Backpage: A Blueprint for Squelching Speech

U.S. District Judge Diane Humetewa acquitted three former Backpage executives of myriad counts against them last week—more evidence of how empty so much of the federal case against them is. Humetewa ruled that there was insufficient evidence to uphold 50 of the counts* against journalist and Backpage co-founder Michael Lacey, 10 of the counts against former Executive Vice President Scott Spear, and 18 of the counts against former Chief Financial Officer Jed Brunst.

From the beginning, this prosecution has been premised on a bogus rationale (authorities yammer on about sex trafficking though none of the defendants are charged with sex trafficking), overreaching in its scope (attempting to hold a web platform accountable for user-generated speech, in contradiction to Section 230), offensive to the First Amendment, and relentless in its attempts to handicap the defense. So it’s a treat to see a judge slap prosecutors down a notch, even if it comes very late in the game (after two trials and after one defendant taking his own life) and even though it may not make much of a practical difference for Lacey, Brunst, and Spear (who face imprisonment for the rest of their lives even with the acquittals).

But to read Humetewa’s recent order is to get infuriated about the underlying case all over again. Presenting the evidence in the light most favorable to the government’s position, Humetewa manages (inadvertently?) to highlight how insane and unfair this position is.

Keep reading

Former Ligonier Valley police chief facing multiple felonies for alleged sexual assault

Officials with DreamLife Recovery reached out to Channel 11 on Saturday and confirmed that Berger had been fired.

A former Westmoreland County police chief is now on the other side of the law.

Former Ligonier Valley Chief John Berger is behind bars at the Westmoreland County Jail after being arrested Friday on sexual assault charges.

This comes after he was fired from Ligonier Valley Police last May following a raid by federal agents.

“It’s unbelievable. I can’t believe it,” said Daniel Beranek. He was one of several people Channel 11 spoke to in Donegal, shocked to learn of Berger’s arrest Friday for allegedly sexually assaulting a patient at a Donegal rehab center.

“Very, very horrible,” said Beranek.

According to State Police, the sexual assault happened at DreamLife Recovery in Donegal.

Berger began working there in January as a Behavioral Health Technician following a stint at the drug and alcohol rehab center as a patient and his firing as the Ligonier Valley Police Chief last May.

He was fired after federal agents raided the department and seized his phone and police cruiser.

“There’s no excuse for it honestly but definitely being held accountable and being a police officer to held to a higher standard and falling like that is pretty atrocious,” said Zachary Buchholz, who also spoke to Channel 11 in Donegal.

Investigators say Berger first met the victim last year when they were both patients at DreamLife.

She told police, “Berger would make unwanted sexual advances towards her almost weekly if not daily.”

The police report states those advances resumed starting in March when the victim returned to DreamLife.

“Unbelievable honestly. I wouldn’t say that he should be working there anymore or around in that environment and definitely should probably seek a little bit of help for that as well,” said Buchholz.

On Monday around 11:00 pm, police paperwork states Berger went into the victim’s room while she was sleeping, woke her up by whispering her name and “forcefully started to kiss her.”

State Police say he then groped her and forced her to give him oral sex.

“I would never think a law enforcement officer would be doing that,” Beranek said.

In an interview with State Police Friday, investigators say Berger owned up to the charges.

Berger is now being held at the Westmoreland County Jail unable to post $100,000 bail.

Keep reading

Defending Individual Liberty

The ideal of individual liberty is perennially under attack not only from socialists, as one might logically expect, but also from conservatives who regard individualism as a form of selfishness. The ordinary meaning of selfishness is “caring only about what you want or need without any thought for the needs or wishes of other people,” and many conservatives see this as a major contributing factor in social decline. The conservative British journalist Nick Timothy attributes many social ills to selfishness, arguing that “our society has become more about ‘me’ than ‘we’,” leading to higher rates of crime, antisocial behavior, and a ballooning welfare state as selfish people try to take as much as possible from the public purse while contributing little or nothing to it.

