Blow to Islamic supremacism: Texas Islamic Groups argued that Internet speech should be less protected than print, radio, or television speech. They lost.
Congratulations to the attorneys on the case for Plaintiff Joe
Kaufman (who won), who were:
Brandon Bolling, Thomas More Law Center, Ann Arbor, MI
Thomas Brandon, Whitaker Chalk, Ft. Worth, TX
William J. Becker, Jr., The Becker Law Firm, Los Angeles, CA
Manuel Klausner, Los Angeles, CA, Individual Rights Foundation
Good news: In a 36-page opinion in Kaufman v. Islamic Society of
Arlington County, Texas, et al., signed by Justice Terrie Livingston for a
3-judge panel, dated June 25, 2009, the Texas Court of Appeals (Second District,
Fort Worth) ruled as follows:
1. Found that "an [I]nternet communicator may qualify as a member of the
media" and denied the motion of the seven plaintiff/appellee Muslim
organizations to dismiss Kaufman's interlocutory appeal before trial. In a
significant ruling that may have impact beyond Texas, the court expressly
rejected the contention that Kaufman is not a "media defendant" under the Texas
statute that "gives procedural protection to "electronic or print media"
defendants. The court found that (a) Kaufman's journalistic experience, (b)
his" extensive notoriety" through his TV appearances, (c) his substantial
readership, (d) "the inherent public interest in the terrorism issues he
reports," and (e) his publishing his article online in Front Page Magazine, an
Internet publication with "broad readership and its existence as a
news/commentary medium that is independent from Kaufman’s article," entitled him
to the statutory protection to seek dismissal of an unmeritorious libel claim
before "the time-consuming and expensive trial phase"); and
2. Found the trial court erred in denying Kaufman's motion for summary
judgment contending that the Muslim organizations' defamation claims were barred
as a matter of law because Kaufman's article and his graphic were not
specifically directed towards the seven Muslim organizations -- and therefore
did not "concern" them as required under Texas defamation law -- and reversed
the trial court's order denying Kaufman's motion for summary judgment; and
UCLA law professor, Eugene Volokh, a prominent first amendment
scholar, posted the following item on Volokh.com concerning the court's opinion:
Texas Islamic Groups Argue That Internet Speech Should Be Less
Protected Than Print, Radio, or Television Speech:
The
Texas Court of Appeals disagrees, holding that a Texas statute that gives
procedural protection to "electronic or print media" defendants covers Internet
journalists on par with print journalists (and reaffirming that the First
Amendment does as well). The case is Kaufman v. Islamic
Society of Arlington, Texas; Kaufman is the defendant in the
underlying libel action, even though his name is listed first in the appeal --
the plaintiffs, who made the argument, were Islamic Society of Arlington, Texas,
Islamic Center of Irving, DFW Islamic Educational Center, Inc., Dar Elsalam
Islamic Center, Al Hedayah Islamic Center, Islamic Association of Tarrant Count,
and Muslim American Society of Dallas.
Here's
the core legal issue: A Texas statute allows pretrial appeals
of, among other things, an order that
denies a motion for summary judgment that is based in whole or in part
upon a claim against or defense by a member of the electronic or print media,
acting in such capacity, or a person whose communication appears in or is
published by the electronic or print media, arising under the free speech or
free press clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, or
Article I, Section 8, of the Texas Constitution, or Chapter 73.
It's about time they took the thugs down. CAIR's exploitation of our system of democracy to exploit the ends of the Muslim Brotherhood is particularly galling. The front for the Muslim Brotherhood in the US and an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land terror funding case has been given a free pass. No mas! The is the best news I have heard all year. I am encouraged enormously and hope that others look to Yerushalmi's example. We must do more of this. CAIR and their ilk use the legal system to shut up and shut down those who speak the truth. Let's turn that sucker around. If they could nail Capone on tax evasion ..............
David Yerushalmi is my hero. Go David Go!
Yerushalmi has been practicing law for 25 years. He is a litigator specializing in securities law, public policy relating to national security, and public interest law.
June 15, 2009 – Washington, DC: The District Director for California State Senator Carol Liu (D-La Cañada) was served last week in a federal fraud and racketeering lawsuit. Tahra Goraya was served on Wednesday, June 10th while at work at the state senator’s Glendale office serving the 21st District.
Goraya served as “national director” of the Council on American-Islamic Relations at the time of the alleged fraudulent scheme perpetrated by CAIR and its national leadership in Washington, D.C.
According to the complaint filed by former CAIR clients in November 2008, Goraya was directly involved in the fraud and cover-up. Goraya apparently resigned from CAIR sometime after the fraudulent scheme was fully underway and moved back to her home state of California. There she took a job as District Director for California State Senator Carol Liu. Goraya was served with the summons and complaint at Senator Liu’s Glendale offices. She has until June 30th to file her response with the court.
The federal racketeering (or RICO) lawsuit was filed November 18, 2008 in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia by four former CAIR clients. The complaint alleges criminal fraud and racketeering against CAIR, a self-described Muslim public interest civil rights law firm. The lawsuit also names CAIR’s national leadership, including Goraya, as individual defendants.
The lawsuit alleges that Morris Days, who served as the “Resident Attorney” and “Manager for Civil Rights” at the now defunct CAIR chapter in Herndon, Virginia, was in fact not an attorney and that he defrauded hundreds of CAIR clients by failing to provide legal services for which they had paid.
While attorney David Yerushalmi represents the four plaintiffs in this particular lawsuit, two of whom are African American Muslims, the complaint alleges that according to CAIR internal documents, there are hundreds of victims of the CAIR-Days fraud scheme.
According to the complaint, CAIR failed to conduct a background check on Days prior to hiring him and when they did discover his massive fraud, rather than inform their clients and authorities, they immediately set about to conspire with Days to continue the fraud and to cover it up. CAIR officials purposefully concealed the truth about Days from their clients, law enforcement, the Virginia and D.C. state bar associations, and the media. When CAIR began fielding irate calls from clients about Days’ failure to provide competent legal services, CAIR fraudulently deceived their clients about Days’ relationship to CAIR, suggesting he was never actually employed by CAIR, and even concealed the fact that CAIR finally fired him for criminal fraud.
“The evidence has long suggested that CAIR is a criminal organization set up by the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas to further its aims of stealth Jihad in the U.S.,” Mr. Yerushalmi was quoted at the time of the filing referring to the fact that CAIR has been named by the federal government as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation terror financing trial which led to multiple convictions, including at least one CAIR founding member and senior executive.
“But our investigation and this complaint make clear that CAIR’s criminal activities know no bounds,” Yerushalmi continued.
“According to the facts as carefully laid out in this complaint,” Yerushalmi explained, “CAIR has engaged in a massive cover-up of a criminal fraud in which literally hundreds of CAIR clients have been victimized and because of the CAIR cover-up they still don’t realize it. The fact that CAIR has victimized Muslims and non-Muslims alike demonstrates that CAIR is only looking out for CAIR and its ongoing effort to bilk donors out of millions of dollars of charitable donations thinking they are supporting a legitimate organization.”
After serving all of the defendants except Morris Days and Tahra Goraya, the plaintiffs learned that Days had died from lung ailments and Goraya had left for California. Because the 120-day time limit to serve the summons and complaint was nearing, the court granted the plaintiffs more time to serve Goraya and this was accomplished last week.
Goraya is the director of the 21st District office of Senator Liu, which serves Burbank, Glendale, Pasadena, La Cañada Flintridge, San Gabriel, Temple City, and the Los Angeles communities of Tarzana, Encino, Reseda, Van Nuys, Sherman Oaks, Studio City, North Hollywood, Silverlake, Los Feliz, Eagle Rock, Echo Park, Atwater Village, and Chinatown.
The CAIR defendants have filed a perfunctory motion to dismiss, which the parties fully briefed and submitted to the court in mid-March of this year. Mr. Yerushalmi said he expects the court’s ruling at any time. When asked about next steps, Mr. Yerushalmi said: “We are fully confident the court will deny the CAIR defendants’ motion and allow discovery to proceed. We are eager to begin examining CAIR’s internal documents and taking testimony. In the meantime, we have heard from additional former CAIR clients and victims and expect to either call them as witnesses or include them as additional plaintiffs.”
The complaint also alleges that in addition to covering up the Days fraud scheme, CAIR officials in D.C. forced angry clients who were demanding a return of their legal fees to sign a release that bought the client-victims’ silence by prohibiting them from informing law enforcement or the media about the CAIR-Days fraud. According to the agreement, if the “settling” clients said anything to anyone about the fraud scheme, CAIR would be able to sue them for $25,000.
This enforced code of silence left hundreds of CAIR client-victims in the dark such that to this day they have not learned that Days is not an attorney and that he had not filed the legal actions on their behalf for which Days and CAIR publicly claimed credit.
The complaint identifies CAIR as a racketeering enterprise under the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), which is a criminal racketeering statute that allows victims to sue the defendants in civil court. In addition to damages, the plaintiffs are seeking injunctive relief under this and other statutes to shut down CAIR and to prevent the individual defendants from engaging in public interest legal work in the future.
The named defendants are: the Council on American-Islamic Relations Action Network Inc. (dba CAIR); Nihad Awad aka Nihad Hammad who serves as executive director of CAIR National; Parvez Ahmed who was the chairman of the board of CAIR National during the relevant time period; Tahra Goraya who was the national director of CAIR but who has since resigned; Khadijah Athman who is the manager of the “civil rights” division of CAIR; and Nadhira al-Khalili, Esq., who is in-house legal counsel for CAIR.
According to the complaint, CAIR’s in-house Washington, D.C.-based attorney Khalili was directly involved in taking the legal files out of the CAIR Virginia office and concealing them in the D.C. office.
Also named as defendants are Ibrahim Hooper and Amina Rubin, CAIR’s director of communications and coordinator of communications, respectively. According to the complaint, these two were directly responsible for issuing fraudulent press releases about the Days fraud scheme, thus aiding and abetting the CAIR cover-up.
Despite the temporary leftist Islamic takeover of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, there are heroes across this great nation taking action to protect us from jihad. In this latest victory, the scourge of a particularly devastating jihad, litigation jihad, was defanged in Florida.
Florida has passed a libel tourism law much like the one we passed in New York, Rachel's law, named after the courageous author Rachel Ehrenfeld, who exposed terror financing and was sued by one of the richest men in Saudi Arabia. Consider the Saudi billionaire Sheikh Khalid Bin Mahfouz's wallet, and then imagine Rachel's wallet. David meets Goliath.
David won :)
HOUSE BILL TO PROTECT FLORIDIANS
FROM LIBEL TOURISM PASSES UNANIMOUSLY
~Bill Shields Floridians from Libel Suits Filed by Terrorists, Other Foreigners~
TALLAHASSEE, FL - Representative Charles E. Van Zant (R-Keystone Heights) lauded the unanimous passage of House Bill (HB) 949 by the Florida House of Representatives. The measure relates to grounds for non-recognition of foreign defamation judgments. This legislation closely resembles a similar law that was passed nearly a year ago by the New York Legislature.
HB 949, like the law passed in New York, will help in the fight against a tactic known as “Libel Tourism” which results from defamation lawsuits filed against authors critical of individuals with known ties to terrorist organizations like al Qaeda and Hamas. The lawsuits have been finding their way into foreign courts. HB 949 will provide Florida courts with the ability not to recognize a foreign judgment, if that country’s laws protecting free speech and the free press are not at least as protective as freedoms provided in the constitutions of Florida and United States.
“This bill protects all Floridians’ fundamental right to the freedom of speech and press without fear of reprisal from foreign courts,” said Representative Van Zant, the bill’s sponsor. “Political speech is a right we as Americans and Floridians hold dear. This law will ensure that no Floridian will ever have to answer to terrorists as a result of their criticism of terrorism, or its enablers.”
House Majority Leader, Adam Hasner (R-Boca Raton) added, “This bill protects Floridians from having their right to free speech suppressed by those with radical ideologies. Foreign courts that do not place the same value on our constitutionally guaranteed freedom of speech will no longer be used to intimidate Florida citizens.”
The bill’s companion, Senate Bill 1066, will be considered in the Senate Rules Committee before heading to the Senate floor for final passage.
I attended a lunch to benefit lone warrior against libel tourism, Rachel Ehrenfeld. James Woolsey helped host this benefit to assist the beleaguered Rachel Ehrenfeld. The lack of substantial support reflects poorly on us. The Saudi use of litigation warfare is a lethal weapon. What is really at stake is our very freedom of speech. This is economic warfare against the West.
WE MUST HELP GET THIS LEGISLATION PASSED! It's importance cannot be stressed enough. It is extraordinary as it's use is "dual cause". First it is specific to the great evil of funding Islamic terrorism and secondly it allows authors to freely write their books without worrying if some foreigner with a bottomless bank account will sue them in a foreign court.
STATUS OF RACHEL'S LAW BEFORE CONGRESS: Senators Specter and Schumer have filed the Free
Speech Protection Act, with minor changes, as an amendment for consideration to
be included in the Senate Defense Authorization bill (S. 3001).
FROM ACT FOR AMERCIA:
The
decision to allow amendments like this to be voted on for inclusion in the bill
is made by the "managers" of the bill (Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman
Carl Levin and for the GOP John Warner in Senator John McCain's absence).
Senator Levin has to agree to allow a vote on our amendment. Levin, Warner and
other Senate leaders are negotiating over which amendments (if any) will be
allowed for consideration, and so far, only amendments directly related to the
defense bill have been considered and voted on.
It is therefore
URGENT that Senators Levin, Warner, and other members of the Senate Armed
Services Committee hear from the grassroots right away. We need you to contact
these members and urge them to include the Free Speech Protection Act as an
amendment to the Senate Defense Authorization bill, S.3001. Tell them protecting
American authors who write about terrorism is crucial to our national security
and the war on terrorism.
Following is a link to a listing of the
members of this committee.
* Please email, fax or phone Senators Levin
and Warner and respectfully ask them to include this vital legislation as an
amendment.
* If any of these Senators is YOUR Senator, it is especially
important for you to make contact with them as soon as possible, preferably by
phone.
Getting this legislation passed will help ensure that American authors
who have the courage to write about terrorism will not be subject to
intimidation lawsuits filed in foreign jurisdictions. Protecting our precious
free speech rights is a crucial front in the war on terrorism.
Great oped piece today in, of all places, The New York Times
When Rachel Ehrenfeld wrote “Funding Evil: How Terrorism Is Financed and How to Stop It,” she assumed she would be protected by the First Amendment. She was, in the United States. But a wealthy Saudi businessman she accused in the book of being a funder of terrorism, Khalid bin Mahfouz, sued in Britain, where the libel laws are heavily weighted against journalists, and won a sizable amount of money.
The lawsuit is a case of what legal experts are calling “libel tourism.” Ms. Ehrenfeld is an American, and “Funding Evil” was never published in Britain. But at least 23 copies of
the book were sold online, opening the door for the lawsuit. When Ms. Ehrenfeld decided not to defend the suit in Britain, Mr. bin Mahfouz won a default judgment and is now free to sue to collect in the United States.
The upshot is a First Amendment loophole. In the Internet age, almost every American book can be bought in Britain. That means American authors are subject to being sued under British libel law, which in some cases puts the initial burden on the defendant to prove the truth of what she has written. British libel law is so tilted against writers that the United Nations Human Rights Committee criticized it last month for discouraging discussion of important matters of public interest.
