Parler Shutdown In Latest Attack on Free Speech On The Internet

 Jonathan Turley gets it right again on the Parler shutdown.

The liberal attack on free speech continues.

That many main-stream Leftists and Rightists favor limitations on our speech is frightening.  The kind of censorship taking place now has never led to a better place.

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Recently, millions of supporters of Twitter reportedly left that company due to its continued censoring of viewpoints and the permanent banning of President Donald Trump. Many went to the more open forum offered by Parler — making it the number one item on Apple’s App store. Apple, Google, and other companies then moved to cut off Parler, which has now been shutdown. In so doing, these companies eliminate any alternative to their own controlled platforms. It is a major threat to free speech. Yet, the silence of academic and many free speech advocates is striking and chilling.

Apple issued a statement that “We have always supported diverse points of view being represented on the App Store, but there is no place on our platform for threats of violence and illegal activity.” So Parler can operate only if Apple and Google are satisfied that it is engaging in the same controversial policies of censorship. Parler is based on the original concept of the Internet as an open forum for free speech.

I admittedly know little about Parler, but it does not matter beyond the fact that this is an alternative forum for free speech. I am an unabashed Internet originalist. I have long opposed the calls for censorship under the pretense of creating “an honest Internet.” We have have been discussing how writers, editors, commentators, and academics have embraced rising calls for censorship and speech controls, including President-elect Joe Biden and his key advisers. The erosion of free speech has been radically accelerated by the Big Tech and social media companies. The level of censorship and viewpoint regulation has raised questions of a new type of state media where companies advance an ideological agenda with political allies.

As I have previously written, we are witnessing the death of free speech on the Internet. What is particularly concerning is the common evasion used by academics and reporters that this is not really a free speech issue because these are private companies. The First Amendment is designed to address government restrictions on free speech. As a private entity, Twitter is not the subject of that amendment. However, private companies can still destroy free speech through private censorship. It is called the “Little Brother problem.” President Trump can be chastised for converting a “Little Brother” into a “Big Brother” problem. However, that does alter the fundamental threat to free speech. This is the denial of free speech, a principle that goes beyond the First Amendment. Indeed, some of us view free speech as a human right.

Consider racial or gender discrimination. It would be wrong regardless if federal law only banned such discrimination by the government. The same is true for free speech. The First Amendment is limited to government censorship, but free speech is not limited in the same way. Those of us who believe in free speech as a human right believe that it is morally wrong to deny it as either a private or governmental entity. That does not mean that there are not differences between governmental and private actions. For example, companies may control free speech in the workplaces. They have a recognized right of free speech. However, the social media companies were created as forums for speech. Indeed, they sought immunity on the false claim that they were not making editorial decisions or engaging viewpoint regulation. No one is saying that these companies are breaking the law in denying free speech. We are saying that they are denying free speech as companies offering speech platforms.

If Pelosi demanded that Verizon or Sprint interrupt calls to stop people saying false or misleading things, the public would be outraged. Twitter serves the same communicative function between consenting parties; it simply allows thousands of people to participate in such digital exchanges. Those people do not sign up to exchange thoughts only to have Dorsey or some other internet overlord monitor their conversations and “protect” them from errant or harmful thoughts.

Much of our free speech today occurs on private sites like Twitter and Facebook. The Democrats want private companies to censor or label statements deemed misleading. Such a system would evade First Amendment conflict but it would have an even greater likely impact on free speech than direct government monitoring.

How A Snap Impeachment Could Shatter Our Constitutional Balance

 Here is Jonathan Turley's wisdom, again.

It is not generally appreciated that legal, but ill-advised actions can destroy a country just as effectively as sedition.

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Below is my column in the Hill newspaper on my concerns over the planned “snap impeachment” this year. In my view, impeaching on the speech alone would raise serious concerns over the use of impeachment in the future. Many Democrats, including members of Congress, refused to accept Trump as the legitimate president when he was elected and refused to do so as rioting broke out at the inauguration. Many of the same members have used the same type of rhetoric to “take back the country” and “fight for the country.” The concern is that this impeachment will not only create precedent for an expedited pathway of “snap impeachments” but allow future Congresses to impeach presidents for actions of their supporters. The point of this column is to call for greater caution and deliberation before we take this step to consider the basis and implications of this impeachment. As with the calls to use the 25th Amendment, there are real dangers to any opportunistic or hurried use of this option. There is also the alternative of a joint and bipartisan condemnation of both houses, which would be both justified and unassailable.

As I have said, there could be evidence to support impeachment on the proposed incitement article but it would have to be found before or after the speech to show an intent to spark rioting or to allow it to continue. As with the 25th Amendment claim, such evidence would be found from within the White House and through a traditional impeachment inquiry.

Here is the column:

Author Franz Kafka once wrote, “My guiding principle is this: Guilt is never to be doubted.” Congressional Democrats appear close to adopting that Kafkaesque standard into the Constitution as they prepare for a second impeachment of President Trump. In seeking his removal for “incitement,” Democrats would gut not only the impeachment standard but free speech, all in a mad rush to remove Trump just days before the end of his term.

Democrats are seeking to remove Trump on the basis of his speech to supporters before the Jan. 6 rioting at the U.S. Capitol. Like many, I condemned that speech as it was still being given, calling it reckless and wrong. I also opposed the challenges to electoral votes in Congress. However, Trump’s speech does not meet the definition of incitement under the U.S. criminal code. Indeed, it would be considered protected speech by the Supreme Court.

