[Welcome, Instapundit readers! This post has information about the anti-speech thuggery of convicted bomber Brett Kimberlin, and his business partner Brad Friedman, against me.]

At Big Journalism, Liberty Chick has posted on Think Progress’s whitewashing of convicted bomber Brett Kimberlin from the Chamber of Commerce/HBGary story. She concisely explains the background and echoes my findings regarding Think Progress’s decision to eliminate Kimberlin from the story:

Think Progress, a project of John Podesta’s Center for American Progress Action Fund, has been fiercely pushing a story about leaked emails that suggest the U.S. Chamber of Commerce was aware of espionage work being performed against American citizens by one of its private security firms. . . .

But the reports are noticeably silent on one crucial component of the story.

The primary focus of the Chamber’s investigation was actually none other than the organization known as Velvet Revolution, and one of its co-founders, Brett Kimberlin.

Recognize that name? That’s because we told you all about this convicted domestic terrorist, known as the Speedway Bomber, who in 1981 was finally convicted of a week-long bombing spree in Indianapolis, IN in which eight separate bombs caused extensive property damage, destroyed a police cruiser, and severely maimed a man, eventually leading to that man’s suicide.

I think Liberty Chick also makes some good observations about the tactics of the firm hired by the Chamber. Understand that they not only gathered information on opponents, but they also spoke of planting false documents purportedly by their enemies. We cannot sanction such activity, and it’s important to say so. Liberty Chick says:

In the end, I don’t agree with what HBGary Federal did or how any of the firms involved have handled this. Having been a target of such attacks myself of numerous occasions, I might have actually shared some common ground with folks like Brad Friedman and other leftists on this issue. But the left’s intentional deception makes it so difficult to do so.

To that I would add: their deception and their own use of thuggish stalker and harassment tactics makes it difficult to sympathize.

Let’s all remember how Brett Kimberlin stalked Karl Rove in a Safeway, conned Rove into posing with him by pretending to be Rove’s fan, and then took a picture of Rove’s car . . . complete with license plate. And let’s all remember how Brad Friedman published those photos on his blog.

As I revealed yesterday, Brett Kimberlin has written numerous e-mails to my bosses, complaining about me and calling me a stalker. In his latest, he said: “I have already reported him to the Bar and to the ethics board and have motions in court addressing his reprehensible conduct. He is very close to getting sued and having a criminal complaint filed against him for harassment and stalking.” In addition, two secretaries in my office told me that Kimberlin called them ranting about me, calling me a racist, a stalker, and saying he was going to get a restraining order against me. There is more.

And Brad Friedman? He sent a Twitter message to Steve Cooley complaining about me. He and his stooge Ernest Canning are constantly disparaging me in a dishonest manner while using my full name and job title — a tactic they share with the Charles Johnsons and Jeff Goldsteins of the world.

There is much, much more to their intimidation tactics. I’m not discussing it all publicly now. Subscribers who want further details are welcome to e-mail me for the full scoop. The stuff I’m not putting in the post is way worse.

So, while I totally disagree with the tactics of HBGary Federal, I also totally disagree with the stalkerish, dishonest, and thuggish tactics used by Brad Friedman and his business partner, Speedway Bomber Brett Kimberlin.

They are what they decry.

Not to mention: setting off bombs is a fairly serious form of harassment. And Kimberlin was convicted of doing that . . .

P.S. I should add that this current campaign of harassment is merely a microcosm of what Shirley Sherrod is doing to Andrew Breitbart. Just when he is breaking the Pigford story wide open, Sherrod is suing him. Could it be any clearer what she’s trying to do? Silence him — just like Kimberlin is trying to silence me and Liberty Chick with threats of frivolous litigation.

Thank God for people like Andrew Breitbart and Liberty Chick, who stand up for what’s right despite the risks. And for people like Ron Coleman, my lawyer in the Kimberlin matter, for standing up for me.

UPDATE: Thanks to Instapundit for the links. Please consider bookmarking the main site, and follow my updates on Twitter here.

You can read the other related Think Progress post here. My backgrounder on convicted bomber Brett Kimberlin, who is threatening to sue me for telling the truth about him, is here. He is a serial litigant who has filed over 100 lawsuits, so I am expecting this will happen soon.

Finally: although I have pro bono counsel, I would certainly welcome any help towards litigation costs and the cost of local counsel. If you want to help out, the donation buttons are on the right. Please consider becoming a “subscriber” and making a recurring donation of $9 per month. I expect to give special non-public litigation updates to subscribers if the lawsuit is filed.

[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.]

CBS News has released a statement that one of its reporters was sexually assaulted.  To quote from their official statement:

On Friday, Feb. 11, the day Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak stepped down, CBS chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan was covering the jubilation in Tahrir Square for a “60 Minutes” story when she and her team and their security were surrounded by a dangerous element amidst the celebration. It was a mob of more than 200 people whipped into frenzy.

