IMHO it still does. Harry should check out Feathers of Hope. I can't imagine any lawyer of any persuasion endorsing gestapo tactics. if Harry and his coleagues (and the Media) would concentrate on Feathers of Hope, we could get rid of the fascists and the band of thieves. https://jerryweiss.substack.com/p/to-stop-the-coup-impeach-the-traitor
Harry -- you are too young to remember Joe Duggan ....
Every last one of these MAGA MAROONS should be up before the Bar association. What's taking so long for the Bar to be reacting to their unethical actions?
Perhaps even the ABA is fearful of their threats? They’re probably grateful they’re not in this mix, but they need to be I agree.
This egregious and anti-Constitutional, unethical and corrupt regime must be brought down. Martin, Bondi, are not there to serve the People by our Constitution, but trump himself. They are a clear and present danger to the entire nation.
While it's not impossible it's extrmely unikely in the short - medium term. And the reason why is that most congressional MAGAs are on board with one or more of the following: Project 2025, the tech bros, the crypto guys, the Koch Network folks.
The thing making some MAGA congress members uncomfortable is this: they prefer to commit their abuse and destruction using a surgical grade scalpel vs the dirty, ragged kitchen knife wielded by Trump, Musk and their more rabid cult members.
Where I live 3 Cuban American MAGATS represent a Dem majority. 2 of the 3 were former Dems. They have formally protested ill treatment of their own people, who are depicted by most Republicans as DEI. Injustices are exposed here daily, like shipping valid visa holders for deportation. Like firing fed workers who are Republicans on pretexts.
Jerry has been working at this for some time. Check out his Substack.
I don't know where you live, but all politics is local. Republicans on the Canadian border are acutely aware how it affcets them, up close and personal.
If I were Jefrfries, I'd offer the Foreign Intelligence Committee to Mike Turner, R. Ohio.
As it happens I live in Michigan just a couple of hours from the Canadian border. Sorry you are so wrapped up in your narrative you couldn't be bothered toactually respond to what I said in my post.
But I have question. What's the association between this Feathers of Hope you're so keen on and the Christian fiction novel Feathers of Hope by Sharon Garlough Brown?
Nicely written, but depressing by the facts. I guess this is the new world, now, a world driven by retribution, cowardice, and playground-level vengeance. To the professional men and women still trying to do their duty, may they be granted all strength and courage.
Harry, I value your column and your podcast so much, have listened for years. But it is shattering to read this. I don't know what to do with the grief. I do my little bits of financial support, I write my blue-state senators and congressman, and I encourage my friends in red states to do so as well. I have a deep sense--having listened to you, and Preet, and Joyce White Vance, and Barb McQuade, and many others over the past eight years--of what the DoJ has been, to you and to this country and so to me and my loved ones. I can't bear hearing about it now. It's like listening to a slaughter, live, in real time. I can't imagine what it takes for you to write about it. Please keep us informed. I will keep reading and listening and looking for what else I can do to someday turn it around and make it sane again. I'm just so, so sorry for your loss, and for all the people like Joshua Stueve who are losing a lifetime's care and honor and work.
Completely endorse this comment; I was just thinking exactly the same as a read this post, almost verbatim. I have the same sense of helplessness, as I have been donating to various groups defending democracy and the rule of law, going to protests and indivisible meetings and writing increasingly frantic emails to various senators and reps, and it feels futile. Law and justice move slowly and the lust for political power seems to be paramount.
Jane Rabbit and Salt & Pepper, I third this sentiment. Always feels as if all our donating, protesting, writing calling speaking out canvassing.... amounted to nothing. Washed away like sandcastles at high tide.
But we owe it to the "ones who went before" to keep up our spirit of Unreasonable Optimism. Granted I will never have to escape a plantation in the wee hours of night with attack dogs tracing my scent; I won't be forced to work long hours for no pay, see my children sold away from me, nor get my head bashed in while marching over the Pettus Bridge; I likely won't be rounded up, stripped of my citizenship, and made to live in segregated Bantustans with no vote and no recourse. I won't be imprisoned & given 74 lashes for making a truthful movie. My town will probably not be invaded and burnt to the ground by people whose ancestors forcibly brought my ancestors here and who are now outraged at me for existing.
If this sounds melodramatic, so be it. Gets me through the day. That and bleak humor.
Imagine how THEY felt.
Imagine how they FELT.
