The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Re: @X3n0ph0n and the Burden of Proof

Posted on | December 24, 2013 | 15 Comments

John Hoge takes notice of Team Kimberlin publicist Xenophon:

If the post that went up Monday evening at Breitbart Unmasked (No, I won’t link to it.) is any indication, TDPK truly misunderstands the memorandum Aaron Walker filed in the Maryland Kimberlin v. Walker, et al. case. And he misunderstands its significance.

Having previously addressed Walker’s filing, I will excerpt, but not link, Xenophon’s typically boastful output:

A federal judge dismissed Walker’s federal lawsuit against Kimberlin, Neal Rauhauser, and Ron Brynaert with prejudice over a year ago, but the vexatious Mr. Walker has learned no lessons from that blistering rejection of his paranoid style.
Instead, he tries to re-litigate all his failures once again in a grand unified conspiracy theory.

This has been recycled endlessly by Team Kimberlin: Walker’s lawsuits against Kimberlin were dismissed and therefore . . .?

If Walker failed to prove his claims against Kimberlin, this is because the plaintiff has the burden of proof in a civil suit. But as Kimberlin is now the plaintiff, and Walker among the defendants, the advantages of the defense have been transferred to Kimberlin’s antagonists. Xenophon evidently doesn’t recognize the significance of this, assuming that because Walker lost as a plaintiff, Walker will also lose as a defendant. Further demonstrating a deficiency of understanding, Xenophon continues:

Mr. Walker and his four co-defendants are being represented in the state defamation case by two attorneys, Marc Del Bianco and Francis Ostronic, neither of whom were party to Mr. Walker’s filing. Both of them will be asked to account for it anyway. Walker has tried to exercise leadership by claiming to represent everyone’s interests, including Kimberlin Unmasked. Walker’s filing leaves competent counsel with a dilemma: they can either move to have Walker’s novella-length screed stricken, and apologize to the court, or they can walk away from the case while there is still time to reach cover.
Either way, they should politely tell their client that he has done them no favors and ask him to please shut up.

Even if we stipulate Xenophon’s (and Kimberlin’s) claim that Walker’s filing was improper, why should my attorney be required to apologize on my behalf for what my co-defendant Walker has done without my knowledge, permission or authorization? But such are the implausible assumptions that Team Kimberlin rely on, and Xenophon piles up these assumptions in profusion:

According to our sources Mr. Kimberlin has found a very competent attorney to handle the work of dismantling Mr. Walker on a witness stand.

Uh, “dismantling Mr. Walker on a witness stand”? This requires the assumption that one or the other of Kimberlin’s lawsuits will eventually make it to trial when, in fact, there have been only two procedural hearings to date, and the next hearing in the Maryland case — where the various preliminary motions will be heard — is not until Jan. 13.

Many of the defendants in the federal suit (myself among them) have not yet been served, and we are therefore very early in the game, which is ultimately unlikely to result in a trial, because Brett Kimberlin is completely full of crap. Legal scholars can ponder what “completely full of crap” means, but permit me to express doubt that any “very competent attorney” is likely to agree to represent Brett Kimberlin.

 

Category: The Kimberlin Files

#SouthSudan: Words Aren’t Enough

Posted on | December 24, 2013 | 17 Comments

There has been relatively little conservative commentary on the crisis in South Sudan. Part of this could be explained by low expectations: Anarchy in Africa is not exactly unusual, and why should this particular episode of mayhem deserve our attention? Part of it may be due to the sense that no important American interest is affected by events in South Sudan. But it may be that conservatives are just overlooking an excellent opportunity to hoist President Obama by his own petard, to cite this crisis as further evidence of the Nobel Peace Prize winner’s ineptitude.

Rick Moran at American Thinker expresses a pessimistic view:

Things are getting out of control in South Sudan. There are now reports of massacres, mass graves, rape, and it’s getting worse. A refugee crisis is brewing as tens of thousands flee the ethnic cleansing underway.
South Sudan could easily become another Somalia — a failed state run by gangs and warlords who target the innocent. Will the world stand by and let it happen again?
Of course we will.

Quite likely true, but why should we pass up this chance to point out the vast distance between President Obama’s “Hope and Change” rhetoric and the dismal result of his policies? Because the dismal result is staring the world right in the face:

U.S. Marines stood by to help evacuate Americans in South Sudan as the top U.N. official there warned Tuesday of a “breakdown in respect for the most basic rights of people” amid the country’s widening military and humanitarian crisis.
U.N. Assistant Secretary-General Toby Lanzer tweeted that more accounts were reaching him of human rights abuses amid widening violence that has stoked fears of an all-out civil war in the world’s newest country.
In Geneva, Switzerland, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay called human rights abuses in the country a “serious and growing” problem.
“Mass extrajudicial killings, the targeting of individuals on the basis of their ethnicity and arbitrary detentions have been documented in recent days,” Pillay said, according to the statement. “We have discovered a mass grave in Bentiu, in Unity State, and there are reportedly at least two other mass graves in Juba.”
One U.N. official saw 14 bodies at the mass grave in Bentiu and another 20 on a nearby riverbank, said Ravina Shamdasani, a spokeswoman for the commissioner.
“As for the other two reported graves in Juba, we are still working to verify but it is very difficult, and there are reports that some bodies may have already been burned,” she said.