In the crush of the mob, she was separated from her crew. She was surrounded and suffered a brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating before being saved by a group of women and an estimated 20 Egyptian soldiers. She reconnected with the CBS team, returned to her hotel and returned to the United States on the first flight the next morning. She is currently in the hospital recovering.

There will be no further comment from CBS News and correspondent Logan and her family respectfully request privacy at this time.

Nobody else seems to know more than this and of course “brutal and sustained sexual assault” could mean several things.  LA Weekly claims she was repeatedly raped, but they seem to be assuming that this is what CBS news is saying.  That is less than clear.  I would add that the LA Weekly article is downright creepy in the way it was written.

There isn’t much more to say that that.  Either you get that this is self-evidently evil, whatever it was exactly, or you don’t.  Let’s hope that she suffered as little as possible, and recovers quickly and fully.

Finally Hot Air speculates intelligently that “[i]n an ideal world the army would have shot the attackers on the spot, but you can imagine the chaos that would have broken out in the Square if Egyptian soldiers suddenly started firing on people.”  Whether it will change how these things are covered is less clear.  I suspect that for the networks the answer in the future is just more security.  But they will never stop showing that front line coverage.

H/t: DRJ.

Update: What is so deformed in some people that a thing like this happens and the first thoughts is on the political implications, or on the political positions of the victim?  Read here, if you have the stomach.

Update (II): More on that scumbag from the last update, here.

[Posted and authored by Aaron Worthing.]

[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.]

In the law of self-defense, it is not typically necessary to prove you (or another) were actually, currently in danger.  It is only necessary to prove that you had a reasonable belief that you were in danger.  So, for instance, if a man comes at you with an unloaded weapon, and you do not know it is unloaded, you may shoot and kill him in self-defense.  The key to this is that you can only excuse a mistake of fact—a mistaken belief that you are in danger.  By comparison, if you make a mistake of law, that is no defense to any crime (except a few federal crimes which are irrelevant, here).

One issue that has come up is whether you can legally justify homicide or other violence in defense of others, if that other person is in fact a fetus.  If you accept that a fetus is a person, it makes a certain degree of sense, but whether you like it or not, abortion is legal and the correct way to change that is through peaceful means, not by murdering every person who carries out an abortion.

So this morning Mother Jones created something of a stir when they alleged that some South Dakota lawmakers were attempting to do exactly that—to make it lawful to kill an abortionist in order to prevent a lawful abortion.  Then over at the Plum Line, Greg Sargent actually gets in touch with one of the bill’s sponsors, and asks him what the bill is supposed to do:

I just had a spirited conversation with the bill’s chief sponsor, State Representative Phil Jensen, and he defended the bill, arguing that it would not legalize the killing of abortion doctors.

“It would if abortion was illegal,” he told me. “This code only deals with illegal acts. Abortion is legal in this country. This has nothing to do with abortion.” In other words, since abortion is not “homicide,” the law could not apply.

So basically if it’s a legal abortion being performed, it doesn’t count.  But on the other hand, if it a doctor forcing a woman to have an abortion, a boyfriend beating on a woman’s stomach to kill their child, etc. then you can even kill a man in an attempt to prevent that fetus from dying—even if there is little danger to the mother.  Or so he says.

But whatever his intention is, the law does a poor job of expressing that intent.  Here’s one proposed revision:

(more…)

[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.]

From the AP:

An Italian judge on Tuesday ordered Premier Silvio Berlusconi to stand trial on charges he paid for sex with a 17-year-old Moroccan girl, then tried to cover it up….

Prosecutors allege Berlusconi paid for sex with the Moroccan girl, nicknamed Ruby, then used his influence to get her out of police custody when she was detained for the unrelated suspected theft of euro3,000 ($4,103). They allege that Berlusconi feared her relationship to him would be revealed.

Both Berlusconi and Ruby have denied having sexual relations, although she has said Berlusconi gave her euro7,000 ($9,550) on their first meeting.

The child prostitution charge carries a possible prison sentence of six months to three years. The abuse of influence charge, which experts say is more dangerous for Berlusconi, carries a possible sentence of four to 12 years.

Read the whole thing.  But, but…  wait, I thought Europeans were above this kind of provincial Puritanism?

And of course just yesterday, we got this golden nugget of a quote from him:

“Every woman that has had the opportunity to know me knows my regard for them: I have always behaved with the greatest attention and respect towards them,” the billionaire businessmen said. “I have always made it so that every woman feels, how should I say, special.”

Finally in unrelated news, Roman Polanski was quoted as saying, “You mean I can’t go to Italy, either?”

[Posted and authored by Aaron Worthing.]

[Guest post by Aaron Worthing; if you have tips, please send them here.]

Niall Ferguson comes on MSNBC and splashes the cold water of reality regarding The Won’s wonderful foreign policy:

Harsh. There’s a long clip of it, here, too.

And there is a Daily Beast article by him along the same lines, here.

Hat Tip: Hot Air.

[Posted and authored by Aaron Worthing.]