Epitaph
Today, from the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:
Or they could have simply disagreed and subsequently been proven right. Nah....There's an epitaph for someone in there somewhere.
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Or they could have simply disagreed and subsequently been proven right. Nah....There's an epitaph for someone in there somewhere.
A Mother who underwent an abortion after learning that she was pregnant with twins is suing the NHS for ?250,000 after one of the babies survived.Will she win? According to the article, another woman received a ?10,000 settlement under similar circumstances in 2001.
Stacy Dow, who was 16 when she found out that she was pregnant, is seeking compensation and damages for the ?financial burden? of raising her daughter. Miss Dow, whose father has had to take on a second job to help to pay for his granddaughter, is claiming for ?loss, injury and damage? suffered at the hands of Tayside University Hospitals NHS Trust.
The teenager, who hoped to train as a nurse, decided to have an abortion as soon as she discovered that she was six weeks pregnant. Days later the procedure was carried out at Perth Royal Infirmary, where doctors advised her that no live material was left in her uterus.
When Miss Dow started to put on weight and her periods stopped, she assumed that it was because of the contraception injection she had been given. The hospital had told her that possible side-effects included weight gain and an erratic menstrual cycle.
Miss Dow said: ?After 33 weeks I went to the GP and he told me I was pregnant. I thought he meant I had fallen pregnant again, and I couldn?t believe it when I was told that it was one of the original pregnancies.?
``I don't know how they did it for all that time, but that shows they're all about class over there,'' center fielder Johnny Damon said. ``For them to respect everything we did means a lot.''. . .
``I know a lot of people won't want to hear it, but I thought sitting out there the entire time watching showed a lot of class,'' he said. ``I don't think our rivalry will ever get diminished. They are led by a really classy person and that showed today.'' . . .
``It shows the class of that organization,'' he said. ``We can't say enough about it. I know everyone over here appreciated it.''Via Bronx Banter.
The pervasiveness of the practice is impossible to quantify but there's no doubt that it happens frequently. In most of the few criminal trials I've sat in on, I've seen police officers give eyewitness accounts that were so improbable as to be laughable. Mostly, I'm sure, this stems from sloppy decisions or poor observations made in the heat of the moment that required buttressing in order to assure conviction. My guess is that most of the lying is coached by prosecutors. Neither the cops nor the prosecutors really think they're doing anything wrong, since they're sure they've got the right guy. Mostly, they do. But the practice turns the criminal justice system on its head. And, aside from citizen skepticism, there's not a hell of a lot we can do about it.Yes there is. We can fire the cops who do it, and prosecute them. I think I've finally found the moment where I want to give Ethel Merman's great lines from It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World:
Now what kind of an attitude is that, these things happen? They only happen because this whole country is just full of people, who when these things happen, they just say these things happen, and that's why they happen! We gotta have control of what happens to us.It's a bad practice. It shouldn't be coutenanced with subtle explanations that avoid the heart of the matter.
On Wednesday, we quoted Justice Department prosecutor Noel Hillman that no original documents were destroyed, and that the contents of all five at issue still exist and were made available to the 9/11 Commission. But that point didn't register with some readers, who continue to suggest a vast, well, apparently a vast left- and right-wing conspiracy. The Washington Times, the Rocky Mountain News and former Clintonite Dick Morris have also been peddling dark suspicions based on misinformation.This leaves me thoroughly confused. Is a Federal Prosecutor proposing that the Washington Post publishes urban myths? John at Powerline isn't buying Hillman (the WaPo link just before is dead but you can read the key parts at the Powerline link):
The confusion seems to stem from the mistaken idea that there were handwritten notes by various Clinton Administration officials in the margins of these documents, which Mr. Berger may have been able to destroy. But that's simply an "urban myth," prosecutor Hillman tells us, based on a leak last July that was "so inaccurate as to be laughable." In fact, the five iterations of the anti-terror "after-action" report at issue in the case were printed out from a hard drive at the Archives and have no notations at all.
"Those documents, emphatically, without doubt--I reviewed them myself--don't have notations on them," Mr. Hillman tells us. Further, "there is no evidence after comprehensive investigation to suggest he took anything other than the five documents at issue and they didn't have notes." Mr. Berger's sentencing is scheduled for July, and Mr. Hillman assures us Justice's sentencing memo will lay out the facts and "make sure Mr. Berger explains what he did and why he did it." Meanwhile, conservatives don't do themselves any credit when they are as impervious to facts as the loony left.
I don't see how this can be squared with what Hillman is now telling us. Why would Berger remove five identical copies of the same report, shred three of them with a pair of scissors, and return the other two to the archives? And why, as he has now admitted, would he lie about such conduct? And, if Berger shredded three of the copies, how can Hiillman have seen them to verify that they contained no notes? If Hillman's current account is correct, Berger sounds like a candidate for a psychiatric ward, not for Secretary of State.Yeah, what's with that recent habit thing? Oh, never mind.
