If It Quacks Like A Duck ...
If it feels anti-Semitic ... it probably is. Also, a tragic update on Marcellus Williams and America's dumbest criminal (also my mayor).
I’m Michael A. Cohen, and this is Truth and Consequences: A no-holds-barred look at the absurdities, hypocrisies, and surreality. If you were sent this email or are a free subscriber and would like to become a paid subscriber, you can sign up here.
If money is tight or you’re already up to eyeballs in subscriptions, here’s another idea — share this article. Email it to a friend (or even an enemy). Post it on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn. Text or email it to your wife, husband, mother, father, brother, sister, or even your creepy second cousin who lives in Dearborn. Word of mouth is often the best way to build support for a creative endeavor, so if everyone here sends it to just one person … it would be much appreciated.
A Tragic Update
Marcellus Williams is dead.
The state of Missouri executed Marcellus Williams on Tuesday evening by lethal injection, over the objections of the local prosecutor whose office obtained Mr. Williams’s murder conviction in 2003.
… Mr. Williams’s lawyer, Tricia Rojo Bushnell of the Midwest Innocence Project, said it was unjust to execute a man when the prosecutor’s office had admitted it was wrong and had fought to overturn the death sentence. “The execution of an innocent person is the most extreme manifestation of Missouri’s obsession with finality over truth, justice and humanity,” she said.
We will likely never know with absolute certainty if Williams was innocent of the crime for which he was convicted, but considering the doubt around his case, as well as the objections of prosecutors and the family of the victim to his execution, it is impossible for me to find any justice in his death.
The death penalty is an abomination and a blight on American society.
This Week in Anti-Semitism
Rashida Tlaib is at it again.
Tlaib, who is the only Palestinian-American member of Congress, has a history of making anti-Semitic statements and using anti-Semitic tropes, and earlier this month, she did it again. After Dana Nessel, the Michigan Attorney General, brought charges against 11 individuals involved in protests at the University of Michigan, she said this.
Tlaib sharply criticized … Nessel for filing charges against pro-Palestinian protesters at the University of Michigan on Thursday, saying her harsh actions could ruin the lives of bright, young students and set a dangerous precedent for peaceful protests.
… “This is a move that’s going to set a precedent, and it’s unfortunate that a Democrat made that move,” Tlaib said in an exclusive interview with Metro Times on Friday. “You would expect that from a Republican, but not a Democrat, and it’s really unfortunate.”
“We’ve had the right to dissent, the right to protest,” Tlaib says. “We’ve done it for climate, the immigrant rights movement, for Black lives, and even around issues of injustice among water shutoffs. But it seems that the attorney general decided if the issue was Palestine, she was going to treat it differently, and that alone speaks volumes about possible biases within the agency she runs.”
Nessel is the first Jewish person to be elected Attorney General of Michigan.
Tlaib says is that there’s been plenty of dissent and protest on issues like “climate, the immigrant rights movement, for Black lives, and even around issues of injustice among water shutoffs,” but that Nessel, who is Jewish, has handled the issue “differently” when it comes to Palestinians. And she blames “possible biases” that she refuses to name.
Gee, what possible bias could Tliab be referring to?
Back in 2016, Donald Trump suggested that a federal judge presiding over a civil fraud lawsuit regarding Trump University could not handle the case impartially because of his Mexican heritage. It created, said Trump, “an inherent conflict of interest” because Trump is “’ building a wall” (as a point of reference Trump did not build a wall).
Tlaib is pretty much saying the exact same thing — just being a tad more subtle about it.
Yet, there seems to be a bizarre argument that unless Tlaib specifically references the fact that Nessel is Jewish, it can’t be anti-Semitism. But it takes a special kind of obtuseness to avoid the obvious conclusion that Tlaib is suggesting that the Jewish Attorney General of Michigan is biased against Palestinian protesters because she is Jewish. Tlaib’s not making some generalized charge of anti-Palestinian bias. She is calling out Nessel by name and arguing that she has a double standard when it comes to Palestinian protesters and other groups of protesters.
Last week, Nessel responded. In a tweet defending Tlaib after a cartoonist suggested she’s a member of the terrorist group Hamas, Nessel brought up Tlaib’s earlier comments.
And then the firestorm ensued. Not surprisingly, the usual suspects have weighed in on behalf of Tlaib.
Thoough, you know who has remained silent? Tlaib. She has had 14 days to clarify what biases she is referring to in this quote or at the very least reassure Nessel that she wasn’t implying the Attorney General has an anti-Palestinian bias.
She has not done so.
But there’s something else of interest in Tlaib’s remarks.
