Mark Brennan: Law Versus Justice

Al Lewis on Judge Rakoff's Due Skepticism About A Sweetheart Deal Between Justice and Wall Street

2011-11-14T11:20:00.001-07:00

Well said, Al! One might suggest that "The Best System of Justice Money Can Buy" replace "Equal Justice for All" on federal court house porticoes.

Big Business, and other major political contributors, necessarily enjoy undue influence in government (including but not limited to the SEC and every US Attorney's office in the nation), because they control the electoral process, and in turn the process of appointing judges, prosecutors, and regulators.

Unsurprisingly, very few are elected or appointed who do not have their best interests first and foremost in their hearts. Therefore, regulators and prosecutors learn very early in their careers to either "play ball", or look for other work.

Once we have all suffered the consequences of either express, or tacit, deregulation, a few sacrificial heads roll, and a few relatively modest fines are paid, but the same people, or genre of people, remain very much in control, and we are left to await the next crisis, fomented by unrestrained greed on the part BOTH "the 1%" and that part of "the 99%" who love the benefits of speculative bubbles and the illusory wealth they create until, as in the case of Enron, or the housing catastrophe, the con is exposed.

In the end, this is all the result of nihilism, and "getting rich quick", having become the dominant faith of our era, not just among elites, but also among a great many of the general population who seek to emulate those whose privilege relieves them of any meaningful moral or legal accountability.

Those of us who choose to live in modest houses we can easily afford, drive cars that are not too flashy but get us where we are going, refrain from investing in companies (such as Enron or Duke) that systematically stole billions from the ratepayers of California, and pay our taxes instead of indulging in governmentally-sanctioned tax fraud through scams such as "prepaid forward contracts", pay the price.

Meanwhile, those all too happy to cash in on the scams, such as Enron shareholders who didn't protest Enron's illegal conduct when its shares were at $90, sub-prime borrowers who knew there was no way they could pay back their mortgages, or real estate speculators in Florida, California, Nevada, and Arizona who got greedy, whine most loudly and get to suck on the public sugar teat even more.

This is a cultural problem that infects all levels if society, not JUST the "1%". When the ethics of the people who lead our institutions are the same as those of the Mafia, is it any wonder many of the lazy or weak-minded follow their lead?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204224604577030320924886882.html?KEYWORDS=al+lewis#articleTabs%3Darticle

Denver Dem Errand Boy Tom Strickland Rewarded by BP for his "Public" Service with Big, Fat Partner Share at Wilmer Hale (formerly Wilmer, Cutler and Pickering)

2011-09-20T22:59:00.002-06:00

We are asked to believe that preening Denver Dem errand boy Tom Strickland's future receipt of a fat partner share at the DC Democratic law firm, Wilmer Hale (which is defending BP with respect to the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe), should in no way be regarded as his reward for valuable services rendered while he was Denver Dem errand boy Ken Salazar's right-hand man at Interior. Right!

Strickland may indeed be "walled off" from direct involvement in the Deepwater Horizon case, yet that does nothing to diminish the blatant, actual conflict of interest inherent in his making millions in future partner shares from the lead firm defending the biggest case he oversaw while at Interior.

The rules of "ethics" may indeed permit Strickland and Wilmer, Hale to rely upon the fiction that his being "walled off" from that case in the future removes the taint of his profiting from having been up to his ears in the case in the past.

Certainly, since the firms for which Strickland has worked throughout his career are immune from serious scrutiny by attorney regulation because they control the attorney regulation and governmental "ethics" process, Strickland and WilmerHale need not fear that this apparent breach of the public trust will have adverse consequences for them.

Attorney regulation is used by those who control the government and judiciary to punish their enemies and protect their friends. The rules of "ethics", and the lackeys charged with enforcing them, do nothing to prevent wholesale subversion of our system of government and justice for fun and profit by those who run the country and their minions.

Since they control who gets to run for office or be a judge, and their minions write and enforce the rules of "ethics", it should come as no surprise that those rules do nothing meaningful to interfere with their routine exploitation of public office and obstruction of justice for private gain.

Unless those who control the electoral process (through legalized bribery disguised as "free speech") can be sure you will protect their interests while in office, they will never permit you to run for elective office, or be appointed to a regulatory or judicial position.

Hence, such nominees or appointees normally come from firms, such as Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Schre[c]k, Hogan Lovells, Greenberg, Traurig, WilmerHale, and others that specialize in subverting our systems of government and justice for fun and profit, or have at least received their stamp of approval.

If you display such devotion to the truth and the law that you just might do the right thing regardless of the effect on your career, pocketbook, and political or professional future, they will never admit you to their club. They will do everything they can to exclude you from the inner circle, and even destroy you, if they must.

If you fail to adequately protect their interests while in elective or appointed office, you will never be offered a fat partner share at one of their lobbying firms, fat speaking fees, or lucrative positions on their boards, after you leave government.

Hence, we have the best system of government and justice money can buy, thanks to "ethics" rules that render direct bribery completely unnecessary.

http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_18937649

9/11: Richard Clarke Speaks Out

2011-08-12T00:09:00.005-06:00

One month until the 10th anniversary of 9/11, and most Americans still do not know the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, about the role of Pakistan in the attack, and the degree to which US officials had reason to know of imminent attack, but sat on their hands.

These young filmmakers have filmed an extraordinary interview of Richard Clarke, which I encourage everyone to watch when it comes out in full.

http://www.secrecykills.com

It will leave you ready enraged, and ready to raise Hell, not against al-Qaeda, but against those in our own government or "leadership" who: went out of their way to AVOID preventing 9/11; allowed Bin Laden and thousands of Taliban and al-Qaeda to escape from Afghanistan to Pakistan in late 2001; diverted attention from the degree of Pakistan's complicity in the attack even while they encouraged us to attack Iraq, with disastrous results; who almost certainly knew for many years prior to Bin Laden's assassination that he was living under the protection of the ISI in Pakistan, yet looked the other way.

Al-Qaeda is in no small part a subsidiary of the ISI. We invaded Iraq and hanged Saddam, though he had nothing to do with 9/11. We have done nothing to the Pakistanis. I suggest we use our expensive nuclear arsenal to render Pakistan, and Afghanistan, irrelevant.

As I have often written and said, the greatest enemies of the US are not in Karachi, Riyadh, or Baghdad, but in New York and Washington, D.C. But for their treachery, 9/11 could never have occurred, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and their disastrous fiscal consequences, would likely have been unnecessary.

"9/11: Press for Truth"

2011-08-11T23:53:00.001-06:00

I just watched the final hour of a compelling documentary on a local PBS station: "9/11: Press For Truth". I was thrilled to see that they had tied together in a very compelling way disturbing truths or suspicions about which I have often written in other venues concerning the mis- or malfeasance by US officials that allowed 9/11 to occur, and failed to focus our wrath on the state that played the greatest role in it: Pakistan. Watch it!

http://www.911pressfortruth.com/

Judicial Ethics: Do ANY Federal Judges NOT have powerful friends??

2011-06-18T13:51:00.000-06:00

I have often observed that judicial appointments are more a function of "who[m] you know and who[m] you blow" than they are of the qualifications of the candidates.

Highly qualified men and women of unimpeachable ethics and integrity are routinely passed over in favor of those with close ties to powerful interests that dominate both major parties, and who can be depended on to take good care of those interests when they or their friends need a favor. Those who will invariably "call 'em as they see 'em", without regard for the consequences of their rulings on Big Business or Big Government, need not apply.

Predictably, the New York Times attempts to portray Clarence Thomas' close ties to magnate Harlan Crow as suggestive of greater impropriety than the close ties of every single Supreme Court Justice (else he or she would not BE on the Supreme Court) to a number of powerful people or interests.

The Times misses the far more important question: So long as our political system, and judicial appointments, are controlled exclusively by those (Wall Street, Big Oil, the Military-Industrial Complex, Government Unions, AARP, AIPAC, Hollywood) with the ability to lavish huge bribes disguised as "free speech" upon politicians, should we be at all surprised that only those whose careers demonstrate their blind fealty to the sacred orthodoxies of those special interests make it on to the federal bench?

Barney Frank and the Protection Rakcet that is the U.S. Congress

2011-06-08T19:56:00.000-06:00

Yet more evidence of the degree to which Congress pretends to regulate the pirates who have brought us one disaster after another, even while, in exchange for legalized bribes disguised as "free speech", it effectively allows Wall Street, Big Oil, and others whose interests are adverse to the interests of the People to regulate themselves. The American Revolution began over far less outrageous abuses of power. "Gentlemen, why stand we here idle?"

http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/06/08/mr-frank-goes-to-wall-street/?nl=business&emc=dlbka8

Controlling the Prosecution through Legalized Bribery Disguised as "Free Speech" Gives Wall Street Con Artists a License to Steal

2011-04-14T11:42:00.001-06:00

Gee, could it be that they were not prosecuted because, thanks to our system of legalized bribery disguised as "free speech", they control the prosecution? Is there any doubt that, if any of us indulged in fraud amounting to "one tenth particle of a hair" of what these glorified con artists pulled off, the same errand boys and girls who are protecting THEM would send US to federal prison for a VERY long time?

https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/14/business/14prosecute.html?_r=1&exprod=myyahoo

Connick v. Thompson: Supreme Court Gives Prosecutors a License to Steal

2011-04-11T09:57:00.001-06:00

http://jonathanturley.org/2011/04/10/connick-v-thompson-and-prosecutorial-impunity/

Turley sums it up well. The Supreme Court has declared those who enforce the law to be above it, and to make us all dependent upon the integrity and honesty of individual prosecutors. This decision will increase the pressure on honest prosecutors in large urban offices to cut corners, lest they achieve lower conviction rates than their colleagues, make their politician bosses look bad, and be fired, or forced to quit.

Supreme Court Endorses Criminal Conduct By Prosecutors, Confirming Once Again that Those Who Enforce the Law Correctly Deem Themselves Above It!

2011-03-30T18:08:00.004-06:00

Yet again, the United States Supreme Court has endorsed the absurd notion that prosecutors who deprive a citizen of his life, liberty and pursuit of happiness through intentional fraud are immune from liability.

If we punish theft in order to deter it, how can it be that the Supreme Court feels that the failure to punish prosecutorial fraud will not encourage it?

We should all be afraid, very afraid. Those who enforce the law correctly deem themselves above it, in the eyes of the Nation's highest court!

Prosecutorial fraud is by no means unusual. Many prosecutors would never condone or engage in it. However, the pressures to engage in it are enormous. I myself am a victim of it, having been driven from the legal profession by the Colorado Supreme Court in unconstitutional reprisal for winning a $1.22 million jury verdict from, and $850,000 settlement from, its corrupt Democrat cronies in the City of Denver.

The attorney who prosecuted me for winning my client's case, Kim Ikeler, recommended dismissal of the charges against me for lack of evidence, after the jurors all told him I did not engage in the misconduct of which I was fraudulently accused by Judge Robert E. Blackburn (as a pretext for throwing out the jury's verdict as a favor to the City of Denver, in exchange for which he or someone very powerful in the GOP probably got a big favor from the City).

The case against me was a total sham. The "evidence" against me was lay opinion evidence concerning my demeanor and style offered by the attorneys whose asses I kicked at trial and by the judge's courtroom clerks.

My confrontation clause and due process rights were violated because: (1) my principal accuser, Judge Blackburn, was allowed to testify against me through his hearsay new trial order, I was denied the right to cross-examine him, and his unlawful and unconstitutional new trial order was used as specious grounds for depriving me of my liberty and property, i.e., my right to practice law; (2) I was not allowed to subpoena the jurors, who were the key witnesses in my favor.

One of the judges in my case, Ed Kahn, is a long-time partner and close friend of the shitbird Denver City Attorney, David Fine. Kahn refused to recuse himself from my case despite his close connection to Fine.

The "judge" who presided over the case, shitbird William Luzero, worked for the City of Denver as an attorney when I was suing it. Before that, he was a hack in the U.S. Attorney's office.

The federal courts, which are mostly populated by those who "rise" in the profession by going along to get along, do nothing to interfere. They almost always dismiss suits against police, prosecutors and courts for fraudulent or unconstitutional prosecution, on the basis of immunity and abstention doctrines that were intended to protect honest cops, prosecutors and judges, but have been distorted to give crooked cops, prosecutors and judges a license to wipe their asses with the constitution when it suits them.

The American Revolution was fought over far less. Yet, the vast majority of the American People are so successfully distracted from such important matters by trivia, or so intimidated by the inequality of power of which they are victims, that they could not be bothered to lift a finger to write an email in protest, let alone shoulder a rifle to alter or abolish the government that has become so destructive of their security and happiness.

DA's and Criminals Alike Swim and Play in the Same Sewer of Moral and Ethical Compromise

2011-03-02T10:03:00.000-07:00

First, one must credit the Denver Police and District Attorney's office for their success in penetrating the veil of silence that normally attends such cases, for the obvious reason that witness intimidation by violent criminals works, and is a serious threat to the community.

Second, one must admit that it is impossible to turn sociopathic criminals against one another without strong inducements, such as reduced sentences, so that such prosecutions invariably require "pacts with the devil". The prosecutor can only hope that the devil whom he/she prosecutes with the help of the devil with whom he/she deals is the more guilty of the two.

Third, this series of prosecutions appears to be one in which there is serious question whether the devils who secured reduced sentences with their cooperation are any less culpable than those they have helped convict.

Worse, it appears that they may well be AS culpable or even MORE culpable, but that they hoodwinked the DA into allowing them to cop a lesser plea, or, in the eyes of the DA, are more useful for other unstated purposes (e.g., having cooperated in other investigations or cases).

In the Willie Clark case, there were two shooters, and Clark was driving. Though Clark may indeed have been one of the shooters (his role and position as driver opens that to serious question), he was certainly not the only one. Yet, another person in the car who could also have been one of the shooters, Ponytail Harris, was permitted to testify against Clark, in exchange for very lenient treatment.

One can't help thinking the Denver DA is either very gullible, or has other good reason (perhaps his role as an informant in other cases, perhaps federal?) to go easy on Harris.

Or, the DA just decided to go with whichever story witnesses would support, figuring that, even if Clark was not the shooter, or was no more or less culpable than the key witness against him, at least they would convict SOMEONE for killing Darrent Williams, when convicting No ONE might be their only alternative.

Similarly, in this case, there is serious reason to question whether Birch killed Kalonnian Clark, and apparently good reason to suspect one of the key witnesses against him was the/an actual triggerman.