So I owe it to Harriet Tubman, to enslaved people everywhere now and in the past, to the Selma-to-Montgomery marchers, to the non-white South Africans under apartheid, to Soheila Golestani, to the Americans and their descendants who endured the Tulsa Race Massacre and died while *still* being denied justice over a century later... not to give in to despair.
I owe it to President Zelenskyy - did you see his dry humor at work this past week on Xitter? Bouncing back from the Friday Debacle and focusing on next steps with PM Starmer? Practical, upbeat, goal-oriented. What an amazing role model. Too bad there's no "Grace under Pressure" category for the Nobel Prize🏆
We can do this. We can keep doing the things. Maybe not every day. But we WILL overcome. Be stubborn. Be absurd. Persist. Maybe it IS futile for us. But not for those who come after. ✊💙
Yes. We can and we must and we will. And we are so incredibly lucky to have had the lives we've had so far. Lock arms and carry on! There are more of us than there are of them. And we won't quit.
Even if Trump and his goons get ousted, it's going to take years for this country to do a full reset of everything and then rebuild from the ground up. Very sad that the generation I'm in is going to go through massive turmoil, and we may not even get to be around when things get better in the distant future.
Yeah, it won't be done in one administration or a dozen. This is appalling and unconstitutional, and I hope scrotus gets a case that enables them to throw out all the bums. Yes, I know that's pie in the sky dreams, but I do hope there are enough true Americans on that disgusting court who care about the constitution.
That is the end goal - not to resurrect it. They are selling off buildings & office leases. Intentionally make it a bad thing to work for the government to disincentive anyone from a civil service career. Leave an empty shell for the next administration whom if are to run a normal government will be handicapped from the start. No funds will be budgeted to rebuild, and the , waste, fraud & abuse' will be the anthem du jour.
Word up! And here I thought Reagan was a disaster. Well, we got through that nightmare somehow, and the Dubya years, and I lived to see the Obama era. They can't take that away from us ✊ So, maybe after we get through this, something wonderful will happen that we can't even imagine right now. Meanwhile - hard fight, yup. Here we go. #persist !
So, so, so sad that we've elected a mob boss and autocrat wannabe whose every word and deed reinforces his many qualifications for that role: he lacks a moral compass, he is greedy, he is cruel, he puts his relatives and capos into seats of power and protects them while they loot and pilliage through the good graces of his crooked judges.
The cabinet's whole objective is pushing the Project 2025 mandates to "dismantle the government". Why are we stuck watching it unfold to allow the judicial process its slow movement? For instance, Marc Rubio trying to send USAID funds but Musk having Big Balls stop them "via the server".
Taking the oath is one thing but these folks do not consider the US Constitution as what they are following. There has to be a shadow government because what they are doing is straight out of P2025 and any idiot on the planet knows you do not do an audit by attaching servers to a system. The BS sent to the public about "read only" is crap. So there are no ethics from the Trump side, they want no regulation, nothing in their way from the Heritage Foundation agenda and you can hear them manipulating the public view every time they claim publicly that they are in the right because the executive office "has that power" when if you read the Constitution, they do not.
So eloquently written Harry. Your words here, when it comes to the matter of independence in our judiciary in all its manifestations, ring true to me. My field has been public health. We are at a crossroads there too. The catastrophe that is potentially on the horizon will be unlike anything we have seen since the great plagues that hit and changed Europe forever. I remain with you in dedication though. I am at another corner of the field, standing guard in my honor of my commitment to duty.
I spent most of my career in federal court and I know in what high regard the court, at least the very large border district I worked in, holds for AUSAs. This is heartbreaking, wrong, and portends the end of democracy as we know it. I don't know what else they'll call it, but it is dishonorable and disgusting.
(1) make a false statement of fact or law to a tribunal or fail to correct a false statement of material fact or law previously made to the tribunal by the lawyer;
(2) fail to disclose to the tribunal legal authority in the controlling jurisdiction known to the lawyer to be directly adverse to the position of the client and not disclosed by opposing counsel; or
(3) offer evidence that the lawyer knows to be false. If a lawyer, the lawyer’s client, or a witness called by the lawyer, has offered material evidence and the lawyer comes to know of its falsity, the lawyer shall take reasonable remedial measures, including, if necessary, disclosure to the tribunal. A lawyer may refuse to offer evidence, other than the testimony of a defendant in a criminal matter, that the lawyer reasonably believes is false.
(b) A lawyer who represents a client in an adjudicative proceeding and who knows that a person intends to engage, is engaging or has engaged in criminal or fraudulent conduct related to the proceeding shall take reasonable remedial measures, including, if necessary, disclosure to the tribunal.
