The Lincoln Strategy on Abortion

Those following along on twitter might have seen me go at Will Saletan for saying this:

What's more disgusting than late-term abortion? This scheme to exploit it by hiring actors & secretly taping doctors. wapo.st/11wBHIW
— Will Saletan (@saletan) April 29, 2013

Oy, there was so much wrong with this it was hard to know where to begin.  First, the videos he is complaining about appear to be journalism.  Politically motivated journalism, but journalism nonetheless.  How does this differ from the hundreds of hidden camera investigations conducted by ABC, CBS, NBC and so on over the years?  But suddenly whenever a conservative uses it to go after a liberal sacred cow, its somehow unfair and unethical.  Heck one of the targets of this called it “terrorism.”

Of course what is upsetting them are these videos that have been surfacing, James O’Keefe III style.  Apparently Liveaction.org ran women who were genuinely pregnant into abortion clinics and essentially got a candid take on the attitude of these doctors’ attitude towards life and death.  Here’s one video, for instance:

David Sirota’s “Mafia” Defense of Islamofacsism

I know, I know, it is over a week old, but the guy is continuing to defend the article on terms that are either 1) clueless or 2) dishonest.

The title of the article is the first sign something is deeply wrong: “Let’s hope the Boston Marathon bomber is a white American.”  The subtitle clarifies it and for the first time makes it clear how deeply racist (and religiously bigoted) the article is: “There is a double standard: White terrorists are dealt with as lone wolves, Islamists are existential threats.”

This was of course written on April 16, when we had no proper idea who the person or persons who bombed the Boston Marathon were.  So it was ironic when we had the shootouts and finally we had one living bomber, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who—what do you know?—is a white American!

I mean let’s break it down.  Tsarnaev is actually from the Caucus region, so he is literally a Caucasian and he is also an American, having gained his citizenship last September 11.  Yes, the same September 11 on which Ambassador Stevens was murdered.  The slaps to this country’s face just keep coming.

And yet, this “white American” is also what Sirota would surely call an “islamist terrorist.”  (I prefer the term “islamofascist” so it is clear that we are not talking about all of Islam.)  The point is that revealing Dzhokhar as the terrorist proved in one fell swoop how bigoted Sirota’s title and subtitle were.  There are indeed white American Islamofascist terrorists.  These are not mutually exclusive terms.

But if you dig into the piece, there is an even deeper bigotry going on here:

What Weiner’s New Logo Says About His Psyche (Update: Twitchalanche and Loweralanche)

Update: I have a Twitchy Weiner... er, Twitchy post referencing me again.  Thanks!  And thanks to Becca Lower for the link.

Now first, dear reader, we are about to talk about what is going on in Anthony Weiner’s head.  This is going to involve some frank discussion about his sex life so...  be warned.  But I think I am going to get at a good point, here.

So yesterday we learned that Anthony Weiner has created a new twitter account.  Indeed we even had a Twitchy Weiner Twitchy post on Weiner’s new account.  And this prompted more than a few jokes by myself and others.  Okay, a lot of jokes.  But I find sometimes when you are riffing off something, you occasionally stumble on a deeper point.

One important piece in the second coming of Weiner, is his “Keys to the City” document.  You can read it all here, and it is mainly the usual liberal claptrap, but it’s designed to convince New Yorkers that Weiner is an “idea man.”  And I had some pointed commentary aimed at his proposal to make smokers pay for city health insurance.  You see, he is proposing that the city offer a “single payer” health insurance, and then to make smokers pay more for said insurance.

Of course that is done ordinarily by private insurance, but it becomes more sinister when it’s the government doing it, because it means that the government would collect all kinds of private data about you (which should raise privacy concerns), evaluate how your live your life and then change how much you pay for insurance based on those choices (which should raise a different kind of privacy concern).  And there are a lot of choices that might affect the cost of health care...

The Danger of Treating War As a Criminal Matter... to Criminal Rights

I glossed over this in my last post, but I would like to reiterate something I said over a decade ago when the World Trade Center was still smoldering.  I was in a class with Gary Hart of all people.  Yes, that Gary Hart.