Mr. bin Mahfouz, who has denied financing terrorism, said Ms. Ehrenfeld’s book contained inaccuracies and demanded a retraction. He also demanded a significant contribution to a charity of his choice — a charity Ms. Ehrenfeld said she feared would be one with ties to terrorism. Ms. Ehrenfeld, who describes herself as being “in the business of stopping people who fund terrorism,” refused to back down. “I said,” she later recalled, “he’s found the wrong victim.”
Ms. Ehrenfeld rallied prominent champions of free speech to her cause, including the American Library Association, the Association of American Publishers and the PEN American Center. She also set to work trying to change American law. The New York State Legislature passed a bill that some are calling “Rachel’s law,” which blocks enforcement of libel judgments from countries that provide less free-speech protection than the United States. Gov. David Paterson signed it on May 1.
A similar, bipartisan bill has been introduced in Congress. The federal bill would extend protection to the entire country. It would also allow American authors and publishers to countersue, and if a jury found that the foreign suit was an attempt to suppress protected speech, it could award treble damages. There is little opposition to it — and Congress should pass it before it adjourns later this month.
“Libel tourism” is a threat to America’s robust free-speech traditions, which protect authors here. If foreign libel judgments can be enforced in American courts, there will be a “race to the bottom”; writers will only have as much protection as the least pro-free-speech nations allow.
Most writers, particularly those who concern themselves with arcane subjects like terrorism financing, are not wealthy. The prospect of a deep-pocketed plaintiff coming after them in court can be frightening. Even if the lawsuit fails, the cost and effort involved in defending against it can be considerable.
The result is what lawyers call a “chilling effect” — authors and publishers may avoid taking on some subjects, or challenging powerful interests. That has already been happening in Britain. Craig Unger’s “House of Bush, House of Saud: The Secret Relationship Between the World’s Two Most Powerful Dynasties” was a best seller in the United States. But its British publisher canceled plans to publish the book, reportedly out of fear of being sued. (A smaller publisher later released it.)
Ms. Ehrenfeld says that even in the United States, writers and publishers have been backing away from books about terrorism financing — particularly about the Saudi connection — out of fear of being sued. It is hard to know if other books are not being written out of fear of lawsuits — that is the essence of the chilling effect.
Britain should rethink its libel laws, as the U.N. committee urged, for the sake of its citizens. But until it does, the United States should ensure that other countries’ pro-plaintiff libel laws do not infect this country and diminish our proud tradition of freedom of expression
My co- blogger and Atlas advertiser (we love that!)Dancing with Genesis was recently threatened with a lawsuit by alleged Saddam hatchet man Auchi. Talk about David and Goliath. The funny thing is Jim picks up his Auchi stuff from me - I heard not a peep. Perhaps the passage of Rachel's Law in New York looked after the little guy, now we have to pass it that legislation nationally: SUPPORT THE FREEDOM OF SPEECH PROTECTION ACT.
Why
aren’t the American media investigating the role of British billionaire
businessman Nadhmi Auchi in supplying loans to Barack Obama fundraiser
Tony Rezko? Some point to media bias, but there is another factor.
Working for Auchi, who was born in Iraq, attorneys from London law firm
Carter-Ruck have for several months been flooding American and British
newspapers and websites with letters demanding removal of material they
deem “defamatory” to their client.
In its June 28 edition,
British satirical magazine Private Eye explains: “Until Carter-Ruck and
Partners and England’s stifling libel laws got to work, the few
American journalists not caught up in Obama-mania were turning to the
archives of the British press to answer an intriguing question: who is Nadhmi Auchi?”
What is so “stifling” about English libel law? In the U.K., as Carter-Ruck explains on its own website,
“A libel claimant does not have to prove that the words are false or to
prove that he has in fact suffered any loss. Damage is presumed.”
The Obama campaign recently issued a non-denial denial in response to claims that Obama met with Auchi―contained in Jerome Corsi’s bestseller, The Obama Nation.
They cited only two references. One is, “Mr. Auchi’s lawyer” who told
the February 27, 2008 London Evening Standard, “As far as he can
remember he has had no direct contact with Mr. Obama.” Another is, “A
lawyer for Auchi, Alasdair Pepper” who says, according to the April 16,
2008 Washington Post, “Auchi Had ‘No Recollection’ Of Meeting Obama or
Michelle.” Alasdair Pepper is the attorney whose name appears on the Carter-Ruckdemand letters.
The Secret Loan
A secret $3.5 million loan
from an Auchi company to key early-money Barack Obama fundraiser Antoin
Rezko was exposed while Rezko was awaiting trial on fraud and
money-laundering charges earlier this year. Rezko’s bail was revoked
and police showed up banging on the doors of his Wilmette Chicago
mansion to drag him off to jail early in the morning of January 28th.
Auchi’s loan to Rezko had come on May 23, 2005 but had not been
disclosed to the Court as required in his bail agreement. Three weeks
later, on June 15, 2005, Rezko’s wife assisted the Obamas in the
purchase of their South Chicago mansion by purchasing a next-door
undeveloped lot being sold with the house.
According to the Times of London,
“Mr. Rezko’s lawyer said his client had ‘longstanding indebtedness’ to
Mr. Auchi’s General Mediterranean Holding (GMH). By June 2007 he owed
it $27.9 million. Under a Loan Forgiveness Agreement described in
court, M. Auchi lent Mr. Rezko $3.5 million in April 2005 and $11
million in September 2005, as well as $3.5 million transferred in April
2007. That agreement provided for the outstanding loans to be
‘forgiven’ in return for a stake in the 62-acre Riverside Park
development.”
Rezko’s relationship with Barack Obama goes back to at least 1990, when Obama’s law firm did work relating to thousands of now-decaying Rezko
apartment units in South Chicago. Rezko was a key early-money
fundraiser in Obama’s state Senate campaigns and his failed run at the
U.S. Congress.
According to TheTimes of London,
“Mr. Auchi first met Mr. Rezko after the 2003 Iraq war and they have a
business relationship.” At the time Auchi was facing the possibility of extradition to France. The Times of London
explains: “Mr Auchi was convicted of corruption, given a suspended
sentence and fined £1.4 million in France in 2003 for his part in the
Elf affair, described as the biggest political and corporate scandal in
post-war Europe. He, in a statement from his media lawyers, claims he
is appealing against the sentence.”
Allow me to introduce you to Nadhmi Auchi. He was charged in the
1950s with being an accomplice of Saddam Hussein, when the future
tyrant was acquiring his taste for blood. He was investigated in the
1980s for his part in alleged bribes to the fabulously corrupt leaders
of post-war Italy. In the 1990s, the Belgium Ambassador to Luxembourg
claimed that Auchi’s bank held money Saddam and Colonel Gadaffi had
stolen from their luckless peoples. In 2002, officers from the Serious
Fraud Squad raided the offices of one of Auchi’s drug companies as part
of an investigation of what is alleged to be the biggest swindle ever
of the (British National Health Service). With allegations, albeit
unproven, like these hanging over him, wouldn’t you think that British
MPs would have the sense to stay away?
But after threats from Carter-Ruck, Cohen’s “defamatory” article became one of six Guardian and Observer articles scrubbed from the Internet this April.
Blogger “A Jacksonian” received a similar demand
on or before June 24. His article is still up. It details much of the
information contained in the six deleted Guardian/Observer articles.
A new left-wing organization "will use any means necesssary" to see that Barack Hussein Obama becomes president. They are threatening major donors who contribute to Republican causes with lawfare if they fund efforts to expose the truth about Obama.
Ha!
This would be funny if it weren't so dangerous. Why funny? Because major donors on the right do not donate to the army of right leaning blogs and grass roots efforts that are doing all the work in exposing Obama for what he is - the corrupt, marxist Nation of Islam candidate. We work for nothing. We have no George Soros, no moveon. org NO ONE giving us dough ! That's how the left operates, like a greasy corrupt political machine (think Obama and Chicago ). We are working for free for the greater good (how's that for marxism turned on its ear?).
Individuals, like me, are working our tails off fighting to save America and the free world from the manchurian candidate. There is no dough. That's the problem with the right! Major donors give to conservative think tanks who, by and large, don't do jack and have become so politically correct, they've rendered themselves useless and ineffective.
Wanna piss off the left? Contribute to Atlas and help me expose the fraud that is Obama (use my email address - atlasshrugs2000@aol.com ) GO HERE! I won't tell :)
Once again the brownshirts shred freedom of speech, the basic tenet of our great republic in its aggressive pursuit of liberal fascism:
A new left-wing organization that wants to help elect Barack Obama president is sending letters to nearly 10,000 major donors who contribute to Republican causes, threatening them with potential legal problems if they finance conservative groups.
The nonprofit organization, Accountable America, is even offering a $100,000 reward for information that leads to the criminal conviction or fines of at least $10,000 for violations of campaign finance laws or other statutes by a conservative group, according to The New York Times.
Accountable America is led by Tom Matzzie, former Washington director of the liberal activist group MoveOn.org, and its research director is Judd Legum, who served that role in Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.
Matzzie called the organization’s effort “going for the jugular.” He told The Times, "We want to stop the Swift Boating before it gets off the ground.”
The warning letter being sent to potential donors “is intended as a first step, alerting donors who might be considering giving to right-wing groups to a variety of potential dangers, including legal trouble, public exposure and watchdog groups digging through their lives,” The Times reports.
If a conservative group do run ads attacking Obama, Matzzie says his group plans to run ads countering it exposing the donors behind the anti-Obama message.
Matzzie’s group has so far raised only $200,000, but he said he hopes to raise more than $500,000 by next week and $2 million overall.
Republican strategist Chris LaCivita doubts the group will succeed in scaring off donors, saying “they’re not going to be intimidated by some pipsqueak on the kooky left.”
Matzzie previously headed the Campaign to Defend America, which has run ads against Republican presidential candidate John McCain in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Every week, Rich Davis and his band of patriots stands across the street from the American destroyers and they waves their flags, sing their songs, support the troops. Support the truth.
And every week, the moonbats, haters, and lefties across the street grow angrier and nastier. All because of Rich and his shiny, happy people :)
Well, in the new America, in the left's America, you are not allowed to have an opinion that is not theirs. If you do, they sue! Welcome to the fairness doctrine.
Rich received this legal letter from the "peace" movement. Mind you these are the same folks that attacked a blogger filming one of the rallys (it went to court, the assailant plead guilty): Violent "Peace" Protester Hits Girl Blogger
So it's cool for Porter's bots to get all up in the patriots faces, push them, strike women, curse them, and violate the agreement. They can be divisive and occupy a public square alone to torment the town for five years - but when the "victory" movement shows up and she gets a little push back - she and her thumb suckers start whining and crying, harrasment.
Once again the left throws the first amendment under the bus. Go back to North Korea (Porter's dream vacation idea - no, I'm serious - she wrote that once).
It doesn't faze Rich one bit. We have an army of lawyers. It's a desperate act of a spoiled brat. Typical leftist.
After a year-long investigation, the Alberta Human Rights and Citizenship
Commission has rejected a complaint by the Edmonton Council of Muslim Canadians
against former Western Standard publisher Ezra Levant over his republication of
the Danish Muhammad cartoons.
The allegation that the February 14, 2006, issue of the now defunct magazine
was likely to expose Muslims to hatred helped to spark a national debate about
human rights law and free speech, and its rejection comes after similar
complaints of Islamophobia against Maclean's magazine also failed.
Expose who to whose hatred. Acts of religious violence are the hallmarks of the Religion of pieces.
In a report on his investigation, which recommended the complaint not be
referred for a panel hearing, AHRCC Southern Director Pardeep S. Gundara wrote
that the cartoons are "stereotypical, negative and offensive," and they "do
reinforce stereotypes," but they were "related to relevant and timely news" and
were "not simply gratuitously included."
And if they were gratuitous? What's the dif? Freedom of Speech, baby
CAIR is gloating over the dhimmi ruling of San Francisco (need I say more?) libtard Judge Susan Ilston against the courageous Michael Savage. Ilston was appointed by cigar stuffing Bill Clinton. This is a terrible blow, a terrible blow, for freedom of speech lovers . Of course, inindicted c0-conspirator CAIR is using freedom of speech to kill freedom of speech and in typical Orwellian double spea, calls it a victory for free speech (!). Worse yet, the king of litigation jihad is crying about law costs and begging for infidel dollars. I guess the 50 million the Saudis gave CAIR has been spent on suing airlines,ordinary Americans and scaring the folks.
Based on this ruling, shouldn't CAIR's lawfare aginst Savage be dismissed as well?
We hope you will join us in celebrating what many are calling a huge victory for freedom of speech. Last year
during a nationally-syndicated radio broadcast, host Michael Savage screamed
attacks on Muslims, Islam and the Quran.
Savage's anti-Muslim rant included: "I don't wanna hear anymore about Islam.
I don't wanna hear one more word about Islam. Take your religion and shove it up
your behind. I'm sick of you."
To listen to Savage’s anti-Muslim rant, click here.
As you know, CAIR's response to these
attacks, coupled with the efforts of other like-mined
organizations, cost Savage advertisers like Sears, Sam’s Club and GEICO
Insurance. He told reporters that he lost more than
$1 million in revenue.
In response to our anti-hate campaign, Savage
sued CAIR. He claimed that our replaying of his bigoted remarks
infringed on his "copyright." We simply believed people had a right to hear and
judge his hate-filled words for themselves.
THE GOOD NEWS:In a ruling issued on Friday, Federal Judge Susan Illston
dismissed Savage’s lawsuit against CAIR.
In her ruling, Judge Illston wrote that the lawsuit Savage filed was "a
dispute about...the protections of the First Amendment, protections upon which
plaintiff (himself) relies for his livelihood and the airing of his radio
program." Judge Illston also implied that the lawsuit may have been brought in
an effort to "harass" CAIR.
We could not have won this case without the help
we have received from supporters like you. Despite this legal
victory, our work continues. Savage's attorney has been quoted in the media as
saying they plan to file another complaint against us.
Freedom is not free. Justice does not defend itself. Lawsuits are costly.
This case, part of defending the image of Islam, has channeled resources away
from our normal civil rights and advocacy work. Michael Savage's malicious words
are not only directed at Muslims. He has issued on-air insults against
immigrants, African-Americans, women, and most recently autistic children, who
he called "brats" and "morons.”
Hamas respects successful jihad. Litigation jihad is one of the most venal and effective weapons in the jihad assault on Western civilization. Hamas is suing UK blogger over a tiny detail (over at Gates of Vienna). This friends, is terrorism. Think of the tens of thousands of dollars this will cost the individual blogger who gets sued. Think. The little guy up against those bloody petrol dollars. One has to wonder if Hamas is using US State department funds to pursue this? The new front ....... terrible, all of it.
A British blog called Harry’s Place
is being sued by Mohammed Sawalha for posting a variant of a translated
phrase from one of the plaintiff’s speeches. Lest you think of Mr.
Sawalha as an innocent lamb, consider that even the BBC (yes, even the
Beeb!) says that he “master minded much of Hamas’
political and
military strategy” and in the UK “is alleged to have directed funds,
both for Hamas’ armed wing, and for spreading its missionary dawah”.
Harry
is evidently up against some high-priced and hard-hitting solicitors on
behalf of the Hamas mastermind. He’s going to need help if Mr. Sawalha
continues with his legal intimidation.
Last
Friday, in the wake of a closely argued debate about whether Mohammed
Sawalha, the President of the British Muslim Initiative, had used the
phrase “Evil Jew” or “Jewish Lobby” in a speech, Harry’s Place received
a letter. The letter is from Dean and Dean, a firm of solicitors who
are acting for Mr Sawalha. Mr Sawalha has demanded that we take down
certain articles from Harry’s Place, and publish an apology “in the
attached wording” […]
Mr
Sawalha claims that we have “chosen a malevolent interpretation of a
meaningless word”. In fact, we did no more than translate a phrase
which appeared in an Al Jazeera report of Mr Sawalha’s speech. When Al
Jazeera changed that phrase from “Evil Jew” to “Jewish Lobby”, we
reported that fact, along with the statement that it had been a
typographical error.
