Professional Courtesy Runs Amok

The level of corruption in the Department of Justice is astounding.  Bureaucrats receive little or no punishment for serious infractions,

Illegal activity is frequently overlooked as a result of what is called professional courtesy.  A police officer might not ticket a fellow officer for exceeding the speed limit.  This is almost excusable: we often excuse behavior by a family member that we would not tolerate in a stranger.  When a life threatening situation is excused it is no longer a matter of courtesy: to allow a highly intoxicated driver to proceed with only a warning does no favour for the driver or his potential victims. It appears that the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is allowing our highways to be flooded with drunken drivers.  

Judge Emmet Sullivan, the highly respected judge in the Michael Flynn case, is capable of outrage.  He told General Flynn, "Arguably, you sold your country out," and “I’m not hiding my disgust, my disdain for this criminal offense.”  Sullivan questioned prosecutors, "Could he have been charged with treason?”  Clearly it does not appear that Sullivan plans to go easy on Flynn. 

Sullivan is much more forgiving of his colleagues in the legal profession.  For the record he has made many denunciations and threats in response to gross misconduct by prosecutors.  However, consequences have been minimal.  Sullivan has had a great deal of exposure to prosecutorial misconduct.  He presided over the trial of Senator Ted Stevens.  The prosecution's criminal activity in this case was so blatant that the conviction was thrown out.  Unfortunately Stevens lost his Senate seat giving the Democrats an 60 seat filibuster proof majority.

Much of the evidence leading to Stevens' conviction was gathered by FBI lead agent Mary Beth Kepner.  Kepner was described by her supervisor as a "top-notch, creative investigator, dogged and determined and so creative in developing cooperating witnesses, cooperating subjects."  Investigators found that while she may have been very creative, she was not "top-notch."

FD-302s are official records based on notes taken during FBI interviews  They must be composed within five days of the interview.  Judge Sullivan ordered the Feds to turn over all of the FBI's 302s to the defense. Kepner had not document all of her interviews, so she made them up following the judge's order, backdating two of the 302s by more than two years.  Kepner denied under oath that she had done this.  Her excuse was, "You know, unfortunately, you know, I was disorganized with this, you know, I was overwhelmed and, you know, I lost materials that had, you know, I lost notes, I lost 302s."   Attention was brought to Kepner's behavior by her partner "whistleblower" Chad Joy.  While Joy was taken off criminal cases, in effect ending his career, Kepner was allowed to remained with the FBI.

The DOJ's prosecution team "was part of an elite group of prosecutors in the Public Integrity (PIN) Section, with experience pursuing high-profile and complex cases."  The team included Brenda K. Morris, principal deputy chief of the PIN Section, William M. Welch II, James A. Goeke, Edward P. Sullivan, Joseph W. Bottini, and Nicholas A. Marsh.  This team was repeatedly chastised by Judge Sullivan for withholding exculpatory information. "As any law student knows, prosecutors must disclose any potentially exculpatory evidence to the defendant in a case." The prosecutors not only withheld information they also submitted false information.  Judge Sullivan complained, “It’s very troubling that the government would utilize records that the government knows were false.”

Judge Sullivan was losing patience with the prosecutors.  He insisted they release the documents.  He stated, “That was a court order. That wasn’t a request,” and “I didn’t ask for them out of the kindness of your hearts….Isn’t the Department of Justice taking court orders seriously these days?”  He then held Morris, Welch, and Patricia Stemler, chief of the Criminal Division’s Appellate Section, in contempt of court.  Sullivan appointed a special prosecutor, Henry F. Schuelke III, to investigate the case.  Schuelke III, did not recommend criminal charges against any of the federal prosecutors despite finding widespread misconduct, some of it intentional.  Sullivan said he would not hold them criminally responsible for their "ill-gotten verdict."

18 U.S. Code § 1519. deals with the destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in Federal investigations and bankruptcy.  The penalty for knowingly falsifying documents includes imprisonment for up to 20 years.  The team appears to have gotten off lightly. Joseph W. Bottini was suspended without pay for 40 days.  James A. Goeke was suspended without pay for 15 days.  Nicholas A. Marsh escaped punishment by committing suicide. William M. Welch II and Brenda K. Morris were both exonerated.  This was Morris' second escape from a misconduct charge.  In 2007 the government paid a $1.34 million misconduct settlement in a case she was involved in.

