Howdy All, a few Interesting Items for your information. Enjoy –
In this issue –
1. Hunter
2. Efficiency
3. Israel
4. FFL
5. Paxton
6. DART
1. Hunter. The big story last week was an attempted plea bargain deal between federal prosecutors in Delaware and the Hunter Biden legal team. After some preliminary shenanigans, prosecutors attempted to slip in blanket immunity from investigation / prosecution at the last minute. The judge started asking questions. The normal 15 – 30-minute session (occasionally portrayed on shows like Law and Order) stretched out to three hours, with the judge finally telling both legal teams to go away and try again. The big deal in this is that federal prosecutors were acting as an adjunct of the Biden defense team rather than representing the interests of the People of the United States in their pursuit of justice. Their actions open everyone participating up to and including current US Attorney General Merrick Garland to a charge of obstruction of justice, a charge which led to former US Attorney General John Mitchell’s 1975 conviction of obstruction of justice and an 8-year sentence in Club Fed over his 1972 role in Watergate.
- The plea bargain fell apart Weds, July 26. Best reporting on it in the places I browse are PowerLine, Legal Insurrection and American Thinker. There have also been great columns on it in other venues like The Federalist. Will Scharf went through the mechanics of what transpired in a July 27 piece in the Federalist that is as good a place to start as any.
- Scharf meticulously takes apart what prosecutors tried. Plea bargains are governed by relevant and predictable Federal Rules. In this subsection judicial approval is necessary. If the judge believes the government’s decision to not prosecute or dismiss charges in return for a plea to other charges is unjust, the judge can reject the plea. In this case, Biden agreed to plead guilty to two misdemeanor charges of tax evasion, the same sort of felony charges that removed Al Capone from the gangster business. In return for the plea, the feds agreed not to prosecute Biden for gun charges or foreign agent registration (FARA) charges, or other crimes related to his international business dealings in Ukraine, China and other locales. Note that Paul Manafort was sentenced to 73 months in prison for violating FARA. 1966 – 2015 there were only seven criminal prosecutions under FARA before it became a favorite tool for Do(In)J political persecutions.
- In Biden’s case, the legal teams worried that the judge might reject such a broad grant of immunity for a minor guilty plea, so they structured the bargain under a different provision of federal rules, which also flagged the judge that there was game being played. The lawyers on both sides tried to insulate the plea from judicial oversight by hiding it, buried in a separate pretrial diversion agreement. This also flagged to the judge that a game was being played. The pretrial diversion agreement was submitted at the last minute, with lawyers from both sides lying about what was in it. Essentially, if Biden successfully completed probation, he would be shielded from any future charges for any crimes relating to the offenses charged in the plea agreement. Think of blanket immunity and you’ll be close.
- The lawyers put the facts into the obvious and visible plea agreement and the non-prosecution agreement into the not so obvious or visible pretrial diversion agreement, hiding the full scope of what Do(In)J was offering. The pretrial diversion agreement was an effort to shield Biden from a future administration simply throwing it out, prohibiting a future government from deeming Hunter had violated the agreement without convincing a judge. This is completely new and without precedent. This also put the judge in the politically uncomfortable position of having to sign off approving any future prosecution.
- The judge understood that lawyers on both sides were trying to paint her into a corner. Instead of signing off on the agreement, she asked questions and demanded answers in open court. The lawyers on both sides were unable to explain themselves to her satisfaction. When Do(In)J lawyers attempted to claim that Hunter Biden would be able to be prosecuted under FARA, the defense team threw the BS flag, as they believed FARA was fully part of the plea bargain (it was, and the feds were lying in open court). This was the point where the judge stopped the festivities, sending both sides back to their room to try again.
- At this point, time is on the side of both prosecutors and the defense, as the more days, weeks and months pass, more things fall on other side of the statute of limitations moving timeline. Everything that is, other than obstruction of justice for the participants. Everyone participating in this charade on the Do(In)J side intentionally delaying prosecutions or investigations is a potential perp, available for future prosecution. Hope using your position as a lawyer for the People of the United States to defend the Biden Crime Family was worth it, guys.
2. Efficiency. Next on the rolling Biden hit parade on your way of life are new efficiency standards for hot water heaters. The new rule goes into effect 2029 and will require substantial changes in technology. All new electric water heaters must use heat pump technology rather than conventional storage. All natural gas fired hot water heaters must use condensing technology (bad news) to fall in line with the new standards. And what do we all get with the shiny new federally-mandated crapware? Jennifer Granholm’s Department of (No)Energy pulled claims of saving nearly $198 billion and reduction of over 500 million tons of CO2 emissions over 50 years out of their favorite bodily orifice and waved it around for their media cheerleaders. Both numbers are garbage. As it turns out, I do have personal experience with a high efficiency forced air furnace here in Alaska. It also had condensing technology. Forced air furnaces up here last 10 – 15 years. Old one dies. I replace it with a new high efficiency one, which bricks itself a mere 7 years of use. And yes, it happened in the middle of winter, which is a whole other exciting story. Went through the same fire drill with high efficiency washing machine and dryer set. Both died about half the useful lifetime. Managed to replace both with commercial equipment not subject to the “helpful” new efficiency rules. I would strongly suggest that readers contact their congress critters and shut this foolishness down. We don’t want to be forced to purchase anything. For the most part, we simply want to be left alone to live our lives as we have chosen to do so.