Yet, the Denver DA has yet again given the witness, Ponytail Harris (the same key witness who fingered Willie Clark as the triggerman in the Darrent Williams murder, but who himself was a plausible suspect as one of two shooters in that case) lenient treatment in exchange for his testimony against Clark.

To strengthen the case with which they decided to run, the Denver DA concealed highly exculpatory evidence from the defense for three years, and would now have us believe this was completely inadvertent.

Don't believe it. They probably withheld it because they feared it would weaken their ability to pursue the course of prosecution they decided would be most successful (not necessarily most just). They probably waited to disclose it in the hope Birch would cop a plea and not go to trial. Once facing trial, they probably disclosed it only at the latest point they could without risking dismissal of the case as a sanction.

I once, not all that long ago, would have naively found it difficult to believe that the Denver District Attorney's Office would engage in such blatantly unethical, or at minimum highly questionable, conduct.

However, having devoted the better part of seven years litigating against the City of Denver in a Civil Service Commission and subsequent federal case in which I won a $1.22 million age discrimination jury verdict and judgment against, and $850,000 settlement from, the City, I can now state with great confidence that the Denver City Attorney's Office will do anything to win, ethical or unethical, and deems itself above the law.

Protected from the consequences of their unethical conduct by cronies in the federal courts and the Colorado Supreme Court, they are not far wrong in this belief. They can suborn perjury and obstruct justice without so much as a second look from the Colorado Supreme Court's ethics Gestapo, which is controlled by their Democrat cronies on the Court.

They can through their arrogance and stupidity suffer a $1.22 million jury verdict in federal court, yet somehow manage through behind-the-scenes wheeling and dealing to persuade a federal judge 15 months later to grant them a new trial on an unlawful pretext that bears no relationship to the facts and is completely unlawful. They can then successfully retaliate against the attorney who defeats them fairly and squarely in trial by procuring his fraudulent prosecution and conviction in a witch hunt and show trial in which the judge is in their pocket and assiduously ignores the facts and the law to achieve the result desired: virtual disbarment of the attorney for the crime of very skillfully and ethically winning his client's case.

Are we to believe that the Denver DA's Office is immune to the same bureaucratic temptations, corner-cutting, lawlessness, and arrogance that so permeates the rest of the City?

I would like to think so, but I doubt it.

This is not to say that Birch is innocent of any crime. It may well be he needs to go to prison for others he has committed, but for which the Denver DA has been unable to convict him.

This is, of course, the basis on which a lot of DA's feel no compunction in forcing defendants to plead guilty to crimes, or in convicting them of crimes, everyone knows they likely did not commit: if they didn't commit this one, they committed others, so, in the larger scheme of things, justice will be done if they go to prison (even if such justice requires that someone else equally guilty go free, or suffer far less punishment).

Most of us choose to live with such expedient compromises of the truth and the law, for they are necessary to the "smooth functioning" of our system of "justice", and help protect us against some undeniably VERY evil people.

It's only when we ourselves become victims of such unbridled prosecutorial lawlessness that we begin to question whether our system of "justice" may be in need of serious reform, and whether we are too lax in selecting the police and prosecutors whom we empower to send people to prison for crimes they know they did not commit.

Only then do we begin to understand what it was like to be a Black man in America in the 1950's or 1960's, or what it's like, even now, to be without adequate means to defend oneself against an arrogant judicial machine, whatever one's race. The Tim Masters case leaves little doubt that many cops, prosecutors, and judges are morally and intellectually unfit to wield the enormous power we grant them just because, despite their mediocrity, they happen to be connected to the local political machine that controls their particular county or jurisdiction.

I have little sympathy for Mr. Birch. I would, however, urge everyone to consider that, if he is convicted in this case, no one should applaud because he is obviously guilty of the crime with which he is charged. They might applaud because, if the witnesses against him are to be believed (?), he is (just like them), a serious threat to the community (or at least to someone powerful or connected who wants him to go away for a long time).

Whatever the truth may be, the one thing of which we can be confident is that the Denver Post will never bother to root it out, but will instead spout the Denver Democratic Party Line, and will do nothing to interfere with Mitch Morrissey's eventual run for higher office, in which he will undoubtedly crow about his successful prosecution of the murderers of Darrent Williams and Kalonnian Clark (but not mention the lengths to which his office went to nail the alleged murderers with the help of equally, or even more, plausible suspects).

"Convergence Theory", Revisited

2011-02-15T18:50:00.000-07:00

The courage this woman displayed in publicly exposing the corruption of the judge presiding over the Khodorkovsky case is remarkable, and of a sort of which almost no judicial bureaucrats in this country are capable, even though their bosses in many cases behave in much the same way.

I cannot help thinking that the talents of Robert Blackburn and William Lucero are wasted in this country, and that they might have done well to pursue careers in the Soviet Union. They would fit right in!

http://www.denverpost.com/business/ci_17383688

"Kagan Shows Her True Colors" or "Why Wall Street Loves Elena"

2011-01-14T11:15:00.000-07:00

Those mystified by the breezy approval of Elena Kagan for the Supreme Court may now better understand why errand boys and girls for Wall Street thought she would be an outstanding appointment.

She may well lean left on certain social and cultural issues, but she is no threat to the people who run the country on the issue that matters most to them: ensuring that the government does nothing to seriously interfere with their ability to make vast sums at the expense of The People.

Colorado's "Judge" Robert Blackburn May Have Competition in the Judicial Tyranny Sweepstakes

2011-01-14T11:05:00.000-07:00

It is oddly comforting to know that Colorado's Robert E. Blackburn is not alone on the federal bench in his utter contempt for the jury system and disregard for the rights of attorneys and litigants who appear before him.

Perhaps we should convene a variation on "American Idol" in which Americans are asked to view summaries of the blatant misconduct of judicial tyrants such as Blackburn and McBryde, and vote for their "favorite"?

Anyone curious to understand the source of my thorough contempt for "Judge" Blackburn will find the following of interest:

http://www.westword.com/2007-12-13/news/blackburned/

John Hickenlooper, Colorado's Dome-Brewed Governor - Denver - Slideshows

2011-01-14T10:49:00.000-07:00

John Hickenlooper, Colorado's Dome-Brewed Governor

Thank GOD for Westword, without which we would be subjected only to the nauseatingly fawning treatment of John Dickinpooper by major media controlled by his business and political allies. Whereas he pretends with his "Opie" act to be an "aw-shucks" enlightened progressive, he is in fact closer to "Dwight" on "The Office" in his methods, and is surrounded by an unscrupulous brood of vipers who stop at nothing to subvert justice to avoid the consequences of their arrogance and stupidity, with the help of their corrupt friends in the judiciary. Such is, apparently, their leftist idea of luminously enlightened "civility".

Colorado's Unethical Ethics Cop, John Gleason, called in by AZ Dems to do Hatchet Job on Joe Arpaio and his DA Buddy

2010-12-08T12:01:00.000-07:00

It appears that Phoenix DA Andrew Thomas and his ally, Sheriff Joe Arpaio, are under attack by political enemies who resent their position on the treatment of illegals.

It also appears that Thomas got out of line in ways that are undoubtedly routine on both sides of the political fence in notoriously corrupt Arizona. (Anyone remember Kemper Marley?)

Andrew Thomas may or may not be guilty of misconduct. Don't, however, be fooled into taking John Gleason's word for it.

It is obvious that this is a political prosecution, and that Gleason, a political reptile who has long abused the power of his office to oppress enemies of those who control the State of Colorado, and protect their friends from scrutiny or prosecution for their routine subversion of justice for fun and profit, was called in to provide the result desired by Thomas' political enemies.

Tenth Circuit Slam Dunks Nurse Abused by Hospital Employer

2010-11-17T10:30:00.000-07:00

In this case, Chaplin v. Estes Park Medical, the Tenth Circuit affirms summary judgment, confirming once again that its approves judicial repeal of the Americans with Disabilities Act to the extent it applies to employment situations. The recent amendments to the ADA were helpful in this respect, but fall short of the mark required to compel the Tenth Circuit to change its ways.

Curiously, it seldom confronts the question of whether very profitable class actions brought against retailers or other public accommodations under the Title II of the ADA (in which companies, or prisons, are extorted by attorneys for hundreds of thousands, or millions, in fees in order to escape the consequences of failing to provide, often at great expense, the best possible accommodation of those in wheelchairs or otherwise subject to limitations) are always as well founded as the plaintiffs alleged. That is because those cases are almost always settled by stipulation requring the payment of massive fees to the connected plaintiffs' attorneys who bring them.

Of Judicial Retentiveness: Which is worse, appointing or electing judges?

2010-10-27T16:22:00.001-06:00

Retired Colorado Supreme Court Justice Jean Dubofsky thinks it's just awful that, for the first time ever, credible campaigns are being mounted to persuade people to vote against retention of certain Colorado Supreme Court Justices or other giants of the bench.

Justice Dubofsky's concern is less with preservation of the alleged integrity of our courts, which is demonstrably open to question, and more with continued control of appointments by special interests served by an inner circle of connected attorneys, including Justice Dubofsky. These attorneys ensure that no one who threatens those special interests will ever be appointed to the bench in Colorado.

In other words, the integrity of the courts in persistently serving the interests of her clients and friends is likely Justice Dubofsky's real concern.

If the integrity of the judiciary were her real concern, she would be pressing for serious reform of the current system. Instead, she offers a parade of horribles that is laughable given it assumption that the current system blesses us with intellectual and moral giants whose only concern is Justice.

That said, I support retention of Justice Mike Bender because he is the only Colorado Supreme Court Justice who has ever evidenced any serious concern with the rights of the little guy, and support retention of the others because it would be disastrous to give the corrupt machine that John Hickenlooper fronts the opportunity (since Hick will inevitably win) to appoint three new, young Justices, like Monica Marquez, who will be on the court much longer than the current occupants. Justice Dubofsky knows quite well the degree to which "who[m] you know and who[m] you blow" matters much more in Colorado courts than the quality of one's case. She knows quite well the degree to which she and other members of the inner circle are immune from scrutiny of their methods or ethics, even while the Colorado Supreme Court regularly abuses its unbridled power, subject to no meaningful review or control, to retaliate against unconnected advocates for the powerless who defeat the powerful interests with which she is directly or loosely allied.

Monica Marquez is a nice person. She is undeniably smart. Nonetheless, her appointment despite her minimal qualifications reveals a serious flaw in the clubbily opaque manner in which judicial appointments now occur. In theory, our existing method of judicial appointments makes sense. In practice, it is fraught with back-scratching and corruption that ensures that only those who exalt the power of Big Business or Big Government over the interests of the People will be seriously considered. One's ability to engage in legalized bribery disguised as "free speech" determines one's role in the process. Hence, virtually no one gets to be a judge without the approval of the likes of Steve Farber, Norm Brownstein, Mike Norton, Cole Finegan and the people or organizations who are their masters.

Judicial appointment committees invariably consist of complaisant minions for powerful interests willing to supply a veneer of objectivity to a process that is only quite secondarily influenced by proper considerations such as competence, integrity, and devotion to the Constitution, the Truth, and the Law, above all else. The key consideration, as manifested by the appointment of smart but minimally qualified people such as Allison Eid and Monica Marquez, who have never in their professional lives taken a serious risk to help someone down on his or her luck or oppose abuse of power, is whether they will protect the interests of those who appoint them.

Only judges who will enable such abuse of governmental power through Constitutional contortionism will ever be seriously considered for appointment by committees consisting of "leading members of the bar" who pose no threat to the wealthy and powerful interests that control our country, and who, in order to maintain the illusion of democracy, provide the People with the opportunity to select between the two candidates for office they have identified as least likely to threaten their interests.

The judicial appointment process in this State and Nation is a "black box". Those who apply or are nominated but are excluded from serious consideration are never disclosed. Applicants are kept secret. Their deliberations are not documented. The process is polluted with all manner of considerations that are unrelated to the question of who is, without a doubt, the best person for the job. People are routinely nominated to perform the judicial analog to heart surgery even though their only experience is the judicial analog to removing hemorrhoids. Much better qualified candidates are routinely ignored, and their identity suppressed to preserve the illusion that the actual nominee is the best qualified.

That pretty well sums up our wonderful "Missouri Plan" judicial appointment process. People who should never be allowed to get near the Governor's chair or the US Congress naturally think it is quite OK to appoint comparably underqualified cronies to the judiciary.

GOP activists Matt Arnold and John Andrews of "Clear the Bench Colorado" do not employ the same standards when it comes to the many lousy appointments made by Owens or other GOP, including Owens' placing the unethical prosecutors who railroaded Tim Masters on the bench, or Wayne Allard's appointment of the execrable Robert E. Blackburn, who apparently never tried a case in federal court before he ascended to his enormously powerful position.

Justice Dubofsky knows this, but she would rather fool you into thinking all will be well so long as she and her friends in the inner circle run the judiciary free from interference from the masses. "Clearing the Bench" is not the answer, but neither is maintaining the God-awfulstatus quo. The answer ultimately lies in a truly open and meaningful appointment and retention process in which the best possible person for the job, based on experience, training, ethics, and concern for Justice above all else, gets the job, instead of, as more often than not occurs, less qualified cronies of political hacks and those whose life's work is subverting justice and our government for fun and profit in the service of powerful special interests that are enemies of the People. That won't happen until the People take back their government from special interests that control both major parties through legalized bribery disguised as "free speech".

Musings on the Lack Outrage Over Vicious Executions by Prisoners

2010-10-27T16:04:00.003-06:00

One cannot help wondering why card-carrying ACLU members and limousine liberals who devote so much time and energy to ensuring that the condemned are executed painlessly, or to protecting terrorists (who would kill us all if they could, and have no respect for the rights of others) from abuse, do not lift a finger or open their very big mouths to help US citizens who every day of the week are brutally raped, tortured, and murdered by other prisoners (often with the knowledge or complicity of guards and wardens who are either on the take or find it useful to form alliances with certain criminals in order to control or reduce the influence of others).

We have the death penalty, often visited in the most brutal manner possible, in every state in the USA. Thousands of prisoners suffer it every year, all across the US, in prisons state and federal, most having committed no crime worthy of such brutal “correction”.

Yet, because it is administered by other prisoners, often with the knowledge or approval of public “officials”, it is largely ignored.