This school of conservative thought regards “excessive individualism” or “hyperindividualism” as a cause of social decay. Its proponents fear that the me-me-me society is partly to blame for the decline of Western civilization and therefore argue that defending individual liberty will only fuel further societal breakdown. As the family continues to be undermined by public policy, books like #MeFirst! A Manifesto for Female Selfishness, which promote “self-worship” and advise women not to have children, are seen as the logical result of individualism. Individualism is often referred to in this context as “rampant individualism” or “atomistic individualism,” which is associated with unhappy outcomes such as increasing loneliness and depression.

Keep reading

Pregnant women in Missouri can’t get divorced. Critics say it fuels domestic violence

The turning point for Destonee was a car ride.

She describes a scene of emotional abuse: Pregnant with her third child, her husband yelled at her while her older two kids listened in the car. “He would call me awful things in front of them,” she says. “And soon my son would call me those names too.”

She made up her mind to leave him, but when she went to a lawyer to file for divorce, she was told to come back when she was no longer pregnant.

Destonee requested she be identified by only her first name. She says she still lives with abusive threats from her ex-husband. She couldn’t end her marriage because Missouri law requires women seeking divorce to disclose whether they’re pregnant — and state judges won’t finalize divorces during a pregnancy. Established in the 1970s, the rule was intended to make sure men were financially accountable for the children they fathered.

Advocates in Missouri are now pushing to change this law, arguing that it’s being weaponized against victims of domestic violence and contributes to the contraction of women’s reproductive freedoms in a post-Roe v. Wade landscape.

“In Missouri, it feels as though they have really closed down every door in terms of reproductive autonomy,” says Kristen Marinaccio, an attorney and expert in divorce law who has examined these kinds of laws in Missouri and other states. She says beyond the legal and financial ties of marriage, there is powerful emotional weight to legally terminating a marriage. “You might just think, well, it’s a piece of paper,” she says, “but that piece of paper that tells you you’re no longer in this horrible marriage is really freeing for a lot of clients.”

After hearing stories about survivors unable to leave marriages, state Rep. Ashley Aune introduced House Bill 2402. It would allow pregnant women to finalize divorce in Missouri.

Aune says that the law has gone unexamined for too long and that policymakers need to give women the right to leave a dangerous or even life-threatening situation. “How can you look that person in the eye and say, ‘No, I think you should stay with that person,'” says Aune, a Democrat. “That’s wild to me.”

Keep reading

The TikTok Ban Is The Next Patriot Act

HR 7521, called the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, is a recent development in American politics. TikTok has been in the news for the past few years, after the public became aware of its connections to China. The popular social media mobile app is currently owned by ByteDance Ltd, a Chinese company. China and the United States currently have a rocky relationship, leading to fears that the Chinese government could potentially use this app to spy on American citizens. Several states and counties voted to restrict the usage of the app in some ways, mostly disallowing government employees from using it on government-owned phones. Earlier this month, the United States Congress passed a piece of legislation that would restrict the app’s availability if certain requirements are not met by ByteDance.

Putting aside the idea that politicians rarely have pure motives, this act has the potential to be just as dangerous as the Patriot Act. With a supposed goal of protecting American national security, the Patriot Act granted sweeping permissions to the federal government and the National Security Agency to spy on American citizens, with far less due process. In addition to having the potential to violate privacy rights and the Fourth Amendment, this new act is a blatant attack on property rights. Mobile device manufacturers and owners have every right to install whatever software they would like, as it is their property. Any illusion of a right to national security is immediately contradicted as collective rights are positive in nature and thus not rights at all.

Keep reading

US House Passes Controversial Bill That Expands Definition of Anti-Semitism

The United States House of Representatives has overwhelmingly passed a bill that would expand the federal definition of anti-Semitism, despite opposition from civil liberties groups.

The bill passed the House on Wednesday by a margin of 320 to 91, and it is largely seen as a reaction to the ongoing antiwar protests unfolding on US university campuses. It now goes to the Senate for consideration.