And the debate was about whether we can declare war on what is in essence a terrorist organization.   I was in favor and I made many legalistic arguments, but you always make policy arguments after the legal arguments, especially at this school, and I made this point I am about to make now.

When you try to treat something that is best treated as war as a matter of criminal law, you inevitably warp the criminal law, too.  After all, treating it as a matter of criminal law is less efficient, less effective.

And so the temptation is to stretch the law to be more efficient.  For instance, right now we believe we have killed or captured all the men who left the bombs at the Boston Marathon.  But are we sure we have gotten all the bombs?  Are we sure we have all the co-conspirators?  Well, obviously, we must find out, and if we read him those pesky Miranda rights, which tell him that he has a right to remain silent, then he just might shut up!

Indeed under the Miranda regime, once he says he wants a lawyer, all questioning must stop until they get him one.  And then who knows how that lawyer might interfere.  Plus, lawyers create their own problems, such as intelligence leaks.  The Lynne Stewart case comes to mind.

So today we find out that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev has not been Mirandized.  Now of course the Miranda rights represent one of the more brazen creations of judicial activism.  I mean the Supreme Court came up with a script the cops have to say when they arrest him.  Where is this script written in the Constitution?  It isn’t there.  But on top of it, virtually all of it informs the defendant of rights he doesn’t actually have under the original constitution.  For instance, you have a right against self-incrimination, but only as a witness.  It says nothing about talking under questioning.  And you have a right to an attorney, but not a right to a free one.  That is a right they pulled out of their keisters on another day.  So they pulled out of their keisters a right to be informed of two other rights that they previously pulled out of their keisters.

Should We Try Dzhokhar Tsarnaev For Treason?

Update: Senormedia pointed out an embarrassing error.  Fixed!

So yesterday we had a manhunt from the brothers Tsarnaev, ending in the death of one and the capture of Dzhokhar.  (By the way, I am going to charge both men with discrimination against dyslexics for having such complicated names to spell.)  So after the jubilation—I predict a baby boom arriving in the Boston area in about six nine months—the question becomes what to do with them?

Right now they haven’t even Mirandized Dzhokhar yet on the theory of it being an emergency situation.  This is one of many, many exceptions to Miranda carved out when there is a real danger and you need information now.  Like as in, you have a robbery.  The guy clearly had a gun.  But when you capture him later, you can’t find it.  In that case, a cop is allowed to ask, “where is the gun?” without first Mirandizing him, because securing the gun is an emergency matter of public safety.  If memory serves, he can still refuse to answer it but if he says, “it’s over under the couch” then that statement can be used against him at trial.

I mean not to go off too far on a tangent, but the real way to think of Miranda, at least from the judicial perspective, is as a rule of evidence.  Maybe the police will separately punish cops for failing to Mirandize, but as far as the courts are concerned, whether or not an alleged criminal is mirandized only matters if and only if you try to bring the relevant statements into evidence.  If the criminal is silent, it doesn’t matter if they were told they had a right to be, at least from the courts’ perspective.

Now from my perspective I am increasingly of the view that this guy should be treated as enemy combatant instead of a criminal defendant.  I could go on and debate that issue but rather than do that, since it is clear the Obama administration is not going to do that, let’s put that aside.  Let’s assume we are going to send him into our criminal justice system.  So what do we do with him?

BREAKING: Anti-SWATting California Senator SWATted

This is the latest post in what I half-jokingly call The Kimberlin Saga^®.  If you are new to the story, that’s okay! Not everyone reads my blog.  The short version is that Kimberlin has been harassing me for over a year, his worst conduct being when he attempted to frame me for a crime.  I recognize that this might sound like an incredible claim, but I provide video and documentary evidence of that fact; in other words, you don’t have to believe my word.  You only have to believe your eyes.  So, if you are new to the story, go to this page and you’ll be able to catch up on what has been happening.

First, I have been a little under the weather and combined with being busy with other things, I have not been able to blog as much as I would like.  And of course there is lots of other things happening, but you will forgive me if I pay a little more attention to news about SWATting.

But to review a few events you might not have seen.  First, as I noted previously, Bill Schmalfeldt had made a threat last October to SWAT John Hoge—or more precisely it was made from an IP address, that Schmalfeldt has been known to use.  And then as Patterico pointed out, Erik Rush had a disagreement with Bill Schmalfeldt and what a coincidence, he was SWATted, too!