When I testified in both the Clinton and Trump impeachment hearings, I noted that an article of impeachment does not have to be based on a clear crime but that Congress historically has looked to the criminal code to weigh impeachment offenses. In this current controversy, any such comparison would quickly dispel claims of criminal incitement. Despite widespread, justified condemnation of his words, Trump never actually called for violence or a riot. Rather, he urged his supporters to march on the Capitol to express opposition to the certification of electoral votes and to support the challenges being made by some members of Congress. He expressly told his followers “to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.”

Such electoral-vote challenges have been made by Democrats in past elections under the Electoral Count Act, and Trump was pressing Republican lawmakers to join the effort on his behalf. He stated: “Now it is up to Congress to confront this egregious assault on our democracy…And after this, we’re going to walk down – and I’ll be there with you – we’re going to walk down … to the Capitol and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women.”

He ended his speech by saying a protest at the Capitol was meant to “try and give our Republicans, the weak ones … the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country. So let’s walk down Pennsylvania Avenue.” Such marches are common — on both federal and state capitols — to protest or to support actions occurring inside.

The governing legal standard for violent speech is found in Brandenburg v. Ohio. As a free speech advocate, I have long criticized that 1969 case and what I consider its dangerously vague standard. However, even Brandenburg would treat Trump’s speech as protected by the First Amendment. Under that case, the government can criminalize speech that is “directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.”

There was no call for lawless action by Trump. Instead, there was a call for a protest at the Capitol. Moreover, violence was not imminent; the vast majority of the tens of thousands of protesters present were not violent before the march, and most did not riot inside the Capitol. Like many violent protests we have witnessed over the last four years, including Trump’s 2017 inauguration, the criminal conduct was carried out by a smaller group of instigators. Capitol police knew of the planned march but declined an offer of National Guard personnel because they did not view violence as likely.

Thus, Congress is about to seek the impeachment of a president for a speech that is protected under the First Amendment. It would create precedent for the impeachment of any president who can be blamed for the violent acts of others after the use of reckless or inflammatory language.

What is even more unnerving are the few cases that would support this type of action. The most obvious is the 1918 prosecution of socialist Eugene Debs, who spoke passionately against the draft in World War I and led figures like President Wilson to declare him a “traitor to his country.” Debs was arrested and charged with sedition, the new favorite term of today’s Democratic leaders to denounce Trump and Republican members who challenged the Biden victory.

In 1919, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote for a unanimous bench in one of the most infamous decisions to issue from the Supreme Court. The court dismissed Debs’ free speech rights and held that it was sufficient that his words had the “natural tendency and reasonably probable effect” of deterring people from supporting the war.

That decision was a disgrace — but Democrats are now arguing something even more extreme as the basis for impeachment. Under their theory, any president could be removed for rhetoric deemed to have the “natural tendency” to encourage others to act in a riotous fashion. Even a call for supporters to protest peacefully would not be a defense. It would be as if Debs first denounced the war but also encouraged people to enlist. This standard would allow for a type of vicarious impeachment — attributing conduct of third parties to a president for the purposes of removal.

Democrats are pushing this dangerously vague standard while objecting to their own statements being given incriminating meaning by critics. For example, conservatives have pointed to Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) calling for people to confront Republican leaders in restaurants; Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) insisted during 2020’s violent protests that “there needs to be unrest in the streets,” while then-Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) said “protesters should not let up” even as many protests were turning violent. They can all legitimately argue that their rhetoric was not meant to be a call for violence, but this is a standard fraught with subjectivity.

The damage caused by this week’s rioting was enormous — but it will pale in comparison to the damage from a new precedent of a “snap impeachment” for speech protected under the First Amendment. It is the very danger that the Framers sought to avoid in crafting the impeachment standard. In a process meant to require deliberative, not impulsive, judgments, the very reference to a “snap impeachment” is a contradiction in constitutional terms. In this new system, guilt is not to be doubted and innocence is not to be deliberated. It would do to the Constitution what the rioters did to the Capitol: Leave it in tatters.

Why the second wave of COVID-19?

 Here is a link to a post by Nic Lewis at judithcurry.com, "COVID-19: why did a second wave occur even in regions hit hard by the first wave?"

Some excerpts follow.

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Here are his key points.

The herd immunity threshold (HIT) depends positively on the basic reproduction number R0 and negatively on heterogeneity in susceptibility.

Since neither of the factors on which the HIT depends are fixed, the HIT is not fixed either.

R0 depends on biological, environmental and sociological factors; colder weather and the evolution of more transmissible strains likely both increase R0; more (less) cautious behaviour and social distancing / restrictions on mixing reduce (increase) R0.

Second waves were due primarily to changes in these factors increasing R0 and thus the HIT from below to above the existing level of population immunity.

Heterogeneity in susceptibility is partly biological, but social connectivity differences are key.

The effect of heterogeneity in susceptibility on the HIT can be represented by a single parameter λ.

λ will always exceed 1 (its level in a homogeneous population); pre-epidemic λ may be ~4. The higher λ is, the lower the HIT for any given R0.

The natural infection HIT is hence bound to be below the level of {1 – 1/R0} quoted by ‘experts’.

Government restrictions reduce λ as well as R0, so the HIT falls less than it would if λ were fixed.

The final size of an uncontrolled epidemic will substantially exceed the HIT, due to overshoot, so high reported seroprevalence levels can be consistent with a much lower HIT.

