Another job he was assigned to in prison was doing quality control for military equipment. Rather than ensuring that equipment used by the men and women of the armed forces were in proper working order, Brett Kimberlin gave the equipment a positive rating -- and then cut the wires himself.

This is not an allegation; this is an amusing anecdote he enjoys bragging about. From Citizen K, page 184, directly quoting Kimberlin from the many conversations the author had with him in preparing the book:

"I'd run the cables through quality control," [Kimberlin] said. "I'd check them. I'd sign off on them. And then I'd cut some of the damn wires."

Prison did not stop his crimes. Prison only taught him new skills.

As Singer says about Kimberlin's self-education as a jailhouse lawyer:

Jailhouse law suited all of Brett Kimberlin's aptitudes: It appealed to his peripatetic imagination and disciplined habits, offered rich opportunities for creative sophistry, and gratified his bottomless capacity for self-justification.

Citizen K, page 183.

Stopping Brett Kimberlin's remorseless war on civil society, on the freedoms of his fellow Americans, will not take a letter.

Stopping Brett Kimberlin will take an Act of Congress.

At his sentencing hearing for his conviction of the Speedway Bombings -- a week-long bombing spree in Speedway, Indiana, in 1978 -- Brett Kimberlin vowed to Judge Steckler:

"If I am sentenced to one day or one hundred years, to me it's a travesty and a tragedy and an injustice, and for that reason I would ask that I don't have an executed sentence. And furthermore, I have decided and am prepared to take this on appellate levels and do everything possible to vindicate myself, whether through the district court, appellate court, Supreme Court. If I have to go through the United Nations I plan on doing that, and I plan on going to the World Court. I plan on filing lawsuits against every person that I know that lied against me and any agencies that were involved with corruption and use of perjured testimony."

Citizen K, page 180. Emphasis added.

Brett Kimberlin was true to his word. As recounted in the biography for which he himself cooperated, Brett Kimberlin has filed 100 lawsuits or more on his own behalf. He has sued, or harassed, or both, judges, prosecutors, witnesses, wardens, reporters, and even, oddly, Senator Orrin Hatch (Orrin Hatch apparently joined the Conspiracy Against Brett Kimberlin at some point in his senatorial career).

He also sued a victim of his bombing, to escape the money judgement awarded to her for her husband's maiming by one of his bombs. That husband, Vietnam War hero Major Carl DeLong, eventually took his own life.

Carl DeLong had survived Vietnam, but he did not survive Brett Kimberlin.

Apart from the United Nations and World Court -- which, it turns out, do not have jurisdiction over bombing sprees in Indiana -- Brett Kimberlin has filed suit after suit protesting his perfect innocence in the Speedway Bombings and harassing and threatening those who say otherwise.

Released from prison in 2000, Brett Kimberlin has now turned his jailhouse lawyer skills on a new pool of victims: Bloggers who dare to publicly mention, on their small-scale electronic newspapers, Brett Kimberlin's criminal record. And the avalanche of frivolous, vexatious, and outright malicious lawsuits begins anew, as well as more alarming harassments.

I am writing to you, Members of Congress, to alert you of the full menace that Brett Kimberlin still poses to society. He should never have been let out of prison; having lived nearly the entirety of his life since high school as one-man crime wave, it can hardly have been believed that he had truly reformed by 2000.

That is a mistake which of cannot of course be cured. But Congress can act to limit Brett Kimberlin's ability to continue to wreak misery and fear upon law-abiding citizens in other ways, which I will propose at post's end.

It is a burden to live with a criminal conviction for a terrifying domestic-terrorism bombing spree, as Brett Kimberlin well knows.

However, Brett Kimberlin has decided that burden shall no longer fall upon his shoulders, but upon the shoulders of anyone who mentions his extensive, remorseless, relentless criminal history.

Brett Kimberlin has personally decided that it is society at large, rather than himself, who shall bear the burden of his crimes.

