Law and Disorder March 27, 2017

Updates:

  • Michael Smith : Supreme Court Justice Nominee Neil Gorsuch
  • NY Governor Cuomo Proposes Visitation Reduction For Inmates At Max Security Prisons
  • Call Governor Cuomo 518-474-8390 / Contact Information Link

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The Politics Behind ‘Russia-gate’

We are in the midst of what has been referred to as “Russia-gate”. The Democrats with their neoconservative allies and most of the major media are alleging, with no proof, that President Trump has been in collusion with Russia and specifically that Russia helped tilt the election in his favor.  Mainstream journalist and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman has for example compared the alleged Russian hacking of the Democratic Party emails to be another Pearl Harbor or 911.  This hysteria is extraordinarily dangerous inasmuch as Trump may be put into a position in confronting Russia, the other major nuclear power in the world.

Guest – Robert Parry is a Washington DC investigative journalist and co-founder of Consortium News.  He has covered Washington for nearly 4 decades. One of the many important stories he broke was on the Iran-Contra scandal. His latest book is America’s Stolen Narrative: From Washington and Madison to Nixon, Reagan and the Bushes to Obama.

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Electronic Devices Seized And Data Requested From Inauguration Arrestees

At the Trump inauguration protests earlier this year over 200 people were mass-arrested and charged under the Felony Riot Act, punishable by up to 10 years in prison and a $25,000 fine. Those picked up in the sweep — including journalists, medics and legal observers — had their phones, cameras and other personal belongings confiscated as evidence. Law enforcement is compelling Apple, Facebook and Google to hand over the personal information of many of those arrested. The tech giants appear to be complying, or are willing to comply with these data-mining requests. Several of the persons arrested have been contacted by Facebook and Apple and notified that their personal information has been requested by the United States Attorney’s Office. An Apple customer notice to one noted that: “Apple will be producing the requested data in a timely manner as required by the legal process.” An NLG attorney representing several of the protesters, Mark Goldstone, has said that one of his clients will fight vigorously to prevent the data from being handed over as the phone was not even present at the demonstration.

Cellebrite-Mobile Forensics

Guest –  Stephanie Lacambra, a criminal defense staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Stephanie is a long-time indigent criminal defense trial attorney and immigration defense activist who graduated from UC Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law in 2004. Before coming to EFF, she worked as a Deputy Federal Defender for two years at the Federal Defender’s Office of San Diego trying federal felony cases ranging from illegal entry into the US to drug and alien smuggling.  Then she spent the next decade working at the San Francisco Public Defender’s office trying dozens of cases ranging from robbery to attempted murder. She continues to speak truth to power by protecting individual privacy rights from government overreach as part of the Civil Liberties Team at the EFF.

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Law and Disorder March 20, 2017

Update:

  • Michael Smith Attends Lynne Stewart’s Wake In New York City

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Law and Disorder co-hosts look at the seeds of fascism within the Trump Administration and Attorney Michael Smith references excerpts of the recent article A Short History of the Trump Family by Simon Blumenthal, including the below paragraph.

“Reckoning with Trump means descending into the place that made him. What he represents, above all, is the triumph of an underworld of predators, hustlers, mobsters, clubhouse politicians and tabloid sleaze that festered in a corner of New York City, a vindication of his mentor, the Mafia lawyer Roy Cohn, a figure unknown to the vast majority of enthusiasts who jammed Trump’s rallies and hailed him as the authentic voice of the people.”

October 2006: If It’s Not Facism, What Is It? Who Benefits & Why Now?

There appears to be a major transformation in progress. Bourgeois democracy, however limited and constricted it has been, is being revamped. The separation of powers, first enunciated by the founders, hardly exists any more. The Executive branch has overpowered Congress and the Judiciary. Neither the corporate media, the two party system, nor the unions provide much of a countervailing force. With the defeat of the Soviet Union and the “Socialist Block” imperialism has launched wars to consolidate capitalism and oil control in Yugoslavia, Afganistan, Iraq and Lebanon. Panelists: Mark Crispin Miller, Heidi Boghosian, Bertell Ollman, Moderated by Michael Steven Smith.
The standard of living for the American working class and middle class is being rolled back quickly; only profit margins of the large corporations and the top one per cent are expanding. Democracy is not an abstraction, but a tool and an aspect of the class struggle. Thus we are experiencing a consolidational of wealth and power that is historically qualitatively transformative. Understanding what is going on is the first step in fighting it. We hear an excerpt from Bertel Ollman , professor of politics at NYU, and has written and edited over a dozen books, including Alienation: Marx’s Conception of Man in Capitalist Society, Social and Sexual Revolution: Essays on Marx and Reich, Dialectical Investigations, How to Take an Exam and Remake the World, and most recently Dance of the Dialectic: Steps in Marx’s Method.

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Why The Rise Of Fascism Is Again The Issue

Fascism has taken on many forms through the rise and fall of empires. One aspect of modern day fascism can seen as propaganda, lies and deceit used as political leverage to eventually absorb sovereign states. Our guest John Pilger lays out the swath carved by fascism in the last 70 years in his recent article Why The Rise Of Fascism Is Again The Issue. Using the word carefully, Pilger describes a new kind of fascism, centered in America but based on the big lie of war and aggression. Pilger documents key events from the Holocaust to Libya to Serbia, to Yugoslavia, to Afghanistan in the 1970s, to Vietnam and up to the current revival of fascism in the heart of Europe. We get a historic perspective from John Pilger, going all the way back to the second world war. If you think the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yugoslavia, Libya and now the Ukraine occur by happenstance, you are mistaken says Pilger, an Australian-British journalist based in London. These are part of the American effort to become the global power.