Dangerous stuff, we're trying to get as many bloggers as possible to react to it. Join the list of supporting blogs.The British blogs have already amassed together. A blogburst has been started at NeoConstant in support of Harry’s Place ( and here's the
original blogburst post)
Harry’s Place,
a UK blog dedicated to promoting the ideals of freedom and democracy,
is being sued by Mohammed Sawalha, the President of the British Muslim
Initiative, which has been linked to Hamas and the Islamic Brotherhood,
both terrorist organizations. The blog reports that Mr. Sawalha, according to the BBC…
“master
minded much of Hamas’ political and military strategy” and in London
“is alleged to have directed funds, both for Hamas’ armed wing, and for
spreading its missionary dawah”.
In their revelation of the impending lawsuit against them leveled by Mohammed Sawalha, they write:
Mr
Sawalha claims that we have “chosen a malevolent interpretation of a
meaningless word”. In fact, we did no more than translate a phrase
which appeared in an Al Jazeera report of Mr Sawalha’s speech. When Al
Jazeera changed that phrase from “Evil Jew” to “Jewish Lobby”, we
reported that fact, along with the statement that it had been a
typographical error.
Mr Sawalha has been the prime mover in a number of Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood associated projects. He is President of the British Muslim Initiative. He is the past President of the Muslim Association of Britain. He was the founder of IslamExpo, and is registered as the holder of the IslamExpo domain name. He is also a trustee of the Finsbury Park Mosque….
…Mr
Sawalha says that the attribution of the phrase “Evil Jew” to him
implies that he is “anti-semitic and hateful”. Notably, he does not
take issue with our reporting of the revelation, made in a Panorama
documentary in 2006, that he is a senior activist in the clerical
fascist terrorist organisation, Hamas.
It looks
like Harry’s Place is going up against some pretty top-notch lawyers on
this one, and they’ve got guts, but as the post goes on to say:
If Mr Sawalha persists in attempting to silence us with this desperate legal suit, we will need your help.
We won’t be able to stand up to them alone.
This is why we’ve started this blogburst, to get the word out that we won’t let members of Hamas or any radical terrorist group censor us or any of our fellow bloggers.
If you’d like to add your site to the blogroll, simply email us at admin@neoconstant.com, and include your site’s URL.
Then
copy and paste this entry into one of your posts. Future posts will be
emailed to you. Thanks, and don’t forget to head over to Harry’s Place to show your support of their freedom of speech!
Further to my previous emails I have learned that one of the key figures in Islam Expo is in the process of suing the highly admirable blog Harry's Place.
I am fully aware of the bias involved - and many of the unpleasant figures behind - Islam Expo. I have followed the event on both previous years and have always been fully aware of the highly prejudicial and biased nature of the forum.
However, I believe passionately in freedom of speech. This means that I have often taken to platforms and had to talk opposite people whose views I find morally distasteful and worse. I knew that this was going to be the case at Islam Expo. Among the pannelists in the uneven panel you intended to put me on were Seamus Milne, and Anas Altikriti. Milne has previously come close to libelling me in print. He - like Altikriti - has views which I abhor. But I am willing to speak with such people, and make my case in almost any venue which cares to have me.
However, the event of Mohammed Sawalha's legal action against Harry's Place makes it impossible for me to be on your platform. A concerted attempt to prevent writers from highlighting the agendas or affiliations behind your event ridicules the very idea of an open debate.
I will not come on a platform hosted by people carrying out legal action against a deeply admirable and informed proponent of free speech. I hope your debate benefits from its newly re-found uniformity.
The
Tundra Tabloids' definition of 'litigation jihad': "A non-lethal
means by which Islamists carry out their holy war against the infidel whenever
the use of violence is not an option."
The British Muslim Initiative,
(like its US cousin CAIR) is a front or 'fig leaf' organization for the
Palestinian terrorist organization, Hamas. The reason why they are in the news,
is that they have recently fired a warning shot across the bow of the British
website called 'Harry's
Place'.
The BMI is threatening "legal action" for the
website's publishing of a quote uttered by its president Mohammed Sawalha at a demonstration
condemning the recent Jewish community's pro-Israel rally that celebrated
Israel's 60th Day of Independence. The BMI is upset that Harry's
Place
"quoted a piece (translated from
Arabic) stating that Mr. Sawalha had described the Jews in Britain as
evil/noxious."
Harry's Place had used an Al-Jazeera report on the
demonstration attended by Sawalha, in which he stated: “to express our resentment at the celebrations by the
Jewish community”. But as Harry's Place has it, being the Hamas minded
Islamist that he is, Mohammed Sawalha couldn't hold his rhetoric to a bare
minimum, he just had to let it all hang out.
HP:He also made
another statement, which has been the subject of some dispute. Al Jazeera
initially reported the phrase in question as containing the word
“الوبيل”. That word translates as “evil” or “baneful”, or some
variant thereon. The next word was “يهودي “, which means “Jew”
or “Jewish”. We translated the phrase, as it appeared, as “evil Jew” or “Jewish
evil”.
Some time later, the word
“الوبيل ” was removed from the Al Jazeera report. It was
replaced with the word “اللوبي ”, “lobby”.
The British Muslim Initiative then
issued a bombastic “press release”, which it pasted in our comments section,
claiming that we had:
“deliberately skewed the word
‘Lobby’ to turn it into some other word and make it seem as though it means
‘evil/noxious’”
It went on to describe Mr Sawalha
as a promoter of “community relations and cultural dialogue”, and object to him
being ”demonised” as a “‘Jew-hater’ and ‘anti-Semitic’.”
I do not know Mr Sawalha. However,
if he is a senior Hamas activist, and a supporter of that organisation, I cannot
imagine he has anything positive to contribute to “community relations”.
Moreover, it is very unlikely that any British court would regard it as
defamatory to describe a Hamas activist as a racist. Hamas is a proudly racist,
and genocidal terrorist organisation.
This is a classic example of Islamists dissembling before
the non-Muslim community. "We didn't actually say that! You are misrepresenting
what was actually said!", in spite of the fact that it was taken straight from
an Al-Jazeera report. To further complicate matters, the
Islamist friendly news organization conveniently changed their original report
to now read "evil lobby".
Nice to have an ace up your sleeve when it's
needed, and Al-Jazeera is ready to help out!
Barry Rubin
explores the modus operandi of the Islamists and their useful stooges in the
western media, who pretty much help out the Islamists in much the same vein as
Al-Jazeera.
BR: There is one case after another of this situation. Some
make global headlines like the Dura case, where French television covered up its
staged broadcast claiming that Israel killed a boy in Gaza even when a French
court found it was phony, or the supposed Jenin massacre, reported on the basis
of one unknown Palestinian witness and maintained by many even after the UN
found it phony.
[...]
As so often happens, however, the response
of Sawalha and company was neither to affirm proudly their views--which are
typical of Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood propaganda in the Arab world--nor to
back down but to fabricate and attack.
It reminds me of the time that a
BBC stringer in Gaza made a pro-Hamas speech which appeared on that group's
site. When Israel complained, the speech was quickly taken down. The BBC then
said it could not investigate the issue since there was no remaining evidence.
The fact that a "screen shot" existed of the article did not move them from that
stance.
Or when Islamist terrorism leads
to criticism the response of Muslim individuals, institutions, and regimes is to
put a far lower priority on rejecting or reinterpreting the specific texts used
by the Islamist terrorists than to claim "Islamophobia" on the part of the
critics.
And so Al-Jazeera simply changed
the wording of the interview's text to read: "Jewish lobby" instead of the "evil
Jew." As an aside, note that "evil Jew" is a far more vicious statement than
"evil Jews." After all, the latter implies opposition to those Jews who support
Israel while the former pushes the idea that Jews are innately evil, an idea
that is usually or almost always present in Hamas, Islamist, and a great deal of
general Arab discourse.
At any rate, the British Muslim
Initiative then issued a press release they put on the "Harry's Place" site but
not on their own. (As so often happens with the language switcheroo, the
radicals don't want their own supporters to know about their moderate pretenses
or understand that they know it is all a con-game).More here
The Muslims who are waging a physical and psychological jihad
against the West, are also waging a highly successful propaganda campaign as
well. They need to keep their base support well motivated with extremism, while
they pepper the non-Muslim media with words of moderation and tolerance. Arafat
did much of the
same, and he was supposedly the "moderate". Yeah riiight.
The other
weapon in the jihadists' arsenal is the litigation machine, which threatens
those who are able to read between lines of the jihadists' public messages, or
get a hold of the speeches and sermons giving in private settings, with the
latter being the most damaging. Remember the Dispatches series by UK Channel
Four "Undercover Mosque"? The news station was afterwards
investigated -due to the complaints leveled by the Muslim community- for being
"Islamophobic", in spite of the documentary showing the mosques' own imams and
leaders preaching highly intolerant and racist messages.
That is the
reality of the jihad campaign being waged against us here in the West, which
focuses more on intimidation and dissembling and litigation than on violence and
mayhem. But all of the methods and means employed by the jihadis are as divisive
as they are destructive, and are used interchangeably in order to keep the
non-Muslim host society off balance. In order to defeat it, you have to be able
to spot it and that's exactly what the bloggers at Harry's Place did.
The
Tundra Tabloids offers its heartfelt thanks to Harry's Place, and to all other
bloggers, speakers and activists who dare to stand in the breach for the rest of
us. We owe you all more than could ever be repaid. More here. *L* KGS
Is it just me, or are you getting freakin' sick of this? This Muslim knows why he lost clearance. He knows the government can't release such classified information. So he sues to force discovery. Another Great American ............
Charging violation of his constitutional rights to free speech and religion,
equal protection and due process, nuclear scientist and prison imam Moniem
El-Ganayni filed a federal lawsuit yesterday against the Department of Energy
and its acting deputy secretary, Jeffrey F. Kupfer.
The action stems from the loss of Dr. El-Ganayni's security clearance, and
hence his job, at Bettis Laboratory in West Mifflin, based on unspecified
grounds of "national security." It does not seek to overturn the revocation, but
rather the right to see the alleged evidence against him -- he doubts any exists
-- and the chance to contest the decision "before a nonpolitical, neutral
arbiter, as mandated by DOE regulations."
"The government has offered no factual details in this case. All they've done
is to parrot boilerplate language from the DOE," said Witold Walczak, legal
director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania, which is
representing Dr. El-Ganayni along with lawyers from the Downtown offices of
Schnader Harrison Segal and Lewis.
"There are ways to handle classified information without compromising
national security," he said. "The government has done it before."
The suit says Dr. El-Ganayni was damaged by the government's actions and, in
addition to a hearing, seeks affirmation of his rights as a U.S. citizen, plus
costs and attorneys' fees.
National security, the suit alleges, was invoked "solely to shield the agency
from having to disclose the unconstitutional retaliatory and discriminatory
reasons" for its action. In reality, it says, the decision was made "because he
is a foreign-born Muslim who has spoken publicly and critically about U.S.
foreign policy and the FBI's treatment of Muslims."
Altogether now. Hurl.
"Many [native-born] Americans say what I say about the war," Dr. El-Ganayni
said yesterday. "But when I say it, I become a traitor. I want to show that the
laws apply to me the same as to any other citizen."
The 29-page complaint sets out a scenario of post-9/11 suspicion and
harassment against local Muslims, and Dr. El-Ganayni's opposition to it. It says
he was visited by government agents at his home, asked to inform on other
Muslims (he refused) and denied boarding passes on routine airline flights when
his American-born wife went right through.
Dr. El-Ganayni came to the United States from Egypt in 1980, became a U.S.
citizen in 1988 and started work at the Bettis nuclear propulsion research
facility in 1990. He earned his advanced degrees at the University of
Pittsburgh, co-founded the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh, and ministered to
prisoners in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
He contends that he never had a clearance problem at work until he began
speaking out against the Iraq war and the FBI's efforts to recruit informants at
local mosques.
The Canadian Human Rights Commission has dismissed a complaint against Maclean's magazine over a controversial article on the future of Islam, magazine officials said yesterday.
Meanwhile, a decision from the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal over the same issue isn't expected for several months.
On Thursday, the Canadian "Human Rights" Commission (very quietly) dismissed the Canadian Islamic Congress complaint against Maclean's re America Alone
- and without even giving the Socks the consolation of an Ontario-style
drive-by verdict. The decision of the Jennifer Lynch mob includes the
following:
The Steyn article discusses changing global demographics and other
factors that the author describes as contributing to an eventual
ascendancy of Muslims in the 'developed world', a prospect that the
author fears for various reasons described in the article. The writing
is polemical, colourful and emphatic, and was obviously calculated to
excite discussion and even offend certain readers, Muslim and
non-Muslim alike.
Overall, however, the views expressed in the Steyn article, when
considered as a whole and in context, are not of an extreme nature as
defined by the Supreme Court in the Taylor decision. Considering the
purpose and scope of section 13 (1), and taking into account that an
interpretation of s. 13 (1) must be consistent with the minimal
impairment of free speech, there is no reasonable basis in the evidence
to warrant the appointment of a Tribunal.
Five Feet of Fury has a gorgeous response to the bullshit taqiya the "moderates" sling at the West (Siddiqui is a well known Israel basher at the Star and his reply is the standard one he gives to those who object to his columns.)
Millions of us want to know: why do so many Muslims do things like that, Mr.
Siddiqui?
And why don't more of your fellow Muslims condemn them, loudly, publicly and
without the usual "buts" about Israel's or America's mostly imaginary
equivalence? Now that would be a column worth writing.
You work from a false assumption, Mr. Siddiqui: that hate is bad.
It's a sad commentary when even the so-called educated members of your
"community" -- three law school graduates -- can't appreciate basic English
literary devices that date back to Chaucer.
Except for the Koran, which contains more hate speech than every issue of
Maclean's published in the last hundred years put together.
(Now THAT would be an interesting case for the Human Rights Commission. I'm a
free speech absolutist, but I'd love to see how a case calling the Koran "hate
speech" would play out, what with all its calls to violence against "apes and pigs" ,
i.e. Christians and Jews.)
PS: you foolishly cited professor John "Who?" Miller's tedious, cliche ridden screed against
Steyn. Speaking of "riddled with errors": did you know that the great journalism
professor Miller accused Steyn of not "arguing in food [sic] faith"? (Have
someone else in the newsroom explain his mistake to you...)
And the New York Times guy says he "can't believe what he's
witnessing".
Hmmmmmmmmmm.... can't see why, they help usher in this scourge. And if Obombshell gets into the office, expect the same - think un"Fairness" doctrine. Steyn blasts at NRO: (links hat tip s)
The Canadian Islamic Congress lawyer says that freedom of speech is a "red
herring". If it were, it would be on the endangered species list. And the
New York Times guy says he "can't believe what he's witnessing".
With their usual low cunning, the "human rights" sheikhs chose a courtroom
that only seats 40 people so a big crowd (including CBC reporters) were
wedged up peering through the glass in the door until the head sheikh (a judge
best known for fining the Knights of Columbus for declining to rent their hall
for a lesbian wedding) said the pressed faces of the people were distracting her
and shooed them away. Typical. A third-rate bureaucracy that tells everyone from
McDonald's to Maclean's magazine how to run their affairs can't even organize a
show trial with minimal competence.
