Democrats' Reaction to Anti-choice Edict Shows Party Out-of-Touch in Joe Biden

Update: See also Kavanagh, CounterPunch: "The Democratic Party knows exactly what it’s doing when it repeatedly supports and promotes anti-abortion-rights candidates against abortion-rights supporters—like Tim Kaine in 2016, Henry Cuellar this year, and its current leader, Joe Biden, who for years said that Roe 'went too far; and supported a constitutional amendment to overturn it, because he did not 'think that a woman has the sole right to say what should happen to her body.'"

Madison, Wisconsin — Joe Biden's most prominent statement to date following the Dobbs opinion abolishing women's liberty to decide to bear children is to castigate reproductive choice "activists" for not being "mainstream" Democrats.

The statement delivered in June by outgoing White House communications director Kate Bedingfield, a Biden loyalist, was striking in its dismissal of reproductive liberty "activists," stating their need to join Biden's anti-choice political commitments, (Ashley Parker, Yasmeen Abutaleb and Tyler Pager, Washington Post).

Kate Bedingfield's statement is reproduced below from the July Washington Post: a story that is virtually blacked-out on MSNBC.

The president has been showing his deep outrage as an American and executing his bold plan — which is the product of months of hard work — ever since this decision was handed down.

Joe Biden’s goal in responding to Dobbs is not to satisfy some activists who have been consistently out of step with the mainstream of the Democratic Party. It’s to deliver help to women who are in danger and assemble a broad-based coalition to defend a woman’s right to choose now, just as he assembled such a coalition to win during the 2020 campaign.

This follows Biden's May refusal to do engage.

"Do something, Democrats," rang out in D.C. in May, Reuters reports. 

Nothing from Joe Biden. Nothing.

U.S. Supreme Court, State and Federal Judiciary Need Radical Reform

Madison, Wisconsin — If you ever have spoken with a mother of a wrongfully convicted victim, you know why you should work to free the innocent and condemn the judiciary.

Mothers are up against unyielding judges and prosecutors who operate in collusion with other politicians, against the innocent.

The judiciary branch at all levels of operation is often a black-robed bulwark against justice. All those wrongful convictions we hear about in the news?

These miscarriages of justice are presided over by judges, but it's taboo to point out that strutting judges have ruined lives, and that judges are catastrophically wrong in how they conducted themselves.

Judges, especially federal judges, are commonly absurd figures, yet unless you read Lara Bazelon (as one should), this reality of the judiciary is protected by professional taboo, cult command, corporate media and Democrats.

Richard Posner, public intellectual and former judge on the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, upon his retirement, termed many federal judges, "reactionary beasts," manipulating statutes and the Constitution as they engineer desired results in federal litigation.

But even Posner shied away from a full-blooded critique for reasons unknown.

The United States Supreme Court is poised to launch a massive assault against liberty, and escalate judicial malice to a new level — the long-planned destruction of women's liberty, in accordance with the Catholic Church and other political actors.

This coming instantaneous ripping away of foundational rights is not inducing national Democratic Party voices to demand radical reform of the judiciary branch (Roe v. Wade, Politico, Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization). Last year, at oral arguments in Dobbs, Democrats offered statements that they may be open to considering and looking at the issue of Court reform and not "doing nothing." Seriously, that's what Democrats had to say on the eve of the destruction of Roe, and Planned Parenthood v. Casey.

Rules of Professional Conduct of attorneys generally protect the judges' cult, and broadly forbid attorneys from pointing out intellectually dishonest operations of judges and other attorneys.

In fact, attorneys operate under an affirmative duty to "further the public's ... confidence in the rule of law and the justice system." Democrats in Congress and the presidency follow these taboo dictates, no matter the provocation.

Even when the justice system and its actors are dishonest and destructive. Can you imagine a member of Congress or a president demanding public confidence and respect, on the pain of contempt and imprisonment? Their popularity would tank immediately, and such officials would be suspected of having taken leave of their senses.