(c) The duties stated in paragraphs (a) and (b) continue to the conclusion of the proceeding, and apply even if compliance requires disclosure of information otherwise protected by Rule 1.6.
(d) In an ex parte proceeding, a lawyer shall inform the tribunal of all material facts known to the lawyer that will enable the tribunal to make an informed decision, whether or not the facts are adverse.
Can there be silver lining is this playbook? I imagine the quality of lawyermanship at DoJ is going to slip some due to the resignations, firings and transfers, and low morale. Hopefully, it will become easier to win the scores of cases being brought against the government. Maybe some DoJ lawyers will get so pissed at the toxic workplace atmosphere that they will make preventable mistakes or by other means cease to be effective counsel, i.e. lose on purpose. One can hope.
Absolutely. If Senator Robert C. Byrd could go from a KKK-chapter-organizing young arch conservative to an older wiser Civil Rights supporter who was honest about his past and the shame he felt;
then there's hope for any one of these currently misguided cogs in the destruction machine to have a change of heart and start acting up. Just don't know which ones yet.
Really good point about the mediocrity index changing the odds - i actually laughed out loud - thanks!🤣
Once “taking an oath” meant something … now it’s just a smirk and a knowing nod—more worthlessness from the MAGA bully boys.
The inmates are running the asylum that our government --White House/Congress/Cabinet/SCOTUS has become.
Like “King of Hearts” … but unfunny and inhumane.
IMHO it still does. Harry should check out Feathers of Hope. I can't imagine any lawyer of any persuasion endorsing gestapo tactics. if Harry and his coleagues (and the Media) would concentrate on Feathers of Hope, we could get rid of the fascists and the band of thieves. https://jerryweiss.substack.com/p/to-stop-the-coup-impeach-the-traitor
Harry -- you are too young to remember Joe Duggan ....
Every last one of these MAGA MAROONS should be up before the Bar association. What's taking so long for the Bar to be reacting to their unethical actions?
Don’t hold your breath waiting on the bar associations. Chief exhibit: Rudy Giuliani. Took the bar 4(?)years to act. They are always last to act.
Not talking about that. E.G. Some Republican members were prosecutors. May, if pressed, stand up. The only issue in common is treason.
Perhaps even the ABA is fearful of their threats? They’re probably grateful they’re not in this mix, but they need to be I agree.
This egregious and anti-Constitutional, unethical and corrupt regime must be brought down. Martin, Bondi, are not there to serve the People by our Constitution, but trump himself. They are a clear and present danger to the entire nation.
Most say they are patriotic. Some are lawyers first, political appointees second. Many of the Trump appointees obey the oath and rule agianst him.
No, they don't.
In the 2000 cycle, dozens of his appointees ruled against him.
and meant nothing.
I think the issue for you, Daniel, is "imagining" rather than assessing the actual facts.
I actually KNOW MAGATS who have flipped. Why not Congreessional MAGATS?
While it's not impossible it's extrmely unikely in the short - medium term. And the reason why is that most congressional MAGAs are on board with one or more of the following: Project 2025, the tech bros, the crypto guys, the Koch Network folks.
The thing making some MAGA congress members uncomfortable is this: they prefer to commit their abuse and destruction using a surgical grade scalpel vs the dirty, ragged kitchen knife wielded by Trump, Musk and their more rabid cult members.
Treason is another matter altogether.
Where I live 3 Cuban American MAGATS represent a Dem majority. 2 of the 3 were former Dems. They have formally protested ill treatment of their own people, who are depicted by most Republicans as DEI. Injustices are exposed here daily, like shipping valid visa holders for deportation. Like firing fed workers who are Republicans on pretexts.
Jerry has been working at this for some time. Check out his Substack.
I don't know where you live, but all politics is local. Republicans on the Canadian border are acutely aware how it affcets them, up close and personal.
If I were Jefrfries, I'd offer the Foreign Intelligence Committee to Mike Turner, R. Ohio.
As it happens I live in Michigan just a couple of hours from the Canadian border. Sorry you are so wrapped up in your narrative you couldn't be bothered toactually respond to what I said in my post.
But I have question. What's the association between this Feathers of Hope you're so keen on and the Christian fiction novel Feathers of Hope by Sharon Garlough Brown?
https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/59353380-feathers-of-hope
It still means honor and duty to those who take them with integrity
Nicely written, but depressing by the facts. I guess this is the new world, now, a world driven by retribution, cowardice, and playground-level vengeance. To the professional men and women still trying to do their duty, may they be granted all strength and courage.
