Special prosecutors were assigned to investigator the matter and completely cleared the newspaper of any wrongdoing.  Meanwhile, lawsuits have been filed against the city, its then-mayor, several town officials and the sheriff, Gideon Cody, who resigned a little over a month later.
 
Well, last week, Sheriff Gideon Cody was arrested for obstruction of justice.  The charge was for persuading a witness to destroy emails and withhold information from an investigation into Cody’s involvement in the raid.
 
Owner-publisher Meyer notes that the charge is only for the cover-up, not for the raid itself, and feels there’s been local political influence in blocking efforts.  However, he said he was “happy something happened, at least.”  He also said that they paper has “probably exhausted all options here” over the raid, there are still those lawsuits pending, and it’s likely that they will pursue legal charges in federal court.
 
For reasons I don’t know I can’t find the articles I wrote about the raid, however this is a good piece about it by NBC News, and it includes video of the MSNBC interview with Eric Meyer.  You can find it here.
​

​The guest on this week’s Al Franken podcast is Dahlia Lithwick, the show’s Supreme Court expert and host of the Amicus podcast.  As Al writes, “The Supreme Court term has ended after a series of punishing decisions that break years of precedent. While there were many horrible decisions made in this term, two stand out: The cases on Presidential Immunity and the Chevron Doctrine. Why are these so important? Al and Dahlia lay out the devastating consequences ahead in the wake of these decisions and try to lay out a path forward.”

Turning on the news yesterday morning, I thought there was little that could come along that would push the news channels off from continuing to report 24/7 that someone took a shot at Trump two days earlier.  But then, I hadn’t counted on Judge Aileen Cannon.
 
(I was going to say that I hadn’t counted on “the mobster’s wife,” but decided that was a little unfair.  Not unfair, mind you, just a little unfair.  After all, her husband Josh Lorence recently worked for John Rosatti, a former member of the Colombo crime family, who used to pal around in New York with Trump and now lives near Mar-a-Lago. It is certainly possible that everything Mr. Lorence did in his work with Rosatti was perfectly legal and not mob-related at all, but even he thinks his work, at the very least, appears sketchy, since he wiped any mention of it from his LinkedIn page.  But I digress…)
 
To be clear, I wasn’t surprised by Cannon’s decision, tossing the entire documents case – long considered the most slam-dunk prosecution of all the indictments.  I just wasn’t expected it this week.  I should add something that I haven’t heard any mention of on the news coverage – while I don’t say that the timing of her decision was intentional, I will put it this way:  considering how beneficial her rulings and delays have almost all been for Trump, this dismissal certainly was remarkably helpful to Trump, coming on the first day of the Republican National Convention, when it can now be used as a major talking point about Trump’s supposed innocence and mythical witch hunts.
 
My first reaction, like I’m sure many people’s, was teeth-gnashing outrage.  But as a few minutes past, I came to a different conclusion – it’s still an outrage, but it also may be a case of “Be careful what you wish for, because you might get it.”
 
For starters, although the time it takes for the appeals process means Aileen Cannon’s ruling ensures the case won’t be heard before the election, it already was delayed long enough – and she’ll delay it further -- that it wasn’t going to be heard before the election any way.  So, this doesn’t change that at all.
 
Additionally, when Jack Smith makes his appeal to the 11th Circuit Appeals Board, it seems near-certain they will overturn the ruling that has seemingly no basis in merit and which other courts have already ruled on behalf of the Special Counsel appointment being legal,
 
Further, even if Trump appeals to the Supreme Court, and they’re so deep in the bag for him that they throw out the Special Counsel’s case, that doesn’t mean the case it over.  Attorney General Merrick Garland can just reassign it to a local U.S. Attorney and re-file it.
 
That said, I don’t think even this Supreme Court would rule the Special Counsel office to be illegal.  There are too many cases already decided that would be thrown out if the High Court invalidated the office.  Additionally, the Hunter Biden guilty verdict would be thrown out, as would the Special Counsel’s second Hunter Biden case that is still working its way through the legal process.  Moreover, there have already been several court decisions supporting the legitimacy of the Special Counsel’s office.  So, given that throwing out the case would also throw out so many other cases, including those with Hunter Biden, and given that there is so much precedent supporting it (not that this court cares about precedent), and given that that throwing out the Special Counsel wouldn’t even make the case go away, I suspect that even this Supreme Court would find almost no reason to do something with so little basis in law that would also throw out a favorite MAGOP guilty verdict and have no effective meaning.
 
Which brings us to the “Be careful what you wish for” part.
 