Now Judge Sullivan has been dealing with a new set of prosecutors.  He is confronting many of the same old problems.  The case against General Flynn involves an interview he had with the FBI dealing with his meetings with the Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.  Contrary to protocol James Comey had sent two FBI agents to interview Flynn without notifying the White House.  The interview has been described as a "perjury trap."  Flynn was advised by FBI officials that he did not need to have White House counsel present.  He was also not given his Miranda rights.  The  Mueller’s team stated “He does not need to be warned it is a crime to lie to federal agents to know the importance of telling them the truth.”  Notes about the meeting asked, "What is our goal?"  "Truth/Admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?"  Flynn's attorney Sydney Powell wrote. "The object of the interview was to secure, rather than prevent, a 1001 [false statements] violation."  It is understandable why the DOJ was reluctant to release documents to the court and defense.  Judge Sullivan received documents more than two years after he had ordered them.  302s were lost or destroyed and documents were altered by Peter Strzok and Lisa Page.  These documents do not show the investigation of a crime. They show prosecutors trying to create a crime.

Joseph E. diGenova, former U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia claims, “the people at [the Justice Department] have come to believe that they are immune, that nobody can touch them, and that judges will ignore their prosecutorial misconduct.”  If the officials involved only receive a few days suspension without pay Joseph E. diGenova is correct.  When corruption becomes the norm it is no longer seen as corruption.

General Flynn vs. The Deep State

Cardinal Richelieu reportedly said, "If you give me six sentences written by the most innocent of men I will find something in them with which to hang him. Later 

Stalin's director of the Soviet secret police, Lavrenti Beria, said, “Show me the man and I’ll find you the crime.”  Harvey Silverglate has written a book, Three Felonies a Day, which suggests that anyone can be convicted of a crime if government officials desire it.  General Michael Flynn has pled guilty to lying to the FBI.  Pleading guilty is not unusual behavior when confronting the enormous power of the state.  During the Soviet purge trials Grigory Zinoviev, Lev Kamenev and many others pled guilty to ridiculous charges.  We believe that things like this sould not happen in the United States.

Flynn's problems arose as a result of the Deep State's efforts to take down Donald Trump.  Senator Schumer stated, “Let me tell you: You take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you.  For a practical, supposedly hard-nosed businessman, he’s being really dumb to do this.”  Trump's problem was that the intelligence community had decided to destroy him before he had an opportunity to "take them on."  

The Judge in the Flynn case, Emmmet Sullivan, has experience with corrupt Department of Justice officials.  He presided over the conviction of Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska in 2008.  Stevens was convicted of lying on financial disclosure documents.  A few days later, Stevens lost re-election.  Sullivan wrote, "The government's ill-gotten verdict in the case not only cost that public official his bid for re-election, the results of that election tipped the balance of power in the United States Senate."  DC Bar claimed that the team of prosecutors failed to hand over key exculpatory evidence and knowingly presenting false evidence to the jury.

Judge Sullivan said, “It’s very troubling that the government would utilize records that the government knows were false.  It strikes me that this was probably intentional. I find it unbelievable that this was just an error.”  However, Michael E. O’Neill of George Mason University School of Law believed this was all just a giant mistake. “If all of our lives and careers were defined by our mistakes, nobody would have a job, so you hate to think that one mistake would damage someone’s career.”

Judge Sullivan appointed a special prosecutor to investigate prosecutor misconduct.  He did not recommend criminal charges against any of the federal prosecutors despite finding widespread misconduct.  The report concluded, "the investigation and prosecution of Sen. Stevens were permeated by the systematic concealment of significant exculpatory evidence which would have independently corroborated (his) defense and his testimony, and seriously damaged the testimony and credibility of the government's key witness."  Sen. Lisa Murkowski stated, "I'm pleased that Judge Sullivan has decided that transparency is not merely the best option, but the only option if Americans are to regain the ironclad and fundamental trust in our justice system."