The New York Times reports:

On Monday, the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, urged a major increase in peacekeeping troops in the country, where the organization’s bases in Juba and other cities have become de facto sanctuaries for tens of thousands of civilians trying to escape the violence. Bor, the capital of Jonglei state, and Bentiu, the capital of Unity state, an oil producing area, are considered especially tense and dangerous.
Hundreds of people, and possibly many more, have been killed in more than a week of clashes and confusion around the country. . . .
On Monday, the Pentagon said it was stepping up its planning to evacuate Americans and protect those who remain in South Sudan. About 150 Marines and six transport aircraft are being sent from Spain to Djibouti, where an emergency force was created in the wake of the deadly attack on the American Mission in Benghazi, Libya, on Sept. 11, 2012.
The move was hinted at in a letter President Obama sent to congressional leaders on Sunday in which he said that he might take “further action” to support American citizens and interests in the strife-ridden region.
The United States also put forward a Security Council resolution on Monday to approve Mr. Ban’s plea for more international peacekeepers. . . .
“The leaders of South Sudan face a stark choice,” said Samantha Power, the American ambassador to the United Nations. “They can return to the political dialogue and spirit of cooperation that helped establish South Sudan, or they can destroy those hard-fought gains and tear apart their newborn nation.”
Diplomats from Africa, the United States and elsewhere have tried to bring the warring parties to the table, hoping to cobble together a cease-fire before the cycle of violence gathers momentum and leads to a protracted civil war.

So far, U.S. policy in South Sudan is to issue strongly worded warnings that the combatants ignore. Good luck with that.

 

PREVIOUSLY:

 

Category: Sudan

The World’s Worst Pro Se Litigant™ Says ‘Defendant Walker Has Gone Rogue’

Posted on | December 24, 2013 | 18 Comments

An interesting aspect of being accused by Brett Kimberlin of being part of two distinct conspiracies — one described in his Maryland suit Kimberlin v. Walker, et al., and the other described in the federal RICO suit John Hoge has dubbed Kimberlin v. the Universe, et al. — is that my alleged co-conspirators have done things without my knowledge or permission, and yet I’m somehow responsible for their actions.

Kimberlin just filed motions expressing his anger that my co-defendant Aaron Walker filed a motion on behalf of co-defendant Kimberlin Unmasked, including this claim:

“Defendant Walker has gone rogue and filed his pleading because of his grandiose and misplaced belief that he is a ‘legal scholar’ who is not bound by the rules. He believes that the lawyers in the case are not blessed with his skills or knowledge so he must file pleadings to educate them and the Court on the facts and laws as only known by him.”

This is rich amusement, indeed. Given the wild hare-brained recklessness of Kimberlin’s own pro se litigation — any competent attorney would have advised him against filing these lawsuits — who is Kimberlin to argue that Aaron Walker, a Yale-educated attorney, is acting on a “grandiose and misplaced belief”?

While I am not qualified to judge the legality or wisdom of Walker’s filings, it seems that Kimberlin is upset that Walker has done something unexpected and unusual, outside the rules of the game as Kimberlin understood them. Given his own demonstrable contempt for law — as evidenced by the crimes for which he served 17 years in federal prison — it’s quite ironic that Kimberlin expects his antagonists to scrupulously adhere to the rules. Is it not possible that Walker understands the rules better than Kimberlin? Could it be that Walker’s filings, while unexpected and unusual, were nonetheless entirely legal?

We’ll have to wait and let the court sort this out, but my own guess is that Kimberlin’s motion is just a continuation of his long-term efforts to damage Walker’s reputation as a lawyer, and will likely fail.

Meanwhile, my co-defendant Kimberlin Unmasked calls attention to this recent outburst by Kimberlin associate Neal Rauhauser:

This is further rich amusement: In September and October, Rauhauser and his friends were thumping their chests and proclaiming that Kimberlin’s lawsuits were legal tours de force, that the defendants were all guilty and should be terrified at the looming prospect of Kimberlin’s courtroom triumph. Yet now it’s December, the defendants have begun filing motions in the case, and suddenly Neal Rauhauser is on Twitter seeking pro bono legal assistance for the pro se plaintiff, Brett Kimberlin.