Maybe the folks who can't get in should file a "human rights" complaint
against the "human rights" tribunal for denying them the human right to attend a
human rights trial. Say what you like about Saddam's justice system, but at
least I'd be dead by now and out of my misery.
VANCOUVER -In the subterranean bowels of a provincial courthouse, a bizarre and
frightening spectacle starts to unfold.
if found to have violated the code, Maclean's faces sanctions, including payment
to the complainant "an amount that the member or panel considers appropriate to
compensate that person for injury to dignity, feelings and self respect or to
any of them."
The magazine could also be ordered to stop publishing certain ideas and
points of view. Lawyer Faisal Joseph, representing the complainant, asked the
Tribunal yesterday to use its "discretion" and order Maclean's to publish a
suitable response in its pages. That, or publish the panel's ultimate findings.
Such are the frightening aspect of this case.
"Strict rules of evidence do not apply" in cases before the Tribunal, noted
its chairwoman, Heather MacNaughton. A lawyer and a veteran of human rights
inquiries, she made the comment yesterday afternoon, when allowing an Ontario
law student -- yet another non-B. C. resident -- to deliver for the complainant
testimony about the "Islamaphobic" Steyn excerpt.
The Canadian Islamic Congress lawyer says that freedom of speech is a "red herring".
Throwing out the greatest civilization in human history with both hands.
UPDATE: Supercargo left this comment. Canada better get it together -"mulitculturalism" will be the death of the West:
Prior to 9-11 a Canadian Christian preacher was convicted under the "hate" law for accusing muslims of hate, deceit, and subversion. In Dec. 2001, an Appeals court upheld his sentencing. At the time, I communicated with Harding and he claimed that he was forced to take instructions in Islam, from the Islamic Society of North America. In fact, one text was written by arch terrorist, Maulana Maududi, founder of Jamaat-i-Islami (the JI invited bin Laden to attend their 1998 convention in Peshawar, Pakistan). Harding told me that the ISNA enforcer threatened to throw him in jail if he didn't co-operate. In Canada, scrutiny of Muslims is a hate crime.( Court doc here)
Steyn's Kangaroo Court is now in session- Andrew Coyne, National Editor of MacCleans magazine, is liveblogging the case of Mohamed Elmasry vs. Mark Steyn/Maclean’s
before (oyish) the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal.
9:45 AM PST The Chair is reviewing the legal history of the complaint. Apparently they have no jurisdiction over the Maclean’s website. So that’s a relief…
9:48 AM We have friends: the BC Civil Liberties Association and the Canadian Association of Journalists are here as intervenors.
9:54 AM Lawyers for the two sides are wrangling now over what
witnesses the complainants are going to call, and whether “my friend”
had properly informed “my friend” as to what “my friend” (the first
one) had planned…
11:26 AM While they’re arguing, we pause for a brief
background break. Here are the sanctions the tribunal can impose on
Maclean’s, as set out in the BC Human Rights Code. Can you say
“chilling effect”?
Remedies 37 (1) If the member or panel designated to hear a complaint
determines that the complaint is not justified, the member or panel must dismiss
the complaint. (2) If the member or panel determines that the complaint is
justified, the member or panel (a) must order the person that contravened
this Code to cease the contravention and to refrain from committing the same or
a similar contravention, (b) may make a declaratory order that the conduct
complained of, or similar conduct, is discrimination contrary to this
Code, (c) may order the person that contravened this Code to do one or both
of the following: (i) take steps, specified in the order, to ameliorate the
effects of the discriminatory practice;
…(d) if the person discriminated against is a party to the complaint, or is
an identifiable member of a group or class on behalf of which a complaint is
filed, may order the person that contravened this Code to do one or more of the
following: (i) make available to the person discriminated against the right,
opportunity or privilege that, in the opinion of the member or panel, the person
was denied contrary to this Code; (ii) compensate the person discriminated
against for all, or a part the member or panel determines, of any wages or
salary lost, or expenses incurred, by the contravention; (iii) pay to the
person discriminated against an amount that the member or panel considers
appropriate to compensate that person for injury to dignity, feelings and self
respect or to any of them. (3) An order made under subsection (2) may require
the person against whom the order is made to provide any person designated in
the order with information respecting the implementation of the order. (4)
The member or panel may award costs (a) against a party to a complaint who
has engaged in improper conduct during the course of the complaint, and (b)
without limiting paragraph (a), against a party who contravenes a rule under
section 27.3 (2) or an order under section 27.3 (3). (5) A decision or order
of a member or panel is a decision or order of the tribunal for the purposes of
this Code. (6) The member or panel must inform the parties and any intervenor
in writing of the decision made under this section and give reasons for the
decision.
11:34 AM Our argument re Miller: if he’s here to testify
about the practices of responsible journalism, and if responsible journalism is
not a defence under Section 7.1, then what’s the point?
11:38 AM It’s kind of a cool defence, when you
think of it. The law does not permit us to defend ourselves on the basis of
responsible journalism (or anything else, really). But that’s patently
unreasonable, so the complainants are actually trying to sneak it back in—to
make the issue our journalistic practices, rather than their attempt to silence
us. We’re not giving them that opportunity.
11:45 AM
First witness: Khurrum Awan, one of the Osgoode Hall law
students who are popularly presented as complainants in the case. Or as they are
affectionately known around here, the “sock puppets,” given that the case is in
fact entirely driven by Elmasry.
Serious guy, thoughtful, well-spoken. Former president of the Canadian Isamic
Congress youth wing. Long history of involvement in issues of “media
misrepresentation” of Muslims…
12:05 PM McConchie is again pointing out that Awan
is from Ontario, so whatever traumatic impact the Steyn article is supposed to
have had on him occurred, as it were, outside the BC tribunal’s
jurisdiction.
12:08 PM Their reply: he’s a member of the Muslim
“community,” which includes BC Muslims. So, I take it, if he’s harmed, they
are.
Is it a human rights violation to apply the Yiddish term “chutzpah” to the
group of Muslim lawyers trying to sue Maclean’s magazine in various human rights
venues for printing the “Islamophobic” opinions of contributor Mark Steyn? We
hope not: No English word we can think of suits the complainants better.
Three weeks ago, the case being pressed by the Canadian Islamic Congress
(CIC) was tossed out (albeit with an unprecedented display of regret) by the
Ontario Human Rights Commission. How did CIC lawyer Faisal Joseph and his
Osgoode Hall helpmates respond to the setback? Why, by calling a press
conference and repeating their original demand for substantially equal space to
rebut Mr. Steyn, with a few of the details changed. (They’ve relented, for
example, on their insistence that they be allowed to control the physical design
of the pages on which their counterblast would run.) Not only that, but they
represented the demand as a renewed effort toward “reasonable conciliation” —
while at the same time pledging to forge ahead with their legal threats outside
Ontario if Maclean’s wasn’t “reasonable” enough to suit their tastes. “One way
or another it’s going to be dealt with, either by agreement or by an imposed
decision,” said Mr. Joseph.
You must admit, it takes an audacious general to demand the enemy’s surrender
so soon after a losing battle.
All I can say is thank each and every one of you that supported, wrote, called, donated etc to protect truth tellers against litigation jihad. Bless you.
The Libel Terrorism Protection Act, also known as RACHEL's LAW,
signed by Governor
Albany, NY (May 1, 2008) -- New York State Governor David
Paterson yesterday signed the "Libel Terrorism Protection Act"
(S.6687/A.9652), which on March 31 passed the state's Assembly
and Senate unanimously.
Also known as Rachel's Law, the bill sponsored by Assemblyman
Rory Lancman (D-Queens) and Senate Deputy Majority Leader Dean G.
Skelos (R-Rockville Centre) will protect American journalists and
authors from foreign lawsuits that infringe on First Amendment
rights. The bill also received unprecedented support from
Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver.
"New Yorkers must be able to speak out on issues of public
concern without living in fear that they will be sued outside the
United States, under legal standards inconsistent with our First
Amendment rights," said Governor Paterson. "This legislation
will help ensure of the freedoms enjoyed by New York authors."
Reflecting the New York legislation's importance, U.S. Rep. Peter
King (R-N.Y.) on April 16 introduced a similar bill, the Freedom
of Speech Protection Act (H.R. 5814), in the House of
Represenatives.
In Ehrenfeld v. Mahfouz, New York State's highest court held that
it was unable to protect Dr. Ehrenfeld from a British lawsuit
filed by Saudi billionaire Khalid Salim Bin Mahfouz. Britain's
High Court ordered her to pay over $225,000 in damages and legal
fees to Bin Mahfouz, apologize and destroy copies of her books.
Instead, November 2006, Dr. Ehrenfeld sought a U.S. federal court
order to protect her constitutional rights. But a New York Court
of Appeals ruling with national implications sent legal
shockwaves throughout American newsrooms.
The New York court potentially undermined U.S. journalists'
ability to expose terrorism's financial and logistical support
networks, when it ruled that the court lacks jurisdiction to
protect Americans - on U.S. soil - from foreign defamation
judgments that contradict the First Amendment to the United
States Constitution.
Rachel's Law declares overseas defamation judgments unenforceable
in New York State unless the foreign defamation law provides, in
substance and application, the same free speech protections
guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution. The law gives New York
residents and publishers the opportunity to have their day in
court.
The bill could not have passed without the expert assistance of
Attorney Daniel Kornsein of New York City's Kornstein, Veisz,
Wexler & Pollard, LLP. Kornstein represented Dr. Ehrenfeld in
Ehrenfeld v. Mahfouz.
Its supporters included First Amendment Attorneys Floyd Abrams,
David Siegel, Samuel Adaby, Harvey Silverglate; the New York City
Bar Association; PEN; The Authors Guild; New York D.A. Robert M.
Morgenthau; Former Secretary of State George Shultz; Former CIA
Director R. James Woolsey; State University of New York Counsel
Nicholas Rostow; 9/11 Families for a Secure America; The
Association of American Publishers; Act for America; Rabbi Aaron
Raskin; New York Board of Rabbis President Joseph Potasnik; many
other public officials and tens of thousands of concerned New
Yorkers and Americans, especially New York business leader
Lawrence Kadish and ACD Senior Fellow Alyssa A. Lappen.
"This law will give New York's journalists, authors and press the
protection and tools they need to continue to fearlessly expose
the truth about terrorism and its enablers, and to maintain New
York's place as the free speech capitol of the world," Lancman
stated.
"The truth is a critically-important component in the War on
Terror," said Senator Skelos. "This important new law will
protect American authors and journalists who expose terrorist
networks and their financiers."
Manhattan District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau said: "Terrorism
and terrorist financing are matters of vital interest to all New
Yorkers, in no small part because New York City remains a target
of significance for international terrorists. New York authors
must have the freedom to investigate, write and publish on
terrorism and other matters of public importance, subject only to
limitations that are consistent with the U.S. Constitution. This
legislation will help to ensure such freedom."
Today, Governor Paterson declared the intention of New York
State, the publishing capital of America, to safeguard the First
Amendment and its courageous writers.
Rachel's Law marks an important step in Dr. Ehrenfeld's efforts
to stop Arab billionaires like Khalid bin Mahfouz from attempting
to silence U.S. writers who expose Saudi terrorist funding and
global radical Muslim organizations, including al Qaeda and
Hamas.
Rachel's Law --- and your financial support---now make it
possible for Dr. Ehrenfeld to return to court for a declaratory
judgment against Mahfouz. Your generosity makes possible the
continued exposue of financial jihad by courageous investigative
journalists and researchers. We are only as strong as our
supporters, and your financial assistance is essential to our
success.
The American Center for Democracy (ACD) is a tax-deductible,
non-profit organization that qualify as exempt organizations
under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code and
Regulations.
Re: Khald bin Mahfouz, picture aboved—“The t’ings dat yo’ li’ble /To read in his libel tourism lawsuits/Dey ain’t necessarily so!” (Apologies to George Gershwin)
Nonpareil first amendment lawyer Floyd Abrams includes a rigorous defense of the intrepid Rachel Ehrenfeld in this Wall Street Journal appeal to New York Governor David Patterson for his signature into law of a bill passed unanimously by the New York state legislature granting Ms. Ehrenfeld, and other potential US citizen defendants sued for libel abroad, the right to obtain a declaration in New York that their works are protected under American law.
Ehrenfeld’s travails have motivated Rep. Peter King (R., N.Y.) to propose federal legislation which would provide the same relief.
Abrams cites a late 1941 Supreme Court opinion which “…starkly distinguished American protection of speech from that of England.” Justice Hugo Black’s opinion stated plainly,
No purpose in ratifying the Bill of Rights was clearer…than of securing for the people of the United States much greater freedom of . . . expression . . . than the people of Great Britain had ever enjoyed
Let us hope Governor Patterson signs the bill today.
Isabella the Crusader sent me the fabu news. The lawfare jihadi weenies are vewy scar-wed wight now. Malkin has dah money post here, "Well, well, well. Looks like the speech-squelchers in Canada want to back off their bullying of Mark Steyn and Maclean’s. Too little, too late:". Yeah baby.
[I]t’s fair to say that the Maclean’s imbroglio has been
one of the biggest shots in the arm to Canadian conservatives in
general. It’s turned red-meat right-winger Ezra Levant
into a star blogger and a free-speech hero with brand-name recognition
in the United States, turned Steyn’s name into a household word,
created a debate within the Jewish community over its traditionally
doctrinaire support for blanket hate-speech laws (Ezra for CJC
president, anyone?), shone a light on the amateurish shenanigans of
Canada’s human rights commissions, driven a powerful movement for
reform of said commissions, and generally served to marginalize the
pro-censorship lobby to the point that its main defender is now a
disgruntled former journalist who fills his blog with unhinged
conspiracy theories about how everyone who favours free speech is a
racist.
All of which to say: Thank you, CIC. You’ve done a good deed — albeit unintentionally.
My fellow hatemonger Ezra Levant was a big hit at
yesterday's conference on legal jihad in New York. In fact, judging from his
reception, he and his inquisitrex Shirlene McGovern seem to be the two most
famous Albertans on the planet. If I were Shirlene, I'd be pitching some sort of
hate-speech show-trial show to Court TV. Ezra writes about the conference
here, but he also makes some sharp
points about the preposterousness of the Section 13 prosecutions: Why is it okay
for Richard Warman, a private citizen, to join Stormfront and say that gays are
a cancer, but it's a crime for Joe Schmoe, a private citizen, to join Stormfront
and say gays are a cancer? Whatever happened to equality before the law?
Likewise, why is it okay for Canadian Human Rights
Commission bigshot Ian Fine to quote in public a lot of offensive speech by
hateful white supremacists to show the virulence that's out there, but, if I
quote in public a lot of offensive speech by hateful Islamic supremacists to
show the virulence that's out there, I get hauled up before his crappy
commission?
The contradictions in this racket are what render it
preposterous. In what Paul Wells calls her "barely lucid, rambling meditation",
Ontario's head commissar gives the game away: Unfortunately she doesn't have the
jurisdiction to jail Steyn for "Islamophobia", but she would if she could - so
she's going to seek the power to do so when the Ontario "Human
Rights" Commission is "reformed". I hope the Government of Ontario is
dumb enough to give her the extra powers she seeks, and perhaps then she'll be
man enough to haul me and Ken Whyte into her pseudo-courtroom and actually
convict us of the crime rather than merely issuing the verdict in a press
release.
The Toronto Star has figured out where all
this is headed and they don't care
for it. Nor do all the impeccably liberal
progressive types quoted in Charlie Gillis' profile of Richard Warman, in the
new print edition of Maclean's. The "human rights" racket has no
friends and no defenders other than current commissioners, former commissioners
and others living high off the "human rights" hog - and Barbara Hall is too tone
deaf (or hanging out with too many sharia-hungry Islamists) even to
notice.