Sullivan ultimately dismissed the Stevens conviction after the Justice Department admitted misconduct in the case.  When four attorneys who prosecuted Sen. Stevens requested a damaging report be kept private Sullivan rejected their request.  However, he said he would not hold them criminally responsible for their "ill-gotten verdict."

The prosecution team was led by "some of the Justice Department’s finest lawyers handled the case. The trial team was part of an elite group of prosecutors in the Public Integrity (PIN) Section, with experience pursuing high-profile and complex cases" according to DC Bar created by the District of Columbia Court of Appeals in 1972.  The team included Brenda K. Morris, principal deputy chief of the PIN Section, William M. Welch II the supervisory attorney, James A. Goeke, Joseph W. Bottini and Nicholas A. Marsh.  Morris has a knows a great deal about Public Integrity.  In 2002 Morris' team misled a U.S. magistrate in order to conduct an unconstitutional search.  This resulted in the government settling the case for $1.3 million.  While Morris and Welch were exonerated lesser officials were not so lucky.  Goeke was suspended without pay for 15 days and Bottini was suspended without pay for 40 days.  Marsh escaped punishment by committing suicide.  

Flynn was aware that his conversation with the Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak was recorded  A Washington Post article published one day before Flynn's White House interview with the agents, citing FBI sources, publicly revealed that the FBI had wiretapped Flynn's calls.  It would not make sense to lie about something that was recorded.  Fox News legal analyst Gregg Jarrett asserted "You know, all along Flynn was set up by Comey and McCabe. He was lied to. They set up a perjury trap that Flynn didn't fall into. The FBI agents who interviewed him said, 'Hey, this guy is telling the truth. How could you possible prosecute a guy for lying when the only witnesses say he didn't lie?'  But, Bob Mueller's team of partisans prosecuted him anyway and coerced him under threat to cop a plea. This is one of the worst cases of miscarriage of justice I have ever seen."

It is reassuring that there are public officials outraged by this corrupt behavior.  They claim there must be consequences.  40 or 15 days without pay.  We are told the wheels of justice grind exceedingly slow.  For some reason justice has wings when in comes to people like Roger Stone or Paul Manafort.  We are constantly assured that the next investigator will get results.  This excuse can only be used for a limited time.

Coronavirus Vs. The Deep State Educational Complex

Among the many changes the coronavirus will bring is greater scrutiny of the Deep State Educational Complex.  

Post coronavirus conditions will reveal many dramatic changes in our economy and society.  A number of employers who were capable of having their workers work from home will have found that in many cases the situation was more efficient.  Perhaps the most significant change will be its effect on education.  Recently a Deep State publication printed an article entitled "Homeschooling during the coronavirus will set back a generation of children.”  In it an education "expert," Kevin Huffman, claims "The United States is embarking on a massive, months-long virtual-pedagogy experiment, and it is not likely to end well."  He has come to this conclusion because "years of research shows that online schooling is ineffective."  Of course this research was conducted by educational "experts" who might have an interest in denigrating "virtual-pedagogy."  

The educational complex from pre-k to graduate school is controlled to a large extent by the Deep State.  Many 1960 radicals like Bill Ayers, Bernardine Dohrn and Angela Davis joined the educational complex with the intent of indoctrinating children.  1960s radical Jerry Ruben boasted, “We are stealing the youth of America right out of the kindergartens and elementary schools.”  The Deep State believes children belong to the state.  This is an ancient idea that can be traced back to Plato.  It was popular during the French Revolution and advocate by Bertrand Barere and the Marquis de Sade who stated, “Do not think you can make good republicans so long as you isolate in their families the children who should belong to the republic alone.”  The Soviet Union had its advocates in M.N. Liadov and Zlata Lilina: “We must rescue these children from the nefarious influence of family life.   Our task now is to oblige the mother to give her children to us – to the Soviet state.”  Today we have Simone de Beauvoir who stated, "No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children, Melissa Harris-Perry, "we have to break through our kind of private idea that kids belong to their parents", and Hillary Clinton, It Takes a Village.

