Monthly Archives: May 2022

Just Be Quiet

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…and do what you’re told. We wouldn’t have accused you if you weren’t guilty.

The SEC’s Director of the Division of Enforcement, Gurbir Grewal, doesn’t like it when lawyers defending their clients from SEC accusations get too much in his way.

The SEC also is seeing instances where lawyers repeatedly interrupt witness testimony to lodge frivolous objections….

Of course, it’s Grewal’s definition of frivolous. If he were serious, he’d be in court getting the frivolity sanctioned. And this:

In some instances, lawyers are representing companies and individuals in cases where they have a conflict of interest[.]

If that were true, he’d be objecting in court. Where are his objections?

And some lawyers are asserting legal privilege to shield documents from the eyes of SEC staff in cases where that privilege doesn’t apply[.]

Again, that’s Grewal’s position. And he asserts it as if, because he’s asserted it, it must be so.

And this:

Mr Grewal said he had recently learned about an entity with billions of dollars in assets that produced a mere 200 documents in a six-month period, after being served with a request for customer account and trading data.

Grewal is being disingenuous on two counts with this bellyache. One is that he’s been the Enforcement Director for nearly a year; how is it that he’s only just “recently” learning of this situation? Is he in charge, or isn’t he? If he is, does he read his staff’s input, or doesn’t he?

The other count is his beef that this represents an accused company’s delaying tactic. If he didn’t like it the slow production, why did he allow it to persist for so long? Why wasn’t he trying to force the pace—in court if necessary?

Grewal gave the SEC’s game away with these, as cited by the WSJ:

…[he] called on lawyers to work more cooperatively with the agency….

And

Lawyers who do cooperate in a genuine way with the SEC are better positioned to win credit for their clients in the form of a more lenient resolution of the agency’s investigation

This is one more reason the SEC cannot be trusted. I’ve mentioned another earlier.

Putin Threatens Again

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Now he’s “advising” the Swedish government that if they join NATO—or merely apply to join—it’ll be too bad for their nice little country:

Sweden’s accession to NATO will inflict considerable damage to the security of Northern Europe and Europe as a whole. The Russian Federation will have to take response measures, both military-technical and others, to curb the threats to its national security which arise in this context.

Because moving to defend itself against a threat is itself threatening. Putin is projecting. If he truly has no designs against Sweden (or Finland, come to that, or Europe), then there is nothing to fear from an alliance that is defensive in nature.

And this implied threat:

[M]uch will depend on the specific conditions of Sweden’s integration into the North Atlantic Alliance, including the potential deployment of strike systems of this military bloc on its territory[.]

Attempting to dictate the domestic military policy of a sovereign nation: “no foreign troops or systems on your soil are allowed by me.”

Putin continues to demonstrate clearly why a defensive buildup by free and sovereign nations is necessary.

So Will All Americans

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The Wall Street Journal‘s Editorial Board is concerned about the House of Representatives’ abuse of its subpoena power. Rightly so, but they’re too narrow in their concern.

Republicans are sure to see the subpoenas [of five Republican Representatives, by the January 6 Committee] as a case of turning the investigative power of the House against the opposition party.

So are will Americans see this abuse.

Republicans will argue that any such effort [to hold Representatives refusing to answer the subpoenas in contempt and seek their prosecution] is a violation of the Constitution’s Speech and Debate Clause.

So will Americans see this abuse.

Silence is Violence

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That’s what the Left likes to say when folks of whom they disapprove don’t talk/tweet/Facebook post/whatever about events on which the Left casts opprobrium.

There has occurred the firebombing of an Oregon Right to Life facility in the Salem, OR, suburb of Keizer.

It’s been more than a week since that cynically timed for Mother’s Day attack, and Oregon’s Progressive-Democratic Party elected politicians are being determinedly quiet about it.

Governor Kate Brown, Senator Jeff Merkley, and Senator Ron Wyden all declined to respond to multiple requests for comment via phone and email from Fox News Digital regarding the firebomb attack….

And

The Twitter accounts of Brown, Wyden, and Merkley also did not mention or condemn the attacks and all three have tweeted about other issues since Sunday, including Wyden, who warned Americans that their geolocation data could be “weaponized” against them if they seek an abortion.

Silence by the Progressive-Democrats. Except when they’re being overtly pro-abortion.

…pro-choice protesters across the country have stormed Catholic churches and some have called for vandalism in the Roe v Wade debate.

Caroline Reilly, of the Rewire News Group, has been particularly explicit (Jerry Dunleavy, of the Washington Examiner, had to retweet Reilly’s call because Reilly subsequently tried to rewrite her history and pretend she’d not called for murder by deleting her tweet):

Rot in the ground. Tweeted out Mother’s Day evening, shortly after the firebombing.

But the Progressive-Democrats are silent on the matter of violence against those who disagree with them.

Everybody but our President

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We’ve seen European heads of state visit Ukraine to meet with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy; British PM Boris Johnson openly walked the streets of Kyiv with him.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D, CA) led a delegation of Progressive-Democrat Congressmen to Ukraine to meet with Zelenskyy.

Even our First Lady Jill Biden traveled to Ukraine to meet with Ukraine’s First Lady Olena Zelenska.

Now

[a] Republican delegation led by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R, KY) has met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kiev….

But our President, Joe Biden (D), that accomplished master of…abundant caution…still won’t to go.