I guess that, since there is no easy method of litigating it, or attractive statutory fee provision that pays for comfortable cars, offices, and high heels, it doesn’t generate much outrage or attention from those allegedly concerned with “justice”.

Of course, it can also get a person killed to raise questions about the activities of the Crips, Aryan Nation, M-13s, or other groups that effectively control nearly every prison in the country, and have lots of members on the outside.

Too, prosecutors would rather not admit that many of the most outrageous crimes in the country occur not on the street, but in the jails and prisons to which they through any means possible, in their Inquisitorial certainty and blind ambition, unhesitatingly condemn those who lack the resources of an O.J. or John Gotti to defend themselves.

To be sure, most they send are guilty of something, but in many cases of something not much more serious than the crimes many prosecutors commit (subornation of perjury, obstruction of justice) to secure convictions necessary to advance their political or bureaucratic prospects. (Remember Tim Masters?)

This, I would respectfully suggest, is a much greater outrage than executing a vicious murderer in an unpleasant way. Yet, it is largely ignored.

Wikileaks: Turns Out the US Government is a Greater Threat to the USA than Al-Qaeda! The Real Reason 9/11 Happened!

2010-10-19T13:03:00.002-06:00

This is one of the most important articles ever written about the root cause of 9/11, which ultimately was not the existence of towelheads determined to kill us, but the perplexingly determined efforts of a number of public officials (who in most instances remain in powerful positions in the FBI and elsewhere) to, for all practical purposes, sabotage efforts to prevent 9/11.

That is why, though it sounds outrageous, it is really quite fair to say that the real enemies of this country are in DC, not Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan. If our highest elected and appointed officials were as dedicated to getting the job done as are the brave young kids they send to shitholes like Iraq and Afghanistan in the name of fighting the alleged "War on Terror", it would never have been "necessary" to send brave young kids to shitholes like Iraq and Afghanistan. 9/11 happened not because terrorists were determined to kill Americans, but because the U.S. Government was not sufficiently determined to stop them.

"Inside Job": Documentary Exposes Degree to which Wall Street Regulates Itself, and We All Pay the Price

2010-10-19T12:59:00.001-06:00

Kathleen Parker comments on the lessons of a new documentary, "Inside Job", which anyone who wants to understand how it could be that Wall Street effectively regulates itself (thanks to our system of legalized bribery disguised as "free" speech) to the nation's detriment should see.

Nothing will change until the People exercise their right to alter or abolish the government that has become destructive of the ends for which it was formed.

The American colonists revolted against King George over far less.

The question is whether any meaningful change can occur so long as those responsible for our national dysfunction control the means of access to the electoral arena. Certainly, some meaningful changes have occurred in response to recent catastrophes, but do not significantly alter the balance of power in favor of the People, and do not address the root cause, which is official corruption.

Wall Street and Government Conspire to Increase the Misery They Created

2010-10-19T12:54:00.000-06:00

This report by the Huffington Post on the degree to which government is conspiring with Wall Street to profit from the misery created by Wall Street and its lapdogs in government tells us everything we need to know about the degree to which governments in this country have become destructive of the ends for which they were formed, and the necessity of altering or abolishing them.

Errand Boy for Resource Pirates Appointed No. 2 in US Attorney's Office

2010-09-14T16:32:00.001-06:00

In U.S. Attorney’s Office, Walsh Names Troyer His No. 2

Well, this certainly proves the truth of Aesop's marvelous quip, as true now as it was thousands of years ago: "We hang petty thieves, the great ones we appoint to high office." Resource pirates and other enemies of the People will undoubtedly be delighted to know that they will have a friend and advocate in the US Attorney's office.

Troyer's bio, from the web site of Hogan and Lovells, of which former Denver City Attorney, Friend of Bill (Ritter), and shanty Irish "fixer", Cole Finegan, is the managing partner, tells you everything you need to know about whose interests he will serve while on the People's payroll:

Bob Troyer is a trial lawyer who focuses on class action litigation, complex commercial litigation, environmental litigation, white collar defense, and internal investigations. He has litigated cases in more than 10 federal jurisdictions and argued numerous appeals before the U.S. Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Bob recently tried and won a Clean Water Act case in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado, defending Colorado's only active gold mine against the Sierra Club and Mineral Policy Center. After a two-week trial, all claims against Bob's clients were dismissed, and he recovered the mine's attorney's fees. He currently is defending two Clean Air Act cases pending in federal courts in Iowa and Wyoming. Bob also is currently representing the operator of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in defense of a Clean Water Act citizens suit in federal court in New Mexico.

Bob also represents a major international corporation in a federal multidistrict class action arising out of the 2006 pet food recall. In addition, he represents the world's largest food company in a class action pending in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California brought under the Alien Tort Statute and various consumer protection laws.

Prior to joining Hogan & Hartson, Bob was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Colorado. In his five plus years at the U.S. Attorney's Office, he prosecuted a wide variety of violent and nonviolent crimes, including homicide, gun, drug, immigration, and white collar cases. During his tenure as a federal prosecutor, Bob received the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force Award (2003), the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office Award (2002), and the Department of Justice Superior Performance Awards (2000-2003).

Before joining the U.S. Attorney's Office, Bob was a shareholder in the Denver office of a national firm, where he litigated a wide range of complex commercial, class action, environmental, and regulatory cases. He began his legal career in the Boston office of another national firm, where he litigated a variety of complex commercial and environmental cases.

Well, Instead of Winning a $1.22 Million Judgment and $850,000 Settlement Against the Corrupt City of Denver, I Should Have Distributed a Few Kilos of Cocaine?

2010-09-11T20:45:00.003-06:00

A friend who has also been victimized by Colorado's deeply corrupt and Sovietic Atty. Regulation System in reprisal for defeating powerful enemies on behalf of the little guy brought to my attention that, incredibly, a woman allegedly convicted of cocaine trafficking was long ago admitted to the Colorado bar, and, not only that, was pardoned by W as a favor to her sponsor, local plutocrat, Silverado veteran, and AIPAC leader, Larry Mizel.

She is a partner at Sherman & Howard, a firm that specializes in representing the rich and the powerful, and is full of "leading members of the bar." She was formerly with, yes, Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Madden (now Shrek).

Gee, one might think one's chances with the Colorado Supreme Court vary according to "who[m] you know, and who[m] you blow".

Since this woman is evidently on very close terms with the people who run the State, and country, she gets a free pass for conduct far worse than anything I have ever done, and undoubtedly hobnobs regularly with all manner of "leading members of the bar".

I guess the secret to remaining in good standing with the Colorado Supreme Court is to commit felonies, or work for people who do?

They didn't teach that at Stanford Law School. Must be a CU or DU thing.

Maybe if, next time, instead of winning a $1.22 million judgment against and $850,000 settlement from the massively unethical and dishonest City of Denver, I distribute a few kilos of cocaine, the Colorado Supreme Court will show me more clemency!

WTF?

Tom Tancredo: Errand Boy for Hickenlooper's "GOP" Friends? Or Sincerely Trying to Save Us from Hick and His Corrupt Cronies?

2010-09-11T12:53:00.000-06:00

Although I am not a Maes supporter, the plaintiffs in this case appear to be correct in their assertion that Tancredo's inclusion on the ballot was erroneous.

This is a very serious matter that may well require reprinting of the ballots and/or delay of the election.

The ACP has no ability to "waive" State law.

Colorado Revised Statutes 1-4-601(4)(a) and C.R.S. 1-4-1304 appear to unambiguously require that Tancredo have been registered as an American Constitution Party voter prior to January 1, 2010.

http://www.elections.colorado.gov/Conte ... 0Final.pdf

If I am not mistaken, had Tancredo wished to run as an unaffiliated candidate, he would have been required to change his registration in or about May, 2009, and collect a massive number of signatures during a 45-day window commencing in May, 2010 in order to petition on to the ballot. (This is another of the many ways in which the two major parties have succeeded in maintaining a death grip on the electoral process, by making it extremely difficult for independents or minor party candidates to gain access to the ballot.)

One must ask, "Cui bono?"

By encouraging Tancredo to jump in, are Hickenlooper's "GOP" supporters, e.g., Larry Mizel, Norm Brownstein, and others similarly situated, hoping to make it even easier than it already would have been for Hick to win the job, and take care of them from the east end of City Plaza as well as he has from the west?

One must wonder if they have promised Tancredo valuable consideration for his assistance, or what he hopes to accomplish by ensuring Hick's election.

One must also admit the possibility that Tom simply wants with all his heart to save us from the admission of Hickelooper and his corrupt cronies to an even larger gaming room.

I personally like Tom Tancredo very much. He is a true Patriot, a very nice fellow, and his heart is generally in the right place.

I have always agreed with him on a number of issues related to domestic and foreign policy, with the exception of his undue fealty to Israel, which I perceived to be dictated by the need to avoid incurring the wrath of Larry Mizel, Norm Brownstein, and AIPAC, and which distinguishes him from Pat Buchanan, whose views on most important subjects, but not all, parallel my own.

I also was put off by Tom's unjust attack some years ago on the young Latino fellow who grew up in the US as the child of illegals, worked hard, stayed out of trouble, got straight A's, and deserved a scholarship to CU. That kid represented everything that is good in immigrants, illegal or otherwise. Tom should have done everything he could to see to it the kid got a full ride to CU, and held him up as an example of the kind of immigrants we should welcome through a better system of permitting hard-working, decent people like his own ancestors and mine to enter the country.

As the descendant of Italian immigrants who were despised by Irish immigrants (such as my paternal ancestors) despite their mutual Catholicism because they were used by the likes of Rockefeller and Carnegie as scab labor to undercut unionization in steel mills and mines, Tom should be, in my view, more circumspect in his attacks on immigrants.

He has certainly matured in his understanding of the issue, as he has for some time now asserted what I publicly asserted long before him (on, e.g., "Colorado State of Mind"): the real reason the US Government and most states have never acted to effectively restrict illegal immigration is that the people who run Colorado and the country, big political contributors, prefer the availability of a cheap, docile work force, just as did their ancestors or predecessors 100 years ago. Those jobs they could not outsource to the fascist capitalist paradise (free of any meaningful environmental, labor, wage-hour, or safety regulations, or unions) they have created in China, they have wherever possible handed over to contractors who employ illegals with practical impunity.

Just as our alleged war on drugs is nothing other than a charade designed to preserve the illusion of law enforcement, even while many "leading citizens" and major political contributors benefit from the massive infusions of capital provided by the investment of drug proceeds in apparently legitimate banks, businesses, and developments across the country ("El Chapo" and the like would prefer to invest in the US, where, ironically, the rule of law provides them with more protection of their investments than would be possible in their home countries), so is our alleged war on illegal immigration a complete charade.

If the Government wanted to shut down the use of illegal immigrants, it would establish a much more robust enforcement scheme that imposed severe penalties on employers for employing them directly, or, equally importantly, indirectly through subcontractors that afford them "plausible deniability". Instead, we get occasional raids that are showy but nothing more than elaborate theater in which the victim is undoubtedly a company with no ties to big political contributors to whichever Administration is in power.

Meanwhile, a stroll by any major construction project in the country, such as the Southglenn redevelopment by which I passed hundreds of times during its construction, will reveal that hundreds of persons who are obviously (by virtue of their dress, stature, and other markers that anyone quite familiar with Latin America can readily use to identify them as from South of the Border--this is not "racism"; it's the same technique once used to distinguish Sioux from Arapahoe from Crow, etc.) not American-born Latinos are working on them, employed directly or indirectly by, as in the case of Southglenn, Jalisco International, a company someone with whom I am well acquainted who has spent most of his life in or on the border of Mexico identifies as controlled by, yes, "El Chapo" Guzman! El Chapo has built a number of magnificent malls in Mexico, e.g., the "Plaza de Oro" (in which I have spent a number of hours and which I can attest rivals any mall in this country) in Guadalajara, and a number of other commercial developments.

One of the reasons the Mexican Government never seems to be able to manage to get El Chapo is that doing business with him is easier, and more profitable, for a lot of businesses, banks, and politicians in Mexico than trying to take him down. Hence it is El Chapo's enemies in Michoacan and the Gulf Cartel (formerly led by Beltran-Leyva) who usually bear the brunt of the Mexican government's ire. Not unlike the Chicago Police or the FBI during the height of the Sicilian Mafia (which is now, since what was once criminal is now largely legal in this country, a very "legitimate" array of commercial enterprises), the authorities in Mexico are to a large extent controlled or manipulated by competing criminal enterprises for the purpose of gaining a competitive advantage, yet never are allowed to make a serious effort to destroy them ALL.

The way to end the serious problem of illegal immigration: finally make employing them TRULY illegal.

The way to end the serious problem of drug trafficking that seriously undermines the rule of law in this country and is destroying Mexico with what will soon be very serious strategic problems for the US that make Iraq and Afghanistan highly irrelevant by comparison: legalize drugs in this country and take the money out of it.

Once the small percentage of Americans with seriously addictive personalities can get prescriptions for the stuff, supplied by Eli Lilly or Altria, and not have to engage in prostitution and theft to feed their habits, the people of Mexico and the USA will be much better off. The taxes collected would build hundreds of medical schools or research facilities, and reduce the huge incentive for corruption in every aspect of our government and society, whether law enforcement, the courts, or our legislatures, created by the status quo.

Right now, all we're succeeding in doing is sustaining a high price for the benefit of drug lords like El Chapo and his "legitimate" partners in crime on both sides of the border, and the profits go to fuel only more and more lawlessness on both sides of the border.

Once Tom gets a clearer picture of who the enemy really is, which is the people who run this country, and NOT impoverished Mexicans, I'll support him 100%.

Ritter Appoints Monica Marquez to Colorado Supreme Court

2010-09-09T12:01:00.000-06:00

Monica Marquez is a fine person and very bright. Her appointment, however, reveals a serious flaw in the clubbily opaque manner in which appointments to such powerful positions are routinely conducted, at the State AND Federal level, by officials in both parties.

The problem with our method of judicial appointments, at both the State and Federal level, is that, while in theory it is reasonable, in practice (as is true of most of what goes on in the political arena), it is fraught with back-scratching and corruption that ensures that, with few exceptions, only those who exalt the power of Big Business or Big Government over the interests of the People will be seriously considered.