It is time for Congress to act.

Brett Kimberlin has litigated and re-litigated and sur-litigated his claims of innocence in every proper tribunal, and now has turned to litigating these matters as against private citizens.

He has decided that if he cannot get his criminal conviction overturned by the courts, he will do the next best thing: He will personally harass anyone who dares mention this conviction.

He may not get his conviction expunged, overturned, or pardoned, but by suing any American citizen who refers to the official court records of the Federal Courts of the United States of America, he will make sure no one breathes a word about it.

The United States government and court system have long been the targets of Kimberlin's relentless lawsuits, motions, appeals, complaints, filings, accusations, and calls for grand jury hearings into those who supposedly conspired with the government to frame him.

The State must bear such a burden -- after all, if the state intends to deprive a man of his liberty, it must entertain almost every legal filing the accused submits.

The State is obligated to do that. And the State has the resources to argue against such filings.

Private citizens do not. Private citizens, engaging lawfully in reporting on facts, should not be dragooned lawsuit after lawsuit, subpoena after subpoena, into Brett Kimberlin's hyperactive quest to sue anyone who writes about the Speedway Bombings.

If Brett Kimberlin seeks relief, he should direct his efforts to the courts which can provide a new trial or a vacating of the decision, or to the President of the United States, who can provide a pardon, and, if he sees fit, a full exoneration for his crimes.

But he should be foreclosed from continuing to seek such relief from private citizens, who cannot grant it, and who are only hailed into court to answer specious claim after specious claim to convince them that life would go better for them if they just stopped mentioning Brett Kimberlin.

We are citizens of the United States. If the court records of the United States say that Brett Kimberlin was convicted of, and sentenced to fifty years for, planting the bombs that terrified Speedway, Indiana, and maimed Carl DeLong, we ought to be able to rely upon that official ruling, and not be subject to endless harassments by a career criminal who has decided to live in a fantasy world in which he was a "political prisoner" and perfectly innocent of his crimes.

We ought not exist in a world of punishment by vindictive lawsuit for the crime of not indulging Brett Kimberlin's fantasy.

When I wrote of this several weeks ago, I asked, rhetorically, "Did Congress pass a law forbidding me from mentioning that Brett Kimberlin was convicted of the Speedway Bombings?"

Of course Congress had passed no such law -- but Brett Kimberlin is imposing his one-man private law that that is now the official policy of the United States of America.

Will Congress speak up and assure American citizens that it is not in fact illegal to make reference to the court records of the United States, and that any suit predicated on such a fact-pattern -- yet another minor variation of his claims that by referencing the court records of the United States of America, he is the victim of "harassment" and "conspiracies" against him -- is baseless?

Will Congress read his criminal record into the Congressional Record, to put beyond doubt that it is lawful to state his conviction for the Speedway Bombings openly, and without fear?

Will Congress consider enacting positive legislation to limit Brett Kimberlin's relentless determination to sue over any negative mention of his past?

For example: Will Congress act to pass a federal anti-SLAPP suit (SLAPP meaning "Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation," i.e., "lawfare" to intimidate people from expressing their First Amendment rights), such that the victims of such suits can remove them to federal courts and have them quashed? And further providing for stiff punitive fines for those who file them?

Will Congress hold hearings -- conduct an investigation -- into the exact mission of Brett Kimberlin's tax-exempt, not-for-profit "charities," The Velvet Revolution and Justice Through Music, to ensure these organizations, for which donations are tax-exempt, are behaving in compliance with the public interest?

Will Congress provide for a federal vexatious litigant statute, limited, if need be, to only cases of cross-state-boundary suits (i.e., federal diversity) and, if needing further limitations, to cases in which the vexatious litigation seeks to stifle the constitutional right to free speech guaranteed by the First Amendment?

California's vexatious litigant statute, for example, states that someone who has filed a series of vexatious litigations shall be put onto a list, and once on that list, they must post large bonds before suing anyone else, and further, are requited to get a senior judge to sign off on any fresh litigation as having merit.