3. Israel. The Netanyahu government passed the first of several chunks of judicial reform a week or so ago. This first piece removed the ability of the Israeli Supreme Court to make up their own government policy on the basis of what they believe is reasonable. Over the last 30 years, the Israeli Supreme Court has unilaterally grabbed the power to make policy and to appoint their own replacements and other judges. This has led to an uncontrollable, unaccountable, and a very, very leftist court system. Protests against the legislation have been loud, continuous, well-orchestrated and hysterical. International leftists including the Biden Regime, banksters and media have been in lockstep opposition. Yet Netanyahu and his fractious majority have so far persisted. Pray that they continue.
4. FFL. This week’s FFL story demonstrates that the anti-gunners in the Biden Regime have shifted targets from buyers to sellers, with nearly 2,000 forced out of business over paperwork mistakes. Over the last two years, the BATFE has permanently revoked licenses over minor paperwork errors. They are calling this program zero tolerance when it is in reality an end run around firearms laws. Gun Owners of America fired a lawsuit in federal court a couple weeks ago asking for an injunction to the zero-tolerance policy and declare that the BATFE is acting unconstitutionally, arbitrarily and capriciously contrary to law in application of standards for revocation of federal firearms licenses (FFLs). While there were only 88 licenses revoked in 2022 (up from 8 in 2021), the number of “voluntary” FFL surrenders following an inspection increased from 96 in 2020 to 789 in 2021 to 1,037 in 2022. This is all likely due to the same technique described last week, with a raid, seizure of all firearms on the premises, and a promise to drop charges if the FFL is surrendered. The firearm transfer information is recorded in the Form 4473. It originally had 30 discrete information items. Those have increased to over 100 due to regulatory bloat by the BATFE. More entries generally equal more errors, with a nearly 44% error rate found in 2020 inspections. This makes what the BATFE is doing as easy as taking candy from a baby. BATFE is declaring that any error found is “willful” which in turn allows them to grab the weapons and FFL. What is a willful error? A “G” that looks like a “6” or vice versa. The tone between FFL holders and inspectors has significantly deteriorated over the last few years, where guilty until proven innocent now all the rage on the BATFE side.
5. Paxton. Some additional information about the impeachment of Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and his impending trial by the Texas Senate. Mark Pullam in The Federalist and Misrule of Law calls it The Establishment Plots a Coup in the Lone Star State. In it, he makes the case that this is Texas RINOs going after a Tea Party favorite. He reminds everyone of the lawfare operated against former governor Rick Perry, former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, and then Texas Treasurer (and future US Senator) Kay Bailey Hutchison. Paxton’s real crime appears to have been winning the Texas Attorney General election in 2014 over a RINO who thought he had the election sewn up. In response, the loser and his supporters unleashed a series of frivolous criminal charges against Paxton. Paxton has been elected three times and is a real thorn in the side of the Republican establishment in Texas. They are concerned over his election and voting fight in Houston and that he may decide to run for Governor. This is why he was impeached over charges of doing favors. Here’s where it gets interesting. Only two elected officials have been removed from office in Texas via impeachment, the first a century ago. The impeachment allegations were well known before and during the 2022 election. In Nov 2022, Paxton was elected with nearly 4.3 million votes. Under Texas law, there is a strong argument that an elected official cannot be removed from office for misconduct if the offenses were known before the last election and were a matter of public record. The Texas Supreme Court has previously ruled against removal in such a case. This is ugly and will get worse.
6. DART. Nearly a year ago, the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft crashed a 580 kg spacecraft into a 150 m rubble pile asteroid (Dimorphos) at a speed of 6.5 km/sec. The test was an attempt to find out if an impact could change the orbit of the target. Dimorphos is in orbit around a larger asteroid, Didymos. If we can physically change the orbit of an asteroid via an impact, this tells us something about using impacts to deflect future asteroids and comets on collision course to earth. DART was the first attempt. Much to everyone’s surprise, the expected change in orbital period was around 73 seconds. It actually changed it by 33 minutes, telling us that the rubble pile was a lot less dense than originally thought. When the impact took place, it ejected a massive jet of material. Observations by Hubble released last week also found a cloud of boulders, perhaps 0.1% of the original mass of the asteroid, were photographed as they drifted away from Dimorphos. Essentially, the impact created a cloud of at least 37 boulders visible from earth orbit. These rocks range from 1 – 7 m in diameter. All in all, a successful first test, but a test nonetheless. Better yet, we learned something unexpected. There will be others and we will learn a bit more. Planetary defense? What a concept.
More later –
- AG