THE COUNTER JIHAD MAFIA from right to left Andrew Bostom, Cliff May FDD, Robert Spencer, Brian of London (Shire Network)
The first panel is speaking ..... Stanley Kurz is telling us things are better than they seem in Canada because perhaps the liberals are waking up to whats happening.....all it took for Canada to wake up was to have one liberal PM Keith Martin to stand up for Levant and the floodgates opened.
The restriction on free speech is no longer a slippery slope now we are "careening down"
We all hang together or we we all hang separately.
The time is now to reform our nation's libel laws. Perhaps we ought to meet in London next year to see how far Rachel's law has fared in the UK.
Apparently, Bin Mafouz, the Saudi Billionaire that is suing Ehrenfeld and attempting to bankrupt Ehrenfeld has sued for libel 41 times prior to Ehrenfeld. Uh..... I see a pattern. But clearly the aim is clear .... to intimidate, destroy financially ruin anyone who speaks out against Islam.
Brooke Goldstein, Director of the Legal Project, MEQMEF - Pipes legal project to corral armies of lawyers (pro bono) to fight the the litigation jihad. Very strong speaker. Warns the litigation jihad is gaining momentum with deleterious effect.
Ezra is da money. First he says it has been Americans that have come to his aid, in support, in increasing public aswareness, on the blogs - he called Americans the "grown ups of the world."
Levant is incredulous that a "fatwah" (the plaintiff cited Koranic verse in making his case) is prosecuted by the secular state.
He said the human rights commission are power without law. You can't win so they only way to fight back is to take it to the court of public opinion.
The intention of all this litigation jihad lawfare is not win, it is to demoralize, destroy .....but it is the process that's the punishment. One case is going on 25 years. Levant's legal expenses outside of the Western Standard are over $100,000.
He talks of meritocracy, rule of law, western values vs. "Saudi values". We have to vigorously pit our values against theirs
"a taboo is being broken".
I am vlogging the second panel on the supressing the discussion of Islam with Cliff May moderating, Robert Spencer (whose remarksd I am uploading), Claudia Rosett, Frank Gaffney, Steve Emerson and Ibn Warraq.
The theme of Spencer's remarks is islamophobia is really islamorealism.
If
you would have asked me late last year what I was going to do with
myself after shutting down the Western Standard, I might have had a few
guesses. But I never thought I would be fighting off a human rights
complaint from radical jihadis in Alberta, and a defamation action from
a radical censor in Ontario -- and trying to get our politicians to
listen. But I’m up for the fight -- I just need help paying the lawyers.
Can you please help me? Ezra Levant
What timing! Tomorrow, the most courageous truth tellers and fighters for free speech descend on Manhattan to attend the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and The New Criterion's conference: FREE SPEECH IN AN AGE OF JIHAD. Luminaries include Mark Steyn, Robert Spencer, Ibn Warraq, Ezra Levant, Rachel Ehrenfeld, Dr. Andrew Bostom, Steven Emerson, Frank Gaffney, Claudia Rosett, Cliff May as well as other leading lights in the fight for free speech and against libel tourism. And I will be there reporting live.
• Ezra Levant (famous for
his stirring YouTube video of his confrontation with the Canadian Human
Rights tribunal after he published the “Mohammed Cartoons”)
• FreeDominion.ca (Canada’s answer to FreeRepublic.com)
• Kate McMillan of SmallDeadAnimals.com
• Jonathan Kay of the National Post daily newspaper and its in-house blog
• and me, Kathy Shaidle of FiveFeetOfFury.com
At Ezra’s, Kathy’s, Connie and Mark’s, and Kate’s blogs, you can find “Donate” buttons. They are going to need dough. Send whatever you can. This is how the leftist Islamic alliance removes the enemy -- bankrupts him. Just ask Rachel. And please note, it's all conservative bloggers. All of them....... this from Ezra:
Today I was sued by Richard Warman, Canada’s most prolific – and profitable – user of section 13
of the Canadian Human Rights Act. As readers of this site know, Warman
isn’t just a happy customer of section 13 and its 100% conviction rate,
he’s a former CHRC employee, an investigator of section 13 thought
crimes himself. In fact, he was often both a customer and an
investigator at the same time.
Being sued by Warman is like being sued by the CHRC
It’s
impossible to criticize section 13 without criticizing Warman, because
without Warman, section 13 would have been defunct years ago – almost
no-one else in this country of 33 million people uses it. I’d call it
“Warman’s Law”, but I’ve already given that title to another law
enacted because of Warman. Warman’s Law is a law brought in by the B.C. government
specifically to protect libraries from Warman’s nuisance defamation
suits. (We should find some way to set up a Warman’s law to protect universities from Warman, too.)
Warman doesn’t just “use” section 13. As I’ve documented here before, he actively interferes with other CHRC investigators working on his complaints.
For example, he called up Hannya Rizk, a fellow investigator he
trained, and told her to improperly withhold information from the
person Warman had complained about; he told Rizk to slow down her work
to fit his other plans; he tried to get Rizk to improperly disclose
confidential information about cases to third parties.
And
then there’s Warman’s direct interference in the investigation of his
own complaints – wandering right into the CHRC offices, hopping right on investigator’s computers, using their passwords, and just having a ball
– violating not only privacy and confidentiality, but the integrity of
the CHRC’s evidence – not that such sloppiness has detracted from their
100% conviction rate.
Warman
isn’t solely responsible for the corruption of the CHRC, of course – he
couldn’t get away with his antics without the cooperation and even
encouragement of the rest of the CHRC staff, which happens to include
some decidedly ethically challenged people.
But Warman is the central figure in its abuse. That is a source of
great pride for Warman, who professes a philosophy he calls “maximum disruption”.
The
more I learn about Warman, the more I write about him. And, like the
CHRC, he hates public exposure. Earlier this year, Warman’s lawyer
served me with a lengthy Libel Notice, which I posted to my website here, with my commentary on it here.
Warman’s new lawsuit, which you can see here,
covers much of the same ground – but not all of it. For example, you’ll
see that part 4 of his Libel Notice – which made up a third of his
lengthy complaint – has been dropped from his lawsuit. That part was
Warman’s threat to sue me for discussing his conspiracy to assault his
nemesis, David Icke. I guess it’s pretty tough to complain about that,
when the whole thing was caught on video.
Warman’s suit would censor the conservative blogosphere
Warman’s not just suing me. He’s suing some of the biggest names in the Canadian blogosphere – from Kate McMillan of Small Dead Animals to Kathy Shaidle of Five Feet of Fury (or, Five Feet of Furry, as the lawsuit says on page 2), to Free Dominion,
the largest conservative chat site in Canada. Warman’s goal is
breathtaking in its chutzpah: he wants to muzzle the Canadian
conservative Internet. It’s not just his goal – it’s the goal of the
CHRC itself, and its friends at the Canadian Jewish Congress, who have
stated their goal is to “tame”
the Internet – or at least those voices they disagree with. It wouldn’t
surprise me one bit if the CJC was bankrolling Warman’s lawsuit –
they’ve done joint legal work together before, and Warman’s number one defender is on the CJC’s legal committee.
The CJC hates conservatives, and this would be a way for them to do
damage to the conservative blogosphere without taking the political
flak for it.
Take
a look at the language Warman’s lawsuit uses to smear Free Dominion. At
paragraph 17, Warman calls them an “extreme right-wing discussion
forum”. Look at that language – hardly distinguishable from the CHRC’s
and CJC’s boilerplate insults reserved for neo-Nazis. That’s what this
lawsuit is about: an attempt by the CHRC’s biggest star to try to
marginalize Canadian conservatism. And why not? The CHRC has moved from
targeting white supremacists to targeting mainstream conservatives like
Mark Steyn; the Alberta HRC has already gagged Christian pastors and
taken a run at Calgary’s bishop, and two years ago they charged me with
publishing the Danish cartoons of Mohammed. Surely attempting to
criminalize conservatism is just the next, natural step for these
congenital censors.
Warman has admitted to posting anonymous, hateful comments
I’m not going to go through every line in the Statement of Claim; the bulk of it refers to the revelation that Warman published bigoted comments
about Sen. Anne Cools under a pseudonym, calling her a n*gger and a
c*nt. I’m a little surprised that Warman would choose this as his hill
to die on – after all, he has already confessed
to calling gays “sexual deviants” who are a “cancer” and he would sign
off his online remarks with Nazi shorthand for “heil Hitler”, so I’m
not sure how denying his Anne Cools remarks salvages his reputation.
Warman has a habit of trying to revise history when it’s embarrassing
to him. Here are some excerpts from a transcript
where he vigorously denies – then sheepishly admits – making bigoted
remarks online under a fake name. And sometimes when Warman himself
won’t fess up, he forgets to coordinate his answers with his fellow
CHRC staff, who confess his dirty deeds for him. That kind of crap might fly in a Human Rights Tribunal – then again, what doesn’t? But good luck with those kind of shenanigans
in a real court, with a real judge who’s wondering why his time is
being wasted adjudicating a political dispute with no legal merit
dressed up as a defamation action.
I’ve
got a few more things to say about the Statement of Claim, but for
strategic reasons and for legal reasons, I’m going to save them for my
Statement of Defence. But there are a couple more things I’d like to
point out.
A comedy of errors
Defamation
law and law in general is a details business. So it makes me chuckle to
see a Statement of Claim, that has obviously been in the works for
three months, so riddled with little typos. I laughed out loud when I
saw Kathy Shaidle’s site, Five Feet of Fury, called Five Feet of Furry
on page 2 of the lawsuit. I don’t know exactly what that means, but it
might even be cause for Kathy to file a defamation suit against Warman!
On
page 4 Warman brags about his “Saul Hayes Human Dignity Award”, but on
page 16 it’s the “Saul Human Dignity Award”. On page 14 he calls the
Justice Minister Rob Nichols, not Rob Nicholson.
Or
take the various names by which the National Post’s Op-Ed blog is
described: on page 4 it’s “Full Comment”, on page 18 it’s
“FreeComments” and by page 20 it’s “FullComments”, “Freecomments” and
“FullComment.com”, all on the same page.
Kate’s
first name is spelled Catherine on page 2 but Catherin on page 22. Her
last name is spelled McMillan on page 2 but MacMillan on page 22.
Obviously,
none of these typos will determine the outcome of this suit. But the
kind of sloppiness that doesn’t even get the name of two of the
websites and one of the defendants right is the same kind of sloppiness
that makes other, more serious errors. The Statement of Claim is the
foundation of a lawsuit – it’s the primary document. I love the fact
that everyone – including the judge – will read typos and grammatical
errors on almost every page and wonder: “what else is wrong with this?”
My lawyers will be there to answer that question.
The inexplicable decision to sue the National Post
As
per the typos, there are two other defendants in this suit: the
National Post and its editor, Jonathan Kay. Six weeks ago, Kay briefly
– maybe for an hour or two – posted a column about Warman’s Sen. Cools
comments on the National Post’s website. But as soon as Warman
complained, Kay took it down, and the Post later published an apology
both in print and online. I obviously disagreed with that decision, but
I’m not the one responsible for putting out a newspaper every day on a
tight budget. Kay and the Post are in the business of publishing, not
suing. They made the decision to cut bait, and move on to other, more
important fights – as they have done with their outstanding coverage of
the CHRC ever since.
But
that act of over-generous magnanimity – legally unnecessary in my view,
but probably a smart business decision – did not exempt them from
Warman’s litigious nature. He’s suing them nonetheless. I’m not sure
what Warman hopes to get from them – they’ve already apologized in a
disproportionate way. It will be interesting to see how the Post
responds. Will they try to cut bait again? If so, how? Or have they
reached a point with Warman where they realize he is using this lawsuit
as a punishment to them – maximum disruption-style – for their
excellent reporting on Warman and the CHRC?
Warman will never sue Rogers
Speaking
of big, corporate defendants, where is Maclean’s magazine and Mark
Steyn on the list of defendants? I would never wish a Warmansuit on
Maclean’s or Steyn, of course. But next to the Post, nobody’s been
tougher on Warman and his bigoted, anonymous online comments then them.
Could it be – perhaps? – that Warman doesn’t want to sue Maclean’s,
which is owned by Rogers – which just happens to be the ISP through
which the Cools comments were posted? Is Warman afraid that they will
prove what he doesn't want them to prove -- that it was he who posted
those bigoted remarks? I don’t know, but I’m curious. And I think a
judge will be curious as to why comments in Maclean’s magazine, with
its 2.8 million readers, weren’t regarded as actionable, whereas a few
bloggers were. In a lawsuit that already reeks of politics, not serious
legal matters, it’s just one more reason for judges to raise an eyebrow.
RACHEL’s LAW
unanimously Passed by NY Legislators Thank you all for
supporting the bill.New York
State Assembly, 25TH District New York State Senate,9 District
Assemblyman Rory I .Lancman Sen. Dean G.
Skelos
Legislature Passes Libel Terrorism Protection Act
To Protect American Journalists and Authors From
Overseas Defamation
Lawsuits
Albany, NY (March 31, 2008) – The New York State
Legislature today unanimously passed the “Libel Terrorism Protection Act”
(S.6687/A.9652), sponsored by Assemblyman Rory Lancman (D-Queens) and Senate
Deputy Majority Leader Dean G. Skelos (R-Rockville Centre).
When signed
into law by Governor David Paterson, this legislation will protect American
journalists and authors from foreign lawsuits that infringe on their First
Amendment rights.
The ignominious Syed Soharwardy of Calgary, who has applied to the Albert Human Rights
Commission to punish the publisher Ezra Levant of the Western Standard isn't quite as erudite or eloquent when others choose his path and use the human rights commission to sue him. (BTW, if you missed my interview with Ezra Levant, go here.)
A Calgary Muslim couple who filed Human Rights complaints against Calgary
Imam Syed Soharwardy have had their house torched:
Several Muslims say their lives are at risk because they dared speak out in
what has become an ongoing dispute in their community.
Yesterday, one of the people claiming to be victims of ongoing violent
attacks, Dr. Iftikhar Ahmed, watched in horror as a car pulled up outside his
Panatella Blvd. N.W. home and a man armed with a jerrycan and booze bottle got
out, scaled the fence and set his home ablaze as seven children and three other
adults slept.
Hours earlier, Ahmed had called 911 after two threatening men came to the
door.
"I was so upset," said Ahmed, adding that's why he was still awake at about 4
a.m. when he saw the stranger set his home on fire.
"Within two minutes, we had a big fire," he said.
"We have a fear of death."
Arson Det. Scott Sampson said the family was definitely targeted and the fire
could easily have been deadly.
The suspects hurled two Molotov cocktails at the home, one which ignited
grass and another which bounced off a window, setting the exterior of the house
on fire, said Sampson.
"If he wasn't up, the house would have gone up," Sampson said.
Cops are investigating several other attacks against members of the Muslim
community with the help of RCMP, Services Alberta and the National Security
investigation section.
Police have not ruled out other attacks may be related to the ongoing dispute
among Muslim community members which involves human-rights complaints and
allegations of misappropriation of funds.
Najeeb Butt says his wife was attacked during a recent invasion at their
northeast home, her hands slashed as she put them up to defend herself.
"My main concern is the protection of myself, my family and my friends," he
said. (Calgary Sun)
SAN FRANCISCO -- A federal judge said Friday she's inclined to dismiss
a lawsuit by conservative radio talk show host Michael Savage against a Muslim
rights group that reprinted his attacks against Islam and called for an
advertising boycott.
