When conservatives commit campaign fraud

Funny thing about conservatives. The same people who vigorously defend voter suppression laws because, five Democratic voters in all of America were caught casting fraudulent votes will instantly wail selective prosecution when one of their own is caught breaking the law. And of course, our Lady of the Winebox, Ms. Althouse is not alone in inquiring if indicting the perp isn't just so much overkill for such a minor crime.

To be clear, I'm not big on the schadenfreude. I take no pleasure in seeing the tiresome blowhard Dinesh D'Souza indicted for campaign finance fraud. I do however find it satisfying to see some small justice visted upon the pompous twit even though I doubt he'll suffer much punishment beyond the embarrassing press for his crime.

Granted D'Souza's violation of the law wasn't the worst crime in the history of campaign frauds:

Dinesh D’Souza, a controversial political commentator, author and former president of King’s College, was indicted today by a grand jury for alleged campaign finance fraud, U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara’s office announced this evening.

According to the office, Mr. D’Souza, 52, is charged “with violating the federal campaign finance laws by making illegal contributions to a United States Senate campaign in the names of others and causing false statements to be made to the Federal Election Commission in connection with those contributions.”

According to a complaint, Mr. D’Souza contributed $20,000 to a New York Senate candidate’s campaign—five times the legal limit—by using straw donors, whom he later reimbursed.

Still, he did break the law deliberately in order to help out his long time friend. Not buying the "well the law is too complicated and he didn't realize arranging straw donors was illegal. He's not that stupid. However, one wonders why he would take the chance when it was so clear his candidate was going to lose the election. She barely captured around 27% of the vote. Surely the polling would have predicted the trouncing. Given D'Souza's history, one might suspect it was his "little head" doing the thinking on this one. That so rarely ends well.

Halliburton charged with criminal acts

But of course it's Halliburton, which is apparently above the law so, no real penalties will incur.

Under the plea agreement, which requires court approval, Houston-based Halliburton will also face three years' probation, pay the maximum fine of $200,000 and continue to cooperate in the Justice Department's criminal investigation of the April 2010 explosion and fire on the drilling platform, which killed 11 rig workers off Louisiana.

The Justice Department said it would not pursue further criminal charges against Halliburton or its subsidiaries. [...]

Halliburton's energy-services subsidiary designed and built the well for BP. In early May, the company began an internal investigation to determine whether the number of "centralizers" — metal collars that help keep the well pipe centered — played a role in the blowout. Halliburton recommends installing 21, but BP chose to use just six.

Their computer models said it was okay. But no one can find them. They've disappeared. Nor do we know who created said models. The creators remain unidentified. But Justice says Halliburton offered "significant and valuable cooperation during the course of its investigation" so all is forgiven. They pay the maximum fine of $200,000 and get three years probation, whatever that means, and we'll call it even. Because you know, a 200K fine is really going to sting a corporation that saw total revenue of $28.5 billion in 2012[pdf].

What a country. Too big to fail means too big to jail.

A license to kill

I expected this verdict but nonetheless it still rankled when I woke up to find George Zimmerman was acquitted. And no, despite the old saw, Zimmerman was not found innocent. Neither was he exonerated of the crime. The fact that he killed an unarmed teenager with a gun was never in dispute. He was acquitted on the charge of murder. There's a difference.

Neither can it be said that the court delivered justice for Trayvon. That would have required a guilty verdict, which just wasn't going to happen under Florida laws. Our legal system is imperfect. The guilty often go free while the innocent are sometimes convicted. And yes, the outcomes are often based on class status and race. It's not been unnoticed that a black woman in the same state, under the same laws, was given a 20 year sentence for merely shooting a gun into the air.

This is what happens when a "jury of peers" are the judges and the judge merely conducts the proceedings. It also happens when a single justice decides a case. It's a myth they don't bring their own prejudices into the courtroom. But it's useful to remember at such times, when the anger at injustice boils the blood, that judges and juries are constrained by laws written by politicians. The system is imperfect because is it an invention of humans who are also imperfect beings.

Much will be said today and in the days to follow about this case. Many will try to make sense of the outcome where none can be made. In the end all we can do is accept that sometimes the system really sucks and do our best to write better laws that deliver justice more perfectly. Probably an impossible task when politicians have the final say.

As for the instant case, the best summation I've seen is this: "The real danger of this acquittal is not riots in the streets. It's more George Zimmermans." A subject Charlie Pierce covered so eloquently already that there's nothing left to say.

FBI drones spying on America

More great news on the domestic surveillance front. FBI director Robert Mueller told a Senate hearing today the FBI owns several of their very own drones

“Does the FBI use drones for surveillance on US soil?” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) asked Mr Mueller during an oversight hearing on Capitol Hill Wednesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

“Yes,” Mueller responded bluntly, adding that the FBI’s operation of drones is “very seldom.”

Mueller adds they're "generally used in a particular incident where you need the capability.” Wonder what he means by "generally." Implies that maybe they're occasionally used in "other" capacities. And this would be the same FBI that hasn't found an single instance of unjustified shootings in their internal review of 150 shooting incidents between 1993 to early 2011, 70 of which ended in death. And that one innocent guy who got his face shot off? Still justified. But they did give him $1.3 million in damages, so there's that.

Of course, this isn't limited to the feds. Don't have the numbers, but relying on memory, there has to be at least thousands of innocent victims across America who have been killed in botched local law enforcement raids. They almost never get charged with any kind of misconduct or negligence either. Every profession covers for its own. LEOs every more than most.

Leaks and the limits of the First Amendment

Walter Pincus gets to the heart of what's wrong with the media freakout about DoJ's leak investigations. Do read it all, it's short but here's the main point. The media may "just be doing their job" but the leaker is in breach of their contract. The leaker is breaking the law to give them the information. So why is it so damn scandalous for the DoJ to seek to enforce the law? That is their job.

As Pincus points out:

Applying labels such as co-conspirator provides a probable cause for the judge to grant the warrant, as in the Rosen case. If Rosen offered money or some other reward, it might be a different case. I believe the First Amendment covers the right to publish information, but it does not grant blanket immunity for how that information is gathered.

Rosen actively encouraged his source to break the law. He brazenly waltzed in and out of the State Department wth barely an attempt to cover his tracks. I used more sophisticated subterfuge to hide my underage cigarette smoking from my parents. And I'm not moved by the wailing about leak investigations “intimidating a growing number of government sources.” The DoJ's job is not to make it easy for lazy journalists to get a scoop. Furthermore, exposing active undercover counterterrorism operations being conducted in the interests of national security is not whistleblowing. It just isn't.

The White House Correspondents’ Association board was late to the defense of the reporters. When they say, “Reporters should never be threatened with prosecution for the simple act of doing their jobs,” it should raise the question, what the hell is their job? Traditionally it was to watchdog government misconduct, not to expose our intelligence assets who are risking their lives to provide inside information on foreign plots against our country.

The principle of freedom of the press on which our country was founded was designed to protect criticism of corrupt politicians. Our founders designed it protect the press from retribution when it exposes government misconduct. It's not a blanket exemption for exploiting insider connections to expose rightful government process conducted for our protection simply to win a news cycle.

As Pincus notes there's a big difference between nothing being more sacred to the profession of journalism and the notion that “nothing is more sacred than our profession.” At some point we have to ask, is journalism even a profession anymore, or is it just another Big Business conducted for no loftier goal than corporate profit.