When "normalcy" returns the vast majority of students will return to government and government supported schools.  A significant number will not and many of the parents who do send their children back will be much more attentive to some of the more bizarre programs advocated by the left.  Lessons, like putting a condom on a cucumber are probably not what most parents are in favor of.  The idea that “gender is a social construct” and the push for same sex bathrooms are other issues that are not popular with most parents.  Parents may object to a Common Core official's explanation that "3×4 = 11" might be an acceptable answer. "If they were able to explain their reasoning."

The Deep State will redouble its offensive against homeschoolers.  They view homeschoolers as "deplorables" clinging to their guns and bibles.  One of the leaders of this offensive is Harvard Law’s Elizabeth Bartholet.  She calls for a radical transformation in the homeschooling regime, and a related rethinking of child rights and reframing of constitutional doctrine."  And she "recommends a presumptive ban on homeschooling, with the burden on parents to demonstrate justification for permission to homeschool."  Home schooled children will grow up “alienated from society, ignorant of views and values different from their parents.”  She claims, “Some homeschooling parents are extreme religious ideologues who live in near-total isolation and hold views in serious conflict with those generally deemed central in our society."   Another opponent of homeschooling is Prof. James Dwyer of William and Mary School of Law, who argues “fundamentalist Christian and Catholic schools may be damaging to children,” through the “excessive restriction of children’s basic liberties, stifling intellectual development, the instilling of dogmatic and intolerant attitudes."

Deep State "experts" would fear exposure less if they were successfully educating our children.  

It is becoming increasingly obvious that they are not.  Everyone agrees that the system is failing.  Only their solutions differ.  Progressives believe that more money is the answer.  They point to the fact that teachers have to buy school supplies out of their own pocket.  They fail to mention the thousand-dollar-a-day consultants.  As an example Washington D.C. superintendent Franklin Smith hired consultant, Abena Walker, for approximately $250,000 to develop a program.  Walker founded the unaccredited Pan-African University which awarded Walker a master's degree.  Walker is an expert on "Nommo," the African concept of the magic power of the word.  Opponents want a return to more traditional methods of teaching.  School superintendents also receive outrageous salaries.  Outgoing Keansburg Schools Superintendent Barbara A. Trzeszkowski received $556,000 in severance and unused sick and vacation time.  Former Atlanta Public Schools Superintendent Kathy Augustine who was implicated in the Atlanta school scandal received $188,000 for a single day of work when she was terminated. Philadelphia superintendent Arlene Ackerman received a $905,000 buyout.  She then applied for unemployment.

There are numerous examples of education bureaucrats' bizarre behavior.  Otis Mathis had to resign as President of the Detroit School Board after allegations that he fondled himself during a meeting with a school superintendent.  Why she did not get up and leave during this 20 minute incident is also curious.  Mathis was an inspiration to children because he could not read due to a "learning disability" yet he was a success.  Kenilworth school superintendent, Thomas Tramaglini, was charged with defecating in public.  Apparently this was part of his daily routine at the Holmdel High School football field.

No group has received more attention or been the recipient of greater government largess than African-American students.  Yet according to the 2015 National Assessment of Educational Progress, only 18 percent of African-American fourth-graders were proficient in reading. The eighth-grade numbers were worse, with only 16 percent of African-American students proficient in reading.  CNN has reported that there are many college athletes are functionally illiterate.It’s been estimated that 19% of high school graduates fall into that category.

Uniformed guards and metal detectors were not necessary in public schools generations ago.  

An average 157,000 crimes are committed daily in public schools. 900 teachers are threatened daily with bodily harm.  Former Camden Mayor Milton Milan complained Camden's school system "relegates too many of our young men to criminal careers" and "lifetimes of dependency."  Who is running this system?  Is it the Mafia?  Is it white racists?  Or is it compassionate well funded  (Per-pupil spending of $27,500 2014) experts.  Former Secretary of Education William Bennett  claimed, "So schools became laboratories, and students guinea pigs."  More and more parents are objecting to this.