Savage sued the Council on American-Islamic Relations in December after the
organization posted excerpts from an Oct. 29 broadcast in which he called the
Quran a "hateful little book ... a document of slavery" and said, "I don't want
to hear one more word about Islam. Take your religion and shove it."
His lawsuit accused the group of violating Savage's copyright by posting more
than four minutes of excerpts on its Web site without his permission. He also
claimed that the group was engaged in racketeering, saying it poses as a civil
rights organization but is actually a "mouthpiece of international terror" that
helped to fund the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Love this guy.
The broadcaster's syndicated program "Savage Nation" has about 8 million
listeners a week on 400 stations, including on KNEW-AM in the Bay Area. He said
the Council on American-Islamic Relations was harming him by taking his
statements out of context, urging visitors to its Web site to complain to his
advertisers and using his material to raise money for illegal activities.
The group called his claims about its activities preposterous, denied any
connection to terrorism and said in court papers that Savage was trying to
"intimidate and silence (the organization) in retaliation for (its) criticism of
his radio rants." Numerous companies have withdrawn their advertising from his
program, the group said, including Sears, AT&T and Wal-Mart.
This is not so. CAIR contends this but these companies have said this is not so. But the publication bought CAIR's misinformation without investigating those bogus claims
At a hearing Friday, U.S. District Judge Susan Illston of San Francisco said
that she found much of the organization's position to be persuasive and that she
had tentatively decided to dismiss the suit.
Tool!
She added, however, that she would probably allow Savage to refile the suit
and fix its defects, which she did not specify.
I pray Savage refiles if it is indeed dismissed. DISCOVERY PHASE!
Savage's lawyer, Daniel Horowitz, disputed the group's contention that its
excerpting of his broadcast was protected by the legal doctrine of fair use,
which allows portions of copyrighted material to be reprinted for the purposes
of commentary, criticism or parody. Horowitz contended the organization had
disqualified itself from protection because of its allegedly illicit motives and
commercial use of the material.
The author of a book about financing terrorism
can't prevent a Saudi billionaire from trying to enforce a London libel verdict
in the United States, a federal appeals court said Monday. The 2nd U.S.
Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Manhattan author Rachel Ehrenfeld's lawsuit to
stop the billionaire, Khalid Salim A. Bin Mahfouz, from trying to collect on a
default judgment obtained against Ehrenfeld in London.
Ehrenfeld's
attorney, Daniel Kornstein, said he was disappointed by the ruling.
"This is a matter that's not only about Rachel Ehrenfeld. It's about New
York writers and publishers generally and their ability to investigate and speak
their minds on matter of urgent public interest," he said.
Stephen J.
Brogan, a lawyer for Bin Mahfouz, did not immediately return a phone message
requesting comment.
Ehrenfeld wrote that Bin Mahfouz and
his family provided financial support to al-Qaida and other "Islamist terror
groups."
A 2005 ruling by London's High Court of Justice ordered
Ehrenfeld to pay Bin Mahfouz $225,000, declare her writings about him to be
false, destroy existing copies of the book and apologize.
Ehrenfeld had
then asked a Manhattan court to declare that the London judgment was
unenforceable in the United States. A lower court previously said the matter was
out of its jurisdiction.
Bin Mahfouz has not tried to collect on the
London judgment in the United States. New York state has a so-called
"long-arm" law, which establishes jurisdiction for almost anyone who does
business in New York. But New York's Court of Appeals previously found that it
does not apply to Bin Mahfouz's case.
The 2nd Circuit also said Monday
that Ehrenfeld had failed to asked the lower court to decide whether the First
Amendment entitled her to a ruling in her favor and thus could not argue for
such a ruling from the appeals court.
UPDATE 3/4: Check this out. Not surprising but terrible. All of it. Jihad is laughing and winning;
In yesterday’s post Sharia Momentarily Thwarted in NY, the key word was momentarily. The passing of the libel tourism bill couldn’t be celebrated long.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Manhattan author Rachel Ehrenfeld’s lawsuit to stop the billionaire, Khalid Salim A. Bin Mahfouz, from trying to collect on a default judgment obtained against Ehrenfeld in London.
Stephen J. Brogan, a lawyer for Bin Mahfouz, did not immediately return a phone message requesting comment.
It turns out the Stephen J. Brogan is also representing EL-SHIFA PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRIES COMPANY and SALAH EL DIN AHMED MOHAMMED IDRIS. If El-Shifa Pharmaceutical doesn’t ring a bell - it should. [Bin Mahfuz was a partner]
Brian's entire family's personal financial future on the line so he decided to comply with the AP's request to the fullest extent possible.
I, for one would have loved Brian to be the "fair use" case that I believe he is, but it is financially devastating to fight their allegations. The AP pretty much would have completely destroyed him, and he is the individual person that would have suffered the consequences.
Please see his latest update at snapped shot.
See full complaint and excellent post over the blog "This goes to 11"
First let me THANK every reader, blogger, and concerned freedom lover who wrote me offering help and guidance in dealing with litigation jihadists. Kind of scary how many lawyers are hanging out here. I love that! Your regard
and affection has stunned me. Floored.
Schumann Hanlon
L.L.C 30 Montgomery St Jersey City, NJ 07302-3821
Re:
Feinberg v. Geller
Dear
Mr. DeLonge:
We represent Pamela
Geller and write in response to yours of February 25, 2008.
Your
client’s threats are utterly meritless. His reputation is by all
indications quite immune to degradation. Furthermore, the suggestion
that unnamed persons could be provoked to harm him is ludicrous,
utterly unsupportable by the applicable legal standard, and appears
to be an artifact of a fantastically exaggerated sense of
importance—or an attempt to manufacture a legal claim out of whole
cloth.
Any
lawsuit filed on the basis of the preposterous charges in your letter
would be patently frivolous. If your client attempts to test the
judiciary’s commitment to free speech Ms. Geller will not only
defend herself vigorously, but will relentlessly seek all available
sanctions and attorneys’ fees arising from such litigation provided
by law.
You
client may also rest assured that Ms. Geller’s blog posts will
remain online. Indefinitely.
Very
truly yours,
Ronald
D. Coleman
UPDATE:
This ganser mensch is handling this pro bono.
Thank you Rachel Ehrenfeld. Rachel's law has passed in NY. Thank you Rachel for not giving in, not buckling under, fighting the great fight FOR FREEDOM OF SPEECH at great personal cost. Rachel stood alone. She stood on the side of right and of truth.
I am a proud New Yorker this day. Another FREEDOM OF SPEECH victory.
This is a great day for freedom loving men and a very bad day for jihadists and their handmaidens.
The state will protect authors against foreign libel judgments after a US journalist was sued by a Saudi businessman in London
Politicians in New York have acted to protect the state’s writers and
publishers from so-called libel tourism after an English libel judgment went
against an American author.
The Libel Terrorism Protection Act was given a unanimous passage in the state
Senate in Albany, the New York Law Journal reported. The new bill was
introduced after the New York Court of Appeals ruled in December that the
state’s laws did not protect Rachel Ehrenfeld, an American author, from a
possible bid by a Saudi Arabian businessman to enforce a summary judgment issued
by the High Court in London.
The bill is intended to amend New York’s so-called "long-arm statute" in
order to give the state’s courts jurisdiction over a foreign libel claimant who
won a judgment against an author or publisher with sufficient physical or
financial ties to the state.
It would allow New York’s courts to declare that a foreign judgment was
unenforceable if the courts decided that the libel laws in foreign jurisdictions
did not protect freedom of speech and the press to the same extent as the laws
in New York and the US.
The New York Law Journal reported that the Bill had made “unusually
swift” progress since being introduced into the legislature and said new
legislation usually took several months, or even years, to reach the floor of
the Assembly or Senate.
Dr Ehrenfeld claimed her book, Funding Evil, in which she makes a
series of allegations about the charitable activities of wealthy Saudi
businessman Sheikh Khalid bin Mahfouz, was protected under the freedom of speech
section of the US constitution.
UPDATE: These corrections I am loathe to report. Naomi Ragen just emailed;
I'm afraid my last e-mail concerning the passing of the Libel
Tourist Act was premature. Rachel Ehrenfeld informs me that
while the New York Senate has passed the law, unanimously, it
still has to make its way through the Assembly.
PEN, by the way,
refused to support it.
What does this say about an organization dedicated to artistic
freedom for writers? Simply because a Muslim is involved, they
are now
against artistic freedom?
UPDATE: Rachel Ehrenfeld wrote me and explained it this way,
Alas, The Times lead was misleading. The war is still on --the bill passed
unanimously in the Senate only, but is still lingering in the
Assembly.
We are doing our best to move it, and hope the Assembly will
clear it soon. There is already interest in Congress to adopt a similar law
nationally.
NY residents contact your assembly people. The truth tellers are the light in what could be a very dark world. Very dark.
The leftist Islamic alliance spend their limited energies on shutting down the truth tellers.
"rabbi" Feinberg has sent me a legal doc threatening litigation jihad. Specifically he takes issue with the word "crazy". I have attended many Pro Pali Arab rallys, CAIR rallys, KGIA press conferences, and the belligerent "rabbi" is always there. Fighting for the jihad, threatening, bullying, blustering, screaming in your face. My favorite personal moment is when he screams NAZI! in my face all because I attend. (The Nazi moment is in the video below)
I stand behind my coverage as accurate. Feinberg wants to sue me? Good. I was at these events. He was physical, dangerous and abusive. I will not take the truth down or will I tell others that ran my reportage to take down their posts either. A real Jewish Rabbi does not hate Jews or Christians. A real Rabbi does not support Hamas who states plainly in their charter to destroy Israel. What's next? A lawsuit from Hamas for calling them savages?
Feinberg wants a fight. I am anxious for the discovery phase. Dying to know who he is connected to, who he works for and on whose payroll(s) he is on. We need to further investigate his ties to CAIR et al.
He is an avid supporter of the New York public Arabic school, Khalil Gibran International Academy, Click below to watch his press conference advocating the return of ex principal Dhabah Almontaser who was forced to resign for statements that condoned intifada.
Click here for video of Feinberg press conference on theArab women website, Awaam:
This was taken in Union Square...an anti-war vigil... he was very angry at us
because we showed up and did a good counter-rally.
Pro-Islamist Rally Video: Watch the rabbi threaten great American Joe Kaufman (minute 3:25 ) Now, is that "crazy"? In the video, the "rabbi" is threatening to destroy daring truth teller Joe Kaufman And
if you want to see previous temper tantrums that the "rabbi " threw, check out his tantrum at the CAIR fundraiser I happen to cover. He was CAIR's front man (video here). That's him right at the beginning of the film but I missed getting on film his attempt to grab my camera.
This is a beautiful thing. Atlas readers have first hand knowledge of the harassment and attrition Rachel Ehrenfeld has suffered at the hands of billionaire Saudi Bin Mafouz. He funded terror, she exposed it, he sued her in the UK and won (Rachel lives in NY). This is lawfare. The litigation jihad relentlessly pursues those exposing ugly truths in an attempt to shut them up and shut them down. And while most of these cases are never won, they wreak havoc on an individual's personal life and finances.
Please see my previous articles on the trials and tribulations Ehrenfeld has suffered just to expose the truth.
February
25, 2008 -- A CRITICAL First Amendment bill, the "Libel Terrorism
Reform Act" is pending in both houses of the state Legislature. It was
written in direct response to the Court of Appeals' decision in the
case of Ehrenfeld v. bin Mahfouz.
Rachel Ehrenfeld is an Israeli-American terrorism scholar and
internationally recognized counterterrorism expert. In her book
"Funding Evil: How Terrorism Is Financed and How to Stop It," she
identified Khalid bin Mahfouz, banker to the Saudi royal family and one
of the world's richest men, as a leading terrorism financier.
Ehrenfeld cites government documents as evidence for these particulars:
* As far back as 1996, French, British and US intelligence believed
bin Mahfouz had erected a banking system to benefit Osama bin Laden.
* Bin Mahfouz's bogus Muwafaq (Blessed Relief) "charitable
foundation" fronted for several other terror groups, including Makhtab
al-Khidamat, al Qaeda, Hamas and Abu-Sayyaf. The "charity's" head was
Yassin al-Qadi, later designated by the State and Treasury Departments
as an international terrorist.
Bin Mahfouz responded by suing Ehrenfeld for libel - but not
in New York, even though "Funding Evil" was published here. He sued in England,
where libel law places the burden of proof on defendants, rather than
on plaintiffs. The English court accepted jurisdiction on the dubious
grounds that 23 copies of Ehrenfeld's book had been bought there via
the Internet.
In a US court, bin Mahfouz would be forced to open his
finances to scrutiny and be deposed under oath - neither of which he
had to do when suing in England.
Britain has no First Amendment to protect free speech or a
free press - and it has recently seen a surge in "libel tourism" -
actions by wealthy, nonresident Arabs linked to terrorism who sue in
England because its law strongly favors libel plaintiffs.
Last year, English legal publisher Sweet and Maxwell reported that the number of such libel cases tripled from the year before to 13 percent of all defamation cases in Britain.
Libel tourism has forced British publishers to pulp (that is,
destroy unsold) five books on terrorism, and libel fears led Random
House UK to drop plans to publish Craig Unger's US bestseller, "House
of Bush, House of Saud."
Ezra Levant has set up a legal defense fund to assist bloggers against threats
to their freedom of expression.
"When I mused about a mutual aid
society for bloggers, I immediately received several requests for help. Even
though I haven’t set up the structure for the Union of Bloggers yet, I’ve
accepted two of them, and I have permission to write about one of them: It’s
Warren Kinsella’s absurd threat against a blogger named Blazing Catfur.
What did Blazing Catfur do? He
engaged in satire, which is the deadliest weapon against humourless censors. He
demonstrated the foolishness of Kinsella’s logic that:
Dr. Keith Martin — a Liberal MP,
human rights activist, and visible minority — wants to amend the Canadian Human
Rights Act;
Some white supremacists want to
amend the CHRA too;
Therefore Martin’s idea is tainted
by association.
I thought Blazing Catfur’s
satirical deployment of that absurd guilt by association logic was far more
powerful than any stern criticism. And I think Kinsella did, too, or else he
wouldn’t have threatened a lawsuit against Blazing Catfur and another blogger,
Mike Brock, who engaged in a similar satire.
So the Union of Bloggers — before
we’re formally incorporated — has a case."
Ms Noah has just increased
her claim for compensation against Sarah Desrosiers, from £15,000 to
£35,000. Why? Because Ms Desrosiers made the story public. Ms Noah claims that
she has received hate mail as a result of the the publicity.
As I said in my previous
post on this case, London's employment tribunals are a law unto themselves,
so there is no telling how this demand for extra compansation will be viewed.
The case has now been postponed until March, which will, no doubt, give Bushra
Noah still more time to feel "awkward and embarrassed" and to raise her claim
for compensation yet again.
Ms Noah had already been turned down for 25 other hairdressing jobs. Perhaps
the mistake that Sarah Desrosiers made was giving her some honest feedback,
rather than making something up about someone else being better qualified or
having to withdraw the vacancy due to an unexpected fall in profits.
Speaking of Steyn, Ehrenfeld, Savage ............... keep free speech free. From The Act for America Blog
If you haven’t already done so, please click
here to sign the petition we want to send to leaders in the New York
Assembly and Senate. As you know, we have been following this legislation and
have been giving you updates on its status.
Legislators need to hear from you – especially if you live in New
York.
It only takes a few moments to add your name to the petition and then forward
it on to friends and family members. This is more than a petition expressing an
opinion on an issue. This is a petition calling on legislators to take
action!