Meanwhile I appeared on the Huffington Post Live with several other people to talk about SWATting.  You can watch the program, here:

The “Journalist” Bill Schmalfeldt (II)

This is the latest post in what I half-jokingly call The Kimberlin Saga^®.  If you are new to the story, that’s okay! Not everyone reads my blog.  The short version is that Kimberlin has been harassing me for over a year, his worst conduct being when he attempted to frame me for a crime.  I recognize that this might sound like an incredible claim, but I provide video and documentary evidence of that fact; in other words, you don’t have to believe my word.  You only have to believe your eyes.  So, if you are new to the story, go to this page and you’ll be able to catch up on what has been happening.

So a while back, I pointed out that Bill Schmalfeldt is not a journalist in a post called “The ‘Journalist’ Bill Schmalfeldt.”  In it, I pointed out how Bill Schmuckfeldt thought it was some kind of revelation when someone told him something... that was already on my blog.  In that case, it was the fact at the time that I was helping Seth Allen, which was named in numerous posts.  When someone pointed the fact I was helping Seth Allen out to him, he thought it was a terrible, damaging admission, when it was nothing of the sort.  It just meant I was an attorney helping a client, pro bono.

Go ahead, read that prior piece for review if you are inclined, because the same pattern is about to be repeated.

You see, there is a person on the internet who writes as “@KimberlinUnmask” and this person, (or persons, I suppose), apparently runs a website called Kimberlin Unmasked.  And for a while people have wondered who this person is because every person who angers Brett Kimberlin must be identified, or something.  Seriously, can Team Kimberlin explain why this person’s identity matters a damn?

Anyway, one of the people they have claimed this person was, is me.  You know, because I need an additional identity to talk about Kimberlin because... why exactly?  Have I ever been shy about talking about Kimberlin?  What purpose would it even serve?

Anyway, today Bill Schmalfeldt decided he had the proof that Kimberlin Unmasked was actually me because he had seekrit information no one else had.  So Schmalfeldt tweets this out:

Bill Schmalfeldt Admits His Conduct is Harassment

This is the latest post in what I half-jokingly call The Kimberlin Saga^®.  If you are new to the story, that’s okay! Not everyone reads my blog.  The short version is that Kimberlin has been harassing me for over a year, his worst conduct being when he attempted to frame me for a crime.  I recognize that this might sound like an incredible claim, but I provide video and documentary evidence of that fact; in other words, you don’t have to believe my word.  You only have to believe your eyes.  So, if you are new to the story, go to this page and you’ll be able to catch up on what has been happening.

So today the ever-helpful @Kimberlinunmasked tweeted this out:

Bill Schmalfeldt threatens to dox #BlogHoCoSAO participants kimberlinunmasked.blogspot.com/2013/04/blogho… twitter.com/Kimberlinunmas…
— Kimberlin Unmasked (@Kimberlinunmask) April 8, 2013

Admittedly the picture is hard to read, but the key thing is he is threatening to dox every participant in Everyone Blog About the Howard County State’s Attorney Day after declaring it to be “harassment.”

And in doing so, he has tacitly admitted that he is himself engaged in harassment.  See if you follow this.

For months Schmalfeldt continually emailed and tweeted to Lee Stranahan with accusations of things like him pimping out his wife to prostitutes and attacks on him for the stillborn death of his daughter.  Yes, really.  It was so repellent even self-identified members of anonymous were disgusted.  Then again, this is a man who was kicked off Daily Kos for being disgusting and who desperately attempted to cover up a parody ad where he imagined Lee pimping out his own children, so disgusting is par for the course for Bill Schmuckfeldt Schmalfeldt.

Schmalfeldt’s defense was that he was a journalist who was just trying to contact a source in regards to a story.  This was plainly false, because many of the tweets and emails were nothing of the sort—often nothing more than insults—and moreover as his own lawyer has admitted and I demonstrated, Bill Schmalfeldt is not a journalist.  No, what he is, is a thug—a paid one, if he has any intelligence.