This seems like a model law for the United States-- does anyone favor vexatious litigation against the federally-guaranteed right to free speech?

How many Congressmen would rise to oppose such a bill?

Such a law would quickly put an end to Brett Kimberlin's jailhouse-lawyer conveyor belt of unending litigation. Perhaps there would be three, four, or five new victims... but then, the victimization would finally end.

At some point, the ongoing case of Brett Kimberlin v. The World At Large must finally, finally end.

At some point, the list of Brett Kimberlin's victims must be capped.

There are many things Congress can do to champion citizens' rights to free speech. A letter to the Department of Justice -- while welcome -- is unlikely to make the madness finally stop.

Brett Kimberlin had an interesting quote -- directly from his own mouth -- about his mindset.

I believe in this simple sentence, Brett Kimberlin encapsulates his worldview.

The context is that Brett Kimberlin was talking about other major narcotics-smugglers who found his tactics and schemes to be too risky.

"I've met smugglers who thought my methods were too ballsy. I looked at it as just the opposite. If you do something right out in the open, as long as you don't trip up and make a mistake, then nobody's going to suspect it."

Citizen K, page 57. Emphasis added.

A crime is in progress. It is ongoing. Will Congress please act to stop it?

A PLEA FOR ACTION, NOT WORDS

If you are reading this, please contact Congress to ask them to not only take an interest in this matter, but to seriously consider enacting positive statutory law to limit Brett Kimberlin's ongoing abuse of the legal system and corruption of justice.

Please be polite with them: As you will soon be hearing, Congress is in fact getting involved. Congress is decidedly not indifferent to the plight of ordinary citizens exercising their rights under the First Amendment.

However, I think Congress does not yet appreciate a few things:

Brett Kimberlin will not be stopped by publicity. He craves publicity. He's loved publicity since he first got a taste of media adulation with his "I was Dan Quayle's pot dealer" claims, which, you will not be surprised to learn, Mark Singer has found to be likely a fabrication.

Brett Kimberlin will not be stopped by scrutiny. Even when he was a suspect in the Speedway Bombings, and being followed by agents of the FBI -- and he knew he was being followed -- he continued to conduct his large-scale drug smuggling operation. While being investigated for the Speedway Bombings, he was arrested independently for procuring false military ID. And then, having been arrested (and released) for procuring false military ID, he was arrested for smuggling tons of marijuana into America.

The fact that the FBI was watching him didn't seem to matter. He considers them stupid; he always thinks he's one step ahead of them. The fact that he has frequently been arrested and caught does not seem to enter into his reasoning.

And, as he himself says: If you do it right out in the open, then who's going to suspect it?

Congress also doesn't appreciate the urgency of the situation. If there's one theme of Brett Kimberlin's life, it's escalating risk-taking when already in a risky situation.

The Speedway Bombings, of which he was convicted, were conducted even as he was under investigation for the murder-by-hire of an innocent grandmother. The theory was that Brett Kimberlin set the bombs to cause chaos and prevent a proper investigation of the execution-style murder of Julia Scyphers.

That was never proven; that is a suspicion the police and FBI held. Brett Kimberlin was never charged for Julia Scyphers' murder; the case remains open.

Officially-- no one knows who murdered Julia Scyphers, or for what possible reason a grandmother was executed.

The point is that he definitely was under investigation for the murder -- this is a publicly-reported fact -- and he knew that.

And yet even being under suspicion by police for a murder, he planted and detonated the bombs in Speedway. This is a fact.

Escalation.

The police and FBI don't know the motive for the bombings. They never suggested one in court, and Brett Kimberlin, who claims to be innocent, has never said why he planted the bombs.

But the theory -- again, not proven, not tested in court -- the police and FBI had was that the bombs were planted to divert resources away from the Julia Scyphers murder.

Escalation.