As for Rauhauser’s claim that Kimberlin was the victim of a “faked rape charge from some cranks,” the charge in question was filed July 28 by Kimberlin’s estranged wife:

“Brett Kimberlin met me when I was 14 years old. I was
living in Ukraine. Brett Kimberlin courted me and
enticed me to come to Maryland so I could be his
sex partner and bride. I arrived in Maryland
September, 1996, when I was fifteen years old.
Brett Kimberlin had sex with me every single day
between the day I arrived and the day I
turned sixteen, on Nov. 16, 1996.”

This charge — 16 is the legal age of consent in Maryland — was subsequently dismissed, but as it was based on a sworn statement by Mrs. Kimberlin, it would seem that Rauhauser is accusing her of being a “crank.” Nor have Rauhauser or any other Kimberlin fanboys addressed the substance of the accusations that Mrs. Kimberlin made in her July 7 motion for a protective order against her estranged husband:

T. Kimberlin v. B. Kimberlin Petition for Protective Order 7.9.13 (OCR)

Those claims of her husband’s “threatening” and “abusive” behavior were made by Mrs. Kimberlin before I even knew that she had been estranged from Brett Kimberlin and, while the court denied the protective order she sought, her accusations against her husband (a public figure) were nevertheless newsworthy. These charges were highly relevant in light of Brett Kimberlin’s criminal history:

“Plaintiff is a public figure because he has had an authorized biography published about him detailing his exploits. Citizen K: The Deeply Weird American Journey of Brett Kimberlin (Singer, Mark, Knopf, New York, 1996) is an authorized biography of Plaintiff Kimberlin. In it the book insinuates that the Plaintiff had an inappropriate relationship with a ten year old girl, (id. at 78.), that he was suspected in having arranged a murder-for-hire of the girl’s grandmother (at 82, 83), and that the subsequent Speedway Bombings were an attempt to distract the murder investigation (at. 89).”

That’s what the Franklin Center said in filing its motion to dismiss Kimberlin’s federal RICO suit. Maybe Neal Rauhauser can explain why these facts should be ignored. Good luck with that.

 

BomberSuesBloggers.com




 


Category: The Kimberlin Files

Reagan and the ‘Welfare Queen’

Posted on | December 24, 2013 | 19 Comments

One of the things about the Internet Age is that it assists us in determining the truth about circumstances which have historically been the subject of myth-making. Josh Levin of Slate discovered the facts behind a favorite anecdote of Ronald Reagan’s:

[I]n stump speech after stump speech, Reagan regaled his supporters with the story of an Illinois woman whose feats of deception were too amazing to be believed.
“In Chicago, they found a woman who holds the record,” the former California governor declared at a campaign rally in January 1976. “She used 80 names, 30 addresses, 15 telephone numbers to collect food stamps, Social Security, veterans’ benefits for four nonexistent deceased veteran husbands, as well as welfare. Her tax-free cash income alone has been running $150,000 a year.” . . .
Many accounts report that Reagan coined the term “welfare queen,” and that this woman in Chicago was a fictional character. In 2007, the New York Times’ Paul Krugman wrote that “the bogus story of the Cadillac-driving welfare queen [was] a gross exaggeration of a minor case of welfare fraud.” MSNBC’s Chris Matthews says the whole thing is racist malarkey — a coded reference to black indolence and criminality designed to appeal to working-class whites. . . .
Though Reagan was known to stretch the truth, he did not invent that woman in Chicago. Her name was Linda Taylor, and it was the Chicago Tribune, not the GOP politician, who dubbed her the “welfare queen.” It was the Tribune, too, that lavished attention on Taylor’s jewelry, furs, and Cadillac—all of which were real. . . .
When I set out in search of Linda Taylor, I hoped to find the real story of the woman who played such an outsize role in American politics—who she was, where she came from, and what her life was like before and after she became the national symbol of unearned prosperity. What I found was a woman who destroyed lives, someone far more depraved than even Ronald Reagan could have imagined. In the 1970s alone, Taylor was investigated for homicide, kidnapping, and baby trafficking. The detective who tried desperately to put her away believes she’s responsible for one of Chicago’s most legendary crimes, one that remains unsolved to this day. Welfare fraud was likely the least of the welfare queen’s offenses. . . .

Read the whole thing at Slate. Some of the Chicago Tribune reporting cited by Reagan was done by Pulitzer Prize winner Charles Bliss, and her crimes were reported by the New York Times: with the headline “Welfare Queen Loses Her Cadillac Limousine.” In other words, this wasn’t an obscure case and Reagan didn’t make it up. The Welfare Queen was both real and notorious.