The Libel Terrorism Protection Act is necessary to protect free speech and
press rights of New York authors and publishers from those who want to silence
what they are writing about Islamic terrorism. Without such protection,
increasing numbers of authors will be afraid to write about the issue of Islamic
terrorism for fear of being sued in foreign courts. We can keep this from
happening by helping to get this legislation passed.
If you’re a chapter leader, this is a great project to take on that doesn’t
require a great deal of time!
Prisoner sued after Quran disappeared in transfer between prisons
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court
said Tuesday that a Muslim inmate cannot sue the government over the
disappearance of the prisoner's copies of the Quran and a prayer rug.
In a 5-4 ruling, the justices said
the federal law the inmate relied on prohibits lawsuits against federal
corrections officers.
Abdus-Shahid M.S. Ali says the
missing books and rug reflect widespread harassment against Muslim inmates in
federal, state and local prisons stemming from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
I love Mark Steyn. It is poetic justice and a great comfort that he would be anointed, by circumstance, the lead man, the General as it were, in the battle on "lawfare" .......litigation jihad in the west. I will be introducing Steyn at CPAC - a rare blogger moment you won't want to miss, I assure you. Seriously, be at CPAC - sign up here. Steyn's latest column in Macleans (have you subscribed in support yet?) is a s good as he gets. Better :-) This is the real battlefield in the war of ideas. Success or failure here is just as important as beating the enemy in Iraq, Nasrallah in Lebanon, the radical extremists in the UK, the islamisation of Europe etc. Steyn's column reveals how morally ill these commissions are and makes a devastating open and shut case for the dismantling of these leftarded kangaroo courts.
In the three decades of the Canadian
"Human Rights" Tribunal's existence, not a single "defendant" has been
"acquitted." Would you bet on Maclean's bucking this spectacular 100
per cent conviction rate? "Sentence first, verdict afterwards,"
declares the queen in Alice In Wonderland. Canada's not quite there
yet, but at the Human Rights Commission, it's "Verdict first, trial
afterwards." So I'm guilty and Ken Whyte's guilty and Maclean's is
guilty because that's the only verdict there is.
Who has availed themselves of the "human rights" protected by
Section XIII? In its entire history, over half of all cases have been
brought by a sole "complainant," one Richard Warman. Indeed, Mr. Warman
has been a plaintiff on every single Section XIII case before the
federal "human rights" star chamber since 2002 — and he's won every
one. That would suggest that no man in any free society anywhere on the
planet has been so comprehensively deprived of his human rights. Well,
no. Mr. Warman doesn't have to demonstrate that he's been deprived of
his human rights, only that it's "likely" (i.e. "highly un-") that
someone somewhere will be deprived of some right sometime. Who is
Richard Warman? What's his story? Well, he's a former employee of the
Canadian Human Rights Commission: an investigator. Same as Shirlene
McGovern.
Isn't there something a little odd in a supposedly
necessary Canadian federal "human rights" system used all but
exclusively by one lone Canadian who served as a long-time employee of
that system? Why should Richard Warman be the only citizen to have his
own personal inquisition? You can hardly blame the Canadian Islamic
Congress and the Islamic Supreme Council of Canada and no doubt the
Supreme All-Powerful Islamic Executive Council of Swift Current, Sask.,
for now figuring they'd like a piece of the human rights action.
In
a free society, justice must not only be done, but must be seen to be
done. And when you see what's being done at the CHRC it's hard not to
conclude that the genius of the English legal system — the balance
between prosecutor, judge, and jury — has been all but destroyed. The
American website Pundita has a sharp analysis of Section XIII,
comparing it to Philip K. Dick's sci-fi novel The Minority Report, set
in a world in which citizens can be sentenced for "pre-crime" — for
criminal acts which have not occurred but are "likely" to. Who needs
futuristic novels when we're living it here and now in one of the
oldest constitutional democracies on the planet? What kind of countries
have tribunals with 100 per cent conviction rates that replace the
presumption of innocence with the presumption of guilt and in which
truth is not only no defence but compelling evidence of that guilt?
Consider this statement, part of the criteria by which the star chamber
determines when a Section XIII crime has occurred. What does it look
for as evidence?
"Messages that make use of allegedly true
stories, news reports, pictures and references to apparently reputable
sources in an attempt to lend an air of objectivity and truthfulness to
the extremely negative characterization of the targeted group have been
found to be likely to expose members of the targeted group to hatred
and contempt."
Read that again slowly. Citing news reports,
reputable sources, facts, statistics, documentation, quotations,
references, scholarly studies, etc., has been "found" to be clear
evidence of your "likely" "pre-crime."
[...]
Who has been "killed" or "beaten" or "harassed" by Coyne-Steyn "hate
propaganda"? The killings and bombings, as Ezra Levant pointed out,
occur in countries without freedom of expression — because when you
criminalize words the only expression left is action. How sad to see
Canada pursuing, as the federal "human rights" commission puts it, "A
Watch On Hate." Not "hate crimes" or even "hate speech," but just
"hate" — thoughts, feelings. Mohamed Elmasry of the Canadian Islamic
Congress is a world-class hater who thinks all Israeli civilians over
18 are legitimate targets for murder. Bully for him. Yet, in his
pursuit of Maclean's, Lauren Demaree sees the hater as the pin-up
crusader who'll abolish hate. No free society can do that. But it can
certainly abolish, incrementally, freedom of expression and the
presumption of innocence in relentless pursuit of such a banal
happy-face chimera. The arbitrary absurdity of Alice-in-Wonderland's
queen yoked to the Cheshire Cat smile. This is your fight, too, Lauren,
even if you don't yet know it.
David Warren opineshere,"Seriously: I think those with the means (Maclean's magazine, for
instance) should now be applying to proper courts of law in Canada, to obtain
injunctions against harassing “human rights” suits, brought with the purpose of
abridging freedom of the press. And other media in Canada, whether or not
already under attack themselves, should be giving continuous front-page coverage
to this issue, in which freedom of the press is itself at stake.
For
there is something even more seriously wrong in Canada, than HRCs, when these
appalling cases are getting more attention abroad, than here at home."
Fitzgibbons said he doesn't want to represent Mohamed anymore. "There is not a force on this planet that can keep me on this case if I have a choice," the attorney said. "There's no way I can work with him. The estrangement is so significant, there's no way to mend this."
Fitzgibbons said Mohamed "has been the most difficult client I have ever had in 20 years of practicing case law, the most difficult." (that's because he is al-Qaeda trained )
IF AN INDICTMENT IS ISSUED AND THE TRIAL, BEGINS, THE BROTHER HAS TO PAY ATTENTION TO THE FOLLOWING:
At the beginning of the trial, once more the brothers must insist on proving that torture was inflicted on them by State Security [investigators] before the judge, (or create a disturbance and call attention to your situation)
Complain [to the court] of mistreatment while in prison.
Make arrangements for the brother’s defense with the attorney, whether he was retained by the brother’s family or court-appointed.
During the trial, the court has to be notified of any mistreatment of the brothers inside the prison.
It is possible to resort to a hunger strike, but it is a tactic that can either succeed or fail. (Sami al-Arian)
When the brothers are transported from and to the prison [on their way to the court] they should shout Islamic slogans out loud from inside the prison cars to impress upon the people and their family the need to support Islam.
Inside the prison, the brother should not accept any work that may belittle or demean him or his brothers, such as the cleaning of the prison bathrooms or hallways. (Ahmed
Mohamed would not wear wristband ID)
The brothers should create an Islamic program for themselves inside the prison, as well as recreational and educational ones, etc.
The brother in prison should be a role model in selflessness. Brothers should also pay attention to each others needs and should help each other and unite vis a vis the prison officers.
The brothers must take advantage of their presence in prison for obeying and worshiping [God] and memorizing the Qora’an, etc. This is in addition to all guidelines and procedures that were contained in the lesson on interrogation and investigation. Lastly, each of us has to understand that we don’t achieve victory against our enemies through these actions and security procedures. Rather, victory is achieved by obeying Almighty and Glorious God and because of their many sins. Every brother has to be careful so as not to commit sins and everyone of us has to do his best in obeying Almighty God, Who said in his Holy Book: “We will, without doubt, help Our messengers and those who believe (both) in this world’s life and the one Day when the Witnesses will stand forth.”
TAMPA - A former University of South Florida student charged with trying to help terrorists accused his high-profile attorney Wednesday of charging $750,000 for his services and then trying to coerce him into pleading guilty.
The attorney, John Fitzgibbons, accused his client, Ahmed Mohamed, of engaging in "pure fantasy," and told a federal magistrate, "It's an absolute, total, complete falsehood from this man. It's despicable what he just said."
The magistrate, Mark Pizzo, didn't make any decisions about Fitzgibbon's status in the case at today's hearing, but ordered the parties to return to court Monday afternoon after he decides whether Mohamed will be able to hire another lawyer.
Fitzgibbons said he doesn't want to represent Mohamed anymore. "There is not a force on this planet that can keep me on this case if I have a choice," the attorney said. "There's no way I can work with him. The estrangement is so significant, there's no way to mend this."
Fitzgibbons said Mohamed "has been the most difficult client I have ever had in 20 years of practicing case law, the most difficult."
Fitzgibbons, who was hired by the Egyptian embassy to represent Mohamed, said he quoted a fee of $500,000 to take the case to trial, with an additional $200,000 for expenses. He said he has received just $50,000 toward those expenses. "I think it's entirely appropriate to give a portion back."
Mohamed, who sometimes spoke through an interpreter, but mostly spoke for himself, said the embassy had paid Fitzgibbons the $750,000 and was unwilling to hire another attorney unless a significant portion was refunded. Whether he could hire another attorney, he said, depended on how much money Fitzgibbons was willing to return.
"I feel he is deceiving me," Mohamed said. "I can't trust him no more." He said he feared if he fired Fitzgibbons, the lawyer would be able to keep all the money and he would have no ability to hire someone else.
Fitzgibbons said he has visited Mohamed 20 times in the Hillsborough County Jail in the past three months and has never suggested Mohamed should plead guilty. Fitzgibbons said he has never met with another client so frequently in such a short time and doesn't know of any other attorney who would do that.
Mohamed was arrested Aug. 4 with fellow student Youssef Megahed. The two were charged with illegally transporting explosives after deputies in South Carolina discovered explosive materials in the trunk of their car, authorities said.
Mohamed also was charged with trying to help terrorists by teaching or demonstrating the use of explosives via a video that officials said he made and posted to the Web site YouTube.
"It's a monstrous case," Fitzgibbons said. The attorney said he was faced with trying to keep evidence out of court that investigators found after Mohamed had given them permission to search. In addition, he had to deal with "damaging statements, in the eyes of the government, he made to investigators," Fitzgibbon said.
Megahed and Mohamed are scheduled to go on trial in March. Federal judges usually frown on attorneys withdrawing from cases, especially if their withdrawal could contribute to a delay in a trial.
Pizzo defended Fitzgibbons, telling Mohamed, "I know him to be an excellent lawyer who has represented you diligently in this case and who would continue to represent you diligently." The judge warned the defendant that if he hires another attorney and has a dispute with that attorney, "That will be your problem."
Mohamed tried to retreat a little, saying Fitzgibbons "never used the words, 'plead guilty.' He has used the words 'compromisation, time served,' words leading toward pleading guilty, 'compromisation, settling and time served..' "
"Compromisation is not a word I can conceive Mr. Fitzgibbons using in this context," the judge said. "Nor the words 'time served,' " given the potential penalties Mohamed faces if convicted.
Fitzgibbons had asked Pizzo to hold the hearing in his chambers out of the view of the media. Mohamed, though, insisted on keeping the hearing open.
Pizzo told the defendant Fitzgibbons' request was "to protect your interests."
In the meantime, the prosecution is defending the traffic stop in South Carolina that led to the arrest of the two men.
Defending the traffic stop? Man Islam has us by the cujones eh?
Megahed's attorneys are asking that all the evidence gained in the traffic stop and statements made by the students to investigators be barred from evidence because they claim the detention and arrests of the men were illegal.
In a response filed late Tuesday, the government maintains deputies had sufficient reason to be concerned about the actions of the two men.
Do not ask for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee, bloggers! Get on the horn. NOW! Blogburst! Blogbomb! Blogswarm! The price of free speech is getting wildly expensive. Have you subscribed to Macleans yet?
the best way to show support is to support the beleaguered publishers by taking out a subscription to Maclean's for
you or a friend. US and overseas wannabe-subscribers have told us
they're having a bit of difficulty getting the website form to
acknowledge non-Canadian postal codes. If you have trouble, send us the
details and we'll make sure Maclean's sort it out when the
Subscription Dept wallahs return to the office on Christmas Bank
Holiday First Thursday After Hogmanay, or whenever folks go back
to work in Toronto.
According to the Ottawa Citizen's John Robson, complaints have been filed with
the first three Canadian Human Rights commissions. The first two have agreed to
"launch inquiries" and the third is reportedly undecided.
1) Canadian
Human Rights Commission 344 Slater Street, 8th Floor, Ottawa, Ontario
K1A 1E1, Canada Telephone: (613) 995-1151 Feedback: Contact
form Commissioners: Jennifer Lynch, Q.C. - Chief Commissioner, David
Langtry - Deputy Commissioner, Aimable Ndejuru, Carol McDonald, Harish Chand
Jain
2) British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal 1170 - 605
Robson Street, Vancouver, B.C. V6B 5J3, Canada Telephone: (604) 775-2000 Feedback: Contact
form Email: BCHumanRightsTribunal@gov.bc.ca Tribunal members: Chair
Heather MacNaughton, Tonie Beharrell, Barbara Humphreys, Barbara Junker, Lindsay
Lyster, Diane MacLean, Ana Mohammed, Kurt Neuenfeldt, Abraham Okazaki, Judith
Parrack, Marlene Tyshynski
3) Ontario Human Rights
Commissions 180 Dundas Street W. 7th Floor, Toronto ON M7A 2R9
Telephone: (416) 326-9511 (Human Rights Office) Telephone: (416) 314-4500 (Head Office) Email: info@ohrc.on.ca Commissioners: Chief Commissioner Barbara
Hall, Patrick Case, Pierre Charron, Ruth Goba, Kamala-Jean Gopie, Alana Klein,
Raja Khouri, Fernand Lalonde, Christiane Rabier, Ghulam Abbas Sajan, Bhagat
Taggar, Richard Théberge, Maggie Wente, Albert Wiggan
UPDATE: From the CBC no less: Human Rights gone AwryNorman sent it, "I can't believe the CBC aired this. Rex Murphy hit the nail on the head".
"What I do not associate with this deep and noble concept is getting ticked off by something you read in a magazine - or for that matter hear on television - and then scampering off to a handful - well, three - of Canada's proliferate human rights commissions - seeking to score off the magazine: this is what four Osgoode Hall law students and graduates --- a very definition of the 'marginalized' --- under the banner of the Canadian Islamic Congress have done after reading an excerpt from Mark Steyn's America Alone in Maclean’s. The complainants read the article as “flagrantly islamophobic”.
Maclean’s magazine? Well, we all know what a hotbed of radical bigotry and vile prejudice Maclean’s magazine has been. Go away … for what seems like a century Maclean’s was no more "offensive" (that is the can’t term of choice these days) than a down comforter on a cold day and if Mark Steyn's article offended them: so what? Not every article in every magazine of newspaper is meant to be a valentine card addressed to every reader's self-esteem. Maclean’s published a bushel of letters following the article's appearance: some praised it: others scorned it. That's freedom of speech: that's democracy: that's the messy business we call the exchange of ideas and opinions."
