People can be disbarred for unethical, as well as illegal, activity. Disbarment does not require a criminal conviction.
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You can’t. But now that they have been ordered to preserve them, any evidence that some or all of them have been destroyed or altered can be rolled into an obstruction charge, because they can’t pull the “I didn’t know” defense. So, even if you lose evidence in one case, it provides a whole bunch in the next one.
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Considering the judge in question, not so much. Reading about his background is quite illuminating. Apparently he was a weird, irrational student, and someone commented that he always argued with the other students, never won the arguments and frequently turned nasty and personal as he lost. He was a terrible lawyer with a poor grasp of the law (he excelled only at closing arguments, where he could appeal to emotions rather than make legal arguments), and an even worse judge. He’s a real case study about how an utterly incompetent white guy who manages to charm the right people can fail upwards…
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It doesn’t matter what they did. Using wealth and power to silence a free press sets a dangerous precedent.
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That’s pretty unfair; @wsmcneil is unambiguously negative about Thiel, and he raises some good points about the problematic comparison between Thiel and Moore. Revealing that a politician/judge is a pedophile is journalism in a way that revealing that a private citizen – no matter how wealthy he is – is gay, is not.
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The ethics of involuntary outing is a thing that was debated at great length in the LGBT community during the 1980’s and 90’s.
There was always diversity of opinion, but the general consensus was that it was acceptable if the closeted person was deliberately taking actions that were destructive to the broader Queer community. Many closeted right-wing Conservatives were outed during this time, after they supported anti-gay legislation.
Thiel is a major funder of the American far right, a substantial portion of which still openly calls for the murder of LGBT people on a regular basis. ACT-UP would have had no hesitation in outing a snake like Thiel.
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Nevertheless, the way Cory framed the comparison is problematic. Thiel’s motivations for wanting his sexual activity to remain private are rather different from Moore’s motivations, and I think we would all take issue with the implication that “being outed”=“being painted in an unflattering light”. That’s really the gist of what I’m seeing in @wsmcneil’s post.
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You might want to climb down off that soap box now. As a private individual, Thiel deserved his privacy. As a major donor with a role in policy making for the GOP, which has done its level best to make life a living hell for gay people who aren’t rich enough to stay safe from their laws, he deserved to be outed.
Let me make it clear for you: the person who is quietly committing adultery only has to answer to their spouse. The person who wags his finger in my face for “living in sin” with my girlfriend, then goes off to spend an afternoon with his mistress, deserves to have every sordid detail of his affair plastered all over the news.
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lol.
I’ll use that some time.
There is an old trial lawyers’ saying “When the facts are on your side, pound the facts. When the law is on your side, pound the law. When neither is on you side, pound the table.”
I guess he was good at table-pounding.
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Legally speaking this is all meaningless until someone files a suit. FYI a Rule 11 motion would be denied, as they are 99.9% of the time.
Oh God it’s you again I think that judges who abuse the legal system should be disbarred and I hope he gets convicted. Does that help? Do you jump up to defend people accused of sexual abuse regularly or is that just a special hobby? Anyway I’m out for a while because I really don’t feel like talking to you every time I post. It’s weird. So… bye BB for a while again!
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I may have jumped the gun on that. My apologies.
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Welcome to boing boing.
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Bonus points for correct use of idiomatic gerund, “funnin”.
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The illustration kind of looks like Moore’s head where it truly belongs–stuck on a pike.
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Ah. Too bad. I did read the article about how one of his prof’s gave him the nickname, “fruit salad” as he was so thoroughly mixed up all the time.
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“But he didn’t mind, why, he just smiled.”