There is undeniably a direct correlation between the degree to which one (whatever his or her party) is able to engage in legalized bribery disguised as "free speech" of elected officials and the degree of one's influence over legislative, executive, and judicial affairs. Hence, the likes of Steve Farber, Norm Brownstein, Cole Finegan and the people or organizations who are their masters, as well as Phil Anschutz, John Malone, Larry Mizel, Pat Stryker and Tim Gill, who are among the puppet masters who actually run this State, necessarily have a lot more say in every aspect of our government than those who will never receive more than a patronizing form letter from a politician to thank them for their "input" (which is quickly "output" unless accompanied by a VERY large bundle of checks from "concerned citizens").

Judicial appointment committees invariably consist of complaisant minions for such interests willing to supply a veneer of objectivity to a process that is only quite secondarily influenced by proper considerations such as competence, integrity, and devotion to the Constitution, the Truth, and the Law, above all else. The key consideration, as manifested by the appointment of smart but minimally qualified people such as Eid and Marquez, who have never in their professional lives taken a serious risk to help someone down on his or her luck or oppose abuse of power, is whether they will protect the interests of those who appoint them.

There is no real transparency or accountability to the process, whether it is conducted by the likes of Bill Owens, who never met a fascist prosecutor he didn't love, or the likes of Bll Ritter, who has suckled at the swollen teat of the public fisc all his adult life, and is at base a statist ideologue. By that, I mean someone who has only a very tenuous grasp on the intent behind the Bill of Rights, and is devoted to exalting the abuse of governmental power above the rights of the individual. Both parties are dominated by them. Both parties seek to abuse governmental power, but in the service of interests that are simultaneously overlapping and opposed.

For example, leftist Democrats seek to abuse the power of the State to tax us to subsidize all manner of dysfunction through welfare, and to interfere with or restrict individual rights, such as the right to keep and bear arms or indulge in politically incorrect speech.
Establishment Republicans seek to abuse the power of the State to tax us to subsidize welfare for Wall Street and the Military Industrial Complex, and to interfere with or restrict individual rights, such as the right to encourage violent protests of environmentally destructive conduct by private actors or other outrageously oppressive conduct by our vastly expanded police state on the pretext of preventing "terrorism".

Only judges who will enable such abuse of governmental power through Constitutional contortionism will ever be seriously considered for appointment by committees consisting of "leading members of the bar" who pose no threat to the wealthy and powerful interests that control our country, and who, in order the maintain the illusion of democracy, provide the People with the opportunity to select between the two candidates for office they have identified as least likely to threaten their interests.

Hence, when we might have had a great American like Bob Kerrey as President in 1992, we got Slick Willie (who was nothing but a puppet for Wall Street whose nose was so blackened by weekends he and Hillary spent schmoozing Wall Street bigwigs at "Renaissance Weekends" in places like Hilton Head that he couldn't smell trouble when Monica came his way, so to speak).

Hence, when we might have had a [formerly] great American such as John McCain as President in 2000 (when his election might have done us a world of good by quite possibly preventing 9/11 and sure as hell not invading Iraq, if he were going to invade at all, without following the Eric Shinseki's advice), we got the woefully underqualified and inept W.

The judicial appointment process in this State and Nation is a "black box". Those who apply or are nominated but are excluded from serious consideration are never disclosed. Applicants are kept secret. Their deliberations are not documented. The process is polluted with all manner of considerations that are unrelated to the question of who is, without a doubt, the best person for the job. Think for a moment, how satisfied you would be with a process that forced you to accede to appointment by a committee before whom you were never permitted to appear, and whose deliberations are conducted in secret, of a surgeon to perform open-heart surgery on your child, and you learned that the surgeon selected had never before performed the procedure, but had a lot of experience removing hemorrhoids.

That pretty well sums up our wonderful "Missouri Plan" process. People who should never be allowed to get near the Governor's chair or the US Congress naturally think it is quite OK to appoint comparably underqualified cronies to the judiciary.

My only difference with Matt Arnold and John Andrews is that they do not employ the same standards when it comes to the many lousy appointments made by Owens or other GOP, including, but hardly limited to, Owens' placing the unethical prosecutors who railroaded Tim Masters on the bench for their faithful service to the State, or Wayne Allard's appointment of the execrable Robert E. Blackburn, who apparently never tried a case in federal court before he ascended to his enormously powerful position.

I also do not agree with their attacks on Mike Bender, who is the closest thing we've got to an advocate for the little guy on the Colorado Supreme Court. Despite his liberalism, true conservatives should support Bender's retention. Bender knows enough of the corruption of our legal system to distrust the State, and has a healthy respect for and understanding of the Bill of Rights. That he nevertheless plays the role of pretending that it is a fair and just system just short of perfection is disappointing, but that is the price one pays for power, or the right to petition the powerful. Those unwilling to play a role in the charade never get a part.

GOP: "Irrational Exuberance"? The Dems ARE God-awful, but is the same old GOP the Only Alternative??

2010-09-08T14:12:00.001-06:00

The American electorate mystifies me more and more.

They elected the quite leftist Obama in reaction to the poor leadership of Bush and the GOP that did so much to enable, among other things, 9/11, incompetent management of the war in Iraq until 2007, the thievery on Walll Street (and in DC) that brought us the economic collapse, and weak drilling regulation that contributed to the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe.

They now, if polls are to be believed, are on the verge of handing Congress back to virtually the same god-awful GOP leadership that screwed up so badly that Obama was able to waltz into the White House.

If polls are to be believed, this is because Obama has done exactly what he promised to do, and for which they voted quite enthusiastically.

Needless to say, I look forward to Pelosi and Reid losing power. They suck.

That does not mean, however, that I relish the idea of the same GOP idiots who made Obama possible, in the first place, resuming control of Congress.

Isn't there a third way??

US Government Screws Rocky Flats Workers

2010-09-03T18:19:00.000-06:00

Again, the US Government reserves to itself (and its contractors--is there really a difference?) the exclusive right, with utter impunity, to poison American citizens with plutonium, all in the name of protecting our freedoms from governments that are indifferent to the welfare of their citizens.

God love 'em, the errand boys for Big Government and Big Business on the Tenth Circuit perceive no irony in this, or are inured to it.

Of course, were it otherwise, they would never have been appointed for life to such powerful positions. Those who place the interests of the People before those of Big Government and Big Business need not apply.

Tenth Circuit Screws Rocky Flats Neighbors,, Deflowers Lady Justice

2010-09-03T18:12:00.000-06:00

The august Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals has yet again demonstrated that it firmly believes that the US Government and its contractors are not subject to the Constitution, and need not play by the same rules to which the rest of us are subject.

Imagine the consequences if al-Qaeda were to sprinkle a little plutonium in the air over the Front Range.

Would anyone question that we should do everything in our power, including, if need be, the invasion of foreign lands, in order to punish the "evildoers"?

Apparently, only the US Government is entitled to poison American citizens with impunity!

Can it Be? John Hickenlooper Is No Boy Scout?

2010-08-30T12:36:00.000-06:00

Finally, the Post publishes something that partially exposes Hickenlooper for what he is.

In addition to exposing that he is a fellow traveler with all manner of fringe leftist groups, it exposes him as the profound hypocrite that he is.

While pretending to be an innocuous, "progressive" Boy Scout who devotes all his energy to making Denver more environmentally friendly, he has in fact presided over a decidedly corrupt and lawless administration.

He works hand in glove with various business interests to ensure that they always receive the best possible treatment form the City, at the expense of taxpayers. (To my knowledge, no one has yet investigated the degree to which the taxpayers' interests have been adequately protected in deals related to projects such as Union Station or other development projects.)

Since he learned the power of the police (and fire) union during the Turney scandal, when they stopped writing tickets and cost the City millions to protest the punishment Turney received, he has consistently mollycoddled a corrupt police force. Perea is the fall guy for Hickenlooper's desire to cultivate the support of the public unions in his campaign.

He and his City Attorneys, Cole Finegan and David Fine, have worked quite assiduously to abuse the City's power and political connections to do everything possible to avoid or set aside the consequences of idiotic personnel decisions. That he claims to oppose "ageism" is a joke.

He and his "fixers" managed somehow through improper means to induce US District Judge Robert Blackburn fifteen months after trial to unconstitutionally and unlawfully set aside a perfectly valid $1.22 million age discrimination jury verdict I won against the City for long-time Denver Firefighter Billy Cadorna.

http://www.westword.com/2007-12-13/news/blackburned/

I cannot help suspecting that they obtained Blackburn's cooperation in this subversion of justice by offering a big GOP contributor a juicy contract or other big favor (fast-track zoning approval? condemnation of a desired property? elimination of a competing project?) in exchange for his or her persuading Blackburn to toss the verdict on a whim.

Or could it be that Blackburn is one of the still-unnamed "judges" said to have patronized the Denver Players Club, along with Hickenlooper and numerous other "leading lights" of our fair city whose identities have been suppressed by the Denver Police after they raided the club, evidently to cover up the names of clients before they fell into the hands of Brian Maass? Blackburn allegedly likes to play squash, an odd sport for a rancher's kid from Las Animas.

http://cbs4denver.com/investigates/the. ... 64687.html

They also used their close connections to the Democrat-controlled Colorado Supreme Court to retaliate against me by having me fraudulently prosecuted for "interfering with the administration of justice" by winning a $1.22 million jury verdict, and subsequent $850,000 settlement, for Cadorna.

At the same time, Fine worked very hard to protect Willie Shepherd, who represented and is close to the people who control the City, from the consequences of his much more serious misconduct.

http://www.5280.com/issues/2010/1006/fe ... ageID=2238

Cole Finegan and Supreme Court Justice Mary Mullarkey, who unlawfully directed that I be fraudulently prosecuted and driven from the bar for winning a big judgment against their friends in the City, did everything they could to interfere with investigation of District Judge Larry Manzanares for stealing a laptop from the District Court so he could use it to cruise porn sites (not realizing, despite his Harvard Law degree, that it had been "Lo-Jacked" and would be traced directly to his home).

Far from being the Boy Scout he pretends to be, Hickenlooper and his Democrat buddies are legal and political thugs who first and foremost look out for developers, construction companies, and other political pirates in order to retain their grasp on the power and wealth they seek to use to advance their limousine leftist agenda.

It's a damn shame the best the GOP could do was to run the likes of McInnis and Maes against Hickenlooper.

Evidently, those who control the GOP in Colorado feel they have a lot to gain by Hickenlooper being Governor.

Certainly, Larry Mizel, who controls the Colorado GOP as much or more than any other individual or entity, seems to have been persuaded of that when he met with Hickenlooper and Roxane White several months ago (reported by Penny Parker in the Post).

Of course, it's hard to imagine Dean Singleton (who owns the Post) could be bothered to "sick" one of the few crack reporters he has left on the REAL Hickenlooper and how he and his cronies REALLY operate.

Still, this article shows Singleton feels compelled to allow at least SOME negative press on Hickenlooper in order to maintain the illusion of fairness.

IRS Shoots Down Prepaid Forward Contract Tax Evasion Scam!

2010-07-29T02:13:00.003-06:00

One would think that a man such as Phil Anschutz, who is (as billionaires go) indisputably civic-minded and philanthropic, would enjoy paying capital gains taxes to the government of the country which has allowed him through hard work, extraordinary acumen, good luck, and the judicious purchase of numerous politicians and judges, to amass such a marvelous fortune.

Yet, he, and many others like him, have for years exploited so-called "prepaid forward contracts" as a means of evading capital gains taxes that ordinary citizens such as you and I must normally pay, upon penalty of fine or imprisonment, on the modest "gains" (unadjusted for inflation) we may be so fortunate to "earn" on capital assets such as our home, or Tante Mathilde's autographed photo of Charles Aznavour.

Though Mr. Anschutz has undoubtedly done wonderful things for Colorado, such as funding the new CU medical school at vast expense, and deserves considerable respect, one can't help thinking there is something amiss when only the very rich can have all their massive gains, and keep them, too.

Kenny Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, at the recommendation of Merrill Lynch and others, exploited such contracts (remember the Nigerian oil barges?) in wizardly fashion to treat loans as revenue for balance sheet purposes, and as loans for tax purposes. We all know how well that worked out for Enron. Once the street began to comprehend the degree to which Enron was overstating its revenues through this and other scams, the stock cratered.

Yet, the same essential con remained in wide use, in a number of different ways devised by "leading members of the bar" (who control bar associations and sit on the Board of Trustees of many institutions of higher learning despite the apparent criminality of their work), long after Enron's demise.

Casting some doubt upon, yet hardly disproving entirely, my overarching thesis that we have the best government and system of justice money can buy, a Tax Court Judge has quite correctly, through the application of simple common sense, invalidated Anschutz's transparent effort to avoid paying capital gains taxes on hundreds of millions in capital gains that he sought to have treated as nothing more than a loan.

This is a signal victory for (at least the illusion of) tax fairness. It remains to be seen whether it portends greater actual tax equity, or will amount to little more than window dressing of the sort often used to portray the government as championing fairness even while it puts the screws to the little guy. My guess is that it is window dressing. Nonetheless, for those of us who pay our taxes whether we like it or not, this is certainly a step in the right direction!

For now, therefore, I choose to regard it as a heartening outcome. God knows, one must really stretch to find any, these days.

One wonders how Anschutz's former special assistant, Yalie wunderkind Michael Bennet, whose trajectory is ever upward by virtue of his faithful service to those, such as Anschutz, who run the country, would explain their past creation of, or support for, such massive tax scams, even while they pretend for electoral purposes to be 100% for the little guy.

Undoubtedly, Mr. Bennet will, in classic Yalie-speak, protest that he was for such scams before he was against them?

Certainly, Mr. Bennet is an extraordinarily able fellow, but it is hard to see him as a Naderite reformer of the kind he pretends to be in his campaign communications, when he not so very long ago was Anschutz's right-hand man.

Ken Buck is Just as Establishment GOP as Jane Norton

2010-07-18T02:41:00.000-06:00

Ken Buck has cleverly positioned, and misleadingly portrayed, himself as the "Grassroots Candidate" running against the "Establishment" candidate.

In truth, Buck and Norton are peas in a pod politically, and both have heavy Establsihment support, as this article shows.

The only significant difference between them is between their legs.

Jane is much more attractive and personally appealing, but Buck's superficial gravitas may make him the better adversary to Bennet or Romanoff.

Romanoff's TV ads sound like they are plagiarized from my blog. I hope he means what he says, and says what he means, but, given his track record, I suspect he is cynically attempting to exploit populist rage by creating the appearance of serious differences between Establishment darling Bennet and himself, when few such differences actually exist. I'm willing to give him a hearing, though, despite his close affiliation with my enemies in the Denver Democratic Party.