Not so the judiciary branch.

Writes Lara Bazelon in The Strand Magazine in June 2021:

Judges are the kings and queens of the legal system, literally looking at the populace they rule over from perches high up on a mahogany dais.  Referred to as 'Your Honor,' they demand constant verbal genuflection and scurrying about in response to their commands that is the equivalent of bowing and scraping.

'God save the United States and this Honorable Court!' the U.S. Marshal solemnly intones after the gavel comes down, a roomful of people stand up, and the nine justices of the Supreme Court enter the hallowed marble fiefdom where they preside.

In federal court, you don’t go anywhere or do anything without asking for permission.  'May it please the court?' 'May I approach?' 'May I confer with my client?' 'May I ask for a brief recess so that I can go to the bathroom and throw up because even though I am deathly ill you made me show up anyway?'

Judges are the closest thing that America has to royalty. Their power is enormous: what they do changes the courses of fortunes and lives.  They can award millions, even billions, they can send people to prison for the rest of their lives—or to their deaths. Often their decisions bind future generations. Because judges have so much power and responsibility, we assume they are eminently deserving of the honor and authority conferred upon them.

As the Dobbs leak shows, the judiciary does not function in an intellectually honest, apolitical fashion objectively finding facts, doctrine and application of law like detached agents of pure epistemology, hard science enforced by tyrannical control of courtrooms and taboo rules against public criticism.

Judges act as black-robed kobolds, diminutive "goblin-like creatures with short-tempers and a mischievous spirit."

Congress needs to begin reform of the judiciary that will include mandates that every oral argument, judicial memo and correspondence be revealed to the American people in as close to real-time as possible.

Judges cannot be trusted with the honor and authority conferred upon them.

The institutional narcissism and unparalleled arrogance of the judicial branch, working for totalitarian movements, needs to come to an end.

Wisconsin Admits State Gave Murder Victim's Family 'Many Bones' — Confirming Assertions Made by Wrongfully Convicted Man's Attorney

Kathleen Zellner, depicted above in image, has shown
beyond serious dispute Wisconsin has framed, destroyed
exculpatory evidence, and secretly broken state laws, all
to convict and protect the convictions of two innocent
men. Though disgraced jurists like Ken Kratz, Josh Kaul,
and many others characters employed by the Wisconsin
Department of Justice do not know it, the truth has a way
of coming out even in Wisconsin. Image from
innocence supporter, JamesBond 007, UK.

Cover-up Continues, as Attorney General Still Opposes Hearing on Destruction of Evidence

Madison, Wisconsin — The state of Wisconsin admitted that law enforcement and prosecutors secretly gave the family of murder victim Teresa Halbach her bodily remains, a 2011 illegal scheme that the state variously claimed is either delivery of animal bones or human bones.

The 2005 murder of Teresa Halbach and the frame-up of wrongfully convicted Steven Avery and Brendan Dassey are featured in Making a Murderer.

"The State has confirmed with us that they did in fact give 'many bones' back to [Teresa Halbach's] TH’s family. They have no proof they gave notice to SA [Steven Avery] or his attorneys = violation state law [and] due process," writes Avery's post-conviction attorney, Kathleen Zellner.

FYI: The State has confirmed with us that they did in fact give “many bones” back to TH’s family. They have no proof they gave notice to SA or his attorneys =violation state law & due process. @RollingStone @BBCWorld @Newsweek #MakingAMurderer2

— Kathleen Zellner (@ZellnerLaw) February 19, 2019

The admission is significant because, as Zellner told Newsweek, "This admission proves these bone fragments were returned to the family and it is undisputed there was no notice given to Steven Avery or his attorneys and that violates Wisconsin law, ... When any of these bones were returned to the Halbach’s Wisconsin State law and due process were violated. The State has confirmed returning many of the bones to the Halbach’s so the court should grant our motion to stay and remand."

Yes, the appellate court should grant the motion.