If the bill were to become law, it would codify a definition of anti-Semitism created by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) in Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

That is a federal anti-discrimination law that bars discrimination based on shared ancestry, ethnic characteristics or national origin. Adding IHRA’s definition to the law would allow the federal Department of Education to restrict funding and other resources to campuses perceived as tolerating anti-Semitism.

But critics warn IHRA’s definition could be used to stifle campus protests against Israel’s war in Gaza, which has claimed the lives of 34,568 Palestinians so far.

Keep reading

Outrage Erupts When Pennsylvania Authorities Toss 2 Farmers in Prison on 30-day Sentences

Authorities claim there’s no need for sentencing hearing, bail option

A state legal action in Pennsylvania is sparking outrage, online and elsewhere, for the result it demanded: Two farmers arrested and jailed on 30-day sentences with no sentencing hearing and no option for bail.

Authorities say that’s the process they use for contempt charges, for which Ethan Wentworth of Airville, York County, and Rusty Herr of Christiana, Lancaster County, have been serving time since last month.

Broadcast outlet WPMT in Harrisburg reported the government’s complaint concerns their company, NoBull Solutions, which offers to help dairy farmers with their reproductive management of cattle.

Their lawyer, Robert Barnes, charges, “This is the craziest thing I’ve every seen.”

The fight apparently stems from allegations the two were practicing veterinary medicine without a license for running ultrasound test on cattle, a procedure that is common for farmers to use for various reasons.

The result was an investigation by the state of Pennsylvania, where officials demanded that the two turn over their records.

They failed to do what state officials demanded, and the report notes that resulted in contempt orders against the men.

The state’s court officials told the broadcast outlet that there is no option for bail, and no “sentencing hearing” required for contempt charges. Authorities simply arrest the suspects and jail them, the report said.

Eventually, a judge signed arrest warrants for the two, as well as orders to jail them in their respective counties, warrants that just recently were executed.

Keep reading

New Columbia Wrinkle: Police Takedown Facilitated By Faculty Member Who Serves On NYPD Anti-Terror Squad…Conspiracists Cry Foul

The recent ousting of students and professional agitators from a Columbia University building was led in part by a Columbia adjunct professor who is also the civilian Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence and Counterterrorism for the NYPD.

The story is from The Grayzone, a media project headed by Max Blumenthal, Jewish blogger and former Clinton aide. That said, the article is written with a decidedly pro-Palestine bent. Author Wyatt Reed describes the Columbia uprising as a “protest model [that] has since spread to over 100 other universities in the US, and even been taken up abroad, with similar actions occurring at Leeds University in the UK and the Sorbonne in Paris”, as if it were organic, and not, in fact, funded by groups such as the Soros-backed U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights (USCPR).

Still, Reed injects some salient points into the Columbia conversation. He correctly notes that, “During the NYPD’s triumphant May 1 post-raid press conference, Weiner blamed ‘outside agitators’ for triggering the military-style police crackdown at Columbia. However, she refused to name the outsiders supposedly on the scene.”

Next, Reed asserts that Weiner falsely used the terroristic past of an elderly Columbia encampment visitor–Nahla al-Arian, 63, as preface for police intevention:

“…a brief visit to Columbia by Nahla Al-Arian, who Weiner incorrectly described as ‘the wife of somebody who had been convicted for material support to terrorism.’

‘That’s not somebody who I would want necessarily influencing my child if I were a parent of somebody at Columbia,’ Weiner commented.

Nahla’s husband, Palestinian academic Sami Al-Arian, had been indicted on flimsy terrorism charges in 2003, but a jury refused to convict him. Nevertheless, her brief stop at the Columbia encampment — where she says she did not even interact with any demonstrators — was cited by Adams during three separate media engagements to justify the police repression.”

–Ibid., editorial emphasis.

Further, Reed points out, somewhat ominously, that Weiner is the granddaughter of one of the creators of the hydrogen bomb:

Weiner is the granddaughter of Stanislaw Ulam, the Polish Jewish mathematician who helped conceive the hydrogen bomb as part of the Manhattan Project. “I’m very proud of that legacy,” Weiner said of her grandfather’s work upon being appointed as NYPD intelligence chief.