It not only seems likely that Jack Smith will make a quick appeal – in fact, I suspect the appeal has long been expected and written, and they’re just tweaking it to precisely fit the ruling, but given their past actions quickly overturning Judge Cannon on appeal, the 11th Circuit will likely overturn this decision quickly, as well.  And more importantly – it seems that her decision here is not only so over-the-top egregious and unsupportable, that it is finally the ruling that Smith will use to get her removed from the case, showing he can’t get a fair trial from her, since (on top of all her other decisions and delays) she just threw out his entire case, which (I presume) the 11th Circuit will overturn.  In fact, her decision might be so egregious, along with past actions that the 11th Circuit might even act on its own and reassign the case without Jack Smith having to file for that to occur.
 
Another possibility is that Smith could simply re-file the case in another jurisdiction, likely Washington, D.C., which has already ruled that his appointment is legitimate.  That would mean that a few items in the indictment would have to be thrown out, since they didn’t occur in D.C., but most of the case would hold.
 
The only downside in this is that if Trump does win the election, he’ll make sure that the case goes away.  But that has nothing to do with Cannon’s ruling.  That would happen regardless of it.
 
As for the ruling, as ghastly as it was, in the end (and soon), it very well might be far worse for Trump.

​Not being a lawyer, it is beyond my skillset to analyze in detail yesterday's Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity.  Even the constitutional legal experts on TV described it as convoluted and complex, so if they were having trouble with it, what chance have I got?  For some things a president has immunity, for some things he doesn’t, and for some things…well, maybe does or doesn’t, but we’ll presume he does and it’s up to lower courts to decide, at which point the loser will appeal the decision and it will be sent back to the Supreme Court to decide.
 
But as long as it’s an official act, it’s protected by immunity, whatever an official act actually is, and if it’s an official act, motives can’t be questioned.  So, since appointing ambassadors is an official act, if you give a million dollar bribe to a president and get appointed, the president can’t be convicted, since appointing ambassadors is an official act.  Now, whether the person making the bribe can be indicted, that’s another matter for the High Court to decide.
 
By the way, calling them the “High Court” gives them new meaning, since it appears six of the Justices were on something.
 
However, though I can’t unpack this fully from a legal standpoint – and neither, it seems, can the Supreme Court itself – I do have some thoughts coming at it from another angle.
 
My level of outrage at the Supreme Court has reached its limit.  That’s not to say that I can no longer be outraged by their decisions – we’re at the point where that’s almost a given.  But because the bucket is now full, any new outrage added to it only creates an overflow, and an old outrage will spill out.
 
After all, according to the Roberts Court, it’s now okay for a state official to take a bribe, as long as it wasn’t called a bribe beforehand, and was only paid off as a “gratuity” after the fact.  Thank you for your servitude!
 
And more to the point, the Roberts Court has made abundantly clear that, despite what the six Republicans serving all said under oath when they testified before Congress at their confirmation hearing, none of them actually believe in precedent, except only as a matter of convenience when it serves their purpose, and so they can point to from on high. 
 
Fifty years of the Constitutional protection of Roe v. Wade?  Nah, we just don’t like that. Throw it out.  Forty years of government agency protection of experts under Chevron?  Used by courts over 18,000 times?  Nah, we do not like that, throw it out.  And besides, we Justices know more than experts anyway.  About everything.
 
On and on it goes.
 
Precedence is the rock foundation of the law.  It’s what allows people to understand and rely on and follow what the law is.  Precedence is only overturned when new and compelling conditions have changed so much that they demand even just hearing the new evidence -- and only then, after hearing arguments, accepting the arguments that the old realities no longer are valid, and the new status in the country now applies.  Without precedence, you have a Supreme Court that now decided that, no, we don’t like the law, so we’re going to change it.  The law becomes merely the whim of who happens to be sitting on the court.  If you’re deeply religious, and the law goes against your personal religious beliefs, sorry, the law is no good, overturn it, and everyone in the country must follow your beliefs now.  Until, that is, new people on the court come in who also don’t believe in precedent, and overturn that.  The answer isn’t the law -- the answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind.  The answer is blowing in the wind.
 
The moment I heard the immunity decision announced as “In a 6-3 decision,” my immediate reaction (and I’m sure the same for many) was “Oh, God, it’s a political ruling.”  And so it was.  Twisted and convoluted and jury-rigged (wow, does that word now take on new, whimsical meaning) to somehow create totally new law out of thin air undermining 230 years of Constitutional precedence.  So much for Republican supposed-hatred of “activist judges…”  (Ha!!  There was an old canard that was never hard to spot.)  No one is above the law.  A president, not a king.  Throw that out the window.  All to do its best to protect one man, while trying not to seem like they were.  It was a failed attempt at subterfuge.
 