But lawyers at the Wisconsin Department of Justice do not want to appear in Sheboygan County Court, the jurisdiction to which the case would be remanded or sent back, and explain in a public hearing why the state violated state law in giving likely exculpatory evidence to the family of a murder victim.

It's unclear why the DoJ attorneys are worried.

Sheboygan County Court Angela W. Sutkiewicz is a prosecutor's judge.

Sutkiewicz will flack and cover for the state of Wisconsin. Even if a video surfaced with law enforcement discussing ways of framing Steven Avery, Sutkiewicz would rule, 'nothing to see here,' and this is no new evidence.

Sutkiewicz substitutes her affinity for prosecutors in place of neutral adjudication. To be accused means you have no rights, to be convicted means law enforcement can do no wrong, in what passes for Sutkiewicz' legal mind in Wisconsin.

In 2017, Sutkiewicz rejected Steven Avery's request for a trial made through his post-conviction attorney, Kathleen Zellner.

Sutkiewicz issued her ruling and opinion without ordering and conducting an evidentiary hearing on Kathleen Zellner's 1,200-page post-conviction motion, replete with expert forensic testimony and analyses.

"The judge criticized the defense conclusions as 'speculative' and based on 'interim opinions' by experts," notes Heavy. com.

On June 14, 2018, Avery through Zellner filed a motion for judicial substitution of Sutkiewicz, (Fox-11, Digital). The state of course objected to the motion for a new judge, (Fox-11 News).
---
Sutkiewicz' court is a first procedural step for what in most states would already be a conviction that would have been vacated or reversed.

It's likely Kathleen Zellner has gamed out the procedural map dozens of steps into the future.

It's just as likely, should Avery's conviction not be reversed or vacated, Avery's case will eventually appear before the Wisconsin Supreme Court, where the population will learn what a Brady motion violation is, and why the state's Brady violations should also result in vacating the wrongful conviction.

Zellner's explosive motion Jan 24, 2019 seeking a hearing because the Calumet County Sheriff's Office secretly transferred evidence, the remains of a murder victim, Teresa Halbach, to private custody in 2011, in violation of state statutes that govern preservation of physical evidence collected, subject to criminal investigations is being adjudicated. So, we wait.
---
In other developments, Avery advocates report that numerous Twitter accounts —  advocating DNA testing and law enforcement abiding by state law —  have been mysteriously shut down in actions apparently traced to persons close to the disgraced ex-district attorney and sex offender, Ken Kratz.

Kratz prosecuted Avery and Brendan Dassey, pleading two contradictory accounts of the same murder, in violation of Wisconsin ethical rules for prosecutors.

Wisconsin Law Enforcement Is a Clown Show That Has Veered into the Malice, Pathology of a Crime Family

Wisconsin law enforcement is a menace to humanity.

Update: For more Making a Murderer-related pieces dating back to 2015, see MaM results.
 ---
Madison, Wisconsin — Wisconsin law enforcement was displayed to the world in the Making a Murderer docu-series that shines a light on the malicious prosecutions of Steven Avery and Brendan Dassey.

There's the prosecuting attorney in both cases, ex-Calumet County district attorney Ken Kratz, who can no longer practice law in Wisconsin, and was chased out of office in 2010 after 10 different sexual harassment complaints came to light.

Now, Kratz lives on a public pension and defends himself against allegations of misconduct in his contradictory accounts of the 2005 murder of Teresa Halbach.

Ken Kratz' wife is a Trump-loving political rightwinger, just like Kratz. Leah Kratz publicly mocks and taunts Avery, innocence advocates, including atty Kathleen Zellner, for post-conviction litigation that points out in legal filings the state destroyed and manipulated evidence in plain violation of state law and Avery's Constitutional rights.

Writes Kratz this weekend:

Hey guys, Stevie’s still sitting in a jail cell 🙌🏻👏🏻🙌🏻👏🏻 #MakingAMurderer #MakingAMurderer2 Keep dragin ass, Kathleen. We love it! 😁😁

— Leah Kratz (@LeahMarieKK) February 16, 2019

One can garner much about the culture of east-central Wisconsin from this one tweet from an unhinged hick.