Here is his appendix, which attempts a layman's explanation.

The following discussion, which represents my semi-quantitative broad brush analysis of what has occurred, relates primarily to the progress of the epidemic in western Europe. However, it may also be somewhat applicable to the north east United States, where the epidemic took off only slightly later than in western Europe and where the seasonal variation in climate is also large.

In the initial stages of the first wave, which generally started in major cities, in early spring 2020, infections appear to have been doubling every three days or so prior to governments imposing restrictions or people becoming significantly more cautious. Depending on the assumed distribution of the generation interval (from one infection to those it directly leads to), that implies an R0 value of between 2 and 4.[14] I will assume a middle of the range R0 value of 3 for illustrative purposes. That would imply a HIT of 67% for a homogeneous population, reducing to 24% for a population with the highest degree of heterogeneity illustrated in Table 1, which might be expected to apply before people started behaving more cautiously and mixing less.

When people started mixing less, voluntarily or by government fiat, R0 would have reduced, but as discussed above λ will also have fallen. The combined effect of these changes can be visualised as moving diagonally upwards and leftwards in Table 1, from the green columns to the yellow columns and then to the salmon columns. The resulting reduction in the HIT would therefore be somewhat smaller than that implied by the reduction in R0 alone.

By late spring or early summer the first wave had largely faded, and it generally continued to decline after restrictions on mixing were at least partially relaxed. As summer progressed, people’s behaviour unsurprisingly returned closer to pre-epidemic norms. I will assume for illustrative purposes that the yellow columns (λ = 3) were representative of that period. Since by midsummer the epidemic appears to have been declining even where only a minor first wave had occurred, it seems that R0 must generally have declined to 1 or below, so that population immunity levels would everywhere have exceeded the HIT (which is only positive if R0 > 1).

As autumn arrived, infections and then serious illness started to rise again, although where testing was increasing the rise may have been exaggerated. It follows that R0 must have risen again, resulting in the HIT increasing to above the level of population immunity. An obvious explanation for the rise in R0 is seasonally reduced sun and cooler weather, with more contact occurring indoors, where almost all COVID-19 transmission appears to take place. A major increase in mixing among young people as school and, particularly, university terms started likely also boosted R0 and the level of infections in the autumn; young adults have generally had the highest incidence rates during the second wave.[15] In some places the rise in infections appears to have occurred slightly earlier, perhaps as a result of holidaymakers returning infected from areas where COVID-19 was more prevalent.[16]

Initially it seemed that some large cities where a significant proportion of the population had been infected in the first wave might be spared, but in most cases the increase in R0 evidently became sufficiently large to raise the HIT to above the level of population immunity. As a result of increasing infections, government-imposed restrictions were generally increased, which as well as reducing R0 will also have reduced the heterogeneity factor λ. This can be visualised as a move diagonally upwards from the yellow columns to the salmon columns. Those actions appear typically to have pushed Rt down to about 1, or slightly lower, which in the presence of a reasonable degree of existing population immunity implies an R0 level significantly above 1. With reduced heterogeneity, the existing level of population immunity causes a lesser reduction in Rt, relative to R0, but Rt will still be a smaller fraction of R0 than the proportion of the population that remains susceptible to infection.

In the UK, and possibly various other countries, a new lineage (B.1.1.7) of the SARS-CoV-2 virus has now emerged[17] and grown faster than existing ones, as discussed in a previous article[18]. Since writing that article, some further data has provided less indirect evidence that B.1.1.7 is 25–50% more infectious than pre-existing variants.[19] On the other hand, recent data from the regions where B.1.1.7 has become dominant suggests that it may now be growing no faster than other variants.[20] It has been suggested that the fast growth in the regions where B.1.1.7 now dominates may have been at least partly due to it spreading there in schools.[21] However, making for illustrative purposes the assumption that B.1.1.7 is actually 25–50% more infectious, R0 will have been increasing, perhaps typically reaching somewhere in the range1.5 to 2.0 once B.1.1.7 becomes the dominant variant, if R0 was previously in the 1.2 to 1.4 range.

Tougher restrictions that have been introduced in a number of countries in response to infection rates increasing, whether due to the spread of the B.1.1.7 lineage, to cold winter weather or to greater mixing, will have reduced population heterogeneity in social connectivity further. In these circumstances, is unclear whether existing levels of population immunity will suffice to prevent further growth of the B.1.1.7 lineage, or the rather similar one that has emerged in South African, even with severe restrictions being introduced. However, increased population immunity resulting from some combination of further spread of infections and vaccination programmes, the combination varying from one country and region to another, should bring COVID-19 epidemics under control within the next few months.

Government screws up again – the Astra-Zeneca COVID-19 vaccine story

 From John Cochrane's blog.

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From Alex Tabarrok at Marginal Revolution, quoting Marty Makary, M.D., a professor of surgery and health policy at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine:

... the FDA needs to stop playing games and authorize the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine. It’s safe, cheap ($2-$3 a dose), and is the easiest vaccine to distribute. It does not require freezing and is already approved and being administered in the United Kingdom.

Sadly, the FDA is months away from authorizing this vaccine because FDA career staff members insisted on another clinical trial to be completed and are punishing the company for inadvertently giving a half-dose of the vaccine to some people in the trial.

It’s like the FDA is holding out, pontificating existing excellent data and being vindictive against a company for making a mistake while thousands of Americans die each day...