Harry, I value your column and your podcast so much, have listened for years. But it is shattering to read this. I don't know what to do with the grief. I do my little bits of financial support, I write my blue-state senators and congressman, and I encourage my friends in red states to do so as well. I have a deep sense--having listened to you, and Preet, and Joyce White Vance, and Barb McQuade, and many others over the past eight years--of what the DoJ has been, to you and to this country and so to me and my loved ones. I can't bear hearing about it now. It's like listening to a slaughter, live, in real time. I can't imagine what it takes for you to write about it. Please keep us informed. I will keep reading and listening and looking for what else I can do to someday turn it around and make it sane again. I'm just so, so sorry for your loss, and for all the people like Joshua Stueve who are losing a lifetime's care and honor and work.
Completely endorse this comment; I was just thinking exactly the same as a read this post, almost verbatim. I have the same sense of helplessness, as I have been donating to various groups defending democracy and the rule of law, going to protests and indivisible meetings and writing increasingly frantic emails to various senators and reps, and it feels futile. Law and justice move slowly and the lust for political power seems to be paramount.
Jane Rabbit and Salt & Pepper, I third this sentiment. Always feels as if all our donating, protesting, writing calling speaking out canvassing.... amounted to nothing. Washed away like sandcastles at high tide.
But we owe it to the "ones who went before" to keep up our spirit of Unreasonable Optimism. Granted I will never have to escape a plantation in the wee hours of night with attack dogs tracing my scent; I won't be forced to work long hours for no pay, see my children sold away from me, nor get my head bashed in while marching over the Pettus Bridge; I likely won't be rounded up, stripped of my citizenship, and made to live in segregated Bantustans with no vote and no recourse. I won't be imprisoned & given 74 lashes for making a truthful movie. My town will probably not be invaded and burnt to the ground by people whose ancestors forcibly brought my ancestors here and who are now outraged at me for existing.
If this sounds melodramatic, so be it. Gets me through the day. That and bleak humor.
Imagine how THEY felt.
Imagine how they FELT.
So I owe it to Harriet Tubman, to enslaved people everywhere now and in the past, to the Selma-to-Montgomery marchers, to the non-white South Africans under apartheid, to Soheila Golestani, to the Americans and their descendants who endured the Tulsa Race Massacre and died while *still* being denied justice over a century later... not to give in to despair.
I owe it to President Zelenskyy - did you see his dry humor at work this past week on Xitter? Bouncing back from the Friday Debacle and focusing on next steps with PM Starmer? Practical, upbeat, goal-oriented. What an amazing role model. Too bad there's no "Grace under Pressure" category for the Nobel Prize🏆
We can do this. We can keep doing the things. Maybe not every day. But we WILL overcome. Be stubborn. Be absurd. Persist. Maybe it IS futile for us. But not for those who come after. ✊💙
Yes. We can and we must and we will. And we are so incredibly lucky to have had the lives we've had so far. Lock arms and carry on! There are more of us than there are of them. And we won't quit.
Know neither Harry nor you are alone Jane.
Thanks. Grateful never to feel alone!
Even if Trump and his goons get ousted, it's going to take years for this country to do a full reset of everything and then rebuild from the ground up. Very sad that the generation I'm in is going to go through massive turmoil, and we may not even get to be around when things get better in the distant future.
Yeah, it won't be done in one administration or a dozen. This is appalling and unconstitutional, and I hope scrotus gets a case that enables them to throw out all the bums. Yes, I know that's pie in the sky dreams, but I do hope there are enough true Americans on that disgusting court who care about the constitution.
See Feathers of Hope.
That is the end goal - not to resurrect it. They are selling off buildings & office leases. Intentionally make it a bad thing to work for the government to disincentive anyone from a civil service career. Leave an empty shell for the next administration whom if are to run a normal government will be handicapped from the start. No funds will be budgeted to rebuild, and the , waste, fraud & abuse' will be the anthem du jour.
So very true. trump has totally destroyed our democracy. He's a DISGRACE AND A COWARD 😡. We've got a hard fight on our hands😢
Word up! And here I thought Reagan was a disaster. Well, we got through that nightmare somehow, and the Dubya years, and I lived to see the Obama era. They can't take that away from us ✊ So, maybe after we get through this, something wonderful will happen that we can't even imagine right now. Meanwhile - hard fight, yup. Here we go. #persist !