But what is Everyone Blog About the Howard County (MD) State’s Attorney Day?  It is a day in which bloggers (broadly defined) will contact their office and ask for a comment on a story and report their results.  And this is what Schmalfeldt calls harassment!—which is the same thing he (falsely) claimed he was doing.  So by accusing us of harassing the State’s Attorney Office, he is implicitly admitting he has been harassing us.

Well, of course it isn’t for many reasons but the most fundamental one is this: because we the people have a right, guaranteed explicitly in the First Amendment, to petition the government for a redress of grievances and that is all this is.  The government has no right to say, “stop contacting me,” because the First Amendment does guarantee a right to contact them and demand that our grievances be addressed.

Which is not to say the government can never be harassed.  For instance, if people call up and threaten them that counts has harassment and probably breaks a whole slew of other laws at the same time.  But just calling the offices of a unit of the government and asking for a comment on a story?  Of course not.

Everyone Blog About Howard County State’s Attorney Day

This is the latest post in what I half-jokingly call The Kimberlin Saga^®.  If you are new to the story, that’s okay! Not everyone reads my blog.  The short version is that Kimberlin has been harassing me for over a year, his worst conduct being when he attempted to frame me for a crime.  I recognize that this might sound like an incredible claim, but I provide video and documentary evidence of that fact; in other words, you don’t have to believe my word.  You only have to believe your eyes.  So, if you are new to the story, go to this page and you’ll be able to catch up on what has been happening.

It looks like another busy day in the blogosphere for me.  But I wanted to share that I called Wayne Kirwin at the State’s Attorney’s office and got only a voice mail.  As is my long practice, I left a voice mail message asking for a comment about it, and leaving my phone number.  And I followed it up with this email:

Subject: In follow up of my voice mail

Mr. Kirwin,

My name is Aaron Walker.  A few weeks ago, I came into your office to discuss charges of harassment and electronic harassment by a Mr. Schmalfeldt.  I met with Assistant State’s Attorney Jim Brewer.  Also present was my wife and a victim’s advocate named Erica.  I believe she is Erica Carpio.

Mr. Brewer came in with an extremely hostile attitude toward the claim and I attempted to explain to him that there was a larger context to this situation.  I tried to explain that this was part of a pattern of retaliatory conduct directed at myself and my wife for over a year led by convicted terrorist Brett Kimberlin after I had reported him for criminal conduct.  See, e.g., Kimberlin v. White, 7 F.3d 527, 528-529 (7^th Cir. 1993) .  I explained to Mr. Brewer that Mr. Kimberlin had escalated his conduct on the same day I filed those charges to actually stalking my wife in the parking lot of your district court and that this had left my wife so shaken she had cried for over an hour afterward and inquired into whether he would prosecute that claim.

Mr. Brewer had the nerve to say he wouldn’t and told me that, “if you are so concerned for your safety, don’t come to Maryland.”

I consider that to be a statement of surrender to the forces of evil.  It is saying that Maryland is so incapable of controlling its criminals that rather than prosecute the criminals, visitors should avoid the state entirely.  And by extension, it suggests that good people already living there should probably leave.

Maryland has a moral duty to protect the safety of both its residents and its visitors.  I ask you today whether the Howard County State’s Attorney has decided to shirk its duty in that regard.  Or if the Howard County State’s Attorney has any statement in response to this issue.

I have left a similar, albeit shorter, voice mail message to the same effect.  You can reach me at [redacted] or at this email address.

Aaron

We’ll see if he gets back with me.  I suspect he might be inundated with calls.

If you would like to participate in this protest, do the same thing.  Call them, see if you can get any response and report it.  Any reply, including, no reply is worth reporting.  See more tips for participation, here.

Tune in to OTNN at 11 P.M.

This is the latest post in what I half-jokingly call The Kimberlin Saga^®.  If you are new to the story, that’s okay! Not everyone reads my blog.  The short version is that Kimberlin has been harassing me for over a year, his worst conduct being when he attempted to frame me for a crime.  I recognize that this might sound like an incredible claim, but I provide video and documentary evidence of that fact; in other words, you don’t have to believe my word.  You only have to believe your eyes.  So, if you are new to the story, go to this page and you’ll be able to catch up on what has been happening.

