[guest post by Dana]

Let’s go!

First new item

Liz Cheney warns Supreme Court:

“When [Trump] now is pushing this idea that a president should have complete immunity against any criminal prosecution for anything he does in office and he’s pushed this appeal to the Supreme Court, I think it’s very important that the Supreme Court recognizes what he’s doing is a delaying tactic,” Cheney said.

“It cannot be the case that a president of the United States can attempt to overturn an election and seize power and that our justice system is incapable of holding a trial and holding him to account before the next election.”

Cheney said she trusts the court will “deal in a responsible and expeditious fashion with this appeal.” However, she added the court taking action that would result in further delay in the public seeing evidence and amount to “suppression of the evidence.”

Second news item

Judge overseeing Trump’s criminal trial in NY speaks out after Trump goes after Judge Merchan’s daughter on social media:

U.S. District Judge for the District of Columbia Reggie Walton…reacted to Trump lashing out at Judge Juan Merchan.

Merchan is presiding over the former president’s falsifying business records trial where the Republican has pleaded not guilty to 34 charges. Trump also attacked Merchan’s daughter in social media posts.

Trump has posted twice about Loren Merchan on Truth Social, the social media platform where the former president has more than 6.8 million followers, including calling her a “Rabid Trump Hater, who has admitted to having conversations with her father about me.”

Trump’s attacks came after Judge Merchan issued a gag order ahead of the former president’s April 15 hush money trial. The order was to prevent Trump from publicly speaking about court staff, jurors, potential witnesses and lawyers from the Manhattan district attorney’s office, or their families…

“We do these jobs because we’re committed to the rule of law and we believe in the rule of law. The rule of law can only function effectively when we have judges who are prepared to carry out their duties without the threat of potential physical harm,” Walton said.

Walton, who has presided over cases related to the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, said he and his daughter have also received threats, including one person who called him and said they know where the judge lives.

“You can’t let that impact on how you live your life, and how you treat litigants who are before you,” Walton said. “Even though threats may be made against you and your family, you still have an obligation to ensure that everybody who comes into your courtroom is treated fairly, regardless of who they are or what they’ve done.

Judge Luttig also weighs in:

The Nation is witnessing the determined delegitimization of both its Federal and State judiciaries and the systematic dismantling of its system of justice and Rule of Law by a single man – the former President of the United States.

In the months ahead, the former president can only be expected to ramp up his unprecedented efforts to delegitimize the courts of the United States, the nation’s state courts, and America’s system of justice,
through his vicious, disgraceful, and unforgiveable attacks and threats on the Federal and State Judiciaries and the individual Judges of these courts.

Never in American history has any person, let alone a President of the United States, leveled such threatening attacks against the federal and state courts and federal and state judicial officers of the kind the former president has leveled continually now for years.

But suffice it to say, never in history has any person leveled such attacks and been met with such passivity, acquiescence, and submissiveness by the nation.

It is a regrettable commentary on our times that a lone federal judge, The Honorable Judge Reggie B. Walton — because no one whose responsibility it is to do so has had the courage and the will — would finally be left no choice but, himself, to express on national television the profound concerns of the entire Federal and State Judiciaries over Donald Trump’s contemptible attacks on the federal and state courts, the judges of these courts and their families, and the other participants in the judicial process.

It is the responsibility of the Supreme Court of the United States in the first instance to protect the federal courts, the federal judges, and all participants in the justice system from the reprehensible spectacle of the former president’s inexcusable, threatening attacks,
just as it is the responsibility of the respective State Supreme Courts in the first instance to protect their courts and their state judges from the same.

Ultimately, however, it is the responsibility of the entire nation to protect its courts and judges, its Constitution, its Rule of Law, and America’s Democracy from vicious attack, threat, undermine, and deliberate delegitimization at the hands of anyone so determined.

Third news item

So this is the softer and more enlightened Taliban, eh?:

The Taliban’s announcement that it is resuming publicly stoning women to death has been enabled by the international community’s silence, human rights groups have said.

Safia Arefi, a lawyer and head of the Afghan human rights organisation Women’s Window of Hope, said the announcement had condemned Afghan women to return to the darkest days of Taliban rule in the 1990s.

“With this announcement by the Taliban leader, a new chapter of private punishments has begun and Afghan women are experiencing the depths of loneliness,” Arefi said.

“Now, no one is standing beside them to save them from Taliban punishments. The international community has chosen to remain silent in the face of these violations of women’s rights.”

Fourth news item

Worried and prepared:

Polish and allied aircraft were scrambled this morning after Russia launched missile strikes on Ukraine, the Operational Command of the Polish armed forces said.

“Polish and allied aircraft are operating in Polish airspace, which may result in increased noise levels, especially in the southeastern part of the country,” the Command said on the social media platform X.

Russia attacked three thermal power plants of Ukraine’s largest private power firm DTEK on Friday, damaging facilities, the firm said.

It comes as Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky predicted which countries Vladimir Putin would attack if he was successful in Ukraine – including Germany.

Zepensky’s predictions:

Zelensky predicts which countries Putin would target after Ukraine

Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has warned which countries he believes Vladimir Putin will target next if he is victorious in Ukraine.

Kazakhstan would be next, followed by the Baltic states, Poland and then Germany, Mr Zelensky claims.

“Even tomorrow, the missiles can fly to any state,” he told US broadcaster CBS. “For him, we are a satellite of the Russian Federation,.

“At the moment, it’s us, then Kazakhstan, then Baltic states, then Poland, then Germany. At least half of Germany.”

Fifth news item

Berkeley bigots shamefully spout off:

A Berkeley City Council meeting went off the rails this week as pro-Palestinian protestors heckled an 89-year-old Holocaust survivor as she urged the council to pass a resolution in support of Holocaust Remembrance Day.

The Jewish Community Relations Council posted clips from the Tuesday meeting to social media, which quickly went viral and showed the moment that the meeting had to stop as Susanne DeWitt was shouted down.

The Jewish Chronicle reported on the meeting Thursday, writing, “A Berkeley City Council meeting on Tuesday descended into chaos as a mob of pro-Palestine demonstrators harassed council members and Israel supporters, calling them ‘Zionist pigs’, ‘genocide enablers’, ‘murderers’ and ‘money suckers’.”

…

DeWitt was allowed to finish by the councilman running the meeting and she added that Hamas’s attack led to the “murder of 1200 Israelis and the brutal torture and rape of women.”

“Lies!” shouted the protestors. The meeting then devolved into shouting as the councilman leading it called for a break.

Have a great weekend.

—Dana