Hillman says the truth will come out when Berger is sentenced. Let's hope so. For now, consider me unconvinced. And what's with the Journal's recent habit of unfairly blasting conservatives in unsigned editorials?
Progressives pay a heavy price for failing to defend the fairness of our judicial victories at the grassroots. In the short run, we weaken judicial precedents, leaving them exposed to criticism that they are unfair and undemocratic--which ultimately may result in the selection of judges willing to overturn them. In the long run, we pay an even heavier price by galvanizing opponents bent on freeing themselves from what they perceive as elitist disrespect for democratic governance.Volokh:
Winning in court is generally good -- but there's no substitute for winning elections, and for persuading the public more broadly. Any victory that's only a victory in court is not likely to last long, at least on the important issues that are likely to remain in people's minds. Neuborne is right to remind his side about this; I hope people on my side (generally libertarians and, on many issues, conservatives) remember this, too.To which I wish I could add a great quote from Learned Hand, one of the esteemed judges of the first half of the last century -- it's in one of my law school casebooks, stored in a box deep in the bowels of what most would call a basement and which I'm starting to think of as a crypt. Hand essentially said, if I've got this right, that societies which call upon upon judges to decide issues it has not decided for itself are in for a bad time. Hand has been dead for over forty years, but he wasn't named Learned for nothing.
In the radio hoax, the men were instructed to strip, then leave wearing only a small T-shirt. Two men agreed, disrobing in front of Brown. The third victim noticed Brown's home detention ankle bracelet, left the home and contacted the radio station.The moral of the story? Always check for the ankle bracelet.
Mr. Berger admits to compounding the mistake after removing the second set of documents on Oct. 2, 2003, the associate said. In comparing the versions at his office later that day, he realized that several were essentially the same, and he cut three copies into small pieces, the associate said. He also admitted to improperly removing handwritten notes he had taken at the Archives, the associate said.What was that -- a favor? Oh gee, you don't need these extra copies? I know you guys at the Archives must have a space problem so I'm going to help you out? Ahh, but there's the rub. Were they indeed "copies", as in five exactly identical set of papers?
The Post, meanwhile, insists on calling these "copies". They were not exact copies; each memo started off as a copy of an original draft by Richard Clarke, but the memos had handwritten notes from each recipient as comments, requests for revision, and suggestions for possible action. Each document was unique, and their destruction by Mr. Scissors means that we will never know what some did with Clarke's information. All we know is that it must have reflected badly on Berger, Clinton, or both. Otherwise, why would Berger destroy them?But what about the pants? Jim Geraghty at NRO, quoting the WaPo link above, says pants now seem to be uninvolved.
Although one element of this story apparently is a bit of an urban legend:But can we reach that conclusion upon reading the entire bit from the Post?
On Sept. 2, 2003, the associate said, Berger put a copy of the Clarke report in his suit jacket. He did not put it in his socks or underwear, as was alleged by some Republicans last summer.
The Berger associate authorized to speak with reporters described the chronology the former national security chief gave to the Justice Department in his negotiations with the Justice Department. On Sept. 2, 2003, the associate said, Berger put a copy of the Clarke report in his suit jacket. He did not put it in his socks or underwear, as was alleged by some Republicans last summer. On Oct. 2, 2003, he again spent hours at the archives and got four more versions of the document. Back in his office, he studied them in detail, realized they were largely identical, and took the scissors to three of the copies, the associate said.Well, two thoughts. The mystery "associate" (do a CTRL-F on both the WaPo and NYT articles and count how many times you find that word) said Berger stuck the first example in his suit jacket. No word yet from the "associate" on how he got the other four out a one time, or whether men's trousers or hosiery were involved.
And I'm ? oh dear Whomever there's no hope for me is there? ? thinking about what's inside Sandy Berger's pants:Or -- it was the dastardly Republicans. Your pick.Berger and his lawyer said Monday night he knowingly removed handwritten notes he had made while reading classified anti-terror documents at the archives by sticking them in his jacket and pants.That's right ? the former National Security Advisor to President Clinton stuffed classified information down his pants and walked (a bit oddly, I'd wager) to his car. So that I might not be labeled a partisan hack, let me first say something in Sandy's defense ? at least he didn't also have a shredder down there. Because you just know that Fawn Hall could have destroyed top secret documents with a top-secret spy device hidden in her not-so-Top-Secret cotton thong.
So, let me get this straight: Sandy Berger intentionally destroyed the only copies of top secret documents about this country's historical knowledge of looming terrorism threats for clearly political purposes, even though a bipartisan Congressional commission was requesting and utilizing all such documents in an effort to formulate recommendations about how to protect America from another terrorist attack.Easy -- a $10,000 fine and giving up his security clearance for three years. Or, as some might say, a slap on the wrist.