My emphasis. Alex:

See also my post The AstraZeneca Factory in Baltimore. Thousands of people are dying every day. We have a vaccine factory ready to go. The FDA should lifts its ban on the AstraZeneca vaccine.

Alex understates the case. It is not just that "thousands of people are dying every day." It is that we are in the phase of exponential growth, and a new more infectious variant has just arrived bumping up the growth rate further. Every hour of delay means tens of thousands more will die.

We are in a fight of bureaucracy vs. exponential growth and evolution. Exponential growth and evolution are winning. Just how many thousands have to be on the left side of the trolley switch before the FDA stops allowing Astra-Zeneca to pull it? What's the risk aversion coefficient that justifies months of delay and another clinical trial?

More deeply, can the FDA ever figure out that the point here is to stop a pandemic? The mentality is traditional: we must provide a perfect vaccine to protect individuals, taking the disease as given, and people who die while we do more studies are worth the cost. That is simply not what's going on right now. The point of the vaccine is to stop a pandemic. The disease is growing exponentially, and mutating and evolving. The externality is everything. I know, it's awfully hard for bureaucracies to innovate and change mindset. Well, sometimes you have to.

For years the FDA was focused on, don't repeat thalidomide. Drugs must be safe. AIDS forced a hard reckoning. The people who are dying while you wait matter. But this is a third, even harder conceptual change. Stopping the spread of the disease matters. And the FDA does not have the years it took to make the AIDS change of mindset.

Alex, by the way, gets the award for most influential economist of the year. It looks like his campaign for first doses is going to be Biden Administration policy. Well done Alex!

But it turns out vaccine supply is not even the short run constraint, it is unbelievably snafued rationing rules. Virginia Postrel, summarizing many stories you've heard:

When the federal government turned state agencies into the country’s vaccine distributors, it bypassed the usual supply chains. Doctors and hospitals couldn’t get Covid-19 vaccines the way they order other inoculations.

Distribution also became politicized in ways that slow down vaccination. Every shot comes with a ton of paperwork, and the rationing rules are hard to understand. Who exactly qualifies as a health-care worker or an essential employee? Is it OK for hospitals to give shots to janitors or billing clerks?

In Minnesota hospitals, one doctor who asked to remain anonymous noted in an interview, “there was a lot of focus on scheduling appointments and dividing up by departments to be sure they were fair” even if that meant delaying vaccines and potentially letting some supplies go to waste. It’s a widespread problem.

As he threatens fines for hospitals that don’t use all their vaccines, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo also signed an executive order requiring providers to certify that every recipient qualifies under the current rationing protocol. Letting someone jump the queue now risks a $1 million fine and the loss of a state license. “If you wanted to make sure that rapidly expiring vaccines distributed in 10-dose vials end up in the trash, this is how you'd do it,” observed commentator Mason Hartman on Twitter.

Micromanagement is impeding the rollout. In South Carolina, for instance, a medical assistant often gives injections in a doctor’s office, and the job requires no special certification. For Covid-19 vaccines, however, the state says that even someone with decades of experience can’t administer a shot unless they have an official credential.

In Europe it is common to give yourself a shot, without a covid-risky trip to a doctor's office, stating in line, filling out paperwork and taking up half an hour of time of a highly trained person. I found this out one day many years ago, with a case of bronchitis. The pharmacist just handed me the shot and said go home, take this. It's not hard, folks. Amazon could just send it to you. Imperfect? Yes. Will there be problems? Yes. Will we beat evolution and exponential growth and save tens of thousands? Yes.

Distribution is hard enough without these roadblocks. Start with the numbers. At Kaiser Permanente facilities, a single vaccinator can give about 10 shots an hour, with much of the time spent filling out forms. To get to herd immunity, the U.S. needs to inject two doses several weeks apart to something like 240 million people. At 10 injections an hour, that’s 48 million hours of vaccinators’ time, 4.8 million hours a week over 10 weeks to get to early March. We’d need 120,000 vaccinators working 40-hour weeks. ...

10 shots an hour is very efficient. Other numbers I've heard go up to .5-1 person-hours per shot, including the paperwork and monitoring afterwards. The 1 hour per shot comes from nursing homes.

This is basic math. We are supposed to revere the "scientists" at FDA and CDC. Did anyone add up 240 million people (more likely 300, per Dr. Fauci), estimate person-hours per shot with all the restrictions, and figure out when the shots will be given?

The last thing we need in these circumstances are special restrictions on who can administer vaccines — restrictions that send the perverse message that vaccines against this disease are somehow more questionable than those against the flu or measles.

A correspondent reports:

I actually got the Moderna vaccine first dose yesterday. In a lot of US, including where I live, only certain healthcare workers are eligible for appointments so far. The limited size of the cohort and the fact a lot of healthcare workers don’t want it after actually having the virus, means appointments are being missed and vaccines wasted. I simply queued for an hour in a standby line last night at my local Safeway pharmacy. They had 8 vaccines reaching expiry if unused, and I was no. 6 in queue. I would have given up my slot for an elderly couple behind me, but there was enough for them too and those that missed out were all early 20s. Mad, Soviet-like system (queuing literally in the frozen meat section of the store for an hour or so), limited eligibility and queueing and I felt kinda dirty getting it, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to pass it up when it will be otherwise wasted.