Update: I will note that this is 11 P.M. Eastern time.

Tonight it will be light fun on the show as I join the panel Own the Narrative Network radio for a game-show thing called Matchcon.  It sounds a little Hollywood Squares-ey, with the difference being that instead of celebrities it is people like me.

Anyway, you can tune in here via the internet.  The call in number is (832) 699-0449 and allegedly you can skype in using “OTNNETWORK.”  Sorry, but I don’t use Skype so I have no concept of how it works so I apologize if I get that wrong.

And if you are coming in from the Own the Narrative Nework, I am there in part to promote the Everyone Blog Howard County State’s Attorney Day declared over at Hogewash.  It’s coming Monday, and ask as many of you as possible to participate.  Here are some tips for participation, here.  And I thank each and everyone one of you who have participated and will participate.

Tips on Participation in Everyone Blog About the Howard County State’s Attorney Day

This is the latest post in what I half-jokingly call The Kimberlin Saga^®.  If you are new to the story, that’s okay! Not everyone reads my blog.  The short version is that Kimberlin has been harassing me for over a year, his worst conduct being when he attempted to frame me for a crime.  I recognize that this might sound like an incredible claim, but I provide video and documentary evidence of that fact; in other words, you don’t have to believe my word.  You only have to believe your eyes.  So, if you are new to the story, go to this page and you’ll be able to catch up on what has been happening.

So next Monday, April 8 (2013) will be Everyone Blog About the Howard County State’s Attorney Day, which was the brainchild of Mr. Hoge at his lovely blog.  Ace was kind enough to promote it, here.  And I wanted to take a moment to talk about some of the different ways you can participate.

One obvious question is “what if I don’t blog?”  Well, here are some ways you can participate, too.

First, you can create your own blog, if only for one post on one day.  Google’s Blogger is free and very simple to use.  And the basic package at Wordpress is also free and simple to use.  You can pay a little to get premium features, but you can create a basic blog for free.

Another approach would be to share your experiences.  I am sure Mr. Hoge will be happy to allow you to leave comments about how it went on his blog.  And while I am bad about comment approvals, here, I will try to really make sure all comments that are appropriate are published on mine.

Or if you would prefer, email me.  Now I will not publish any email where you say you threatened them or otherwise was a jerk, but otherwise as long as it looks genuine, I will publish it.  And if you want me to leave out your name, email address, etc. just say so in the email and I will leave it out.

Or you could even tweet the thing out, or facebook it, or use whatever social media you want.  The hastag on twitter is #BlogHoCoSAO.

Now let's talk about how to contact them, for bloggers and non-bloggers alike. 

You can of course send letters, although it is getting late to do that.  Email addresses work, too.  This is their contact page.  And this is their email address.  If you don’t want it to automatically open your email program, here is the address to cut and paste: sao@howardcountymd.gov.  And here’s their media contact page.  Their PR guy, more or less, is T. Wayne Kirwin.  His phone number is 410-313-3002, and his email is wkirwan@howardcountymd.gov.  (Thanks to Dustyn, with a y, for that pointer.)

And while this doesn’t directly help the cause, you might consider putting one of these bumper stickers on your car.  When people ask what the hell that means, you can explain.

The actual state’s attorney is Dario J. Broccolino, but he was not the one who told me and my tearful, furious wife, that if we were so concerned for our safety to stay out of Maryland.  No, that was Assistant State’s Attorney Jim Brewer, as Becca Lower told you in this piece.  But Mr. Broccolino is ultimately responsible for Mr. Brewer’s conduct and so he’s the one to talk to.

And one more thing.  Maryland is a two party consent state.  So if you would choose to record anyone’s voice (by a tape recorder, or a video recorder with sound), you need that person’s consent (with some exceptions I won’t get into, here).  But it is generally sufficient for consent purposes to tell the person up front that they are being recorded.  So you could, for instance, make a recording of a call you make, upload it to YouTube or a similar service and let us know about it.  Just a thought.

And I want to thank everyone who will participate.  I have no right to expect any of this from you.  Any help I get is a gift, and I owe each of you therefore my gratitude and it is gladly given.