Alas, at least the People of Colorado will have a reasonably acceptable choice to make for Senator.

Sadly, it appears that Hickenlooper will skate into the Governor's office with nary a scratch, despite the massive corruption that permeates the City of Denver.

The idiocy of which McInnis and Maes appear to be guilty seems trivial compared to the shenanigans in which the City has been involved during Hickenlooper's administration, yet there can be no denying that neither Maes nor McInnis seems capable of defeating Hick, or worthy of the Governor's office.

McInnis Deserves Humiliation, But Why Are Equally Unethical Democrats Immune From Similar Scrutiny and Humiliation?

2010-07-16T10:43:00.001-06:00

I am heartened by the Post's assiduous investigation of Mr. McInnis' questionable conduct, for which he richly deserves the humiliation to which he is being subjected.

One might hope that it portends similarly assiduous investigation of the Hickenlooper Administration's routine and systematic unlawful conduct, including, but hardly limited to, use of its police powers and public contracts to reward its friends and punish its enemies.

That, however, would require the completely unwarranted assumption that the Post's goal is something other than seriously weakening the only GOP candidate who stands a (small, but nonetheless meaningful) chance of defeating Hickenlooper.

When the Post starts exposing the degree to which McInnis' Democrat partners at Hogan and Lovells, such as Cole Finegan, or their fellow travelers, such as Steve Farber or David Fine, are little different in their disregard for, or subversion of, the public interest, I will be more inclined to doubt that this is a political hatchet job.

Cole Finegan and his minions facilitated the City of Denver's blatant age discrimination against Firefighter Billy Cadorna, which resulted in a $1.22 million jury verdict against the City, and payment of an $850,000 settlement to Cadorna.

Cole Finegan and Democrat Colorado Supreme Court Justice Mary Mullarkey actively interfered with or opposed the investigation and prosecution of their Democrat buddy, former District Court Judge and Hickenlooper appointee Larry Manzanares, for theft of a computer from the Denver District Court.

As Maximilian Potter reported in 5280, David Fine, Finegan's successor as Denver City Attorney, engineered the deal under which a developer overbilled by attorney Willie Shepherd decided not to pursue the matter against Shepherd. It appears that Fine may have induced him to overlook it with in exchange for favors from the City.

This helped Shepherd avoid serious discipline by the Colorado Supreme Court for misconduct far more serious than alleged "misconduct" on the pretext of which it, as a favor to the City of Denver, effectively disbarred me for the serious offense of winning a big judgment and settlement for Billy Cadorna, and has persecuted other successful advocates for the little guy, such as Sunny Maynard.

Wake up, everyone!

All these weasels, whether Democrat or GOP, are strangers to the truth and errand boys and girls for the same powerful interests.

The only question is which one will do the best job of taking care of the people who run the State and country.

Obviously, the powers-that-be, such as Larry Mizel and Walter Isenberg, have concluded Hickenlooper is their best bet, and so have encouraged their buddy, Dean Singleton, to use his newspaper to expose McInnis' corruption, even while it continues to completely ignore that of his Democratic opponent.

First Amendment Loses Again; Lawyer Suspended for Failure to Worship a Judicial Tyrant

2010-07-16T08:21:00.004-06:00

This article provides yet another instructive example of the degree to which attorneys are, paradoxically, second-class citizens in the degree to which they may exercise their Constitutional rights to speak freely, or to be free from deprivation of their liberty or property without procedural or substantive due process.

Whereas any citizen other than an attorney is free to speak out concerning the evident incompetence or corruption of any public official, including a judge, it is the view of State bar regulators that attorneys, who are in the best position to know the degree to which judges are incompetent or dishonest, must remain silent in the face of judicial tyranny.

This is a threat to the freedom of all, for all depend for the preservation of their freedoms upon the willingness of courageous attorneys to oppose political and judicial tyranny.

Judges are nothing but lawyers who, by virtue of their political connections, are appointed to the bench in order that they may be relied upon, from time to time, to do the bidding of their political allies. They are seldom the best available person for the job, and vary widely in the degree to which they revere the law and the truth above all else, and prove worthy of the position.

Even Supreme Court Justices, however brilliant they may be, are appointed principally because they have throughout their careers devoted themselves to serving the interests of the rich or powerful, whether it be Big Business or Big Government. Populists need not apply. Like John Roberts, Elena Kagan has devoted her entire life to advancing her own career by sucking up to the rich or powerful. She has never in her career gone out of her way to take a big risk on behalf of the little guy. Not since Thurgood Marshall has anyone who devoted his or her career to representing the little guy been appointed to the Supreme Court.

This is likewise true in the lower courts. Most appointed judges are former attorneys for Big Business or Big Government who have never taken a serious risk for anyone, just because it was the right thing to do.

Judges are in most states appointed for life, and are almost entirely unaccountable for routinely incompetent or corrupt exercise of their massive powers to consistently favor their allies.

It is only when they engage in blatantly "inappropriate" conduct (even though it may actually be quite inoffensive in any real sense), such as consorting with whores and strippers, sexually harassing litigants or employees, or actually taking direct (as opposed to subtly indirect) bribes, that they are driven from the bench.

That they are judicial nihilists who routinely rape and murder Lady Justice by granting summary judgment against litigants they do not like (usually the little guy), show favoritism toward litigants they do like (Big Business or Big Government for which they worked as attorneys), gut statutes with which they do not agree, or trash valid jury verdicts with which they do not agree, is never grounds for discipline, let alone impeachment.

At worst, they suffer the mild shame of occasional reversal on appeal.

The only people in a position to expose their incompetence and corruption are attorneys. It is outrageous that judges may muzzle attorneys by threatening them with suspension or disbarment should they speak out against judicial tyranny or incompetence.

Only if lawyers as a class cease complying with this unconstitutional travesty will this perversion of our system of government in the service of special interests be corrected. That is, of course, unlikely, as most lawyers are by nature complaisant, cautious, and circumspect, else they would do something more productive, useful, or at least entertaining, with their lives.

Below is a sage comment the attorney in question, Morris Hoffman, made online in response to the ABA article concerning his proposed suspension for daring to speak ill of the judicial hack with which he was confronted:

"I am the attorney who is the subject of the proceeding. I have practiced for 37 years without even a complaint from any client to the Ardc, no malpractice allegations, no contempt findings, and I have represented the most challenging clients in very difficult litigation. With regard to this Judge, he removed custody of a child from the lawful custodian with whom she had lived her entire life on the day a so called “emergency” Petition for Custody was filed while post Judgment proceedings were already pending in another county. Neither of the parents nor the child had resided in Cook County for years. The Judge denied a peremptory Motion for Change of Judge filed with my appearance on behalf of the mother. The Judge had never previously been assigned to the case. He refused to follow Illinois Supreme Court Rules. During the appearance he was also advised the father to whom he turned over the child was a substance abuse addict who had repeatedly been in in patient treatment. The father was also more than $30,000 in arrears in child support, later recovered on behalf of my client. The Judge without a hearing took custody from my client, a very good mother, and turned the child over to the father. My client DID file a complaint with the Judicial Inquiry Board. It went unanswered. I did contact the Chief Judge. He did nothing. Within a matter of weeks, while Motions were pending seeking to vacate the Order, the father relapsed, was found incoherent on the floor of his home and it was necessary to get an Order of Protection in the county of the child’s residence restoring custody to my client. The father’s visitation was restricted. What kind of Judge does this? I researched his background and found that he was regarded as an egomaniac whose previous public employment was attributed to being the “drinking buddy of big Jim Thompson,” a former Governor. The Judge’s brother is on the Appellate Court and is also an alcoholic. This can be verified by an internet search. It is not true that the comment was made during a Court proceeding. It was made in a private telephone call while the Judge was in chambers. Later the issue was addressed in a letter directed to the Judge suggesting he needed to explore the possibility that he had a Narcissistic Personality Disorder and that it could be affecting the discharge of his duties. I was not found in contempt during any proceeding. After the complaints were filed against the Judge with the proper authorities, he retaliated by personally claiming my client (who had never testified) had committed perjury in an affidavit she swears is true. He then conducted a “hearing” in which he vouched for the credibility of a court employee with whom he was personally acquainted and fined my client. Later, in likely recognition of the impropriety of his conduct, he vacated the fine. As to the other two Counts in the Complaint, they are four and fourteen years old. Previously, an Administrator and Inquiry Board considered the identical allegations, found no Rule violation had occurred and the files were closed. One file was even expunged under the Rules. Despite prior closure and expungement, years later a subsequent Administrator resurrected the matters, conducted no additional investigation and concluded that the prior Administrator and Inquiry Board were in error. I will be 62 years old this year, and I am moving to Florida next year after my wife retires. Just thought you might be interested in the actual facts. Unless you read the actual record, you will not find these facts in the recitations of the Hearing or Inquiry Boards. But then they are appointed by Judges and serve under the umbrella of the prosecuting agency. I at least appreciate the repeated findings by the Commission that I have represented my clients capably. As far as the integrity of the Courts, it depends on the integrity of the human beings who serve. NO ONE should lend blind obedience or respect to institutions. This is what the German people did prior to World War II. People and institutions deserve only the respect they earn. Public servants, including Judges, are due no respect when they engage in improper or unlawful conduct. This is precisely the purpose of the First Amendment and I find no exception in that document for the justifiable and truthful criticism of Judges by lawyers. If someone out there reads the US Constitution and finds any language which would provide authority for another position, please contact me."

McClatchy's Outstanding Expose of Goldmine Sachs' Criminality

2010-07-03T07:28:00.000-06:00

McClatchy Newspapers have published numerous outstanding articles describing the degree to which Goldmine Sachs was far more than just a "market maker", but was very much a market manipulator that contributed mightily to, and profited mightily from, the housing bubble and financial collapse. This link will take you to a page devoted to the subject, which is a must-read.

Tim Masters' Persecutor Will Take the Fall for the Prosecutors-Now-Judges, the Trial Judge, and the System

2010-07-01T12:27:00.003-06:00

Wake up, People, this is little more than cynical theater, an elaborate con, intended to fool you into thinking the system works, and that all is well in Colorado so long as Ken Buck, and other such errand boys for the rich and powerful to whom you have foolishly entrusted the Ship of State, are in charge.

This prosecution will make Broderick the fall guy for the systemic breakdown of the courts in the Masters. THAT, not justice, is its purpose.

The prosecutors-now-judges, the judge presiding over the Masters trial, and the psychologist (whose nonsensical "expert" subjective analysis of Masters' drawings should never have been permitted by the judge) were fully complicit, and had a MUCH higher duty than Broderick to uphold the truth and the law, and protect Masters from fraudulent prosecution.

Yet, they have been, and will continue to be, treated as though they were also victims of Broderick's deceit. Better that the People suffer the illusion that Broderick was a rogue cop who fooled his bosses, than that the People realize that the entire system is corrupt.

Broderick could never have succeeded in convicting Masters had these "professionals" done their jobs correctly. Instead, they breached their highest professional and ethical duties to facilitate Master's conviction.

Ironically, Broderick may have been least culpable. He may well have been convinced, out of stupidity or monomania, that Masters committed the crime, and cut corners to support his idiotic theory.

Given the poor quality of the evidence against Masters and the strong evidence suggesting other, more likely suspects, the prosecutors should have refused to prosecute. The judge should never have permitted the case to go to trial, or the verdict to stand.

For reasons that have yet to be disclosed, they did not, and instead enthusiastically joined in the witch hunt.

They did not likely do so because Broderick fooled them. Even an experienced prosecutor of the most mediocre intelligence would have readily grasped the insufficiency of the evidence against Masters. Any judge worth a damn would have thrown the case out.

Buck's prosecution is intended to help the DA's office, the prosecutors-turned-judges, and the trial judge to pretend they did their jobs well, but were also fooled by Broderick. They would prefer that the public believe them to be incompetent, rather than malicious.

They hope to make Broderick the fall guy for their cynicism and willingness, like most prosecutors (and defense attorneys) to do whatever it takes to win, regardless of the possible innocence (or guilt) of the defendant, and, like all judges, to send innocent people to prison if expedience (a heavy docket or sustaining the illusion that we have a system of "equal justice for all") demands it.

Anyone uncomfortable with the thought of sending innocent people to prison does not remain a prosecutor, or judge, for long.

In all likelihood, the people to whom the prosecutors-now-judges reported at the time were eager to convince the community that they had caught the murderer, and no one need be concerned that a psychopath was still on the prowl.

DAs, politicians, and police chiefs don't keep their jobs, and can't become judges or senators some day, if the people fully grasp the degree of their incompetence. Better to sustain the illusion of competence through fraud than to admit you're too lazy, stupid, or unlucky to be worthy of the public's trust.

The prosecutors-now-judges have, by virtue of their position as "leading members of the bar", been slapped on the wrist by the Colorado Supreme Court with "public censure" for their manifest subversion of justice, at the cost of ten years or more of Tim Masters' life, $10 million plus attorney's fees to the taxpayers, the escape of the real killer, and, let's not forget, the truth and the law.

The Colorado Supreme Court's goal is not to serve the interests of justice, but to create and cultivate the illusion that those charged with steering the Ship of State, including the Colorado Supreme Court, prosecutors, the judiciary, and politicians are infallible.

Hence, the Colorado Supreme Court ignores gross subversion of justice by high officials who are its political allies, or "leading members of the bar" who protect the interests of those who run the State or the Nation, even while it relentlessly persecutes those who valiantly expose and punish official or private corruption.

The City of Denver, as recent events and reports prove, is massively corrupt and unethical.

Its police, prosecutors and City Attorneys routinely subvert justice for political purposes, yet are largely immune from anything other than symbolic scrutiny by its allies in the Colorado Supreme Court.

The City of Denver knowingly sends hundreds, or even thousands, of people to prison every year who, though they may not be choir boys or girls, are innocent of the crimes for which they are convicted, but whose conviction is essential to keeping judicial dockets moving at low cost, and to advancing the careers of cops, prosecutors, and politicians.

I proved to a federal jury that the City of Denver committed fraud, suborned malicious prosecution and perjury, obstructed justice, and willfully ignored federal law in order to destroy the career of Billy Cadorna, a 27-year firefighter with an unblemished record who was not well liked by certain Fire Dept. Asst. Chiefs.

The jury awarded Billy $1.22 million after a very fair trial in which the City seemed determined to do all it could to lose, and I did a good job of exposing the stupidity and dishonesty of the City and its attorneys.