Note this is a state where Safeway pharmacies are allowed to give it, and Gov. Cuomo will not fine then $10 million for letting my friend skip the line

In the U.K. I’m hearing even more insane stories. Only paying general practitioners cost price on delivery of the second dose, so some not bothering to offer it. And paying doctors nearly half the hourly rate they could obtain doing locum work. Penny wise and pound foolish. Literally: the U.K. currently has an incredibly expensive furlough scheme.

I am often asked, "what can the government do to solve x problem?" My stock answer is, get out of the way. It's not always right, but it's often a good start.

A Crisis Of Faith: Why We Should Be Worried More About A Desecration Than An Insurrection

Here is Jonathan Turley with his usual astute and on target analysis, this time of the Capital break-in.

The contrast with JT's writing and what you hear from most politicians, the media, and talking heads is breath-taking.

I expect a continuing and growing divisiveness, loss of our freedoms, trashing of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and taxes and regulations that hurt our economy.

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Below is my column in the Hill on the riot at Congress and its implications for our country. As shown by the unfounded rush for a “snap impeachment,” we are experiencing a crisis of faith in this country — not only in our Constitution but ourselves. Pushing for a snap vote (and snap judgment) on these issues will only exacerbate our divisions. This is a time for deliberative, not impulsive, action in Congress.

Here is the column:

All the images of protesters scaling the walls of the Capitol and briefly occupying Congress will remain seared in our collective memories for decades. Some called it a riot. Others called it an insurrection. Whatever you call it, it was a desecration. The rioters desecrated the most sacred moment of our constitutional system when the nation comes together to certify our next president. That is why it is too easy to treat this like an insurrection crisis. It is far more dangerous. It is a crisis of faith.

There were some truly dangerous people in this mix, such as the agitators who had pipe bombs and ropes. Groups like the Proud Boys and antifa have fulfilled these roles in violent riots on the left and the right for years. However, the vast majority of protesters on Wednesday were nonviolent. Indeed, if this was a real effort at insurrection, we can take great comfort that many of our homegrown revolutionaries have come across as more Groucho Marx than Karl Marx. Those in the Capitol were spread across the spectrum, from mocking to menacing. There were the various costumed characters but also men in camo with suspicious backpacks. Yet the guy taking a selfie with his feet on the desk of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi seemed more interested in Instagram than insurrection.

The ease with which protesters entered the Capitol was shocking. Despite reports in advance of their plans to march there, Capitol Police seemed undermanned and unprepared. Once inside, protesters seemed to have the run of the building. Many of them seemed as shocked as the members of Congress fleeing the House and Senate chambers. This has happened before, although not to this extent. When I was a young page in Congress, a protest by truckers led to an ornate Capitol building door getting broken down, followed by a rampage through the halls of Congress.

The media portrayed the disgraceful rioters as unimaginable. Yet it was entirely all too imaginable. We have had four years of violent protests, including the attacks on federal buildings, members of Congress, and symbols of our democracy. Former Attorney General William Barr was heavily criticized for clearing Lafayette Square last year after protesters injured numerous law enforcement officers, were injured themselves, burned a historic building, caused property damage, and threatened to breach the White House grounds. There were violent riots during the inauguration of Donald Trump and a lethal assault on some Republican lawmakers playing softball. Indeed, this year started as last year ended, with attacks on federal buildings in Portland and other cities.

Several people viewed those violent protests against the police and the White House as sedition, including Barr. I criticized such labeling of Black Lives Matter or antifa riots as sedition or terrorism. I view those labels as undermining free speech. As with the Black Lives Matter movement, I do not believe most of the protesters this week were rioters, let alone part of an insurrection. As with the protests last year, some instigators pushed for confrontations. But most were at the Capitol to voice an opposition to the certification of votes in an election they believe was stolen. I do not share that view, but it is held by some 40 percent of Americans.

What are these people if they are not insurgents or terrorists? The answer is they are faithless. We face a crisis of faith rather than of revolution. Our Constitution is an article of faith. This republic was founded by a leap of faith taken together by people of different backgrounds and beliefs. Yet the Constitution, no matter how well crafted, is ineffectual if people lose faith in its system or, just as important, in each other.

Our system is designed to give everyone skin in the game. It is meant to bring factional interests to the surface. Unlike those that ignore them, our Constitution forces those out into the open in Congress, where they can be voiced and addressed. Systems that ignore all such divisions explode from within, like in the history of France. Our system is based on a type of implosion in which those pressures are directed into Congress, where factional interests are turned into majority compromises.

The violence this week is not what James Madison hoped for in noting the factional interests in Congress. It was a bit too direct for a system based on representative democracy. However, that is precisely the point. Such action taken reflects the same crisis of faith that was evident in Lafayette Park and on the streets of Portland. That is far more dangerous than a few agitators using a protest to commit mayhem. It is not anarchy but instead alienation that we should fear the most in our nation.

For years, the public has shown a lack of trust and faith in our political system. There also is a wide rejection of the media, which once was a shared resource for information. The media has destroyed its credibility with years of bias, including blackouts on stories viewed as harmful to Democrats. Without faith in our leaders or the media, more than half of this nation appears to be untethered from the political system. That detachment is perilous for a representative government.

We need to hold accountable all those who committed violence in the Capitol. However, after we determine who stormed Congress and how they succeeded in doing it, we have a far more difficult task to address. After all, an insurrection can simply be put down, but a desecration is much more insidious and dangerous for our democracy.

The Lafayette Park Protests And The Revision Of History

 Jonathan Turley gets it right on the Left's revision of history and dishonesty.

