ChiGoose

If in the filing where the DoJ first disclosed the photo, they introduced it by saying that it was a picture of documents they removed from a container, then how was it fabricated?

Probably. Which is... not good.

You don't understand. It's "State's rights so long as the states do the thing we want them to"

But he assured us he was settling the issue by leaving it to the states! Who could have possibly predicted this chaos?

I don't think Smith would acknowledge leaking material. I just question whether or not there was actually a leak since there is no evidence that anyone had the photo before it was published to the court docket. I mostly agree with @The Frankish Reich on the NY case. I was skeptical of it as first, but the more I learned about NY practice and the evidence presented in the case, I came to the conclusion that it was a strong case. Would Bragg have brought it against an average Joe? Can't say. That office has brought similar charges in the past but I think it's fair to assume that if Trump wasn't Trump, he might not have been charged. Of course, that doesn't mean he was innocent. He very clearly violated the law and a jury found so. Maybe he and Hunter Biden can commiserate together about how unfair life is. If they didn't want to be prosecuted, they probably shouldn't have done crimes. If I recall, the intelligence agents in question stated that the laptop had all of the earmarks of a Russian op but also stated that they were not saying for certain that it was. Also, that was a letter, not a court case, not testimony taken under oath. Just their assessment of a situation. If you want to complain that the media coverage was bad, by all means do so, but I don't think it's relevant to the Smith investigations.

Interesting... Supreme Court set to allow abortions in medical emergencies, briefly-published opinion shows Draft opinion was briefly posted to the court’s website Wednesday morning The Supreme Court is poised to allow abortions in medical emergencies, an opinion briefly published on the court’s website and obtained by BloombergLaw revealed. Wednesday morning, a draft opinion in the consolidated cases Moyle v US and US v Idaho was published as the court issued two other opinions but quickly removed. The opinion – which is not final – the court will reinstate a lower court ruling that ensured hospitals in Idaho provide abortions in emergency medical situations but decline to issue a formal ruling in the dispute. The majority will instead dismiss the case as improvidently granted.

I think an underreported story here is how nuts the 5th Circuit has gotten. Given the current SCOTUS's disregard for precedent, the 5th Circuit seems to be intentionally trying to push the limits but it's become too much for Roberts, Kavanaugh, and Barrett to abide.

It's great news for corrupt officials like Mike Madigan. U.S. Supreme Court accuses feds of 'vague and unfair trap' in ruling that could affect Madigan corruption case "...The high court’s decision to take up the Snyder case interrupted the momentum federal prosecutors here had built through a series of corruption trials in 2023. Not only were a group of onetime Madigan allies set to be sentenced in January for a nearly decade-long scheme to bribe the ex-speaker, but Madigan had been set to go to trial this spring. Instead, Madigan’s trial is now set for October, and sentencing hearings for the four Madigan allies have been put on hold. The corruption conviction of Snyder gave the Supreme Court the opportunity to study a law known as the “federal program bribery” statute. It applies to any state or local government agent who “corruptly solicits … anything of value … intending to be influenced or rewarded in connection with any business” worth $5,000 or more. Madigan’s lawyers have noted that seven of the 23 counts he faces in his indictment are tied to the law in question. It’s involved in five of the counts in the separate case dealing with the four Madigan allies, who include former ComEd CEO Anne Pramaggiore."

If there’s one thing SCOTUS loves, it’s weakening anti-corruption laws: Be sure to tip your congressman!

Reporting on legal issues is difficult because things are often complicated and lay in gray areas where there is plenty of room to disagree. If the law was easy, we wouldn't need lawyers. But what really irks me is when people like Julie Kelly who either don't know what they are talking about or worse: are intentionally lying, mislead the public. I don't expect the average person to take the time to read through actual court filings; that's what you have reporters for. But when influencers are unable to do the due diligence and just put out information that is blatantly wrong (i.e. Biden tried to have Trump assassinated, the DoJ staged the photograph to harm Trump politically), it misleads the public and can cause serious issues. It leads to people, through no fault of their own, believing conspiracies and lies because they don't realize they've been had by a bad faith actor.

I did not mean to say you were acting in bad faith and if you took my comments as such, I apologize. Sticking strictly to the claims that the DoJ leaked a staged photo to harm Trump politically, it feels like a lot of people are making a bad faith claim because the photo was not leaked and the document it was originally included in had the context that the documents were removed from a container.