Fifteen months after trial, the federal judge who presided over the case fraudulently overturned the verdict as a favor to the City, in apparent exchange for favors (to his political allies or him) yet to be discovered. He granted the City a new trial on the pretext that, because he is so incompetent, he was unable to prevent me from seizing control of the courtroom from him and bending the jury to my will. That is nonsense. I'm pretty good at what I do, but not THAT good!

The Colorado Supreme Court is indifferent to, and has never acted to investigate or punish the judge's subversion, indeed, theft, of justice, or the systematic subversion of the law and the truth by the City of Denver and its attorneys.

The Colorado Supreme Court's only response has been, as a favor to its allies in the City of Denver, to fraudulently prosecute and convict ME, of the void-for-vagueness crime of "interfering with the administration of justice" by proving that the City of Denver is run by a lying, thieving brood of vipers, and winning my client a big judgment and $850,000 settlement.

Again, the point is not justice. The point is to fool the People into thinking corrupt prosecutors, judges and politicians are infallible.

If Buck were a true champion of the law and the truth, he would indict the prosecutors-turned-judges.

He might also indict his predecessor and the judge.

He might even indict himself, for not working tirelessly to free Masters himself, once he had good reason to believe Masters had been railroaded.

The only attorneys connected with this case who deserve any credit for devotion to the truth and the law are those who worked tirelessly in obscurity for many years, without meaningful compensation, to expose the gross miscarriage of justice to which he was subjected.

The irony is that preening media darling, reptilian David Lane, will collect a massive fee for his small contribution, whereas the heroes who actually freed Masters will continue to labor in relative obscurity and will, in all likelihood, one day be punished by the system for the crime of exposing its corruption. Lane, by virtue of his profile and connections, is immune from retaliation. They are not.

Illegal Immigration: Prof. Don Huddle's Excellent Work on Displacement of Native Workers by Illegals, and of Older Illegals by Newer Illegals!

2010-06-26T12:31:00.002-06:00

This headline links to an excellent 1995 summary by Rice University Prof. Don Huddle, a leading labor economist, of the results of his outstanding research on the nuances of the causes and effects of employment of illegals in the Houston area.

Unlike so much of the sentimental and unscientific nonsense written on the subject across the political spectrum, Don's work was grounded above all in empirical observation, and performed with intellectual rigor.

His honest conclusions made him very popular in some circles, and very unpopular in others, but no one could dispute their empirical accuracy.

There is little reason to doubt that his observations and conclusions are as accurate today as they were when he made or offered them.

Illegal Immigration: The True Cause

2010-06-26T11:46:00.002-06:00

This link provides a nice summary of arguments, pro and con, concerning various elements of our alleged immigration "policy", or lack thereof.

Without in any way meaning to suggest illegal immigrants are not a serious problem, I would suggest that the most serious threats to this country and its fiscal health are citizens who work on Wall Street and K Street, reside in its best neighborhoods, and send their kids to exclusive private schools while forcing the poor and the working classes to send their kids to dysfunctional inner city schools.

They, not al-Qaeda, not illegals, not even the Chinese, are this country's most dangerous and destructive enemies, for it is their greed, and subversion of our government through legalized bribery disguised as "free speech", that make catastrophes such as 9/11, Katrina, the financial collapse, and the BP tragedy possible.

If our government were not rendered dysfunctional by their payment of elected officials to ensure that government does not interfere with their commercial activities and interests, none of these would have happened.

Moreover, if they did not profit from the presence in this country of millions of cheap, docile laborers who will never unionize or file a workers' comp or unemployment claim, and who suppress wage levels, our immigration enforcement would be far more robust, and there would be far fewer illegals here.

As it is, the people who run this country, including many who make a lot of noise about illegal immigration for political advantage, only pretend to be fighting a war on illegal immigration, in much the same way they only pretend to fight a war on illegal drugs, from which they also profit immensely by laundering drug money by the billions.

Poor Mexicans or Central Americans are just a symptom, not the root cause, of our problems. The people who run the country would, however, rather distract the People's attention from their own complicity in the creating and sustaining the problem.

By way of example, homebuilders like MDC Holdings (controlled by Larry Mizel, who, along with his long-time consigliere, Norm Brownstein, rose from the ashes of the Silverado Bank scandal without so much as a blemish, and are now far more powerful than ever before) benefit immensely from the bounteous supply of illegal labor in their biggest markets. Of course, they do not employ them directly. They employ them indirectly, through the contractors, and, more importantly, subcontractors, who work on their projects.

Indeed, it is impossible, or at least very difficult, to find a single, major construction project in Colorado, and most other states, that does not use them. Hundreds of thousands of them even work in factories and in construction in the Midwest, despite the ready availability of native workers there.

THIRTY years ago, my old friend and Econ professor, Don Huddle of Rice University, reported after extensive field research over a number of years that, in effect, the State of Texas was the largest employer of illegal labor in Texas, because of their heavy use in construction or repair of highways in the State.

The response to such reports over the years? A shrug of the shoulders by the Establishment, and the cynical use of the issue by both parties for political purposes, even while they do nothing meaningful to halt it and, if anything, actively encourage it.

The GOP likes it because business likes it. The Dems like it both because business likes it, and because it tends to ensure a permanent democratic majority in areas where illegals settle, and reproduce far more quickly than the natives. As a result, most Southwestern States will be predominantly "Latino" in 25-50 years, just as Southern California already is, or soon will be.

As always in matters of public policy, the first and last question that must be asked is, "Cui bono?"

NOT the People, but the people who run the country for fun and profit, at the expense of average citizens.

Willie Shepherd: Unfairly Singled Out? Probably. Mollycoddled by Colorado Ethics Gestapo? Absolutely!

2010-06-19T04:16:00.004-06:00

This recent 5280.com article concerns the questionable (but common among big firm lawyers) billing, marketing, and personnel practices of Willie Shepherd, a Black "rainmaker" for Kamlet, Shepherd, a firm formed by former partners of powerful lobbying firm Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Schrek.

[In my original post on this matter, I suggested that Mr. Potter's article may have portrayed Shepherd's accusers in too favorable a light, and offered my cynical surmise that they were motivated less by devotion to the truth and the law, and more by a desire to gain enough leverage to forestall what they feared would be their summary termination by the mercurial Shepherd, and negotiate a more graceful exit from the firm in negotiations concerning their exit.

I also questioned the article's implied supposition that Shepherd's conduct was unusual among big firm lawyers, and suggested it was in fact quite typical of the routinely unethical conduct of "leading members of the bar" in Colorado, who are largely immune from any scrutiny of their actions by the Colorado Supreme Court's Ethics Gestapo.

I have since received responses (including in a very thoughtful post from a former KSR attorney, below) suggesting that I was too harsh or cynical in my supposition about the motives of Shepherd's accusers. I may well have been, and so have modified this post.]

Shepherd's billing practices and misrepresentations merited severe punishment, yet he received very mild punishment, because of his connection to very powerful members of the inner circle that rules the Colorado Bar, and to whom the Ethics Gestapo and their fearlessly fatuous leader, Obersturmführer John Gleason, answer.

One cannot help noting the stark contrast in the extremely harsh punishment (suspension for a year and a day) meted out to me by Gleason's Ethics Gestapo and their moronic lapdog, "Presiding Disciplinary Judge" William Lucero (in retaliation for my winning a $1.22 million jury verdict against, and $850,000 settlement from, the Colorado Supreme Court's Democrat friends in the City of Denver) and the slap on the wrist Shepherd received for his allegedly fraudulent billing.

The explanation is simple: Shepherd has friends in very "high" places who protected him from serious punishment; I have many enemies in "high" places, including the same people who protected Shepherd.

Of course, Shepherd might well complain that he was singled out for particularly harsh treatment, perhaps because he is Black. A great many "leading members of the bar" would be in trouble were Gleason's Ethics Gestapo to focus on their padding of bills, not to mention their routine subversion of the law and the truth for fun and profit.

Hence, Gleason prefers to focus the energies of his office on retaliating against ethical lawyers (who lack the immunity almost all members of the defense bar, and some privileged members of the plaintiff's bar, enjoy) who diligently and ethically work to defeat the powerful interests to whom Gleason and his Ethics Gestapo answer.

Gleason's mewling concerning the reason he went so lightly on Shepherd tells you all you need to know about Gleason's intelligence, integrity, and competence. He is a lapdog for those who subvert the law and the truth wholesale, for massive fun and profit.

Incredible. BP Engineers Consistently Chose the More Dangerous Course

2010-06-15T16:23:00.000-06:00

This Wall Street Journal article explains that, repeatedly presented with the opportunity to choose between the more prudent or less prudent course, BP drilling managers and engineers consistently chose the less prudent course.

They are not stupid men, yet they behaved as though they are. This is not unusual when men in large organizations are under enormous pressure to achieve goals beyond their reach.

That they were afforded such discretion when under enormous pressure to cut corners, instead of being REQUIRED by law, regulation, or internal policy to always choose the most prudent course, no matter the consequences, is almost impossible to imagine, given the enormous consequences of an error.

BP certainly bears the lion's share of responsibility, but no one should doubt that this catastrophe could not have occurred were MMS and other responsible regulatory agencies not deliberately weakened by successive Administrations and Congresses at the behest of Big Oil.

This is little different from circumstances in which airliners crash due to preventable errors or mechanical problems well known in the industry, but which the FAA has dragged its feet to correct under pressure from the airlines that effectively control it.

Salazar's True "Colores": Errand Boy for Resource Pirates?

2010-06-08T16:40:00.000-06:00

The attached article from the leftist blog site, "Counterpunch", offers an outstanding analysis of the degree to which Ken Salazar has advanced his career by advancing or protecting the interests of resource pirates even while pretending to be an environmentalist. Its author knows whereof he speaks.

One cannot help wondering whether Mr. Salazar's partner share from, if I recall correctly, Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Shrek, during the hiatus between his stint as Colorado AG and his Senate run was his reward for valuable services rendered while in public life? It can hardly be a coincidence that W's Secretary of Interior, Gale Norton, has also collected a fat partner share from that firm.

Lexology - Sweeping changes made to labor and employment whistleblower protections

2010-06-05T19:56:00.000-06:00

Lexology - Sweeping changes made to labor and employment whistleblower protections

This link provides excellent analysis of whistle-blower provisions of the "Restoring American Financial Stability Act of 2010" that will offer whistle-blowing financial firm employees some significant protection against retaliation. Whether such a statute would have prevented the recent catastrophe is open to question, since those most knowledgeable about complex financial fraud or dubious instruments such as collateralized debt obligations or prepaid forward contracts are those who profit most from their existence.

As Enron demonstrated, and as we have repeatedly observed more recently, such weasels normally blow the whistle only once it is too late, i.e., once the harmful effects of the practices from which they have theretofore profited begin to become apparent, and they are seeking leverage in negotiating their exit.

They almost never blow the whistle up-front, when the harmful practices from which they will profit might actually be averted.

Moreover, the harmful effects are seldom as apparent up-front as are the quick benefits to net income per share of accelerating revenue and shifting risk off the books, which are the shady goals underlying all such instruments.

Still, this statute may in rare cases serve its intended purpose.

Alleged Former Brothel-Owner Charged with Tax Evasion

2010-05-26T18:01:00.000-06:00

Alleged Former Brothel-Owner Charged with Tax Evasion

It is remarkable, but hardly surprising, that this is the full extent to date of the repercussions of the "busting" of this "high-class" prostitution ring that serviced numerous still unnamed "leading attorneys, judges, businessmen and athletes" at, among other places, the exclusive Denver Club. (Brian Maass of Channel 4 News broke the story in 2008.)

It seems apparent that the principal reason the Denver Police and/or FBI raided and shut down this operation, once its activities were revealed, was to seize and destroy any evidence connecting powerful figures to it.

Since prostitution is a classic means of compromising politicians and judges in order to exact favors or cooperation from them, this concerns far more than a mere prostitution ring, yet prosecutors who hail from the same inner circle as its leading customers are naturally disinclined to pursue the matter wherever it may lead.

Hogan & Hartson's Shadow Over Colorado

2010-05-25T10:05:00.000-06:00

Hogan & Hartson has, particularly with the assistance of former Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Schreck partners Cole Finegan (also the former Denver City Attorney who presided over the City's $1.22 million loss to me in Cadorna v. City of Denver, D.Colo. 04-cv-01076, and has pulled all sorts of strings via his good friend Colorado Supreme Court Chief Justice Mary Mullarkey to destroy my career and reputation in reprisal) and Tom Strickland (also a failed US Senate candidate and now Deputy Secretary of the Interior), worked diligently to compete with Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Schreck to control or dominate Colorado political and judicial nominations and appointments.

Finegan has recently been recognized, including in 5280's recent listing of the most influential people in Denver, as having succeeded in amassing considerable political weight.

Of course, an otherwise unimpressive man and attorney such as Finegan, like his former partners and now competitors, Steve Farber and Norm Brownstein, would have no power absent their absolute devotion to complaisantly serving the wealthy and powerful special interests that populate their client lists. They are master manipulators and "fixers".

Prostitution always has been, and always will be, the most effective way to win the ear, and loyalty, of politicians.

Brownstein, Hyatt. Farber & Schreck's Lobbying Prominence

2010-05-25T09:51:00.000-06:00

Little old Denver is home to one of the most powerful lobbying firms in the nation: Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Schreck, which ranks fifth in the nation. Little wonder that founding partner Steve Farber effectively controls the Colorado Democratic Party, and that founding partner Norm Brownstein effectively controls the Colorado GOP.

Virtually no one in either party is permitted to run for state or federal office, or win appointment to the state or federal bench, without their blessing.

Little wonder, then, that their clients enjoy particularly favorable treatment in state and federal courts, and that many present or former politicians, public attorneys, or regulatory officials from both parties have at one time or another enjoyed fat partner shares with the firm while awaiting appointment or nomination, or after "public" service as their due reward.

Current or former "public" servants who once were or are now BHFS partners include former Senator and current Interior Department Secretary Ken Salazar, current Deputy Secretary of the Interior and failed Senate Candidate Tom Strickland, former Bush Secretary of the Interior Gale Norton, and former Bush Deputy Secretary of the Interior Marti Allbright.

Needless to say, none was appointed because of his or her devotion to the Sierra Club.

All have represented resource pirates of one kind or another.

How Big Oil/Coal Bought the Interior Dept.