–Ibid.

Reed stops short of calling Weiner a Mossad asset, but he sets the table elaborately, stopping just short of lighting the dinner candles:

The NYPD’s Counterterrorism Bureau currently maintains an office in Tel Aviv, Israel, where it coordinates with Israel’s security apparatus and maintains a department liaison. Weiner appears to serve as a bridge between the Bureau’s offices in Israel and New York.

A 2011 AP investigation revealed that a so-called ‘Demographics Unit’ operated secretly within the NYPD’s Counterterrorism and Intelligence Bureau. This shadowy outfit spied on Muslims around the New York City area, and even on students at campuses outside the state who were involved in Palestine solidarity activism. The unit was developed in tandem with the CIA, which has refused to name the former Middle East station chief it posted in the senior ranks of the NYPD’s intelligence division. 

The ‘Demographics Unit’ appears to have been inspired by Israeli intelligence as well. As a former police official told the AP, the unit attempted to ‘map the city’s human terrain’ through a program ‘modeled in part on how Israeli authorities operate in the West Bank.‘”

–Ibid., editorial emphasis.

To sum up: Rebecca Weiner is, plainly, a liaison between the NYPD and Columbia University. The police division she works for was formed as a response to 9/11, and was done so with Israeli intelligence guidance, as would seem a natural fit for a country that has dealt with Middle East terrorism for decades.

Keep reading

Not in Our Name

Free speech is not a divisible concept. Either everyone is free to say what they want, no matter how noxious others find it, in order to create and sustain the free market of ideas—or else speech isn’t free.

Institutions that curtail speech—that make people’s social media postings grounds for expulsion, that ban or suppress speakers they disagree with, that penalize dissenting opinions in classrooms and workplaces with bad grades and HR reports—should not be allowed to then turn around and invoke the principles of free speech to defend problematic speech with which they happen to agree, let alone disruptive or illegal behavior.

And yet, recent years have seen the emergence of two different speech regimes, one for alleged oppressors and one for the allegedly oppressed. Huge swaths of often innocent speech by the former is deemed out of bounds, even criminal, whereas any speech coming out of the mouth of someone with a claim to victim status—including speech that actively incites violence—is considered sacrosanct.

As a result, there is now a great deal of confusion about freedom of speech, which is a very basic—and very central—principle of American history and society. For those interested in being de-confused, which we humbly submit should be all thinking American citizens, herewith: a primer.

Keep reading

The May 4th Deaths: Kent State 54 Years Ago

On May 4, 1970, Ohio National Guardsmen killed four college students and wounded nine others – one of them, Dean Kahler, is paralyzed below the waist – on the campus of Kent State University. Nobody was found guilty of the bloodletting.

On that awful day, Guardsmen fired M-1 rifles, .45 pistols and a shotgun for 13 seconds, killing Allison Krause and Jeffrey Miller, ROTC student William Schroeder and Sandra Scheuer who was on her way to class, while wounding nine others. Many Americans were outraged at the shootings but the vast majority were not, apparently believing that a nation at war was threatened by “radical” challenges on college campuses and elsewhere and that a government at war was perfectly justified in spying on its dissenting citizens and sending provocateurs to disrupt antiwar opponents. (On May 14-15, 1970, in Jackson, MS., Phillip Gibbs, a Jackson State junior, and James Green, a bystander and high school student, were killed by officers called to the scene following disturbances and student protests against the Vietnam war and continuing bias against blacks. A dozen students were also wounded by gunfire. Again, no one was ever convicted. (See, for example, Tim Spofford’s Lynch Street: The May 1970 Slayings at Jackson State College Kent State University Press).

Antiwar protests in Kent erupted following Richard Nixon’s TV speech announcing on April 30 that the US had invaded Cambodia, thus expanding a war he had once pledged to bring to an end. The following day Nixon denigrated antiwar students as “bums.”

Keep reading