Will Krugman, Matthews and other liberals apologize for smearing Ronald Reagan? Don’t hold your breath.

And one other thing: Linda Taylor was white.

 

Category: History, Journalism

In The Mailbox, 12.24.13

Posted on | December 24, 2013 | 6 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


OVER THE TRANSOM
The Looking Spoon: 44 (mostly non-political) Christmas Memes and Another Gig For Phil Robertson If He Wants It
Proof Positive: Phony Budget Compromise Is Selling Us A Bill of Goods


RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Power: Five Million Hits
American Thinker: Reality Bites Gays
Blackmailers Don’t Shoot: Merry Monday Christmas Linkfest
The Necropolitan Sentinel: Obamacare Watch – Obama Signs Up On Deadline Day (Sort Of)
Don Surber: A Grumpy Cat Christmas
Jammie Wearing Fools: Susan Rice Says NSA Officials Didn’t Lie, They “Inadvertently Made False Representations”
JustOneMinute: I Guess Justine Landed
Pat Dollard: CDC Agrees With Phil Robertson On Gay Sex
Protein Wisdom: Pajama Boy Nation
Shot In The Dark: Not In My ZIP Code
The Jawa Report: Al Qaeda Apologizes For Indiscriminate Killings
The Lonely Conservative: Obamacare Popularity Drops To All-Time Low – CNN Poll
This Ain’t Hell: Kalashnikov Passes
Megan McArdle: Gift Giving Is Good For All Of Us


I’ll be off the Internet until Saturday, when I’ll return to do the FMJRA and maybe the long-awaited Burger Post. There will be no Live At Five or In The Mailbox until next Monday, December 30. Deadlines for the FMJRA and Rule 5 Sunday are the same as on any other week.
Thanks to everyone who has bought stuff through my Amazon links this month. It’s nice to be appreciated; makes me think I’m actually doing some kind of a good job here. Y’all behave yourselves in the comments, and have a Merry Christmas.


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Category: Linkagery

@NYPolJunkie Knows Her Some Snark

Posted on | December 23, 2013 | 13 Comments

by Smitty

boom

One must admit that Pajama Boy looks far more natural here than the original no-talent rodeo clown.

More brutal than this?

Category: Barack Obama, humor

Today’s Ray Of Hope: Baal Going On Enforced Diet, Film At 11

Posted on | December 23, 2013 | 14 Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho


From Operation Rescue (h/t Jeff Quinton on Facebook):

Operation Rescue has concluded an exhaustive survey of abortion clinics in the U.S. and is pleased to announce that it has documented a record number of abortion clinic closures in 2013, during which time 87 surgical abortion clinics halted abortions.


From the Grauniad (h/t The Pagan Temple in the comments to today’s Live At Five):

Spain’s conservative government has approved an abortion law that rolls back current legislation permitting the procedure without restrictions until the 14th week.

The law needs to pass the Cortes, but since the Popular Party has a majority there, it’s pretty much a done deal. Of particular interest is that the law will once again require 16 and 17-year-old girls to get their parents’ permission.


It’s easy to grow despondent when looking at the culture war and seeing how many things are now considered normal that were regarded as unspeakably obscene and even insane just forty years ago. As Jerry Pournelle reminds us, though, despair is a sin. The bad guys don’t always win and the good guys don’t always lose. If the Spaniards can roll back the Culture of Death, so can we – one shuttered abortion clinic at a time.


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Category: Abortion, Spain

The Sudden #SouthSudan Crisis

Posted on | December 23, 2013 | 20 Comments

What is stunning about the situation in South Sudan is how rapidly it has spun completely out of control:

Eight days after a mutiny in South Sudan’s capital signaled the start of “unrest” (as reporters euphemistically phrase it), it was reported Monday that additional U.S. troops would be sent to Africa in preparation for possible further action. Four U.S. troops were wounded Saturday when rebels fired on an evacuation flight to the key South Sudanese town of Bor, about 125 miles north of the capital, Juba.
“Defense officials say the U.S. is moving additional Marines and aircraft from Spain to the Horn of Africa to provide embassy security and help with evacuations from violence-wracked South Sudan,” the Associated Press reported. “A defense official says the extra forces moving to Djibouti will bring the total U.S. troops there to 150, with 10 aircraft, including Osprey helicopters and C-130 transport planes.”
Djibouti is on the east coast of Africa next to Ethiopia, nearly 2,000 miles by road from Juba, and it was not clear how many of the U.S. troops would actually be sent to South Sudan. A Pentagon spokesman said the commander of U.S. Africa Command is “repositioning his forces in the region to ensure that we’ve got capabilities necessary to respond to any request from the State Department.” . . .

Read the whole thing at The American Spectator.

 

Category: Sudan
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