But lucky for Ken Kratz and his ilk in the Manitowoc and Calumet County sheriff offices, they have a friend they may not have counted on: Wisconsin's new Attorney General Josh Kaul (D).

Josh Kaul's office through co-counsel Mark Williams and Thomas Fallon is carrying on the crusade against Avery and Dassey with the same lack of ethics and regard for law that defined the tenure of Kaul's three predecessors in the Wisconsin Dept of Justice.
Writes Amelia McDonell-Parry in Rolling Stone this weekend:

Attorney Kathleen Zellner has filed a new letter with the Wisconsin Court of Appeals on behalf of her client, Steven Avery, accusing the Attorney General’s Office of 'trying to deceive' her and the Court about the status of key forensic evidence in the Making a Murderer case. Zellner’s letter, submitted on February 13th, is actually her second letter to the court in as many days; both letters supplement a January 24th motion that accused prosecutors of violating state law and Avery’s constitutional rights by destroying evidence. Zellner tells Rolling Stone that she has since learned that a key piece of evidence — suspected human pelvic bone fragments, which could exonerate her client — may have been destroyed as well. And, she says, prosecutors are 'obstructing' her efforts to find out. ...

On the morning of February 13th, Zellner received a voicemail from attorney Mark Williams, who is co-counsel on the Avery case alongside Fallon and Gahn. The voicemail and transcript were filed along with her February 13th letter, and provided to Rolling Stone and can be heard here. Williams appears to be under the mistaken impression that he’s leaving a message Fallon(.)

This message has done little to dissuade Zellner’s fears that the pelvic bone fragments have been destroyed as well. At the very least, Zellner tells Rolling Stone, the message strongly suggests that prosecutors aren’t certain that the bones are still in evidence.

'This is another first for me,' Zellner tells Rolling Stone. 'Many times I have felt that certain prosecutors were obstructing my efforts, but this is the first time a prosecutor has actually called my phone and left a message confirming that fact. It’s really very thoughtful of them.'

Zellner also believes that by destroying the bones, the State not only violated their own statute, they’ve also denied Avery his constitutional right to due process according to Arizona v. Youngblood. The 1988 Supreme Court decision requires proof that the State acted in 'bad faith' by destroying or losing evidence — it’s a very difficult standard to meet, but Zellner believes this case would qualify. Her January 24th motion asks for the case be remanded back to the Circuit Court so it can address these claims, both of which would all but require the court to overturn Avery’s conviction.

'They’ve been lying all this time about it — and they’ve been lying to the court,' Zellner continues. 'This whole concealment of what happened to the bones is really a way bigger issue than testing them even, because if they’ve been destroyed it’s a violation of their state statute. I don’t know if it’s a felony, but it’s it’s up there. And that’s what the court is grappling with.'

What Attorney General Josh Kaul should have done following developments in the preceding days is draft a letter to the Wisconsin Office of Lawyer Regulation, and chronicle what Kaul has learned the last three months; arrange a conference with the four appellate justices hearing post-conviction litigation; and admit to a pattern of breaches of ethics and state law.

Kaul had better be in consultation with an ethical advisor as well.

Wisconsin news outlets regard law enforcement misconduct as radioactive. And Kaul and law enforcement are arrogant, confident they get away with much misconduct in a lazy state.

But stay tuned. Despots usually think they're untouchable, but they are rarely correct in this assessment.

#WakeUpWisconsin #WorkWithKZ @GovEvers @WisDOJ exonerate Steven and Brendan then you can get to work on sorting out your corrupt police and prosecutors out!! Ken Kratz and co should be in prison NOT Steven and Brendan #FreeStevenAvery #FreeBrendanDassey https://t.co/LuUsUE7iaI

— Paula Sampson (@PaulaPoolton) February 17, 2019