So, so, so sad that we've elected a mob boss and autocrat wannabe whose every word and deed reinforces his many qualifications for that role: he lacks a moral compass, he is greedy, he is cruel, he puts his relatives and capos into seats of power and protects them while they loot and pilliage through the good graces of his crooked judges.
AND crooked justices.
Don't forget Leigh that he plays very dangerous games that alarm many of our allies.
Martin has no prosecutorial experience? He can point fingers, can’t he? That’s the lowered bar.
The cabinet's whole objective is pushing the Project 2025 mandates to "dismantle the government". Why are we stuck watching it unfold to allow the judicial process its slow movement? For instance, Marc Rubio trying to send USAID funds but Musk having Big Balls stop them "via the server".
Taking the oath is one thing but these folks do not consider the US Constitution as what they are following. There has to be a shadow government because what they are doing is straight out of P2025 and any idiot on the planet knows you do not do an audit by attaching servers to a system. The BS sent to the public about "read only" is crap. So there are no ethics from the Trump side, they want no regulation, nothing in their way from the Heritage Foundation agenda and you can hear them manipulating the public view every time they claim publicly that they are in the right because the executive office "has that power" when if you read the Constitution, they do not.
See Feathers of Hope.
The unasked question: How much will these frivolous lawsuits cost our waste-cutting patriots before they’re thrown out of court?
So eloquently written Harry. Your words here, when it comes to the matter of independence in our judiciary in all its manifestations, ring true to me. My field has been public health. We are at a crossroads there too. The catastrophe that is potentially on the horizon will be unlike anything we have seen since the great plagues that hit and changed Europe forever. I remain with you in dedication though. I am at another corner of the field, standing guard in my honor of my commitment to duty.
I spent most of my career in federal court and I know in what high regard the court, at least the very large border district I worked in, holds for AUSAs. This is heartbreaking, wrong, and portends the end of democracy as we know it. I don't know what else they'll call it, but it is dishonorable and disgusting.
https://www.americanbar.org/groups/professional_responsibility/publications/model_rules_of_professional_conduct/rule_3_3_candor_toward_the_tribunal/
Rule 3.3: Candor Toward the Tribunal
(a) A lawyer shall not knowingly:
(1) make a false statement of fact or law to a tribunal or fail to correct a false statement of material fact or law previously made to the tribunal by the lawyer;
(2) fail to disclose to the tribunal legal authority in the controlling jurisdiction known to the lawyer to be directly adverse to the position of the client and not disclosed by opposing counsel; or
(3) offer evidence that the lawyer knows to be false. If a lawyer, the lawyer’s client, or a witness called by the lawyer, has offered material evidence and the lawyer comes to know of its falsity, the lawyer shall take reasonable remedial measures, including, if necessary, disclosure to the tribunal. A lawyer may refuse to offer evidence, other than the testimony of a defendant in a criminal matter, that the lawyer reasonably believes is false.
(b) A lawyer who represents a client in an adjudicative proceeding and who knows that a person intends to engage, is engaging or has engaged in criminal or fraudulent conduct related to the proceeding shall take reasonable remedial measures, including, if necessary, disclosure to the tribunal.
(c) The duties stated in paragraphs (a) and (b) continue to the conclusion of the proceeding, and apply even if compliance requires disclosure of information otherwise protected by Rule 1.6.
(d) In an ex parte proceeding, a lawyer shall inform the tribunal of all material facts known to the lawyer that will enable the tribunal to make an informed decision, whether or not the facts are adverse.
I cannot thank you enough for all you do to keep us informed.
So heartbreaking. I have no background in Law, just a ton of sympathy and hugs to give to the heroes 😢
Thank you, Harry. They are such hypocrites and their supporters cruel.
And their kings are the true psychopaths. Worse than Hannibal Lecter could even think up, if he were real, that is.
and what do we do about it?
Can there be silver lining is this playbook? I imagine the quality of lawyermanship at DoJ is going to slip some due to the resignations, firings and transfers, and low morale. Hopefully, it will become easier to win the scores of cases being brought against the government. Maybe some DoJ lawyers will get so pissed at the toxic workplace atmosphere that they will make preventable mistakes or by other means cease to be effective counsel, i.e. lose on purpose. One can hope.
Absolutely. If Senator Robert C. Byrd could go from a KKK-chapter-organizing young arch conservative to an older wiser Civil Rights supporter who was honest about his past and the shame he felt;
then there's hope for any one of these currently misguided cogs in the destruction machine to have a change of heart and start acting up. Just don't know which ones yet.
Really good point about the mediocrity index changing the odds - i actually laughed out loud - thanks!🤣