She was explicit in her interview about where the bias came from: the University of Michigan leadership. “I think people at the University of Michigan put pressure on her to do this, and she fell for it,” Tlaib said. “I think President Ono and Board of Regent members were very much heavy-handed in this. It had to come from somewhere.”
Let's put aside the fact that Tliab does not provide a shred of evidence to support her contention that the University of Michigan leadership pressured Nessel to bring charges against protesters.
But the formulation here is interesting. Tlaib doesn't call out the entire Board of Regents ... instead, she refers to specific members of the Board. For those of you who haven't followed the doings in Ann Arbor, members of the Board of Regents have for the past year been harassed by pro-Palestinian protesters (including at their homes) and received a steady stream of death threats.
But a few members of the Board have borne the brunt of these attacks: One Jewish member of the Board of Regents had fake blood thrown over the front door of their law offices and spray painted graffiti that read "FREE PALESTINE" "DIVEST NOW" and "U-M KILLS." Now, it's not as if other members of the Board couldn't have had their businesses vandalized, too. For example, Denise Illitich is on the Board of Regents and owns the Tigers, the Red Wings, and Little Caeser's Pizza (a ubiquitous pizza chain in Michigan). Jewish members of the Board have also had their pictures plastered on pro-divestment and anti-Israel placards on campus. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why pro-Palestinian protesters have singled out these members.
So when Tlaib refers to Board of Regent members rather than the entire Board, she is following the trail blazed by campus protesters -- of training her attacks on Jewish Regents.
That Tlaib is engaging in anti-Semitism really isn't a close call, and frankly, it's irrelevant to one's view about Israel or the war in Gaza. Tliab is lobbing charges of anti-Palestinian bias against Jewish elected officials without evidence. All progressives — whether they are Jewish or Gentile — should condemn it.
America’s Dumbest Criminal
I might have told this story here before, but in the 2021 New York City mayoral election, I stayed home on Election Day. I wasn’t voting for the Republican Curtis Sliwa (even though he used to have me on his radio show), and I sure as hell wasn’t voting for the Democrat Eric Adams, who I was convinced was deeply corrupt (and a clown to boot). Turns out I got that one right.
Mayor Eric Adams of New York City, a former police captain who ran on a law-and-order platform but whose tenure has been consumed by accusations of corruption, spent years accepting free airline tickets, lavish overseas accommodations and illegal campaign donations from Turkey, federal prosecutors said on Thursday.
In return for the gifts and donations, Mr. Adams used his influence as Brooklyn borough president and later as mayor to assist Turkish officials with issues they were facing in the city, prosecutors said — most notably in obtaining safety clearances from the Fire Department for a new high-rise Turkish consulate building.
This is straight-up political corruption: “You give me gifts and illegal campaign contributions, and I will use my office to help you.”
It is not remotely surprising that Adams was finally indicted. He gave federal prosecutors a juicy target, particularly since the odor of malfeasance had long adhered to him, particularly in the 2021 campaign saga of identifying where Adams actually lived.
What truly boggles the mind, however, are the depths of Adams’ stupidity.
As a friend texted me last night, “Wasn’t Adams a COP for like 30 years? I could have eluded capture better on the basis of just watching a lot of cop shows on TV.” Right!?!
Did Adams somehow think that federal law enforcement would fail to piece an indictment together, especially considering how brazen his corruption had been? You would think someone with such a history of shady dealings would do a better job of covering his tracks. But alas, it proves the old saw that most criminals ain’t too bright.
Correction
Earlier in the week, I wrote this “A minister who made a theological case against same-sex murder has changed his mind.”
Um, that should have been “same sex marriage.”
Musical Interlude
It’s been a while since I’ve posted any Grateful Dead content … but on the 52nd anniversary of this killer set, I figured I’d get back into the spirit of things.
This show from the Stanley Theater is chock-full of musical greatness, from an incandescent “Morning Dew” and a gorgeous “Brokedown Palace” to a killer “China Cat” and an absolutely insane “Cumberland Blues” that feels like it’s about to veer off the tracks at any moment … but never does. Oh and also there’s a 30 minute “Dark Star.” Sit back and enjoy this one.
I've long had a problem with Tlaib, a smug, mouthy, flame-throwing asshole, so this comes as no surprise. While her colleague Ilhan Omar has increasingly kept her head down and tried to stay out of the line of fire, Tlaib seems to invite it. I've never forgiven her for laughing and clapping for an audience booing a mention of Hillary Clinton — in 2020, years after Clinton retired from politics. People like her don't help to calm some very troubled waters; they just make things worse.
Your comment about the Donald - he did build part of the wall, with stolen military funds. But he most definitely did NOT GET MEXICO TO PAY FOR IT.