The mere fact that two of the conservative justices, Thomas and Alito, were so overloaded with conflicts for hearing this case, yet didn’t recuse themselves is not only no surprise, but business as usual on the Roberts Court.
 
However, this yesterday was just one in the long line of such party-line decisions.  Merely the latest, cutting down George Washington’s cherry tree to put one of the cherries rolling away on top of the sundae.  The only difference is that this Supreme Court says, under oath, “Oh, no, sir, we did not chop down the cherry tree.”  The majority would probably blame it on the damn libs, as they raised the American flag upside and, now that the term is over, drove off in their luxury cruiser for a well-earned, highly-paid vacation.
 
It’s not hard to see why the Supreme Court is the only court in the country that doesn’t have a code of ethics that needs to be followed.
 
What is also now clear from the many rulings this Roberts Court has made is that it no longer sees itself as an separate branch of government, available under contract for independent right-wing freelance work, but now a wholly-owned subsidiary of the MAGOP Party.
 
Many people who know Chief Justice John Roberts have said that he is very concerned with the legacy of his court.  He doesn’t have to worry about it.  The legacy is written in stone.  Far more permanent than the precedent of law.

Yesterday, in one of its end-of-the-year decisions, Snyder v. U.S., the Supreme Court ruled to allow political bribery.  Really.  Not all political bribery, just if it’s not after the fact, and with a knowing wink.
 
The case concerned the cash-strapped, then-mayor of Portage, Indiana, who prosecutors charged rigged the bidding for new garbage trucks and afterwards receive a “thank you for being good at your job” gift from the head of the truck company that won the bid.
 
Justice Neil Gorsuch referred to this as a “gratuity” and equated this $13,000 "gratuity" to a mayor to taking a teacher to the Cheesecake Factory as a thank you.  Really.  What's the difference, Justice Gorsuch wondered -- no doubt as Justices Thomas and Alito giggled. As they put out a "We accept tips" jar.
 
One difference, of course, is that if you ate $13,000 worth of cheesecake at one sitting, it would probably kill you.
 
It all concerned a federal statute known as §666 (man, is that number appropriate here…), which deals with gifts that state and local officials can accept.  (The ruling does not appear to pertain to federal officials, though if not, it would see an easy next step.)  The decision was written by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, apparently with a straight face, though he tried to justify it by saying the ruling doesn’t transcend local laws against bribery.  It only provides a map for driving around them. 
 
Kavanaugh wrote that "State and local governments often regulate the gifts that state and local governments may accept.  The federal law] does not supplement those state and local rules by subjecting 19 million state and local officials to up to 10 years in federal prison for accepting even commonplace gratuities. Rather, [the federal law] leaves it to state and local governments to regulate gratuities to state and local officials."
 
See?!  There’s that “Gratuities” again.  It’s hard not to love it.
 
Kavanaugh added that “state or local official can violate §666 when he accepts an up-front payment for a future official act or agrees to a future reward for a future official act.  But a state or local official does not violate §666 if the official has taken the official act before any reward is agreed to, much less given. Although a gratuity offered and accepted after the official act may be unethical or illegal under other federal, state, or local laws, the gratuity does not violate §666."
 
At the very least, I hope he got a chuckle out of all those references about not violating “666.”  As much as he – and Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito -- must have loved calling them “gratuities.”
 
What the Justices voting in the affirmative here seem to miss (or see clearly, but just didn’t care) is that a ten buck tip is one thing, but when you hit $13,000 to a public official, whenever it’s given, the rotting fish starts to smell.  For that matter, I wouldn’t be surprised if there are state and local laws prohibiting public officials accepting a $10 “gratuity.”  After all, once the first public official (and would-be briber) knows they can get away with getting an after-the-fact bribe, as long as nothing was agreed to officially beforehand, then all public officials know they can, too.  And further, that erodes public trust in government.  Y’know, the whole “Appearance of impropriety” thingee.
 
Though perhaps when some Justices like Clarence Thomas are dealing with $4 million worth of “gratuities,” a $13,000 tip probably is just pocket change.
 
Just to put some perspective on this all, I have a grad school friend Peter Carlisle who was the Chief Prosecuting Attorney of Honolulu for about 16 years, and then got elected the city’s mayor.  At one point while in office – after he announced for mayor – he flew to Southern California for a conference of law officials in Orange County.  But instead of lying there directly, he flew to Los Angeles, so we could visit.  I picked him up at the airport, and after paying for parking, I handed him the $8 LAX receipt, since it did me no good – but he wouldn’t accept it.  He said this flight to Los Angeles was a pleasure visit, not an official government trip.  If he’d flown directly to Orange County, that would have been different.
 