2010-05-20T04:01:00.001-06:00

This blog page article from Climate and Capitalism appears to provide a surprisingly even-handed description of the degree to which Salazar, like virtually all Secretaries of the Interior, is little more than an errand boy for the energy companies he now pretends to be so vigorously regulating. It is particularly informative on the question of the degree to which the law firms to which Salazar is most closely tied (especially Brownstein Hyatt, Farber and Schreck) cultivated him, as they did Gale Norton before him, as their fox in the Interior chicken coop.

Whether Dem or GOP, they all come from the same law firms, where they are held in reserve while collecting extremely generous partner shares in exchange for services previously or yet to be rendered while in government.

When Salazar indignantly testifies in Congress that regulation by Interior of offshore drilling has been lax, someone should press him to explain the degree to which such laxity is the inevitable consequence of Senators and Interior Secretaries long on Big Oil's payroll doing their best to prevent effective regulation, and punishing career civil servants who pursue effective regulation. Regulation of drilling has been lax precisely because politicians and lobbyists such as Salazar or his former or future law partners have made, or will make, millions protecting Big Oil from effective regulation.

Convergence Theory Revised: The US and Russian Legal Systems Look Increasingly Similar

2010-05-20T03:32:00.000-06:00

This article from the Wall Street Journal concerning the Kremlin's continuing persecution of Mikhail Khodorkowsky provides a cautionary tale for those who naively believe US prosecutors or, as in my particular case, legal ethics prosecutors, would never abuse their powers from behind the protection of overbroad immunity doctrines to punish their political enemies. Their tactics are at times little different from those employed by totalitarian regimes.

Industry Self-Regulation: "Trust Me!"

2010-05-12T01:00:00.000-06:00

Yet another excellent column on the disastrous consequences of legalized bribery disguised as "free speech", in which only those who can bundle millions in campaign contributions or those who control the media have any meaningful say in government. That is, political speech is anything BUT free; hence, we have the best system of justice and governance that money can buy!

Denver Bar Honors Holland & Hart Attorney Jason Crow

2010-05-12T00:31:00.002-06:00

Denver Bar Honors Holland & Hart Attorney Jason Crow

I normally am disgusted by the spectacle of big firm lawyers who profit from systematic subversion of the truth and the law indulging in self-congratulatory portrayals of themselves as paragons of the bar.

I have to admit, however, that Holland and Hart attorney Jason Crow deserves the greatest possible respect and adulation, not for his legal work, but for his extraordinary service to his country (described in his LinkedIn bio, quoted below).

I remain hard pressed to understand what a stand-up Patriot like him is doing in a brood of vipers like Holland & Hart.

"Before pursuing a career as an attorney, Mr. Crow was a Captain in the United States Army where he served as an Executive Officer for a U.S. Army Special Operations Task Force in Afghanistan and Iraq. In this role, he planned comprehensive and complex special operations combat missions in multiple countries, supervised and led special operations forces in high-profile missions, and managed a remote Army special operations base on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. He was also a Platoon Leader for the U.S. Army Rangers, and an Infantry Platoon Leader with the U.S. Army paratroopers serving three combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Since leaving active military duty in 2006, Mr. Crow has been heavily involved in veterans advocacy, including the push for a new VA hospital in Aurora, Colorado. Recently, Governor Ritter appointed him to the Colorado Board of Veterans' Affairs. The Board's many responsibilities include overseeing the state's veterans nursing homes and administering the veterans trust fund."

Law Week Coverage of Lawyers Committee Luncheon

2010-05-12T00:21:00.001-06:00

Fawning Law Week Online Report On Colorado Lawyers Committee Luncheon: Arnold & Porter, Morrison and Foerster, Holland and Hart, and other Big Firm Partners May Make Millions Subverting Justice and Government for the benefit of Robber Barons and Corporate America, but Lo and Behold, they are really Champions of the Little Guy!

How heart-warming to know that so many "leading members of the bar" (who one might think make millions subverting justice and government for the benefit of Robber Barons and Corporate America) are actually selfless advocates for the little guy, and that John Walsh has not been nominated to be US Attorney because he will protect powerful interests from meaningful scrutiny or liability, but because he is a selfless advocate for the poor and downtrodden!

Law Week continues to provide just the kind of sycophantic coverage of the Colorado big firm bar and judiciary of which Colorado citizens have no need, even while it singles out advocates for the enemies of the big firms for unusually harsh treatment.

Oil Drillers Effectively Regulate Themselves, with Predictably Catastrophic Results

2010-05-07T11:31:00.000-06:00

In this Wall Street Journal article, the degree to which yet another federal agency has been rendered captive to the powerful interests it is supposed to police is exposed.

This is due less to the lassitude and inefficiency of its employees, and more to the fact that, if they were likely to be highly dedicated and efficient in policing the drillers, they would never be hired, or would be driven from the agency at the insistence of the drillers.

This is the method by which all federal agencies are governed. The result is that only those who avoid offending extremely powerful interests that maintain an iron grip on our government through legalized bribery will be hired or retained by federal regulatory agencies. So long as they jerk off while viewing porn on their office computers, instead of protecting the People's interests, they will be rated "fully successful".

Financial Reform Goldman Can Love

2010-05-07T11:19:00.001-06:00

This column from today's Wall Street Journal describes quite concisely and well the protection racket in which members of Congress routinely engage while they pretend to be protecting the People's interests.

I would only add that both parties indulge in this execrable practice. Whichever party is in power naturally receives the most legalized bribes disguised as "free speech". Because the Dems are in power, they are naturally receiving the most.

This explains, among far too many things, why: (1) large corporations, banks, FNMA, and mortgage originators get away with recklessly creating and using weapons of mass economic destruction against the People without meaningful scrutiny or supervision from the SEC, Congress, or the Federal Reserve; (2) why oil companies effectively regulate themselves, and their drilling practices, free from meaningful scrutiny or oversight; (3) why hard-charging FBI agents such as John O'Neill, head of the FBI's NYC Counter-terrorism Strike Force, were prevented in the mid-to-late 1990's from pursuing investigations and interrogations in Saudi Arabia and Yemen (for fear they might jeopardize the interests of Big Oil, the Carlyle Group, and others who make billions on the Saudi Peninsula), with the result that al-Qaeda was not unraveled, and 9/11 occurred; (4) why the Corps of Engineers failed to properly maintain and expand the levees in New Orleans, and why the federal government was ill-equipped to respond proactively and rapidly to Katrina; (5) why we get a turkey F-35 "Joint Strike Fighter" that is vastly overpriced and will not perform any of its multiple roles well.

These are just a few recent examples of the way in which our government has been rendered almost completely dysfunctional by a fatal combination of legalized bribery a/k/a "free speech" and entrenched lassitude and inefficiency.

NY Times: Ted Stevens Proteges Infest K Street

2010-05-04T16:58:00.000-06:00

A friend forwarded a link to this article, which offers considerable insight into the way in which Congressional staffers (in this case, of disgraced Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska) successfully parlay their alleged "public service" into extremely lucrative lobbying careers. This pattern is repeated a thousand-fold in every nook and cranny of the federal government, and explains the dysfunction of our government, which is largely captive to the powerful interests it regulates. Though the article is 18 months old, it bears repeating.

The Arizona Project: Do Colorado and Arizona Overlap at the Four Corners?

2010-05-03T04:00:00.003-06:00

The Arizona Project: Arizona and Colorado Have a Lot in Common!
Reflections on Justice and "Joe Bananas"

In a recent conversation, I was reminded by a person intimately familiar with Mexico and the Border States that Joe Bonanno was largely responsible for establishing Sinaloa, and its largest City, scenic Culiacan, as the center of drug production in Mexico.

This caused me to revisit the work of "The Arizona Project". The Arizona Project was an astonishingly intensive expose by leading journalists of organized crime's grip on Arizona. It was inspired by the bombing murder of Arizona Republic reporter Don Bolles. It is widely believed that lieutenants of Arizona kingpin Kemper Marley (who arranged for Cindy Hensley McCain's father to receive a Budweiser distributorship in Phoenix as his reward for taking a fall and going to prison for Marley in the 1940's) murdered Bolles to end his investigation of Marley.

The attached excerpt from a book chronicling the Arizona Project's work includes a fascinating passage describing the manner in which it is thought Joe Bonanno influenced a federal judge to throw out an apparently perfectly valid jury verdict convicting Joe Bonanno's son of conspiracy to commit murder.

It bears an uncanny resemblance to my own recent experience in winning a $1.22 million jury verdict against the City of Denver, only to see it thrown out on a whim by an imperious federal judge, and to have my name and reputation smeared by that same federal judge and the corrupt Colorado Supreme Court. Just as in the Bonanno case, the jurors in our case protested that the judge could not have been more wrong in his speculation concerning the basis of the jury's verdict.

One cannot help wondering whether the "leading members of the bar" who look out for the City of Denver's interests were pupils or colleagues of "Joe Bananas", or his "fixers".

Would a Third Party Operate Just as do the GOP and Dems?

2010-04-30T23:44:00.000-06:00

Stephen Diamond, you raise an excellent question in your comment. You are quite correct; as the famous scene in "Viva Zapata!", in which Zapata demands to know the name of an unknown, insolent peasant who confronts him (echoing an early scene in which Zapata confronts a powerful official), illustrates, once rebels win power, they too are tempted to abuse it. Given the current legal regime, in which legalized bribery passes for "free speech", it is reasonable to suppose a third party would be vulnerable to similar undue influence.

As a Perotista and even Ralph Nader supporter in times past, however, I believe a third party would frighten the two major parties sufficiently that they would no longer take for granted the votes of so many whose interests they systematically ignore. Both parties are controlled from the margins, rather from the middle. Yet, they depend upon the successful abuse of wedge issues to garner just enough votes from the middle to put them over the top. In this way, they succeed in a game of distraction that lessens the influence of moderate, but reform-minded, voters.

As the so-called "Tea Party" movement demonstrates, a great deal of unfocused, inchoate anger is being co-opted by GOP operatives, and dismissed too readily by Dem operatives, to further major party agenda.

A third party that would appeal to independents and Reagan Democrats, and would be devoted to a platform of meaningful campaign finance reform and reform of government, might well succeed in offering Tea Party activists, who are currently unfocused and inaccurate in their targeting, a more meaningful focus for their anger and energy . They are angry, but are not terribly sophisticated in their understanding of the essential nature of the problems against which they should be fighting. I believe it's worth a try, though you raise fair questions about its likely success.

"We Have Met the Enemy, and He is US!"

2010-04-28T13:20:00.002-06:00

This sums it up quite well: "We have met the enemy, and he is US!" Unless and until we stop electing lapdogs for Wall Street who BS their way into high office by pretending to be servants of the People, and exploiting wedge issues like guns and wetbacks to differentiate themselves (from the lapdogs against which they run in elections rigged to invariably elect a lapdog for Wall Street, whichever party wins), little will change.

So long as the only people who have "free speech" politically are those who can raise millions to buy TV air time by sucking up to Wall Street, Big Oil, Big Government Unions, et al., our Nation will remain hijacked out from under the People.

Goldman Execs Were Just Doing Their Job, Which is to Sucker the Rest of Us.

2010-04-28T10:33:00.003-06:00

Watched several hours of the Goldman CFO, Viniar, and CEO, Blankfein, testify yesterday afternoon. It was an interesting exercise in cynical political theater, intended to permit the very people who worked so diligently to enable dangerous derivatives trading, and to protect the financial industry from adequate oversight and scrutiny in exchange for legalized bribes (called "free speech" by the Supreme Court), to portray themselves as reformist crusaders.

The greatest sin of the Goldman execs may be that they are smarter than most. Certainly, if I were a plutocrat, I would want them watching my money, as they are the epitome of extremely smart, ruthlessly reptilian, completely amoral financiers who could care less if the world is going to Hell in a hand basket so long as they are doing well, themselves.

They behaved rationally to maximize their profits and minimize their losses. Earlier than most, they recognized the bubble was about to burst. Having through legalized bribery helped create a market in which the destruction of trillions in wealth was incentivized, they did a better job than most of avoiding the consequences, and reaping the benefits. They did so by selling crap to well-heeled suckers. In the lax regulatory and legal environment in which they operate, and according to the rules of the game in the cut-throat world of global finance, they were under no obligation to warn the buyers that they were buying crap.

The problem then, is not so much that Goldmine Sachs engaged in fraud in the DeutscheBank/ACA transaction, but that a series of legislative or regulatory enactments or defaults over a number of years created an environment in which the management of Goldman would not have been doing its job had it not engaged in the systematic destruction of other people's wealth to increase or preserve its own.

This is the antithesis of the capitalist ideal, in which the markets operate to increase liquidity and sensibly diversify risk so that no failure from taking on too much risk cannot be easily absorbed.

The financial reform bill must do SOMETHING right, else Mitch McConnell and other whores for Wall Street would not oppose it. Yet, it fails to attack the insidious nature of derivatives trading, which is supposed to hedge against and spread risk, but actually concentrates it, and is likely to be highly ineffective, else the whores for Wall Street in the Obama camp would not support it.

Former Firefighter Wins Lawsuit Against Denver - cbs4denver.com

2010-04-26T23:03:00.000-06:00

Former Firefighter Wins Lawsuit Against Denver - cbs4denver.com

This was a very good day, and the beginning of a wonderful year, unexpectedly brought to an abrupt halt by lawless Judge Robert E. Blackburn's unlawful September 30, 2007 new trial order, in which he unconstitutionally tossed a valid jury verdict and judgement for $1.22 million as a favor to the City and County of Denver. We settled the case for $850,000 in December, 2008, before retrial.

Workers Punished in SEC Porn Flap - WSJ.com

2010-04-24T00:18:00.001-06:00

Jerking Off While Rome Burns: Workers Punished in SEC Porn Flap - WSJ.com

Your tax dollars at work! It is difficult to imagine a better illustration of the degree to which regulatory agencies are afflicted with a cancerous culture of complacency and indolence.

In exchange for massive bribes disguised as "free speech", elected politicians routinely cultivate this culture by punishing initiative and ensuring that any investigations or enforcement actions that threaten key contributors are squelched, and that personnel who display remarkable initiative are punished.

Only well after the fact do these agencies act to protect the public, a day late, and trillions of dollars short.