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One of the most unsettling aspects of the last four years is the intentional effort to rewrite history in the media to fit a narrative either by denying facts or echoing clearly false statements. The recent stories on the riot in Congress is a good example. Most of us denounced Trump’s speech (as it was being given) and, of course, the rioting itself. Some, however, have noted that there have been violent protests for years, including the protest in Lafayette Square. The fact that there have been violent protests by the left does not take away from the disgraceful attack on Congress. Yet, there seems a controlling narrative that must be maintained at all costs — portraying past protests by groups on the left as peaceful to magnify the criticism of the recent violence in Congress. Even a site ironically called Media Matters published a piece not only calling the Lafayette protest peaceful but repeating a long discredited claim about the controversial Trump photo op. I testified in Congress on the Lafayette Park operation and the revisionism surrounding the controversy is alarming.

The Lafayette Park protests occurred over multiple days and the clearing operation was ordered as a result of a decision made before the final day to establish a greater perimeter to protect the White House complex and immediate surrounding area — much as the same fence perimeter was used last week on Capitol Hill. The operation was carried out, in my view, in an abusive way due to the level of force deployed and, as discussed below, the charging of the police line. They could have cleared the area without that level of force in my judgment, as I discussed in my testimony.

The Media Matters article by Bobby Lewis is illustrative an array of such media pieces. It was sent to my attention by a reader due to a reference to an interview that I did this week:

“Fox contributor Jonathan Turley compared the Capitol attack to “the Lafayette Park incident,” a June 2020 Black Lives Matter protest he falsely described as “an attack on the White House.” What actually happened was federal security forces tear-gassed protesters and media, without warning or serious provocation, in order to violently clear a path for a Trump photo-op in front of a church whose leaders did not want him there.”

Other sites have described the Lafayette Park protests as “peaceful.” One site called Quartz said the protests were “entirely peaceful” and objected that there was no “attack on the White House.”

That is simply not true. Quartz was open in how it construed the protest as peaceful by referring to only the final day. While that claim is contested by law enforcement which showed objects being thrown at police, it simply ignores that the order to clear the area was due to the preceding violence of the prior two days.

As discussed in my testimony, there was an exceptionally high number of officers injured during the protests around the White House complex. Some 150 officers were injured during the protests and half of those were injured around the White House. The Justice Department claimed 750 injured officers during the various protests. What is clear that is dozens of officers were injured and there are videotapes of officers hit by frozen bottles, bricks and other missiles. For two days, the violence continued with the burning of a historic structure, extensive property damage and the attempted burning down of the historic St. John’s Church. The attacks around the complex were so great that the President was moved into the bunker and officers said that they were concerned that the complex might be breached.

It is also untrue that the area was cleared “in order to violently clear a path for a Trump photo-op.” A wide array of witnesses and documents detailed how the plan to clear the area was put into motion over 24 hours before the actual operation — and long before any discussion of a photo op. The Park Police wanted to expand the perimeter to protect the White House and the plan was approved by then Attorney General Bill Barr. It was delayed because the officers were waiting for both fencing material and back-up personnel. When the personnel and fencing arrived, they proceeded with the operation. Barr repeatedly denied having knowledge of Trump’s desire for a photo op which arose long after the plan was approved.

At the hearing, I testified that I believed that there were unlawful actions taken in the operation. The final police charge appeared unjustified as was an attack on a media crew. I also criticized with the level of force used and suggested an array of inquiries for Congress to pursue in these areas of possible illegality.

However, the record and videotapes demonstrate that there was a high level of violence and destruction in Lafayette Park. Indeed, there are analogies to the situation at the Capitol. As with the Capitol, National Guard personnel were brought in after the violence had occurred. Indeed, in Lafayette Park, there was violence for two days before the deployment and the clearing of the area. In both situations, fencing was added to protect an expanded perimeter.

The point is not to defend either law enforcement operation. Indeed, I was highly critical of the clearing of Lafayette Park due to the excessive force used by the Park Police. However, it is simply not true that the Lafayette Park protests were peaceful as demonstrated by the high number of law enforcement injuries and extensive property damage. Even on the day of the clearing of the area, there was some violence. However, when the park was cleared, there was not the violence of the preceding days. That is why the level of force was excessive. The reports of a “peaceful” protest intentionally omits the violence leading up to the plan to expand the perimeter. The clearing of the park was not to address the immediate violence in the park. It was approved earlier to clear the park to protect the complex. Thus, there had been considerable violence and destruction but there was not such violence at the time of the clearing of the park. That is what happened in Lafayette Square.

I fail to see why such facts cannot be recognized and still criticize actions in both operations. Indeed, you can make the valid point that the effort to stop a constitutional act in Congress is a far greater threat to our system. Yet, there is no need to revise the facts to make those points. Indeed, they are more compelling when presented in a frank and honest way. We cannot reach a consensus as a nation if we are demanding answers based on diametrically opposed facts. There is clarity — and a truth — to be found in these incidents but it will take people of good faith to reach achieve that vital goal.

Left-wing Activists and the Capitol intrusion

The entire blame for the Capitol intrusion has been placed on Trump and his Supporters.  Now, there is evidence that there were Leftist Extremists that played a central role.  Here is an example from the Epoch Times.

Perhaps, in fairness, the entire blame for the Capitol intrusion should be placed on the Left for a few weeks.