Yes, I know, that might be carrying things to extremes, but that’s also how the concept of being honorable and the “Appearance of impropriety” works.
 
Note to Justices Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh. Roberts and Coney-Barrett:  See above. And just know that Peter Carlisle is not a tree-hugging liberal, he’s a Republican.  So, it’s actually possible.  Rare though such things apparently may be.
 
I was going to say that it probably helps when you were a Chief Prosecuting Attorney for 16 years, but then an image of Rudy Giuliani popped into mind.  Though I would like to believe he’s the exception.  Though given the conservative majority on the Supreme Court, I don’t know if my belief is supported.
 
In case you find this ruling too bizarre to believe, you can read a full article about it all here.

And this seems an appropriate place to add that if you have enjoyed these free columns over the years, just click on the "Buy Now on Amazon.com" icon in the upper right of any page before the next time you go to Amazon to buy anything.  It will take you directly to Amazon as normal, but a code will be attached so that I will receive about .000001% of whatever you buy during that session.  Last year, I made about $20 this way!  (Thanks to everyone who participated.  After the fact, of course.)  Oh, sure, it's not exactly a "gratuity," and not anywhere near $13,000.  But if I keep it up for another 650 years, I'll be there!

Also, I offer nothing in advance for this.  The only thing I guarantee is that during the next six centuries, I will at some point write about Chicago and reference the beloved Northwestern University.
​

So, it’s now been reported that, over time, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has taken in over $4 million in gifts.  Most of that has been unreported.  But the implication of this when stated is that if it been reported, then it would have been okay.  It, of course, would not have been okay.  Especially since, if it had been reported, alarm bells would have gone off after the first $10,000.
 
I believe the next closest amount of gifts received by a Supreme Court Justice during the same period was $100,000 that went unreported for a trip.  To no one’s shock, that went to Justice Sam Alito -- and his Mrs.  (I will leave out saying that when this story was reported, it sent up a red flag.)
 
As for the rest of Justices, I believe the total amount of gifts they’ve received ranges in the amount that is best describes as “peanuts.”  Which puts Clarence Thomas’ $4 million worth of gifts in their own stratospheric perspective.
 
But what leaps out to me is not the total – and their sources, some of which are ludicrous, like having his mother’s home, for which Thomas had a 1/3 interest, bought by a billionaire who collects Nazi paraphernalia, as a kindly “gift” just to be nice, because after all who doesn’t –  but just one item in particular.
 
That would be the previously unreported gift of a $500,000 trip that Supreme Justice Clarence Thomas, who oversees interpreting the U.S. Constitution, said he “unintentionally omitted” from recording.
 
Hey, who doesn’t “unintentionally omit” a $500,000 gift?  Especially if you’re a Supreme Court Justice who oversees interpreting the U.S. Constitution who is required by law to report gifts he receives.  But then, in fairness, to put this in perspective, who hasn’t “unintentionally omitted” a $500,000 trip?  It can happen to anybody.
 
“So, Clarence, been anywhere interesting when the Court was out of session?  Got any trip photos you want to show us tonight?”  Nah, we haven’t been anywhere recently.  Have we, honey?  Let’s play mahjong.
 
“Hey, Ginni. What’s up with work?”  No, no, don’t say anything, honey, I don’t want to know!!!  We never talk about our work.  I have no idea what she does.  We keep it separate.  Do you even have a job, honey?  No, wait, don’t tell me.
 
Everyone forgets their half-a-million dollar trips.  Every forgets about reporting their half-a-million dollar gifts that they’re required to do as part of the ethics requirement for their job, most especially it’s a lifetime appointment for overseeing the laws of the land under the U.S. Constitution.
 
And this doesn’t even touch the other $3,500,000 you got as “gifts.”
 
Just the $500,000 trip you got as a gift that you “unintentionally omitted.”

But this isn't just about Clarence Thomas.  We know who he is.  This is about the elected Republicans in the U.S. Senate who are okay with it all, and even just blocked a bill to tighten up ethics requirements for the Supreme Court.

Because a Supreme Court Justice with a lifetime appointment to oversee the U.S. Constitution getting $4 million in gifts and "unintentionally omitting a $500,000 gift for a trip, that's normal, that's okay.
 
It could happen to anybody.
 
If your name is Clarence Thomas.