Bill Moyers Journal . William K. Black on Fraud | PBS

2010-04-23T22:13:00.001-06:00

Bill Moyers Journal . William K. Black on Fraud | PBS

I recommend that everyone watch this interview, as I did this evening. Mr. Black knows whereof he speaks, and minces no words about the roots of our current financial crisis, and the likelihood that the very officials who presided over the catastrophe while protecting Goldman's interests in Washington will "reform" the system to their own disadvantage.

Key Senators Raise Funds on Wall Street as They Rewrite Financial Rules - WSJ.com

2010-04-23T11:06:00.001-06:00

Key Senators Raise Funds on Wall Street as They Rewrite Financial Rules - WSJ.com

Well, it appears to be business as usual in D.C.

What we need is a massive, rigorous overhaul of financial regulation, consisting of, in no small part, returning to Glass-Steagall (repealed with Clinton's approval by Phil Gramm and his ilk in Congress) and stringent amendment and enforcement of laws already on the books.

What we will get, thanks to legalized bribery disguised (with the recent blessing of the Supreme Court) as "free speech", will be the appearance of enhanced regulation bu the reality of deliberately underfunded and poorly managed agencies quite deliberately rendered incapable, by Congress and successive Administrations, of doing their jobs effectively.

Chinese Crackdown on Human Rights Lawyers Continues - Law Blog - WSJ

2010-04-22T13:46:00.001-06:00

Chinese Crackdown on Human Rights Lawyers Continues - Law Blog - WSJ

Apparently, the Chinese have been studying our judiciary and attorney regulation system closely, and have decided to follow their lead. Perhaps Judges Blackburn and Lucero should apply for a job in China. They would fit right in!

Questions for Banks That Put Together Deals - DealBook Blog - NYTimes.com

2010-04-22T08:03:00.000-06:00

Questions for Banks That Put Together Deals - DealBook Blog - NYTimes.com

An excellent explanation of the way in which (while the same lapdog politicians who would now have us believe they are fixing the markets looked the other way in exchange for legalized bribes disguised as "free speech" and cheap mortgages) con men on Wall Street with Wharton School degrees converted what is supposed to be a system that supports useful enterprise and prudent risk-taking into nothing more than a casino in which unscrupulous "wiseguys" made billions marketing cut glass as diamonds, on a scale John Gotti could only have dreamed about. "We have met the enemy, and he is US!" Nothing will change unless the People refuse to allow themselves to be fooled into complacency with "new regulations", and throw all the bums in Congress who allowed this to happen out. Neither the Dems nor the GOP will get the job done. Only a new party, of, by, and for the People, can.

The Systemic Failure of Government Founded on Legalized Bribery

2010-04-21T21:57:00.000-06:00

Mr. O'Driscoll offers as sound an analysis of the cynicism underlying all pretense of regulation by politicians and bureaucrats bought and paid for by those they would regulate. Congress amounts to little more than a grandiose protection racket.

Legalized Bribery Unabated: What is to be done?

2010-04-21T21:31:00.001-06:00

The root of all evil. This, yet again, is why nothing in the way of truly meaningful reform of any aspect of our government will be possible until we destroy the system of legalized bribery disguised as free speech that is running our country into the ground, with the enthusiastic support of Supreme Court Justices placed on the bench to preserve the iron grip of Big Business and Big Government on our nation.

When a new trial SHOULD be granted, but the Supreme Court turns a blind eye

2010-04-20T12:27:00.001-06:00

Unbelievable. Hood may well be guilty as hell, but, if there were ever grounds for a new trial, the judge getting it on with the prosecutor has to rank at the top. This is an arbitrary and unconstitutional decision that only tends to reinforce that those who enforce the law correctly deem themselves above it. The Texas Governor should commute the sentence, but the chances of that are less than zero, since he is a preening statist dickweed who plays to the mob.

Nihilism and the End of Law | First Things

2010-04-18T02:06:00.002-06:00

Nihilism and the End of Law | First Things

The single most compelling essay I have read on the disastrous consequences of nihilism, by far the predominant faith in our legal, business and governmental cultures.

Fwd: Martin Sandberger's Last, and Only, Interview - Inbox - Yahoo! Mail

2010-04-18T02:04:00.001-06:00

Martin Sandberger's Last, and Only, Interview

Why the rule of law matters more than we realize, and why the casual subversion of justice in the service of ideology or ambition is so dangerous.

Goldman Sachs May Not Be Completely Above the Law??

2010-04-17T13:53:00.003-06:00

Well, this tends to undermine my overarching theory of government as practiced in the US in the 21st Century. Of course, that may well be the goal: to sustain the illusion that those, such as Goldmine Sachs, who run the country are NOT above the law, despite their iron grip on the levers of power through legalized bribery disguised as free speech.

Time will tell. If Goldmine loses, and loses in the Court of Appeals and Supreme Court, my faith in the US Government may be repaired at least a little, if not completely restored.

Denver Post: Cadorna Judgement

2010-04-17T10:55:00.003-06:00

Please note that, as reported, Judge Blackburn stated in November 28, 2006 that there was more than enough evidence to support the jury's verdict. Yet, on September 30, 2007, after the City got to him through back channels and persuaded him through means yet to be discovered to change his tune, he unlawfully granted a new trial order, which he could only do under federal law by asserting that there was insufficient evidence to support the verdict.

This flagrant self-contradiction is quite telling. What could have caused him to change his mind in the ten months from November 28, 2006 to September 30, 2007?

The City of Denver has many powerful friends, and grants hundreds of millions in contracts, and extremely valuable zoning and construction permits, to many big GOP contributors every year. For all practical purposes, lawyer-lobbyist Norm Brownstein runs the Colorado GOP. For all practical purposes, his partner, Steve Farber, runs the Colorado Democratic Party. Their firm, Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Shrek, was the firm from which Cole Finegan, the weasel City Attorney who presided over the Cadorna debacle, came. Brownstein, Hyatt also represented the City in post-trial matters, including the unfounded motion for a new trial.

If this had happened in Chicago, everyone would assume that powerful interests in the GOP had arranged for the judge to toss the verdict as a favor the the City, in exchange for which the City would grant a fat contract to some big GOP construction or management company. Or, everyone might wonder whether the City had managed to bribe the judge with a job for a relative, a deposit in a foreign account, or forgiveness of a loan. Or, everyone might wonder whether the City had blackmailed the judge with threats to expose his consorting with prostitutes.

Of course, that could only happen in Chicago. That could never happen in Colorado. Besides, Judge Blackburn is unquestionably above being unduly influenced in such a way.

Still, one has to wonder what caused him to blatantly contradict himself, and violate his oath to uphold the Constitution, by trashing a completely valid jury verdict on a whim.

9NEWS.com | Denver | Colorado's Online News Leader | "Cookbook Case" provides lessons for employers

2010-04-17T10:21:00.001-06:00

9NEWS.com | Denver | Colorado's Online News Leader | "Cookbook Case" provides lessons for employers

A fair-minded and accurate article at 9 News concerning the Cadorna case and the excellent result I achieved for my client.

Obama Nominates Stanford Law Grad to be U.S. Attorney

2010-04-15T12:23:00.001-06:00

As a Stanford Law grad (Class of 1983), I am delighted President Obama selected a Stanford grad whose credentials and experience render him far more qualified for such an important and powerful position than the previous nominee, who has no more business being U.S. Attorney than I do Pope, or most who have held this position.

As someone far too intimately familiar with the corruption of the local Democratic Machine, however, I cannot help wondering whether, as is usual in U.S. Attorney nominations, Mr. Walsh has been selected less because of his outstanding resume, and more because he can be counted on to take good care of and pose no serious threat to clients of Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Shrek, Hogan and Hartson, and other errand boys and girls for the rich and powerful.

Let's hope he was nominated more because Stanford Law grad Penny Pritzker, Obama's finance chair, has encouraged him to nominate as many Stanford grads as possible, and less because he received the Good Housekeeping seal of approval from Steve Farber, Cole Finegan, and their ilk.

Something tells me both were factors. Time will tell.

EEOC v. Lockheed-Martin Sweetheart Deal

2010-04-15T03:45:00.000-06:00

The attached document is the protest of the settlement between the EEOC and, in effect, the most powerful part of the US Government (the Military-Industrial Complex in the "person" of Lockheed-Martin) in which the EEOC sold out a class of 3,600 older employees under pressure from the Clinton Administration, despite our having obtained some of the best evidence of systematic age discrimination ever discovered in any such litigation. The federal judge in question, a Clinton appointee, went along to get along.

Tenth Circuit Deprives Uranium Mining Victims of Compensation

2010-04-15T03:33:00.001-06:00

In this outrageous decision, the Tenth Circuit insulated the U.S. Government and its contractor, Union Carbide, from liability to residents of a uranium mining town that the same U.S. Government declared an uninhabitable Toxic Waste site, through intellectually dishonest construction of the federal statute intended to compensate those victimized by the heedless rush for nuclear supremacy at all costs. Your tax dollars at work!

Why Attorneys Should Have Free Speech Rights

2010-04-15T02:41:00.001-06:00

This article from Boston College explains quite cogently why it is essential that the courts and bar regulators dominated by Establishment law firms should not be permitted to discipline lawyers who criticize the judiciary. The Legal Establishment and the judiciary it controls naturally wish to unconstitutionally muzzle those in the best position to expose their corruption and incompetence: the lawyers who appear before them.

It is bad enough that lawyers must be circumspect in their criticisms of the courts lest they suffer retaliation in the rulings they receive and thereby harm their clients’ interests. It is simply intolerable that they may speak out only at the likely cost of their livelihood. There is something Sovietic about a system in which those upon whom citizens must depend to protect their constitutional rights have none, themselves. Justice Douglas’ dissent in Lathrop was prophetic.

If judges exercise their powers incompetently or corruptly, they, not the lawyers who protest, and they alone are responsible for the resulting damage to the public’s perception of their infallibility. If they do not wish to be criticized, let them ensure “equal justice for all”, instead of continually reinforcing the perception that the motto on courthouse porticoes should be “The Best System of Justice Money Can Buy”.

Attorneys Effectively Have No Constitutional Rights

2010-04-15T02:30:00.002-06:00

Incredibly, those upon whom citizens must depend to protect their Constituional rights have none, themselves.

Thanks to the indiscriminate use of abstention doctrines to prevent federal courts from interfering in the activities of state bars, and incredibly moronic interpretations by numerous courts and disciplinary authorities of the degree to which attorneys enjoy First Amendment rights, Courts and bar authorities may discipline attorneys for exercising their First Amendment right to discipline attorneys who criticize judges.

In this way, those in the best position to expose corruption and incompetence in our courts are muzzled, to the degree they wish to retain their license to practice. Fortunately, a few bright stars are challenging the constitutionality of this repression. The only difficulty is that they must litigate their claims before the very people responsible for trampling their rights!

Justice Douglas warned against this unlawful infringement upon the independence of attorneys for unpopular causes or clients in his stinging dissent in Lathrop v. Donohue, 50 years ago!

My Life Story, For What It's Worth

2010-04-14T14:51:00.002-06:00

The Valedictory Affidavit I filed with the Colorado Supreme Court to verify that I no longer pose a threat to the rich and the powerful may be perceived by some as a narcissistic effort at self-justification. To those less unkindly disposed, it will inform idealistic young attorneys with a strong inclination to challenge authority of the harm doing so can have on one's career.

Reject Your Elders - Page 1 - News - Denver - Westword

2010-04-14T04:35:00.001-06:00

Reject Your Elders - Page 1 - News - Denver - Westword

My very hard, highly effective work to correct systematic discrimination against older employees of Martin-Marietta paid off, but not nearly as well as I had hoped, thanks to sabotage of our efforts from within the Clinton Administration, and a sweetheart deal crammed down the throat of a class of 3,600 by the Pentagon, the EEOC, and Judge Wiley Daniel.

Denver shells out $850,000 to settle costly cookbook case - Denver News - The Latest Word

2010-04-14T04:31:00.003-06:00

Denver shells out $850,000 to settle costly cookbook case - Denver News - The Latest Word

The City was able to persuade Judge Blackburn to throw out a lawfully won and proper jury verdict on a whim, in exchange for consideration yet to be determined. The City nevertheless paid Cadorna twice his actual damages as of the date of settlement to go away prior to retrial. They obviously knew quite well that they would lose yet again. They have since done their best to retaliate against me through fraudulent disciplinary proceedings pursued by their friends in the Colorado Supreme Court despite the prosecuting attorney's recommendation of dismissal.

Blackburned - Page 1 - News - Denver - Westword

2010-04-14T04:29:00.002-06:00

Blackburned - Page 1 - News - Denver - Westword

This illustrates the profound danger of elevating errand boys and girls for powerful interests to the bench, instead of only the most competent and incorruptible attorneys available.

A Travesty of Justice in Colorado: Lawyer Suspended for A Year and A Day for WINNING His Client's Case : My Shingle

2010-04-14T04:28:00.002-06:00

A Travesty of Justice in Colorado: Lawyer Suspended for A Year and A Day for WINNING His Client's Case : My Shingle

At first, Ms. Elefant joined in mocking me for representing myself in the disciplinary hearing, on the assumption I had a choice, and on the natural but mistaken assumption that I must have done something wrong else I would not have been subjected to prosecution. She soon came to the conclusion that I was quite unjustly prosecuted and convicted, for improper reasons.

$1.22 Million ADEA Judgment against the City of Denver

2010-04-14T04:14:00.001-06:00

If the arrogant idiots had only shown modest regard for the truth and the law, they would never have suffered this humiliating defeat, and felt compelled to devote the next few years to subverting justice to get it undone, pay Cadorna $850,000 to settle, and use their friends in the Colorado Supreme Court to fraudulently prosecute me for "interfering with the administration of justice" by winning my client's case. Had I lost, they would not have investigated or prosecuted me.

Cadorna v. City of Denver

2010-04-14T01:51:00.003-06:00

An interesting story. How the City of Denver sought to drive a Firefighter from its ranks through subornation of perjury and malicious prosecution, only to have to pay him $850,000 to settle claims on the basis of which I obtained a $1.22 million jury verdict for him in June, 2006.

The Best System of Justice Money Can Buy

2010-04-14T00:37:00.000-06:00

In this site, I will explore the many lessons my 25 years of practice in the fields of labor, employment and civil rights law have taught me that were never taught in my classes at Stanford Law School. Through at times bitter experience, I have come to comprehend the degree to which our system of laws and government have been systematically subverted by the pernicious influence of legalized bribery disguised as campaign finance. "Equal Justice for All" should be replaced on many courthouses with "The Best System of Justice Money Can Buy".