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John Sullivan, videographer and founder of “a group for racial justice and police reform,” posted a video on YouTube on Jan. 7 that shows him entering the Capitol building in Washington with a group of Trump supporters and possibly others on the previous day. He’s heard on video encouraging others and convincing Capitol police to let the trespassers through at several impasses. The video also reveals further details about the situation that led to the death of Ashley Babbitt, an Air Force veteran shot inside the building by Capitol Police.

Sullivan is known for taking part in protests and riots connected with the Black Lives Matter movement, which was founded by Marxist organizers.

In July, he was arrested in Utah for alleged rioting, making a threat of violence, and criminal mischief due to his part in a protest that resulted in the shooting of a motorist.

“As a protest organizer, John Sullivan is heard talking about seeing the shooting, looking at the gun, and seeing smoke coming from it. John did not condemn the attempted murder nor attempt to stop it nor aide in its investigation by police,” the police affidavit said, Desert News reported.

“An armed revolution is the only way to bring about change effectively,” he said in a Dec. 28 tweet.

On Jan. 2, Sullivan wrote in a tweet: “[Expletive] The System – Time To Burn It All Down. #blm #antifa #burn #[expletive]thesystem #abolishcapitalism #abolishthepolice #acab #[expletive]trump.”

Sullivan also uses the moniker “Jayden X” online and is the founder of “Insurgence USA,” which describes itself as started “in 2020 in response to the Gorge Floyd tragedy,” referring to the Minnesota man who died after ingesting a potentially lethal amount of Fentanyl and was then pinned down during an arrest with a police officer kneeling on his neck.

The aim of Insurgence USA is “to empower and uplift black and indigenous voices” and “build local powers to enable the community to intervene in violence enacted by the state and government vigilantes,” the description of its YouTube channel says.

In his graphic video from the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol, Sullivan can be heard saying “let’s burn this [expletive] down,” before entering the building.

In response to criticism on Twitter, Sullivan responded by saying he was there only to report and his actions were “part of blending in, so I don’t get beat up.”

But the video shows he was actively helping convince Capitol police officers to let the trespassers through as well as encouraging the trespassers to continue pushing forward.

Shortly after entering the building through a broken window, Sullivan heads down a corridor, but then turns around and walks toward an entrance next to the broken window. A woman holding a camera enters the door and walks toward him. He doesn’t talk to her, turns around, and heads down the corridor again. He will talk to the woman later.

There appeared to be hundreds of people inside, wandering around.

Near the end of the corridor, Sullivan makes a right into another corridor. Several police officers on both sides are moving people along, preventing them from taking another turn. At the end of the corridor, there’s another entrance and several officers ushering people out.

When Sullivan reaches the door, he refuses to leave.

“I’m just recording the situation,” he tells one officer.

“You’ve got to do it from outside. C’mon guys,” the officer says.

The woman is seen keeping close to Sullivan.

“They are already inside, bro. Like, you’re not stopping anything from happening,” he tells the police.

The officers successfully get several more people out and seem to secure the door.

Sullivan manages to stay inside, arguing he can’t go out through this entrance because it’s blocked. The officers try to hold him and a small group of others near the door from going back deeper inside the building, but at one moment people just stream through to the corridor, Sullivan with them.

The group then rejoins the larger crowd inside, weaving their way through the building until reaching the majestic Capitol rotunda, a favorite tourist attraction lined with statues and paintings.

Sullivan sounds ecstatic about the experience.

“I never would have imagined that we would be here,” he says, talking to another man.

The woman then turns to Sullivan saying, “Let me give you a hug now. We did it. You were right. We did it.”

“Dude, I was trying to tell you. I couldn’t say much,” he replies.

There seems to be a short interruption in the video several seconds later.

The woman then says, “You aren’t recording, right?”

“I’ll delete that [expletive] up,” he replies. “But I didn’t record you I mean.”

He then enters another chamber.

“Do not deface the statues,” somebody says.

“I can respect the stat—well, people might burn this down, I’m not going to lie. So it might be too late for that,” he replies.

Shortly after, Sullivan and a group of other trespassers reaches the glass-pane door to the Speaker’s Lobby. The narrow corridor is barricaded from the other side with furniture.

Three police officers are standing in front of the door, guarding it. Some people shout at the officers. Jayden starts to talk to them.

“We want you to go home. I’m a reporter and there’s so many people. It’s just, they’re going to push their way up here. Bro, I’ve seen people out there get hurt. I don’t want to see you get hurt. We will make a path death [expletive] … Please, let us make a path. Just let us make a path. I want you to go home.”

The officers then walk away.

“Go. Go. Let’s go. Get this [expletive],” Sullivan shouts.

Three rioters proceed to break the door’s window panes with kicks, a flag pole, and a helmet.

“Yo! There’s a gun! There’s a gun! There’s a gun!” Sullivan shouts, his video showing a plainclothes police officer with his gun drawn in a door frame to the left on the other side of the glass-pane door. He’s aiming at the door.

“Hey, he’s got a gun!” somebody else shouts.

The rioters continue for a few more seconds, knocking two of the window panes out.

A graphic video taken by another person on the scene shows the first three officers leaving while four more officers with helmets and rifles stand by, just several feet from the door, one of them talking to a man in a black suit with a pin in the lapel.

A young woman climbs into one of the empty window frames. Her name is Ashli Babbitt.

The officer on the other side of the door fires a single shot, striking her in the neck.

She falls on her back.