Guest – John Pilger, an Australian-British journalist based in London. John has worked in many facets of journalism, including a correspondent in the Vietnam War, the Middle East Desk for Reuters in London, a documentary film maker, and a producer for the Independent Television Network in London. Pilger is known for his conscience, bravery and acute historical insight.   His articles appear worldwide in newspapers such as the Guardian, the Independent, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times.

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Law and Disorder March 13, 2017

Hosts Mourn The Passing Of Friend And Colleague Lynne Stewart

Attorneys Heidi Boghosian and Michael Smith remember the courageous people’s lawyer Lynne Stewart.

We listen back to a past interview with Lynne Stewart February 4, 2008.

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit Hears Lynne Stewart’s Arguments

Law and Disorder hosts welcome back civil rights attorney Lynne Stewart. Lynne Stewart has been free on bail pending appeal since federal judge John Koeltl gave her a 28 month sentence in October 2006. As you may recall Lynne Stewart was initially facing up to 30 years after being found guilty of conspiring to aid terrorists. She was convicted of distributing press releases on behalf of her jailed client Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman who is serving a life sentence on terror-related charges.

Here on Law and Disorder we’ve followed Lynne Stewart’s case as it contains key breaches of civil liberties such as government eavesdropping into attorney/ client conversations.

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Recognizing 50 Years of The Center For Constitutional Rights And Michael Ratner

Michael Ratner co-founded Law and Disorder Radio radio 13 years ago.  He died last May in New York City of complications after cancer surgery at age 73.  At the time, he was the President of the Center for Constitutional Rights. Some years ago he helped form it’s European counterpart, the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights. Last year was the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

The held a commemorative conference in Berlin last December on the 50th anniversary of the CCR and honored it’s president, Michael Ratner.  Michael Smith, the co-host along with Heidi Boghosian of Law and Disorder Radiospoke at the conference about Michael Ratner and the four founders of the CCR. He was joined in his presentation by attorney Margaret Ratner Kunstler, a key figure in the early days of the CCR. Today we bring you excerpts from this presentation.

Law and Disorder March 6, 2017

Attorney Kellyanne Conway: Ethics Complaint

President Donald Trump and his main advisor Steve Bannon have declared war on any press that is critical of them. Last week in an historically unprecedented move they banned the New York Times and CNN from a news conference.  President Donald Trump’s spokesperson Kellyanne Conway has countered factual reporting with what she calls “alternative facts”, that is, lies. In order to raise the fear level of the population two weeks ago she falsely claimed a muslim carried out a terrorist massacre in Bowling Green, failing to indicate whether it was Bowling Green, New York, Bowling Green, Ohio, or Bowling Green, Kentucky.  Also that week she promoted Ivana Trump’s product line trying to perk up sales of Trump’s fading brand after her jewelry and dresses were dropped by Nordstrom and other department stores.

Kellyanne Conway is a lawyer who graduated from George Washington School of Law in Washington DC. Lawyers’ unethical and illegal conduct is monitored by the Bar Association there. In response to her unethical conduct a number of law professors who specialize in legal ethics filed a complaint with the association.

Guest – Attorney Ellen Yaroshefsky, a specialist in ethics who teaches at Hofstra Law School. Ellen Yaroshefsky is a former staff attorney and then board member of the Center for constitutional rights.  She is a leader of the National Lawyers Guild. Currently, she is the director of the Monroe Freedman Institute for the Study of Legal Ethics at the law school at Hofstra University.

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Obama v Bahlul Case: First Amendment Protections And More

We are on the verge of unconstrained military power to suppress dissent under Commander-In-Chief Donald Trump.  Section 1021 of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act would allow him to fully put into effect the military detention of dissenters who oppose government wartime policies or support whistleblowers who bring those policies to light. In the case of ” Hedges versus Obama”,  the Department of Justice argued that “mere expressive activities” could be sufficient grounds for military detention of civilians such as journalists and US citizen Chris Hedges, at the Commander-In-Chief’s discretion. The conspiracy conviction by a Military Commission of Mr. Ali al Bahlul,  who made a movie promoting Al Qaeda, is going before the Supreme Court. He is represented by three attorneys including our guest Attorney Todd Pierce.

Guest -Todd Pierce, an attorney and a retired U.S. Army Judge Advocate General Corps Officer. He served as a military defense counsel before the Military Commissions on teams representing three Guantanamo clients. He remains involved with Guantanamo related issues as co-counsel on a Guantanamo case currently before the appellate courts as well as consulting on related human rights cases. He serves on the Advisory Board of ExposeFacts.org. He writes as a critic of U.S. foreign and national security policy, regularly contributing to Consortiumnews.com, antiwar.com, mondoweiss.net, and other media. He is a member of the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity and Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence and the Consultative Counsel of Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy. He currently is working on a Masters Degree in Politics at the New School in New York with a particular focus on the works of Hannah Arendt and her writings on imperialism and totalitarianism.

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