US Airways and Minneapolis airport officials are demanding a jury trial in a civil rights lawsuit filed by a group of Muslim imams who were removed from a flight for suspicious behavior.
The airline and Metropolitan Airports Commission (MAC), which oversees Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, are also claiming immunity for their employees named in the suit, citing a "John Doe" law passed by Congress last year that, among other things, protects people acting in an official capacity to prevent terrorist attacks.
"We believe the police officers acted appropriately and that it is important that airports across the nation be able to take action when there is a reasonable belief that travelers could be threatened," said Patrick Hogan, MAC spokesman.
"In this case, there were travelers and flight crew members who raised concerns, and we worked with federal authorities who interviewed the imams," Mr. Hogan said. "We believe the process worked as it should to protect the traveling public."
Michael Savage deserves a fookin medal. While big, ginormous media talking heads like Bill O'Reilly and CNN et al continue to give CAIR respect and a platform to spout their treasonous garbage in attempt to spread the death cult of Islam, Savage is fighting the enemy in our midst and revealing them to be what they truly are - he Islamic enemy within.
And I don;t care if you like Savage or not, on this we are one and must all get behind it. He is righteous in this and deserves our full support.
CAIR uses the legal system to beat truth tellers into submission. We must respond in kind. Let's use the discovery phase to get to the bottom of CAIR's nefarious dealings. This is an opportunity.It time we lifted up the rock ....SAVAGE! Contribute to his legal fund.
Now the radio talk star is going for the legal jugular in his battle with the
group that bills itself as a Muslim civil rights organization.
The San Francisco-based talker has amended his lawsuit against CAIR for
misusing audio clips of his show as part of a boycott campaign against his
three-hour daily program to include charges the group "has consistently sought
to silence opponents of violent terror through economic blackmail, frivolous but
costly lawsuits, threats of lawsuits and abuses of the legal system."
The amended lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Northern California,
also charges CAIR with using extortion, threats, abuse of the court system, and
obtaining money via interstate commerce under false and fraudulent circumstances
– calling it a "political vehicle of international terrorism" and even linking
the group with support of al-Qaida.
The federal government recently named CAIR, based in Washington, D.C., as an
unindicted co-conspirator in an alleged scheme to funnel $12 million to the
terrorist group Hamas.
We all support Steyn. Fiercely. Wanna show how? From Steyn online
Meanwhile, as I've said before, the best way to show support is to support the beleaguered publishers by taking out a subscription to Maclean's for you or a friend. US and overseas wannabe-subscribers have told us they're having a bit of difficulty getting the website form to acknowledge non-Canadian postal codes. If you have trouble, send us the details and we'll make sure Maclean's sort it out when the Subscription Dept wallahs return to the office on Christmas Bank Holiday First Thursday After Hogmanay, or whenever folks go back to work in Toronto.
Regular Atlas readers know what I vocal supporter and admirer I am of Mark Steyn's books, brawn, wrtitngs, and fearlessness (something our culture is sadly in too short supply of). His appearance on my show was one of my favorites.
Steyn ought to haul these asshats into court and counter sue them for harassment. Allow me to take the stand for that man. This Islamic thuggery and attrition during a world war against Islamic jihad cannot be sanctioned by the state.
NY Post -- Celebrated author Mark Steyn has been summoned to appear
before two Canadian judicial panels on charges linked to his book “America
Alone."
The book, a No. 1 bestseller in Canada, argues that Western nations are
succumbing to an Islamist imperialist threat. The fact that charges based on it
are proceeding apace proves his point.
Steyn, who won the 2006 Eric Breindel Journalism Award (co-sponsored by The
Post and its parent, News Corp), writes for dozens of publications on several
continents. After the Canadian general-interest magazine Maclean's reprinted a
chapter from the book, five Muslim law-school students, acting through the
auspices of the Canadian Islamic Congress, demanded that the magazine be
punished for spreading “hatred and contempt" for Muslims.
The plaintiffs allege that Maclean's advocated, among other things, the
notion that Islamic culture is incompatible with Canada's liberalized, Western
civilization. They insist such a notion is untrue and, in effect, want opinions
like that banned from publication.
Two separate panels, the British Columbia Human Rights Tribunal and the
Canadian Human Rights Commission, have agreed to hear the case. These bodies are
empowered to hear and rule on cases of purported “hate speech."
Of course, a ban on opinions - even disagreeable ones - is the very
antithesis of the Western tradition of free speech and freedom of the press.
Indeed, this whole process of dragging Steyn and the magazine before two
separate human-rights bodies for the “crime" of expressing an opinion is a good
illustration of precisely what he was talking about.
As I have said many times before, the real threat
to civilisation comes not from acts of terror, appalling though these are; it
comes from the fact that Islamists are progressively making slaves out of us in
our own countries.
A Turkish lawyer is taking legal action against Inter Milan, the Italian
football team, for wearing a strip with “Crusader-style” red crosses that he
alleges is ”offensive to Muslim sensibilities”.
Loving Michael Savage truly, madly, deeply. Loving loving loving. Turning the litigation jihad on litigation the jihadists. I cannot wait for the discovery process.
And any advertiser that capitulated to CAIR's thuggery really ought to be boycotted. Boycott Office max(Mr. Sam K. Duncan Chairman of the Board, President, Chief Executive Officer Office Max 263 Shuman Boulevard Naperville, IL 60563Tel: 630-438-7800 Fax: 630-864-4524 E-Mail: samduncan@officemax.com, investor@OfficeMax.com )and Citrix (Mr. Brett Caine, President: E-Mail: brett.caine@citrix.com, Tel: 805-690-2911; Laura McCormick, Vice President, Communications: E-Mail: laura.mccormick@citrix.com, Tel: 805-690-6435, and E-Mail: info@citrixonline.com, gotofeedback@citrixonline.com )
As set forth herein, CAIR is not a civil rights organization but is instead a political organization designed to advance a political agenda that is directly opposed to the existence of a free society that includes respect and dignity for all people and all religions....
CAIR's fundamental purpose is to be a lobbyist for foreign interests.
The Foreign Agents Registration Act requires registration as an agent of a foreign principal when an organization acts on the order, request, or under the direction or control of a foreign principal, or whose activities are directed by a foreign principal when that person engages in political activities for or in the interests of such foreign principal or acts in a public relations capacity for a foreign principal.
CAIR would have to register as a foreign agent if their activities were not hidden under the false claim that they are a civil rights organization that enjoys tax exempt status.
and, the tip of the iceberg that everyone should know by now:
CAIR while claiming in its paperwork to be a civil rights organization was in fact co-founded in 1994 by Ibrahim Hooper, Nihad Awad, and Omar Ahmad, all of whom had close ties to the Islamic Association for Palestine (IAP), which was established by senior Hamas operative Mousa Abu Marzook.
The director of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation counter-terrorism unit has stated that IAP is "a Hamas front…(that is) controlled by Hamas, it brings Hamas leaders to the US, it does propaganda for Hamas." CAIR opened its first office in Washington, DC, with the help of a $5,000 donation from the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development (HLF), a self-described charity founded by Hamas operative, Mousa Abu Marzook.
So Dabah Almontaser, the filed her lawsuit last night against the NY dhimmi mayor.You would have thought Mike would have learned long ago, when you step in s**t, you can't get the stink off. Good luck with that mayor.
The ousted
principal of a controversial Arabic public school in Brooklyn filed a federal
lawsuit against the city yesterday, claiming the Bloomberg administration
violated her rights to free speech and due process.
In a complaint she submitted in Manhattan federal court, Debbie Almontaser,
the founder and former principal of the Khalil Gibran International Academy,
claims top city officials violated her 1st and 14th Amendment rights.
The suit names both Mayor Bloomberg and Deputy Mayor Dennis Walcott,
claiming they pressured her to resign as principal because she hadn't properly
condemned "Intifada NYC" T-shirts during an exclusive August interview with The
Post.
Her words led to public admonitions against her and the academy in ensuing
days.
The filing says that later that week, Walcott offered her a spot elsewhere as
assistant principal in exchange for her resignation "by 8 a.m. the next morning
so that [Bloomberg] could announce it on his radio show." She succumbed to the
pressure and faxed her resignation the following morning, according to the
filing.
The complaint also says Almontaser reapplied for her post, but was rejected
outright by Schools Chancellor Joel Klein and District Superintendent Rosemary
Stuart, who also are named in the suit.
She claims she was denied because of the negative publicity surrounding her
comments about the T-shirts rather than because of her qualifications.
The suit seeks unspecified "compensatory and punitive damages."
Department of Education officials declined comment.
Pam went to the pathetic news conference. Check out the video.
They will take our system, sodomized us with our legal system, sue us into silence. This is the strategy.
Complaint by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia & the Royal
Embassy of Saudi Arabia brought on their behalf by
Schillings solicitors hat tip Liam
Dispatches: Undercover Mosque, Channel 4, 15 January 2007
Summary: Ofcom has not upheld this complaint by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and
the Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia (“the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia”), of unfair
treatment.
Yay!
On 15 January 2007, Channel 4 broadcast an edition of its investigative programme
Dispatches, entitled Undercover Mosque. The programme reported the findings of an
undercover reporter who visited a number of Mosques and Islamic organisations in
Britain. The programme stated that it had discovered extremism being preached in
this country: “…an ideology of bigotry and intolerance spreading through Britain with
its roots in Saudi Arabia”.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s complaint was considered by Ofcom’s Fairness
Committee, its most senior decision making body in matters of Fairness and Privacy.
The Case of the Closeted Saudi Sheikh, His Relentless Campaign to Silence Free Speech in the West, and The Case that May Finally Bring His Libel Tourism to an End
Yesterday, the indomitable Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld had her day in court. This time, the New York State Court of Appeals heard her case. Ehrenfeld was sued by the ever-litigious billionaire, Sheikh Khalid Bin Mahfouz, who sued her in London for writing a book (Funding Evil) which was published in America where Ehrenfeld, an Israeli-American citizen, resides.
Ehrenfeld chose not to appear in the London courtroom and Mahfouz won a default judgment. Instead, she counter-sued Mahfouz here. Ehrenfeld is arguing that New York should have jurisdiction to decide whether such a judgment is enforceable in New York State where, after all, authors enjoy a First Amendment right to publish their views.
Ehrenfeld is doing the heavy lifting for us all. She is doing so on her own. A new, brief video about her important First Amendment/Libel case has just been released in both English and Arabic. PRESS HERE TO VIEW
IT.
"The Libel Tourist" is a short-form documentary film produced by the Moving Picture Institute. MPI's short film program seeks to provide filmmakers with the opportunities to display their filmmaking skills while making an impact on behalf of human freedom.
Though it addresses one of the gravest subjects of contemporary political life, it is only 8 minutes long. In those 8 minutes, our eyes are opened to a new and chilling threat: the story of how Saudi petrodollars have cowed, silenced, and almost broken freedom of speech in the West.
The film documents the true story of how an American-Israeli author Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld was ordered to destroy all copies of her book in a country where it had never been published- England—after a notoriously litigious Saudi billionaire sued her in a British court. Ehrenfeld's book Funding Evil; How Terrorism is Financed – and How to Stop It, accuses the Saudi billionaire of funding of terrorism.
Now Ehrenfeld is fighting back, counter-suing him in the New York, to defend her and our First Amendment rights. She speaks on film for the first time in "The Libel Tourist."
"This film is an eye-opening exposé," says Jared Lapidus, the film's director. "It deals directly with the issues of terrorism, Islamo-fascism, and how it is infringing on our rights in the West, and the U.S. in particular."
film credits
Directed, Produced, & Edited: Jared Lapidus
Executive Producers: Thor Halvorssen, Rob Pfaltzgraff
Written by: Jared Lapidus, Sheldon Lapidus
Written by (Concept): Thor Halvorssen
Music by: Allan Fox
Narrated by: Dave Benson
Production Coordinator: Marina Lyaunzon
Copy Writer: Celia Farber
Graphic Design: Chandler Tuttle
Hellzapoppin on the overlapping fronts on the cyber, e-, and litigation jihads here and abroad. Audrey Hudson over at The Washington Times investigates Osama's latest threat to the West- cyber or e-jihad. She quotes Atlas. Yeah baby.
Robert Spencer, whose Web site Jihad Watch is a lightning rod for
criticism from Islamist groups, said he is consulting with his
technical advisers to ensure his page is inoculated from intrusion.
"Jihadists
and their allies cannot compete in the arena of open debate, and so
they resort to thuggish tactics to silence their opponents," Mr.
Spencer said.
Aaron Weisburd, who operates Internet Haganah and has shut down more
than 1,000 jihad and al Qaeda sites, predicts the attack to be
"unsophisticated and will have minimal impact."
[...]
Pamela Geller, who runs Atlas Shrugs, said she has warned her peers to back up their blogs as a precaution.
"It's
another front in the global jihad. Litigation jihad, academic jihad,
cyber jihad, finance jihad," Mrs. Geller said. "Frankly, I don't think
they're all that good."
Mr. Shackleford said he expects an
attack will be tried against the Jawa Report as well as Jihad Watch,
but it will be "pretty weak and easy to defend against."
"It may cause some problems on some Web sites, but it won't take down the State Department or military," Mr. Shackleford said.
"The reason why is that cyber-jihadists think they are clever, but they are really morons," Mr. Shackleford said.
DEBKAfile,
an online counterterrorism Web site, said the cyber-jihadists will
offer "would-be martyrs, who for one reason or another are unable to
fight in the field, to fulfill their jihad obligations on the Net."
"These virtual martyrs are assured of the same thrill and sense of elation as a jihadi on the battlefield," DEBKAfile said.
One
message board called al-Jinan acted as the main page for attackers to
download software called "Cyber Jihad 3.0" for the attacks, but
another, unidentified blogger initiated a counterattack and shut down
the page last week.
Well, I read Atlas Shrugs, Power Line, National Review blogs ...... ... Ambassador John Bolton
I'm a fan! - Mark Steyn
Fearless, intelligent, beautiful -- Pamela Geller wears her Supergirl
costume well.
Pamela Geller is a dynamo of energy and
a paragon of courage and fearlessness.
-- Robert Spencer, JihadWatch in his book Stealth Jihad
You do great work with your blog. -- Geert Wilders
"Courageous insights from a pulchritudinous pundit!!" Dr. Andrew Bostom, Leading Scholar on Islam
"Great site," Dick Morris
"Indeed, some of Israel's best friends and most articulate defenders can be found in the blogosphere .... Atlas Shrugs, [et al] all provide a refreshing alternative to the moral relativism and politically correct anti-Israel blather of the media. Michael Freund, Jerusalem Post
"The best there is," Beryl Wajsman, President Institute of Public Affairs
Speaking to the unnamed, unchampioned, beating heart of her new land, Ayn was to say: 'Yours is the glory.'"
A man whose ability and independence leads others to reject him, but who perseveres nevertheless to achieve his values. Man as an individual, as a creator. What's the most depraved type of human being? Not a sadist or a murderer or a sex maniac or a dictator; "The man without a purpose." Yet most people seem to go through their lives without a clearly defined purpose.
Life has Loveliness to sell,
All beautiful and splendid things,
Blue waves whitened on a cliff,
Soaring fires that sways and swing,
And children's faces looking up,
Holding wonder like a cup
Life has Loveliness to sell,
Music like a curve of Gold,
Scent of pinetrees in the rain,
Eyes that love you,
arms that hold,
And for your spirit's still delight,
Holy stars that star the night.
Spend all you have for loveliness,
Buy it and never count the cost;
For one white singing hour of Peace
Count many a year of strife well lost
And for a breath of ecstasy
Give all you have been, or could be.
Rabbi Michael
Feinberg
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