One of the officers in helmets aims his rifle at the door. It appears he’s not sure who’s on the other side and who fired the shot. He quickly lowers the rifle and gestures. It appears he’s realized the shooter was a fellow officer.

The officers and some others try to help the woman.

Chaos intensifies.

“She’s dead. She’s dead,” Sullivan repeats.

Babbitt was pronounced dead on arrival at a hospital.

Sullivan didn’t immediately respond to questions submitted through a direct Twitter message.

Some advantages of rent control

It hurts Bad People, e.g., Landlords.

It makes Bad People pay the cost of providing what Good People view as a social good.

It makes it possible for Good People to do what is “right” using bad people’s money. In other words, it makes it possible to steal from Bad People.

It assures that prices and rents of new housing will be excessive.

It reduces the supply of housing from what it would otherwise be.

It assures that older housing will be ill maintained.

It assures a “housing shortage”.

It destroys whole sections of cities, e.g., the South Bronx in New York City.

Mark Twain: Quotes

...the citizen who thinks he sees that the commonwealth's political clothes are worn out, and yet holds his peace and does not agitate for a new suit, is disloyal; he is a traitor.

A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court

(Of course, both the Left and the Right see themselves in this role.)

You should never do anything wicked and lay it on your brother, when it is just as convenient to lay it on some other boy.

Advice for Good Little Boys

In the space of one hundred and seventy-six years the Lower Mississippi has shortened itself two hundred and forty-two miles. That is an average of a trifle over one mile and a third per year. Therefore, any calm person, who is not blind or idiotic, can see that in the Old Oolitic Silurian Period, just a million years ago next November, the Lower Mississippi River was upwards of one million three hundred thousand miles long, and stuck out over the Gulf of Mexico like a fishing-rod. And by the same token any person can see that seven hundred and forty-two years from now the Lower Mississippi will be only a mile and three-quarters long, and Cairo and New Orleans will have joined their streets together, and be plodding comfortably along under a single mayor and a mutual board of aldermen. There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesale returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.

Life on the Mississippi

I have been reading the morning paper. I do it every morning--knowing well that I shall find in it the usual depravities and basenesses and hypocrisies and cruelties that make up civilization, and cause me to put in the rest of the day pleading for the damnation of the human race. I cannot seem to get my prayers answered, yet I do not despair.

Letter to William Dean Howells, 2 April 4 1899

Every civilization carries the seeds of its own destruction, and the same cycle shows in them all. The Republic is born, flourishes, decays into plutocracy, and is captured by the shoemaker whom the mercenaries and millionaires make into a king. The people invent their oppressors, and the oppressors serve the function for which they are invented.

Mark Twain in Eruption

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to reform (or pause and reflect).

Notebook, 1904

Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.

Mark Twain, a Biography

Jonathan Turley gets it right about calls to prosecute Trump over his speech

 There seems to be a dwindling respect for freedom of speech by, mostly, Democrats and their allies in the media.  Here is the latest comment about that from Jonathan Turley.  As usual, JT is on target.

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In a profanity laced diatribe, MSNBC host Joe Scarborough demanded the arrest of President Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani, and Donald Trump Jr. for insurrection. Scarborough declared “If Donald Trump Jr., Rudy Giuliani and Donald Trump are not arrested today for insurrection and taken to jail and booked . . . then we are no longer a nation of laws and we only tell people they can do this again.” What he is suggesting would be the very antithesis for the rule of law.

Scarborough also struck out at the police as racist for not shooting the protesters:

“If these insurrectionists were black, they would have been shot in the face. And my god, if these insurrectionists were Muslim they would have been sniped from the top of buildings. So I want to know from the Capitol Hill police — what, is it just white people? Or is it Donald Trump supporters? Why do you scream at people for walking across the street three blocks away from the Capitol? Why are you known as these badasses around the Capitol? But then Trump supporters come in and you open the f—— doors for them. You open the doors for them and let them breach the people’s house. What is wrong with you? Are we a nation of laws? Are we a nation of one man?”

CNN’s Jake Tapper also argued that this was racial double standard and that, if the protesters were black, they would have been crushed by police.

Trying to racialize or politicize this tragedy is fundamentally wrong. Scarborough ignores that police in various cities have been criticized in past violent protests by groups like Black Lives Matter for standing back and not intervening. Prosecutors were criticized for dropping charges against many protesters. Protesters engaged in days of violence and arson outside of the White House before former Attorney General Bill Barr ordered the Lafayette Park area cleared. He was criticized for both the order to clear the area and (more legitimately) the degree of force used. Scarborough was one of those who denounced the use of force, which was justified after officials feared the breaching of the White House complex security.

I certainly agree that the Capitol appeared utterly unprepared for this protest. That will be the subject of investigation. However, the breach of the Capitol happened quickly after a protest that was peaceful for hours on the mall.

The call for the arrests however are beyond the pale. Many of us of criticized Trump’s speech as he was giving it. Many of us opposed the challenge made to the electoral votes. That however is not the crime of insurrection to call for a protest march on Congress. We have seen violent protests on the left and the right being led by instigators from groups like Antifa and Proud Boys.

I previously wrote in opposition of declaring Antifa a terrorist organization or labeling left-wing protesters “seditious.” Such efforts would gut protections of free speech under the First Amendment. The same is true with Scarborough’s Siren’s call. If we start charging people for insurrection for reckless political speeches, we will truly “no longer [be] a nation of laws.”