omnia vincit amor
Mark Sanford has gotten engaged to the Argentinian lady who was his mistress during his first marriage.
Jaybird
Jaybird is Birdmojo on Xbox Live and Jaybirdmojo on Playstation's network. He's been playing consoles since the Atari 2600 and it was Zork that taught him how to touch-type. If you've got a song for Wednesday, a commercial for Saturday, a recommendation for Tuesday, an essay for Monday, or, heck, just a handful a questions, fire off an email to AskJaybird-at-gmail.com
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June 17, 2020
In a landmark decision, a U.S. appeals court on Thursday rejected the 12-year quest of a Jeffrey Epstein survivor to hold the government accountable for giving the infamous child predator a clandestine deal that essentially allowed him to get out of jail after a minimal sentence, and, according to recent lawsuits, continue to abuse girls and women.
The 7-4 decision by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals was split mostly along gender lines, with four female judges issuing a scathing rebuke of the majority’s interpretation of the Crime Victims’ Rights Act (CVRA). The decision, unless it is overturned on further appeal, could allow wealthy defendants to continue to arrange favorable plea deals from the government without any oversight or accountability, said an attorney who originally filed the challenge.
“The ruling is very disturbing. It sets up two systems of justice, one for wealthy defendants who can negotiate deals before charges are filed — and one for most criminal defendants, who don’t have the wealth and power to arrange those kinds of deals,’’ said the attorney, Paul Cassell.
...
In her dissenting opinion, Senior Circuit Judge Frank Hull skewered the majority’s “sense of sorrow,’’ over not being able to give Epstein’s victims justice. Noting that the decision would have far-reaching impact in other cases involving wealthy defendants, she said the ruling “leaves federal prosecutors free to engage in the secret plea deals and deception’’ before criminal charges are ever made public, resulting in “the travesty” that happened in the Epstein case.
She also noted that “the Department of Justice’s failure to discipline its own prosecutors heightens the importance of the CVRA’s private right of action.’’
DOJ’s investigation found that prosecutors exercised “poor judgment,’’ but stopped short of recommending sanctions against prosecutors, including Alexander Acosta, the U.S. Attorney in Miami who approved the secret deal.
Acosta declined to comment on the ruling.
Featured image is "Pommes pourries - Rotten apples" by rore is licensed under CC BY 2.0)
Comment →Name of officer who shot Daunte Wright will be released "shortly," city manager says
From CNN's Maureen Chowdhury
Comment →Reporters pressed Brooklyn Center Mayor Mike Elliott and City Manager Curt Boganey about why the name of the officer who shot Daunte Wright has not been released.
Mayor Elliott said it was "privileged" information at the moment since the shooting is under investigation. He did express willingness to share additional information about the female officer in question.
Earlier in the news conference, Brooklyn Center Police Chief Tim Gannon said Wright was fatally shot during a traffic stop after a police officer shouted "Taser!" but fired a handgun instead of the non-lethal stun gun.
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All should be well. Please report any problems you might see.
It’s probably wrong for me to be kind of happy for him.Report
It’s because he tore off the plastic armour he was encased in when he was a politician and showed off the real, mixed up, mistake-making but really in love goof-up underneath. And rather than retreat to the plastic armour by trying to patch things up (or cover things up) with his first wife “for the sake of the children” he’s going to go off and be real. You can criticize him heavily for what he did to the first family but his embrace of a new life is rather touching.Report
And if you can do all that and still get a cushy job with the network that stands for family values, all the better.Report
I find myself very, very happy to be reading this. I think I had been pulling for this.Report
My feelings are more mixed. I don’t wish anyone unhappiness, and I am not saying that the man has to remain in sackcloth and ashes for the rest of his life, but…how old are his kids?
I dunno, maybe the damage is already done, and eventually they’ll understand. Hopefully they are at least out of high school now.Report
Unfortunately, from pictures I could find in some Google searching, it looks like the kids are all in elementary to middle school range.Report
It’s a bit hard to explain why I am less inclined to come down as hard on him as I am some others. The nature of the affair (one of the heart, not of the loins, with a more-or-less age-appropriate woman), it cost him the opportunity of a lifetime (and he hasn’t whined about it), and so on make me more inclined to wish him the best rather than live the rest of his life in lonely misery for his mistakes (I wouldn’t mind that fate for Edwards, though even there I think it’s time we stopped caring).Report
I do hope he’ll be staying off the Amazonian Trail.Report
Good for him. While he certainly massively humiliated his wife and embarrassed his kids, he seemed more like a love sick clueless dope. Not a bad guy per se. I’m certainly not ignoring the hurt he put on his family, but if he has a chance to have some good love in his life then good for him.
Separate note: RIP Neil Armstrong…how about a tribute thread to him.Report
Borgiboe should do that.Report
Meh, who cares.Report
Good luck to her dealing with the ex-wife and all the step kid issues. Should be a blast.
Yeah, he was in love, but it still doesn’t excuse his behavior.Report
I’m not going to comment about particular behavior and whether or not it warrants excuses, but I’m okay with saying… when it comes to a marriage?
That is something that at the core isn’t about anything other than the two people directly involved.
I’m not even sure the children qualify as directly involved … in fact, I suspect in the grand scheme of things… not. “Staying together for the children” in my experience seems to correlate highly with at best very dysfunctional home life in the here-and-now and really bad spousal candidate selection in the next generation. My experience isn’t authoritative or anything, granted. YMMV and all that.Report
I don’t think staying together for the sake of the kids is a great idea either. I was just making a rather cynical comment on what are often the realities of second marriages and why they fail more frequently than first marriages: step kid issues and embittered exes.
As for Sanford, while I can’t condone his affair, at least he owned up to it once it was exposed, unlike the typical pol.Report