Former North Dakota lawmaker to plead guilty to traveling to pay for sex with minor "BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — A former North Dakota lawmaker who was one of the most powerful members of the Legislature has signed a plea agreement with federal prosecutors on a charge that he traveled to Europe with the intent of paying for sex with a minor. Former Republican state Sen. Ray Holmberg, 80, of Grand Forks, signed the plea agreement last week. It was filed Monday. He agreed to plead guilty to travel with intent to engage in illicit sexual activity. Prosecutors will recommend the low end of the sentencing guideline range and move to dismiss Holmberg’s other charge, receipt and attempted receipt of child sexual abuse material, according to the plea agreement. He would have to register as a sex offender under the plea deal. The maximum penalties are 30 years in prison, a $250,000 fine and lifetime supervised release, according to the document. Prosecutors will likely recommend a prison sentence of roughly three to four years, Holmberg attorney Mark Friese said. The court will schedule a plea hearing and order a presentence investigation report, he said. Sentencing is likely to happen sometime this fall, he said. The travel offense doesn’t carry a mandatory sentence; the receipt charge has a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in prison, Friese said. Prosecutors alleged Holmberg repeatedly traveled to Prague in the Czech Republic with intent to pay for sex with a minor from around June 2011 to November 2016. The indictment against Holmberg was unsealed in October 2023. Holmberg served in the Legislature from 1976 until mid-2022. He first announced his intent not to seek reelection, but he resigned following reporting from The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead that he exchanged dozens of text messages with a man in jail for child sexual abuse material. His trial was scheduled to begin in September in Fargo. He initially pleaded not guilty. For many years, Holmberg chaired the influential Senate Appropriations Committee, which writes budgets. He also chaired the Legislative Management panel, which handles the Legislature’s business between biennial sessions. That job let him approve his own travel. Records obtained by The Associated Press showed that Holmberg took dozens of trips throughout the U.S. and to other countries since 1999. Destinations included cities in more than 30 states as well as Canada, Puerto Rico and Norway. Earlier this year, the North Dakota School Boards Association returned about $142,000 to the state and ended its role in the Global Bridges teacher exchange program months after releasing travel records following Holmberg’s indictment that showed he traveled to Prague and other European cities in 2011, 2018 and 2019, utilizing state funds. It’s unclear whether the misconduct alleged by authorities occurred during any of those trips."

Not a great sign

I don't understand why anyone still believes her analysis. She's constantly being proven wrong by people with actual expertise. Do people even care if they're being lied to or misinformed? It's like getting football analysis from someone who maybe watched a game one time.

Is there any evidence of this? Every article I've seen from when the photo originally came out stated that they found the photo in a court filling, not that it was leaked to the outlet. I'm not aware of any outlet that published or referenced the photo before the filing. In the filing, the government clearly states that the documents in the picture (which are on the floor) were found within a container in Trump's office. So from day one, the government is saying "this picture is of documents we found in a box" not "hey, these documents were all over the floor." Unless I'm missing something, it really seems like this idea of it being a leaked photo staged to damage Trump is just a bad faith concoction.

I'd go primarily election reforms that would destroy the two-party system and end the duopoly of the Democratic and Republican parties. Elections no longer being First Past the Post, but instead using Single Transferable Vote or Ranked Choice voting. Congressional districts being multi-member districts. Repeal the arbitrary cap of 435 seats in the US House set in 1911 and greatly increase the size of the House to reduce the ratio of members of Congress to people living in a district. I'd start with doubling it and go from there. End gerrymandering nationwide through methods like independent committees, shortest split line, efficiency gap, etc. Overturn Citizens United, ban SuperPACs, and seriously clamp down on how much money can be spent on elections This would likely result in: Viable minority parties being able to get elected Both the Democratic and Republican parties splitting up into smaller parties like leftist, center-left, center-right, and right wing No real Spoiler Effect Voters being able to choose their representatives instead of the other way around Voters actually being able to hold elected accountable since they won't have to choose between the lesser of two evils Reduction of zero-sum "us vs them" politics as parties will likely need to partner in coalitions to get things done; likely also reduction in negative partisanship Elections not being dominated by the ultra rich who can just buy their way in Conservatives in liberal areas able to get representation and vice versa with liberals in conservative areas Reduction in geographic polarization

Was it a leak? As far as I can tell, the media picked up on the photo from a court filing by the government in response to a motion by Trump's team. As to the inclusion of the photo, it was provided with the context of "Certain of the documents had colored cover sheets indicating their classification status. See, e.g., Attachment F (redacted FBI photograph of certain documents and classified cover sheets recovered from a container in the “45 office”)." (p13) which highlights that, as part of the search, investigators removed the documents from a container in order to document them and the cover sheets. Looks to me like the DoJ included the photo to bolster its argument that there were government documents with classification markings present at Mar a Lago after Trump's team had certified that all such documents had been returned. I'm not sure what the government can do about bad faith outlets taking that out of context to promote a narrative.

I think this is also a good explanation of why we haven't met alien life. I don't think there's one solid reason, but more a combination of things. Looking for that anthill in the forest is already difficult, but even harder if a percentage of the ant colonies kill themselves. Or the ants or their anthills don't look like anything we're expecting so we walk right by them.

They are definitely not here. As to elsewhere, that's the crux of Fermi's paradox. Given the complexity and difficulty of interstellar travel, it's possible (likely? probable?) that civilizations tend to destroy themselves before they develop the means to travel the stars.

The photo was included in a court filing to show the types of documents that were found during the search. The fact that some in the media took that and did not put it in the proper context isn't the fault of the investigators. Should they have just decided not to provide evidence to the court under the theory that some people might misinterpret it? People still seem to be confusing the investigation with the media coverage of it...

Shocking news as it turns out the police regularly fabricate photos such as these:

Given all of the coverage, and all of the analysis and even the Hur report, I really don't get how people still don't understand this. Trump got in trouble solely because he obstructed the investigation. He could have stolen all of the documents, not declassified them, paraded them about Mar a Lago, wallpapered his office with them, and he *still* wouldn't have been charged if he had simply given them back when the government asked.

Well, not in the Mar A Lago case where they found documents with classification markings as well as classification folders/cover sheets (many of which were empty).

Do not take legal advice from food bloggers.

Adding classification markings to both protect the underlying classified material and to document for evidentiary purposes which documents were classified is not embellishment. There seems to be quite a bit of confusion here between the investigators and the media. I do not blame investigators for the media being dumb and bad. If the cops put a sign on the drugs that said "cocaine" and a sign on a gun that said "glock," I don't think that'd be embellishment.