And this leads to the last point that I don't know if Congress is aware of: Brett Kimberlin is a dangerous man. That is not my opinion; that is the finding of the United States federal courts.

This is not some blogwar bullshit. This is not a case of "he called me a dirty name on the internet and I'm angry."

This is digital terrorism, straight up. With consequences that go far beyond what someone said about you on Twitter.

Some people are heartened that this malicious ongoing to threat to society is finally getting some media coverage, and some United States government officials are now paying close attention.

I'm not. Because I know what happened last time Brett Kimberlin began getting some serious scrutiny: Bombs began going off.

Escalation.

I will be heartened when laws are passed to circumvent his freedom to destroy lives, and when FBI agents are closely monitoring him.

Until then, I'm terrified.

If you have an interest in championing free speech, please use this tool to find your congressman's contact information, and write to him, or, preferably, call him.

Again, be polite; most Congressmen have not even heard of this issue yet.

However, in being polite, please also be insistent if your Congressman offers you what seems to be a blow-off letter -- "you should contact the DoJ," etc.

We have contacted the Department of Justice. We've contacted a lot of people.

We're specifically asking for Congress to act, not to just provide the phone number of someone else to call.

Phone numbers we have. It's action we seek.

Michelle Malkin has provided the contact information for specific Congressmen she believes might be interested, or hold particular power over such matters. You can also contact them, in addition to your own Congressman.

By the way, I wouldn't necessarily assume that a liberal Congressman would not be interested in an ongoing abuse of the legal process for private vengeance. At the very least they should be apprised of the situation -- if they decide to do nothing, that's a matter for their own conscience.

I had hoped to write the definitive post on Brett Kimberlin. However, I am unable to finish this today; this is merely what I am able to write by close of business today.

Thus, I have not discussed Brett Kimberlin's actual crimes, both past and ongoing.

I will discuss these later.

TO BE CONTINUED....

Posted by: Ace at 11:41 AM | Comments (844)
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To help you adjust to tomorrow's upcoming Day of Blogger Silence tonight's ONT will have reduced word count, be less picturey. It good when my laziness, principle coincide.

Posted by: Maetenloch at 06:23 PM | Comments (2063)
Post contains 864 words, total size 14 kb.

I'm sure you're as surprised as I am that the press missed a few things in 2008.

Stanley Kurtz got the minutes of the meeting.

In late October 2008, when I wrote here at National Review Online that Obama had been a member of the New Party, his campaign sharply denied it, calling my claim a “crackpot smear.” Fight the Smears, an official Obama-campaign website, staunchly maintained that “Barack has been a member of only one political party, the Democratic Party.” I rebutted this, but the debate was never taken up by the mainstream press.

Recently obtained evidence from the updated records of Illinois ACORN at the Wisconsin Historical Society now definitively establishes that Obama was a member of the New Party. He also signed a “contract” promising to publicly support and associate himself with the New Party while in office.

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Minutes of the meeting on January 11, 1996, of the New PartyÂ’s Chicago chapter read as follows:

Barack Obama, candidate for State Senate in the 13th Legislative District, gave a statement to the membership and answered questions. He signed the New Party “Candidate Contract” and requested an endorsement from the New Party. He also joined the New Party.

Consistent with this, a roster of the Chicago chapter of the New Party from early 1997 lists Obama as a member, with January 11, 1996, indicated as the date he joined.

Breitbart's piece castigates Ben Smith for believing the campaign's apparent lies, and for dismissing it as another right-wing smear.

I'm willing to give him a break on that. Sometimes, people are simply misled.

But now that there are records from the New Party itself, will Ben Smith correct the record?

No one likes to eat shit and confess he got it wrong. Nevertheless, it's necessary to do so.

I'm sure Ben Smith would much rather ignore this. I would, myself.

No one -- no one -- enjoys confessing he's wrong. No one ever said it was fun.

It is, however, required of men of honesty and character.

Posted by: Ace at 02:41 PM | Comments (616)
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